Are Military Retirees "burdens" on our country?

PostmodernProphet said:
no, "burdens on our country" would be liberals.....
Click to expand...

What about military retirees who are liberal?

WinterBorn said:
I have not seen anyone on these forums suggest that they are a burden. But I don't read a lot of threads.
Click to expand...

I've seen comments from ILA, PMP, and Patriot66 to that effect. Oh, and USF. Even though he's on the gubmint dole.

PostmodernProphet said:
want to wager on whether the folks getting assistance in the red states are liberal voters?........
Click to expand...

lol...do you ever get anything right? It's like you're Bizarro Enstein.



More...

There is nothing more vexing to liberals than poor Republicans. Their very existence rankles. It turns their world on its head and their assumptions inside out. The effort to explain them is understood not just as a political paradox but a psychological disorder. They have been duped. They must have been. How else would one explain putting your cross next to the man who derided them as "victims" among the 47% "I don't worry about" . To many liberals these are turkeys voting for Christmas or lemmings off for a leap; the condemned tying the noose for their own execution.

At times the contradictions are striking. In August 2009, when opponents of Obamacare were disrupting town hall meetings with claims of death panels, Kenneth Gladney and other members of St Louis tea party got into a fight with Democrats at a public meeting. He had to go to the emergency room with injuries to his knee, back, elbow, shoulder and face and ended up in a wheelchair. It turned out Gladney, who had recently been laid off , had no health insurance. He appealed for donations.

Trace a map highlighting government dependency and those most reliant on benefits live in Republican states and often Republican counties. In Floyd county in Eastern Kentucky, 40% of the income comes from the government. In 2008 Floyd, where almost 20% live below the poverty line and the median income is almost 20% lower than the country, voted for McCain – a 27 point swing against the Democrats and the first victory for Republicans in living memory.

"We're getting more and more *people coming here as time goes by," Tom Price, who helps administer a food bank for the local church told me when I visited just a year after Obama was elected. "The bottom's just fallen out of it all … Is there a direct correlation [between Obama's victory and the region's bad times]? I don't know. But I do know a lot of people are hurting." Of the 10 states with the lowest median household income 9 backed John McCain. (The one exception is New Mexico which Bush won in 2004).
Click to expand...
 
sorry howie....if you want me to notice something your going to have to get someone to quote you....I still have your sorry ass on ignore.....
 
tekkychick said:
Pretty clear that DamnYankee said military pensions are a burden. He even started a new thread about it. Are you reading something different?
Click to expand...

Considering the definition he posted, DY is correct that the pensions are a burden. The problem is that people are reading that in a negative way that the word does not actually justify.

BURDEN
1a : something that is carried : load
b : duty, responsibility

m-w.com


Their pension is carried by the tax payers. Their pension is a duty and it is a responsibility. None of that is negative.

So in the context of the conversation, DY is correct that retired military personnel's pay is a burden. It is the same with children. They are a burden on their parents. The question is, do you see that as negative?
 
maineman said:
DY claimed that my pension from the military - my former employer - was a burden on them. Can you fucking read???
Click to expand...

Is your pension a duty to you from your previous employer? Is your previous employer responsible for paying you the retirement?

The problem is your reaction to the word "burden". In this context, DY is correct.
 
A pension is earned, it's part of a package offered to an employee. If you work for us for x amount of years we will offer you this retirement. US military or not, it's earned. Just because you don't want to honor commitments later is no excuse to not to perform your end of the promise.
 
Jarod said:
A pension is earned, it's part of a package offered to an employee. If you work for us for x amount of years we will offer you this retirement. US military or not, it's earned. Just because you don't want to honor commitments later is no excuse to not to perform your end of the promise.
Click to expand...

Apparently you read something I did not. I did not see anything that suggested DY thinks the duty to the retirees should not be honored. In fact, I saw nothing that suggested he thinks the employer is not responsible for that pension.

Can you show me a link?
 
WinterBorn said:
Is your pension a duty to you from your previous employer? Is your previous employer responsible for paying you the retirement?

The problem is your reaction to the word "burden". In this context, DY is correct.
Click to expand...

So basically, you're defending an ad hominem attack on one poster.from another because the attacker has a similar political viewpoint as yours and the victim of the attack does not....you accomplish this by using semantics.
 
Steelplate said:
So basically, you're defending an ad hominem attack on one poster.from another because the attacker has a similar political viewpoint as yours and the victim of the attack does not....you accomplish this by using semantics.
Click to expand...

No, I am not defending any attack at all. And my political viewpoint has nothing whatsoever to do with this. I am simply saying that the word "burden", as defined in the dictionary. The negative connotations are not a requirement of the word.


BURDEN
1a : something that is carried : load
b : duty, responsibility

m-w.com

Please tell me how a military retiree's pension does NOT fit the description above? Unless you can do that, I submit that YOU are the one doing something based on your political viewpoint and your personal dislikes, not me.
 
The listing from the Thesaurus shows the synonyms for "burden" and quite accurately highlights the real meaning of the word, the truncated version from merriam webster notwithstanding. Everyone knows what a burden is, and everyone knows what DY meant when he used that word. He is usually very careful with his word choice (the Talmud/Torah fuckup is not normal). Those who come to his defense on this are nothing but partisan hacks. They all know what he meant, and they defend him nonetheless. Fucking sick.


Main Entry: burden  [bur-dn] Show IPA
Part of Speech: noun
Definition: mental weight; stress
Synonyms: Herculean task, accountability, affliction, albatross, anxiety, ball and chain, blame, care, charge, clog, concern, deadweight, difficulty, duty, encumbrance, excess baggage, grievance, hardship, hindrance, load, millstone, misfortune, mishap, obstruction, onus, punishment, responsibility, sorrow, strain, task, tax, thorn in one's side, trial, trouble, weary load, work, worry
Antonyms: aid, help, relief
 
maineman said:
The listing from the Thesaurus shows the synonyms for "burden" and quite accurately highlights the real meaning of the word, the truncated version from merriam webster notwithstanding. Everyone knows what a burden is, and everyone knows what DY meant when he used that word. He is usually very careful with his word choice (the Talmud/Torah fuckup is not normal). Those who come to his defense on this are nothing but partisan hacks. They all know what he meant, and they defend him nonetheless. Fucking sick.


Main Entry: burden  [bur-dn] Show IPA
Part of Speech: noun
Definition: mental weight; stress
Synonyms: Herculean task, accountability, affliction, albatross, anxiety, ball and chain, blame, care, charge, clog, concern, deadweight, difficulty, duty, encumbrance, excess baggage, grievance, hardship, hindrance, load, millstone, misfortune, mishap, obstruction, onus, punishment, responsibility, sorrow, strain, task, tax, thorn in one's side, trial, trouble, weary load, work, worry
Antonyms: aid, help, relief
Click to expand...

Anyone who has been on these forums for more than an hour should have better sense than to claim I am a partisan hack defending DY. You, of all people, know better.

That you choose to ignore the words, from your own list, that fit what a military pension is, speaks volumes. You want to claim that a common view of the word "burden" is now the way it can be seen? From your own list you have words like accountability, care, duty, load, responsibility, and task. Those are not bad words, but they do fit the definition of a military pension.

You want to pick the meaning from a thesaurus instead of a dictionary? Really? And you call me a hack?

What happened here is that you got your panties in a wad when DY said what he did. Now, whether he was right or wrong, you are bound and determined to make it about flag-waving patriotism and not about accuracy.
 
I was about to post the full definition as well, but I see MM beat me to it. He's so fast!!! um, I mean, in typing, I wasn't of course implying anything else. Um, I'm not implying he's SLOW either - I'm sure he's heckuva faster runner and swimmer than I am so...

ok, now how do I get out of THIS corner????

Moving right along and ignoring the train wreck - I was going to post the full definition and point out that there are literal meanings ; but there are also connotations of the word. And as the synonyms indicate, burden is generally negative in its connotations.

DY could have said "military pensions are a reward for valuable service that the country is happy to give"; he could have said "pensions are an obligation to the country in return for service" ; neither of those would have had as negative of connotations.

But over and over he hammers burden.... I've only been on this board a week, and from his postings I totally interpret this as a pejorative. If he wants me to take it some other way, then he would need to change the tone of his postings. Totally up to him, of course.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top