Ingratitude? (Kentucky politics)

[anriana]

I live in Kentucky. We have two major cities (Louisville and Lexington) that are just like any other large city, and the rest of the state mainly lives up to redneck stereotypes.

Most of our state taxes come from the two main cities and are siphoned out to the other, poorer counties. (sorry I don't have sources for this; most of it was ran in the local newspaper and I can't find it online)

About a year our two main Universities (one in each city) wanted to give health insurance to hetero- and homo- sexual domestic partners of employees. There was a fairly large protest over this. Lawmakers from rural counties tried to pass bills making partner benefits illegal. Our state attorney talked about how it violated our constitution ("Only a marriage between one man and one woman shall be valid or recognized as a marriage in Kentucky. A legal status identical or substantially similar to that of marriage for unmarried individuals shall not be valid or recognized.") I remember getting political fliers/ads demonizing people who live in sin and talking about how they are always poor and always going to be poor and giving them health benefits is encouraging their poverty.

None of the bills passed and the University was eventually able to offer the benefits, but it's always seemed to me that this was very ungrateful of the outer countries, in a "we'll take your liberal money but only if you behave the way we want you to" kind of way, and I just don't understand why you would care if other people got health insurance. On the other hand, I don't think receiving state taxes means you can't have an opinion or are having your silence bought off. So, ignoring what the issue actually was, is it wrong for county X to accept money from county Y and then dictate how county Y should spend the rest of its money?

[IDrinkaRum]

I can understand. There are some people in Northern Virginia who wants Northern VA to secede from the rest of Virginia because the lawmakers in Richmond don't want to spend more money on the roads up north. However, there are nice, 4 lane highways (4 lanes going both ways) in the middle of nowhere that are upgraded, repaved, etc., etc. (That's the main problem of NoVA - bad roads, congested roads, etc.)

Those south of Fredericksburg are like, but we need the money to fix our roads!! You have more money than the rest of the state, plus we have rights to your money. blah, blah, blah. Blech.

[Slytovhand]

Ummm - more money = more votes?

Besides, that would also imply more people (although, there is also the higher income side of things as well), and thus, if the majority of the people want a law to be passed a particular way, then it ought to be - after all, that's what democracy is all about..(hahahahahahahaaaa.......)


By the same token... a while back, we have 1 Greens MP in the Senate, and due to that election result, he was in the enviable position of the government needing his vote in order to get stuff passed. He is from Tasmania, which has a fairly small percentage of Australia's population. They also have a large percentage of old-growth rainforest, and thus environmental issues factor very highly in Tasmanian politics (obviously.. that's how a Greens representative gets voted in!)

I, and many others, think this was a good thing, because he managed to stop a stack of railroading of bills getting passed which could have had a larger negative effect on our country.

So - what I'm saying is that just because there is a large population and therefore popular support of the democracy (and the democratically elected government) is the way to go, it doesn't mean that all decisions being made are going to be the 'right' decision (or bill) - and gay marriage is one of them.

Slyt

[anriana]

Ummm - more money = more votes?

Besides, that would also imply more people (although, there is also the higher income side of things as well), and thus, if the majority of the people want a law to be passed a particular way, then it ought to be - after all, that's what democracy is all about..(hahahahahahahaaaa.......)

It wasn't going to be put to the ballot though, just debated about out in our Congress.

So - what I'm saying is that just because there is a large population and therefore popular support of the democracy (and the democratically elected government) is the way to go, it doesn't mean that all decisions being made are going to be the 'right' decision (or bill) - and gay marriage is one of them.

Yes, and I think most people would agree with that.

[protege]

I can understand. There are some people in Northern Virginia who wants Northern VA to secede from the rest of Virginia because the lawmakers in Richmond don't want to spend more money on the roads up north.

Damn...and I thought it was just here. Plenty of people in Pittsburgh do not like how Philadelphia gets most of the tax dollars. Right now, both cities are having problems with their transit systems. Both get massive subsidies to stay in business. In the past year, only one of those systems got their subsidies. Yep, Philly. Our system was told to get it back into the black, or else.

What I find hilarious about that, is that there's *never* been a passenger-hauling transit company in the US that has made money...without government subsidies. Unless that transit company is also hauling freight (like a railroad), it's not possible. But, even the railroads eventually soured on passenger service. Because they couldn't charge high-enough rates, it ate up serious revenues, yet didn't put much to the bottom line. That's why Amtrak came about, and now *they* are facing the same problems!

[IDrinkaRum]

Protege - That's why we haven't been able to get our Metro to like the Dulles area or to my town. The people in Richmond don't believe it's "needed". Even though all the other Metro areas in NoVA are filled to capacity & then some. It's unbelievable. Yeah, I think NoVA should secede too.

[protege]

I hear ya on that one. There are plenty of areas in Pittsburgh that could use an expanded subway system. Places like Oakland (where Pitt and CMU are), and others that are simply choked with vehicles most of the time. That'll never happen though--the city would rather waste their money on a connector running *under* the river over to the stadiums. Such a waste, since it would only be used when the Steelers and our Pirates are playing. Total cost for that little project? About a billion dollars

Also a waste, is our 'southern beltway.' This was supposed to relieve traffic, but has in fact, made it worse! I've heard that because the beltway is a toll road (what, routes 43, 66, and the turnpike weren't enough?)...nobody's using it. Instead, they're simply using the other roads. Route 51 is a mess most nights. Can't understand why

[smileyeagle1021]

, is that there's * almost never* been a passenger-hauling transit company in the US that has made money...without government subsidies. !

edited for accuracy... Utah used to have a very profitable commuter line back in the 20s, so it is possible for a passenger transit system to make a profit, it's just extremely rare in this day of easy access to interstate freeways, mass produced cars, and (relatively) cheap fuel ($4 a gallon isn't cheap, but even at only 10 mpg that would work out to 40 cents a mile, most vehicles get closer to 20 mpg which would be 20cents per mile, my car gets 30 mpg with is 13cents per mile which means at current bus fare I'd have to go 13.5 miles for it to be cheaper than driving). That said, with our utter dependence on foreign oil and urban air being the filthiest it's been sense we stopped using coal to heat our homes I'd say any project or program that gets people out of cars is a benefit to the community and the nation.
Anyway, coming back on to the topic of how tax dollars are distributed, we get the same thing in Utah, you go up to Logan or down to St George and all you hear is people bitching about all the big public works projects on the Wasatch Front and all the tax dollars going there... well duh, 2 million of the states 2.5 million live on the Wasatch Front, we by our simple numbers and better prosperity pay more taxes than you do, it's only fair that we get more back. Oh they bitch about how the Front is getting 2 new freeways, and 6 new rail lines (though if I may nitpick, we are getting 4 new rail lines and an extension on an existing and one of those lines is being built in 2 phases... ok so that is 6 projects but doesn't change when we our finished we will go from 2 lines to 6 which means 4 new, ok) and all that Cache Valley is getting is a widening of a highway between Logan and Tremonton...
So total people served by that expansion... there are roughly 10-15k in Tremonton and Logan has roughly 100k... and very few people are driving between the two... and as far as what the cities need Logan doesn't need any major freeways, the roads that need to be expanded can't be expanded doubtless of how much money is thrown at them because it would require demolishing historic buildings and we already provide subsidies for them to run a 15 line FARE FREE bus system, yes, we on the front help subsidize their fare free system (they make up the rest in sales tax) yet they bitch about us building rail lines that we'll have to pay to use. That aside none of their tax dollars will be diverted to the Front, it will all come from fed subsidies and our own tax dollars...
/end rant

really back on topic, yeah I agree with the OP, the people in rural kentucky are ingrates... they haven't learned the old saying you can't have your cake and eat it too, if they want to take the urban liberal money then they have to put up with the urban liberal politics, if they don't like where the money is coming from they need a new source of money. not to try to change their existing source into what they want.