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Ongoing discussion of the political news of the day. This thread is for 'smaller' stories that don't call for their own thread. If a story blows up, please start a new thread for it.

Texas prisons ban all chaplains from execution chamber after Supreme Court ruling

Only days after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Texas could not execute an inmate without allowing a Buddhist chaplain into the death chamber with him, the state has banned all prison chaplains from the chamber in future executions.

Last week, the high court halted the execution of Patrick Murphy, a member of a gang of escaped prisoners known as the "Texas Seven," who had claimed the state was violating his religious rights by not allowing him to have a Buddhist chaplain in the room with him during the execution as it does for Christian and Muslim inmates.

Texas argued that for security reasons, it allows only prison employees in the execution room, and has only Christian and Muslim clerics on the payroll.

So they couldn't put a monk on the payroll? Really?

Just hire a contract monk. Come on.

Texas just wants to get their kill on. Can't let things like that get in the way.

It's entirely possible that they can't hire a Buddhist Monk.

"Hey can you come work for us, we need you to cross a checkbox so we can execute a guy."
"So... if I say no... you can't execute him?"

Personally even money is on prison officials thinking Buddhism and Islam are the same.

Garrcia wrote:

Personally even money is on prison officials thinking Buddhism and Islam are the same.

I don't think it's about being specifically Muslim or Buddhist. They are opposed to any infidel being involved, and they would rather further 'punish' their christian capital punishment victims than risk meeting the spiritual needs of an infidel prisoner.

Could just gone with...

IMAGE(http://www.americanenglishdoctor.com/IMAGES/Media/monk-show.jpg)

Yonder wrote:

It's entirely possible that they can't hire a Buddhist Monk.

"Hey can you come work for us, we need you to cross a checkbox so we can execute a guy."
"So... if I say no... you can't execute him?"

I would assume that this is actually the correct answer.

Finland’s Basic Income Experiment Shows Recipients Are Happier and More Secure

The Results So Far
Basic income recipients were no more and no less likely to be employed than members of the control group

Basic income recipients were happier with their lives and experienced less stress

They had more trust in other people and social institutions, and showed more faith in their ability to have influence over their own lives, in their personal finances and in their prospects of finding employment

When you click on your article, Farley3k, the tab title seems to completely disagree with the headline and article. The tab title reads 'Free Money Experiment Highlights Limits of Finnish Welfare'. What a crazy spin to take away from whatever version of the article that forgotten line of text came from. Sounds like what Fox News would do to it.

Really odd. MediaBiasFactCheck.com seems to think Bloomberg sits near center (left leaning) and ranks high for factual accuracy. 'Allsides' agrees, basically, putting it more firmly center and mentioning a possible left lean.

Who writes the tab titles I wonder becuase the HTTP title is

"finland-says-basic-income-recipients-less-financially-insecure" (when you take out the Bloomberg stuff.

That is kind of interesting. Is it part of the metadata in the article?

polypusher wrote:

When you click on your article, Farley3k, the tab title seems to completely disagree with the headline and article.

I don't think it does. It mentions the limits in the article:

Initial results of the two-year study had already shown that its 2,000 participants were no more and no less likely to work than their counterparts receiving traditional unemployment benefit.

and right underneath that is a link to a previous article by the author that focuses on the effect it had on the incentive of people to work. This article is focused on the psychological benefits.

One of the fears of UBI is that people on it will just stop working. The findings show this is not the case. That's not a 'limit of Finnish Welfare'. It's showing that fear has no basis in reality.

polypusher wrote:

One of the fears of UBI is that people on it will just stop working. The findings show this is not the case. That's not a 'limit of Finnish Welfare'. It's showing that fear has no basis in reality.

Oh, so your issue is with the tab heading (and I guess the earlier article)? That it should be more positive because although there are limits (it didn't help people find jobs), it still disproves a major criticism of UBI?

cheeze_pavilion wrote:
polypusher wrote:

One of the fears of UBI is that people on it will just stop working. The findings show this is not the case. That's not a 'limit of Finnish Welfare'. It's showing that fear has no basis in reality.

Oh, so your issue is with the tab heading (and I guess the earlier article)? That it should be more positive because although there are limits (it didn't help people find jobs), it still disproves a major criticism of UBI?

I'm confused, was it presented as intending to help people find jobs? I thought the perceived problem was that as a knock-on effect it would incentivize working people to stop working, but that the program was about financial/food security not employment.

thrawn82 wrote:

I'm confused, was it presented as intending to help people find jobs? I thought the perceived problem was that as a knock-on effect it would incentivize working people to stop working, but that the program was about financial/food security not employment.

I don't know enough about this specific implementation, but certainly one of *my* hopes would be that it would help people find jobs. Freed from the bureaucratic hassle (not to mention legal peril) of doing the cost/benefit analysis of dealing with a confusing web of means-tested social welfare programs, and secure in the idea that there's a check showing up regularly to pay for things like transportation and work clothes, that more people might pursue employment, not less or even equal.

I'll take the dessert topping even if it's not also a floor wax, though ; D

edit: today is one of those days (I guess I got my cynicism out of my system earlier in another thread) when I'm feeling like my old curious self, so I looked around a bit, and this particular program was presented as intending people to find jobs:

Starting in the 1980s, Finnish progressives began discussing how distributing unconditional income might be a way to combat poverty and inequality resulting from declining employment in the industrial sector. The theory was that receiving a guaranteed income could free all citizens and allow groups like the jobless, students, stay-at-home parents and the elderly to meaningfully contribute to society through, say, caretaking, charity or artistic projects.
.
But by the time Finland actually attempted the experiment, a conservative government committed to economic austerity was in power. How could it spearhead a leftist benefits program in the midst of economic hardship?
.
It didn’t. The government has made no secret of the fact that its universal basic income experiment isn’t about liberating the poor or fighting inequality. Instead, the trial’s “primary goal” is “promoting employment,” the government explained in a 2016 document proposing the project to Parliament. Meaning: The project was always meant to incentivize people to accept low-paying and low-productivity jobs.

also:

The Finnish trial, the results of which were released Friday, wasn’t an experiment in universal basic income (UBI), which includes all citizens whether they’ve got jobs or not. Rather, it was a targeted attempt to see what would happen if the government chose 2,000 unemployed citizens at random and gave them a check of 560 euros ($635) every month for two years. Participants were assured they’d keep receiving the money if they got a job. In fact, the experiment’s stated goal was about “promoting employment” — the government wanted to see if having a basic income leads people to accept more work, even if it’s low-paying or temporary.
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By that metric, the experiment was a failure: Receiving free money didn’t impact the likelihood of people entering the workforce one way or another.
.
But here’s what the basic income did do: It made recipients feel happier and less stressed. “The basic income recipients of the test group reported better wellbeing in every way than the comparison group,” according to researcher Olli Kangas.
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That’s a very positive result, and the fact that it wasn’t what Finland was shooting for shouldn’t be allowed to overshadow it.
polypusher wrote:

One of the fears of UBI is that people on it will just stop working. The findings show this is not the case. That's not a 'limit of Finnish Welfare'. It's showing that fear has no basis in reality.

It shows that fear has no basis in reality for Finland today.

American culture is not Finnish culture, the American employee experience is not the Finnish employee experience and the American work ethic is not the Finnish work ethic.

I'm very suspicious of assuming we'd see the exact same result here.

Yeah UBI isnt directly about employment. Its about fixing poverty and all that comes with it.

This is the best argument I've seen for UBI

Jonman wrote:

It shows that fear has no basis in reality for Finland today. ... I'm very suspicious of assuming we'd see the exact same result here.

Of course we wont, but that's not an argument for or against it. It should be experimented with. If it's better than current systems by a big enough margin (in actual cost and in personal outcomes for people) to cover the cost of replacing the system, it should replace the system.

I thought one of the arguments for UBI is that in a post scarcity economy The number of jobs needed to supply the goods and services for people to have decent standard of living is less than the number of jobs needed for people to be able to afford such. Thus it is actually desirable to have a certain number of freeloaders. UBI allows people to be freeloaders while still providing an incentive to work; it helps balance an over supply of labor with an under supply of jobs.

Naturally that does not take away from the social or economic benefits of eliminating poverty. There are many good reasons to endorse UBI.

Jonman wrote:

It shows that fear has no basis in reality for Finland today.

American culture is not Finnish culture, the American employee experience is not the Finnish employee experience and the American work ethic is not the Finnish work ethic.

I'm very suspicious of assuming we'd see the exact same result here.

The standard answer when anything anywhere else in the world seems to work better than the way the US does it.

"look how universal heath care works in every other industrialized nation!"
American culture is not the same!
American health care experience isn't the same!
I am very suspicious of assuming we'd see the exact same result here.

Fill in everything/anything that other countries do. It is the mindset that has stopped the US from improving in almost any meaningful way over the last .... well my life time so half century. *

*Not true of course for everyone - the 1% have gotten way, way, way richer so that is improving.

farley3k wrote:

The standard answer when anything anywhere else in the world seems to work better than the way the US does it.

I'm not saying we shouldn't do it. I'm saying that if we do it, we shouldn't be surprised when we don't see the exact same results as Finland.

I'm arguing that we acknowledge the frightening complexity of the situation and not be simple minded about reading across results that may not be applicable.

I'm arguing that we treat a complicated situation as complicated. Nothing more.

Ok, fair enough.

I am not sure I get the distinction because - to me - that is true of everything you try. Try a movie that your friend said was great - we shouldn't be surprised that our results are different. Try a pair of earbuds recommended highly on Amazon - we shouldn't be surprised that our results are different. Try a medication to stop that blasted itching when I pee - don't be surprised that my results may vary....wait I may have said to much....

farley3k wrote:

I am not sure I get the distinction because - to me - that is true of everything you try.

The distinction is that no-one is running a national political campaign messaging policies that suggest everyone watch movies their friends like.

Look, my whole issue is that it's lazy justification for a complicated and nuanced policy to say "look, this country that is economically, geographically, culturally and historically entirely different from us did it and it worked fine!"

That's what I'm railing against. I want that conversation to look more like "look, here's what Finland did, here's what happened, here's what we can learn from their experience, and here's how WE'D need to approach it if we wanted to achieve similar results given our vastly different situation."

Saudi Arabia Detains 2 U.S. Citizens In First Sweep Of Activist Arrests Since Jamal Khashoggi Killing

I am sure trump will be calling his son-in-law to talk to his friend MBS to show the displeasure of America at detaining US citizens.

Jonman wrote:
farley3k wrote:

I am not sure I get the distinction because - to me - that is true of everything you try.

The distinction is that no-one is running a national political campaign messaging policies that suggest everyone watch movies their friends like.

Look, my whole issue is that it's lazy justification for a complicated and nuanced policy to say "look, this country that is economically, geographically, culturally and historically entirely different from us did it and it worked fine!"

That's what I'm railing against. I want that conversation to look more like "look, here's what Finland did, here's what happened, here's what we can learn from their experience, and here's how WE'D need to approach it if we wanted to achieve similar results given our vastly different situation."

The problem is the discussion then shifts to "wow that's complicated; if we can't gather all the information and have a definite known result, we shouldn't do anything". Sometimes just doing a thing and tweaking based on actual results provides more value than doing, you know, nothing.

EDIT: In essence, you get lazy justification for maintaining the status quo.

We are also far more multicultural than Finland. There is no one way each demographic of Americans will handle it or pass judgment on how others are handling it.
( I am definitely a supporter of UBI in case it wasn't clear)

Jonman wrote:
farley3k wrote:

I am not sure I get the distinction because - to me - that is true of everything you try.

The distinction is that no-one is running a national political campaign messaging policies that suggest everyone watch movies their friends like.

It's there an entire profession called advertising that is doing exactly this?

This whole discussion is further foiled by the fact that there isn't one america with a uniform culture, theres 3 or 4 geographically and culturally distinct Americas that happen to share the same government.

thrawn82 wrote:

This whole discussion is further foiled by the fact that there isn't one america with a uniform culture, theres 3 or 4 geographically and culturally distinct Americas that happen to share the same government.

Rather like....united states.....

farley3k wrote:
thrawn82 wrote:

This whole discussion is further foiled by the fact that there isn't one america with a uniform culture, theres 3 or 4 geographically and culturally distinct Americas that happen to share the same government.

Rather like....united states..... :)

'united' is going a bit far...