Perhaps the BEST B1G Forum anywhere, here at College Football Fan Site, CFB51!!!

Urbana (OH) University has permanently closed. They were NCAA D2.

They're all battling to be the last sap with black-lung in the last coal mine.

No, that's not what they are doing.  They're trying to make a living.
Easy for you to dismiss them.

It's not an either/or thing.  So while you call it talking out of both sides, the answer to nearly every either/or is BOTH.  Yes, the ultra wealthy have "won" under the current structure and are motivated to prevent change, often unethically  AND yes, the coal miners in 2020 are playing the violin on the Titanic.  They aren't educated and lack the confidence to try something new.  Both are true.  And I'm the asshole for pointing this out?

My crime is having been raised by parents who gave a damn.  I'm a jerk because I'm smart and educated, which SORRY, doesn't nulify my right to speak about coal miners.  No one forced them to have 4 kids, raising them to be coal miners.  Hell, Mr. Peabody probably sent someone around to every store to buy up all the condoms in KY/WV.  Got to pump out that next generation of workers! 

I'm the jerk because an entire group of people failed at instilling confidence and the bravery to go out to do something new with their lives.  This sickness of doing something because it was good enough for your parents is how the rich hold entire towns under their thumb, it's how religions survive despite lacking any evidence, and it's how our economic foundations pause - thus rewarding those who have already "won."

But I'm the jerk.  Thanks.

Your circumstances were different - there but by the grace of god go I.You obviously couldn't give a shit after a limpdick remark like that.Oh your parents cared - so much so they would produce a snot who shits on the less fortunate.Why don't you spend your time working with the less fortunate rather than lampooning them,since you are so gifted .But I'll get off the board now you may want to badmouth Special Olympians

It's not fair to blame them for their narrow scope of possibility.  It is fair to blame them for ignoring it.  The moment a person becomes aware of their plight, it's on them to combat it.

I've got a few neighborhoods in Chicago that could use a speech on this.

I thought cost was why we don't manufacture anymore.  You have to pay an American worker way more than a kid in China.  No? 

We do have a problem here, or a fear I should say, of being on the leading edge of technology/machines/robots/A.I..  Yes, it's going to take a lot of reeeeally cushy factory jobs.  Artificially delaying it will only make it worse when it inevitably happens. 

It's not automation, it's communication. 

Prior to the internet, high-tech complex manufacturing was very difficult to outsource. The on-the-ground expertise and real-time communication to the design/engineering teams needed made it difficult to produce quality products. 

That all changed, dramatically, over the last 20 years. With most everything being done/stored electronically, with rich communication (email w/attachments, even video conferencing) the ability to transmit complex information back and forth, and with cheap voice communication (VOIP rather than the old-school long distance plan), it's basically shrunk the globe to the point where "over there" is no longer very far away. 

Working across time zones can still be a PITA, but that's more of an annoyance than a hard constraint. For some teams, it can actually be a benefit, because people working in the US during our day can hand findings off to Asia who can continue the work while we sleep, and then have results/findings ready to review back in the US when we wake up. Rinse/repeat. 

Prior to the internet, it was impossible to take advantage of foreign low-cost labor except for easy-to-produce goods. Now we can do so, and further, increases in education in places like China/India mean that they also have high-skill workers available too. A software engineer in Bangalore costs a lot less  to employ than a software engineer in San Jose. 

I've got a few neighborhoods in Chicago that could use a speech on this.

Different demographic than coal miners