Tweet
Carl Paladino, Buffalo real estate developer and Republican candidate for New York State governor, wants to turn New York State prisons into housing for welfare recipients. Prison dorms.
Paladino ".. has promised a 20 percent reduction in the state budget and a 10 percent income tax cut if elected."
Asked at the meeting how he would achieve those savings, Paladino laid out several plans that included converting underused state prisons into centers that would house welfare recipients. There, they would work for the state — “military service, in some cases park service, in other cases public works service,” he said — while prison guards would be retrained to work as counselors.
Instead of handing out the welfare checks, we’ll teach people how to earn their check. We’ll teach them personal hygiene … the personal things they don’t get when they come from dysfunctional homes.
PERSONAL HYGIENE?
Now, Paladino says that none of this would be compulsory – the poor would be going into this ‘housing’ on a voluntary basis.
In Dickens’ time, these were called – work houses.
Charlie, Charlie…you must be whirling in your grave these days….
64 Comments
What a piece of work.
And who will be selling personal hygiene products? And who will train prison guards to be counselors? And who will be hired to run these work houses? Making money off of the poor is and has always been disgusting.
Advocating going back to 19th century policies is mind boggling. Conservatives used to be less blunt about their class warfare. Although if you were paying attention, Alan Greenspan advocated “job insecurity” in testimony to Congress in 1997. If workers are worried about their jobs, they won’t strike for higher wages. Yippee! This keeps inflation down, you know. Yippee! High unemployment is good. Yippee!
It would be nice if we had spokespeople on the side of low unemployment and the idea of people stuck in prison work houses as a bad. It would be nice for those spokespeople to speak out in the stark terms of “return to the era of Dickens”.
But they duck their heads into their shells when the right wingers scream “class warfare”! They don’t or won’t speak up.
It ‘s because we have two wings of the corporate party. We have no spokespeople for the working class. We don’t even have an effective independent union movement. We don’t have anyone on the side of the middle class and poor like Dickens. The loudest voices are on the side of the oligarchs. The loudest voices are on the side of Scrooge, Uriah Heap, and Fagan.
SO the Communists turn out to be telling the truth after all. “reformism” didnt save capitalism from itself, because all the reforms can, and eventually will be undone. find an anti capitalist organization, (or start one i guess) and join it.capitalism is the problem. any permanent solution involves getting rid of, not reforming it.
I got a better idea.
let the bush tax cuts expire, as they were intended to.
Create the Obama Tax Cuts, in a bill and put it to a vote before the election.
It cuts taxes beginning Jan 1 for those making less than 150k and couples at less than 250k. Everyone in that “poor cohort” gets the 20% dividend and long-term cap gains cuts, along with current marginal tax rates.
the rich, who arent doing their job by spending, get to pay what they were paying in 1999.
If the goopers want to vote against tax cuts for the middle class, the so-called little people (thank you very much sen. simpson) then let them do it and pay the price.
and let’s stop calling the new tax plan anything to do with Bush.
They are OBAMA tax rates.
That is a really good idea !!
thanks. now, to just get that tot he white house or nancy P’s office.
lol!! yeah…..
Maybe the ‘Clever Ones’ here :) can draw up something and we start a Face book push (with links for state reps etc for questions etc..lol!!)).. I’m good(ish) with ideas, but not a ‘computer’ type…
Good idea, but not bi-partisan enough for Obumma.
And this is the same party that screeches at the top of their lungs if anyone considers creating public-sector jobs.
Apparently it’s the part about creating public-sector jobs that people can live on that the GOP objects to …
I have heard many of the states have started using prisoners for this very thing already. Like if you call a call center in the US there’s a good chance you’re talking to an inmate.
Of course, there have been low paid prison industries for along time but, now, they are being used as slaves.
Here it is:
Prison Call Centers Put Squeeze on Service Sector
Probably where the moke got his idea.
I think the writer did a pretty good job of avoiding/dropping the real juicy bits, by using that particular headline..;)
Also, Loved this..
‘Federal Prison Industries advertises its call centers as “Domestic outsourcing at offshore prices.”‘ Classy….not.
Amazing that he would volunteer all those areas of Upstate NY for this. Oneida Co had/has at least four medium security prisons (plus a Psych hospital associated with one of them.
I’m sure nothing can go wrong with this half-baked ill-conceived idea.
When bigger idiot politicians are born, they will come from New York State.
Jeebus.
The assholes just keep getting bigger and stinkier.
What a humungous asshole.
This guy not only deserves to lose, he deserves to lose his standing as a human being, because he is 100% asshole.
Gawd, and I can type until my fingers are blue yet this DOES seem to be the direction we’re headed. Maybe the great experiment of representative democracy really doesn’t work.
Damn this is infuriating. That views like these are treated as somehow even debateable and welcomed into the discussion is bullshit.
*sigh*
It is depressing. We write letters, spread the word to our neighbors and coworkers, and spend every available opportunity to try to bring some sanity, some reality, back to our communities…and the return on our investment is almost nothing.
I find I have to use clandestine methods to get people to reevaluate their feelings and opinions. If a coworker brings up a fox news or right-wing talking point, I try to use right-wing talking points to undermine their right-wing talking points. I don’t try to change minds. I just try to force them to realize, on their own time, that perhaps fox news is not the end-all-be-all for information.
Paladino sounds a little nutty and where does personal hygiene come into it? Guess he thinks all poor people are dirty.
I don’t know what part of the dysfunctional universe manufactures people like Paladino but they turn up during every Depression and unless they are confronted, they become the new power brokers. The most benign name for them is Cheap Labor Conservatives. The most damning is Hitler capo.
or sturmbannfuhrer
These goopers have no limit to their hatred of the poor and blaming them for all our ills when in fact it is the rich who create the ills by their refusal to pay taxes or to pay a fair wage.
I heard recently from a conservative, “Since when has the poor employed anyone?” My response is, “The poor employ the rich all the time, with the Poverty Industry that has sprung up all over this country, exploiting their labor for pennies on the dollar while their rich “employers” get rich on that labor. Also the rich are using the poor for their own non-profits, which become tax havens and give “services” that help a few but leave the rest out in the cold ~ literally as the homeless population is burgeoning as we speak …”
She did not like my answer, lol.
Cat in Seattle
And a good one it is. I like to say the “nanny state” has turned to entitling the wealthy
Thank you. My old peace sign said, “The rich get tax cuts, the poor pay for war.” I was challenged by one fellow who said that the poor pay no taxes. I responded by asking him if he would like to know how I thought they paid for war. I said, “They pay in low wages, bad schools, bad food, bad housing, bad cars and bad neighborhoods.”
You know what, since views like these are acceptable to discuss and run on, I sooooooooooooo wish his opponent would respond by announcing his/her plan to lower taxes on most of her constituents by:
Having all those who make more than $250,000 a year forfiet 1/4 of their salary to the state and spend 2 months of the year in these “volunteer” work houses working for the state and the community. Since we all know that the only way folks get rich is by scamming and stealing and somehow stepping on somebody.
Sort of like we all know the reason people are poor is cause of their hygiene and dysfuncional upbringing.
What an asshole.
No kidding. I know a guy, sold corporate health insurance, built himself a nice little profitable business, then wanted to sell it. teh economic hit man comes in and tells him his business is worthless as he is bein g too good to his employees….benefits, vacations, sick leave, etc.
So this guy, goes and tells all the little people who helped him gladly to build his business because he was treating them so well, that they would have to take cuts or find another job.
Said it was “the hardest thing he’s ever had to do” My heart bled for him…but more for the people he was screwing over
Needless to say, his employees lost their “work ethic” pretty fast and now the guy has to do all the work himself for the people who bought his company…cause he’s “the rainmaker”
the guy is my brother…we don’t talk much as we disagree on most everything; and he doesn’t like to be disagreed with
Oh man that is so sad.
Man actually does right by his employees and suffers for it.
Only in America.
*sigh*
I wish the best for you and your brother, and sorry this messed up system betrayed him that way.
Well, He wanted more, IMO and was willing to sacrifice his people to get it. so I don’t feel very sorry for him….but maybe I’m being a bitch. he fell hook, line and sinker for the superiority of the wealthy line bush was peddling.
He really turned into a different person while bush was in office. It was frightening to see.
Fox News/Limbaugh Conservatives will love this guy. The Personal Hygiene meme is one that conservatives have been soaking in. They regurgitate it often. Dirty bums who refuse work, etc.
Apparently, Rush Limbaugh (Ass Pimple) is the picture of cleanliness (which is next to godliness which equates with the crusade against Muslims).
Wait… You mean all that brown on their skin isn’t dirt? Who knew…/snark
Palin/Gingrich/Angle are working right out of Book Two of the Mein Kampf playbook.
Instead of demonizing Jews for all that’s wrong with the Fatherland, substitute Brown People.
Instead of Beer Hall Meet-ups by Brownshirts, substitute Tea Party groups.
Instead of Propaganda Instruments, substitute Talk Radio.
Paladino’s idea is hardly different than a ‘concentration camp’ where ‘societal miscreants’ are re-educated to learn the ‘right’ way.
Hitler was originally taken to be a backwards, rather dumb, ideologue, but when he wrote Mein Kampf he told every German just exactly what his ‘pure’ Germany would look like when he came to power – and then he did it – in one of the most intelligent, advanced societies of the time.
I maintain that the Palin Crowd is using the Iraq War as the equivalent of WWI.
TARP is the Treaty of Versailles.
And, Obama is the Weimar Government (which didn’t end well.)
It was anger and unrest over the Economic Collapse of the Weimar Government that Hitler rode all the way to the Chancellorship in 1933.
And the rest was history…
Excellent summation. Couldn’t agree more. Except you forgot to add our very own Reichstag burning
I never thought of that, but you have an excellent point in Obama’s administration as our Weimar Republic. The parallels are chilling.
One difference, although shrinking: We still can speak out without being shot!
So long as we do not lose our ability to do so in the remaining media yet available, we have to keep up the pressure.
Paladino’s ideas are offensive, but he’s not alone . . .
So dehumanizing those the left progressives don’t like is now the order of the day?
“This guy not only deserves to lose, he deserves to lose his standing as a human being, because he is 100% asshole.”
“We Have Met The Enemy and He Is Us” is rather appropriate in view of how rabid FDL postings have become.
When I first joined, respect was paramount. It is no longer so and I for one cannot abide by this. Tolerance, especially from those who think they know more, is gone, and now we fight ourselves. Then give ourselves a big pat on the back for being more progressive than the next person.
Jane showed this attitude of respect when she joined forces with Norquist. We can do no better than to emulate this outreach.
Obviously, living in prisons as housing substitute has some very painful connotations. But his basic idea, training, is not too far off FDR’s WPA vision.
Thoughtless? Perhaps. Asshole? No.
It’s not I that’s dehumanizing that asshole, as it is his views and his alone that are doing that.
For far too long we on the left, IMO, have, as a result of our tolerance, let things go far to far. Bigotry is NOT to be accepted. Whether it’s of black folks, brown folks, muslim folks, or poor folks. I will not accept it, and IMO all that harbor it aren’t fit to live in a civilized society.
I. Stand. By. Every. Word. Of. My. Post.
And if that’s unacceptable to FDL, then by all means ban me. If it’s unacceptable to you, then by all means ridicule me or ignore me like a troll.
Equating “ignore me” with “troll”? How convenient, while playing that old TV game “Can You Top This?
Jesus Christ posting here would likely be a troll, by these standards.
Perhaps you misunderstood.
I was saying ignore me as though I’m a troll. Not that you are one, I most certainly do NOT think you’re a troll.
But some folks say “Do Not Feed Trolls” so I was suggesting to ridicule me or ignore me the way you would a troll.
Understood. Thank you.
I guess “reading the article” is out of the question huh? LOL
The key idea for me that I wish to recall about the post-Weimar years is the indignities imposed upon the German people and then upon the poor and those without work within German society. One of the reasons why people leapt into Hitler’s arms was that he offered them a kind of neurotic triumph, of restored pride, by giving those who had nothing, jobs and a positive identity. That is why I am so angry with the new fascist alliance between government and business. They are calling the unemployed lazy. Paladino is calling the poor dysfunctional. Those negatives do not fall on deaf ears and there will be a price to pay for them.
That is what Ronald Reagan offered working class whites, in a softer way, but the same stuff — a neurotic triumph. I couldn’t believe it when some older Democrats I knew fell for his swill. When I called them on it, they said ‘he makes me feel better.’ That’s not politics, it’s neurosis. This disease has been a long time in coming. If you look at the old clips of Nixon you can see him appealing to the same fears, but without the savvy of a professional actor or the defeat in Vietnam to lend a helping hand.
good points and well stated, but perhaps read the article?
Paladino: Prison Dorms for Welfare Recipients
I did and his POV can be challenged and needs to be. But not by calling him a 100% asshole.
I think he’s quite a bit off thoughtless. Thoughtless implies a social slight or hurting someone’s feelings, not demeaning the poor by proposing that they should be housed in a former prison and ministered to by former guards retrained as social workers(!). I’m sorry, but I don’t think any respect is due to the originator of such an idea.
I understand that also, and the impulse to that conclusion is strong. Yet I don’t think it rises to the level of lack of human respect.
I’m not a New Yorker, so I know little about the man.
thanks.right on. moreover, any idiot who claims to be competent enough to represent others in elected office, who would revive a bad idea that was abandoned as unworkable 80 years ago, dosent deserve such respect. workhouses are a wax museaum relic of the 19th century. they were wasteful, expensive to maintain, cruel, and universally unpopular by the time the last ones were closed in 1930. GB in 1930 was not a hot bed of squishy liberalism. workhouses are a ridiculous idea and anyone who advocates recreating the workhouse system in 2010 is ridiculous and not worthy of respect.
Anyone notice that there are two almost identical posts running at the same time. What gives?
A real estate developer?? My oh my, how arrogant people get when they become wealthy. I wonder, will they put in the pipes for the gas chambers before or after he puts the welfare recipients in there?? You see, what’s so telling about this is the fact that they already have work programs for people who are receiving public assistance. Without the concept of virtual incarceration. I have a better idea. I say that we take “ALL” of the politicians, put them in these “facilities” hook them up to adrenaline IVs and get them to start working on real solutions to some of these problems. You give them two good meals a day with one hour to shower and four hours of sleep. Then, back to the IVs. We don’t have to pay them since they have all they will need. This way we save ourselves all the millions of dollars we normally waste on them. We can put this money to better use on some of the programs that help our fellow citizens.
He has a proposal to provide housing, food, job training and employment to people who need it. What exactly is your objection, that he wants to close and convert a prison? I would have thought Progressives would be all in favor of tearing down a prison’s walls and converting it into a place that provides for people in need.
Serious question:
If a Dem advanced the exact same plan (complete with the snobbish “personal hygiene” remark) but the proposed location was an abandoned military base or a bankrupt hotel would you still be talking about Nazism and Dickens?
Yes.
TomThumb and gesneri:
So, in the 1930′s you’d have raised the same objections to the Works Progress Administration and the Civilian Conservation Corps?
Neither of those programs housed their workers or their workers’ families in former prisons looked after by former prison guards. Workers not infrequently lived on the jobsites, but they could send their wages, paid at the prevailing rate, home to their families to help them stay in their homes.
You are making different programs equivalent to Paladino’s suggestion. That’s unreasonable.
The CCC and WPA had many good aspects. Would you consider writing a post about that?
I prefer something like the CETA programs of the seventies so that people can stay with their families and get good healthcare benefits and pay into FICA and unemployment insurance.
Thanks for commenting.
I don’t think there’ll be much “conversion” of the prison; he’d retain the guards, after all, for a supposed different purpose, but I suspect they’d be retained to control the inmates–excuse me, the voluntary guests.
And in answer to your serious question: yes, absolutely, I would respond the same way. I am not a Democrat, and I certainly don’t think that they have very many good answers to our society’s current problems. And because of the unforgiving job market for people over 60, I’m starting to use my retirement savings about 10 years sooner than I had hoped, so I’m pretty sensitive to comments about the poor at this point. I’ll probably be one of them in a few years. Oh, and I don’t need any lessons in hygiene.
Thanks. I resemble your remarks. /s/
Firstly, who is trying to sell this proposal to? the socially conservative Republican voters, in order to win their votes, as part of his political campaign.
Secondly, pay attention to who he is directing this at: welfare recipients.
He is not offering such to the homeless, people who are in need of shelter. Rather he is targeting the most despised population in the eyes of the well to do social conservatives.
Thirdly, notice that he is not proposing them employment. He is proposing to :
“Instead of handing out the welfare checks, we’ll teach people how to earn their check.”
Doublespeak translation: These people are leaches, parasites on the backs of hard working (TM)Americans. We must “teach” them to “earn their check”, ie. they do not deserve any kind of monetary help from society.
Fourthly, his employment suggestion is:
“military service, in some cases park service, in other cases public works service,”
Now of course he says such is “voluntary”. But he wants such people to “earn their check” by being drafted into some kind of service-ie. some kind of service which will serve the purpose of remedial education for these people who obviously have been taught such perverse values(by their dysfunctional family homes) such as “entitlement” and their apparent failure to understand the real value of having “earn(ed) their (own) check”.
Fifthly, notice the kind of valuation he makes:
“We’ll teach them personal hygiene … the personal things they don’t get when they come from dysfunctional homes.”
ie. all welfare recipients are “dirty”/”filthy”. They come from “dysfunctional homes”. So welfare recipients are the ill-begotten offspring of dysfunctional families who, having grown up in squalor, need to be educated in “personal hygiene” and taught to “earn their checks” because obviously these “scum” believe, mistakenly, they are “entitled” to something.
His personal loathing of welfare recipients(ie. the poor) and his targeting of such “proposals” as part of his campaign to win the votes of the socially conservative Republicans is about as transparent as it gets. If you fail to see the semantic games he is playing and comprehend them for what they are, I would suggest that you are either beyond naive or willfully ignorant.
A Democrat who would even consider such a proposal would be committing political suicide. For the most part such absolutely crystal clear class baiting is taboo amongst Democrats. Unfortunately this just means that Democrats who are actually social conservatives have to resort to much more subtle forms of class baiting(ie. systematically only ever talking about the middle-class without ever even acknowledging that there is a profoundly surging underclass of the poor in this country). With Democrats what is important is what they don’t say. Republicans, rhetorically, on average, are not that savvy.
This person is not an asshole. He is anti-social. Germans have a wonderful word for people like this: aso. These people need to be called out for being the societal poison that they are.
Thank you.
Why did a program like “Habitat for Humanity” strike such a chord? We thought we had learned lessons from Dickensian England and our own “projects”. Herding the poor into concrete jungles was bad enough, but putting them in prisons so that “work will make you free”, sends chills down my spine. No this man deserves no respect. These are dangerous ideas.
Asshole is probably too kind a word. It lets him off too easy. He is a bad man.
gesneri, in #50 you said it wasn’t about the proposed site being a former prison, but in #52 your objection is “former prisons looked after by former prison guards.” Which is it? And why do you assume the wages would not be paid at the prevailing rate, or couldn’t be sent home?
iwbcman: A Republican candidate trying to appeal to social conservatives is, ipso facto, talking about forced labor camps? Let’s try to avoid assumptions based on nothing but your own prejudices.
“notice that he is not proposing them employment.” That would be significant, if it were true. Since it’s not (“where they could work in state-sponsored jobs”), let’s move along.
Tom, why do you say the comparison is “unreasonable”? Can anyone point to a real difference between this and WPA or CCC?
Of course, if Prop. 19 passes in California, there will be a lot of private prison guards out of work and they can always relocate to NY and become private guard-counselors if Paladino is elected and has his way. But doesn’t that have the rather uncomfortable aroma of fascism?
Close down a prison.
Do not shit-can former employees: retrain them for new positions.
Convert the facility (which has a large amount of usable infrastructure) to a housing/training center where those without jobs can go (if they wish) to receive food, shelter, medical attention, and job training.
Provide employment on-site or off-site for participants.
No, that doesn’t smell like fascism: that smells like a vocational school with on-campus housing for those in need.
Are you sure people aren’t freaking just because the proposal involves renovating a prison? God knows, many here are assuming it would still be a place of incarceration. I rather suspect FDLers would be very supportive if a Dem politician said, “Let’s take some unused state land and build a vocational school, with dorms, where those on unemployment or welfare can have a decent place to live, good food, job training and guaranteed employment.”
There are only two practical differences between that and Paladino’s proposal: the former function of the facility, and the initial after the guy’s name. Is it one of those that’s bothering you?
How many New York state prisons are privately-owned and operated facilities?
Methinks I smell another RepubliKKKan rat.
IOW, RepubliKKKans don’t propose anything unless it involves a pay-off of some kind to someone they know, like a pay-off to “state” prison for-profit private operators.
And Paladino says it will be voluntary, but I wonder what will happen to the people who don’t volunteer to go to these converted halfway welfare houses. I just bet that any refuse-niks will see their public assistance slashed.
Ah! That’s a much more realistic concern than the concentration camp crap.
Great read Awnt Toby.
Thanks. Rcc’d, always.