The New Republican Rules Posted by ALEX ALTMAN Wednesday, January 5, 2011 at 8:14 pm 1 Comment • Related Topics: congress, democrats, federal budget, government, john boehner After the ceremonies and standing ovations died down, the new Republican House majority did get around to some crucial business today. By a straight party-line vote, the House approved a new rules package for the 112th Congress, 240-191.
Republicans say passing the new package--a right granted by the Constitution--will foster openness and transparency and help curtail wasteful spending. There are nods to the Tea Party's "Contract From America," including the provision that each bill must cite its constitutional authority and others that specify minimum time requirements that the text of a bill or amendment must be available before being acted upon. Whereas in the past, the federal debt ceiling would rise automatically when a budget resolution to borrow more money was adopted, now such a measure will force a vote--one that's like to spark internal strife when Tea Party deficit hawks balk.
Perhaps most importantly, the budget rules include a major shift in strategy, from a policy known as "Pay as You Go" -- a system that tries to control the budget by requiring by requiring tax cuts or spending increases to be offset, and which was in place during the Clinton Administration surplus -- to a "Cut as You Go" model, which requires spending to be offset but spares tax cuts from that requirement. The bipartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget has a full run-down and analysis, citing both positive budget-related provisions (the focus on curbing long- and short-term spending) and the ones with the potential to do serious damage.
Exempting tax cuts, as the report notes, will make it much harder to balance the budget; cutting spending alone does little good if there's a corresponding loss in revenue. The rules also vest an enormous amount of power in Paul Ryan, the Wisconsin deficit hawk who will helm the Budget Committee, enabling Ryan to set spending limits essentially by fiat. As Norman Ornstein of the American Enterprise Institute writes:
[There is a] provision in the rules to deputize the chairman of the House Budget Committee to unilaterally create spending and revenue limits and caps by committee and enact them simply by publishing them in the Congressional Record.
This is breathtaking: It demolishes the Congressional budget process in one fell swoop, and it takes away the accountability, openness and deliberation that a regular budget process provides. This is the opposite of accountability; Members, by voting in lockstep to enact a package of rules, will implicitly vote for a budget they have never seen. It will be binding in the House.
When individual appropriations come up, any proposal that changes the edicts of Budget Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) by restoring cuts in spending will be ruled out of order. Dramatic and Draconian budget cuts without votes or debate. That is the new open and deliberative House?
Ryan has indicated he'll roll back non-security discretionary spending to 2008 levels--which would prompt deep cuts in most other areas, potentially creating friction with Senate Republicans. After promising in the Pledge to America to cull $100 billion in waste in year one, Republicans are now cutting that number in half. Democrats argue that their new rules are rife with hypocrisies, underlining the gap between the GOP's rhetoric on fiscal discipline and the reality.
"This rules package shows Republicans already going back on their promises of fiscal responsibility and of a transparent, open Congress," Steny Hoyer, the Democratic whip, said on the floor Wednesday. At a press conference yesterday, Democratic leadership argued the rules would "explode" the deficit; Rep. Chris Van Hollen, Ryan's foil as the committee's ranking member, argued that GOP "budget gimmicks" amounted to "Enron-style accounting," a charge he repeated during today's floor debate. Exhibit A, he said Tuesday, was their first major piece of legislation, the health-care repeal effort. As I wrote, the GOP dismissed the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimate that the PPACA would slash the deficit by $143 billion through 2019, and the repeal legislation identifies no counterweight to that sum. "That kind of flim-flam," Van Hollen said, "is the kind of thing the American people came to expect the last time they were in charge."
You can't cut the deficit AND cut taxes AND spend retarded amounts of money funding stupid wars and throwing all our taxpayer money into the military all at the same time.
The tea party is such a joke the majority of them are idiots like the ones who wrote this bill. How can you lower the deficit while also cutting taxes for everyone (especially the richest 2% of people ya lets make sure they have as much money as possible). At least the democrats are up front about how they want to pay for all this crap, the republicans are such hypocrites. Although i think the hypocrisy is mostly unconscious since 95% of them in the government are just bat shit stupid.
And so now the house doesn't get to deliberate on our budget because its created by some small committee and doesn't get voted on? Why would anyone think that is a good idea...
Wow I love how TL hates on right wingers... I get flamed for being a troll for posting unpopular political opinions elsewhere and then I read this... Fail.
And to get back on topic +1 for no more obama socialist policies. If I wanted to live in Europe I'd move there...
I'm in DC right now and saw them getting sworn in. Shit is about to go down. The Senate has an empowered minority but the House does not. Luckily shit still has to pass in both houses and Obama is still ready to veto when necessary.
The only thing I'm really worried about is the debt limit being held hostage. That could have disastrous effects for interest rates and inflation or even defaulting on our loans to countries like China. It gets a lot more complex than that but it is still some scary stuff seeing our economic plan and status in jeopardy.
On January 06 2011 11:24 t3hwUn wrote: Wow I love how TL hates on right wingers... I get flamed for being a troll for posting unpopular political opinions elsewhere and then I read this... Fail.
And to get back on topic +1 for no more obama socialist policies. If I wanted to live in Europe I'd move there...
Hmm. Sorry the first article isn't neutral. I can't seem to find anything that isn't full of shit lol.
As a conservative I'm afraid/nervous to see what's going to happen with this Republican Congress. Between November and now the political atmosphere has been changing and it has become more of a us vs them battle than ever before.
On January 06 2011 11:24 t3hwUn wrote: Wow I love how TL hates on right wingers... I get flamed for being a troll for posting unpopular political opinions elsewhere and then I read this... Fail.
And to get back on topic +1 for no more obama socialist policies. If I wanted to live in Europe I'd move there...
the word "socialist" gets thrown around waaaaaay too much. problem with people like you is that all you do is throw around talking points and cover your ears whenever people say anything rational.
what has obama done that can be classified as "socialist"?
On January 06 2011 12:27 Amber[LighT] wrote: Oh wait voting Tea Party was a terrible idea?
As a conservative I'm afraid/nervous to see what's going to happen with this Republican Congress. Between November and now the political atmosphere has been changing and it has become more of a us vs them battle than ever before.
On January 06 2011 12:27 Amber[LighT] wrote: Oh wait voting Tea Party was a terrible idea?
As a conservative I'm afraid/nervous to see what's going to happen with this Republican Congress. Between November and now the political atmosphere has been changing and it has become more of a us vs them battle than ever before.
On January 06 2011 11:24 t3hwUn wrote: Wow I love how TL hates on right wingers... I get flamed for being a troll for posting unpopular political opinions elsewhere and then I read this... Fail.
And to get back on topic +1 for no more obama socialist policies. If I wanted to live in Europe I'd move there...
the word "socialist" gets thrown around waaaaaay too much. problem with people like you is that all you do is throw around talking points and cover your ears whenever people say anything rational.
what has obama done that can be classified as "socialist"?
I like how some republicans have even called him a Nazi and a socialist in the same sentence. (not in this article).
On January 06 2011 11:24 t3hwUn wrote: Wow I love how TL hates on right wingers... I get flamed for being a troll for posting unpopular political opinions elsewhere and then I read this... Fail.
And to get back on topic +1 for no more obama socialist policies. If I wanted to live in Europe I'd move there...
If you call Obama a Socialist you know NOTHING about what he's done in office.
On January 06 2011 12:27 Amber[LighT] wrote: Oh wait voting Tea Party was a terrible idea?
As a conservative I'm afraid/nervous to see what's going to happen with this Republican Congress. Between November and now the political atmosphere has been changing and it has become more of a us vs them battle than ever before.
yeah, I'm pretty scared.
Nothing inherently wrong with tea party, but :/
well i don't know about that..
Tea party wants to do good things. Are these things good? Will it turn out well? But just because somebody identifies with tea party ideals doesn't mean they are stupid or evil.
Well, alright
tea party ideals aren't inherently evil. Misthought? maybe The party is, but no more than any other party.
The point obama is moving towards socialism is reasonable, and defendable. But that we're anywhere close to a socialism is not.
On January 06 2011 11:00 funnybananaman wrote: You can't cut the deficit AND cut taxes AND spend retarded amounts of money funding stupid wars and throwing all our taxpayer money into the military all at the same time.
Too true.
I don't hate the tea party or anything. I believe we need to get out of debt and taxes should be as low as possible, but the wars we are in are by far the biggest burden to the budget. I don't see why conservatives can't see this.
On January 06 2011 11:00 funnybananaman wrote: You can't cut the deficit AND cut taxes AND spend retarded amounts of money funding stupid wars and throwing all our taxpayer money into the military all at the same time.
Too true.
I don't hate the tea party or anything. I believe we need to get out of debt and taxes should be as low as possible, but the wars we are in are by far the biggest burden to the budget. I don't see why conservatives can't see this.
I do
Everyone bundles conservatives in one big ignorant group
On January 06 2011 11:24 t3hwUn wrote: Wow I love how TL hates on right wingers... I get flamed for being a troll for posting unpopular political opinions elsewhere and then I read this... Fail.
And to get back on topic +1 for no more obama socialist policies. If I wanted to live in Europe I'd move there...
What's funny is that Obama is about as socialist as Sarkozy...
On January 06 2011 12:27 Amber[LighT] wrote: Oh wait voting Tea Party was a terrible idea?
As a conservative I'm afraid/nervous to see what's going to happen with this Republican Congress. Between November and now the political atmosphere has been changing and it has become more of a us vs them battle than ever before.
yeah, I'm pretty scared.
Nothing inherently wrong with tea party, but :/
well i don't know about that..
Tea party wants to do good things. Are these things good? Will it turn out well? But just because somebody identifies with tea party ideals doesn't mean they are stupid or evil.
Well, alright
tea party ideals aren't inherently evil. Misthought? maybe The party is, but no more than any other party.
The point obama is moving towards socialism is reasonable, and defendable. But that we're anywhere close to a socialism is not.
Listen. Everyone who identifies the tea party as a single entity should honestly be banned from further discussions because they don't know what they're talking about.
The "tea party" movement is just a name for the general grassroots gathering of moderate and conservative Americans who believe the country is headed in the wrong direction and that current Republicans (and democrats) are incapable of resolving the issue. Tea Parties as they are called are meetings whereby like-minded people share their common interest in changing the direction America is headed in.
The movement is not a unified group seeking election of people it chooses. It is not even a group with a uniform agenda. It is a collection of people with similar, but not identical views on the major problems in America - these being: big gov't, heavy spending, socialist policy shifts, and others. The major emphasis of all tea party movements is a dramatic cut on spending on gov't. It's actually closer to a libertarian movement than a truly right wing one, though what we're seeing is that the candidates who are the most controversial (i.e. heavy right wing religious people) are getting the most press (which, lets face it, is extremely liberal and has a liberal leaning in all reports, with the exception of Fox). Therefore, the public thinks the tea-party movement is full of racists, bigots, religions nuts, and extremists. In fact the movement is 99.9% average Americans who have a legitimate concern about our gov't and the direction its heading.
My grandparents have been to nearly every tea-party event in the DC area. They used to vote democrat 30 years ago. Democrat vs republican no longer means what it used to. It's not about civil rights anymore. It's about socialism vs capitalism and big gov't regulation and centralization vs federalism, small gov't, and the free market.
As for the situation in Congress - the Republicans have a very tough role to fill, and the Democrats have a choice. Obama can pull a Clinton and just cede authority to the Republican congress and let them pass what they want in order to make it look like he's both more moderate (which might make him reelectable, as per Clinton) and like he's accomplishing something. On the other hand he can veto every single thing possible and lock down Congress and create basically what is a 2 year lame duck period where gov't almost shuts down. He can try to spin it like Republicans are blocking the Democrats from doing anything, but I think that time has passed and the American people won't stand for it. (In addition, it actually isn't even possible for that to occur, since all bills will originate within a Republican house and will be killed by democrats).
Either way, the era of democrat control is over, and all they can do now is damage control. If they really want power back, they need to make a massive shift towards the right and become more moderate. It's clear that both parties are severely polarized, and IMO the party that chooses to identify itself as moderate first is the one that will have power (as it should be).
If both parties continue to polarize, I think we may finally see a shift from 2 party politics given a strong enough independent candidate.
Obama can pull a Clinton and just cede authority to the Republican congress and let them pass what they want in order to make it look like he's both more moderate (which might make him reelectable, as per Clinton) and like he's accomplishing something.
Has he not been doing this for the past two years? Has he not been the most moderate, bipartisan president in recent decades? Has he accomplished absolutely nothing because he insists on cooperating with the Republicans, aka the "Party of No," who have blatantly stated that their top priority in 2010 is to make sure Obama isn't reelected (Mitch McConnell)? Check.
On January 06 2011 11:00 funnybananaman wrote: You can't cut the deficit AND cut taxes AND spend retarded amounts of money funding stupid wars and throwing all our taxpayer money into the military all at the same time.
Too true.
I don't hate the tea party or anything. I believe we need to get out of debt and taxes should be as low as possible, but the wars we are in are by far the biggest burden to the budget. I don't see why conservatives can't see this.
I do
Everyone bundles conservatives in one big ignorant group
qq
Sorry I should say "many conservatives" or "Neo-cons" or "Bush-styled conservatives"
I don't even know what conservative really means anymore anyways. The tea partiers are radical in some of there policies, but "radical conservative" doesn't make sense.
On January 06 2011 11:00 funnybananaman wrote: You can't cut the deficit AND cut taxes AND spend retarded amounts of money funding stupid wars and throwing all our taxpayer money into the military all at the same time.
Too true.
I don't hate the tea party or anything. I believe we need to get out of debt and taxes should be as low as possible, but the wars we are in are by far the biggest burden to the budget. I don't see why conservatives can't see this.
Look at the budgets and spending of this country and try to support your claim. Social policies such as SS, medicare, medicaid, and welfare represent substantially more spending than on defense.
Check out the amount of money spent on the Iraq War. The total cost of the war barely exceeds the cost of just 1 year of social security. Add in medicare, medicaid and other entitlements and compare. If you cut those programs by half you could fund over 5 Iraq wars a year!
The defense budget for 2010 is listed as $664 billion. Compare this to those 3 big entitlement expenditures listed above: $1421 billion!
Do you really think we're in a costly war? We could cut out entitlements for an entire year and that would cover 3 Iraqs. We haven't even been close to full war mode since WWII. If we actually had a serious war that was a direct threat to the American people, we effectively could spend dozens of times more money on it without risking inflation, simply by cutting socialist welfare policies.
People don't realize it, but the US is a massive welfare state. The amount of money we spend on helping out the poor, elderly, disabled, or just outright lazy is astronomical. So, you could reduce the amount of everyone's social security checks by 10% or let a madman research nuclear devices for use on our allies. And lets not forget, any conflict in the middle east drives up oil prices and costs the US possibly even more than we'd have ever spent on this war.
On January 06 2011 11:24 t3hwUn wrote: Wow I love how TL hates on right wingers... I get flamed for being a troll for posting unpopular political opinions elsewhere and then I read this... Fail.
And to get back on topic +1 for no more obama socialist policies. If I wanted to live in Europe I'd move there...
The reason you probably get those responses is because of nonsense like the latter half of your post. None of Obama's policies are socialist, you clearly do not know what that word means.
Listen. Everyone who identifies the tea party as a single entity should honestly be banned from further discussions because they don't know what they're talking about.
Well, they are more of a movement than an entity. I treated them as an entity to make it more believable lol.
Obama isn't terribly bipartisan. but neither has any major american president in recent history. Clinton got forced into it.
And yes, tea party is more libertarian than right wing.
We could cut out entitlements for an entire year and that would cover 3 Iraqs. We haven't even been close to full war mode since WWII. If we actually had a serious war that was a direct threat to the American people, we effectively could spend dozens of times more money on it without risking inflation, simply by cutting socialist welfare policies.
Because stopping all help cold turkey to some 150million people in the our country is a reasonable course of action. As opposed to stopping a needless war.
Also lets cut back SS by 10% because ya know they get too much money alrdy. SS checks are alrdy too low as it is because of inflation.
A better solution would be to dump all the lazy, stupid, and/or drug/booze addicts using the system to support their way of life that doesn't contribute to society. I bet that would save enough money to fund an Iraq war in a year or two. Or better yet, cut all pop, candy, chips, and junk food from foodstamps along with the ability to withdraw cash from your foodstamp help.
[Eternal]Phoenix, do you really think we should cut things that help the American people in favor of a pointless and stupid war? We should force American people at home to suffer just because politicians in Washington feel the need to flex their political muscle? Do you know that our spending on military alone is greater than the spending on military for the entire rest of the world COMBINED? Half of our discretionary budget is spent on defense. Fifty percent!
Medicare / Social Security are necessary things paid for by tax revenues, the war spending is unnecessary and guess what - people WANT to spend taxes for welfare like Medicare / Social Security because it benefits THEM. At this point almost no one wants to fund America's stupid wars, except for our crazy politicans and military-industrial complex.
I don't understand. If you're an old person, would you like to have your social security check cut by 10% because some diehard conservative wants to fund a pointless war? That might be your only source of income.
let a madman research nuclear devices for use on our allies. And lets not forget, any conflict in the middle east drives up oil prices and costs the US possibly even more than we'd have ever spent on this war.
The war is debatably pointless, but I don't think it's worth arguing.
Domestic issues should take precedent.
Our spending on military alone is over half the declared budget of the world. not to sound like a conspiracy theorist, but I doubt every nation is declaring their entire defense budgettt...
In regards to the Tea Party, I believe my junior year history teacher puts it very well: "Though Jimmy Carter and The Tea Party are similar in some aspects, they're different in most. There's a difference to being an outsider to Washington, and just being inexperienced."
But yeah, I'm just a little apprehensive about this new Congress. I really hope that they don't do anything stupid that will screw us over. However, my biggest concern is how Obama is going to deal with a Republican-majority Congress. He's going to face a lot of opposition, and there will be a lot of debate over what each side thinks is good for the country (read: Nothing will get done.) <fantasy>If anything, I hope Obama will do what Truman did and ride on the campaign "the good for nothing X Congress." If history repeats itself, Obama will get re-elected on that campaign, and will get a workable Congress again </fantasy>
^ Eisenhower (or truman, maybe superior is right?)
I hope congress is actually effective: they haven't actually done anything yet. Hopefully they shed rhetoric fairly decently.
Obama isn't god, he means well, but he's done good shit, stupid shit, and made mistakes. So although I'd like a republican president, he's most certainly not
1) nazi 2) socialist 3) communist 4) anarchist 5) retardist 6) Liquidist
On January 06 2011 13:33 Superiorwolf wrote: [Eternal]Phoenix, do you really think we should cut things that help the American people in favor of a pointless and stupid war? We should force American people at home to suffer just because politicians in Washington feel the need to flex their political muscle? Do you know that our spending on military alone is greater than the spending on military for the entire rest of the world COMBINED? Half of our discretionary budget is spent on defense. Fifty percent!
Medicare / Social Security are necessary things paid for by tax revenues, the war spending is unnecessary and guess what - people WANT to spend taxes for welfare like Medicare / Social Security because it benefits THEM. At this point almost no one wants to fund America's stupid wars, except for our crazy politicans and military-industrial complex.
I don't understand. If you're an old person, would you like to have your social security check cut by 10% because some diehard conservative wants to fund a pointless war? That might be your only source of income.
let a madman research nuclear devices for use on our allies. And lets not forget, any conflict in the middle east drives up oil prices and costs the US possibly even more than we'd have ever spent on this war.
Ok I guess you're trolling o.o
This country has existed for 150 years before social security was even conceived of. In addition, social security actually is a byproduct of a mass of failed (and some decently successful) experiments in the Great Depression. Nobody needs it, and in fact every person nowadays is urged to save for their own retirement and invest privately because only an idiot would rely on social security for their wellbeing. If we didn't have it at all, people on the whole would actually be better off since everyone would be forced to take care of themselves.
The good part of social security is of course helping disabled people, or elderly who've lost pensions or such. It does play a good role, but it's so bloated and misused it's become a broken system. Cutting it does more good than harm to the country at this point IMO, but that's just my opinion.
As for medicare/medicaid, these ideas were invented less than half a century ago. America was just fine in the 1950s before these ideas were even implemented. Sure, there were other problems with 1950s America (social equality, racism, sexism, etc.) but those have nothing to do with gov't entitlement.
And lastly, I just supported the so called "pointless war" with 2 powerful arguments that you just ignored. First, there was clear indication of a WMD developmental project in Iraq. If they got ahold of those weapons they could end up in the hands of terrorists who could harm America or its allies. In addition, if Israel ever finds out any non-friendly nation in the region has nuclear weapons they will destroy them, and nuclear capabilities will almost certainly be used. They have too much to lose by 1 nuke going off in their country to risk it.
Any violence in the region would lead to economic disaster in the area, skyrocketing the price of oil, hurting American economy by impacting industry, which means less taxes and higher prices for all of America. In the end, every American is losing more money by having to buy more expensive goods and having to pay more taxes to make up for the lost revenue from commerce. Either way we pay, but in this case a war is actually cheaper (and it stimulates the defense sector, creating jobs!)
On January 06 2011 11:00 funnybananaman wrote: You can't cut the deficit AND cut taxes AND spend retarded amounts of money funding stupid wars and throwing all our taxpayer money into the military all at the same time.
Too true.
I don't hate the tea party or anything. I believe we need to get out of debt and taxes should be as low as possible, but the wars we are in are by far the biggest burden to the budget. I don't see why conservatives can't see this.
We haven't even been close to full war mode since WWII. If we actually had a serious war that was a direct threat to the American people, we effectively could spend dozens of times more money on it without risking inflation, simply by cutting socialist welfare policies..
Again, please learn the definition of the word socialist and then get back to us.
Leaving your other arguments aside, but saying USA spending on military is greater than the rest of the world combined is totally pointless.
It might sound outrageous but if you look at the % of GDP, USA is no different than any other countries. Simply put, USA is much richer than rest of the world, so they also need to spend much higher amount to protect their assets.
Not to mention some country like China hides their various military spending in different category such as research, education ect.
On January 06 2011 11:24 t3hwUn wrote: Wow I love how TL hates on right wingers... I get flamed for being a troll for posting unpopular political opinions elsewhere and then I read this... Fail.
And to get back on topic +1 for no more obama socialist policies. If I wanted to live in Europe I'd move there...
the word "socialist" gets thrown around waaaaaay too much. problem with people like you is that all you do is throw around talking points and cover your ears whenever people say anything rational.
what has obama done that can be classified as "socialist"?
I would consider his Healthcare bill to be socialist. But to clarify my post I believe we need a return to state's rights and a weakened federal system. The federal government has proved time and time again to be a black hole for tax dollars. Maybe Obama isn't a socialist but his educational background says otherwise IMHO.
Its not talking points. Its about a return to domestic and fiscal responsibility, lowered taxes and less spending PERIOD.
And as posted previously the "war" in Afghanistan is now a glorified humanitarian struggle that we have received backlash for not doing in the past. Much of our tax dollars go to other countries for various reasons. As complicated as the issue is the most frustrating thing is Obama has really done nothing to help grow the private sector...
On January 06 2011 13:53 furymonkey wrote: Simply put, USA is much richer than rest of the world, so they also need to spend much higher amount to protect their assets.
On January 06 2011 13:53 furymonkey wrote: Simply put, USA is much richer than rest of the world, so they also need to spend much higher amount to protect their assets.
That is a 100% baseless notion.
It makes sense to a certain extent. We have more stuff, so we can spend more to protect it. I think a better argument is because we disclose all our defense spending and about no other countries do we actually spend less than it would seem. (Still too much IMO)
Okay I can understand the last part of your earlier post now, but I still don't think it is a viable argument. Certainly, the Wikileaks cables did reveal that there was evidence of WMDs in Iraq afaik, but it still is questionable as to why we continued to stay there after we found no WMDs. If anything, US Army presence instigates further violence in the area from the Taliban/Al-Qaeda, and I'm glad we're finally withdrawing slowly but it's something we should have done a long time ago. I don't think it's in the business of America to continue acting imperialistic with all these wars, meddling in the business of other nations only gets more people hostile towards America. We should instead focus on the domestic sector and improving life at home, whether that means creating new jobs with green technology (aka a way to reduce our dependence on oil) or reducing our ever-increasing federal debt.
On January 06 2011 13:53 furymonkey wrote: Simply put, USA is much richer than rest of the world, so they also need to spend much higher amount to protect their assets.
That is a 100% baseless notion.
It makes sense to a certain extent. We have more stuff, so we can spend more to protect it. I think a better argument is because we disclose all our defense spending and about no other countries do we actually spend less than it would seem. (Still too much IMO)
It is absolutely ridiculous with not a hint of logic behind it. How are our assets being threatened? How is our military spending protecting our assets?
Sorry but "we got more stuff so we need more stuff to protect our stuff" isn't an acceptable argument.
On January 06 2011 13:59 Superiorwolf wrote: Okay I can understand the last part of your earlier post now, but I still don't think it is a viable argument. Certainly, the Wikileaks cables did reveal that there was evidence of WMDs in Iraq afaik, but it still is questionable as to why we continued to stay there after we found no WMDs. If anything, US Army presence instigates further violence in the area from the Taliban/Al-Qaeda, and I'm glad we're finally withdrawing slowly but it's something we should have done a long time ago. I don't think it's in the business of America to continue acting imperialistic with all these wars, meddling in the business of other nations only gets more people hostile towards America. We should instead focus on the domestic sector and improving life at home, whether that means creating new jobs with green technology (aka a way to reduce our dependence on oil) or reducing our ever-increasing federal debt.
Don't start this. This is another topic. Stay on point.
Sorry, as much as you hope that we are living in a utopia world, we aren't.
Military power is one of the elements to have to be influential in the world. Without it, you will find many country would not give a crap about you. There-by you will be losing assets, physically or not.
What saddens me about the budget debates, is that everyone in both parties are ignoring the single biggest budget problem facing us in the future: the aging demographic of the United States. Improvements in medicine have meant that we live longer then ever, but do not work proportionately longer. People are having less children, and people are entering the work force much later due to the increased educational requirements of a technologically advanced society.
What this means is that we have a big social security crisis coming, as receipts will be vastly less then expenditures. Both parties are paralyzed be special interest blocks that seem only interested in preserving the status quo. Pre-9/11 Bush Jr. actually tried reforming it and was met by stiff resistance and failure. Obama has not even tried to approach the topic. There are a number of great ways to approach the problem but no-one will even talk about them for fear of losing the senior vote(and the senior vote is huge, they vote disproportionally in elections because they do not have jobs and young children to take up their time.
On January 06 2011 14:01 furymonkey wrote: Sorry, as much as you hope that we are living in a utopia world, we aren't.
Military power is one of the elements to have to be influential in the world. Without it, you will find many country would not give a crap about you. There-by you will be losing assets, physically or not.
Yeah.
I mean the point is we have tons of shit. If we don't have substantial military to back that up we're a prime target for blackmail/implied threat of attack.
Lots of the defense budget is going to having tons of people on the ground overseas which is bad, but the notion we should have the same defense budget as sweden per capita is preposterous. Fine for sweden. USA is a bit of a larger target...
The world isn't fluffy and happy: military might still plays a role.
On January 06 2011 14:01 furymonkey wrote: Sorry, as much as you hope that we are living in a utopia world, we aren't.
Did anyone claim that we are? Or are you just arguing with yourself?
Military power is one of the elements to have to be influential in the world. Without it, you will find many country would not give a crap about you. There-by you will be losing assets, physically or not.
Did anyone propose that we stop all military spending? We are discussing the amount of military spending, not the concept of it existing entirely. You seem desperately confused over the topic of debate.
On January 06 2011 11:00 funnybananaman wrote: You can't cut the deficit AND cut taxes AND spend retarded amounts of money funding stupid wars and throwing all our taxpayer money into the military all at the same time.
Too true.
I don't hate the tea party or anything. I believe we need to get out of debt and taxes should be as low as possible, but the wars we are in are by far the biggest burden to the budget. I don't see why conservatives can't see this.
Look at the budgets and spending of this country and try to support your claim. Social policies such as SS, medicare, medicaid, and welfare represent substantially more spending than on defense.
Check out the amount of money spent on the Iraq War. The total cost of the war barely exceeds the cost of just 1 year of social security. Add in medicare, medicaid and other entitlements and compare. If you cut those programs by half you could fund over 5 Iraq wars a year!
The defense budget for 2010 is listed as $664 billion. Compare this to those 3 big entitlement expenditures listed above: $1421 billion!
Do you really think we're in a costly war? We could cut out entitlements for an entire year and that would cover 3 Iraqs. We haven't even been close to full war mode since WWII. If we actually had a serious war that was a direct threat to the American people, we effectively could spend dozens of times more money on it without risking inflation, simply by cutting socialist welfare policies.
People don't realize it, but the US is a massive welfare state. The amount of money we spend on helping out the poor, elderly, disabled, or just outright lazy is astronomical. So, you could reduce the amount of everyone's social security checks by 10% or let a madman research nuclear devices for use on our allies. And lets not forget, any conflict in the middle east drives up oil prices and costs the US possibly even more than we'd have ever spent on this war.
"The US is a massive welfare state" Really? Have you ever been outside of the country? We are one of the MOST conservative industrialized countries on the world.
I'm not sure what you mean by "welfare" but if you mean unemployment benefits, you have no grasp on how economics works. Same for you social security arguments; end SS and you end spending by the elderly which hurts our econ.
Not to mention the fact that the "social policies" are designed to HELP whereas Iraq did nothing but hurt.
I'd also like to see a source for the 1.4kb number - is that since Roosevelt and the great depression? If so, it's a ridiculous statistic.
And no, Hussein was not going after Nukes when we invaded >>
On January 06 2011 14:01 furymonkey wrote: Sorry, as much as you hope that we are living in a utopia world, we aren't.
Military power is one of the elements to have to be influential in the world. Without it, you will find many country would not give a crap about you. There-by you will be losing assets, physically or not.
Agreed, but we don't need the level we have now. We outspend the entire rest of the industrialized world 2 to 1.
On January 06 2011 13:53 furymonkey wrote: USA is much richer than rest of the world
ask china
GDP per capita(PPP) numbers, 2010:
6 United States 47,123 93 China, People's Republic of 7,518
The US is indeed much richer then China. Chinas growth rate is quite high, but the US is much, much richer, exceeding China in both GDP per capita, and gross GDP by huge margins. In fact the only countries "richer" then the united states are micro-states/Norway(which is basically a micro state by population).
On January 06 2011 11:00 funnybananaman wrote: You can't cut the deficit AND cut taxes AND spend retarded amounts of money funding stupid wars and throwing all our taxpayer money into the military all at the same time.
Too true.
I don't hate the tea party or anything. I believe we need to get out of debt and taxes should be as low as possible, but the wars we are in are by far the biggest burden to the budget. I don't see why conservatives can't see this.
We haven't even been close to full war mode since WWII. If we actually had a serious war that was a direct threat to the American people, we effectively could spend dozens of times more money on it without risking inflation, simply by cutting socialist welfare policies..
Again, please learn the definition of the word socialist and then get back to us.
Edit:
My friend informs me that I'm actually still wrong and that entitlements are in fact socialist in that they offer a uniform option to everyone controlled by the gov't, and that they are essentially a "gov't option" whereby the industry is partially controlled by the gov't being involved.
On January 06 2011 14:01 furymonkey wrote: Sorry, as much as you hope that we are living in a utopia world, we aren't.
Military power is one of the elements to have to be influential in the world. Without it, you will find many country would not give a crap about you. There-by you will be losing assets, physically or not.
Agreed, but we don't need the level we have now. We outspend the entire rest of the industrialized world 2 to 1.
Again, china and russia are definitely not disclosing their entire budgets.
There was some report that found that, I'll try and dig it up.
We should cut funding by stopping our deployments, not by lessening our defense at home.
Military power is one of the elements to have to be influential in the world. Without it, you will find many country would not give a crap about you. There-by you will be losing assets, physically or not.
Did anyone propose that we stop all military spending? We are discussing the amount of military spending, not the concept of it existing entirely. You seem desperately confused over the topic of debate.
I simply replied to your statement about USA spending is much higher than the rest of the world, that the spending is backed up by the % of GDP, also an indication of standard of living.
The assets I refer to aren't just physical things within the country, but influence over the world.
On January 06 2011 11:00 funnybananaman wrote: You can't cut the deficit AND cut taxes AND spend retarded amounts of money funding stupid wars and throwing all our taxpayer money into the military all at the same time.
Too true.
I don't hate the tea party or anything. I believe we need to get out of debt and taxes should be as low as possible, but the wars we are in are by far the biggest burden to the budget. I don't see why conservatives can't see this.
Look at the budgets and spending of this country and try to support your claim. Social policies such as SS, medicare, medicaid, and welfare represent substantially more spending than on defense.
Check out the amount of money spent on the Iraq War. The total cost of the war barely exceeds the cost of just 1 year of social security. Add in medicare, medicaid and other entitlements and compare. If you cut those programs by half you could fund over 5 Iraq wars a year!
The defense budget for 2010 is listed as $664 billion. Compare this to those 3 big entitlement expenditures listed above: $1421 billion!
Do you really think we're in a costly war? We could cut out entitlements for an entire year and that would cover 3 Iraqs. We haven't even been close to full war mode since WWII. If we actually had a serious war that was a direct threat to the American people, we effectively could spend dozens of times more money on it without risking inflation, simply by cutting socialist welfare policies.
People don't realize it, but the US is a massive welfare state. The amount of money we spend on helping out the poor, elderly, disabled, or just outright lazy is astronomical. So, you could reduce the amount of everyone's social security checks by 10% or let a madman research nuclear devices for use on our allies. And lets not forget, any conflict in the middle east drives up oil prices and costs the US possibly even more than we'd have ever spent on this war.
"The US is a massive welfare state" Really? Have you ever been outside of the country? We are one of the MOST conservative industrialized countries on the world.
I'm not sure what you mean by "welfare" but if you mean unemployment benefits, you have no grasp on how economics works. Same for you social security arguments; end SS and you end spending by the elderly which hurts our econ.
Not to mention the fact that the "social policies" are designed to HELP whereas Iraq did nothing but hurt.
I'd also like to see a source for the 1.4kb number - is that since Roosevelt and the great depression? If so, it's a ridiculous statistic.
And no, Hussein was not going after Nukes when we invaded >>
There you go. Look for yourself. I don't make this stuff up. You don't believe it because you cannot hold your beliefs about gov't economics if you know it's true. Misinformation is a serious problem when it comes to our spending, and people need to wake the hell up.
Oh and Hussein was definitely going after nukes when we invaded. It's fact.
On January 06 2011 13:33 Superiorwolf wrote: [Eternal]Phoenix, do you really think we should cut things that help the American people in favor of a pointless and stupid war? We should force American people at home to suffer just because politicians in Washington feel the need to flex their political muscle? Do you know that our spending on military alone is greater than the spending on military for the entire rest of the world COMBINED? Half of our discretionary budget is spent on defense. Fifty percent!
Medicare / Social Security are necessary things paid for by tax revenues, the war spending is unnecessary and guess what - people WANT to spend taxes for welfare like Medicare / Social Security because it benefits THEM. At this point almost no one wants to fund America's stupid wars, except for our crazy politicans and military-industrial complex.
I don't understand. If you're an old person, would you like to have your social security check cut by 10% because some diehard conservative wants to fund a pointless war? That might be your only source of income.
let a madman research nuclear devices for use on our allies. And lets not forget, any conflict in the middle east drives up oil prices and costs the US possibly even more than we'd have ever spent on this war.
Ok I guess you're trolling o.o
This country has existed for 150 years before social security was even conceived of. In addition, social security actually is a byproduct of a mass of failed (and some decently successful) experiments in the Great Depression. Nobody needs it, and in fact every person nowadays is urged to save for their own retirement and invest privately because only an idiot would rely on social security for their wellbeing. If we didn't have it at all, people on the whole would actually be better off since everyone would be forced to take care of themselves.
The good part of social security is of course helping disabled people, or elderly who've lost pensions or such. It does play a good role, but it's so bloated and misused it's become a broken system. Cutting it does more good than harm to the country at this point IMO, but that's just my opinion.
As for medicare/medicaid, these ideas were invented less than half a century ago. America was just fine in the 1950s before these ideas were even implemented. Sure, there were other problems with 1950s America (social equality, racism, sexism, etc.) but those have nothing to do with gov't entitlement.
And lastly, I just supported the so called "pointless war" with 2 powerful arguments that you just ignored. First, there was clear indication of a WMD developmental project in Iraq. If they got ahold of those weapons they could end up in the hands of terrorists who could harm America or its allies. In addition, if Israel ever finds out any non-friendly nation in the region has nuclear weapons they will destroy them, and nuclear capabilities will almost certainly be used. They have too much to lose by 1 nuke going off in their country to risk it.
Any violence in the region would lead to economic disaster in the area, skyrocketing the price of oil, hurting American economy by impacting industry, which means less taxes and higher prices for all of America. In the end, every American is losing more money by having to buy more expensive goods and having to pay more taxes to make up for the lost revenue from commerce. Either way we pay, but in this case a war is actually cheaper (and it stimulates the defense sector, creating jobs!)
I'm going to entirely ignore your bit on the middle east, because if you don't believe the reports that their were no WMDs in Iraq, then theirs no point in discussing that with you.
Social Security is important for a few reasons:
1. People pay into it. When they get their monthly check, its like an investment into the govt. being paid back to them. This has a few positive effects: a. Good flow of money. b. Government gets a loan and thus more spending money.
2. The only people who lose money in the system are the super rich who would be more inclined to save that money anyway, thus being a detriment to the economy.
3. All of these welfare programs could be paid for simply by increasing tax rates to what they were pre- Reagan. (Which, I might add, you said was a good era in American history (the 1950's that is)).
On January 06 2011 11:00 funnybananaman wrote: You can't cut the deficit AND cut taxes AND spend retarded amounts of money funding stupid wars and throwing all our taxpayer money into the military all at the same time.
Too true.
I don't hate the tea party or anything. I believe we need to get out of debt and taxes should be as low as possible, but the wars we are in are by far the biggest burden to the budget. I don't see why conservatives can't see this.
Look at the budgets and spending of this country and try to support your claim. Social policies such as SS, medicare, medicaid, and welfare represent substantially more spending than on defense.
Check out the amount of money spent on the Iraq War. The total cost of the war barely exceeds the cost of just 1 year of social security. Add in medicare, medicaid and other entitlements and compare. If you cut those programs by half you could fund over 5 Iraq wars a year!
The defense budget for 2010 is listed as $664 billion. Compare this to those 3 big entitlement expenditures listed above: $1421 billion!
Do you really think we're in a costly war? We could cut out entitlements for an entire year and that would cover 3 Iraqs. We haven't even been close to full war mode since WWII. If we actually had a serious war that was a direct threat to the American people, we effectively could spend dozens of times more money on it without risking inflation, simply by cutting socialist welfare policies.
People don't realize it, but the US is a massive welfare state. The amount of money we spend on helping out the poor, elderly, disabled, or just outright lazy is astronomical. So, you could reduce the amount of everyone's social security checks by 10% or let a madman research nuclear devices for use on our allies. And lets not forget, any conflict in the middle east drives up oil prices and costs the US possibly even more than we'd have ever spent on this war.
"The US is a massive welfare state" Really? Have you ever been outside of the country? We are one of the MOST conservative industrialized countries on the world.
I'm not sure what you mean by "welfare" but if you mean unemployment benefits, you have no grasp on how economics works. Same for you social security arguments; end SS and you end spending by the elderly which hurts our econ.
Not to mention the fact that the "social policies" are designed to HELP whereas Iraq did nothing but hurt.
I'd also like to see a source for the 1.4kb number - is that since Roosevelt and the great depression? If so, it's a ridiculous statistic.
And no, Hussein was not going after Nukes when we invaded >>
There you go. Look for yourself. I don't make this stuff up. You don't believe it because you cannot hold your beliefs about gov't economics if you know it's true. Misinformation is a serious problem when it comes to our spending, and people need to wake the hell up.
Oh and Hussein was definitely going after nukes when we invaded. It's fact.
Yeah, I'm sure he'd want them, but he was probably way far away.
If you look at the evidence I'm of the opinion his scientists asserted they were farther than they were to appease him. Just my personal conspiracy theory, but I think he thought he was further than he is, further contributing to our confusion.
On January 06 2011 11:00 funnybananaman wrote: You can't cut the deficit AND cut taxes AND spend retarded amounts of money funding stupid wars and throwing all our taxpayer money into the military all at the same time.
The tea party is such a joke the majority of them are idiots like the ones who wrote this bill. How can you lower the deficit while also cutting taxes for everyone (especially the richest 2% of people ya lets make sure they have as much money as possible). At least the democrats are up front about how they want to pay for all this crap, the republicans are such hypocrites. Although i think the hypocrisy is mostly unconscious since 95% of them in the government are just bat shit stupid.
And so now the house doesn't get to deliberate on our budget because its created by some small committee and doesn't get voted on? Why would anyone think that is a good idea...
lieing so you can keep sitting around doing nothing and get a nice paycheck seems like a pretty sweet gig
Obama can pull a Clinton and just cede authority to the Republican congress and let them pass what they want in order to make it look like he's both more moderate (which might make him reelectable, as per Clinton) and like he's accomplishing something.
Has he not been doing this for the past two years? Has he not been the most moderate, bipartisan president in recent decades? Has he accomplished absolutely nothing because he insists on cooperating with the Republicans, aka the "Party of No," who have blatantly stated that their top priority in 2010 is to make sure Obama isn't reelected (Mitch McConnell)? Check.
Completely agree with what's said here.
I get upset when people spout nonsense without looking at what has actually been happening over the past decade. People are just so damned short-sighted it's disgusting...
On January 06 2011 13:53 furymonkey wrote: USA is much richer than rest of the world
ask china
Oh hey look another idiot spouting some politico nonsense with two words to make himself feel cool. Get out of this thread if all you can do is copy and paste bullshit, please. One sec, lemme ask China. Hey China, are you richer than the US? China's summarized response, "No."
On January 06 2011 14:01 furymonkey wrote: Sorry, as much as you hope that we are living in a utopia world, we aren't.
Did anyone claim that we are? Or are you just arguing with yourself?
Military power is one of the elements to have to be influential in the world. Without it, you will find many country would not give a crap about you. There-by you will be losing assets, physically or not.
Did anyone propose that we stop all military spending? We are discussing the amount of military spending, not the concept of it existing entirely. You seem desperately confused over the topic of debate.
I simply replied to your statement about USA spending is much higher than the rest of the world, that the spending is backed up by the % of GDP, also an indication of standard of living.
The assets I refer to aren't just physical things within the country, but influence over the world.
US defense spending is also well below historical norms. Graph stops in 2003, but the current number is 4.6% of the GDP, 10% of what it was during WW2 and 50% of what it was during Vietnam.
On January 06 2011 11:00 funnybananaman wrote: You can't cut the deficit AND cut taxes AND spend retarded amounts of money funding stupid wars and throwing all our taxpayer money into the military all at the same time.
Too true.
I don't hate the tea party or anything. I believe we need to get out of debt and taxes should be as low as possible, but the wars we are in are by far the biggest burden to the budget. I don't see why conservatives can't see this.
Look at the budgets and spending of this country and try to support your claim. Social policies such as SS, medicare, medicaid, and welfare represent substantially more spending than on defense.
Check out the amount of money spent on the Iraq War. The total cost of the war barely exceeds the cost of just 1 year of social security. Add in medicare, medicaid and other entitlements and compare. If you cut those programs by half you could fund over 5 Iraq wars a year!
The defense budget for 2010 is listed as $664 billion. Compare this to those 3 big entitlement expenditures listed above: $1421 billion!
Do you really think we're in a costly war? We could cut out entitlements for an entire year and that would cover 3 Iraqs. We haven't even been close to full war mode since WWII. If we actually had a serious war that was a direct threat to the American people, we effectively could spend dozens of times more money on it without risking inflation, simply by cutting socialist welfare policies.
People don't realize it, but the US is a massive welfare state. The amount of money we spend on helping out the poor, elderly, disabled, or just outright lazy is astronomical. So, you could reduce the amount of everyone's social security checks by 10% or let a madman research nuclear devices for use on our allies. And lets not forget, any conflict in the middle east drives up oil prices and costs the US possibly even more than we'd have ever spent on this war.
"The US is a massive welfare state" Really? Have you ever been outside of the country? We are one of the MOST conservative industrialized countries on the world.
I'm not sure what you mean by "welfare" but if you mean unemployment benefits, you have no grasp on how economics works. Same for you social security arguments; end SS and you end spending by the elderly which hurts our econ.
Not to mention the fact that the "social policies" are designed to HELP whereas Iraq did nothing but hurt.
I'd also like to see a source for the 1.4kb number - is that since Roosevelt and the great depression? If so, it's a ridiculous statistic.
And no, Hussein was not going after Nukes when we invaded >>
There you go. Look for yourself. I don't make this stuff up. You don't believe it because you cannot hold your beliefs about gov't economics if you know it's true. Misinformation is a serious problem when it comes to our spending, and people need to wake the hell up.
Oh and Hussein was definitely going after nukes when we invaded. It's fact.
Social Security taxes actually entirely cover their part of the budget, and if we were to make tax hikes on the rich and spending cuts in mil we'd be fine.
Defense dept. spending isn't the entirety of the mil. budget, you also have to factor in VA, which is another 72 Bil.
We spend as much on the DoD as we do on SS and thats with us out of Iraq this year. Medicare and medicaid together at 750b, which I would again argue could easily be covered by a tax hike and cuts to the military expenditure. The NYT had a cool interactive "Balance the Budget" thingy a little while ago - you could cut military spending and just raise taxes and be fine.
Furthermore, it's entirley unrealistic to cut SS (leave most of the elderly broke) or medicare and medicaid (anyone who gets a disease but doesn't have health insurance = fucked either financially or physically). Our government sets out to insure people's health, which is a much better cause than invading Iraq (had nothing to do with 9/11, provide a source for WMDs that isn't fox news) and Afghanistan.
On January 06 2011 14:01 furymonkey wrote: Sorry, as much as you hope that we are living in a utopia world, we aren't.
Did anyone claim that we are? Or are you just arguing with yourself?
Military power is one of the elements to have to be influential in the world. Without it, you will find many country would not give a crap about you. There-by you will be losing assets, physically or not.
Did anyone propose that we stop all military spending? We are discussing the amount of military spending, not the concept of it existing entirely. You seem desperately confused over the topic of debate.
I simply replied to your statement about USA spending is much higher than the rest of the world, that the spending is backed up by the % of GDP, also an indication of standard of living.
The assets I refer to aren't just physical things within the country, but influence over the world.
No, you simply misrepresented what I said. I never claimed nor implied that we are living in a perfect world.
How is the extent of our military spending protecting our assets throughout the world? I've yet to see a single piece of evidence supporting the idea that if we weren't spending this much on defense that our "assets"(which you haven't even clearly defined) would be put at risk.
You seem to be making a very basic argument now, that if we didn't have a military that our influence and power would be greatly reduced. Well, of course, no one has argued against that. What we are discussing is the extent of that spending.
On January 06 2011 14:01 furymonkey wrote: Sorry, as much as you hope that we are living in a utopia world, we aren't.
Did anyone claim that we are? Or are you just arguing with yourself?
Military power is one of the elements to have to be influential in the world. Without it, you will find many country would not give a crap about you. There-by you will be losing assets, physically or not.
Did anyone propose that we stop all military spending? We are discussing the amount of military spending, not the concept of it existing entirely. You seem desperately confused over the topic of debate.
I simply replied to your statement about USA spending is much higher than the rest of the world, that the spending is backed up by the % of GDP, also an indication of standard of living.
The assets I refer to aren't just physical things within the country, but influence over the world.
US defense spending is also well below historical norms. Graph stops in 2003, but the current number is 4.6% of the GDP, 10% of what it was during WW2 and 50% of what it was during Vietnam.
Very nice information that I was thinking about posting myself. It's a really good measure of where we really stand. People haven't seen a real war in over a generation, and we haven't seen a massive direct threat in 65 years. There's a major lack of perspective in this country and it's lead to alarming complacency. People need to look at history, take a deep breath, and relax. People think every decade is the 90s, but that's the great exception to the norm. This is far closer to normal by historical standards than 15 years ago.
The spending on DoD is clearly way too much, and since conservative platform is cutting spending, I don't see why we don't cut in this sector. The United States is not threatened by anything, the chance of a major attack is basically zero, and as such it is really unnecessary to have the excessive budget for defense that we have. Ron Paul says that the United States has to stop massive spending on DoD and imperialistic overseas expenditures and I agree with him completely.
Edit: As Phoenix says above me, we haven't seen a massive threat in 65 years.
On January 06 2011 13:33 Superiorwolf wrote: [Eternal]Phoenix, do you really think we should cut things that help the American people in favor of a pointless and stupid war? We should force American people at home to suffer just because politicians in Washington feel the need to flex their political muscle? Do you know that our spending on military alone is greater than the spending on military for the entire rest of the world COMBINED? Half of our discretionary budget is spent on defense. Fifty percent!
Medicare / Social Security are necessary things paid for by tax revenues, the war spending is unnecessary and guess what - people WANT to spend taxes for welfare like Medicare / Social Security because it benefits THEM. At this point almost no one wants to fund America's stupid wars, except for our crazy politicans and military-industrial complex.
I don't understand. If you're an old person, would you like to have your social security check cut by 10% because some diehard conservative wants to fund a pointless war? That might be your only source of income.
let a madman research nuclear devices for use on our allies. And lets not forget, any conflict in the middle east drives up oil prices and costs the US possibly even more than we'd have ever spent on this war.
Ok I guess you're trolling o.o
This country has existed for 150 years before social security was even conceived of. In addition, social security actually is a byproduct of a mass of failed (and some decently successful) experiments in the Great Depression. Nobody needs it, and in fact every person nowadays is urged to save for their own retirement and invest privately because only an idiot would rely on social security for their wellbeing. If we didn't have it at all, people on the whole would actually be better off since everyone would be forced to take care of themselves.
The good part of social security is of course helping disabled people, or elderly who've lost pensions or such. It does play a good role, but it's so bloated and misused it's become a broken system. Cutting it does more good than harm to the country at this point IMO, but that's just my opinion.
As for medicare/medicaid, these ideas were invented less than half a century ago. America was just fine in the 1950s before these ideas were even implemented. Sure, there were other problems with 1950s America (social equality, racism, sexism, etc.) but those have nothing to do with gov't entitlement.
And lastly, I just supported the so called "pointless war" with 2 powerful arguments that you just ignored. First, there was clear indication of a WMD developmental project in Iraq. If they got ahold of those weapons they could end up in the hands of terrorists who could harm America or its allies. In addition, if Israel ever finds out any non-friendly nation in the region has nuclear weapons they will destroy them, and nuclear capabilities will almost certainly be used. They have too much to lose by 1 nuke going off in their country to risk it.
Any violence in the region would lead to economic disaster in the area, skyrocketing the price of oil, hurting American economy by impacting industry, which means less taxes and higher prices for all of America. In the end, every American is losing more money by having to buy more expensive goods and having to pay more taxes to make up for the lost revenue from commerce. Either way we pay, but in this case a war is actually cheaper (and it stimulates the defense sector, creating jobs!)
I'm going to entirely ignore your bit on the middle east, because if you don't believe the reports that their were no WMDs in Iraq, then theirs no point in discussing that with you.
Social Security is important for a few reasons:
1. People pay into it. When they get their monthly check, its like an investment into the govt. being paid back to them. This has a few positive effects: a. Good flow of money. b. Government gets a loan and thus more spending money.
Social security is NOT an investment... it is redistribution from the currently working to those who cannot work (and in the long term its a redistribution from those who die early to the long lived and disabled)
And if people want to invest their money in a loan to the government, then they can buy government bonds.
The biggest effect of Social Security is to force stupid people to save. If people weren't stupid and short-sighted 95% of Social Security would be unnecessary.
On January 06 2011 14:10 Gentleman7 wrote:
2. The only people who lose money in the system are the super rich who would be more inclined to save that money anyway, thus being a detriment to the economy.
Saved (equals invested unless they are putting it in gold or under their mattress) money is GOOD for the economy.. it buys capital goods that allow people to actually be productive.
And the super rich do not lose in Social security or any of those entitlement programs... they don't pay into them. They probably net benefit because they tend to live longer (and can manipulate their income levels easily)
On January 06 2011 14:10 Gentleman7 wrote:
3. All of these welfare programs could be paid for simply by increasing tax rates to what they were pre- Reagan. (Which, I might add, you said was a good era in American history (the 1950's that is)).
The 1950's was good (primarily because the US was the only remaining industrialized country), but the pre-Reagan 70's era was terrible.
I do agree defense spending should be cut, but the entitlement programs Really need to be cut a lot more.
On January 06 2011 14:25 Superiorwolf wrote: The spending on DoD is clearly way too much, and since conservative platform is cutting spending, I don't see why we don't cut in this sector. The United States is not threatened by anything, the chance of a major attack is basically zero, and as such it is really unnecessary to have the excessive budget for defense that we have. Ron Paul says that the United States has to stop massive spending on DoD and imperialistic overseas expenditures and I agree with him completely.
Edit: As Phoenix says above me, we haven't seen a massive threat in 65 years.
A good reason why we haven't seen a major threat in 20 years(I would call the soviet union a fairly major threat, we were close to global thermonuclear war on many occasions), is our defense spending. We don't magically have the worlds most powerful army by spending nothing, and defense technology is not acquired over-night.
Non operational DoD spending has already been cut majorly. The DDG-1000 program was scaled back to a few ships. The F-22 program was majorly scaled back. The next generation bomber programs were canceled. The future warrior systems programs were delayed. I don't know what more cuts you can ask for? Pretty-much all the money is going into replacing things that are so old they can no longer be retrofitted, and active operations.
On January 06 2011 11:00 funnybananaman wrote: You can't cut the deficit AND cut taxes AND spend retarded amounts of money funding stupid wars and throwing all our taxpayer money into the military all at the same time.
Too true.
I don't hate the tea party or anything. I believe we need to get out of debt and taxes should be as low as possible, but the wars we are in are by far the biggest burden to the budget. I don't see why conservatives can't see this.
Look at the budgets and spending of this country and try to support your claim. Social policies such as SS, medicare, medicaid, and welfare represent substantially more spending than on defense.
Check out the amount of money spent on the Iraq War. The total cost of the war barely exceeds the cost of just 1 year of social security. Add in medicare, medicaid and other entitlements and compare. If you cut those programs by half you could fund over 5 Iraq wars a year!
The defense budget for 2010 is listed as $664 billion. Compare this to those 3 big entitlement expenditures listed above: $1421 billion!
Do you really think we're in a costly war? We could cut out entitlements for an entire year and that would cover 3 Iraqs. We haven't even been close to full war mode since WWII. If we actually had a serious war that was a direct threat to the American people, we effectively could spend dozens of times more money on it without risking inflation, simply by cutting socialist welfare policies.
People don't realize it, but the US is a massive welfare state. The amount of money we spend on helping out the poor, elderly, disabled, or just outright lazy is astronomical. So, you could reduce the amount of everyone's social security checks by 10% or let a madman research nuclear devices for use on our allies. And lets not forget, any conflict in the middle east drives up oil prices and costs the US possibly even more than we'd have ever spent on this war.
"The US is a massive welfare state" Really? Have you ever been outside of the country? We are one of the MOST conservative industrialized countries on the world.
I'm not sure what you mean by "welfare" but if you mean unemployment benefits, you have no grasp on how economics works. Same for you social security arguments; end SS and you end spending by the elderly which hurts our econ.
Not to mention the fact that the "social policies" are designed to HELP whereas Iraq did nothing but hurt.
I'd also like to see a source for the 1.4kb number - is that since Roosevelt and the great depression? If so, it's a ridiculous statistic.
And no, Hussein was not going after Nukes when we invaded >>
There you go. Look for yourself. I don't make this stuff up. You don't believe it because you cannot hold your beliefs about gov't economics if you know it's true. Misinformation is a serious problem when it comes to our spending, and people need to wake the hell up.
Oh and Hussein was definitely going after nukes when we invaded. It's fact.
You should stop using wikipedia as you're only source of information.
Also wheres the proof, because it seems the US, the people who invaded solely on that fact, can't seem to find it themselves.
On January 06 2011 14:25 Superiorwolf wrote: The spending on DoD is clearly way too much, and since conservative platform is cutting spending, I don't see why we don't cut in this sector. The United States is not threatened by anything, the chance of a major attack is basically zero, and as such it is really unnecessary to have the excessive budget for defense that we have. Ron Paul says that the United States has to stop massive spending on DoD and imperialistic overseas expenditures and I agree with him completely.
Edit: As Phoenix says above me, we haven't seen a massive threat in 65 years.
A good reason why we haven't seen a major threat in 15 years(I would call the soviet union a fairly major threat, we were close to global thermonuclear war on many occasions), is our defense spending. We don't magically have the worlds most powerful army by spending nothing, and defense technology is not acquired over-night.
Non operational DoD spending has already been cut majorly. The DDG-1000 program was scaled back to a few ships. The F-22 program was majorly scaled back. The next generation bomber programs were canceled. The future warrior systems programs were delayed. I don't know what more cuts you can ask for? Pretty-much all the money is going into replacing things that are so old they can no longer be retrofitted, and active operations.
My family, and many families of my friends in the area work in the defense sector. Defense research is getting massive cutbacks already. It is much harder to cut back the size of a standing army overnight, and it is also extremely dangerous to cut back on task forces and operational military.
However, the cutting of defense research has the most profound and lasting effects on our ability to stay in power as the #1 military. Remember, china has way more people, and a bigger standing army.
If anything, more money needs to be going into DoD research. It creates jobs and it helps secure our position as the globally dominant military. Also, it's far less money than people think. We could spend 10x what we do on military research and development and it'd be a fairly small overall budget increase.
On January 06 2011 11:00 funnybananaman wrote: You can't cut the deficit AND cut taxes AND spend retarded amounts of money funding stupid wars and throwing all our taxpayer money into the military all at the same time.
Too true.
I don't hate the tea party or anything. I believe we need to get out of debt and taxes should be as low as possible, but the wars we are in are by far the biggest burden to the budget. I don't see why conservatives can't see this.
Look at the budgets and spending of this country and try to support your claim. Social policies such as SS, medicare, medicaid, and welfare represent substantially more spending than on defense.
Check out the amount of money spent on the Iraq War. The total cost of the war barely exceeds the cost of just 1 year of social security. Add in medicare, medicaid and other entitlements and compare. If you cut those programs by half you could fund over 5 Iraq wars a year!
The defense budget for 2010 is listed as $664 billion. Compare this to those 3 big entitlement expenditures listed above: $1421 billion!
Do you really think we're in a costly war? We could cut out entitlements for an entire year and that would cover 3 Iraqs. We haven't even been close to full war mode since WWII. If we actually had a serious war that was a direct threat to the American people, we effectively could spend dozens of times more money on it without risking inflation, simply by cutting socialist welfare policies.
People don't realize it, but the US is a massive welfare state. The amount of money we spend on helping out the poor, elderly, disabled, or just outright lazy is astronomical. So, you could reduce the amount of everyone's social security checks by 10% or let a madman research nuclear devices for use on our allies. And lets not forget, any conflict in the middle east drives up oil prices and costs the US possibly even more than we'd have ever spent on this war.
"The US is a massive welfare state" Really? Have you ever been outside of the country? We are one of the MOST conservative industrialized countries on the world.
I'm not sure what you mean by "welfare" but if you mean unemployment benefits, you have no grasp on how economics works. Same for you social security arguments; end SS and you end spending by the elderly which hurts our econ.
Not to mention the fact that the "social policies" are designed to HELP whereas Iraq did nothing but hurt.
I'd also like to see a source for the 1.4kb number - is that since Roosevelt and the great depression? If so, it's a ridiculous statistic.
And no, Hussein was not going after Nukes when we invaded >>
There you go. Look for yourself. I don't make this stuff up. You don't believe it because you cannot hold your beliefs about gov't economics if you know it's true. Misinformation is a serious problem when it comes to our spending, and people need to wake the hell up.
Oh and Hussein was definitely going after nukes when we invaded. It's fact.
You should stop using wikipedia as you're only source of information.
Also wheres the proof, because it seems the US, the people who invaded solely on that fact, can't seem to find it themselves.
Wikipedia is pretty good for directly verifiable facts. If you dont believe something there, you can click the reference button. In the case of the US budget it is: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy10/pdf/fy10-newera.pdf . If you believe that source is inaccurate, I would challenge you to present a more reputable source for the US budget.
On January 06 2011 11:00 funnybananaman wrote: You can't cut the deficit AND cut taxes AND spend retarded amounts of money funding stupid wars and throwing all our taxpayer money into the military all at the same time.
Too true.
I don't hate the tea party or anything. I believe we need to get out of debt and taxes should be as low as possible, but the wars we are in are by far the biggest burden to the budget. I don't see why conservatives can't see this.
Look at the budgets and spending of this country and try to support your claim. Social policies such as SS, medicare, medicaid, and welfare represent substantially more spending than on defense.
Check out the amount of money spent on the Iraq War. The total cost of the war barely exceeds the cost of just 1 year of social security. Add in medicare, medicaid and other entitlements and compare. If you cut those programs by half you could fund over 5 Iraq wars a year!
The defense budget for 2010 is listed as $664 billion. Compare this to those 3 big entitlement expenditures listed above: $1421 billion!
Do you really think we're in a costly war? We could cut out entitlements for an entire year and that would cover 3 Iraqs. We haven't even been close to full war mode since WWII. If we actually had a serious war that was a direct threat to the American people, we effectively could spend dozens of times more money on it without risking inflation, simply by cutting socialist welfare policies.
People don't realize it, but the US is a massive welfare state. The amount of money we spend on helping out the poor, elderly, disabled, or just outright lazy is astronomical. So, you could reduce the amount of everyone's social security checks by 10% or let a madman research nuclear devices for use on our allies. And lets not forget, any conflict in the middle east drives up oil prices and costs the US possibly even more than we'd have ever spent on this war.
"The US is a massive welfare state" Really? Have you ever been outside of the country? We are one of the MOST conservative industrialized countries on the world.
I'm not sure what you mean by "welfare" but if you mean unemployment benefits, you have no grasp on how economics works. Same for you social security arguments; end SS and you end spending by the elderly which hurts our econ.
Not to mention the fact that the "social policies" are designed to HELP whereas Iraq did nothing but hurt.
I'd also like to see a source for the 1.4kb number - is that since Roosevelt and the great depression? If so, it's a ridiculous statistic.
And no, Hussein was not going after Nukes when we invaded >>
There you go. Look for yourself. I don't make this stuff up. You don't believe it because you cannot hold your beliefs about gov't economics if you know it's true. Misinformation is a serious problem when it comes to our spending, and people need to wake the hell up.
Oh and Hussein was definitely going after nukes when we invaded. It's fact.
You should stop using wikipedia as you're only source of information.
Also wheres the proof, because it seems the US, the people who invaded solely on that fact, can't seem to find it themselves.
Wikipedia is pretty good for directly verifiable facts. If you dont believe something there, you can click the reference button. In the case of the US budget it is: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy10/pdf/fy10-newera.pdf . If you believe that source is inaccurate, I would challenge you to present a more reputable source for the US budget.
How hard was that now.
Just linking a wikipedia page shows nothing. Anyone on the internet can change information on any page and then link that page as proof of fact.
On January 06 2011 11:00 funnybananaman wrote: You can't cut the deficit AND cut taxes AND spend retarded amounts of money funding stupid wars and throwing all our taxpayer money into the military all at the same time.
Too true.
I don't hate the tea party or anything. I believe we need to get out of debt and taxes should be as low as possible, but the wars we are in are by far the biggest burden to the budget. I don't see why conservatives can't see this.
Look at the budgets and spending of this country and try to support your claim. Social policies such as SS, medicare, medicaid, and welfare represent substantially more spending than on defense.
Check out the amount of money spent on the Iraq War. The total cost of the war barely exceeds the cost of just 1 year of social security. Add in medicare, medicaid and other entitlements and compare. If you cut those programs by half you could fund over 5 Iraq wars a year!
The defense budget for 2010 is listed as $664 billion. Compare this to those 3 big entitlement expenditures listed above: $1421 billion!
Do you really think we're in a costly war? We could cut out entitlements for an entire year and that would cover 3 Iraqs. We haven't even been close to full war mode since WWII. If we actually had a serious war that was a direct threat to the American people, we effectively could spend dozens of times more money on it without risking inflation, simply by cutting socialist welfare policies.
People don't realize it, but the US is a massive welfare state. The amount of money we spend on helping out the poor, elderly, disabled, or just outright lazy is astronomical. So, you could reduce the amount of everyone's social security checks by 10% or let a madman research nuclear devices for use on our allies. And lets not forget, any conflict in the middle east drives up oil prices and costs the US possibly even more than we'd have ever spent on this war.
"The US is a massive welfare state" Really? Have you ever been outside of the country? We are one of the MOST conservative industrialized countries on the world.
I'm not sure what you mean by "welfare" but if you mean unemployment benefits, you have no grasp on how economics works. Same for you social security arguments; end SS and you end spending by the elderly which hurts our econ.
Not to mention the fact that the "social policies" are designed to HELP whereas Iraq did nothing but hurt.
I'd also like to see a source for the 1.4kb number - is that since Roosevelt and the great depression? If so, it's a ridiculous statistic.
And no, Hussein was not going after Nukes when we invaded >>
There you go. Look for yourself. I don't make this stuff up. You don't believe it because you cannot hold your beliefs about gov't economics if you know it's true. Misinformation is a serious problem when it comes to our spending, and people need to wake the hell up.
Oh and Hussein was definitely going after nukes when we invaded. It's fact.
You should stop using wikipedia as you're only source of information.
Also wheres the proof, because it seems the US, the people who invaded solely on that fact, can't seem to find it themselves.
Wikipedia is pretty good for directly verifiable facts. If you dont believe something there, you can click the reference button. In the case of the US budget it is: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy10/pdf/fy10-newera.pdf . If you believe that source is inaccurate, I would challenge you to present a more reputable source for the US budget.
How hard was that now.
Just linking a wikipedia page shows nothing. Anyone on the internet can change information on any page and then link that page as proof of fact.
Actually not true. Many pages must be verified by staff before being changed. I have a friend who does a lot of work for Wikipedia. I also have to say that it's the most accessible and well organized place for information. The article they have is really easy to read and is just a good article. Many college professors are fond of Wikipedia for objective information, because it's really really good.
On January 06 2011 11:00 funnybananaman wrote: You can't cut the deficit AND cut taxes AND spend retarded amounts of money funding stupid wars and throwing all our taxpayer money into the military all at the same time.
Too true.
I don't hate the tea party or anything. I believe we need to get out of debt and taxes should be as low as possible, but the wars we are in are by far the biggest burden to the budget. I don't see why conservatives can't see this.
Look at the budgets and spending of this country and try to support your claim. Social policies such as SS, medicare, medicaid, and welfare represent substantially more spending than on defense.
Check out the amount of money spent on the Iraq War. The total cost of the war barely exceeds the cost of just 1 year of social security. Add in medicare, medicaid and other entitlements and compare. If you cut those programs by half you could fund over 5 Iraq wars a year!
The defense budget for 2010 is listed as $664 billion. Compare this to those 3 big entitlement expenditures listed above: $1421 billion!
Do you really think we're in a costly war? We could cut out entitlements for an entire year and that would cover 3 Iraqs. We haven't even been close to full war mode since WWII. If we actually had a serious war that was a direct threat to the American people, we effectively could spend dozens of times more money on it without risking inflation, simply by cutting socialist welfare policies.
People don't realize it, but the US is a massive welfare state. The amount of money we spend on helping out the poor, elderly, disabled, or just outright lazy is astronomical. So, you could reduce the amount of everyone's social security checks by 10% or let a madman research nuclear devices for use on our allies. And lets not forget, any conflict in the middle east drives up oil prices and costs the US possibly even more than we'd have ever spent on this war.
"The US is a massive welfare state" Really? Have you ever been outside of the country? We are one of the MOST conservative industrialized countries on the world.
I'm not sure what you mean by "welfare" but if you mean unemployment benefits, you have no grasp on how economics works. Same for you social security arguments; end SS and you end spending by the elderly which hurts our econ.
Not to mention the fact that the "social policies" are designed to HELP whereas Iraq did nothing but hurt.
I'd also like to see a source for the 1.4kb number - is that since Roosevelt and the great depression? If so, it's a ridiculous statistic.
And no, Hussein was not going after Nukes when we invaded >>
There you go. Look for yourself. I don't make this stuff up. You don't believe it because you cannot hold your beliefs about gov't economics if you know it's true. Misinformation is a serious problem when it comes to our spending, and people need to wake the hell up.
Oh and Hussein was definitely going after nukes when we invaded. It's fact.
You should stop using wikipedia as you're only source of information.
Also wheres the proof, because it seems the US, the people who invaded solely on that fact, can't seem to find it themselves.
Wikipedia is pretty good for directly verifiable facts. If you dont believe something there, you can click the reference button. In the case of the US budget it is: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy10/pdf/fy10-newera.pdf . If you believe that source is inaccurate, I would challenge you to present a more reputable source for the US budget.
How hard was that now.
Just linking a wikipedia page shows nothing. Anyone on the internet can change information on any page and then link that page as proof of fact.
Actually not true. Many pages must be verified by staff before being changed. I have a friend who does a lot of work for Wikipedia. I also have to say that it's the most accessible and well organized place for information. The article they have is really easy to read and is just a good article. Many college professors are fond of Wikipedia for objective information, because it's really really good.
Is that why every teacher in every subject refused wikipedia as a source when I went to school? I do agree with the fact that its an amazingly awesome website for information, just take any information you get and double check it imo.
Ya I tried to change something once on wikipedia years ago and it was reverted within like 2 minutes because there was no source. Wiki's actually pretty good in my opinion, especially for research papers lol XD
On January 06 2011 12:27 Amber[LighT] wrote: Oh wait voting Tea Party was a terrible idea?
As a conservative I'm afraid/nervous to see what's going to happen with this Republican Congress. Between November and now the political atmosphere has been changing and it has become more of a us vs them battle than ever before.
yeah, I'm pretty scared.
Nothing inherently wrong with tea party, but :/
well i don't know about that..
Tea party wants to do good things. Are these things good? Will it turn out well? But just because somebody identifies with tea party ideals doesn't mean they are stupid or evil.
Well, alright
tea party ideals aren't inherently evil. Misthought? maybe The party is, but no more than any other party.
The point obama is moving towards socialism is reasonable, and defendable. But that we're anywhere close to a socialism is not.
Listen. Everyone who identifies the tea party as a single entity should honestly be banned from further discussions because they don't know what they're talking about.
The "tea party" movement is just a name for the general grassroots gathering of moderate and conservative Americans who believe the country is headed in the wrong direction and that current Republicans (and democrats) are incapable of resolving the issue. Tea Parties as they are called are meetings whereby like-minded people share their common interest in changing the direction America is headed in.
The movement is not a unified group seeking election of people it chooses. It is not even a group with a uniform agenda. It is a collection of people with similar, but not identical views on the major problems in America - these being: big gov't, heavy spending, socialist policy shifts, and others. The major emphasis of all tea party movements is a dramatic cut on spending on gov't. It's actually closer to a libertarian movement than a truly right wing one, though what we're seeing is that the candidates who are the most controversial (i.e. heavy right wing religious people) are getting the most press (which, lets face it, is extremely liberal and has a liberal leaning in all reports, with the exception of Fox). Therefore, the public thinks the tea-party movement is full of racists, bigots, religions nuts, and extremists. In fact the movement is 99.9% average Americans who have a legitimate concern about our gov't and the direction its heading.
Wow, where to begin? Let's start by dispelling the (carefully crafted) image of the teaparty as a grassroots organization. For starters, their protests have been funded primarily by the usual Republican politicos using their 501 non-profits to conceal their financing - the Koch brothers via Americans for Prosperity, Dick Armey via FreedomWorks, and Patrick Ruffini via Don'tGO.
As a movement, they have been publicized and given disproportionate media coverage relative to their numbers (http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=3955) by the flagship conservative media networks and punditry (Glenn Beck, Sarah Palin, Bill O'Reilly, Michelle Malkin, Michele Bachmann, Rush Limbaugh...).
Given that a grassroots organization is one that is "driven by the politics of the community, not orchestrated by the traditional power structures," in what sense is the Tea Party a grassroots organization? For your consideration, the definition of astroturf is as follows - "PR or political campaigns that are formally planned by an organization, but are disguised as spontaneous, popular "grassroots" behavior." Given the Tea Party is funded and publicized almost entirely by the GOP old guard, which term sounds more accurate to you?
Simply put, you've bought into the bullshit. Like every other conservative 'grassroots' organization, they adopt a veneer of 'traditional' conservative values by outlining a nostalgic philosophy so vague as to be meaningless in order to both draw support from people like yourself and to obscure the true goal of their organization - the undermining of liberal politics and politicians.
My recommendation? Instead of thinking that every media organization except for FOX is 'extremely liberal' (a tenuous assertion at best which verifies exactly where you get your news from), try obtaining news from multiple sources not reputed for their political biases (FOX, MSNBC, I'm lookin at you). NPR, PBS, BBC, the New Yorker are good starting points.
My grandparents have been to nearly every tea-party event in the DC area. They used to vote democrat 30 years ago. Democrat vs republican no longer means what it used to. It's not about civil rights anymore. It's about socialism vs capitalism and big gov't regulation and centralization vs federalism, small gov't, and the free market.
In what sense have Republicans been in favor of a free market or small government since Eisenhower? Bush the Second presided over the largest expansion of the federal government since FDR. One difference between the parties' economic policy are where your taxes go - towards social programs and regulation (which is not a 4-letter word, btw), or towards subsidies and tax breaks for the wealthy class and their corporations concealed by paying public lip service to small gov't.
Now more than ever the debate is about civil rights - it just pertains to a different minority. The DREAM Act, Arizona SB1070, etc... have established the Republican party as firmly against the civil rights of immigrants.
As for the situation in Congress - the Republicans have a very tough role to fill, and the Democrats have a choice. Obama can pull a Clinton and just cede authority to the Republican congress and let them pass what they want in order to make it look like he's both more moderate (which might make him reelectable, as per Clinton) and like he's accomplishing something. On the other hand he can veto every single thing possible and lock down Congress and create basically what is a 2 year lame duck period where gov't almost shuts down. He can try to spin it like Republicans are blocking the Democrats from doing anything, but I think that time has passed and the American people won't stand for it. (In addition, it actually isn't even possible for that to occur, since all bills will originate within a Republican house and will be killed by democrats).
Obama would be right to call out the Republicans on their obstructionism - the time hasn't passed, if anything it has become more egregious now that they've been emboldened by taking the House.
Are you familiar with the recent Zadroga Bill controversy? In a nutshell, the Republican party decided to filibuster the Zadroga Bill (a bill that would guarantee healthcare funding for 9/11 first responders, who to date have not received a dime in healthcare aid despite their service) until the Bush tax cuts were extended to the top 1% of earners (the Democrats wanted to extend the tax cuts to all Americans making under 250,000$/yr, but Republicans just couldn't stomach it). Unfortunately, the Republicans got their wish.
Either way, the era of democrat control is over, and all they can do now is damage control. If they really want power back, they need to make a massive shift towards the right and become more moderate.
Where have I heard this before?
It's clear that both parties are severely polarized, and IMO the party that chooses to identify itself as moderate first is the one that will have power (as it should be).
If both parties continue to polarize, I think we may finally see a shift from 2 party politics given a strong enough independent candidate.
There will under no circumstances be a shift from 2-party politics - in spite of how 'polarized' you believe the 2 parties are, there is one thing they can agree on - legislative blocks against funding for independents.
I don't know why I responded seriously as your post reads like a Tea Party talking-points memo, but here's hoping you won't dismiss me outright and educate yourself. Before you claim this as liberal spin, all of this is well documented. Check out the wiki on the Tea Party. Cheers.
EDIT:
let a madman research nuclear devices for use on our allies.
On January 06 2011 14:38 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote: If anything, more money needs to be going into DoD research. It creates jobs .
BAD, EVIL ARGUMENT... All government spending creates "jobs".... even a person on unemployment has the "job" of showing up and saying that they were looking for work.
Arguably defense spending pays people for doing something slightly useful.
The issue is how useful it is.
Especially when military superiority is threatening out economic superiority (excess borrowing or taxes required to pay for it)
On January 06 2011 12:27 Amber[LighT] wrote: Oh wait voting Tea Party was a terrible idea?
As a conservative I'm afraid/nervous to see what's going to happen with this Republican Congress. Between November and now the political atmosphere has been changing and it has become more of a us vs them battle than ever before.
yeah, I'm pretty scared.
Nothing inherently wrong with tea party, but :/
well i don't know about that..
Tea party wants to do good things. Are these things good? Will it turn out well? But just because somebody identifies with tea party ideals doesn't mean they are stupid or evil.
Well, alright
tea party ideals aren't inherently evil. Misthought? maybe The party is, but no more than any other party.
The point obama is moving towards socialism is reasonable, and defendable. But that we're anywhere close to a socialism is not.
My grandparents have been to nearly every tea-party event in the DC area. They used to vote democrat 30 years ago. Democrat vs republican no longer means what it used to. It's not about civil rights anymore. It's about socialism vs capitalism and big gov't regulation and centralization vs federalism, small gov't, and the free market.
Oh yes, civil rights is still an issue.
Just ask my (theoretical) boyfriend why we can't get married, why either one of us could be fired from our jobs simply for being ourselves, and why we can't file a joint tax return.
As of 2004: 1138 Rights related to marriage that I'll never have in this kind of political climate, simply for who I am.
If the Republicans were really aiming at restoring the Constitutional foundations of the country, this would be an excellent thing for people who like freedom and liberty. However, a lot of the Republicans will probably continue to expand the Department of Education, take away liberties and freedom to fight 'terrorism', continue to let the fractional reserve banking cartel do anything they want, etc...
So all in all, I don't think the new Congress will accomplish much.
On January 06 2011 14:25 Superiorwolf wrote: The spending on DoD is clearly way too much, and since conservative platform is cutting spending, I don't see why we don't cut in this sector. The United States is not threatened by anything, the chance of a major attack is basically zero, and as such it is really unnecessary to have the excessive budget for defense that we have. Ron Paul says that the United States has to stop massive spending on DoD and imperialistic overseas expenditures and I agree with him completely.
Edit: As Phoenix says above me, we haven't seen a massive threat in 65 years.
One could argue that we haven't seen a massive threat due to our military spending. I would also cut that 65 years figure because clearly no one has ever heard of the Cold War (it wasn't a direct military confrontation but there WAS a threat)
I'm going to link a figure from wikipedia so take this with a grain of salt and feel free to correct me but...
See the massive spike? The US is fine right now, I don't mind our debt levels, as massive as they are because it's entirely manageable atm... but according to the US Government Accountability Office we need to cut our social spending or we're doomed.
This article is from 2002 nearly ten years ago and outlines the problems that are beginning to arise with Social Security. The major problem brought up in the article is the slowing of labor force growth due to people not having babies. In fact, the only reason the US still has a growing labor force is due to immigrants as seen in this article...
In spite of how biased the article is, (Who seriously believes the population growth is going to follow their red line?) the point remains that without immigration American women have been averaging more along the lines of 1.9 babies which increases the burden on the young due to the way social security is structured...
On January 06 2011 11:00 funnybananaman wrote: You can't cut the deficit AND cut taxes AND spend retarded amounts of money funding stupid wars and throwing all our taxpayer money into the military all at the same time.
Too true.
I don't hate the tea party or anything. I believe we need to get out of debt and taxes should be as low as possible, but the wars we are in are by far the biggest burden to the budget. I don't see why conservatives can't see this.
Look at the budgets and spending of this country and try to support your claim. Social policies such as SS, medicare, medicaid, and welfare represent substantially more spending than on defense.
Check out the amount of money spent on the Iraq War. The total cost of the war barely exceeds the cost of just 1 year of social security. Add in medicare, medicaid and other entitlements and compare. If you cut those programs by half you could fund over 5 Iraq wars a year!
The defense budget for 2010 is listed as $664 billion. Compare this to those 3 big entitlement expenditures listed above: $1421 billion!
Do you really think we're in a costly war? We could cut out entitlements for an entire year and that would cover 3 Iraqs. We haven't even been close to full war mode since WWII. If we actually had a serious war that was a direct threat to the American people, we effectively could spend dozens of times more money on it without risking inflation, simply by cutting socialist welfare policies.
People don't realize it, but the US is a massive welfare state. The amount of money we spend on helping out the poor, elderly, disabled, or just outright lazy is astronomical. So, you could reduce the amount of everyone's social security checks by 10% or let a madman research nuclear devices for use on our allies. And lets not forget, any conflict in the middle east drives up oil prices and costs the US possibly even more than we'd have ever spent on this war.
"The US is a massive welfare state" Really? Have you ever been outside of the country? We are one of the MOST conservative industrialized countries on the world.
I'm not sure what you mean by "welfare" but if you mean unemployment benefits, you have no grasp on how economics works. Same for you social security arguments; end SS and you end spending by the elderly which hurts our econ.
Not to mention the fact that the "social policies" are designed to HELP whereas Iraq did nothing but hurt.
I'd also like to see a source for the 1.4kb number - is that since Roosevelt and the great depression? If so, it's a ridiculous statistic.
And no, Hussein was not going after Nukes when we invaded >>
There you go. Look for yourself. I don't make this stuff up. You don't believe it because you cannot hold your beliefs about gov't economics if you know it's true. Misinformation is a serious problem when it comes to our spending, and people need to wake the hell up.
Oh and Hussein was definitely going after nukes when we invaded. It's fact.
You should stop using wikipedia as you're only source of information.
Also wheres the proof, because it seems the US, the people who invaded solely on that fact, can't seem to find it themselves.
Go read the wikileaks thread for proof that Hussein was preparing to have WMDs
On January 06 2011 12:27 Amber[LighT] wrote: Oh wait voting Tea Party was a terrible idea?
As a conservative I'm afraid/nervous to see what's going to happen with this Republican Congress. Between November and now the political atmosphere has been changing and it has become more of a us vs them battle than ever before.
yeah, I'm pretty scared.
Nothing inherently wrong with tea party, but :/
well i don't know about that..
Tea party wants to do good things. Are these things good? Will it turn out well? But just because somebody identifies with tea party ideals doesn't mean they are stupid or evil.
Well, alright
tea party ideals aren't inherently evil. Misthought? maybe The party is, but no more than any other party.
The point obama is moving towards socialism is reasonable, and defendable. But that we're anywhere close to a socialism is not.
Listen. Everyone who identifies the tea party as a single entity should honestly be banned from further discussions because they don't know what they're talking about.
The "tea party" movement is just a name for the general grassroots gathering of moderate and conservative Americans who believe the country is headed in the wrong direction and that current Republicans (and democrats) are incapable of resolving the issue. Tea Parties as they are called are meetings whereby like-minded people share their common interest in changing the direction America is headed in.
The movement is not a unified group seeking election of people it chooses. It is not even a group with a uniform agenda. It is a collection of people with similar, but not identical views on the major problems in America - these being: big gov't, heavy spending, socialist policy shifts, and others. The major emphasis of all tea party movements is a dramatic cut on spending on gov't. It's actually closer to a libertarian movement than a truly right wing one, though what we're seeing is that the candidates who are the most controversial (i.e. heavy right wing religious people) are getting the most press (which, lets face it, is extremely liberal and has a liberal leaning in all reports, with the exception of Fox). Therefore, the public thinks the tea-party movement is full of racists, bigots, religions nuts, and extremists. In fact the movement is 99.9% average Americans who have a legitimate concern about our gov't and the direction its heading.
Wow, where to begin? Let's start by dispelling the (carefully crafted) image of the teaparty as a grassroots organization. For starters, their protests have been funded primarily by the usual Republican politicos using their 501 non-profits to conceal their financing - the Koch brothers via Americans for Prosperity, Dick Armey via FreedomWorks, and Patrick Ruffini via Don'tGO.
As a movement, they have been publicized and given disproportionate media coverage relative to their numbers (http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=3955) by the flagship conservative media networks and punditry (Glenn Beck, Sarah Palin, Bill O'Reilly, Michelle Malkin, Michele Bachmann, Rush Limbaugh...).
Given that a grassroots organization is one that is "driven by the politics of the community, not orchestrated by the traditional power structures," in what sense is the Tea Party a grassroots organization? For your consideration, the definition of astroturf is as follows - "PR or political campaigns that are formally planned by an organization, but are disguised as spontaneous, popular "grassroots" behavior." Given the Tea Party is funded and publicized almost entirely by the GOP old guard, which term sounds more accurate to you?
Simply put, you've bought into the bullshit. Like every other conservative 'grassroots' organization, they adopt a veneer of 'traditional' conservative values by outlining a nostalgic philosophy so vague as to be meaningless in order to both draw support from people like yourself and to obscure the true goal of their organization - the undermining of liberal politics and politicians.
My recommendation? Instead of thinking that every media organization except for FOX is 'extremely liberal' (a tenuous assertion at best which verifies exactly where you get your news from), try obtaining news from multiple sources not reputed for their political biases (FOX, MSNBC, I'm lookin at you). NPR, PBS, BBC, the New Yorker are good starting points.
My grandparents have been to nearly every tea-party event in the DC area. They used to vote democrat 30 years ago. Democrat vs republican no longer means what it used to. It's not about civil rights anymore. It's about socialism vs capitalism and big gov't regulation and centralization vs federalism, small gov't, and the free market.
In what sense have Republicans been in favor of a free market or small government since Eisenhower? Bush the Second presided over the largest expansion of the federal government since FDR. One difference between the parties' economic policy are where your taxes go - towards social programs and regulation (which is not a 4-letter word, btw), or towards subsidies and tax breaks for the wealthy class and their corporations concealed by paying public lip service to small gov't.
Now more than ever the debate is about civil rights - it just pertains to a different minority. The DREAM Act, Arizona SB1070, etc... have established the Republican party as firmly against the civil rights of immigrants.
As for the situation in Congress - the Republicans have a very tough role to fill, and the Democrats have a choice. Obama can pull a Clinton and just cede authority to the Republican congress and let them pass what they want in order to make it look like he's both more moderate (which might make him reelectable, as per Clinton) and like he's accomplishing something. On the other hand he can veto every single thing possible and lock down Congress and create basically what is a 2 year lame duck period where gov't almost shuts down. He can try to spin it like Republicans are blocking the Democrats from doing anything, but I think that time has passed and the American people won't stand for it. (In addition, it actually isn't even possible for that to occur, since all bills will originate within a Republican house and will be killed by democrats).
Obama would be right to call out the Republicans on their obstructionism - the time hasn't passed, if anything it has become more egregious now that they've been emboldened by taking the House.
Are you familiar with the recent Zadroga Bill controversy? In a nutshell, the Republican party decided to filibuster the Zadroga Bill (a bill that would guarantee healthcare funding for 9/11 first responders, who to date have not received a dime in healthcare aid despite their service) until the Bush tax cuts were extended to the top 1% of earners (the Democrats wanted to extend the tax cuts to all Americans making under 250,000$/yr, but Republicans just couldn't stomach it). Unfortunately, the Republicans got their wish.
Either way, the era of democrat control is over, and all they can do now is damage control. If they really want power back, they need to make a massive shift towards the right and become more moderate.
It's clear that both parties are severely polarized, and IMO the party that chooses to identify itself as moderate first is the one that will have power (as it should be).
If both parties continue to polarize, I think we may finally see a shift from 2 party politics given a strong enough independent candidate.
There will under no circumstances be a shift from 2-party politics - in spite of how 'polarized' you believe the 2 parties are, there is one thing they can agree on - legislative blocks against funding for independents.
I don't know why I responded seriously as your post reads like a Tea Party talking-points memo, but here's hoping you won't dismiss me outright and educate yourself. Before you claim this as liberal spin, all of this is well documented. Check out the wiki on the Tea Party. Cheers.
One could argue that we haven't seen a massive threat due to our military spending. I would also cut that 65 years figure because clearly no one has ever heard of the Cold War (it wasn't a direct military confrontation but there WAS a threat)
Yah you're probably right, but if you look at spending levels they of course were much higher during WWII than after. I'm pretty sure they dropped after 1990 as well due to the collapse of the USSR, but I don't have anything to back that up ATM. I'll try to look for something but if someone else can that'd be cool.
The real point is that we spend a good bit to keep ourselves safe, but we clearly can spend a lot more. People should look at history and see that we're well within norms to spend money on national safety at these levels currently.
One could argue that we haven't seen a massive threat due to our military spending. I would also cut that 65 years figure because clearly no one has ever heard of the Cold War (it wasn't a direct military confrontation but there WAS a threat)
Yah you're probably right, but if you look at spending levels they of course were much higher during WWII than after. I'm pretty sure they dropped after 1990 as well due to the collapse of the USSR, but I don't have anything to back that up ATM. I'll try to look for something but if someone else can that'd be cool.
The real point is that we spend a good bit to keep ourselves safe, but we clearly can spend a lot more. People should look at history and see that we're well within norms to spend money on national safety at these levels currently.
I already linked the graph above which shows exactly what you describe in terms of military spending. If you go to the website it gives sources, which are reputable but not as condensed.
On January 06 2011 14:38 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote: If anything, more money needs to be going into DoD research. It creates jobs .
BAD, EVIL ARGUMENT... All government spending creates "jobs".... even a person on unemployment has the "job" of showing up and saying that they were looking for work.
Arguably defense spending pays people for doing something slightly useful.
The issue is how useful it is.
Especially when military superiority is threatening out economic superiority (excess borrowing or taxes required to pay for it)
The value of military research spending, compared to general research spending is difficult to cost.
A large portion of defense research ends up having civilian mixed uses(eg Nuclear Power plants from military nuclear research, the internet from defense communications research, cell phones from military radio technology etc), but it is hard to statistically analyze those benefits.
Another factor you have to look at is the cost of having inferior military technology, if you are involved in a conflict. Basically analyze the costs of having a modern fighter jet/military gizmo x versus the cost of achieving the same goal with ground troops.
I have yet to see good statistics on any of these calculations though I would welcome anyone to provide them.
On January 06 2011 12:27 Amber[LighT] wrote: Oh wait voting Tea Party was a terrible idea?
As a conservative I'm afraid/nervous to see what's going to happen with this Republican Congress. Between November and now the political atmosphere has been changing and it has become more of a us vs them battle than ever before.
yeah, I'm pretty scared.
Nothing inherently wrong with tea party, but :/
well i don't know about that..
Tea party wants to do good things. Are these things good? Will it turn out well? But just because somebody identifies with tea party ideals doesn't mean they are stupid or evil.
Well, alright
tea party ideals aren't inherently evil. Misthought? maybe The party is, but no more than any other party.
The point obama is moving towards socialism is reasonable, and defendable. But that we're anywhere close to a socialism is not.
Listen. Everyone who identifies the tea party as a single entity should honestly be banned from further discussions because they don't know what they're talking about.
The "tea party" movement is just a name for the general grassroots gathering of moderate and conservative Americans who believe the country is headed in the wrong direction and that current Republicans (and democrats) are incapable of resolving the issue. Tea Parties as they are called are meetings whereby like-minded people share their common interest in changing the direction America is headed in.
The movement is not a unified group seeking election of people it chooses. It is not even a group with a uniform agenda. It is a collection of people with similar, but not identical views on the major problems in America - these being: big gov't, heavy spending, socialist policy shifts, and others. The major emphasis of all tea party movements is a dramatic cut on spending on gov't. It's actually closer to a libertarian movement than a truly right wing one, though what we're seeing is that the candidates who are the most controversial (i.e. heavy right wing religious people) are getting the most press (which, lets face it, is extremely liberal and has a liberal leaning in all reports, with the exception of Fox). Therefore, the public thinks the tea-party movement is full of racists, bigots, religions nuts, and extremists. In fact the movement is 99.9% average Americans who have a legitimate concern about our gov't and the direction its heading.
Wow, where to begin? Let's start by dispelling the (carefully crafted) image of the teaparty as a grassroots organization. For starters, their protests have been funded primarily by the usual Republican politicos using their 501 non-profits to conceal their financing - the Koch brothers via Americans for Prosperity, Dick Armey via FreedomWorks, and Patrick Ruffini via Don'tGO.
As a movement, they have been publicized and given disproportionate media coverage relative to their numbers (http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=3955) by the flagship conservative media networks and punditry (Glenn Beck, Sarah Palin, Bill O'Reilly, Michelle Malkin, Michele Bachmann, Rush Limbaugh...).
Given that a grassroots organization is one that is "driven by the politics of the community, not orchestrated by the traditional power structures," in what sense is the Tea Party a grassroots organization? For your consideration, the definition of astroturf is as follows - "PR or political campaigns that are formally planned by an organization, but are disguised as spontaneous, popular "grassroots" behavior." Given the Tea Party is funded and publicized almost entirely by the GOP old guard, which term sounds more accurate to you?
Simply put, you've bought into the bullshit. Like every other conservative 'grassroots' organization, they adopt a veneer of 'traditional' conservative values by outlining a nostalgic philosophy so vague as to be meaningless in order to both draw support from people like yourself and to obscure the true goal of their organization - the undermining of liberal politics and politicians.
My recommendation? Instead of thinking that every media organization except for FOX is 'extremely liberal' (a tenuous assertion at best which verifies exactly where you get your news from), try obtaining news from multiple sources not reputed for their political biases (FOX, MSNBC, I'm lookin at you). NPR, PBS, BBC, the New Yorker are good starting points.
My grandparents have been to nearly every tea-party event in the DC area. They used to vote democrat 30 years ago. Democrat vs republican no longer means what it used to. It's not about civil rights anymore. It's about socialism vs capitalism and big gov't regulation and centralization vs federalism, small gov't, and the free market.
In what sense have Republicans been in favor of a free market or small government since Eisenhower? Bush the Second presided over the largest expansion of the federal government since FDR. One difference between the parties' economic policy are where your taxes go - towards social programs and regulation (which is not a 4-letter word, btw), or towards subsidies and tax breaks for the wealthy class and their corporations concealed by paying public lip service to small gov't.
Now more than ever the debate is about civil rights - it just pertains to a different minority. The DREAM Act, Arizona SB1070, etc... have established the Republican party as firmly against the civil rights of immigrants.
As for the situation in Congress - the Republicans have a very tough role to fill, and the Democrats have a choice. Obama can pull a Clinton and just cede authority to the Republican congress and let them pass what they want in order to make it look like he's both more moderate (which might make him reelectable, as per Clinton) and like he's accomplishing something. On the other hand he can veto every single thing possible and lock down Congress and create basically what is a 2 year lame duck period where gov't almost shuts down. He can try to spin it like Republicans are blocking the Democrats from doing anything, but I think that time has passed and the American people won't stand for it. (In addition, it actually isn't even possible for that to occur, since all bills will originate within a Republican house and will be killed by democrats).
Obama would be right to call out the Republicans on their obstructionism - the time hasn't passed, if anything it has become more egregious now that they've been emboldened by taking the House.
Are you familiar with the recent Zadroga Bill controversy? In a nutshell, the Republican party decided to filibuster the Zadroga Bill (a bill that would guarantee healthcare funding for 9/11 first responders, who to date have not received a dime in healthcare aid despite their service) until the Bush tax cuts were extended to the top 1% of earners (the Democrats wanted to extend the tax cuts to all Americans making under 250,000$/yr, but Republicans just couldn't stomach it). Unfortunately, the Republicans got their wish.
Either way, the era of democrat control is over, and all they can do now is damage control. If they really want power back, they need to make a massive shift towards the right and become more moderate.
It's clear that both parties are severely polarized, and IMO the party that chooses to identify itself as moderate first is the one that will have power (as it should be).
If both parties continue to polarize, I think we may finally see a shift from 2 party politics given a strong enough independent candidate.
There will under no circumstances be a shift from 2-party politics - in spite of how 'polarized' you believe the 2 parties are, there is one thing they can agree on - legislative blocks against funding for independents.
I don't know why I responded seriously as your post reads like a Tea Party talking-points memo, but here's hoping you won't dismiss me outright and educate yourself. Before you claim this as liberal spin, all of this is well documented. Check out the wiki on the Tea Party. Cheers.
let a madman research nuclear devices for use on our allies.
Ohhh, so you are trolling.
Thank you for spelling out how foolish it is to believe the Tea Party is some grassroots movement and not a fully endorsed Republican operation.
You do have a good point regarding the tea party, and I believe it is easy to draw your conclusions given a lack of understanding of proper cause and effect. The Tea Party movement is still driven by the motivations of Americans to see our gov't not go the direction Barrack Obama was leading it. However, any movement needs funding, and the fact is there's a lot of money in the GOP that they'd gladly give to see Obama destroyed and the democrats taken out. It wasn't that the GOP created the movement, it was that the movement enlisted the GOP.
Of course at this point they are rather indiscernible, so your sentiments regarding them are still largely justified.
Nothing is truly independent in American politics.
On January 06 2011 14:25 Superiorwolf wrote: The spending on DoD is clearly way too much, and since conservative platform is cutting spending, I don't see why we don't cut in this sector. The United States is not threatened by anything, the chance of a major attack is basically zero, and as such it is really unnecessary to have the excessive budget for defense that we have. Ron Paul says that the United States has to stop massive spending on DoD and imperialistic overseas expenditures and I agree with him completely.
Edit: As Phoenix says above me, we haven't seen a massive threat in 65 years.
A good reason why we haven't seen a major threat in 15 years(I would call the soviet union a fairly major threat, we were close to global thermonuclear war on many occasions), is our defense spending. We don't magically have the worlds most powerful army by spending nothing, and defense technology is not acquired over-night.
Non operational DoD spending has already been cut majorly. The DDG-1000 program was scaled back to a few ships. The F-22 program was majorly scaled back. The next generation bomber programs were canceled. The future warrior systems programs were delayed. I don't know what more cuts you can ask for? Pretty-much all the money is going into replacing things that are so old they can no longer be retrofitted, and active operations.
My family, and many families of my friends in the area work in the defense sector. Defense research is getting massive cutbacks already. It is much harder to cut back the size of a standing army overnight, and it is also extremely dangerous to cut back on task forces and operational military.
However, the cutting of defense research has the most profound and lasting effects on our ability to stay in power as the #1 military. Remember, china has way more people, and a bigger standing army.
If anything, more money needs to be going into DoD research. It creates jobs and it helps secure our position as the globally dominant military. Also, it's far less money than people think. We could spend 10x what we do on military research and development and it'd be a fairly small overall budget increase.
There's a limit to how useful some of these projects can be and pork barrel spending has been associated with some defense spending.
A question that begs to be asked is that in this post-Cold War world of vast stockpiles of nuclear weapons and globalized economies: How important is a conventional army?
On January 06 2011 15:04 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote: SNIP The real point is that we spend a good bit to keep ourselves safe, but we clearly can spend a lot more. People should look at history and see that we're well within norms to spend money on national safety at these levels currently.
I agree whole-heartedly with this point, in spite of my disagreement with how you portrayed the Tea Party earlier as something other than a Republican front.
On January 06 2011 14:38 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote: If anything, more money needs to be going into DoD research. It creates jobs .
BAD, EVIL ARGUMENT... All government spending creates "jobs".... even a person on unemployment has the "job" of showing up and saying that they were looking for work.
Arguably defense spending pays people for doing something slightly useful.
The issue is how useful it is.
Especially when military superiority is threatening out economic superiority (excess borrowing or taxes required to pay for it)
Well, you're right on some level.
HOWEVER, in this particular case there is one niche that military spending does excel in over private sector. Military contracting for classified level work can only be funded by the gov't. The private sector is not allowed to do some things, nor is there a big demand for them). In this case increases military R&D funding actually does yield a net increase in jobs.
In EVERY SINGLE OTHER CASE you are correct though.
edit:
I should clarify. Military R&D creates unique jobs for a unique demand. The funding could in theory be spent elsewhere and still create jobs. However, in all other situations private funding could create those same jobs. In this way military R&D is not "wasted" money taken from the private sector and thrown into bureaucracy.
However, some poster above me has mentioned a tie to pork spending in the defense budget. I wouldn't exactly call it pork, but there is definitely a large amount of waste spending due to bureaucracy in general. This I cannot defend, and it has to be weighed vs the benefits of the unique job sector R&D provides for. No such thing as a free lunch =[
On January 06 2011 15:11 thehitman wrote: When the new congress cuts military spending it will be a good sign. Otherwise all these new legislation's are crap.
If the USA are to survive and all non politically engaged economists say so, they must stop the wars.
If the USA pulled out of Iraq, Afghanistan, Korea and Columbia it would cut the expenditure by about 15%
If USA closed all their military bases and returned all soldiers home it would cut 25% of the expenditure.
And if the US cut entitlement spending by 5-15% it would have the same effect on the budget.
However, I do think the idea of abandoning a conventional military is a good idea Replace with
-Nukes to fight Nation states
-"Police Infantry" for fighting non-nation state groups in weak nation states (with solid air/drone support)... However this would still be very expensive... as it would require multiple well trained+equipped individuals.
On January 06 2011 15:11 thehitman wrote: When the new congress cuts military spending it will be a good sign. Otherwise all these new legislation's are crap.
If the USA are to survive and all non politically engaged economists say so, they must stop the wars.
If the USA pulled out of Iraq, Afghanistan, Korea and Columbia it would cut the expenditure by about 15%
If USA closed all their military bases and returned all soldiers home it would cut 25% of the expenditure.
And if the US cut entitlement spending by 5-15% it would have the same effect on the budget.
However, I do think the idea of abandoning a conventional military is a good idea Replace with
-Nukes to fight Nation states
-"Police Infantry" for fighting non-nation state groups in weak nation states (with solid air/drone support)... However this would still be very expensive... as it would require multiple well trained+equipped individuals.
A conventional military is required for many reasons:
Occupation and assistance: We cannot give aid to our allies or give aid in foreign disasters without a conventional military. We also cannot actually man our holdings in other parts of the world. If we want to push back China out of South Korea, we cannot do that with nukes.
Nukes = gg:
You cannot rely on nukes as your only deterrent. No nation wants to commit to using them. If we have no conventional army, we have no way to deter enemeis from taking small bites at us repeatedly. We cannot respond to such aggression with nuclear force, so we'd be forced to take a loss for no reason. In addition, nukes are an awfully heavy solution to any war, and even a war hawk is going to be cautious about using one ever.
Tactical strikes:
It is really hard to take out a specific terrorist camp without leveling a city with a nuke. You need conventional forces to take out key targets and perform small scale assaults. In the end, if you wanted to only rely on nukes you'd just be blanketing a country with them to take out every military target you need to take out. That's no way to win a war (unless it's against zerg).
Edit:
It's like trying to defend all your expansions with nukes, and hit nydus worms in your allies' bases without hurting them with nukes. Try it sometime and tell me how that one goes. =D
On January 06 2011 15:11 thehitman wrote: When the new congress cuts military spending it will be a good sign. Otherwise all these new legislation's are crap.
If the USA are to survive and all non politically engaged economists say so, they must stop the wars.
If the USA pulled out of Iraq, Afghanistan, Korea and Columbia it would cut the expenditure by about 15%
If USA closed all their military bases and returned all soldiers home it would cut 25% of the expenditure.
And if the US cut entitlement spending by 5-15% it would have the same effect on the budget.
However, I do think the idea of abandoning a conventional military is a good idea Replace with
-Nukes to fight Nation states
-"Police Infantry" for fighting non-nation state groups in weak nation states (with solid air/drone support)... However this would still be very expensive... as it would require multiple well trained+equipped individuals.
Hypothetical war with North Korea: nuke them. What an awful foreign policy.
Unfortunately, nobody wants to even touch entitlements because of the political environment today, as they say "talk is easy".
On January 06 2011 13:53 furymonkey wrote: Simply put, USA is much richer than rest of the world, so they also need to spend much higher amount to protect their assets.
That is a 100% baseless notion.
It makes sense to a certain extent. We have more stuff, so we can spend more to protect it. I think a better argument is because we disclose all our defense spending and about no other countries do we actually spend less than it would seem. (Still too much IMO)
It is absolutely ridiculous with not a hint of logic behind it. How are our assets being threatened? How is our military spending protecting our assets?
Sorry but "we got more stuff so we need more stuff to protect our stuff" isn't an acceptable argument.
There actually is an interesting theory, supported by some compelling correlations that could imply the Iraq war was purely about trading oil in USD versus Euro's, and future energy blockading of Pakistan via regional control of Eurasian pipelines . You could Google it to get many sites but I will list a few below ,
On January 06 2011 15:11 thehitman wrote: When the new congress cuts military spending it will be a good sign. Otherwise all these new legislation's are crap.
If the USA are to survive and all non politically engaged economists say so, they must stop the wars.
If the USA pulled out of Iraq, Afghanistan, Korea and Columbia it would cut the expenditure by about 15%
If USA closed all their military bases and returned all soldiers home it would cut 25% of the expenditure.
And if the US cut entitlement spending by 5-15% it would have the same effect on the budget.
However, I do think the idea of abandoning a conventional military is a good idea Replace with
-Nukes to fight Nation states
-"Police Infantry" for fighting non-nation state groups in weak nation states (with solid air/drone support)... However this would still be very expensive... as it would require multiple well trained+equipped individuals.
A conventional military is required for many reasons:
Occupation and assistance: We cannot give aid to our allies or give aid in foreign disasters without a conventional military. We also cannot actually man our holdings in other parts of the world. If we want to push back China out of South Korea, we cannot do that with nukes.
I disagree... we could definitely push China out of south Korea with Nukes... or at least the threat of nukes. provided we gave sufficient warning to China before they moved into South Korea.
A full conventional military action between nuclear powers is likely to become a nuclear war anyways.
A nonnuclear power would definitely be deterred.
On January 06 2011 15:31 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote:
You cannot rely on nukes as your only deterrent. No nation wants to commit to using them. If we have no conventional army, we have no way to deter enemeis from taking small bites at us repeatedly. We cannot respond to such aggression with nuclear force, so we'd be forced to take a loss for no reason. In addition, nukes are an awfully heavy solution to any war, and even a war hawk is going to be cautious about using one ever.
"Small bites" that consist of conventional enemy forces could definitely be countered by nukes
On January 06 2011 15:31 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote:
It is really hard to take out a specific terrorist camp without leveling a city with a nuke. You need conventional forces to take out key targets and perform small scale assaults. In the end, if you wanted to only rely on nukes you'd just be blanketing a country with them to take out every military target you need to take out. That's no way to win a war (unless it's against zerg).
If the enemy is attacking in a non conventional way, ie guerilla forces/terrorists.... then conventional forces are not what you want, you want those "Police Infantry"... people that know which 'civilian' to shoot, and the way to have them shot.
Basically any Country using conventional military forces can be safely handled with nukes Any Country using nukes can Only be safely handled with nukes
Organizations (including countries) using non conventional warfare such as terrorism/guerilla warfare should be handled differently... and a conventional military isn't what is needed in that case. What you need is a militarized version of a police force.
Hypothetical war with North Korea: nuke them. What an awful foreign policy
Why?... if it has been previously stated that that would be our response... The "local ally" South Korea would still have their own conventional forces.
You wouldn't necessarily only have ICBMs either... and you wouldn't have to drop them all at once either...one per day until the survivors surrender.
Both the "Nuclear" portion and the "Police" portion of the military would have many things similar to current conventional forces.... "Nuclear" would need: fighters/nuclear bombers/carriers/subs for more tactical nukes on minor conventional powers "Police" would need armored transports (in land, air, and sea), gunships, drones
On January 06 2011 15:11 thehitman wrote: When the new congress cuts military spending it will be a good sign. Otherwise all these new legislation's are crap.
If the USA are to survive and all non politically engaged economists say so, they must stop the wars.
If the USA pulled out of Iraq, Afghanistan, Korea and Columbia it would cut the expenditure by about 15%
If USA closed all their military bases and returned all soldiers home it would cut 25% of the expenditure.
And if the US cut entitlement spending by 5-15% it would have the same effect on the budget.
However, I do think the idea of abandoning a conventional military is a good idea Replace with
-Nukes to fight Nation states
-"Police Infantry" for fighting non-nation state groups in weak nation states (with solid air/drone support)... However this would still be very expensive... as it would require multiple well trained+equipped individuals.
A conventional military is required for many reasons:
Occupation and assistance: We cannot give aid to our allies or give aid in foreign disasters without a conventional military. We also cannot actually man our holdings in other parts of the world. If we want to push back China out of South Korea, we cannot do that with nukes.
I disagree... we could definitely push China out of south Korea with Nukes... or at least the threat of nukes. provided we gave sufficient warning to China before they moved into South Korea.
A full conventional military action between nuclear powers is likely to become a nuclear war anyways.
You cannot rely on nukes as your only deterrent. No nation wants to commit to using them. If we have no conventional army, we have no way to deter enemeis from taking small bites at us repeatedly. We cannot respond to such aggression with nuclear force, so we'd be forced to take a loss for no reason. In addition, nukes are an awfully heavy solution to any war, and even a war hawk is going to be cautious about using one ever.
"Small bites" that consist of conventional enemy forces could definitely be countered by nukes
It is really hard to take out a specific terrorist camp without leveling a city with a nuke. You need conventional forces to take out key targets and perform small scale assaults. In the end, if you wanted to only rely on nukes you'd just be blanketing a country with them to take out every military target you need to take out. That's no way to win a war (unless it's against zerg).
If the enemy is attacking in a non conventional way, ie guerilla forces/terrorists.... then conventional forces are not what you want, you want those "Police Infantry"... people that know which 'civilian' to shoot, and the way to have them shot.
Basically any Country using conventional military forces can be safely handled with nukes Any Country using nukes can Only be safely handled with nukes
Organizations (including countries) using non conventional warfare such as terrorism/guerilla warfare should be handled differently... and a conventional military isn't what is needed in that case. What you need is a militarized version of a police force.
Then what was Vietnam? Why didn't we just use nukes? How do you fight something like that without conventional troops?
Also the US does not have a policy of using nukes against non nuclear threats just because we can. I don't think that's about to change.
On January 06 2011 15:11 thehitman wrote: When the new congress cuts military spending it will be a good sign. Otherwise all these new legislation's are crap.
If the USA are to survive and all non politically engaged economists say so, they must stop the wars.
If the USA pulled out of Iraq, Afghanistan, Korea and Columbia it would cut the expenditure by about 15%
If USA closed all their military bases and returned all soldiers home it would cut 25% of the expenditure.
And if the US cut entitlement spending by 5-15% it would have the same effect on the budget.
However, I do think the idea of abandoning a conventional military is a good idea Replace with
-Nukes to fight Nation states
-"Police Infantry" for fighting non-nation state groups in weak nation states (with solid air/drone support)... However this would still be very expensive... as it would require multiple well trained+equipped individuals.
A conventional military is required for many reasons:
Occupation and assistance: We cannot give aid to our allies or give aid in foreign disasters without a conventional military. We also cannot actually man our holdings in other parts of the world. If we want to push back China out of South Korea, we cannot do that with nukes.
I disagree... we could definitely push China out of south Korea with Nukes... or at least the threat of nukes. provided we gave sufficient warning to China before they moved into South Korea.
A full conventional military action between nuclear powers is likely to become a nuclear war anyways.
A nonnuclear power would definitely be deterred.
On January 06 2011 15:31 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote:
You cannot rely on nukes as your only deterrent. No nation wants to commit to using them. If we have no conventional army, we have no way to deter enemeis from taking small bites at us repeatedly. We cannot respond to such aggression with nuclear force, so we'd be forced to take a loss for no reason. In addition, nukes are an awfully heavy solution to any war, and even a war hawk is going to be cautious about using one ever.
"Small bites" that consist of conventional enemy forces could definitely be countered by nukes
On January 06 2011 15:31 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote:
It is really hard to take out a specific terrorist camp without leveling a city with a nuke. You need conventional forces to take out key targets and perform small scale assaults. In the end, if you wanted to only rely on nukes you'd just be blanketing a country with them to take out every military target you need to take out. That's no way to win a war (unless it's against zerg).
If the enemy is attacking in a non conventional way, ie guerilla forces/terrorists.... then conventional forces are not what you want, you want those "Police Infantry"... people that know which 'civilian' to shoot, and the way to have them shot.
Basically any Country using conventional military forces can be safely handled with nukes Any Country using nukes can Only be safely handled with nukes
Organizations (including countries) using non conventional warfare such as terrorism/guerilla warfare should be handled differently... and a conventional military isn't what is needed in that case. What you need is a militarized version of a police force.
Then what was Vietnam? Why didn't we just use nukes? How do you fight something like that without conventional troops?
Also the US does not have a policy of using nukes against non nuclear threats just because we can. I don't think that's about to change.
Well the US has never said they Won't use nukes against a nonnuclear threat... they never said they would though.
And Vietnam was the failure of a conventional force v. a guerilla war. The "Police" portion would be handling that... and would be very similar to conventional forces... but would have to be much more infantry centered, and equipped/trained in a totally different way.
But that is how they should be structured, not around fighting battles, but at killing/capturing criminals in incredibly hostile territory... in both Iraq and Afghanistan we are not at war with any governmental organizations.... so we are not dealing with conventional war.
The fail was a stimulus that didn't create a new carrier group, stopped production on f-22, and failed to create any jobs. Young people are hurt the most in this economy, so a stimulus that paid unemployed people to exercise would have been better.
I don't know how this became a discussion of the merits of a military armed only with nuclear payloads, but try to consider that military as an extension of foreign policy and you may see how utterly inflexible it is in its applications and benefits. It is essentially only going to maintain deterrence. When applied to live targets it will create environmental externalities, unprecedented ill will, and a new precedent of applied nuclear arms as a policy tool, multiplying the consequences in the future. Imagine a situation where an ailing hegemon is now seen as an imminent threat by all other states, some of which are armed with instant genocide weapons that the hegemon itself has declared open season in using.
OMG guys, I can't bear the though of having a balanced budget, and a monetary system that doesn't get to print money for their friends with no accountability. The world will be in chaos!
On January 06 2011 16:19 EchOne wrote: I don't know how this became a discussion of the merits of a military armed only with nuclear payloads, but try to consider that military as an extension of foreign policy and you may see how utterly inflexible it is in its applications and benefits. It is essentially only going to maintain deterrence. When applied to live targets it will create environmental externalities, unprecedented ill will, and a new precedent of applied nuclear arms as a policy tool, multiplying the consequences in the future. Imagine a situation where an ailing hegemon is now seen as an imminent threat by all other states, some of which are armed with instant genocide weapons that the hegemon itself has declared open season in using.
I'm almost laughing at the ridiculousness of a situation like that, yet people actually come up with these ideas?
To the guy who said the Democrat "era" was only two years, they were in control of Congress since 2006.
I think that the free market can allocate money better than the government, plain and simple.
If government spending creates jobs, then what happened with the stimulus? I know you will argue "pulled us back from the brink blah blah blah", but honestly, the bill was just a trillion dollar pork bill. I still don't think they have spent most of it. Wonder why that is, huh.
Idk, the liberal arguments for most things don't compute with my brain for some reason. It seems that they all want "class warfare" and "poor vs. rich" mentalities about everything. I honestly don't want "rich" people to be taxed more. I work for a small business run by two older guys (construction company), and you think taxing them more will help them hire more and expand??
Helping the poor is another issue for me. Why should the government do it? Do you really think African-American's poverty demographics have shifted in the past 50 years? They have probably gotten worse. Its almost like the Dems want to tell them (although more covertly, obviously) "Hey, guess what guys, vote us in, and we will pay you to not work!" Pretty sweet deal if you can get it I guess.
So basically, what I'm saying is....make government smaller. The people will make things right (if we can/deserve to), not the government. I'm just praying everyone with an "R" by their name doesn't blow it this time. Seems like we have a younger/more libertarian leaning group than in year's past. I'm counting on people like Marco Rubio, Paul Ryan, Allen West, etc. to do what they promised. I will fight them tooth and nail if they don't.
On January 06 2011 16:27 Scruffy wrote: To the guy who said the Democrat "era" was only two years, they were in control of Congress since 2006.
I think that the free market can allocate money better than the government, plain and simple.
If government spending creates jobs, then what happened with the stimulus? I know you will argue "pulled us back from the brink blah blah blah", but honestly, the bill was just a trillion dollar pork bill. I still don't think they have spent most of it. Wonder why that is, huh.
Idk, the liberal arguments for most things don't compute with my brain for some reason. It seems that they all want "class warfare" and "poor vs. rich" mentalities about everything. I honestly don't want "rich" people to be taxed more. I work for a small business run by two older guys (construction company), and you think taxing them more will help them hire more and expand??
Helping the poor is another issue for me. Why should the government do it? Do you really think African-American's poverty demographics have shifted in the past 50 years? They have probably gotten worse. Its almost like the Dems want to tell them (although more covertly, obviously) "Hey, guess what guys, vote us in, and we will pay you to not work!" Pretty sweet deal if you can get it I guess.
So basically, what I'm saying is....make government smaller. The people will make things right (if we can/deserve to), not the government. I'm just praying everyone with an "R" by their name doesn't blow it this time. Seems like we have a younger/more libertarian leaning group than in year's past. I'm counting on people like Marco Rubio, Paul Ryan, Allen West, etc. to do what they promised. I will fight them tooth and nail if they don't.
That was one of the most logical and well reasoned posts I've seen on these forums.
On January 06 2011 16:24 NATO wrote: OMG guys, I can't bear the though of having a balanced budget, and a monetary system that doesn't get to print money for their friends with no accountability. The world will be in chaos!
Hey, don't you know those unions deserved more money than everyone else.
On January 06 2011 16:27 Scruffy wrote: I think that the free market can allocate money better than the government, plain and simple.
In most cases the free market can allocate resources better than a government. However there are some situations where government can out perform the private sector.
One example of this is health care. The government run health care systems throughout the world perform much more efficiently than the US privately run system.
Just compare health care costs in the US to any other country in the world:
HMO and pharmaceutical companies are using the extra money to generate large profits for themselves.
In the long run, the US could save itself lots of money by having everyone pay a tax for health care, and then having health care provided by the government to everyone. The UK and Australia both provide free health care and they both run at around 9% of GDP. The US is up near 15% and growing.
This is why I don't understand why people are against health care reforms. Not only would they help people who can't afford health insurance, but they would reduce overall spending in the long run.
On January 06 2011 15:09 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote: You do have a good point regarding the tea party, and I believe it is easy to draw your conclusions given a lack of understanding of proper cause and effect.
Nah, wrong again. I suppose if you're very generous in where you draw the line between libertarian protesting and Tea Party activism you could interpret the funding as an effect of the movement. However, the facts don't seem to bear that out.
Here's what we know - following Rick Santelli's CNBC rant against 'subsidizing losers' mortgages' in which he called for a 'Chicago tea-party'... "...the movement was first inspired to coalesce under the collective banner of "Tea Party". By the next day, guests on Fox News had already begun to mention this new "Tea Party."
That seems pretty conclusive to me. Disparate libertarian movements all of a sudden had a name and national publicity through FOX and sympathetic punditry - you could call them the precursors of the tea-party movement, but the day after they became the Tea Party they had partisan institutional backing stronger than any other protest group in America. Hell, even the organization's name was jacked from a talking head's rant on CNBC. That doesn't lend credibility to the grassroots nature of an organization if you ask me.
You have backpedaled admirably, and I believe it is conscionable to do so when you have no knowledge on the topic.
In most cases the free market can allocate resources better than a government.
This is true in most cases where profit motive leads business to act in ways that do not oppose consumer interests. When it doesn't (healthcare, social / economic policy, most inelastic goods), government seems to do a much better job.
You're absolutely correct about HMO's bilking the populace - it's a shame our politicians are funded in large part by their donations, otherwise they might stop propagating the myth that we have "the BEST healthcare system in the WORLD (cuz we're 'MURRICA!!)" and we might start cleaning this mess up.
On January 06 2011 16:27 Scruffy wrote: I think that the free market can allocate money better than the government, plain and simple.
In most cases the free market can allocate resources better than a government. However there are some situations where government can out perform the private sector.
One example of this is health care. The government run health care systems throughout the world perform much more efficiently than the US privately run system.
Just compare health care costs in the US to any other country in the world:
HMO and pharmaceutical companies are using the extra money to generate large profits for themselves.
In the long run, the US could save itself lots of money by having everyone pay a tax for health care, and then having health care provided by the government to everyone. The UK and Australia both provide free health care and they both run at around 9% of GDP. The US is up near 15% and growing.
This is why I don't understand why people are against health care reforms. Not only would they help people who can't afford health insurance, but they would reduce overall spending in the long run.
Well unfortunately, my friend, my government isn't very good at anything. I would rather pay MORE for better healthcare than less for shitty. They blew the healthcare problem up so people would be worried. I think they are using like 10 years of taxes to pay for 7 years of spending.
How can a govt bureaucracy be more efficient than a competitive business? It can't. And the "outrageous" profit margins are less than 5 percent.
Seriously? The reason the US health care costs are so high is because we eat too much and they won't let us buy insurance across state lines. Also, many insurance companies pay for cancer treatments and the like while they are denied in places like the UK.
On January 06 2011 16:27 Scruffy wrote: I think that the free market can allocate money better than the government, plain and simple.
In most cases the free market can allocate resources better than a government. However there are some situations where government can out perform the private sector.
One example of this is health care. The government run health care systems throughout the world perform much more efficiently than the US privately run system.
Just compare health care costs in the US to any other country in the world:
HMO and pharmaceutical companies are using the extra money to generate large profits for themselves.
In the long run, the US could save itself lots of money by having everyone pay a tax for health care, and then having health care provided by the government to everyone. The UK and Australia both provide free health care and they both run at around 9% of GDP. The US is up near 15% and growing.
This is why I don't understand why people are against health care reforms. Not only would they help people who can't afford health insurance, but they would reduce overall spending in the long run.
Well unfortunately, my friend, my government isn't very good at anything. I would rather pay MORE for better healthcare than less for shitty. They blew the healthcare problem up so people would be worried. I think they are using like 10 years of taxes to pay for 7 years of spending.
How can a govt bureaucracy be more efficient than a competitive business? It can't. And the "outrageous" profit margins are less than 5 percent.
Seriously? The reason the US health care costs are so high is because we eat too much and they won't let us buy insurance across state lines. Also, many insurance companies pay for cancer treatments and the like while they are denied in places like the UK.
In addition, healthcare costs are massively bloated by outrageous lawsuit practices. Malpractice insurance is ridiculously expensive, and doctors have to spend tons of money on needless tests to cover their asses. What we need is malpractice reform, which allows doctors to do their damn job without paying 200k a year in insurance.
The problem is that the same malpractice lawyers who are raking in millions over these claims are the guys who are lobbying to congress to avoid new laws that would put them out of a job so to speak.
That is the reason the US healthcare system is "broken".
It is still the best healthcare system in the world though. The quality of care, the quality of medication, the variety of doctors and medicines available, and of course the wait times for surgeries and procedures are phenomenal and unobtainable through a gov't health care system.
Sure, there are unethical practices by insurance companies every now and then. However, that's when you (or your employer) switches to a new company. Our coverage shifts all the time. That's the beauty of capitalism. With a gov't system you're stuck with bad healthcare if it's bad.
On January 06 2011 16:27 Scruffy wrote: I'm just praying everyone with an "R" by their name doesn't blow it this time. Seems like we have a younger/more libertarian leaning group than in year's past. I'm counting on people like Marco Rubio, Paul Ryan, Allen West, etc. to do what they promised. I will fight them tooth and nail if they don't.
There are a few new names, yes, but a much, much longer list of names of old-time Republicans who'll have all the say. The people who're still calling the shots in the GOP are the same people that've been running the party since Reagan. The rhetoric isn't any bit different, only a little more trumped up at times.
If you really want to understand right-wing hypocrisy, do two things. One, look at a timeline of the national debt. Two, look at a a brief history of the U.S. progressive income tax.
Republicans' "smaller government" philosophy has amounted to nothing more than a simple tax-cut giveaway for decades now. Our national debt has been ballooning since the Reagan years when he just about cut taxes in half. The national debt accrues interest, making payment of that interest alone one of our government's biggest yearly expenditures - hundreds of billions a year is seriously wasted on what is essentially an out-of-control credit card bill.
A few young Republicans aren't going to do much. In fact, if they're acquainted with their office at all and still call themselves a party Republican, sorry, but your faith is already certainly misfounded.
The Democrats can at least point to the Clinton administration and claim to have some sense of actual fiscal responsibility, however slight. They might not be into cutting all the government programs you don't like (which programs are those, anyways?) but they will at least, occasionally, pay for them.
On January 06 2011 16:27 Scruffy wrote: I'm just praying everyone with an "R" by their name doesn't blow it this time. Seems like we have a younger/more libertarian leaning group than in year's past. I'm counting on people like Marco Rubio, Paul Ryan, Allen West, etc. to do what they promised. I will fight them tooth and nail if they don't.
There are a few new names, yes, but a much, much longer list of names of old-time Republicans who'll have all the say. The people who're still calling the shots in the GOP are the same people that've been running the party since Reagan. The rhetoric isn't any bit different, only a little more trumped up at times.
If you really want to understand right-wing hypocrisy, do two things. One, look at a timeline of the national debt. Two, look at a a brief history of the U.S. progressive income tax.
Republicans' "smaller government" philosophy has amounted to nothing more than a simple tax-cut giveaway for decades now. Our national debt has been ballooning since the Reagan years when he just about cut taxes in half. The national debt accrues interest, making payment of that interest alone one of our government's biggest yearly expenditures - hundreds of billions a year is seriously wasted on what is essentially an out-of-control credit card bill.
A few young Republicans aren't going to do much. In fact, if they're acquainted with their office at all and still call themselves a party Republican, sorry, but your faith is already certainly misfounded.
The Democrats can at least point to the Clinton administration and claim to have some sense of actual fiscal responsibility, however slight. They might not be into cutting all the government programs you don't like (which programs are those, anyways?) but they will at least, occasionally, pay for them.
You should really read up on your facts about deficits and the national debt.
Liberals love to point to the past to things that are currently irrelevant to cover all of their real failures. I don't buy the lies. I'm sorry. I mean you can blame Bush all you want, but it doesn't change the fact that Obama and Congress spent 1 trillion to increase the unemployment rate. When it drops, its usually because people are leaving the workforce (talking about past 2 years or so).
My faith is not misfounded OR misguided. It is fact. The truth is the liberals' natural enemy.
On January 06 2011 16:27 Scruffy wrote: To the guy who said the Democrat "era" was only two years, they were in control of Congress since 2006.
Obviously he was not including 2006 because Bush was still in office. To use "Democrat era" in this context at all is ridiculous given the short time span. It would at least make a little more sense to only use it in reference to the past two years, which is what he seemed to be alluding to.
I think that the free market can allocate money better than the government, plain and simple.
Yes, very plain and very simple.
If government spending creates jobs, then what happened with the stimulus? I know you will argue "pulled us back from the brink blah blah blah", but honestly, the bill was just a trillion dollar pork bill. I still don't think they have spent most of it. Wonder why that is, huh.
That "blah blah blah" is the prevailing view of economists, perhaps you should give it some thought. I'm not quite sure what you mean by that last sentence. It reeks of the type of paranoia seen on the Glenn Beck program. The bill was designed to be implemented over time and not all at once immediately. If you have some strange suspicion regarding that aspect then state it.
Idk, the liberal arguments for most things don't compute with my brain for some reason. It seems that they all want "class warfare" and "poor vs. rich" mentalities about everything.
It's difficult to have a meaningful discussion when people like you simply copy paste talking points that have been repeated a million times. Specifically cite what liberals or liberal arguments you're referring to and what is wrong with them.
I honestly don't want "rich" people to be taxed more. I work for a small business run by two older guys (construction company), and you think taxing them more will help them hire more and expand??
Who stated that it would? You're arguing with no one. Of course it would not create more jobs. However it would go a very long way in helping to pay off the debt which the right wing is all of the sudden so concerned about.
What makes you so certain that a tax cut for those owners would create jobs? I wish that "trickle down effect" played out in reality, it certainly didn't during the eight years in which it was implemented under Bush.
Helping the poor is another issue for me. Why should the government do it?
Altruism? Compassion? Souls?
Do you really think African-American's poverty demographics have shifted in the past 50 years? They have probably gotten worse. Its almost like the Dems want to tell them (although more covertly, obviously) "Hey, guess what guys, vote us in, and we will pay you to not work!" Pretty sweet deal if you can get it I guess.
I can't quite decide: is this vague racism or just plain racism? Stating that black people vote for Democrats so that they can get payed while just sitting around... you are vile.
So basically, what I'm saying is....make government smaller. The people will make things right (if we can/deserve to), not the government.
What utter nonsense. If the federal government is weakened power will not be shifted to the general public. It will be shifted to corporations.
I'm counting on people like Marco Rubio, Paul Ryan, Allen West, etc. to do what they promised. I will fight them tooth and nail if they don't.
Paul Ryan was the deciding vote for Medicare Part D, so obviously he is not libertarian. Allen West is an absolute mad man who has espoused ridiculous views, such as the idea that Obama shouldn't take security precautions when flying into Afghanistan(a type of precaution that every single President has taken). To hang your hopes on those men is just absurd.
It is still the best healthcare system in the world though. The quality of care, the quality of medication, the variety of doctors and medicines available, and of course the wait times for surgeries and procedures are phenomenal and unobtainable through a gov't health care system.
The theoretically best Healthcare that money can buy has about as much to do with a good Healthcare system as invading Iraq to secure peace or Obama with socialism (well, you won't get the last one probably).
Wow... Your so clueless on the materia, it really hurts to read your bullshit.
About every damn statistic on the planet claims that your Healthcare system is fucking expensive and bad at the same time (read: inefficient). Your making up points on the go witheout any facts... my god.
It is still the best healthcare system in the world though. The quality of care, the quality of medication, the variety of doctors and medicines available, and of course the wait times for surgeries and procedures are phenomenal and unobtainable through a gov't health care system.
The theoretically best Healthcare that money can buy has about as much to do with a good Healthcare system as invading Iraq to secure peace or Obama with socialism (well, you won't get the last one probably).
Wow... Your so clueless on the materia, it really hurts to read your bullshit.
About every damn statistic on the planet claims that your Healthcare system is fucking expensive and bad at the same time (read: inefficient). Your making up points on the go witheout any facts... my god.
Your a moron.
Our healthcare system is so good that Canadians often come to America for surgeries and treatments because socialism + health care = insane waits for important treatments. You know what's great about being able to pay for good healthcare? When you have to get treated for your CANCER you can get it before you DIE.
You see the Canadian system with it's wait times and assume it's everywhere like that.
It's not, not at all, they are diffrent in every damn country. All of them have their own (major) issues but every system has it's own "special" little weakpoitns (except one that all have in common... people get older, people want/need better treatment, everything gets more expensive).
Waiting times/lists are something i never heard before reading it here (a few years ago). Something like that does not exist in Switzerland and a lot of other countries.
On January 06 2011 20:34 Velr wrote: See, there is your error.
You see the Canadian system with it's wait times and assume it's everywhere like that.
It's not, not at all, they are diffrent in every damn country. All of them have their own (major) issues but every system has it's own "special" little weakpoitns (except one that all have in common... people get older, people want/need better treatment, everything gets more expensive).
Waiting times/lists are something i never heard before reading it here (a few years ago). Something like that does not exist in Switzerland and a lot of other countries.
Switzerland is a special country. You are neutral, tiny, and fairly well off.
What country is the US more like? Switzerland or Canada?
A system that works for you will never ever ever work for us. Your healthcare system probably wouldn't even serve New York City. Canada is far closer to the US and everything about its system is a disaster. That's more likely what we'd end up with than yours.
Haven't seen a thread that derailed so fast in so many wrong directions. And what a troll parade. Maybe US politics should just be banned for some time, because right now it is pointless to start any kind of thread on this topic.
On January 06 2011 17:18 DTrain wrote: In most cases the free market can allocate resources better than a government. However there are some situations where government can out perform the private sector.
One example of this is health care. The government run health care systems throughout the world perform much more efficiently than the US privately run system.
Just compare health care costs in the US to any other country in the world:
HMO and pharmaceutical companies are using the extra money to generate large profits for themselves.
In the long run, the US could save itself lots of money by having everyone pay a tax for health care, and then having health care provided by the government to everyone. The UK and Australia both provide free health care and they both run at around 9% of GDP. The US is up near 15% and growing.
This is why I don't understand why people are against health care reforms. Not only would they help people who can't afford health insurance, but they would reduce overall spending in the long run.
Cost and effeciency are two completely independent variables, and comparing only costs ignore too many things to even be considered. The US pays the lots of costs for research and licensing for the entire world. Canada on top of that also doesn't allow profits to be made from prescription drugs (mark to market rule). A 5% reduction in US GDP could easily see a raise of 20% or more for other countries, and suddenly the socialized health care is complete garbage.
I doubt the republicans will do anything real. They want to return to 2004 level spending, which is after massive spending increases. I want to return to 1994 levels of spending. If we do that, maybe we won't turn in to 1930 Germany. Republicans are no longer a reversal to Democratic policies which have lead to poverty and mass murder throughout history, but a halt in the march towards social engineering and starvation.
On January 06 2011 16:27 Scruffy wrote: To the guy who said the Democrat "era" was only two years, they were in control of Congress since 2006.
Obviously he was not including 2006 because Bush was still in office. To use "Democrat era" in this context at all is ridiculous given the short time span. It would at least make a little more sense to only use it in reference to the past two years, which is what he seemed to be alluding to.
If government spending creates jobs, then what happened with the stimulus? I know you will argue "pulled us back from the brink blah blah blah", but honestly, the bill was just a trillion dollar pork bill. I still don't think they have spent most of it. Wonder why that is, huh.
That "blah blah blah" is the prevailing view of economists, perhaps you should give it some thought. I'm not quite sure what you mean by that last sentence. It reeks of the type of paranoia seen on the Glenn Beck program. The bill was designed to be implemented over time and not all at once immediately. If you have some strange suspicion regarding that aspect then state it.
Idk, the liberal arguments for most things don't compute with my brain for some reason. It seems that they all want "class warfare" and "poor vs. rich" mentalities about everything.
It's difficult to have a meaningful discussion when people like you simply copy paste talking points that have been repeated a million times. Specifically cite what liberals or liberal arguments you're referring to and what is wrong with them.
I honestly don't want "rich" people to be taxed more. I work for a small business run by two older guys (construction company), and you think taxing them more will help them hire more and expand??
Who stated that it would? You're arguing with no one. Of course it would not create more jobs. However it would go a very long way in helping to pay off the debt which the right wing is all of the sudden so concerned about.
What makes you so certain that a tax cut for those owners would create jobs? I wish that "trickle down effect" played out in reality, it certainly didn't during the eight years in which it was implemented under Bush.
Do you really think African-American's poverty demographics have shifted in the past 50 years? They have probably gotten worse. Its almost like the Dems want to tell them (although more covertly, obviously) "Hey, guess what guys, vote us in, and we will pay you to not work!" Pretty sweet deal if you can get it I guess.
I can't quite decide: is this vague racism or just plain racism? Stating that black people vote for Democrats so that they can get payed while just sitting around... you are vile.
I'm counting on people like Marco Rubio, Paul Ryan, Allen West, etc. to do what they promised. I will fight them tooth and nail if they don't.
Paul Ryan was the deciding vote for Medicare Part D, so obviously he is not libertarian. Allen West is an absolute mad man who has espoused ridiculous views, such as the idea that Obama shouldn't take security precautions when flying into Afghanistan(a type of precaution that every single President has taken). To hang your hopes on those men is just absurd.
This is exactly what I'm talking about. You think the rich, cigar smoking board rooms will take over the world, left unchecked. It obviously has the be a balance between the two.
"I can't quite decide: is this vague racism or just plain racism? Stating that black people vote for Democrats so that they can get payed while just sitting around... you are vile. " How is what I said racist? I know liberals throw around the word "racist" everytime they start to lose an argument (which is quite often, as this thread shows), but please, spare me from your rhetoric. Its not just black people, its all kinds of people. I'm just saying that because 97% of blacks voted for Obama. How come whites don't vote that race proportionate? Makes you think. The typical voter in America asks themselves "who will give me the most stuff/money", and that is who they vote for. This is why we are in this piss poor situation. The problem is you eventually run out of the working man's money...
The whole argument is moot for the most part though. Most liberals seem to think that humans get their rights from government and not from God/allah/whatever you believe in (Atheismo, lol Futurama reference).
Liberals love to point to the past to things that are currently irrelevant to cover all of their real failures. I don't buy the lies. I'm sorry. I mean you can blame Bush all you want, but it doesn't change the fact that Obama and Congress spent 1 trillion to increase the unemployment rate. When it drops, its usually because people are leaving the workforce (talking about past 2 years or so).
My faith is not misfounded OR misguided. It is fact. The truth is the liberals' natural enemy.
No. It's just that your facts come from a rhetorical essay written by the Heritage Foundation.
These are numbers pulled directly from the U.S. Treasury and put into very easy to follow timelines.
As I said earlier, compare the timeline to the changes in the progressive income tax over the past 50 years. Compare it to government spending.
It is clear the national debt started skyrocketing in early Reagan years. This was similarly repeated in the Bush years. Did we multiply government spending in those years? Or were there drastic tax-cuts made?
Edit: For example. The Republicans had control over all 3 branches of government starting in 2002. Go to www.brillig.com/debt_clock/faq.html - look at the numbers following 2002. Why be glad that this party is back in power? They showed the WORST fiscal responsibility in our nation's history. It's inarguable, really. Obama has been in office for not 3 years. The GOP ruined the government's budget for 6 years. And yet you're excited to see them again?
I don't think Obama is doing a good job, personally, nor the Democrats as a whole. But I don't doubt that they have yet to do worse than his predecessors, and there is no reason to be hopeful that this is a brand new Republican party.
"They showed the WORST fiscal responsibility in our nation's history" - about Republicans
Have you not seen how much the Democrats have spent so far? (its 3.4 TRILLION by the way) And if you read the article I posted instead of assuming,
"Fact: The real threat is the projected future debt from entitlement spending." Pretty much sums it up. You think wars are expensive...The US has about 72 trillion in assets for all citizens combined. The problem is that there is 112 trillion in unfunded liabilities.
The economy has grown more than spending has (inflation adjusted) over the years.
"A key lesson for lawmakers: Avoid debt-reduction strategies that would significantly reduce economic growth-thereby preventing significant debt ratio improvement. In particular, tax increases may reduce the nominal debt yet also slow economic growth. The better way to reduce the debt ratio is by combining pro-growth tax policies with spending restraint."
Tell a Democrat to look up restraint in the dictionary. It seems they don't know the definition.
On January 06 2011 20:34 Velr wrote: See, there is your error.
You see the Canadian system with it's wait times and assume it's everywhere like that.
It's not, not at all, they are diffrent in every damn country. All of them have their own (major) issues but every system has it's own "special" little weakpoitns (except one that all have in common... people get older, people want/need better treatment, everything gets more expensive).
Waiting times/lists are something i never heard before reading it here (a few years ago). Something like that does not exist in Switzerland and a lot of other countries.
Switzerland is a special country. You are neutral, tiny, and fairly well off.
What country is the US more like? Switzerland or Canada?
A system that works for you will never ever ever work for us. Your healthcare system probably wouldn't even serve New York City. Canada is far closer to the US and everything about its system is a disaster. That's more likely what we'd end up with than yours.
I know the Swiss system, for obviuos reasons, better than the others. A System which i think would suit the US pretty good because it's run by private insurance companies. But you somehow managed to totally miss my point: The System in about every country is diffrent cause every country has it's own system, in some there are waiting lists, in many not... Some will pay for certain stuff, some not... Some make you pay yourself more, some less...
They got one thing in common: In general they are more efficient than the US system... The fun thing is, on most other topics the right-wing/republicans should/would go for the cheaper method.. Or are they only doing this when it serves their own personal benefit because everything else is facism, socialism or communism?
On January 06 2011 20:34 Velr wrote: See, there is your error.
You see the Canadian system with it's wait times and assume it's everywhere like that.
It's not, not at all, they are diffrent in every damn country. All of them have their own (major) issues but every system has it's own "special" little weakpoitns (except one that all have in common... people get older, people want/need better treatment, everything gets more expensive).
Waiting times/lists are something i never heard before reading it here (a few years ago). Something like that does not exist in Switzerland and a lot of other countries.
Switzerland is a special country. You are neutral, tiny, and fairly well off.
What country is the US more like? Switzerland or Canada?
A system that works for you will never ever ever work for us. Your healthcare system probably wouldn't even serve New York City. Canada is far closer to the US and everything about its system is a disaster. That's more likely what we'd end up with than yours.
I know the Swiss system, for obviuos reasons, better than the others. A System which i think would suit the US pretty good because it's run by private insurance companies. But you somehow managed to totally miss my point: The System in about every country is diffrent cause every country has it's own system, in some there are waiting lists, in many not... Some will pay for certain stuff, some not... Some make you pay yourself more, some less...
They got one thing in common: In general they are more efficient than the US system... The fun thing is, on most other topics the right-wing/republicans should/would go for the cheaper method.. Or are they only doing this when it serves their own personal benefit because everything else is facism, socialism or communism?
How would bankrupting the country with healthcare costs benefit them personally?
On January 06 2011 12:51 Haemonculus wrote: And then there's the flawed notion that Socialism is the big scary terrible horrible awful no good very bad doom-of-the-country in the first place.
Right wingers policy are always designed for an elite. Therefore, they need to scare people so that even people who don't have any interest (98% of the population) vote for them. We had exactly the same with Sarkozy, except that the target is not "socialism" but immigrants. French racism is generated by our governments and our medias so that people vote for policies which fuck them in the ass for the benefit of banks, corporations and their shareholders. But oh, folks, the most important is that we kick arabs out of here, right?
This ideological bullcrap about "socialism" in US is just hilarious. Obama is everything in the world but a socialist. But old good irrational ignorant fear of the "red" is what keep Republican going since 50 years, no reason to stop now even if it doesn't make any sense. Especially when you have brainless zombie army such as Fox News as mainstream medias.
On January 06 2011 12:51 Haemonculus wrote: And then there's the flawed notion that Socialism is the big scary terrible horrible awful no good very bad doom-of-the-country in the first place.
Right wingers policy are always designed for an elite. Therefore, they need to scare people so that even people who don't have any interest (98% of the population) vote for them. We had exactly the same with Sarkozy, except that the target is not "socialism" but immigrants. French racism is generated by our governments and our medias so that people vote for policies which fuck them in the ass for the benefit of banks, corporations and their shareholders. But oh, folks, the most important is that we kick arabs out of here, right?
This ideological bullcrap about "socialism" in US is just hilarious. Obama is everything in the world but a socialist. But old good irrational ignorant fear of the "red" is what keep Republican going since 50 years, no reason to stop now even if it doesn't make any sense. Especially when you have brainless zombie army such as Fox News as mainstream medias.
So obviously it would be better if Fox News didn't exist, right? That way the MSM would be 100% liberal. The main reason Fox News smashes the others in rating because its all conservatives have to watch that isn't absurdly liberal. If you think the fear of communism is all that keeps the conservative movement going, then you obviously know nothing of American politics.
On January 06 2011 16:27 Scruffy wrote: This is exactly what I'm talking about. You think the rich, cigar smoking board rooms will take over the world, left unchecked. It obviously has the be a balance between the two.
Your words, not mine. I was simply telling you a basic fact since you are extremely confused. You spoke as if the balance of power is between the general public and the government, it's not. If the federal government ceased to exist it would not be random citizens in control, it would be major corporations. That's not an opinion, that is plain fact.
How is what I said racist?
You claimed that black people vote for Democrats so that they can sit around while getting paid. That is racist, whether you realize it or not.
I know liberals throw around the word "racist" everytime they start to lose an argument (which is quite often, as this thread shows), but please, spare me from your rhetoric.
You have some nerve claiming that you're winning an argument when you weren't even able to respond to the challenges I made to your last post. You stated something racist so I referred to it as racist, it's as simple as that. You have only yourself to blame for believing in such vile, prejudiced nonsense.
Its not just black people, its all kinds of people. I'm just saying that because 97% of blacks voted for Obama. How come whites don't vote that race proportionate? Makes you think.
Maybe because black people have historically been treated terribly in the United States and this was their first chance to ever elect a black president. That and the fact that the Republican Party abandoned all hope of ever gaining black support with the southern strategy.
The whole argument is moot for the most part though. Most liberals seem to think that humans get their rights from government and not from God/allah/whatever you believe in (Atheismo, lol Futurama reference).
Another baseless assertion, like everything else you post. And how would that make the argument moot? That's totally irrelevant.
That way the MSM would be 100% liberal.
Here, go educate yourself:
/braces for "LOLOL NOAM CHOMSKY? HES SO FAR LEFT"!
On January 07 2011 01:08 Biff The Understudy wrote:
On January 06 2011 12:51 Haemonculus wrote: And then there's the flawed notion that Socialism is the big scary terrible horrible awful no good very bad doom-of-the-country in the first place.
Right wingers policy are always designed for an elite. Therefore, they need to scare people so that even people who don't have any interest (98% of the population) vote for them. We had exactly the same with Sarkozy, except that the target is not "socialism" but immigrants. French racism is generated by our governments and our medias so that people vote for policies which fuck them in the ass for the benefit of banks, corporations and their shareholders. But oh, folks, the most important is that we kick arabs out of here, right?
This ideological bullcrap about "socialism" in US is just hilarious. Obama is everything in the world but a socialist. But old good irrational ignorant fear of the "red" is what keep Republican going since 50 years, no reason to stop now even if it doesn't make any sense. Especially when you have brainless zombie army such as Fox News as mainstream medias.
So obviously it would be better if Fox News didn't exist, right? That way the MSM would be 100% liberal. The main reason Fox News smashes the others in rating because its all conservatives have to watch that isn't absurdly liberal. If you think the fear of communism is all that keeps the conservative movement going, then you obviously know nothing of American politics.
If the only media which you don't find "liberal" is the most disgusting and obscene propagandist shit in the universe, there MAY be a reason. Try to find something else than the conspiracy.
Everytime I watch a minute of Fox News I have nausea and disgust towards humanity. The only thing I have seen which is as disgusting, as manipulative and as fascist than Fox News is totalitarian countries propaganda.
Irrational fears and misinformation is what keeps people voting for republicans. Because there is no reason for someone rationnal who is not a millionaire to vote for policies which sacrify everything to the interest of a few.
It is still the best healthcare system in the world though. The quality of care, the quality of medication, the variety of doctors and medicines available, and of course the wait times for surgeries and procedures are phenomenal and unobtainable through a gov't health care system.
I'm just looking to dispute this claim - numerous by-country rankings often have the United States ranked near the bottom of OECD countries. Unfortunately, being inefficient and being low in quality often go hand-in-hand with healthcare, as because it is inefficient, many people are deprived of it, thus meaning many people aren't being provided for at all. Not being provided for at all implies low quality. You can also dispute this claim by looking at figures such as life expectancy and similar health-related factors, though I could see the arguments against this being valid (American's with "fast-lane behavior".)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WHO's_ranking_of_health_care_systems Granted, this is outdated, however, health care costs since have only risen, and I would guess that quality has stayed relatively equivalent since that years totals. While I understand the method of ranking by the WHO is debatable - i've seen other rankings that have only supported the WHO's conclusions - The united states has a bad health care system. I find it hard to argue against it. Claims that reform will remove quality is your senator taking campaign contributions to fear monger the population.
On January 06 2011 16:27 Scruffy wrote: This is exactly what I'm talking about. You think the rich, cigar smoking board rooms will take over the world, left unchecked. It obviously has the be a balance between the two.
Your words, not mine. I was simply telling you a basic fact since you are extremely confused. You spoke as if the balance of power is between the general public and the government, it's not. If the federal government ceased to exist it would not be random citizens in control, it would be major corporations. That's not an opinion, that is plain fact.
I know liberals throw around the word "racist" everytime they start to lose an argument (which is quite often, as this thread shows), but please, spare me from your rhetoric.
You have some nerve claiming that you're winning an argument when you weren't even able to respond to the challenges I made to your last post. You stated something racist so I referred to it as racist, it's as simple as that. You have only yourself to blame for believing in such vile, prejudiced nonsense.
Its not just black people, its all kinds of people. I'm just saying that because 97% of blacks voted for Obama. How come whites don't vote that race proportionate? Makes you think.
Maybe because black people have historically been treated terribly in the United States and this was their first chance to ever elect a black president. That and the fact that the Republican Party abandoned all hope of ever gaining black support with the southern strategy.
The whole argument is moot for the most part though. Most liberals seem to think that humans get their rights from government and not from God/allah/whatever you believe in (Atheismo, lol Futurama reference).
Another baseless assertion, like everything else you post. And how would that make the argument moot? That's totally irrelevant.
/braces for "LOLOL NOAM CHOMSKY? HES SO FAR LEFT"!
I said there needed to be a balance between powerful corporations and a power-grabbing government. Did you even read what I wrote? Also, I wouldn't consider Noam Chomsky an "education". I have actually seen many documentaries with his speeches/work. I don't think he's totally wrong, but we obviously have some pretty big divisions.
Me telling the truth that there are tons of people, of all races, that recieve tons of govt benefits for free basically does not make me racist. Or maybe it does...?
Is anyone else a little bewildered and disarmed at how genuinely difficult it has become to tell nowadays if someone is a totally serious right-winger or an over-the-top transparent troll? Seriously, you just can't tell anymore. I imagine this must be even harder for the non-Americans who are not used to the brow-beating and mudslinging of American politics.
what started as an attempt to have a reasonable political discussion has deteriorated into a conservative/liberal bashing party with assorted insults to Obama the tea party and a supposedly dumb conservative group at large
On January 07 2011 02:01 Krigwin wrote: Is anyone else a little bewildered and disarmed at how genuinely difficult it has become to tell nowadays if someone is a totally serious right-winger or an over-the-top transparent troll? Seriously, you just can't tell anymore. I imagine this must be even harder for the non-Americans who are not used to the brow-beating and mudslinging of American politics.
Krigwin, I have told you this before I think, and it may be a little hard to swallow but.... believe it or not, there are people out in the world that think differently than you. I'm gonna give that a few minutes to sink in.
I could easily call liberals "trolls", but its pointless, ignorant, and beside the point.
The People get the government they deserve. I wonder, whether Republicans will be able to accomplish anything, or will they get stuck as Democrats did.
Again you're completely unable to defend the points which I challenged. You may as well just say "I give up" instead of responding at all.
On January 07 2011 01:53 Scruffy wrote: I said there needed to be a balance between powerful corporations and a power-grabbing government. Did you even read what I wrote?
No, this is what you said:
So basically, what I'm saying is....make government smaller. The people will make things right (if we can/deserve to), not the government.
I have actually seen many documentaries with his speeches/work. I don't think he's totally wrong, but we obviously have some pretty big divisions.
Then you should know that the ridiculous notion of a liberal media that you asserted earlier is totally false.
Me telling the truth that there are tons of people, of all races, that recieve tons of govt benefits for free basically does not make me racist. Or maybe it does...?
No, this is what you said:
Do you really think African-American's poverty demographics have shifted in the past 50 years? They have probably gotten worse. Its almost like the Dems want to tell them (although more covertly, obviously) "Hey, guess what guys, vote us in, and we will pay you to not work!" Pretty sweet deal if you can get it I guess.
On January 07 2011 02:01 Krigwin wrote: Is anyone else a little bewildered and disarmed at how genuinely difficult it has become to tell nowadays if someone is a totally serious right-winger or an over-the-top transparent troll? Seriously, you just can't tell anymore. I imagine this must be even harder for the non-Americans who are not used to the brow-beating and mudslinging of American politics.
That's true, but sadly I think all of these people are serious.
I don't get why there isn't some sort of way to opt out of things like social security or welfare, in exchange for not having to pay taxes for it. So many people get so riled up about welfare programs, if there was a system like this they'd have no reason to complain since they would have the right to chose whether they'd like welfare in case they ever need it or whether they'd like to take the risk in exchange for less taxes.
I bet that a lot of lower class inexplicably right wing people wouldn't opt out.
Also to people saying Obama is a socialist, I wish there was but a grain of truth in such statements.
On January 07 2011 02:01 Krigwin wrote: Is anyone else a little bewildered and disarmed at how genuinely difficult it has become to tell nowadays if someone is a totally serious right-winger or an over-the-top transparent troll? Seriously, you just can't tell anymore. I imagine this must be even harder for the non-Americans who are not used to the brow-beating and mudslinging of American politics.
Krigwin, I have told you this before I think, and it may be a little hard to swallow but.... believe it or not, there are people out in the world that think differently than you. I'm gonna give that a few minutes to sink in.
I could easily call liberals "trolls", but its pointless, ignorant, and beside the point.
Krigwin is right.
Now, I'll explain you. When you have people who come and tell you that earth was created 6000 years ago, or that the problem of the most capitalist country in the world is that the state is too big and there is no place for business (lol, seriously?), or some racist bullcrap about afro-american who don't want to work (yeah, your post is very racist), it's very very hard to believe that they are serious and are not just trying to piss you off.
Now, I know, people think differently. You see, I'm not a liberal, but I understand liberal thinking. It makes sense, although I have reasons not to share their ideas. That's why I always like talking with liberals. Republican ideas, in an other hand, just mostly don't make any sense at all.
On January 07 2011 02:01 Krigwin wrote: Is anyone else a little bewildered and disarmed at how genuinely difficult it has become to tell nowadays if someone is a totally serious right-winger or an over-the-top transparent troll? Seriously, you just can't tell anymore. I imagine this must be even harder for the non-Americans who are not used to the brow-beating and mudslinging of American politics.
Krigwin, I have told you this before I think, and it may be a little hard to swallow but.... believe it or not, there are people out in the world that think differently than you. I'm gonna give that a few minutes to sink in.
I could easily call liberals "trolls", but its pointless, ignorant, and beside the point.
Krigwin is right.
Now, I'll explain you. When you have people who come and tell you that earth was created 6000 years ago, or that the problem of the most capitalist country in the world is that the state is too big and there is no place for business (lol, seriously?), or some racist bullcrap about afro-american who don't want to work (yeah, your post is very racist), it's very very hard to believe that they are serious and are not just trying to piss you off.
Now, I know, people think differently. You see, I'm not a liberal, but I understand liberal thinking. It makes sense, although I have reasons not to share their ideas. That's why I always like talking with liberals. Republican ideas, in an other hand, just mostly don't make any sense at all.
To us americans, socialism also doesn't make sense because the US prides itself on individualism and individual accomplishment. Collectivist thought is the #1 reason for the majority of the wars that have ever happened. No i'm not a conservative, i'm a libertarian, but just because you have absolutely no knowledge of american thought and philosophy, i'd thought i'd point it out to you. The democrat party here is more conservative than the most conservative party in europe btw. We have no nationalist party since nationalism is a dead idea. Republicans in general are pragmatists which is the problem. Libertarians want real limited government and no foreign intervention and free trade. Republicans simply represent a people who are disillusioned with government and want to enjoy the freedom and prosperity that their grandparents told them about, but don't believe that it is possible so that make concessions such as having a huge army and moderately regulating a central bank. The very small percentage of republicans who are fundamentalist christians that believe in literal 6 day creation make up probably 2-5% of the republican party, however, they are the most vocal and the media really likes to talk about them. Imagine if American's thought that all french people were anarchists, it's basically the same as how french people think of conservative americans.
On January 07 2011 03:00 Biff The Understudy wrote:
On January 07 2011 02:18 Scruffy wrote:
On January 07 2011 02:01 Krigwin wrote: Is anyone else a little bewildered and disarmed at how genuinely difficult it has become to tell nowadays if someone is a totally serious right-winger or an over-the-top transparent troll? Seriously, you just can't tell anymore. I imagine this must be even harder for the non-Americans who are not used to the brow-beating and mudslinging of American politics.
Krigwin, I have told you this before I think, and it may be a little hard to swallow but.... believe it or not, there are people out in the world that think differently than you. I'm gonna give that a few minutes to sink in.
I could easily call liberals "trolls", but its pointless, ignorant, and beside the point.
Krigwin is right.
Now, I'll explain you. When you have people who come and tell you that earth was created 6000 years ago, or that the problem of the most capitalist country in the world is that the state is too big and there is no place for business (lol, seriously?), or some racist bullcrap about afro-american who don't want to work (yeah, your post is very racist), it's very very hard to believe that they are serious and are not just trying to piss you off.
Now, I know, people think differently. You see, I'm not a liberal, but I understand liberal thinking. It makes sense, although I have reasons not to share their ideas. That's why I always like talking with liberals. Republican ideas, in an other hand, just mostly don't make any sense at all.
To us americans, socialism also doesn't make sense because the US prides itself on individualism and individual accomplishment. Collectivist thought is the #1 reason for the majority of the wars that have ever happened. No i'm not a conservative, i'm a libertarian, but just because you have absolutely no knowledge of american thought and philosophy, i'd thought i'd point it out to you. The democrat party here is more conservative than the most conservative party in europe btw. We have no nationalist party since nationalism is a dead idea. Republicans in general are pragmatists which is the problem. Libertarians want real limited government and no foreign intervention and free trade. Republicans simply represent a people who are disillusioned with government and want to enjoy the freedom and prosperity that their grandparents told them about, but don't believe that it is possible so that make concessions such as having a huge army and moderately regulating a central bank. The very small percentage of republicans who are fundamentalist christians that believe in literal 6 day creation make up probably 2-5% of the republican party, however, they are the most vocal and the media really likes to talk about them. Imagine if American's thought that all french people were anarchists, it's basically the same as how french people think of conservative americans.
I have quite a problem with your post, I don't know what to answer because it doesn't answer to mine, and I wonder if you have really read what I have written. It's just irrelevant to what I was saying concerning Scruffy's position and what Krigwin said.
Now that we are there, "collectivism is the n°1 reason for war" made me laugh out loud. I have limited knowledge? Are you sure? Are you really sure?
On January 07 2011 02:56 Attican wrote: I don't get why there isn't some sort of way to opt out of things like social security or welfare, in exchange for not having to pay taxes for it. So many people get so riled up about welfare programs, if there was a system like this they'd have no reason to complain since they would have the right to chose whether they'd like welfare in case they ever need it or whether they'd like to take the risk in exchange for less taxes. .
Because everybody who pays more in taxes for welfare than they receive from it would opt out.
On January 07 2011 03:00 Biff The Understudy wrote:
On January 07 2011 02:18 Scruffy wrote:
On January 07 2011 02:01 Krigwin wrote: Is anyone else a little bewildered and disarmed at how genuinely difficult it has become to tell nowadays if someone is a totally serious right-winger or an over-the-top transparent troll? Seriously, you just can't tell anymore. I imagine this must be even harder for the non-Americans who are not used to the brow-beating and mudslinging of American politics.
Krigwin, I have told you this before I think, and it may be a little hard to swallow but.... believe it or not, there are people out in the world that think differently than you. I'm gonna give that a few minutes to sink in.
I could easily call liberals "trolls", but its pointless, ignorant, and beside the point.
Krigwin is right.
Now, I'll explain you. When you have people who come and tell you that earth was created 6000 years ago, or that the problem of the most capitalist country in the world is that the state is too big and there is no place for business (lol, seriously?), or some racist bullcrap about afro-american who don't want to work (yeah, your post is very racist), it's very very hard to believe that they are serious and are not just trying to piss you off.
Now, I know, people think differently. You see, I'm not a liberal, but I understand liberal thinking. It makes sense, although I have reasons not to share their ideas. That's why I always like talking with liberals. Republican ideas, in an other hand, just mostly don't make any sense at all.
To us americans, socialism also doesn't make sense because the US prides itself on individualism and individual accomplishment. Collectivist thought is the #1 reason for the majority of the wars that have ever happened. No i'm not a conservative, i'm a libertarian, but just because you have absolutely no knowledge of american thought and philosophy, i'd thought i'd point it out to you. The democrat party here is more conservative than the most conservative party in europe btw. We have no nationalist party since nationalism is a dead idea. Republicans in general are pragmatists which is the problem. Libertarians want real limited government and no foreign intervention and free trade. Republicans simply represent a people who are disillusioned with government and want to enjoy the freedom and prosperity that their grandparents told them about, but don't believe that it is possible so that make concessions such as having a huge army and moderately regulating a central bank. The very small percentage of republicans who are fundamentalist christians that believe in literal 6 day creation make up probably 2-5% of the republican party, however, they are the most vocal and the media really likes to talk about them. Imagine if American's thought that all french people were anarchists, it's basically the same as how french people think of conservative americans.
This man spits the truth. I am conservative and libertarian. I see the Republican party as a vehicle to get fresh ideas into government (third parties hardly ever win). Idk, I wish more people would go independent and win, that way labels aren't used as much.
Is it wrong for me to want my country to succeed? I don't think what Obama is/was doing has worked, and I am pretty sure it won't work.
On January 07 2011 03:00 Biff The Understudy wrote:
On January 07 2011 02:18 Scruffy wrote:
On January 07 2011 02:01 Krigwin wrote: Is anyone else a little bewildered and disarmed at how genuinely difficult it has become to tell nowadays if someone is a totally serious right-winger or an over-the-top transparent troll? Seriously, you just can't tell anymore. I imagine this must be even harder for the non-Americans who are not used to the brow-beating and mudslinging of American politics.
Krigwin, I have told you this before I think, and it may be a little hard to swallow but.... believe it or not, there are people out in the world that think differently than you. I'm gonna give that a few minutes to sink in.
I could easily call liberals "trolls", but its pointless, ignorant, and beside the point.
Krigwin is right.
Now, I'll explain you. When you have people who come and tell you that earth was created 6000 years ago, or that the problem of the most capitalist country in the world is that the state is too big and there is no place for business (lol, seriously?), or some racist bullcrap about afro-american who don't want to work (yeah, your post is very racist), it's very very hard to believe that they are serious and are not just trying to piss you off.
Now, I know, people think differently. You see, I'm not a liberal, but I understand liberal thinking. It makes sense, although I have reasons not to share their ideas. That's why I always like talking with liberals. Republican ideas, in an other hand, just mostly don't make any sense at all.
To us americans, socialism also doesn't make sense because the US prides itself on individualism and individual accomplishment. Collectivist thought is the #1 reason for the majority of the wars that have ever happened. No i'm not a conservative, i'm a libertarian, but just because you have absolutely no knowledge of american thought and philosophy, i'd thought i'd point it out to you. The democrat party here is more conservative than the most conservative party in europe btw. We have no nationalist party since nationalism is a dead idea. Republicans in general are pragmatists which is the problem. Libertarians want real limited government and no foreign intervention and free trade. Republicans simply represent a people who are disillusioned with government and want to enjoy the freedom and prosperity that their grandparents told them about, but don't believe that it is possible so that make concessions such as having a huge army and moderately regulating a central bank. The very small percentage of republicans who are fundamentalist christians that believe in literal 6 day creation make up probably 2-5% of the republican party, however, they are the most vocal and the media really likes to talk about them. Imagine if American's thought that all french people were anarchists, it's basically the same as how french people think of conservative americans.
I have quite a problem with your post, I don't know what to answer because it doesn't answer to mine, and I wonder if you have really read what I have written. It's just irrelevant to what I was saying concerning Scruffy's position and what Krigwin said.
Now that we are there, "collectivism is the n°1 reason for war" made me laugh out loud. I have limited knowledge? Are you sure? Are you really sure?
Well, maybe open a history book. Like, once.
No i didn't answer it because there is nothing to answer, but how you responded to them didn't make sense at all. Instead of responding to the question of the intentions of republicans, you respond by saying that republicans make no sense and making huge general blanket statements that only are partially accurate about a significantly small portion of republicans. Republicans themselves are a very divided group. You have fundamentalist christians who only care about the topic of creation/evolution. You have normal christians who only care about abortion and taxes (which is like 50% of republicans). You have atheist republicans who hate taxes and think the government is corrupt. (like 25%) You have people who occasionally vote republican (because their parents do, which is another 25%). Then you have libertarians who will sometimes vote republican since it tends to align closer to libertarians on economic issues during a time of economic recession. The way republicans are portrayed in media is significantly different than how they actually are. Most republicans tend to be families and small business owners since they are generally more affected by taxes than any other group. In the end I really don't care because the republican party cannot last in it's current form. It's too muddled with different opinions. A lot of republicans don't care about issues like marajuana alchohol or even gay marriage as the libertarian influence has become more popular. Eventually the republican party will likely split its ways into a conservative party (for people like palin and bush) and a tea party like movement but will likely adpot libertarian social policy. The democrats are the same way, you have the 10% who actually believe in socialism and then you have the majority who simply believe in a large government and want to implement some domestic policies related to welfare. The democrat party is not nearly as divided as the republican party is.
On January 07 2011 03:00 Biff The Understudy wrote:
On January 07 2011 02:18 Scruffy wrote:
On January 07 2011 02:01 Krigwin wrote: Is anyone else a little bewildered and disarmed at how genuinely difficult it has become to tell nowadays if someone is a totally serious right-winger or an over-the-top transparent troll? Seriously, you just can't tell anymore. I imagine this must be even harder for the non-Americans who are not used to the brow-beating and mudslinging of American politics.
Krigwin, I have told you this before I think, and it may be a little hard to swallow but.... believe it or not, there are people out in the world that think differently than you. I'm gonna give that a few minutes to sink in.
I could easily call liberals "trolls", but its pointless, ignorant, and beside the point.
Krigwin is right.
Now, I'll explain you. When you have people who come and tell you that earth was created 6000 years ago, or that the problem of the most capitalist country in the world is that the state is too big and there is no place for business (lol, seriously?), or some racist bullcrap about afro-american who don't want to work (yeah, your post is very racist), it's very very hard to believe that they are serious and are not just trying to piss you off.
Now, I know, people think differently. You see, I'm not a liberal, but I understand liberal thinking. It makes sense, although I have reasons not to share their ideas. That's why I always like talking with liberals. Republican ideas, in an other hand, just mostly don't make any sense at all.
To us americans, socialism also doesn't make sense because the US prides itself on individualism and individual accomplishment. Collectivist thought is the #1 reason for the majority of the wars that have ever happened. No i'm not a conservative, i'm a libertarian, but just because you have absolutely no knowledge of american thought and philosophy, i'd thought i'd point it out to you. The democrat party here is more conservative than the most conservative party in europe btw. We have no nationalist party since nationalism is a dead idea. Republicans in general are pragmatists which is the problem. Libertarians want real limited government and no foreign intervention and free trade. Republicans simply represent a people who are disillusioned with government and want to enjoy the freedom and prosperity that their grandparents told them about, but don't believe that it is possible so that make concessions such as having a huge army and moderately regulating a central bank. The very small percentage of republicans who are fundamentalist christians that believe in literal 6 day creation make up probably 2-5% of the republican party, however, they are the most vocal and the media really likes to talk about them. Imagine if American's thought that all french people were anarchists, it's basically the same as how french people think of conservative americans.
This man spits the truth. I am conservative and libertarian. I see the Republican party as a vehicle to get fresh ideas into government (third parties hardly ever win). Idk, I wish more people would go independent and win, that way labels aren't used as much.
Is it wrong for me to want my country to succeed? I don't think what Obama is/was doing has worked, and I am pretty sure it won't work.
You guys make me facepalm so much my face hurts.
Do you realize that the State is the representation of public interest?
Do you realize that you are enslaved not by an evil administration but by your companies, your multinational and your oligarchy of shareholders? Do you realize that your food industry, your media industry, your weapon industry, your carceral industry, your pharmaceutic industry, every single industry fucks you in the ass day after day after day after day, because of how ridiculously powerful corporations are nowaday?
And you complain about your powerless adminsitration because it wants to give the chance to people who can't pay their insurance to get their cancer cured.
I'm so happy not to live in America, I would kill myself;
On January 07 2011 03:23 Biff The Understudy wrote:
On January 07 2011 03:12 darmousseh wrote:
On January 07 2011 03:00 Biff The Understudy wrote:
On January 07 2011 02:18 Scruffy wrote:
On January 07 2011 02:01 Krigwin wrote: Is anyone else a little bewildered and disarmed at how genuinely difficult it has become to tell nowadays if someone is a totally serious right-winger or an over-the-top transparent troll? Seriously, you just can't tell anymore. I imagine this must be even harder for the non-Americans who are not used to the brow-beating and mudslinging of American politics.
Krigwin, I have told you this before I think, and it may be a little hard to swallow but.... believe it or not, there are people out in the world that think differently than you. I'm gonna give that a few minutes to sink in.
I could easily call liberals "trolls", but its pointless, ignorant, and beside the point.
Krigwin is right.
Now, I'll explain you. When you have people who come and tell you that earth was created 6000 years ago, or that the problem of the most capitalist country in the world is that the state is too big and there is no place for business (lol, seriously?), or some racist bullcrap about afro-american who don't want to work (yeah, your post is very racist), it's very very hard to believe that they are serious and are not just trying to piss you off.
Now, I know, people think differently. You see, I'm not a liberal, but I understand liberal thinking. It makes sense, although I have reasons not to share their ideas. That's why I always like talking with liberals. Republican ideas, in an other hand, just mostly don't make any sense at all.
To us americans, socialism also doesn't make sense because the US prides itself on individualism and individual accomplishment. Collectivist thought is the #1 reason for the majority of the wars that have ever happened. No i'm not a conservative, i'm a libertarian, but just because you have absolutely no knowledge of american thought and philosophy, i'd thought i'd point it out to you. The democrat party here is more conservative than the most conservative party in europe btw. We have no nationalist party since nationalism is a dead idea. Republicans in general are pragmatists which is the problem. Libertarians want real limited government and no foreign intervention and free trade. Republicans simply represent a people who are disillusioned with government and want to enjoy the freedom and prosperity that their grandparents told them about, but don't believe that it is possible so that make concessions such as having a huge army and moderately regulating a central bank. The very small percentage of republicans who are fundamentalist christians that believe in literal 6 day creation make up probably 2-5% of the republican party, however, they are the most vocal and the media really likes to talk about them. Imagine if American's thought that all french people were anarchists, it's basically the same as how french people think of conservative americans.
I have quite a problem with your post, I don't know what to answer because it doesn't answer to mine, and I wonder if you have really read what I have written. It's just irrelevant to what I was saying concerning Scruffy's position and what Krigwin said.
Now that we are there, "collectivism is the n°1 reason for war" made me laugh out loud. I have limited knowledge? Are you sure? Are you really sure?
Well, maybe open a history book. Like, once.
No i didn't answer it because there is nothing to answer, but how you responded to them didn't make sense at all. Instead of responding to the question of the intentions of republicans, you respond by saying that republicans make no sense and making huge general blanket statements that only are partially accurate about a significantly small portion of republicans. Republicans themselves are a very divided group. You have fundamentalist christians who only care about the topic of creation/evolution. You have normal christians who only care about abortion and taxes (which is like 50% of republicans). You have atheist republicans who hate taxes and think the government is corrupt. (like 25%) You have people who occasionally vote republican (because their parents do, which is another 25%). Then you have libertarians who will sometimes vote republican since it tends to align closer to libertarians on economic issues during a time of economic recession. The way republicans are portrayed in media is significantly different than how they actually are. Most republicans tend to be families and small business owners since they are generally more affected by taxes than any other group. In the end I really don't care because the republican party cannot last in it's current form. It's too muddled with different opinions. A lot of republicans don't care about issues like marajuana alchohol or even gay marriage as the libertarian influence has become more popular. Eventually the republican party will likely split its ways into a conservative party (for people like palin and bush) and a tea party like movement but will likely adpot libertarian social policy. The democrats are the same way, you have the 10% who actually believe in socialism and then you have the majority who simply believe in a large government and want to implement some domestic policies related to welfare. The democrat party is not nearly as divided as the republican party is.
Look, you had George Bush as a leader, and Sarah Palin was n°2 in the presidential election. I don't get how someone with a functional brain can vote for Bush or want Sarah Palin as a vice president. It just doesn't fit.
Now, just that you know, between 40 and 45% of american believe in evolution. I guess the 60% remaining are not 2 or 3% of fucked up republicans.
"Do you realize that the State is the representation of public interest?"
This is fine until the public interest is to get paid by the government taking from working class people. Also we have politicians that rob the Treasury daily to stay in power.
At least corporations actually contribute to society. I hope you don't work for an evil corporation, because I don't.
Also, give me some examples of how im being asspounded daily by corporations. My butthole feels fine.
On January 07 2011 04:00 Scruffy wrote: "Do you realize that the State is the representation of public interest?"
This is fine until the public interest is to get paid by the government taking from working class people. Also we have politicians that rob the Treasury daily to stay in power.
At least corporations actually contribute to society. I hope you don't work for an evil corporation, because I don't.
Also, give me some examples of how im being asspounded daily by corporations. My butthole feels fine.
You don't get it.
Politicians work for the public interest. Their job is to help the country. When they don't, it means they are corrupted, and if all of them are corrupted, your political system is bad (and your political system IS bad as it is financed by private interest which is ludicrous: corruption is structural to your conception of democracy).
Companies work for their shareholders. They are supposed to make a lot of money at any cost, very quickly. Period. That's not about being evil. That's the way it is. Most of the time, that means, fucking everybody, including their customers, and evrybody in the country, in the ass.
If your butthole doesn't hurt, maybe you should really think why americans are so fucking huge, why you have nearly 1% people in jail in your country, why you are doing illegal war for no geopolitical good reason where thousand of your people are dying every year, why your population is so incredibly uneducated, etc etc etc etc
All of theses are not because of government, believe me. And when it is, it is because your government work for private interest. And not for you.
On January 06 2011 16:27 Scruffy wrote: So basically, what I'm saying is....make government smaller. The people will make things right (if we can/deserve to), not the government. I'm just praying everyone with an "R" by their name doesn't blow it this time. Seems like we have a younger/more libertarian leaning group than in year's past. I'm counting on people like Marco Rubio, Paul Ryan, Allen West, etc. to do what they promised. I will fight them tooth and nail if they don't.
ALLEN WEST, REALLY?
This guy is just, wow I don't know. He, just today, criticized the president for landing in Afghanistan during cover of darkness. How dare we try and protect the POTUS? He probably didn't even have any say in the matter anyways. Not to mention every president ever has had their foreign movements into hostile territory shrouded in secrecy, including West's idolized Bush/Cheney presidency.
Also, he claims to have a higher level of security clearance than the POTUS. (Section on West starts at around 2:00).
Discharged from the interrogation unit because he was too over-zealous and his superiors were uncertain of his level of mental stability. Man I'm sure hoping he does what's right.
On January 07 2011 04:00 Scruffy wrote: "Do you realize that the State is the representation of public interest?"
This is fine until the public interest is to get paid by the government taking from working class people. Also we have politicians that rob the Treasury daily to stay in power.
At least corporations actually contribute to society. I hope you don't work for an evil corporation, because I don't.
Also, give me some examples of how im being asspounded daily by corporations. My butthole feels fine.
You don't get it.
Politicians work for the public interest. Their job is to help the country. When they don't, it means they are corrupted, and if all of them are corrupted, your political system is bad (and your political system IS bad as it is financed by private interest which is ludicrous: corruption is structural to your conception of democracy).
Companies work for their shareholders. They are supposed to make a lot of money at any cost, very quickly. Period. That's not about being evil. That's the way it is. Most of the time, that means, fucking everybody, including their customers, and evrybody in the country, in the ass.
If your butthole doesn't hurt, maybe you should really think why americans are so fucking huge, why you have nearly 1% people in jail in your country, why you are doing illegal war for no geopolitical good reason where thousand of your people are dying every year, why your population is so incredibly uneducated, etc etc etc etc
All of theses are not because of government, believe me. And when it is, it is because your government work for private interest. And not for you.
You just take the problem backward.
No kind sir, your ignorant post shows that YOU clearly don't get it.
Politicians are supposed to work for the public interest but that is unfortunately not the case in America today. Hence a sweep of the legislative branch of our government and control to the more fiscally responsible choice in our two party system.
Companies are supposed to make a lot of money and that's the point of capitalism (THE GREAT SCARY EVIL MONSTER). There are companies all over the world that do not have consumer's best interests in mind, but fortunately in our society the consumers choose which companies thrive through their purchases. You're getting fucked in the ass giving up the majority of your paycheck. Maybe you need to open your eyes.
Don't even start this trolling retarded shit. Americans are so fucking huge? Get over yourself please. ZOMG WE HAVE JAILS!!! Not even going to address that. Illegal wars? Uneducated? More troll topics.
Maybe before you post on TL you should act more educated than a 17 year old. And again let me assure you that your mighty EU does not work too well for you good sir. I feel sorry for countries like Germany that got sucked into that madness.
On January 07 2011 04:00 Scruffy wrote: "Do you realize that the State is the representation of public interest?"
This is fine until the public interest is to get paid by the government taking from working class people. Also we have politicians that rob the Treasury daily to stay in power.
At least corporations actually contribute to society. I hope you don't work for an evil corporation, because I don't.
Also, give me some examples of how im being asspounded daily by corporations. My butthole feels fine.
You don't get it.
Politicians work for the public interest. Their job is to help the country. When they don't, it means they are corrupted, and if all of them are corrupted, your political system is bad (and your political system IS bad as it is financed by private interest which is ludicrous: corruption is structural to your conception of democracy).
Companies work for their shareholders. They are supposed to make a lot of money at any cost, very quickly. Period. That's not about being evil. That's the way it is. Most of the time, that means, fucking everybody, including their customers, and evrybody in the country, in the ass.
If your butthole doesn't hurt, maybe you should really think why americans are so fucking huge, why you have nearly 1% people in jail in your country, why you are doing illegal war where thousand of your people are dying every year, why your population is so incredibly uneducated, etc etc etc etc
All of theses are not because of government, believe me. And when it is, it is because your government work for private interest. And not for you.
The governments works for the interest of it's people? Name one country where the government itself was the one to promote more freedoms and rights and liberties. Name one country where the government helped the economy instead of screwing it. Name a single leader who ran a country of 300 million people and didn't have a single self-motivation for power. There is none. Government is evil. Not always by intention or design, but because man is evil. Humans are greedy, lieing, cheating, and disloyal. For example, Obama might truly believe that everything he is doing is for the good of the United states and may be well intentioned, but he doesn't write the laws. He might really think that what he is doing will benefit america, but he is willing to trade liberty for security in everything from the military to personal cell phones.
I freaking love my country. Food is cheap, the average wealth is high, and people are generally let alone to live however they want. The only thing i worry about is yes, corporations are very powerful, but a by product of corporations is a significantly higher standard of living. As long as there do not exists barriers to be competitive with those corporations, then they aren't corrupt. The moment the government creates subsidies or laws restricting companies and raising the barriers to entry, then corporations will become more powerful.
France on the other hand is terrible. The labor laws make it impossible to hire new graduates and gives no incentive for workers to work harder. Laws against religions and internal corruption are rampant in france.
In general, big business is better than big government for 2 reasons. 1. Big business do not have the threat of force. They cannot make you purchase their goods. 2. Their products end up helping the economy and create jobs. Sure mcdonalds might be a huge corporation, but it means that people save a ton of money on food.
Of course in a perfect society mcdonalds wouldn't exist because profit margins would be significantly too low, but the future of economics has to do with accessibility to price information. The more aware the public is to pricing, the more likely they are to make better purchasing decisions lowering the profits of those companies that make a huge margin of profit.
I feel like the biggest issue with United States politics at the moment is our bipartisan system. The fact that such a thing even exists essentially destroys any sense of unity or national pride a citizen can have. I also feel like there's nothing we can do to change that in the near future, short of some sort of revolution.
I'm not going to pretend to know too much about politics, but I do believe I have enough common sense to look at our system, and know its not working, as I'm sure many of you (left-wingers and right-wingers) will agree.
I feel like the fault lies on both sides for being too stubborn to ever sit down and have a civil discussion with each other, that doesn't involve copious amounts of mud-slinging. Until we can all get our heads out of our asses and be willing to listen to what the other has to say, our country will not improve.
As an aside, I would like to say that as far as recent presidents go, in the current political environment, its going to be very difficult for anyone to accomplish anything, so all they can really be judged on is how they present themselves to the public as a leader. On that note, and only taking public presentation into consideration, I think that Bush failed, and Obama is succeeding.
TLDR: Bipartisanship is killing us, we need to stop being so stubborn as a nation, and the president in this political environment is merely a figurehead.
On January 07 2011 04:27 Biff The Understudy wrote: Oh my God...
Way to continue to troll this discussion.
Back to the discussion
On January 07 2011 04:27 ryanAnger wrote: TLDR: Bipartisanship is killing us, we need to stop being so stubborn as a nation, and the president in this political environment is merely a figurehead.
Agreed. But the problem is we have to get spending under control NOW and hopefully the republican party can finally unite and get their shit together for the people. Our government has lost the respect of the people and that is a fundamental problem. Think the "recession" has happened already and is curbing? Wait until all of this bloated spending gets under control. Unfortunately that is the way it needs to be.
On January 07 2011 04:27 Biff The Understudy wrote: Oh my God...
Like I said, you have a completely different understanding of the philosophy of american politics. European politics generally assume that the role of government includes the general welfare of it's citizens. American politics do not. Individualism vs collectivism.
On January 07 2011 04:27 Biff The Understudy wrote: Oh my God...
You should consider not further replying, You are just giving a troll credit while risking getting banned in the process. He will just continue to derail the topic, ignore your points, or if you correct his mistakes move on to the next topic. Classic troll behaviour, not worth your time or your account. Nothing good can come from this.
On January 07 2011 04:07 Biff The Understudy wrote:
On January 07 2011 04:00 Scruffy wrote: "Do you realize that the State is the representation of public interest?"
This is fine until the public interest is to get paid by the government taking from working class people. Also we have politicians that rob the Treasury daily to stay in power.
At least corporations actually contribute to society. I hope you don't work for an evil corporation, because I don't.
Also, give me some examples of how im being asspounded daily by corporations. My butthole feels fine.
You don't get it.
Politicians work for the public interest. Their job is to help the country. When they don't, it means they are corrupted, and if all of them are corrupted, your political system is bad (and your political system IS bad as it is financed by private interest which is ludicrous: corruption is structural to your conception of democracy).
Companies work for their shareholders. They are supposed to make a lot of money at any cost, very quickly. Period. That's not about being evil. That's the way it is. Most of the time, that means, fucking everybody, including their customers, and evrybody in the country, in the ass.
If your butthole doesn't hurt, maybe you should really think why americans are so fucking huge, why you have nearly 1% people in jail in your country, why you are doing illegal war for no geopolitical good reason where thousand of your people are dying every year, why your population is so incredibly uneducated, etc etc etc etc
All of theses are not because of government, believe me. And when it is, it is because your government work for private interest. And not for you.
You just take the problem backward.
No kind sir, your ignorant post shows that YOU clearly don't get it.
Politicians are supposed to work for the public interest but that is unfortunately not the case in America today. Hence a sweep of the legislative branch of our government and control to the more fiscally responsible choice in our two party system.
Companies are supposed to make a lot of money and that's the point of capitalism (THE GREAT SCARY EVIL MONSTER). There are companies all over the world that do not have consumer's best interests in mind, but fortunately in our society the consumers choose which companies thrive through their purchases. You're getting fucked in the ass giving up the majority of your paycheck. Maybe you need to open your eyes.
Don't even start this trolling retarded shit. Americans are so fucking huge? Get over yourself please. ZOMG WE HAVE JAILS!!! Not even going to address that. Illegal wars? Uneducated? More troll topics.
Maybe before you post on TL you should act more educated than a 17 year old. And again let me assure you that your mighty EU does not work too well for you good sir. I feel sorry for countries like Germany that got sucked into that madness.
It's a misconception (a very large one) that our choice in products effects corporations. The fact is that a hand-full or corporations own pretty much everything. Crops for example, they are 90+% Monsanto owned. Dog food, that's 90+% all one company. This is how it works with pretty much every product. You should understand that the consumers are quite well brainwashed.
The countries money is controlled LITERALLY by private interests. The Federal Reserve is in no way government run. The Fed is also where a majority of taxes go. Basically, you pay your taxes to corporations.
The continual state of war (declared or not) the US has been in for decades is great for the few corporations that already fun everything; and terrible for the common man.
Wars of aggression are illegal in international law. They are literally war crimes and the US is quite guilty.
I'd almost go as far to say that corporations intentionally keep people ignorant. Fox News, corporate run Tea Party (it's run by 2 billionaires, mostly), fake news stories distributed among other news stations, etc...
The US also has the largest percent of it's people in jail. This is not a troll topic, it's a valid issue to bring up. Although, I fully admit I lack the knowledge to discuss this topic. BTW, admitting you lack the knowledge to discuss something is what you should have done before you posted. It would have saved a lot of ignorance from being spewed.
On January 07 2011 04:26 darmousseh wrote: The governments works for the interest of it's people? Name one country where the government itself was the one to promote more freedoms and rights and liberties.
...?
On January 07 2011 04:26 darmousseh wrote: The only thing i worry about is yes, corporations are very powerful, but a by product of corporations is a significantly higher standard of living. As long as there do not exists barriers to be competitive with those corporations, then they aren't corrupt.
... ???
On January 07 2011 04:26 darmousseh wrote: In general, big business is better than big government for 2 reasons. 1. Big business do not have the threat of force. They cannot make you purchase their goods.
... ??? ???
I'm sorry, could I politely request that you elucidate on these declarations? Perhaps offer some evidence or contrasting examples as to why you feel these statements are accurate?
"I'd almost go as far to say that corporations intentionally keep people ignorant. Fox News, corporate run Tea Party (it's run by 2 billionaires, mostly), fake news stories distributed among other news stations, etc..."
I read that and I knew you were brainwashed. You know nothing of the Tea Party. Only what the MSM feeds you. I'd say you are unintentionally ignorant.
Also, can we get some examples of "fake news stories", like maybe from foxnews.com or something?
" This is how it works with pretty much every product."
WRONG. You obviously haven't read much market share data. Most products are quite fragmented.
On January 07 2011 04:07 Biff The Understudy wrote:
On January 07 2011 04:00 Scruffy wrote: "Do you realize that the State is the representation of public interest?"
This is fine until the public interest is to get paid by the government taking from working class people. Also we have politicians that rob the Treasury daily to stay in power.
At least corporations actually contribute to society. I hope you don't work for an evil corporation, because I don't.
Also, give me some examples of how im being asspounded daily by corporations. My butthole feels fine.
You don't get it.
Politicians work for the public interest. Their job is to help the country. When they don't, it means they are corrupted, and if all of them are corrupted, your political system is bad (and your political system IS bad as it is financed by private interest which is ludicrous: corruption is structural to your conception of democracy).
Companies work for their shareholders. They are supposed to make a lot of money at any cost, very quickly. Period. That's not about being evil. That's the way it is. Most of the time, that means, fucking everybody, including their customers, and evrybody in the country, in the ass.
If your butthole doesn't hurt, maybe you should really think why americans are so fucking huge, why you have nearly 1% people in jail in your country, why you are doing illegal war for no geopolitical good reason where thousand of your people are dying every year, why your population is so incredibly uneducated, etc etc etc etc
All of theses are not because of government, believe me. And when it is, it is because your government work for private interest. And not for you.
You just take the problem backward.
No kind sir, your ignorant post shows that YOU clearly don't get it.
Politicians are supposed to work for the public interest but that is unfortunately not the case in America today. Hence a sweep of the legislative branch of our government and control to the more fiscally responsible choice in our two party system.
Companies are supposed to make a lot of money and that's the point of capitalism (THE GREAT SCARY EVIL MONSTER). There are companies all over the world that do not have consumer's best interests in mind, but fortunately in our society the consumers choose which companies thrive through their purchases. You're getting fucked in the ass giving up the majority of your paycheck. Maybe you need to open your eyes.
Don't even start this trolling retarded shit. Americans are so fucking huge? Get over yourself please. ZOMG WE HAVE JAILS!!! Not even going to address that. Illegal wars? Uneducated? More troll topics.
Maybe before you post on TL you should act more educated than a 17 year old. And again let me assure you that your mighty EU does not work too well for you good sir. I feel sorry for countries like Germany that got sucked into that madness.
It's a misconception (a very large one) that our choice in products effects corporations. The fact is that a hand-full or corporations own pretty much everything. Crops for example, they are 90+% Monsanto owned. Dog food, that's 90+% all one company. This is how it works with pretty much every product. You should understand that the consumers are quite well brainwashed.
The countries money is controlled LITERALLY by private interests. The Federal Reserve is in no way government run. The Fed is also where a majority of taxes go. Basically, you pay your taxes to corporations.
The continual state of war (declared or not) the US has been in for decades is great for the few corporations that already fun everything; and terrible for the common man.
Wars of aggression are illegal in international law. They are literally war crimes and the US is quite guilty.
I'd almost go as far to say that corporations intentionally keep people ignorant. Fox News, corporate run Tea Party (it's run by 2 billionaires, mostly), fake news stories distributed among other news stations, etc...
The US also has the largest percent of it's people in jail. This is not a troll topic, it's a valid issue to bring up. Although, I fully admit I lack the knowledge to discuss this topic. BTW, admitting you lack the knowledge to discuss something is what you should have done before you posted. It would have saved a lot of ignorance from being spewed.
It's like hitting my head against a brick wall. From this day forth no more politcal talk on TL for me. Apparently you all have it figured out. Good day brilliant logical thinkers. /end sarcasm
On January 07 2011 05:00 Scruffy wrote: "I'd almost go as far to say that corporations intentionally keep people ignorant. Fox News, corporate run Tea Party (it's run by 2 billionaires, mostly), fake news stories distributed among other news stations, etc..."
I read that and I knew you were brainwashed. You know nothing of the Tea Party. Only what the MSM feeds you. I'd say you are unintentionally ignorant.
Also, can we get some examples of "fake news stories", like maybe from foxnews.com or something?
" This is how it works with pretty much every product."
WRONG. You obviously haven't read much market share data. Most products are quite fragmented.
Perhaps the Tea Party comment is deserving of a better explanation. The Koch brothers put large sums of money into promoting the Tea Party. Ads, busing their employees to rallies, promoting candidates, etc... I think it's fair to say that they have a large role in running the Tea Party. Although, yes, there is a portion that is the normal populace. It wouldn't a very good investment if it didn't work to get real people behind it.
You can turn on FoxNews and get spin any time of day. The lead into the Iraq/Afgan wars would be a large example of fake news as well. However, that would be government spin. Unless you go so far as to include Haliburtan and others as possible culprits of the lies. That does come off as conspiratorial, but it does seem to be were the data points.
And your last issue; Most industries are run by very few large corporations. They sell they're products under many different names. This includes the products that are sold under store labels. It doesn't help that there is almost 0 education in this unless you go to school explicitly to learn about it, or do your own research.
On January 07 2011 05:00 Scruffy wrote: "I'd almost go as far to say that corporations intentionally keep people ignorant. Fox News, corporate run Tea Party (it's run by 2 billionaires, mostly), fake news stories distributed among other news stations, etc..."
I read that and I knew you were brainwashed. You know nothing of the Tea Party. Only what the MSM feeds you. I'd say you are unintentionally ignorant.
Also, can we get some examples of "fake news stories", like maybe from foxnews.com or something?
" This is how it works with pretty much every product."
WRONG. You obviously haven't read much market share data. Most products are quite fragmented.
On January 07 2011 05:00 Scruffy wrote: "I'd almost go as far to say that corporations intentionally keep people ignorant. Fox News, corporate run Tea Party (it's run by 2 billionaires, mostly), fake news stories distributed among other news stations, etc..."
I read that and I knew you were brainwashed. You know nothing of the Tea Party. Only what the MSM feeds you. I'd say you are unintentionally ignorant.
Also, can we get some examples of "fake news stories", like maybe from foxnews.com or something?
" This is how it works with pretty much every product."
WRONG. You obviously haven't read much market share data. Most products are quite fragmented.
On January 06 2011 12:51 Haemonculus wrote: And then there's the flawed notion that Socialism is the big scary terrible horrible awful no good very bad doom-of-the-country in the first place.
Right wingers policy are always designed for an elite. Therefore, they need to scare people so that even people who don't have any interest (98% of the population) vote for them. We had exactly the same with Sarkozy, except that the target is not "socialism" but immigrants. French racism is generated by our governments and our medias so that people vote for policies which fuck them in the ass for the benefit of banks, corporations and their shareholders. But oh, folks, the most important is that we kick arabs out of here, right?
This is pretty spot on. I've always been amazed at how so many poorer working class conservative folks continually vote for policies that remove/shrink public services. We have such a goddamn collective boner for the "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" mentality in this country. It's an incredible feat of fear to keep the masses voting against their personal interests, accomplished through several means; religion, (OMG MUSLIMS INVADING OUR COUNTRY), race, (OMG MEXICANS INVADING OUR COUNTRY), or political views, (LIBERALS HATE AMERICA AND YOU BY EXTENSION).
This ideological bullcrap about "socialism" in US is just hilarious. Obama is everything in the world but a socialist. But old good irrational ignorant fear of the "red" is what keep Republican going since 50 years, no reason to stop now even if it doesn't make any sense. Especially when you have brainless zombie army such as Fox News as mainstream medias.
I wish Obama were a socialist, lol. The word doesn't even make sense in modern American politics. We have no real understanding of its meaning, and if you listen to most of the media, you'd think such policies would destroy society overnight.
We're an incredibly divided nation. I didn't realize how sincerely some people held their beliefs until I recently moved up to Alaska. This is a really conservative area, and I've learned a lot debating with my friend's parents. They sincerely believe in creationism. They sincerely believe that the States have a negative carbon footprint, (because of all our wetlands apparently), and that environmental policies are a hoax to "hamper American profits". They sincerely believe Obama is a Muslim terrorist. I got my friend's mother to admit that if it were up to her, "We'd build the goddamn Berlin Wall from California to Texas to keep all the f***ing spics out."
The Tea Party is a republican front, funded by rich republicans and made up of racists and uncle toms (see Alan West)
Anyone who mentions socialism and doesn't follow with the words Marx or Sweden is clearly a moron and doesn't know two shits about history or politics.
On January 07 2011 04:07 Biff The Understudy wrote:
On January 07 2011 04:00 Scruffy wrote: "Do you realize that the State is the representation of public interest?"
This is fine until the public interest is to get paid by the government taking from working class people. Also we have politicians that rob the Treasury daily to stay in power.
At least corporations actually contribute to society. I hope you don't work for an evil corporation, because I don't.
Also, give me some examples of how im being asspounded daily by corporations. My butthole feels fine.
You don't get it.
Politicians work for the public interest. Their job is to help the country. When they don't, it means they are corrupted, and if all of them are corrupted, your political system is bad (and your political system IS bad as it is financed by private interest which is ludicrous: corruption is structural to your conception of democracy).
Companies work for their shareholders. They are supposed to make a lot of money at any cost, very quickly. Period. That's not about being evil. That's the way it is. Most of the time, that means, fucking everybody, including their customers, and evrybody in the country, in the ass.
If your butthole doesn't hurt, maybe you should really think why americans are so fucking huge, why you have nearly 1% people in jail in your country, why you are doing illegal war for no geopolitical good reason where thousand of your people are dying every year, why your population is so incredibly uneducated, etc etc etc etc
All of theses are not because of government, believe me. And when it is, it is because your government work for private interest. And not for you.
You just take the problem backward.
No kind sir, your ignorant post shows that YOU clearly don't get it.
Politicians are supposed to work for the public interest but that is unfortunately not the case in America today. Hence a sweep of the legislative branch of our government and control to the more fiscally responsible choice in our two party system.
Companies are supposed to make a lot of money and that's the point of capitalism (THE GREAT SCARY EVIL MONSTER). There are companies all over the world that do not have consumer's best interests in mind, but fortunately in our society the consumers choose which companies thrive through their purchases. You're getting fucked in the ass giving up the majority of your paycheck. Maybe you need to open your eyes.
Don't even start this trolling retarded shit. Americans are so fucking huge? Get over yourself please. ZOMG WE HAVE JAILS!!! Not even going to address that. Illegal wars? Uneducated? More troll topics.
Maybe before you post on TL you should act more educated than a 17 year old. And again let me assure you that your mighty EU does not work too well for you good sir. I feel sorry for countries like Germany that got sucked into that madness.
It's a misconception (a very large one) that our choice in products effects corporations. The fact is that a hand-full or corporations own pretty much everything. Crops for example, they are 90+% Monsanto owned. Dog food, that's 90+% all one company. This is how it works with pretty much every product. You should understand that the consumers are quite well brainwashed.
The countries money is controlled LITERALLY by private interests. The Federal Reserve is in no way government run. The Fed is also where a majority of taxes go. Basically, you pay your taxes to corporations.
The continual state of war (declared or not) the US has been in for decades is great for the few corporations that already fun everything; and terrible for the common man.
Wars of aggression are illegal in international law. They are literally war crimes and the US is quite guilty.
I'd almost go as far to say that corporations intentionally keep people ignorant. Fox News, corporate run Tea Party (it's run by 2 billionaires, mostly), fake news stories distributed among other news stations, etc...
The US also has the largest percent of it's people in jail. This is not a troll topic, it's a valid issue to bring up. Although, I fully admit I lack the knowledge to discuss this topic. BTW, admitting you lack the knowledge to discuss something is what you should have done before you posted. It would have saved a lot of ignorance from being spewed.
It's like hitting my head against a brick wall. From this day forth no more politcal talk on TL for me. Apparently you all have it figured out. Good day brilliant logical thinkers. /end sarcasm
Yah I'm done in this topic too. I think we've all presented enough reasonable arguments that anyone who continues to post that kind of garbage is wasting our time.
It's one thing to look at data and interpret wrongly/differently. It's another thing to spew crap across the room at mach 2 because they can't contain their bullshit. When people make claims like that without evidence the best thing to do is ignore it, and that's what I'm going to do.
On January 07 2011 01:08 Biff The Understudy wrote:
On January 06 2011 12:51 Haemonculus wrote: And then there's the flawed notion that Socialism is the big scary terrible horrible awful no good very bad doom-of-the-country in the first place.
Right wingers policy are always designed for an elite. Therefore, they need to scare people so that even people who don't have any interest (98% of the population) vote for them. We had exactly the same with Sarkozy, except that the target is not "socialism" but immigrants. French racism is generated by our governments and our medias so that people vote for policies which fuck them in the ass for the benefit of banks, corporations and their shareholders. But oh, folks, the most important is that we kick arabs out of here, right?
This is pretty spot on. I've always been amazed at how so many poorer working class conservative folks continually vote for policies that remove/shrink public services. We have such a goddamn collective boner for the "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" mentality in this country. It's an incredible feat of fear to keep the masses voting against their personal interests, accomplished through several means; religion, (OMG MUSLIMS INVADING OUR COUNTRY), race, (OMG MEXICANS INVADING OUR COUNTRY), or political views, (LIBERALS HATE AMERICA AND YOU BY EXTENSION).
This ideological bullcrap about "socialism" in US is just hilarious. Obama is everything in the world but a socialist. But old good irrational ignorant fear of the "red" is what keep Republican going since 50 years, no reason to stop now even if it doesn't make any sense. Especially when you have brainless zombie army such as Fox News as mainstream medias.
I wish Obama were a socialist, lol. The word doesn't even make sense in modern American politics. We have no real understanding of its meaning, and if you listen to most of the media, you'd think such policies would destroy society overnight.
We're an incredibly divided nation. I didn't realize how sincerely some people held their beliefs until I recently moved up to Alaska. This is a really conservative area, and I've learned a lot debating with my friend's parents. They sincerely believe in creationism. They sincerely believe that the States have a negative carbon footprint, (because of all our wetlands apparently), and that environmental policies are a hoax to "hamper American profits". They sincerely believe Obama is a Muslim terrorist. I got my friend's mother to admit that if it were up to her, "We'd build the goddamn Berlin Wall from California to Texas to keep all the f***ing spics out."
These people exist, and they vote.
The problem itself is the word "socialism" itself and the fact that we have "social welfare" programs. The majority of americans, even democrats, understand socialism to mean having a significant number of social welfare programs designed to promote a minimum standard of living. Even republicans are ok with social welfare programs at the local level, the majority simply think that doing things at the federal level is simply a waste of time and money since most of the money ends up in the wrong hands.
Yes you are right, socialism is not what obama is.
Dealing with conservative spin such as "obama is a muslim" is as simple as asking them "Do you really believe that?" and countering by offering a moderate negative perspective such as "Well, Obama isn't a muslim, but i don't think he's very religious (because he isn't)." is enough to get people off your back.
On January 07 2011 06:31 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote: Yah I'm done in this topic too. I think we've all presented enough reasonable arguments that anyone who continues to post that kind of garbage is wasting our time.
It's one thing to look at data and interpret wrongly/differently. It's another thing to spew crap across the room at mach 2 because they can't contain their bullshit. When people make claims like that without evidence the best thing to do is ignore it, and that's what I'm going to do.
Trying not to be overly offensive. But from our debate in the other thread I have got the impression that you are complaining about practically what you did to the extreme. Repeating your statements over and over again without presenting the fact you base them on, does not make them more right, even if it may to you (social psychology tells us that continuous exposure to objects makes us like them more, see "mere exposure effect"). May I suggest that wherever you carry out your debates in the future, you try reasoning based on facts and open-mindedly discussing facts instead of opinions? I promise that will be a whole new experience where you can actually reason consensus.
On January 07 2011 06:31 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote: Yah I'm done in this topic too. I think we've all presented enough reasonable arguments that anyone who continues to post that kind of garbage is wasting our time.
It's one thing to look at data and interpret wrongly/differently. It's another thing to spew crap across the room at mach 2 because they can't contain their bullshit. When people make claims like that without evidence the best thing to do is ignore it, and that's what I'm going to do.
Trying not to be overly offensive. But from our debate in the other thread I have got the impression that you are complaining about practically what you did to the extreme. Repeating your statements over and over again without presenting the fact you base them on, does not make them more right, even if it may to you (social psychology tells us that continuous exposure to objects makes us like them more, see "mere exposure effect"). May I suggest that wherever you carry out your debates in the future, you try reasoning based on facts and open-mindedly discussing facts instead of opinions? I promise that will be a whole new experience where you can actually reason consensus.
The problem is you can present all the facts you want, but people will still call you an "idiot" or "troll", not because you are acting like one, but because you have a different ideology than them. Just talking from my experience in the general forum. My "fact" may be an "opinion" to you (just because you don't agree with it) and vice-versa. But we could play this game all day.
On January 07 2011 06:31 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote: Yah I'm done in this topic too. I think we've all presented enough reasonable arguments that anyone who continues to post that kind of garbage is wasting our time.
It's one thing to look at data and interpret wrongly/differently. It's another thing to spew crap across the room at mach 2 because they can't contain their bullshit. When people make claims like that without evidence the best thing to do is ignore it, and that's what I'm going to do.
Trying not to be overly offensive. But from our debate in the other thread I have got the impression that you are complaining about practically what you did to the extreme. Repeating your statements over and over again without presenting the fact you base them on, does not make them more right, even if it may to you (social psychology tells us that continuous exposure to objects makes us like them more, see "mere exposure effect"). May I suggest that wherever you carry out your debates in the future, you try reasoning based on facts and open-mindedly discussing facts instead of opinions? I promise that will be a whole new experience where you can actually reason consensus.
The problem is you can present all the facts you want, but people will still call you an "idiot" or "troll", not because you are acting like one, but because you have a different ideology than them. Just talking from my experience in the general forum. My "fact" may be an "opinion" to you (just because you don't agree with it) and vice-versa. But we could play this game all day.
i think you just dont know what a fact is.
you can check fact and opinion in every dictionary. a fact just cannot be a opinion, how hard you ever believe your opinion is a fact, it will never be one.
On January 07 2011 06:31 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote: Yah I'm done in this topic too. I think we've all presented enough reasonable arguments that anyone who continues to post that kind of garbage is wasting our time.
It's one thing to look at data and interpret wrongly/differently. It's another thing to spew crap across the room at mach 2 because they can't contain their bullshit. When people make claims like that without evidence the best thing to do is ignore it, and that's what I'm going to do.
Trying not to be overly offensive. But from our debate in the other thread I have got the impression that you are complaining about practically what you did to the extreme. Repeating your statements over and over again without presenting the fact you base them on, does not make them more right, even if it may to you (social psychology tells us that continuous exposure to objects makes us like them more, see "mere exposure effect"). May I suggest that wherever you carry out your debates in the future, you try reasoning based on facts and open-mindedly discussing facts instead of opinions? I promise that will be a whole new experience where you can actually reason consensus.
The problem is you can present all the facts you want, but people will still call you an "idiot" or "troll", not because you are acting like one, but because you have a different ideology than them. Just talking from my experience in the general forum. My "fact" may be an "opinion" to you (just because you don't agree with it) and vice-versa. But we could play this game all day.
Not all of them will. I have had debates on teamliquid where people brought up facts that I did not know or corrected me where I was objectively wrong which lead me (grudgingly, I have to admit) to revise my opinion. And I think that in some very rare occasions I was able to convince someone else to adjust their opinion due to presenting facts. There is yet hope but if we want to be able to have mature debates we must encourage evidence-based argumenting.
Edit: Also, I think that it is quite easy to test whether someone states facts or opinions. Consider, for example the statement: "Assange is a traitor". You can check pretty quickly that this is factually wrong from a legal standpoint, but as an opinion, it may be valid. Or consider "democrats are morally superior to republicans". This is also easily identifiable as an opinion.
If you can accept that, you can proceed to elaborate from which facts and within which value-system you derive this opinion. From there is is just a small step to a mature debate, in my eyes.
Politicians like to cry about having to cut things that benefit everybody, cops, fire, and defense. While they send big payoffs to their buddies in auto unions, wall street, and green companies partially owned by Al Gore.
On January 06 2011 11:24 t3hwUn wrote: Wow I love how TL hates on right wingers... I get flamed for being a troll for posting unpopular political opinions elsewhere and then I read this... Fail.
And to get back on topic +1 for no more obama socialist policies. If I wanted to live in Europe I'd move there...
the word "socialist" gets thrown around waaaaaay too much. problem with people like you is that all you do is throw around talking points and cover your ears whenever people say anything rational.
what has obama done that can be classified as "socialist"?
Sadly people don't realized that if it weren't for socialist policies the U.S economy would be dead
Examples of Socialist Policies: 1)Social Security 2)Medicare 3)Frikkin Reduce and free lunch in school 4)401K 5) Laws against Monopolies 6) Minimum wages(wages used to be completely competitive) 7) Anti Child Labor Laws
Pure Capitalism caused the Great Depression. For Capitalism to stabilize it is necessary to have "the social safety net" in order to counter act human greed, and prevent a devastating difference between rich and poor.
When Marx wrote that Capitalism would fail he refered to pure capitalistic society that existed at the moment, but failed to consider that the capitalist western countries would opt for socialist policies to bolster Capitalist ideals.
International Baccaluareate Program FTW. For once im actually happy about being informed.
Pure Capitalism caused the Great Depression. For Capitalism to stabilize it is necessary to have "the social safety net" in order to counter act human greed, and prevent a devastating difference between rich and poor.
When Marx wrote that Capitalism would fail he refered to pure capitalistic society that existed at the moment, but failed to consider that the capitalist western countries would opt for socialist policies to bolster Capitalist ideals.
International Baccaluareate Program FTW. For once im actually happy about being informed.
You are wrong. We were not a pure capitalist country before the great depression. It was also prolonged by government intervention. Try reading some new books with opposite points of view.
On January 07 2011 09:13 GinDo wrote: Sadly people don't realized that if it weren't for socialist policies the U.S economy would be dead
Examples of Socialist Policies: 1)Social Security 2)Medicare 3)Frikkin Reduce and free lunch in school 4)401K 5) Laws against Monopolies 6) Minimum wages(wages used to be completely competitive) 7) Anti Child Labor Laws
Pure Capitalism caused the Great Depression. For Capitalism to stabilize it is necessary to have "the social safety net" in order to counter act human greed, and prevent a devastating difference between rich and poor.
When Marx wrote that Capitalism would fail he refered to pure capitalistic society that existed at the moment, but failed to consider that the capitalist western countries would opt for socialist policies to bolster Capitalist ideals.
International Baccaluareate Program FTW. For once im actually happy about being informed.
Well, I do not think we actually have real capitalism, rather its capitalism for the poor and socialism for the rich. Profit gets privatized whereas losses are socialized (state-sponsored bank bail-out, anyone?). The systems we live have a tendency to combine the advantages of both capitalism and socialism for the rich at the cost of the rest of society.
On January 07 2011 09:13 GinDo wrote: Sadly people don't realized that if it weren't for socialist policies the U.S economy would be dead
Examples of Socialist Policies: 1)Social Security 2)Medicare 3)Frikkin Reduce and free lunch in school 4)401K 5) Laws against Monopolies 6) Minimum wages(wages used to be completely competitive) 7) Anti Child Labor Laws
Pure Capitalism caused the Great Depression. For Capitalism to stabilize it is necessary to have "the social safety net" in order to counter act human greed, and prevent a devastating difference between rich and poor.
When Marx wrote that Capitalism would fail he refered to pure capitalistic society that existed at the moment, but failed to consider that the capitalist western countries would opt for socialist policies to bolster Capitalist ideals.
International Baccaluareate Program FTW. For once im actually happy about being informed.
Well, I do not think we actually have real capitalism, rather its capitalism for the poor and socialism for the rich. Profit gets privatized whereas losses are socialized (state-sponsored bank bail-out, anyone?). The systems we live have a tendency to combine the advantages of both capitalism and socialism for the rich at the cost of the rest of society.
Im talking about pre World War I era. We were a pure Capitalistic society as their were no limits on economics that we see post Great depression, such as social security Welfare, Minimum wage, etc etc.
Pure Capitalism caused the Great Depression. For Capitalism to stabilize it is necessary to have "the social safety net" in order to counter act human greed, and prevent a devastating difference between rich and poor.
When Marx wrote that Capitalism would fail he refered to pure capitalistic society that existed at the moment, but failed to consider that the capitalist western countries would opt for socialist policies to bolster Capitalist ideals.
International Baccaluareate Program FTW. For once im actually happy about being informed.
You are wrong. We were not a pure capitalist country before the great depression. It was also prolonged by government intervention. Try reading some new books with opposite points of view.
So im wrong and i should read books with opposite opinions, ok maybe you should too. That statement has no value of argument.
And did you just say the GD was prolonged by government intervention? The combination of FDR's New Deal and the Economic boost from World War 2 Wartime economy served as the solution to the Great Depression. WW2 created jobs by opening markets in the War department, US export of Weapons and food stamps skyrocketed, and the unemployed men were shipped oversees to fight.
I find myself agreeing with the French people in almost every TL thread, and I feel bad when they have to argue us in the US about common sense issues.
You have to regulate capitalism or it ends in revolution between the very rich and the very poor. Taxes are a part of regulation. You have to penalize the very rich. What's so hard to understand about that?
I always hear republicans talk about lowering taxes, while democrats talk about helping people.
I have not heard one new project idea from the republican side after watching many news clips and coverage on cspan.
On January 07 2011 09:44 jungsu wrote: I find myself agreeing with the French people in almost every TL thread, and I feel bad when they have to argue us in the US about common sense issues.
You have to regulate capitalism or it ends in revolution between the very rich and the very poor. Taxes are a part of regulation. You have to penalize the very rich. What's so hard to understand about that?
I always hear republicans talk about lowering taxes, while democrats talk about helping people.
I have not heard one new project idea from the republican side after watching many news clips and coverage on cspan.
Do you penalize the rich because they are INHERENTLY BAD EVIL PEOPLE? LIke Warren Buffet? Who is evil?
Totally separately I'm sorry I've created the thread. Now is some giant cesspool of political accusations.
Pure Capitalism caused the Great Depression. For Capitalism to stabilize it is necessary to have "the social safety net" in order to counter act human greed, and prevent a devastating difference between rich and poor.
When Marx wrote that Capitalism would fail he refered to pure capitalistic society that existed at the moment, but failed to consider that the capitalist western countries would opt for socialist policies to bolster Capitalist ideals.
International Baccaluareate Program FTW. For once im actually happy about being informed.
You are wrong. We were not a pure capitalist country before the great depression. It was also prolonged by government intervention. Try reading some new books with opposite points of view.
There were no socialist policies before the Great Depression. That has nothing to do with books or opinions or anything. What before the Great Depression made us "impure" in terms of capitalism? What are you talking about?
And why is this being brought up, anyway? The new system lets Congress be LESS frugal with your money. If anything, fiscal conservatives should be heavily against this. Pay-As-You-Go is much stricter than this bullshit.
There is nothing fiscally responsible about the republican party.
Pure Capitalism caused the Great Depression. For Capitalism to stabilize it is necessary to have "the social safety net" in order to counter act human greed, and prevent a devastating difference between rich and poor.
When Marx wrote that Capitalism would fail he refered to pure capitalistic society that existed at the moment, but failed to consider that the capitalist western countries would opt for socialist policies to bolster Capitalist ideals.
International Baccaluareate Program FTW. For once im actually happy about being informed.
You are wrong. We were not a pure capitalist country before the great depression. It was also prolonged by government intervention. Try reading some new books with opposite points of view.
So im wrong and i should read books with opposite opinions, ok maybe you should too. That statement has no value of argument.
And did you just say the GD was prolonged by government intervention? The combination of FDR's New Deal and the Economic boost from World War 2 Wartime economy served as the solution to the Great Depression. WW2 created jobs by opening markets in the War department, US export of Weapons and food stamps skyrocketed, and the unemployed men were shipped oversees to fight.
Don't argue with an Econ Major.
And then post-WW2 we had an advantage in that our economic competitors in Europe and Asia had their infrastructures ravaged and destroyed by years of war. The American industrial machine was relatively untouched.
On January 07 2011 09:44 jungsu wrote: I find myself agreeing with the French people in almost every TL thread, and I feel bad when they have to argue us in the US about common sense issues.
You have to regulate capitalism or it ends in revolution between the very rich and the very poor. Taxes are a part of regulation. You have to penalize the very rich. What's so hard to understand about that?
I always hear republicans talk about lowering taxes, while democrats talk about helping people.
I have not heard one new project idea from the republican side after watching many news clips and coverage on cspan.
Do you penalize the rich because they are INHERENTLY BAD EVIL PEOPLE? LIke Warren Buffet? Who is evil?
Totally separately I'm sorry I've created the thread. Now is some giant cesspool of political accusations.
The logical end of your thinking is a dictatorship.
You penalize the rich because human nature is imperfect and greedy, and no one person, or small subset of persons, should be allowed too much power.
For all of those who think capitalism is the cause of the great depression. Milton Freedom wrote about how the federal reserve was the cause of the great depression. Ben Bernake, the current fed, recently said that yes, it was the federal reserves fault and they are sorry. Take that anti-capitalists.
Quote " I would like to say to Milton and Anna [Schwartz, Friedman's coauthor]: Regarding the Great Depression. You're right, we did it. We're very sorry. But thanks to you, we won't do it again."[46] Bernanke has cited Milton Friedman and Anna Schwartz in his decision to lower interest rates to zero." Freaking wikipedia
i love the economics arguing. It is doubtful any1 in this thread is an economist or business major. Note: I'm not an economist. Both Hayek's policy (leave it alone it will fix itself) and Keynsian policy (socialism, throwing money at the problem) work. Each is different, they work in different ways. Different people like different shit, I personally prefer Hayek's laissez-fair approach, if someone is corrupt people will stop trading with them and thus they will become obsolete and if needed moderate government assistance to stop monopolies, trusts, etc. moreover, keynsian policy throws money @ the problem, creates social programs like medicare, medicaid, etc etc etc. The problem w/ socialism is that it maintains a lifestyle for forever basically which doesn't lead to any leaps in technology. I honestly don't get it, if you like socialism, move to canada or europe--if you like capitalism move to america. the decision isn't hard, but arguing on forums doesn't help.
On January 07 2011 09:59 Question132 wrote: i love the economics arguing. It is doubtful any1 in this thread is an economist or business major. Note: I'm not an economist. Both Hayek's policy (leave it alone it will fix itself) and Keynsian policy (socialism, throwing money at the problem) work. Each is different, they work in different ways. Different people like different shit, I personally prefer Hayek's laissez-fair approach, if someone is corrupt people will stop trading with them and thus they will become obsolete and if needed moderate government assistance to stop monopolies, trusts, etc. moreover, keynsian policy throws money @ the problem, creates social programs like medicare, medicaid, etc etc etc. The problem w/ socialism is that it maintains a lifestyle for forever basically which doesn't lead to any leaps in technology. I honestly don't get it, if you like socialism, move to canada or europe--if you like capitalism move to america. the decision isn't hard, but arguing on forums doesn't help.
Yes, because packing up your entire life and moving overseas is easy. We're not all in such a position to leave everything you know behind, lol.
On January 07 2011 09:59 Question132 wrote: i love the economics arguing. It is doubtful any1 in this thread is an economist or business major. Note: I'm not an economist. Both Hayek's policy (leave it alone it will fix itself) and Keynsian policy (socialism, throwing money at the problem) work. Each is different, they work in different ways. Different people like different shit, I personally prefer Hayek's laissez-fair approach, if someone is corrupt people will stop trading with them and thus they will become obsolete and if needed moderate government assistance to stop monopolies, trusts, etc. moreover, keynsian policy throws money @ the problem, creates social programs like medicare, medicaid, etc etc etc. The problem w/ socialism is that it maintains a lifestyle for forever basically which doesn't lead to any leaps in technology. I honestly don't get it, if you like socialism, move to canada or europe--if you like capitalism move to america. the decision isn't hard, but arguing on forums doesn't help.
On January 07 2011 03:00 Biff The Understudy wrote:
On January 07 2011 02:18 Scruffy wrote:
On January 07 2011 02:01 Krigwin wrote: Is anyone else a little bewildered and disarmed at how genuinely difficult it has become to tell nowadays if someone is a totally serious right-winger or an over-the-top transparent troll? Seriously, you just can't tell anymore. I imagine this must be even harder for the non-Americans who are not used to the brow-beating and mudslinging of American politics.
Krigwin, I have told you this before I think, and it may be a little hard to swallow but.... believe it or not, there are people out in the world that think differently than you. I'm gonna give that a few minutes to sink in.
I could easily call liberals "trolls", but its pointless, ignorant, and beside the point.
Krigwin is right.
Now, I'll explain you. When you have people who come and tell you that earth was created 6000 years ago, or that the problem of the most capitalist country in the world is that the state is too big and there is no place for business (lol, seriously?), or some racist bullcrap about afro-american who don't want to work (yeah, your post is very racist), it's very very hard to believe that they are serious and are not just trying to piss you off.
Now, I know, people think differently. You see, I'm not a liberal, but I understand liberal thinking. It makes sense, although I have reasons not to share their ideas. That's why I always like talking with liberals. Republican ideas, in an other hand, just mostly don't make any sense at all.
To us americans, socialism also doesn't make sense because the US prides itself on individualism and individual accomplishment. Collectivist thought is the #1 reason for the majority of the wars that have ever happened. No i'm not a conservative, i'm a libertarian, but just because you have absolutely no knowledge of american thought and philosophy, i'd thought i'd point it out to you. The democrat party here is more conservative than the most conservative party in europe btw. We have no nationalist party since nationalism is a dead idea. Republicans in general are pragmatists which is the problem. Libertarians want real limited government and no foreign intervention and free trade. Republicans simply represent a people who are disillusioned with government and want to enjoy the freedom and prosperity that their grandparents told them about, but don't believe that it is possible so that make concessions such as having a huge army and moderately regulating a central bank. The very small percentage of republicans who are fundamentalist christians that believe in literal 6 day creation make up probably 2-5% of the republican party, however, they are the most vocal and the media really likes to talk about them. Imagine if American's thought that all french people were anarchists, it's basically the same as how french people think of conservative americans.
This man spits the truth. I am conservative and libertarian. I see the Republican party as a vehicle to get fresh ideas into government (third parties hardly ever win). Idk, I wish more people would go independent and win, that way labels aren't used as much.
Is it wrong for me to want my country to succeed? I don't think what Obama is/was doing has worked, and I am pretty sure it won't work.
You guys make me facepalm so much my face hurts.
Do you realize that the State is the representation of public interest?
Do you realize that you are enslaved not by an evil administration but by your companies, your multinational and your oligarchy of shareholders? Do you realize that your food industry, your media industry, your weapon industry, your carceral industry, your pharmaceutic industry, every single industry fucks you in the ass day after day after day after day, because of how ridiculously powerful corporations are nowaday?
And you complain about your powerless adminsitration because it wants to give the chance to people who can't pay their insurance to get their cancer cured.
I'm so happy not to live in America, I would kill myself;
I don't blame you, I'm getting the fuck outta here as soon as possible. How easy is it to obtain a French student visa? :p
realy dont read if you feal depressed or bad , im not saying anything new .
osama = for the poor people and midle class = my pick since im here .
republic or anything else = for people who got money , to much money. they need more mineral .
that should be easy like that but you add something :
MEDIA ( mass power ) : who control media ? = rich = osama bad .
that kinda sad but if you control media right now ... you control the world .
you want up the price for something ? say in the new for 2 week that more rare or for some reason the thing you want higher = some bad shit have happen , we need up the price , sorry man we got so much less , you gotta pay higher
so you use media for give the reason ( people need reason for accept crazy shit like that ) now you up the price
maybe that the reason osama got a very bad image in media right now ?
but what i dont understand = they are way more poor people that rich , why we got less power ?!
easy fix : everyone who got more that XXXXXXXX give 15 % of the money he got or you pay more tax .
that just fucking crazy that everything work the other way : people who got less pay more , and people who got more pay less , where the logic here ?
you got less = you give less . you got more = you give more .
when many people got so much money that they dont event know what to do using it and probably cant use it all in all their life ... and next to you someone starving to dead.....
not gotta talk about war and the money they put here.... or im realy going to be banned haha .
for resume what happen : kill the guy starving and get more mineral . what should happen : open the trade window and give some mineral .
going back play sc2 i guess everything better here and we got the trade window ingame for 2vs2 .
On January 06 2011 11:24 t3hwUn wrote: And to get back on topic +1 for no more obama socialist policies. If I wanted to live in Europe I'd move there...
On January 06 2011 11:24 t3hwUn wrote: And to get back on topic +1 for no more obama socialist policies. If I wanted to live in Europe I'd move there...
Bahahaha. I weep for thee.
that because he black ? or you got alot of money ?
if that any other reason im fealing sorry for you .
but yeah get back on topic , cya
edit : i still feal bad for you if that any of the 2 too .
On January 07 2011 09:44 jungsu wrote: I find myself agreeing with the French people in almost every TL thread, and I feel bad when they have to argue us in the US about common sense issues.
You have to regulate capitalism or it ends in revolution between the very rich and the very poor. Taxes are a part of regulation. You have to penalize the very rich. What's so hard to understand about that?
I always hear republicans talk about lowering taxes, while democrats talk about helping people.
I have not heard one new project idea from the republican side after watching many news clips and coverage on cspan.
Do you penalize the rich because they are INHERENTLY BAD EVIL PEOPLE? LIke Warren Buffet? Who is evil?
Totally separately I'm sorry I've created the thread. Now is some giant cesspool of political accusations.
The logical end of your thinking is a dictatorship.
You penalize the rich because human nature is imperfect and greedy, and no one person, or small subset of persons, should be allowed too much power.
Don't get power. It'll get taken by the government.
And even if you legitimately believe that, the reason "What's so hard to understand about that" makes no sense. What if you start a business, are a nice person, and donate to charity, and get your ass taxed off. Would you feel like its fair?
On January 07 2011 06:31 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote: Yah I'm done in this topic too. I think we've all presented enough reasonable arguments that anyone who continues to post that kind of garbage is wasting our time.
It's one thing to look at data and interpret wrongly/differently. It's another thing to spew crap across the room at mach 2 because they can't contain their bullshit. When people make claims like that without evidence the best thing to do is ignore it, and that's what I'm going to do.
Trying not to be overly offensive. But from our debate in the other thread I have got the impression that you are complaining about practically what you did to the extreme. Repeating your statements over and over again without presenting the fact you base them on, does not make them more right, even if it may to you (social psychology tells us that continuous exposure to objects makes us like them more, see "mere exposure effect"). May I suggest that wherever you carry out your debates in the future, you try reasoning based on facts and open-mindedly discussing facts instead of opinions? I promise that will be a whole new experience where you can actually reason consensus.
The problem is you can present all the facts you want, but people will still call you an "idiot" or "troll", not because you are acting like one, but because you have a different ideology than them. Just talking from my experience in the general forum. My "fact" may be an "opinion" to you (just because you don't agree with it) and vice-versa. But we could play this game all day.
You have been contradicted about 100 times in this thread by myself and others, and each time you refuse to defend your arguments. You just move on to the next ridiculous assertion every time that you're unable to defend yourself. That coupled with the racism you spouted earlier is why people suspect you of trolling:
Scruffy wrote: Do you really think African-American's poverty demographics have shifted in the past 50 years? They have probably gotten worse. Its almost like the Dems want to tell them (although more covertly, obviously) "Hey, guess what guys, vote us in, and we will pay you to not work!" Pretty sweet deal if you can get it I guess.
On January 07 2011 06:31 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote: Yah I'm done in this topic too. I think we've all presented enough reasonable arguments that anyone who continues to post that kind of garbage is wasting our time.
It's one thing to look at data and interpret wrongly/differently. It's another thing to spew crap across the room at mach 2 because they can't contain their bullshit. When people make claims like that without evidence the best thing to do is ignore it, and that's what I'm going to do.
Trying not to be overly offensive. But from our debate in the other thread I have got the impression that you are complaining about practically what you did to the extreme. Repeating your statements over and over again without presenting the fact you base them on, does not make them more right, even if it may to you (social psychology tells us that continuous exposure to objects makes us like them more, see "mere exposure effect"). May I suggest that wherever you carry out your debates in the future, you try reasoning based on facts and open-mindedly discussing facts instead of opinions? I promise that will be a whole new experience where you can actually reason consensus.
The problem is you can present all the facts you want, but people will still call you an "idiot" or "troll", not because you are acting like one, but because you have a different ideology than them. Just talking from my experience in the general forum. My "fact" may be an "opinion" to you (just because you don't agree with it) and vice-versa. But we could play this game all day.
You have been contradicted about 100 times in this thread by myself and others, and each time you refuse to defend your arguments. You just move on to the next ridiculous assertion every time that you're unable to defend yourself. That coupled with the racism you spouted earlier is why people suspect you of trolling:
Scruffy wrote: Do you really think African-American's poverty demographics have shifted in the past 50 years? They have probably gotten worse. Its almost like the Dems want to tell them (although more covertly, obviously) "Hey, guess what guys, vote us in, and we will pay you to not work!" Pretty sweet deal if you can get it I guess.
This is opposite of what the thread is about. Republicans are making spending standards much more lax and making it much more difficult to balance the budget and be fiscally responsible. What about that is "small government"? Why are people talking about socialism and such when very clearly, the democrats are the fiscally responsible ones in this case?
This is ridiculous.
moreover, keynsian policy throws money @ the problem, creates social programs like medicare, medicaid, etc etc etc. The problem w/ socialism is that it maintains a lifestyle for forever basically which doesn't lead to any leaps in technology. I honestly don't get it, if you like socialism, move to canada or europe--if you like capitalism move to america. the decision isn't hard, but arguing on forums doesn't help.
This is a little silly to say. America has medicare, medicaid etc. etc. Doesn't that directly imply that America is socialist by what you're saying? America is not a completely capitalist country, because that tends to suck.
On January 07 2011 06:31 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote: Yah I'm done in this topic too. I think we've all presented enough reasonable arguments that anyone who continues to post that kind of garbage is wasting our time.
It's one thing to look at data and interpret wrongly/differently. It's another thing to spew crap across the room at mach 2 because they can't contain their bullshit. When people make claims like that without evidence the best thing to do is ignore it, and that's what I'm going to do.
Trying not to be overly offensive. But from our debate in the other thread I have got the impression that you are complaining about practically what you did to the extreme. Repeating your statements over and over again without presenting the fact you base them on, does not make them more right, even if it may to you (social psychology tells us that continuous exposure to objects makes us like them more, see "mere exposure effect"). May I suggest that wherever you carry out your debates in the future, you try reasoning based on facts and open-mindedly discussing facts instead of opinions? I promise that will be a whole new experience where you can actually reason consensus.
The problem is you can present all the facts you want, but people will still call you an "idiot" or "troll", not because you are acting like one, but because you have a different ideology than them. Just talking from my experience in the general forum. My "fact" may be an "opinion" to you (just because you don't agree with it) and vice-versa. But we could play this game all day.
You have been contradicted about 100 times in this thread by myself and others, and each time you refuse to defend your arguments. You just move on to the next ridiculous assertion every time that you're unable to defend yourself. That coupled with the racism you spouted earlier is why people suspect you of trolling:
Scruffy wrote: Do you really think African-American's poverty demographics have shifted in the past 50 years? They have probably gotten worse. Its almost like the Dems want to tell them (although more covertly, obviously) "Hey, guess what guys, vote us in, and we will pay you to not work!" Pretty sweet deal if you can get it I guess.
That is racism, plain and simple.
Ok. I know I said I would stay out of this but this is enraging. That is NOT racism. That is actually how the democratic party works. Talk to blacks. Seriously. You find one of two views. Most blacks openly support democrats cause other blacks do it, or because they are promised a lot of shit that helps them get more for less (affirmative action) and because historically the democrats have actually pushed civil rights as their agenda and done some good.
There is also the small subset of blacks who will tell you exactly what Scruffy posted. They're very very very angry with the black community because blacks don't accept responsibility for their shortcomings, and blame things on racism, oppression by the white man, and discrimination. Yes, once in a blue moon they're right, but so is everyone from any group. Things like affirmative action and "hate crimes" are a horrible pandering to a people who, quite honestly, are just as capable of achieving what everyone else does. We're basically saying "it's ok to underperform, you're black" or "you're black so we'll protect you because you need it more than everyone else." THAT is true racism.
So when people like you call out facts that might be difficult to swallow as racist, you're only hurting the group you're sheltering, and you look ignorant too.
On January 07 2011 11:46 DoubleReed wrote: Why are we debating socialism!!??
This is opposite of what the thread is about. Republicans are making spending standards much more lax and making it much more difficult to balance the budget and be fiscally responsible. What about that is "small government"? Why are people talking about socialism and such when very clearly, the democrats are the fiscally responsible ones in this case?
This is ridiculous.
Socialism is the issue because the Republicans Are retaining limits on increased Spending (although they are avoiding Cutting Spending... since that always annoys someone more than not increasing spending)
I agree what they are doing is mostly a bid for power and generally financially irresponsible.
But the issue is that they are doing it in a way that it still hinders increasing government involvement in the economy. (ie socialism)
What is wrong with socialism in any form? Isn't USA the land of the free? Can't an elected president be socialist freely?
I used to work for Anthem Blue Cross & Blue shield and i can't understand why you reject socialized medicine. 70% of the Medical Claims get rejected because of abusive behaviour on Anthem's behalf. 20% are properly rejected, and 10% are rejected because the patient tryied to abuse the coverage in a way( I remember this TN guy that wanted a hydraulic cock covered by the healthcare company).
Yes, im from Argentina and a third world country actually denies your health care coverage. LOL.
I have denied Heart Transplants, MRIs , CAT SCANS ETCETCETC that the company billed the patient (An MRI was billed like 10 thousand dollars)
Ok. I know I said I would stay out of this but this is enraging. That is NOT racism. That is actually how the democratic party works. Talk to blacks. Seriously. You find one of two views. Most blacks openly support democrats cause other blacks do it, or because they are promised a lot of shit that helps them get more for less (affirmative action) and because historically the democrats have actually pushed civil rights as their agenda and done some good.
If you could present some significant supporting evidence other than "Talk to blacks" it would help the strength of your argument significantly. As it is now it sounds like an overly generalized assertion that blankets all of the African American community into a very narrow ideology which I am not sure is correct. I am certain that the element you have outlined does exist to some extent, but I am not sure that it applies to most of the African American community.
That being said I would appreciate if people could try to keep the discussion a little more civil. There is absolutely no need to ruin the potential for a decent political discussion over personal egos.
Ok. I know I said I would stay out of this but this is enraging. That is NOT racism. That is actually how the democratic party works. Talk to blacks. Seriously. You find one of two views. Most blacks openly support democrats cause other blacks do it, or because they are promised a lot of shit that helps them get more for less (affirmative action) and because historically the democrats have actually pushed civil rights as their agenda and done some good.
If you could present some significant supporting evidence other than "Talk to blacks" it would help the strength of your argument significantly. As it is now it sounds like an overly generalized assertion that blankets all of the African American community into a very narrow ideology which I am not sure is correct. I am certain that the element you have outlined does exist to some extent, but I am not sure that it applies to most of the African American community.
That being said I would appreciate if people could try to keep the discussion a little more civil. There is absolutely no need to ruin the potential for a decent political discussion over personal egos.
Blacks vote about 90% democrat since... FDR I think. Certainly in recent years. Why else would they continually vote 1 way for 80 years in such strong numbers? Sure, until the 1980s there was a very good reason to vote democrat. What about the last 30 years?
Talking to blacks is actually the best way to learn. I have black friends, worked with black people, and have seen the effects of our policies on blacks in college. Since when did talking to people stop being the best way to get to know them?
It is interesting that Eisenhower and Nixon are the only republicans to have reduced debt during their office. While the Democrats: Truman, Kennedy, Johnson, Carter, and Clinton all managed to reduce debt levels.
In fact Obama is the only Democrat in the last 50 years who has seen an increase in debt during his term.
It's pretty obvious that modern Republicans are not fiscally responsible at all.
Blacks vote about 90% democrat since... FDR I think. Certainly in recent years. Why else would they continually vote 1 way for 80 years in such strong numbers? Sure, until the 1980s there was a very good reason to vote democrat. What about the last 30 years?
Talking to blacks is actually the best way to learn. I have black friends, worked with black people, and have seen the effects of our policies on blacks in college. Since when did talking to people stop being the best way to get to know them?
Simply talking to black people in your day to day life does not necessarily give you complete mastery over the ideology of the entire race. Statistics across the entire populace would be much, much stronger since it would encompass a lot more of the population than the blacks you personally interact with. You may know some blacks quite well, but that does not mean that you know the entire black community quite well.
I would wager that the African Community votes for Democrats more so for historical reasons rather than the other reasons you stipulated, but again it is just assertion. As I said I am uncertain and if you or anyone in this thread for that matter has more significant evidence I would be very much interested.
It is interesting that Eisenhower and Nixon are the only republicans to have reduced debt during their office. While the Democrats: Truman, Kennedy, Johnson, Carter, and Clinton all managed to reduce debt levels.
In fact Obama is the only Democrat in the last 50 years who has seen an increase in debt during his term.
It's pretty obvious that modern Republicans are not fiscally responsible at all.
No its obvious Modern Republican Presidents aren't fiscally responsible...(and that is in the Constitution... Presidents are not Fiscally responsible) since they don't control the budget although they do influence it
Do do that properly you would have to examine
Republican Presidents w Republican Congress Democratic Presidents w Democratic Congress Republican Presidents w Democratic Congress Democratic Presidents w Republican Congress
and compare those 4... or just compare it by Congresses Republican House + Democratic Senate (now) etc.
essentially you have 8 possible combinations
And then you also have to compare policies put in by one that increase in later administrations/Congresses
It is interesting that Eisenhower and Nixon are the only republicans to have reduced debt during their office. While the Democrats: Truman, Kennedy, Johnson, Carter, and Clinton all managed to reduce debt levels.
In fact Obama is the only Democrat in the last 50 years who has seen an increase in debt during his term.
It's pretty obvious that modern Republicans are not fiscally responsible at all.
Only if you don't know how to interpret statistics.
Lets put this in perspective:
Reagan raised the national debt as part of an economic war against the USSR, eventually leading to its collapse. Had he not done what he did, the USSR probably would still be around today.
The debt decrease for Clinton actually only started in around '94, when the congress was controlled by republicans.
Likewise, the greatest periods of debt increase for Bush II were under a democrat controlled congress.
Bush I and Bush II both were involved in foreign conflicts.
Truman's debt decrease is a natural cause of the gov't returning from total war mode.
There's so much stuff that you can draw from a graph if you don't know context. Context shows that your assumptions are incorrect.
Also, the President has minimal control over national debt, since congress is responsible for the budget. The President just has to approve it, and often times it's more important to approve a bad budget than not have one at all, which could halt the Federal gov't entirely.
On January 07 2011 09:44 jungsu wrote: I find myself agreeing with the French people in almost every TL thread, and I feel bad when they have to argue us in the US about common sense issues.
You have to regulate capitalism or it ends in revolution between the very rich and the very poor. Taxes are a part of regulation. You have to penalize the very rich. What's so hard to understand about that?
I always hear republicans talk about lowering taxes, while democrats talk about helping people.
I have not heard one new project idea from the republican side after watching many news clips and coverage on cspan.
Do you penalize the rich because they are INHERENTLY BAD EVIL PEOPLE? LIke Warren Buffet? Who is evil?
Totally separately I'm sorry I've created the thread. Now is some giant cesspool of political accusations.
The logical end of your thinking is a dictatorship.
You penalize the rich because human nature is imperfect and greedy, and no one person, or small subset of persons, should be allowed too much power.
Don't get power. It'll get taken by the government.
And even if you legitimately believe that, the reason "What's so hard to understand about that" makes no sense. What if you start a business, are a nice person, and donate to charity, and get your ass taxed off. Would you feel like its fair?
The situation doesn't matter. If you have more money you get taxed proportionally more.
My point is that demonizing taxes doesn't help us in the end.
On January 07 2011 06:31 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote: Yah I'm done in this topic too. I think we've all presented enough reasonable arguments that anyone who continues to post that kind of garbage is wasting our time.
It's one thing to look at data and interpret wrongly/differently. It's another thing to spew crap across the room at mach 2 because they can't contain their bullshit. When people make claims like that without evidence the best thing to do is ignore it, and that's what I'm going to do.
Trying not to be overly offensive. But from our debate in the other thread I have got the impression that you are complaining about practically what you did to the extreme. Repeating your statements over and over again without presenting the fact you base them on, does not make them more right, even if it may to you (social psychology tells us that continuous exposure to objects makes us like them more, see "mere exposure effect"). May I suggest that wherever you carry out your debates in the future, you try reasoning based on facts and open-mindedly discussing facts instead of opinions? I promise that will be a whole new experience where you can actually reason consensus.
The problem is you can present all the facts you want, but people will still call you an "idiot" or "troll", not because you are acting like one, but because you have a different ideology than them. Just talking from my experience in the general forum. My "fact" may be an "opinion" to you (just because you don't agree with it) and vice-versa. But we could play this game all day.
You have been contradicted about 100 times in this thread by myself and others, and each time you refuse to defend your arguments. You just move on to the next ridiculous assertion every time that you're unable to defend yourself. That coupled with the racism you spouted earlier is why people suspect you of trolling:
Scruffy wrote: Do you really think African-American's poverty demographics have shifted in the past 50 years? They have probably gotten worse. Its almost like the Dems want to tell them (although more covertly, obviously) "Hey, guess what guys, vote us in, and we will pay you to not work!" Pretty sweet deal if you can get it I guess.
That is racism, plain and simple.
Ok. I know I said I would stay out of this but this is enraging. That is NOT racism. That is actually how the democratic party works. Talk to blacks. Seriously. You find one of two views. Most blacks openly support democrats cause other blacks do it, or because they are promised a lot of shit that helps them get more for less (affirmative action) and because historically the democrats have actually pushed civil rights as their agenda and done some good.
More blatant racism. This is just pathetic, I feel like I'm on Stormfront.
Both of you have now asserted, without a scrap of evidence beyond "some black guy said so", that black people in general only vote based on ignorance and immorality. That they vote for Democrats merely because other black people do and because they want to sit around lazily while collecting cash. Those are horrible, racist generalizations which have no basis in reality.
As I explained to 'Scruffy', there are a number of reasons for why black people vote overwhelmingly Democratic, and those reasons are not based in stupidity and laziness. The most clear, significant reason is the southern strategy. With that approach Republicans ceded over any chance of ever receiving black support. That was a calculated and conscious decision, they understood very well what they were sacrificing. But they believed that the white southern voters they would receive in turn would far outweigh the amount of black voters lost, and they were absolutely right. Kevin Phillips, a Nixon political strategist, best outlines the strategy here:
"From now on, the Republicans are never going to get more than 10 to 20 percent of the Negro vote and they don't need any more than that... but Republicans would be shortsighted if they weakened enforcement of the Voting Rights Act. The more Negroes who register as Democrats in the South, the sooner the Negrophobe whites will quit the Democrats and become Republicans. That's where the votes are. Without that prodding from the blacks, the whites will backslide into their old comfortable arrangement with the local Democrats"
There is also the small subset of blacks who will tell you exactly what Scruffy posted. They're very very very angry with the black community because blacks don't accept responsibility for their shortcomings, and blame things on racism, oppression by the white man, and discrimination. Yes, once in a blue moon they're right, but so is everyone from any group. Things like affirmative action and "hate crimes" are a horrible pandering to a people who, quite honestly, are just as capable of achieving what everyone else does. We're basically saying "it's ok to underperform, you're black" or "you're black so we'll protect you because you need it more than everyone else." THAT is true racism.
I don't know what I prefer, the more vague racism as shown above or the more blatant forms. At least the more blatant forms are honest, although more audacious. I really don't know how you expect me to respond to these unfounded allegations against black people. I would be shocked if this nonsense didn't originally come from Limbaugh.
So when people like you call out facts that might be difficult to swallow as racist, you're only hurting the group you're sheltering, and you look ignorant too.
Best use of "sheltering" ever. It's quite revealing.
It is interesting that Eisenhower and Nixon are the only republicans to have reduced debt during their office. While the Democrats: Truman, Kennedy, Johnson, Carter, and Clinton all managed to reduce debt levels.
In fact Obama is the only Democrat in the last 50 years who has seen an increase in debt during his term.
It's pretty obvious that modern Republicans are not fiscally responsible at all.
Only if you don't know how to interpret statistics.
Lets put this in perspective:
Reagan raised the national debt as part of an economic war against the USSR, eventually leading to its collapse. Had he not done what he did, the USSR probably would still be around today.
Yeah, who cares about Perestroika, or Glasnost, or what the Soviet Union's actual budget numbers were, Reagan spent the USSR out of existence.
It is interesting that Eisenhower and Nixon are the only republicans to have reduced debt during their office. While the Democrats: Truman, Kennedy, Johnson, Carter, and Clinton all managed to reduce debt levels.
In fact Obama is the only Democrat in the last 50 years who has seen an increase in debt during his term.
It's pretty obvious that modern Republicans are not fiscally responsible at all.
Only if you don't know how to interpret statistics.
Lets put this in perspective:
Reagan raised the national debt as part of an economic war against the USSR, eventually leading to its collapse. Had he not done what he did, the USSR probably would still be around today.
Yeah, who cares about Perestroika, or Glasnost, or what the Soviet Union's actual budget numbers were, Reagan spent the USSR out of existence.
--
Yet another view that Phoenix presents as fact without a scrap of evidence behind it. That is not at all an accepted or accurate historical view. I've never even heard that ridiculous defense of Reagan before.
To the people thinking the black vote has historically gone to Democrats because they are selfish or whatever: It's actually because the historical Republican strategy is "fuck black people." See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_strategy
Lefnui posted a quote from there, but I prefer this one for maximum impact
You start out in 1954 by saying, "Nigger, nigger, nigger." By 1968 you can't say "nigger"—that hurts you. Backfires. So you say stuff like forced busing, states' rights and all that stuff. You're getting so abstract now [that] you're talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you're talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is [that] blacks get hurt worse than whites. And subconsciously maybe that is part of it. I'm not saying that. But I'm saying that if it is getting that abstract, and that coded, that we are doing away with the racial problem one way or the other. You follow me—because obviously sitting around saying, "We want to cut this," is much more abstract than even the busing thing, and a hell of a lot more abstract than "Nigger, nigger".
Ok. I know I said I would stay out of this but this is enraging. That is NOT racism. That is actually how the democratic party works. Talk to blacks. Seriously. You find one of two views. Most blacks openly support democrats cause other blacks do it, or because they are promised a lot of shit that helps them get more for less (affirmative action) and because historically the democrats have actually pushed civil rights as their agenda and done some good.
If you could present some significant supporting evidence other than "Talk to blacks" it would help the strength of your argument significantly. As it is now it sounds like an overly generalized assertion that blankets all of the African American community into a very narrow ideology which I am not sure is correct. I am certain that the element you have outlined does exist to some extent, but I am not sure that it applies to most of the African American community.
That being said I would appreciate if people could try to keep the discussion a little more civil. There is absolutely no need to ruin the potential for a decent political discussion over personal egos.
Blacks vote about 90% democrat since... FDR I think. Certainly in recent years. Why else would they continually vote 1 way for 80 years in such strong numbers? Sure, until the 1980s there was a very good reason to vote democrat. What about the last 30 years?
Talking to blacks is actually the best way to learn. I have black friends, worked with black people, and have seen the effects of our policies on blacks in college. Since when did talking to people stop being the best way to get to know them?
I rarely see people that have as little clue about the "black" culture and the way they vote as you have but holy crap man.
First my credentials because I obviously need them to be taken seriously by you!
I'm half black.
The reason I generally vote democratic is because I find they are less insane than republicans. Democrats are still right wing compared to the rest of the world, Republicans are pretty much breaking the scale.
It also frightens me when I hear about 55-60 year old republicans saying this isn't the country they were born in and that they want that country back. Let me explain why that frightens me.
The country they were born in had colored water fountains, forced black people to sit in the back, and was generally completely and openly racist. The country in the 1950-1960's era weren't exactly its glory days and I fail to see how anybody could POSSIBLY think that.
As it is right now congress is totally broken. It's now a political shitfest that's all about DEMO VS REPUB and nothing actually gets done. Both sides routinely lie their asses off to get into office about how they'll cut spending, save the national debt crises, and make life easier.
They all lie, they spit in your face after they extend tax cuts to the super rich ( which funny enough won't make a difference because trickle down economics is a retarded principle, thanks Republicans), and then allow people like Rush Limbough actual TV time to sway the masses into a cyclonic hysteria.
On January 07 2011 15:45 Jumperer wrote: I wonder why I never see a republican win a "critical thinking" debate on teamliquid.net or other intellectual forums.
Because rarely do people use critical thinking on any internet forum.
All your contradictory evidence points to why southern blacks would vote democrat. What about northern blacks?
What you're actually saying is that all black people DO think the same because regardless of where they live they still vote democrat simply because blacks in the south vote democrat because the republicans in those states decided to alienate them.
Arguing with internet liberals is like arguing with children. Once the argument is won the name-calling begins. Once I hear "racism" dropped I'm pretty sure the argument is actually over.
On January 07 2011 15:45 Jumperer wrote: I wonder why I never see a republican win a "critical thinking" debate on teamliquid.net or other intellectual forums.
Because rarely do people use critical thinking on any internet forum.
All your contradictory evidence points to why southern blacks would vote democrat. What about northern blacks?
What you're actually saying is that all black people DO think the same because regardless of where they live they still vote democrat simply because blacks in the south vote democrat because the republicans in those states decided to alienate them.
Arguing with internet liberals is like arguing with children. Once the argument is won the name-calling begins. Once I hear "racism" dropped I'm pretty sure the argument is actually over.
And of course you're totally unable to respond to the challenges made, just like 'Scruffy'. I know how much it annoys Republicans when the term racist is brought up, and I don't mean to annoy you. But when you state something which is blatantly racist then sorry, but I'm going to refer to it as such. Saying that black people vote for Democrats merely because they want to sit around lazily and collect cash is racist, and that is precisely what you and 'Scruffy' said.
You're completely misunderstanding the southern strategy. Clearly you weren't even aware of it, which is pretty embarrassing and would explain why you're so confused about the reasons behind black people voting overwhelmingly Democratic. It does not only apply to black people living in the south, that is not why it is the 'southern strategy'. It refers to a general alienation of black people which only began in the south, but is not limited to that area. It's about the white voters of the south who were gained through the strategy, that is why it's the 'southern strategy'.
Again, you guys have some nerve repeatedly claiming that you've won the argument when you aren't even willing to respond to the challenges made.
On January 07 2011 15:45 Jumperer wrote: I wonder why I never see a republican win a "critical thinking" debate on teamliquid.net or other intellectual forums.
Because rarely do people use critical thinking on any internet forum.
All your contradictory evidence points to why southern blacks would vote democrat. What about northern blacks?
What you're actually saying is that all black people DO think the same because regardless of where they live they still vote democrat simply because blacks in the south vote democrat because the republicans in those states decided to alienate them.
Arguing with internet liberals is like arguing with children. Once the argument is won the name-calling begins. Once I hear "racism" dropped I'm pretty sure the argument is actually over.
Didn't you just like, lose an argument then insult someone?
Look, more so than republican/democrat, the big rift in this country is between politician and real person. Let's stop arguing over stupid party lines and get down to the fact that none of us are politicians and therefore there's basically nothing we can do about politics.
On January 07 2011 15:45 Jumperer wrote: I wonder why I never see a republican win a "critical thinking" debate on teamliquid.net or other intellectual forums.
Because rarely do people use critical thinking on any internet forum.
All your contradictory evidence points to why southern blacks would vote democrat. What about northern blacks?
What you're actually saying is that all black people DO think the same because regardless of where they live they still vote democrat simply because blacks in the south vote democrat because the republicans in those states decided to alienate them.
Arguing with internet liberals is like arguing with children. Once the argument is won the name-calling begins. Once I hear "racism" dropped I'm pretty sure the argument is actually over.
Wow, man ... your posts are just hilarious!? Let me try to break it down for you: You take a neutral empirical fact - that skin color is a significant predictor for party loyalty in America - and then present your personal interpretation of the underlying reasoning, which is in a nutshell that black voters only vote what other black voters vote and/or the party which promises them to receive money without working. Your hidden assumption - which you do not spell out of course - is that white voters (or non-blacks at least) behave fundamentally different in that they are (1) not as inclined to simply do what others do and (2) that they don't fall as easily to false promises and/or don't mind working hard (if these are not your hidden assumptions, then your whole argument does not make sense in the first place). Over more you make these wild assertions without backing them up other than with anecdotal evidence. This is actually textbook racism, in that you claim that skin color is a meaningful predictor for complex psychological and social behaviour including work ethics. And when called out on that, you complain about irrational forum posters!? That just cracks me up!
This is not to say that you cannot be right in principle. It might be that skin color is in fact a good predictor for such factors. But that would just mean that racism actually had a point ... unfortunately for you, science is not on your side there ...
On January 07 2011 19:47 ZERG_RUSSIAN wrote: Look, more so than republican/democrat, the big rift in this country is between politician and real person. Let's stop arguing over stupid party lines and get down to the fact that none of us are politicians and therefore there's basically nothing we can do about politics.
Politicians are not born on another planet. They are people like any of us, elected by their peers. (Personally I think anybody who WANTS to get into politics is a person who should NOT be in politics, but that's a whole other topic.) I'm reminded of the standup of George Calin.
"Real people" are as much the problem, if not more. Most people are ignorant and uninformed, and so we get ignorant and uninformed leaders. Practically all politicians are well-intentioned, but they fall into a particular trap. The public, especially these days, wants instant gratification. And yet the majority of the country's problems require long-term solutions, not bandaids. Long term solutions notoriously have short-term detriments. For this reason, politicians can not sell long-term solutions to the public without major backlash.
From the politician's perspective, he can only "make a difference" so long as he's employed. To stay employed, he's forced to hug the popular ideas, not the best ideas And so nothing meaningful gets done.
What we need is more politicians with the balls to make tough/unpopular decisions and sacrifice their careers to do what needs to be done. The alternative is to get the voting public to be better informed, but that's a lot more work and unlikely to happen in the near future due to the combination of bias in the media and general laziness of the public.
On January 07 2011 19:47 ZERG_RUSSIAN wrote: Look, more so than republican/democrat, the big rift in this country is between politician and real person. Let's stop arguing over stupid party lines and get down to the fact that none of us are politicians and therefore there's basically nothing we can do about politics.
Politicians are not born on another planet. They are people like any of us, elected by their peers. (Personally I think anybody who WANTS to get into politics is a person who should NOT be in politics, but that's a whole other topic.) I'm reminded of the standup of George Calin.
"Real people" are as much the problem, if not more. Most people are ignorant and uninformed, and so we get ignorant and uninformed leaders. Practically all politicians are well-intentioned, but they fall into a particular trap. The public, especially these days, wants instant gratification. And yet the majority of the country's problems require long-term solutions, not bandaids. Long term solutions notoriously have short-term detriments. For this reason, politicians can not sell long-term solutions to the public without major backlash.
From the politician's perspective, he can only "make a difference" so long as he's employed. To stay employed, he's forced to hug the popular ideas, not the best ideas And so nothing meaningful gets done.
What we need is more politicians with the balls to make tough/unpopular decisions and sacrifice their careers to do what needs to be done. The alternative is to get the voting public to be better informed, but that's a lot more work and unlikely to happen in the near future due to the combination of bias in the media and general laziness of the public.
I think you have accurately and very stringently described what most people feel about todays politics in most western democracies.
However, I think that this view is rather pessimistic and part of the problem. If you subscribe to the fact that the general public is uninformed, unable to understand the necessities of certain measures and stupid, then you partly justifiy politicians behavior. Their core argument is: me must not listen to the public because they have no ckue, anyway.
In my experience the problem is not politicians being unwilling to make unpopular decisions. As soon as they are lected, they do a lot of shit that pisses of the public. Like tax cuts for the rich, legislation that one-sidely favors big corporations at the expense of smaller businesses, the enviroentment etc.
I would say, what we need is politicians who make realisitic promises before elctions (instead of promising us heaven on earth( but who stick to there promises once they are in office. That and a public whose memory is good enough to remember who was true to their word and who was not.
On January 07 2011 19:47 ZERG_RUSSIAN wrote: Look, more so than republican/democrat, the big rift in this country is between politician and real person. Let's stop arguing over stupid party lines and get down to the fact that none of us are politicians and therefore there's basically nothing we can do about politics.
Politicians are not born on another planet. They are people like any of us, elected by their peers. (Personally I think anybody who WANTS to get into politics is a person who should NOT be in politics, but that's a whole other topic.) I'm reminded of the standup of George Calin.
"Real people" are as much the problem, if not more. Most people are ignorant and uninformed, and so we get ignorant and uninformed leaders. Practically all politicians are well-intentioned, but they fall into a particular trap. The public, especially these days, wants instant gratification. And yet the majority of the country's problems require long-term solutions, not bandaids. Long term solutions notoriously have short-term detriments. For this reason, politicians can not sell long-term solutions to the public without major backlash.
From the politician's perspective, he can only "make a difference" so long as he's employed. To stay employed, he's forced to hug the popular ideas, not the best ideas And so nothing meaningful gets done.
What we need is more politicians with the balls to make tough/unpopular decisions and sacrifice their careers to do what needs to be done. The alternative is to get the voting public to be better informed, but that's a lot more work and unlikely to happen in the near future due to the combination of bias in the media and general laziness of the public.
I think you have accurately and very stringently described what most people feel about todays politics in most western democracies.
However, I think that this view is rather pessimistic and part of the problem. If you subscribe to the fact that the general public is uninformed, unable to understand the necessities of certain measures and stupid, then you partly justifiy politicians behavior. Their core argument is: me must not listen to the public because they have no ckue, anyway.
In my experience the problem is not politicians being unwilling to make unpopular decisions. As soon as they are lected, they do a lot of shit that pisses of the public. Like tax cuts for the rich, legislation that one-sidely favors big corporations at the expense of smaller businesses, the enviroentment etc.
I would say, what we need is politicians who make realisitic promises before elctions (instead of promising us heaven on earth( but who stick to there promises once they are in office. That and a public whose memory is good enough to remember who was true to their word and who was not.
George Washington and many of the founding fathers believed that much of America was unfit to vote. People often forget that part because it doesn't fit in their happy fairytale of how America was born. Originally only white propertied males were given the right to vote. Why did they do this?
It's because only white propertied males were those who were receiving any sort of education, or had any business assets to protect. It was ipso facto class-ism and racism, and yes by today's standards it's an awful thing, but the reasoning behind it is actually quite sound. Uneducated people and people with no investment into society haven't the proper understanding nor perspective that is required to make intelligent voting decisions.
What has happened in the modern age of democracy is now that people who aren't learned scholars of international politics, economics, business, and gov't are outvoting those who are. Political parties have to find issues those groups do care about and use those issues to pull in the voting masses.
The republican base is motivated by social fears - abortion, gay marriage, religion, even some racism and xenophobia.
The democratic base is motivated by dangling the carrot, so to speak - welfare, healthcare, equal opportunity this and that, restraints and regulations on business which "protects" consumers.
Both are manipulation. Both are filled with lies and half truths. This is the nature of modern American politics though. All that we see now, and it's quite evident on this forum, is that both sides only see the other as the base of that party, ignorant and motivated by party propaganda. Both sides seem to the other as blissfully ignorant to the lies they've been fed by their leaders.
Both sides are right.
Until people realize that everything said is simply a bullshit argument designed to trap uneducated Americans into voting emotionally instead of logically, this country will sink ever deeper into a schism of elite and plebes - those with power, and those without.
I'm going to set the record straight. I don't actually give a damn which party I support. I don't even care what tag goes on my vote when it gets sent off. I only care about whoever makes the most logical and well reasoned argument backed up by facts. In recent years I've read a lot and see a lot of evidence supporting conservative theories and libertarian philosophy. The problem is, in this country, there is no pure conservative libertarian movement. It's all lumped up with the fear-driven republican base, and it becomes very hard to separate the gems from the bullshit in political arguments.
There are some very good points and arguments I haven't heard before and even if it looks like I'm fighting against them, I'm listening. The evidence for the southern strategy being the primary cause of alienation of black voters is something I wasn't fully aware of, and now I think my views were skewed because of misinformation. I still believe that both parties prey on racial hate and misunderstanding. Republicans do sometimes reach out to some extreme sectors of society who still believe in segregation and inequality. Democrats preach that all Republicans are racist and want to take away social programs that help blacks.
In the end, it's all tied into education. We have to foster logical thinking and make sure that people don't go by taglines and catch phrases, but by what the real platform is. Do you vote for democrats because Bush led us into an unjust war and all war is evil? Do you vote for republicans because you don't want your money taken away and given to someone who works less via taxes? Do you really understand how all that works, or are those just superficial responses that the parties tell you to have? If you want to show politicians up and prove that you're not what they think you are, then you must learn and reason your way to the proper conclusion, whatever that may be.
I apologize to those of you who are liberal leaning. I shouldn't have been so rash as to insult an entire group for the actions of a few.
Look, more so than republican/democrat, the big rift in this country is between politician and real person. Let's stop arguing over stupid party lines and get down to the fact that none of us are politicians and therefore there's basically nothing we can do about politics.
Politicians are not born on another planet. They are people like any of us, elected by their peers. (Personally I think anybody who WANTS to get into politics is a person who should NOT be in politics, but that's a whole other topic.) I'm reminded of the standup of George Calin.
"Real people" are as much the problem, if not more. Most people are ignorant and uninformed, and so we get ignorant and uninformed leaders. Practically all politicians are well-intentioned, but they fall into a particular trap. The public, especially these days, wants instant gratification. And yet the majority of the country's problems require long-term solutions, not bandaids. Long term solutions notoriously have short-term detriments. For this reason, politicians can not sell long-term solutions to the public without major backlash.
From the politician's perspective, he can only "make a difference" so long as he's employed. To stay employed, he's forced to hug the popular ideas, not the best ideas And so nothing meaningful gets done.
What we need is more politicians with the balls to make tough/unpopular decisions and sacrifice their careers to do what needs to be done. The alternative is to get the voting public to be better informed, but that's a lot more work and unlikely to happen in the near future due to the combination of bias in the media and general laziness of the public.
I think you have accurately and very stringently described what most people feel about todays politics in most western democracies.
However, I think that this view is rather pessimistic and part of the problem. If you subscribe to the fact that the general public is uninformed, unable to understand the necessities of certain measures and stupid, then you partly justifiy politicians behavior. Their core argument is: me must not listen to the public because they have no ckue, anyway.
In my experience the problem is not politicians being unwilling to make unpopular decisions. As soon as they are lected, they do a lot of shit that pisses of the public. Like tax cuts for the rich, legislation that one-sidely favors big corporations at the expense of smaller businesses, the enviroentment etc.
I would say, what we need is politicians who make realisitic promises before elctions (instead of promising us heaven on earth( but who stick to there promises once they are in office. That and a public whose memory is good enough to remember who was true to their word and who was not.
George Washington and many of the founding fathers believed that much of America was unfit to vote. People often forget that part because it doesn't fit in their happy fairytale of how America was born. Originally only white propertied males were given the right to vote. Why did they do this?
It's because only white propertied males were those who were receiving any sort of education, or had any business assets to protect. It was ipso facto class-ism and racism, and yes by today's standards it's an awful thing, but the reasoning behind it is actually quite sound. Uneducated people and people with no investment into society haven't the proper understanding nor perspective that is required to make intelligent voting decisions.
What has happened in the modern age of democracy is now that people who aren't learned scholars of international politics, economics, business, and gov't are outvoting those who are. Political parties have to find issues those groups do care about and use those issues to pull in the voting masses.
The republican base is motivated by social fears - abortion, gay marriage, religion, even some racism and xenophobia.
The democratic base is motivated by dangling the carrot, so to speak - welfare, healthcare, equal opportunity this and that, restraints and regulations on business which "protects" consumers.
Both are manipulation. Both are filled with lies and half truths. This is the nature of modern American politics though. All that we see now, and it's quite evident on this forum, is that both sides only see the other as the base of that party, ignorant and motivated by party propaganda. Both sides seem to the other as blissfully ignorant to the lies they've been fed by their leaders.
Both sides are right.
Until people realize that everything said is simply a bullshit argument designed to trap uneducated Americans into voting emotionally instead of logically, this country will sink ever deeper into a schism of elite and plebes - those with power, and those without.
Very Good post, unfortunetly Your words are true not only in regards to US politics but also to most European countries including mine. Sad but True.
On January 06 2011 15:11 thehitman wrote: When the new congress cuts military spending it will be a good sign. Otherwise all these new legislation's are crap.
If the USA are to survive and all non politically engaged economists say so, they must stop the wars.
If the USA pulled out of Iraq, Afghanistan, Korea and Columbia it would cut the expenditure by about 15%
If USA closed all their military bases and returned all soldiers home it would cut 25% of the expenditure.
And if the US cut entitlement spending by 5-15% it would have the same effect on the budget.
However, I do think the idea of abandoning a conventional military is a good idea Replace with
-Nukes to fight Nation states
-"Police Infantry" for fighting non-nation state groups in weak nation states (with solid air/drone support)... However this would still be very expensive... as it would require multiple well trained+equipped individuals.
There would still be army personnel but a lot less and they are all home, so no spending on maintenance, oil and stuff like that!
'You called me a name so I guess I won the argument'
A classic. Purely egotistical reasoning, if everyone's calling you an idiot you must be smarter than everyone else, right? Right.
'US healthcare is the best in the world because all the world's richest businessmen, royalty and presidents come here to get treatment.'
So your healthcare is the best in the world, for the world's richest people? Awesome.
'Liberals think that *insert anything*/I just love it when liberals *insert anything*/Don't you liberals realise that *insert anything*'
Dividing the whole world into two groups (liberals and normal people, or right-wingers and normal people, whichever your preference) and then calling one of said groups all mindless, thoughtless sheep. Because it's much easier to argue against somebody when you can associate them with everyone from Nancy Pelosi to Mussolini.
On January 07 2011 11:46 DoubleReed wrote: Why are we debating socialism!!??
This is opposite of what the thread is about. Republicans are making spending standards much more lax and making it much more difficult to balance the budget and be fiscally responsible. What about that is "small government"? Why are people talking about socialism and such when very clearly, the democrats are the fiscally responsible ones in this case?
This is ridiculous.
Socialism is the issue because the Republicans Are retaining limits on increased Spending (although they are avoiding Cutting Spending... since that always annoys someone more than not increasing spending)
I agree what they are doing is mostly a bid for power and generally financially irresponsible.
But the issue is that they are doing it in a way that it still hinders increasing government involvement in the economy. (ie socialism)
Okay, this sounds like general confusion. Obama put in the limits on spending. He retained "Pay-As-You-Go" from the Clinton era because he believes that it was instrumental in balancing the budget during Clinton's years in office (which btw, was a democrat president and republican congress). Search for the Policy and you will see Obama supports "Pay-As-You-Go" very strongly. That and Bush racked up a huge deficit with zero limits on spending and less transparency.
So Obama and the Democrats put in "Pay-As-You-Go" which is strict on how much government can spend, as it asserts you have to know where the money is coming from.
Then Republicans get Congress and say "Pay-As-You-Go-except-tax-cuts." NO. That's not fiscally responsible. I know people like tax cuts, but seriously, the money has to go somewhere. It's stupid.
But the "Pay-As-You-Go" policy is a democrat initiative. For some reason people think Obama has increased executive power and dramatically increased spending. It's not actually true, and I don't quite know why people are saying that.
---- So people saying the democrats or Obama is a socialist or whatever: They are the ones who put in strict limits on government spending. Republicans are making those limits more lax.
On January 06 2011 11:00 funnybananaman wrote: You can't cut the deficit AND cut taxes AND spend retarded amounts of money funding stupid wars and throwing all our taxpayer money into the military all at the same time.
Too true.
I don't hate the tea party or anything. I believe we need to get out of debt and taxes should be as low as possible, but the wars we are in are by far the biggest burden to the budget. I don't see why conservatives can't see this.
Look at the budgets and spending of this country and try to support your claim. Social policies such as SS, medicare, medicaid, and welfare represent substantially more spending than on defense.
Check out the amount of money spent on the Iraq War. The total cost of the war barely exceeds the cost of just 1 year of social security. Add in medicare, medicaid and other entitlements and compare. If you cut those programs by half you could fund over 5 Iraq wars a year!
The defense budget for 2010 is listed as $664 billion. Compare this to those 3 big entitlement expenditures listed above: $1421 billion!
Do you really think we're in a costly war? We could cut out entitlements for an entire year and that would cover 3 Iraqs. We haven't even been close to full war mode since WWII. If we actually had a serious war that was a direct threat to the American people, we effectively could spend dozens of times more money on it without risking inflation, simply by cutting socialist welfare policies.
People don't realize it, but the US is a massive welfare state. The amount of money we spend on helping out the poor, elderly, disabled, or just outright lazy is astronomical. So, you could reduce the amount of everyone's social security checks by 10% or let a madman research nuclear devices for use on our allies. And lets not forget, any conflict in the middle east drives up oil prices and costs the US possibly even more than we'd have ever spent on this war.
"The US is a massive welfare state" Really? Have you ever been outside of the country? We are one of the MOST conservative industrialized countries on the world.
I'm not sure what you mean by "welfare" but if you mean unemployment benefits, you have no grasp on how economics works. Same for you social security arguments; end SS and you end spending by the elderly which hurts our econ.
Not to mention the fact that the "social policies" are designed to HELP whereas Iraq did nothing but hurt.
I'd also like to see a source for the 1.4kb number - is that since Roosevelt and the great depression? If so, it's a ridiculous statistic.
And no, Hussein was not going after Nukes when we invaded >>
There you go. Look for yourself. I don't make this stuff up. You don't believe it because you cannot hold your beliefs about gov't economics if you know it's true. Misinformation is a serious problem when it comes to our spending, and people need to wake the hell up.
Oh and Hussein was definitely going after nukes when we invaded. It's fact.
You should stop using wikipedia as you're only source of information.
Also wheres the proof, because it seems the US, the people who invaded solely on that fact, can't seem to find it themselves.
Wikipedia is pretty good for directly verifiable facts. If you dont believe something there, you can click the reference button. In the case of the US budget it is: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy10/pdf/fy10-newera.pdf . If you believe that source is inaccurate, I would challenge you to present a more reputable source for the US budget.
How hard was that now.
Just linking a wikipedia page shows nothing. Anyone on the internet can change information on any page and then link that page as proof of fact.
Actually not true. Many pages must be verified by staff before being changed. I have a friend who does a lot of work for Wikipedia. I also have to say that it's the most accessible and well organized place for information. The article they have is really easy to read and is just a good article. Many college professors are fond of Wikipedia for objective information, because it's really really good.
Is that why every teacher in every subject refused wikipedia as a source when I went to school? I do agree with the fact that its an amazingly awesome website for information, just take any information you get and double check it imo.
The reason professors don't want you to use wikipedia for assignments is because it's so damn easy, you're supposed to put some actual research in and read a book or something.
On January 06 2011 15:11 thehitman wrote: When the new congress cuts military spending it will be a good sign. Otherwise all these new legislation's are crap.
If the USA are to survive and all non politically engaged economists say so, they must stop the wars.
If the USA pulled out of Iraq, Afghanistan, Korea and Columbia it would cut the expenditure by about 15%
If USA closed all their military bases and returned all soldiers home it would cut 25% of the expenditure.
And if the US cut entitlement spending by 5-15% it would have the same effect on the budget.
However, I do think the idea of abandoning a conventional military is a good idea Replace with
-Nukes to fight Nation states
-"Police Infantry" for fighting non-nation state groups in weak nation states (with solid air/drone support)... However this would still be very expensive... as it would require multiple well trained+equipped individuals.
A conventional military is required for many reasons:
Occupation and assistance: We cannot give aid to our allies or give aid in foreign disasters without a conventional military. We also cannot actually man our holdings in other parts of the world. If we want to push back China out of South Korea, we cannot do that with nukes.
I disagree... we could definitely push China out of south Korea with Nukes... or at least the threat of nukes. provided we gave sufficient warning to China before they moved into South Korea.
A full conventional military action between nuclear powers is likely to become a nuclear war anyways.
You cannot rely on nukes as your only deterrent. No nation wants to commit to using them. If we have no conventional army, we have no way to deter enemeis from taking small bites at us repeatedly. We cannot respond to such aggression with nuclear force, so we'd be forced to take a loss for no reason. In addition, nukes are an awfully heavy solution to any war, and even a war hawk is going to be cautious about using one ever.
"Small bites" that consist of conventional enemy forces could definitely be countered by nukes
It is really hard to take out a specific terrorist camp without leveling a city with a nuke. You need conventional forces to take out key targets and perform small scale assaults. In the end, if you wanted to only rely on nukes you'd just be blanketing a country with them to take out every military target you need to take out. That's no way to win a war (unless it's against zerg).
If the enemy is attacking in a non conventional way, ie guerilla forces/terrorists.... then conventional forces are not what you want, you want those "Police Infantry"... people that know which 'civilian' to shoot, and the way to have them shot.
Basically any Country using conventional military forces can be safely handled with nukes Any Country using nukes can Only be safely handled with nukes
Organizations (including countries) using non conventional warfare such as terrorism/guerilla warfare should be handled differently... and a conventional military isn't what is needed in that case. What you need is a militarized version of a police force.
Hypothetical war with North Korea: nuke them. What an awful foreign policy
Why?... if it has been previously stated that that would be our response... The "local ally" South Korea would still have their own conventional forces.
You wouldn't necessarily only have ICBMs either... and you wouldn't have to drop them all at once either...one per day until the survivors surrender.
Both the "Nuclear" portion and the "Police" portion of the military would have many things similar to current conventional forces.... "Nuclear" would need: fighters/nuclear bombers/carriers/subs for more tactical nukes on minor conventional powers "Police" would need armored transports (in land, air, and sea), gunships, drones
Conventional forces are most definitely required in order to occupy areas, defend assets, have a physical presence etc. and so that you're only military capability isn't starting a nuclear war.
The actions of this 'police force' you speak of are exactly what's being done by the military in Afghanistan, they're not standing in a field fighting massive pitched battles, they're systematically hunting for insurgents, clearing areas of enemies and IED's, arresting suspects in towns, seizing weapons etc.
The main question blacks have to ask themselves is "Has my life gotten any better under Democrats?" Probably not. 50 years of social welfare programs and people aren't that much better off. Plus we have a lot of debt/non-tax paying citizens to show for it.
Pay-as-you-go might as well be a MLM marketing scheme. The President can issue "emergency funding" and the like to bypass it. If pay as you go works, then how the hell did the national debt increase by 3.1 trillion? That makes sense.
I am from Alabama, so you are right Lefnui, I MUST be racist. You don't even know me you idiot. I can call you names too, see? I'm pretty sure if I was actually racist, then I wouldn't live where I live right now. Its an upgraded SLAVE HOUSE from the 1830s by the way...
I'm sure your elitist ass wouldn't be good enough for that, would it?
On January 07 2011 21:15 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote: What has happened in the modern age of democracy is now that people who aren't learned scholars of international politics, economics, business, and gov't are outvoting those who are. Political parties have to find issues those groups do care about and use those issues to pull in the voting masses.
The republican base is motivated by social fears - abortion, gay marriage, religion, even some racism and xenophobia.
The democratic base is motivated by dangling the carrot, so to speak - welfare, healthcare, equal opportunity this and that, restraints and regulations on business which "protects" consumers.
Both are manipulation. Both are filled with lies and half truths. This is the nature of modern American politics though. All that we see now, and it's quite evident on this forum, is that both sides only see the other as the base of that party, ignorant and motivated by party propaganda. Both sides seem to the other as blissfully ignorant to the lies they've been fed by their leaders.
Both sides are right.
Until people realize that everything said is simply a bullshit argument designed to trap uneducated Americans into voting emotionally instead of logically, this country will sink ever deeper into a schism of elite and plebes - those with power, and those without.
Props for a quality post, dude.
I think you have very precisely described the biggest downside of a democracy. I wonder what the solution to this problem is. One drastic step might be to let people vote only if they pass a voters license test to sort out the uninformed. However, that clearly violates the idea of equality.
You may alternatively try to educate people to a level where everyone can function as an informed voter. You probabaly need to combine a good education with politicians being able to explain complicated issues in an easy-to-understand way.
But reality shows that it is much more convenient to let the people stay uninformed and use fear/carrots to achieve power.
On January 07 2011 21:15 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote: What has happened in the modern age of democracy is now that people who aren't learned scholars of international politics, economics, business, and gov't are outvoting those who are. Political parties have to find issues those groups do care about and use those issues to pull in the voting masses.
The republican base is motivated by social fears - abortion, gay marriage, religion, even some racism and xenophobia.
The democratic base is motivated by dangling the carrot, so to speak - welfare, healthcare, equal opportunity this and that, restraints and regulations on business which "protects" consumers.
Both are manipulation. Both are filled with lies and half truths. This is the nature of modern American politics though. All that we see now, and it's quite evident on this forum, is that both sides only see the other as the base of that party, ignorant and motivated by party propaganda. Both sides seem to the other as blissfully ignorant to the lies they've been fed by their leaders.
Both sides are right.
Until people realize that everything said is simply a bullshit argument designed to trap uneducated Americans into voting emotionally instead of logically, this country will sink ever deeper into a schism of elite and plebes - those with power, and those without.
Props for a quality post, dude.
I think you have very precisely described the biggest downside of a democracy. I wonder what the solution to this problem is. One drastic step might be to let people vote only if they pass a voters license test to sort out the uninformed. However, that clearly violates the idea of equality.
You may alternatively try to educate people to a level where everyone can function as an informed voter. You probabaly need to combine a good education with politicians being able to explain complicated issues in an easy-to-understand way.
But reality shows that it is much more convenient to let the people stay uninformed and use fear/carrots to achieve power.
Phoenix does have some really good arguments. He'd be fun to have a chat about politics with, but it would probably last a few hours
I'm fine agreeing to disagree, I just hate it when people try to insult me personally for thinking differently. My views are very well researched. You don't have to believe me, but if you knew me, then it would be obvious. I read about 30 political books a year and then donate them to the public library.
So the crux of my argument is that Phoenix is a very bright and thoughtful person.
On January 07 2011 21:15 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote: What has happened in the modern age of democracy is now that people who aren't learned scholars of international politics, economics, business, and gov't are outvoting those who are. Political parties have to find issues those groups do care about and use those issues to pull in the voting masses.
The republican base is motivated by social fears - abortion, gay marriage, religion, even some racism and xenophobia.
The democratic base is motivated by dangling the carrot, so to speak - welfare, healthcare, equal opportunity this and that, restraints and regulations on business which "protects" consumers.
Both are manipulation. Both are filled with lies and half truths. This is the nature of modern American politics though. All that we see now, and it's quite evident on this forum, is that both sides only see the other as the base of that party, ignorant and motivated by party propaganda. Both sides seem to the other as blissfully ignorant to the lies they've been fed by their leaders.
Both sides are right.
Until people realize that everything said is simply a bullshit argument designed to trap uneducated Americans into voting emotionally instead of logically, this country will sink ever deeper into a schism of elite and plebes - those with power, and those without.
Props for a quality post, dude.
I think you have very precisely described the biggest downside of a democracy. I wonder what the solution to this problem is. One drastic step might be to let people vote only if they pass a voters license test to sort out the uninformed. However, that clearly violates the idea of equality.
You may alternatively try to educate people to a level where everyone can function as an informed voter. You probabaly need to combine a good education with politicians being able to explain complicated issues in an easy-to-understand way.
But reality shows that it is much more convenient to let the people stay uninformed and use fear/carrots to achieve power.
Phoenix does have some really good arguments. He'd be fun to have a chat about politics with, but it would probably last a few hours
I'm fine agreeing to disagree, I just hate it when people try to insult me personally for thinking differently. My views are very well researched. You don't have to believe me, but if you knew me, then it would be obvious. I read about 30 political books a year and then donate them to the public library.
So the crux of my argument is that Phoenix is a very bright and thoughtful person.
What is very important, in my eyes, is that we came from calling each other trolls and raging to a point where we actually exchange real arguments and respect each others opinions. If we can do this on the internet, maybe we can do this in real life, too. Not all hope is lost.
On January 07 2011 23:34 Scruffy wrote: The main question blacks have to ask themselves is "Has my life gotten any better under Democrats?" Probably not. 50 years of social welfare programs and people aren't that much better off. Plus we have a lot of debt/non-tax paying citizens to show for it.
We're not better off than 50 years ago? Are you serious? Aside from the fact that I doubt you're old enough to make that determination, I can cite dozens of statistics and case studies that would suggest, in fact, average living conditions are better than they were 50 years ago. Now things like poverty are relative, so in that sense you might be right, but it's relative to the rest of the world as well.
On January 07 2011 23:34 Scruffy wrote: The main question blacks have to ask themselves is "Has my life gotten any better under Democrats?" Probably not. 50 years of social welfare programs and people aren't that much better off. Plus we have a lot of debt/non-tax paying citizens to show for it.
We're not better off than 50 years ago? Are you serious? Aside from the fact that I doubt you're old enough to make that determination, I can cite dozens of statistics and case studies that would suggest, in fact, average living conditions are better than they were 50 years ago. Now things like poverty are relative, so in that sense you might be right, but it's relative to the rest of the world as well.
I'm talking about percentages of blacks that are below the poverty line. I'll try to find backups later (at work). I have seen the issue touched on in various books though.
I don't hate the tea party or anything. I believe we need to get out of debt and taxes should be as low as possible, but the wars we are in are by far the biggest burden to the budget. I don't see why conservatives can't see this.
Look at the budgets and spending of this country and try to support your claim. Social policies such as SS, medicare, medicaid, and welfare represent substantially more spending than on defense.
Check out the amount of money spent on the Iraq War. The total cost of the war barely exceeds the cost of just 1 year of social security. Add in medicare, medicaid and other entitlements and compare. If you cut those programs by half you could fund over 5 Iraq wars a year!
The defense budget for 2010 is listed as $664 billion. Compare this to those 3 big entitlement expenditures listed above: $1421 billion!
Do you really think we're in a costly war? We could cut out entitlements for an entire year and that would cover 3 Iraqs. We haven't even been close to full war mode since WWII. If we actually had a serious war that was a direct threat to the American people, we effectively could spend dozens of times more money on it without risking inflation, simply by cutting socialist welfare policies.
People don't realize it, but the US is a massive welfare state. The amount of money we spend on helping out the poor, elderly, disabled, or just outright lazy is astronomical. So, you could reduce the amount of everyone's social security checks by 10% or let a madman research nuclear devices for use on our allies. And lets not forget, any conflict in the middle east drives up oil prices and costs the US possibly even more than we'd have ever spent on this war.
"The US is a massive welfare state" Really? Have you ever been outside of the country? We are one of the MOST conservative industrialized countries on the world.
I'm not sure what you mean by "welfare" but if you mean unemployment benefits, you have no grasp on how economics works. Same for you social security arguments; end SS and you end spending by the elderly which hurts our econ.
Not to mention the fact that the "social policies" are designed to HELP whereas Iraq did nothing but hurt.
I'd also like to see a source for the 1.4kb number - is that since Roosevelt and the great depression? If so, it's a ridiculous statistic.
And no, Hussein was not going after Nukes when we invaded >>
There you go. Look for yourself. I don't make this stuff up. You don't believe it because you cannot hold your beliefs about gov't economics if you know it's true. Misinformation is a serious problem when it comes to our spending, and people need to wake the hell up.
Oh and Hussein was definitely going after nukes when we invaded. It's fact.
You should stop using wikipedia as you're only source of information.
Also wheres the proof, because it seems the US, the people who invaded solely on that fact, can't seem to find it themselves.
Wikipedia is pretty good for directly verifiable facts. If you dont believe something there, you can click the reference button. In the case of the US budget it is: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy10/pdf/fy10-newera.pdf . If you believe that source is inaccurate, I would challenge you to present a more reputable source for the US budget.
How hard was that now.
Just linking a wikipedia page shows nothing. Anyone on the internet can change information on any page and then link that page as proof of fact.
Actually not true. Many pages must be verified by staff before being changed. I have a friend who does a lot of work for Wikipedia. I also have to say that it's the most accessible and well organized place for information. The article they have is really easy to read and is just a good article. Many college professors are fond of Wikipedia for objective information, because it's really really good.
Is that why every teacher in every subject refused wikipedia as a source when I went to school? I do agree with the fact that its an amazingly awesome website for information, just take any information you get and double check it imo.
The reason professors don't want you to use wikipedia for assignments is because it's so damn easy, you're supposed to put some actual research in and read a book or something.
On January 06 2011 15:11 thehitman wrote: When the new congress cuts military spending it will be a good sign. Otherwise all these new legislation's are crap.
If the USA are to survive and all non politically engaged economists say so, they must stop the wars.
If the USA pulled out of Iraq, Afghanistan, Korea and Columbia it would cut the expenditure by about 15%
If USA closed all their military bases and returned all soldiers home it would cut 25% of the expenditure.
And if the US cut entitlement spending by 5-15% it would have the same effect on the budget.
However, I do think the idea of abandoning a conventional military is a good idea Replace with
-Nukes to fight Nation states
-"Police Infantry" for fighting non-nation state groups in weak nation states (with solid air/drone support)... However this would still be very expensive... as it would require multiple well trained+equipped individuals.
A conventional military is required for many reasons:
Occupation and assistance: We cannot give aid to our allies or give aid in foreign disasters without a conventional military. We also cannot actually man our holdings in other parts of the world. If we want to push back China out of South Korea, we cannot do that with nukes.
I disagree... we could definitely push China out of south Korea with Nukes... or at least the threat of nukes. provided we gave sufficient warning to China before they moved into South Korea.
A full conventional military action between nuclear powers is likely to become a nuclear war anyways.
A nonnuclear power would definitely be deterred.
On January 06 2011 15:31 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote:
You cannot rely on nukes as your only deterrent. No nation wants to commit to using them. If we have no conventional army, we have no way to deter enemeis from taking small bites at us repeatedly. We cannot respond to such aggression with nuclear force, so we'd be forced to take a loss for no reason. In addition, nukes are an awfully heavy solution to any war, and even a war hawk is going to be cautious about using one ever.
"Small bites" that consist of conventional enemy forces could definitely be countered by nukes
On January 06 2011 15:31 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote:
It is really hard to take out a specific terrorist camp without leveling a city with a nuke. You need conventional forces to take out key targets and perform small scale assaults. In the end, if you wanted to only rely on nukes you'd just be blanketing a country with them to take out every military target you need to take out. That's no way to win a war (unless it's against zerg).
If the enemy is attacking in a non conventional way, ie guerilla forces/terrorists.... then conventional forces are not what you want, you want those "Police Infantry"... people that know which 'civilian' to shoot, and the way to have them shot.
Basically any Country using conventional military forces can be safely handled with nukes Any Country using nukes can Only be safely handled with nukes
Organizations (including countries) using non conventional warfare such as terrorism/guerilla warfare should be handled differently... and a conventional military isn't what is needed in that case. What you need is a militarized version of a police force.
Hypothetical war with North Korea: nuke them. What an awful foreign policy
Why?... if it has been previously stated that that would be our response... The "local ally" South Korea would still have their own conventional forces.
You wouldn't necessarily only have ICBMs either... and you wouldn't have to drop them all at once either...one per day until the survivors surrender.
Both the "Nuclear" portion and the "Police" portion of the military would have many things similar to current conventional forces.... "Nuclear" would need: fighters/nuclear bombers/carriers/subs for more tactical nukes on minor conventional powers "Police" would need armored transports (in land, air, and sea), gunships, drones
Conventional forces are most definitely required in order to occupy areas, defend assets, have a physical presence etc. and so that you're only military capability isn't starting a nuclear war.
The actions of this 'police force' you speak of are exactly what's being done by the military in Afghanistan, they're not standing in a field fighting massive pitched battles, they're systematically hunting for insurgents, clearing areas of enemies and IED's, arresting suspects in towns, seizing weapons etc.
Exactly, that is what the "conventional" forces are doing... but that is not what they are designed for. They don't need the newest battle tanks or Anti-Air for that. Their training and equipment needs to be desgned for the type of job they are going to have.
The types of forces that are deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan are what we need. What we don't need are the types of forces sitting in Germany and South Korea. In either of those cases if the situation got hot nukes would start flying anyways.... so scrap the useless conventional forces, and just keep the threat of nukes on the table to force reparations.
Now some small number conventional forces may still be needed. But you only At Best need enough conventional forces to beat the largest Nonnuclear power... and there are almost no militarily significant nonnuclear powers since Iraq was destroyed and North Korea went nuclear. And from the US perspective as a global power, the conventional forces of local allies are better for that purpose anyways. (someone else is paying for them, and they don't cause much resentment among the local populace, and they don't need to be deployed)
On January 07 2011 23:34 Scruffy wrote: The main question blacks have to ask themselves is "Has my life gotten any better under Democrats?" Probably not. 50 years of social welfare programs and people aren't that much better off. Plus we have a lot of debt/non-tax paying citizens to show for it.
We're not better off than 50 years ago? Are you serious? Aside from the fact that I doubt you're old enough to make that determination, I can cite dozens of statistics and case studies that would suggest, in fact, average living conditions are better than they were 50 years ago. Now things like poverty are relative, so in that sense you might be right, but it's relative to the rest of the world as well.
I'm talking about percentages of blacks that are below the poverty line. I'll try to find backups later (at work). I have seen the issue touched on in various books though.
Poverty line is relative. There's no doubt that the average quality of life has risen dramatically in 50 years of "social welfare programs". Any decent study can prove such a thing. And I'm not just talking about the US. Of course life is still bad for many poor people (not just blacks), especially in impoverished northern urban centers, but as a whole life has improved noticeably for everyone, but especially blacks.
Also, people don't insult you personally or call you a troll because you have differing views. Don't try to dismiss others so quickly, especially when people like me are trying to give you the benefit of the doubt and not assume you're a raging troll. People insult you personally because you make completely outrageous assertions (as well as racist remarks) and other declarations without evidence that are designed to be inflammatory whether you intend it or not, then you backpedal, ignore and dismiss people who respond to you, and eventually insult people with partisan language. Those are classic troll tactics. Whether or not you are aware of this is up to you, but continuing to callously dismiss others and throw around "liberal this" and "liberals that" certainly doesn't help your position.
On January 07 2011 23:34 Scruffy wrote: The main question blacks have to ask themselves is "Has my life gotten any better under Democrats?" Probably not. 50 years of social welfare programs and people aren't that much better off. Plus we have a lot of debt/non-tax paying citizens to show for it.
Pay-as-you-go might as well be a MLM marketing scheme. The President can issue "emergency funding" and the like to bypass it. If pay as you go works, then how the hell did the national debt increase by 3.1 trillion? That makes sense.
I am from Alabama, so you are right Lefnui, I MUST be racist. You don't even know me you idiot. I can call you names too, see? I'm pretty sure if I was actually racist, then I wouldn't live where I live right now. Its an upgraded SLAVE HOUSE from the 1830s by the way...
I'm sure your elitist ass wouldn't be good enough for that, would it?
Blacks need to ask themselves whether their situation has become better in the last 50 years? You mean since 1960, four years before Democrat President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act, the hallmark bill of ethnic equality in the States? Seriously?
With regard to racism. I understand that you see the term racist as derogatory, but a racist is not simply a person that "hates" members of other ethnic groups. It is a variant of genetic determinism that maintains that the fact that somebody is genetically linked to a certain ethnic group reveals an important fact about that person with regard to psychological factors and patterns of social behaviour. If you think, for instance, that it is meaningful to distingiush and address people according to their skin color on the basis that they share a genetic heritage which importantly determines their actions then you are a racist. Reading your posts, I can only make sense of your arguments if that is the position you hold.
On January 07 2011 23:34 Scruffy wrote: The main question blacks have to ask themselves is "Has my life gotten any better under Democrats?" Probably not. 50 years of social welfare programs and people aren't that much better off. Plus we have a lot of debt/non-tax paying citizens to show for it.
We're not better off than 50 years ago? Are you serious? Aside from the fact that I doubt you're old enough to make that determination, I can cite dozens of statistics and case studies that would suggest, in fact, average living conditions are better than they were 50 years ago. Now things like poverty are relative, so in that sense you might be right, but it's relative to the rest of the world as well.
I'm talking about percentages of blacks that are below the poverty line. I'll try to find backups later (at work). I have seen the issue touched on in various books though.
Poverty line is relative. There's no doubt that the average quality of life has risen dramatically in 50 years of "social welfare programs". Any decent study can prove such a thing. And I'm not just talking about the US. Of course life is still bad for many poor people (not just blacks), especially in impoverished northern urban centers, but as a whole life has improved noticeably for everyone, but especially blacks.
Also, people don't insult you personally or call you a troll because you have differing views. Don't try to dismiss others so quickly, especially when people like me are trying to give you the benefit of the doubt and not assume you're a raging troll. People insult you personally because you make completely outrageous assertions (as well as racist remarks) and other declarations without evidence that are designed to be inflammatory whether you intend it or not, then you backpedal, ignore and dismiss people who respond to you, and eventually insult people with partisan language. Those are classic troll tactics. Whether or not you are aware of this is up to you, but continuing to callously dismiss others and throw around "liberal this" and "liberals that" certainly doesn't help your position.
Actually % of blacks below the poverty line has been Roughly constant for the last 50 years according to the census bureau (looking at the 18-64 age group) about 22% ~1960, 22% now (fluctuating ~16-25% in between)
The same is true of general poverty but that has stayed lower. (in the 10% range)
So the efforts of Democrats/Republicans, etc. has not helped poor blacks (although it has probably helped some middle/upperclass blacks) with respect to the rest of society. Society has improved in an absolute sense in the last 50 years, but the relative position of poor blacks to the rest of society has not.
And the statement wasn't racist... there were no underlying assumptions that 1. only blacks were lazy or 2. only blacks would vote for people that gave them money
Its more that blacks are the race most receiving the racist message that they need extra help/ its okay to fail because discrimination does it. Some poor whites receive the message too, but its not directed at their race. (something they can't change... they can potentially change their class)
Because genetics that affects your appearance Does affect how society interacts with you. And also if that genetics makes you appear similar to the members of your biological family, it makes you appear as part of a group that society will tend to lump together, because families tend to have common characteristics.
On January 07 2011 23:34 Scruffy wrote: The main question blacks have to ask themselves is "Has my life gotten any better under Democrats?" Probably not. 50 years of social welfare programs and people aren't that much better off. Plus we have a lot of debt/non-tax paying citizens to show for it.
We're not better off than 50 years ago? Are you serious? Aside from the fact that I doubt you're old enough to make that determination, I can cite dozens of statistics and case studies that would suggest, in fact, average living conditions are better than they were 50 years ago. Now things like poverty are relative, so in that sense you might be right, but it's relative to the rest of the world as well.
I'm talking about percentages of blacks that are below the poverty line. I'll try to find backups later (at work). I have seen the issue touched on in various books though.
Poverty line is relative. There's no doubt that the average quality of life has risen dramatically in 50 years of "social welfare programs". Any decent study can prove such a thing. And I'm not just talking about the US. Of course life is still bad for many poor people (not just blacks), especially in impoverished northern urban centers, but as a whole life has improved noticeably for everyone, but especially blacks.
Also, people don't insult you personally or call you a troll because you have differing views. Don't try to dismiss others so quickly, especially when people like me are trying to give you the benefit of the doubt and not assume you're a raging troll. People insult you personally because you make completely outrageous assertions (as well as racist remarks) and other declarations without evidence that are designed to be inflammatory whether you intend it or not, then you backpedal, ignore and dismiss people who respond to you, and eventually insult people with partisan language. Those are classic troll tactics. Whether or not you are aware of this is up to you, but continuing to callously dismiss others and throw around "liberal this" and "liberals that" certainly doesn't help your position.
Actually % of blacks below the poverty line has been Roughly constant for the last 50 years according to the census bureau (looking at the 18-64 age group) about 22% ~1960, 22% now (fluctuating ~16-25% in between)
The same is true of general poverty but that has stayed lower. (in the 10% range)
So the efforts of Democrats/Republicans, etc. has not helped poor blacks (although it has probably helped some middle/upperclass blacks) with respect to the rest of society. Society has improved in an absolute sense in the last 50 years, but the relative position of poor blacks to the rest of society has not.
And the statement wasn't racist... there were no underlying assumptions that 1. only blacks were lazy or 2. only blacks would vote for people that gave them money
Its more that blacks are the race most receiving the racist message that they need extra help/ its okay to fail because discrimination does it. Some poor whites receive the message too, but its not directed at their race. (something they can't change... they can potentially change their class)
Because genetics that affects your appearance Does affect how society interacts with you. And also if that genetics makes you appear similar to the members of your biological family, it makes you appear as part of a group that society will tend to lump together, because families tend to have common characteristics.
This. I'm just offended to be called a racist when you know nothing of me personally. Why is it ok to call people racists just because that is your opinion? I could call everyone on this thread racist, but I'm not (because its not true). Its a pretty serious allegation, and I think you basing this off of two lines of one post is stupid. I say the admins should be the ones to determine this. If I am being racist/insensitive, then I should be banned. I guess we will wait and see. I really love SC/SC2 though, and the TL community, so I am hoping this is not the case.
On January 06 2011 13:19 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote: [quote]
Look at the budgets and spending of this country and try to support your claim. Social policies such as SS, medicare, medicaid, and welfare represent substantially more spending than on defense.
Check out the amount of money spent on the Iraq War. The total cost of the war barely exceeds the cost of just 1 year of social security. Add in medicare, medicaid and other entitlements and compare. If you cut those programs by half you could fund over 5 Iraq wars a year!
The defense budget for 2010 is listed as $664 billion. Compare this to those 3 big entitlement expenditures listed above: $1421 billion!
Do you really think we're in a costly war? We could cut out entitlements for an entire year and that would cover 3 Iraqs. We haven't even been close to full war mode since WWII. If we actually had a serious war that was a direct threat to the American people, we effectively could spend dozens of times more money on it without risking inflation, simply by cutting socialist welfare policies.
People don't realize it, but the US is a massive welfare state. The amount of money we spend on helping out the poor, elderly, disabled, or just outright lazy is astronomical. So, you could reduce the amount of everyone's social security checks by 10% or let a madman research nuclear devices for use on our allies. And lets not forget, any conflict in the middle east drives up oil prices and costs the US possibly even more than we'd have ever spent on this war.
"The US is a massive welfare state" Really? Have you ever been outside of the country? We are one of the MOST conservative industrialized countries on the world.
I'm not sure what you mean by "welfare" but if you mean unemployment benefits, you have no grasp on how economics works. Same for you social security arguments; end SS and you end spending by the elderly which hurts our econ.
Not to mention the fact that the "social policies" are designed to HELP whereas Iraq did nothing but hurt.
I'd also like to see a source for the 1.4kb number - is that since Roosevelt and the great depression? If so, it's a ridiculous statistic.
And no, Hussein was not going after Nukes when we invaded >>
There you go. Look for yourself. I don't make this stuff up. You don't believe it because you cannot hold your beliefs about gov't economics if you know it's true. Misinformation is a serious problem when it comes to our spending, and people need to wake the hell up.
Oh and Hussein was definitely going after nukes when we invaded. It's fact.
You should stop using wikipedia as you're only source of information.
Also wheres the proof, because it seems the US, the people who invaded solely on that fact, can't seem to find it themselves.
Wikipedia is pretty good for directly verifiable facts. If you dont believe something there, you can click the reference button. In the case of the US budget it is: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy10/pdf/fy10-newera.pdf . If you believe that source is inaccurate, I would challenge you to present a more reputable source for the US budget.
How hard was that now.
Just linking a wikipedia page shows nothing. Anyone on the internet can change information on any page and then link that page as proof of fact.
Actually not true. Many pages must be verified by staff before being changed. I have a friend who does a lot of work for Wikipedia. I also have to say that it's the most accessible and well organized place for information. The article they have is really easy to read and is just a good article. Many college professors are fond of Wikipedia for objective information, because it's really really good.
Is that why every teacher in every subject refused wikipedia as a source when I went to school? I do agree with the fact that its an amazingly awesome website for information, just take any information you get and double check it imo.
The reason professors don't want you to use wikipedia for assignments is because it's so damn easy, you're supposed to put some actual research in and read a book or something.
On January 06 2011 15:52 Krikkitone wrote:
On January 06 2011 15:31 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote:
On January 06 2011 15:19 Krikkitone wrote:
On January 06 2011 15:11 thehitman wrote: When the new congress cuts military spending it will be a good sign. Otherwise all these new legislation's are crap.
If the USA are to survive and all non politically engaged economists say so, they must stop the wars.
If the USA pulled out of Iraq, Afghanistan, Korea and Columbia it would cut the expenditure by about 15%
If USA closed all their military bases and returned all soldiers home it would cut 25% of the expenditure.
And if the US cut entitlement spending by 5-15% it would have the same effect on the budget.
However, I do think the idea of abandoning a conventional military is a good idea Replace with
-Nukes to fight Nation states
-"Police Infantry" for fighting non-nation state groups in weak nation states (with solid air/drone support)... However this would still be very expensive... as it would require multiple well trained+equipped individuals.
A conventional military is required for many reasons:
Occupation and assistance: We cannot give aid to our allies or give aid in foreign disasters without a conventional military. We also cannot actually man our holdings in other parts of the world. If we want to push back China out of South Korea, we cannot do that with nukes.
I disagree... we could definitely push China out of south Korea with Nukes... or at least the threat of nukes. provided we gave sufficient warning to China before they moved into South Korea.
A full conventional military action between nuclear powers is likely to become a nuclear war anyways.
A nonnuclear power would definitely be deterred.
On January 06 2011 15:31 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote:
You cannot rely on nukes as your only deterrent. No nation wants to commit to using them. If we have no conventional army, we have no way to deter enemeis from taking small bites at us repeatedly. We cannot respond to such aggression with nuclear force, so we'd be forced to take a loss for no reason. In addition, nukes are an awfully heavy solution to any war, and even a war hawk is going to be cautious about using one ever.
"Small bites" that consist of conventional enemy forces could definitely be countered by nukes
On January 06 2011 15:31 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote:
It is really hard to take out a specific terrorist camp without leveling a city with a nuke. You need conventional forces to take out key targets and perform small scale assaults. In the end, if you wanted to only rely on nukes you'd just be blanketing a country with them to take out every military target you need to take out. That's no way to win a war (unless it's against zerg).
If the enemy is attacking in a non conventional way, ie guerilla forces/terrorists.... then conventional forces are not what you want, you want those "Police Infantry"... people that know which 'civilian' to shoot, and the way to have them shot.
Basically any Country using conventional military forces can be safely handled with nukes Any Country using nukes can Only be safely handled with nukes
Organizations (including countries) using non conventional warfare such as terrorism/guerilla warfare should be handled differently... and a conventional military isn't what is needed in that case. What you need is a militarized version of a police force.
Hypothetical war with North Korea: nuke them. What an awful foreign policy
Why?... if it has been previously stated that that would be our response... The "local ally" South Korea would still have their own conventional forces.
You wouldn't necessarily only have ICBMs either... and you wouldn't have to drop them all at once either...one per day until the survivors surrender.
Both the "Nuclear" portion and the "Police" portion of the military would have many things similar to current conventional forces.... "Nuclear" would need: fighters/nuclear bombers/carriers/subs for more tactical nukes on minor conventional powers "Police" would need armored transports (in land, air, and sea), gunships, drones
Conventional forces are most definitely required in order to occupy areas, defend assets, have a physical presence etc. and so that you're only military capability isn't starting a nuclear war.
The actions of this 'police force' you speak of are exactly what's being done by the military in Afghanistan, they're not standing in a field fighting massive pitched battles, they're systematically hunting for insurgents, clearing areas of enemies and IED's, arresting suspects in towns, seizing weapons etc.
Exactly, that is what the "conventional" forces are doing... but that is not what they are designed for. They don't need the newest battle tanks or Anti-Air for that. Their training and equipment needs to be desgned for the type of job they are going to have.
The types of forces that are deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan are what we need. What we don't need are the types of forces sitting in Germany and South Korea. In either of those cases if the situation got hot nukes would start flying anyways.... so scrap the useless conventional forces, and just keep the threat of nukes on the table to force reparations.
Now some small number conventional forces may still be needed. But you only At Best need enough conventional forces to beat the largest Nonnuclear power... and there are almost no militarily significant nonnuclear powers since Iraq was destroyed and North Korea went nuclear. And from the US perspective as a global power, the conventional forces of local allies are better for that purpose anyways. (someone else is paying for them, and they don't cause much resentment among the local populace, and they don't need to be deployed)
Where do people get these ideas from?
Weakening conventional forces to the point where one relies on nuclear deterrence is a dangerous ideology to adopt. Research the scholarly debate in post-Soviet Ukraine for more information, if you're interested.
It's very difficult to take people seriously when they mention the nuclear option as being one that would "inevitably" be used; it shows a lack of knowledge about the subject to say the least.
On January 08 2011 02:58 Jstor wrote: Lol it's funny how we can talk about black people and their problems here on TL since there aren't any black people that play starcraft o.O
It is still the best healthcare system in the world though. The quality of care, the quality of medication, the variety of doctors and medicines available, and of course the wait times for surgeries and procedures are phenomenal and unobtainable through a gov't health care system.
The theoretically best Healthcare that money can buy has about as much to do with a good Healthcare system as invading Iraq to secure peace or Obama with socialism (well, you won't get the last one probably).
Wow... Your so clueless on the materia, it really hurts to read your bullshit.
About every damn statistic on the planet claims that your Healthcare system is fucking expensive and bad at the same time (read: inefficient). Your making up points on the go witheout any facts... my god.
Your a moron.
Our healthcare system is so good that Canadians often come to America for surgeries and treatments
Please don't parrot Glenn Beck. "Often" is flat wrong. Do some come? Yes. Do the vast majority? No. Does the fact that some people come magically make U.S. healthcare > Canadian healthcare? No. Nor does it provide any meaningful comparisons as to what makes healthcare better in one place than another.
Saying things like that is the very reason so many people around the country (and the world) are constantly pulling their hair out. For some reason people hear a 2 minute sound-bite and think they're well-educated about a subject, when often (like in this case), they're completely wrong and causing others to be just as poorly informed.
For every story you have about how "horrible Canadian healthcare is" (and the implication of all socialism being terrible), there's at least one about how horrible American healthcare is.
It is still the best healthcare system in the world though. The quality of care, the quality of medication, the variety of doctors and medicines available, and of course the wait times for surgeries and procedures are phenomenal and unobtainable through a gov't health care system.
The theoretically best Healthcare that money can buy has about as much to do with a good Healthcare system as invading Iraq to secure peace or Obama with socialism (well, you won't get the last one probably).
Wow... Your so clueless on the materia, it really hurts to read your bullshit.
About every damn statistic on the planet claims that your Healthcare system is fucking expensive and bad at the same time (read: inefficient). Your making up points on the go witheout any facts... my god.
Your a moron.
Our healthcare system is so good that Canadians often come to America for surgeries and treatments
Please don't parrot Glenn Beck. "Often" is flat wrong. Do some come? Yes. Do the vast majority? No. Does the fact that some people come magically make U.S. healthcare > Canadian healthcare? No. Nor does it provide any meaningful comparisons as to what makes healthcare better in one place than another.
Saying things like that is the very reason so many people around the country (and the world) are constantly pulling their hair out. For some reason people hear a 2 minute sound-bite and think they're well-educated about a subject, when often (like in this case), they're completely wrong and causing others to be just as poorly informed.
Most top leaders and ambassadosr or anyone who holds a decent governmental job comes to the US for major operations. That is a fact.
It is still the best healthcare system in the world though. The quality of care, the quality of medication, the variety of doctors and medicines available, and of course the wait times for surgeries and procedures are phenomenal and unobtainable through a gov't health care system.
The theoretically best Healthcare that money can buy has about as much to do with a good Healthcare system as invading Iraq to secure peace or Obama with socialism (well, you won't get the last one probably).
Wow... Your so clueless on the materia, it really hurts to read your bullshit.
About every damn statistic on the planet claims that your Healthcare system is fucking expensive and bad at the same time (read: inefficient). Your making up points on the go witheout any facts... my god.
Your a moron.
Our healthcare system is so good that Canadians often come to America for surgeries and treatments
Please don't parrot Glenn Beck. "Often" is flat wrong. Do some come? Yes. Do the vast majority? No. Does the fact that some people come magically make U.S. healthcare > Canadian healthcare? No. Nor does it provide any meaningful comparisons as to what makes healthcare better in one place than another.
Saying things like that is the very reason so many people around the country (and the world) are constantly pulling their hair out. For some reason people hear a 2 minute sound-bite and think they're well-educated about a subject, when often (like in this case), they're completely wrong and causing others to be just as poorly informed.
Most top leaders and ambassadosr or anyone who holds a decent governmental job comes to the US for major operations. That is a fact.
Source?
Actually I would challenge either side to provide real comparative statistics. Thus far it has been anecdotes and assertions.
On January 08 2011 03:36 t3hwUn wrote: Most top leaders and ambassadosr or anyone who holds a decent governmental job comes to the US for major operations. That is a fact.
Let us assume this is correct. It still does not say anything about the quality of your healthcare system No one doubts the skill of US physicians. The core problem is that the majority of people do not have access to quality healthcare (bceause they have no insurenace or becuase they have one that does not want to cover their expenses) or if they do, the relation between cost and obtained service is worse than in many other countries.
On January 07 2011 23:34 Scruffy wrote: I am from Alabama, so you are right Lefnui, I MUST be racist. You don't even know me you idiot. I can call you names too, see?
I suppose it is technically possible that someone who isn't racist could say blatantly racist things. I certainly didn't claim that you're a racist because you're from Alabama since I wasn't even aware of that(why would I be?). I have however pointed out that you have said racist things in this thread, which is undeniably true:
Scruffy wrote: Do you really think African-American's poverty demographics have shifted in the past 50 years? They have probably gotten worse. Its almost like the Dems want to tell them (although more covertly, obviously) "Hey, guess what guys, vote us in, and we will pay you to not work!" Pretty sweet deal if you can get it I guess.
It's the same thing that Phoenix said, that black people vote in Democrats so that they can sit around lazily and collect money. That is pure racism. And notice how neither of you have been able to defend that concept at all. You have provided absolutely no evidence to support it.
Both of you continually make baseless and racist arguments, they are challenged, and then you refuse to respond to the challenges. You simply claim "I've won this argument" and move on. Well color me unimpressed by your form of debating.
I'm pretty sure if I was actually racist, then I wouldn't live where I live right now. Its an upgraded SLAVE HOUSE from the 1830s by the way...
I'm pretty sure the fact that you live in a former slave house doesn't prove anything. A racist person could live in a former slave house. A person can post racist statements from a former slave house, as you have clearly demonstrated in this thread.
I'm sure your elitist ass wouldn't be good enough for that, would it?
On January 08 2011 03:36 t3hwUn wrote: Most top leaders and ambassadosr or anyone who holds a decent governmental job comes to the US for major operations. That is a fact.
Let us assume this is correct. It still does not say anything about the quality of your healthcare system No one doubts the skill of US physicians. The core problem is that the majority of people do not have access to quality healthcare (bceause they have no insurenace or becuase they have one that does not want to cover their expenses) or if they do, the relation between cost and obtained service is worse than in many other countries.
As I mentioned earlier, the problems within the US medical system will never be fixed by central gov't control and regulation. That will only increase the cost and reduce the quality of care.
The problems with the US healthcare system are related to outrageous malpractice insurance practices causing medical practitioners to spend many factors more than they otherwise would for a treatment.
Doctors have to: a) pay malpractice insurance, the likes of which are easily several hundred thousand dollars even for a general practitioner/pediatrician. I talk to my doctor about this sometimes, and it's not a myth. b) run extra tests/procedures to cover their asses against any unlikely but possible scenario, because if they don't people can sue them for incompetency. This drives up the cost of healthcare a ton. c) avoid getting sued at all costs. Getting sued successfully usually ends their career, since they get kicked out of the AMA. This is the true cost of malpractice lawsuits, so doctors have to spend everything they can to avoid them.
When you say that the majority of people do not have access to quality healthcare because they have no/poor insurance you are outright lying. I believe around 85% of this country has insurance, and lets keep in mind a good bunch of uninsured Americans are uninsured by choice. Many young, healthy people choose to remain uninsured because they believe it's not worth the cost. Many people who are not college/high school graduates and who don't have steady jobs are not insured either. Unemployed people have trouble getting insurance at a reasonable rate, but why wouldn't they? They're not working, so the motivations to insure them over someone who is working a stable job are not the same.
The media likes to glorify insurance horror stories and take shots at big business in general for being the culprit. The truth is that while sometimes bad things happen and people get screwed, the large vast majority of policyholders never experience something that bad. The average joe is going to perhaps have to call up their company to fix a billing error every now and then, but that's no reason to abandon our system altogether.
In fact, capitalism ensures that if a company is being abusive, corrupt, or malicious people will just leave. It happens all the time. Employers, under pressure from employees, will switch providers. What happens if the gov't is being abusive, corrupt, or malicious? What if they're just not up to par in quality? The people cannot switch to a new provider. That's why socialist systems are so dangerous - they don't fix themselves.
I think there are much better ways to improve our system than turning to gov't control. When the gov't starts acting as a free market entity it breaks the mechanics of capitalism and often makes things much much worse.
Just remember, it's life, liberty, and happiness. It's not life, liberty, happiness, and healthcare =D
On January 08 2011 10:03 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote: In fact, capitalism ensures that if a company is being abusive, corrupt, or malicious people will just leave. It happens all the time. Employers, under pressure from employees, will switch providers. What happens if the gov't is being abusive, corrupt, or malicious? What if they're just not up to par in quality? The people cannot switch to a new provider. That's why socialist systems are so dangerous - they don't fix themselves.
I think there are much better ways to improve our system than turning to gov't control. When the gov't starts acting as a free market entity it breaks the mechanics of capitalism and often makes things much much worse.
Just remember, it's life, liberty, and happiness. It's not life, liberty, happiness, and healthcare =D
I am quite sceptical whether your argument - while accurate in theory - holds true in real life.
a) The first problem is that companies do what is in their power to pervert markets, that is they do what they can to make markets as imperfect as possible. THis is important because all the healthy functions of a free market are based on the assumption of a perfect market. In practice, corporations make it harder for the consumer to compare products, they strive towards monopolies, there use illegal agreements about prices between competitors etc.
b) That aside, lets apply a little capitalist logic to the healthcare sector. Insurance companies want to make profit, that is, they fare best when they pay much less than they charge people. Every person prevented from getting healthcare means more profit, that is, it is in the best interest of the insurance companies to deny paying for treatments whenever possible. In a perfect market that would not be a problem because bad apples would lose custormers but that brings us the point a)
Government control may be the solution to the problems caused by a combination of a) and b). Just make sure that there are enough competitors on the market (i.e. disallow ergers or acquisitions that lead to market shares greater X with X to be defined by experts) and force to insurance companies to provide identical baseline insurance, so prices are comparable. With these simple rules you can enforce a functioning market.
On January 08 2011 03:36 t3hwUn wrote: Most top leaders and ambassadosr or anyone who holds a decent governmental job comes to the US for major operations. That is a fact.
Let us assume this is correct. It still does not say anything about the quality of your healthcare system No one doubts the skill of US physicians. The core problem is that the majority of people do not have access to quality healthcare (bceause they have no insurenace or becuase they have one that does not want to cover their expenses) or if they do, the relation between cost and obtained service is worse than in many other countries.
As I mentioned earlier, the problems within the US medical system will never be fixed by central gov't control and regulation. That will only increase the cost and reduce the quality of care.
The problems with the US healthcare system are related to outrageous malpractice insurance practices causing medical practitioners to spend many factors more than they otherwise would for a treatment.
Doctors have to: a) pay malpractice insurance, the likes of which are easily several hundred thousand dollars even for a general practitioner/pediatrician. I talk to my doctor about this sometimes, and it's not a myth. b) run extra tests/procedures to cover their asses against any unlikely but possible scenario, because if they don't people can sue them for incompetency. This drives up the cost of healthcare a ton. c) avoid getting sued at all costs. Getting sued successfully usually ends their career, since they get kicked out of the AMA. This is the true cost of malpractice lawsuits, so doctors have to spend everything they can to avoid them.
When you say that the majority of people do not have access to quality healthcare because they have no/poor insurance you are outright lying. I believe around 85% of this country has insurance, and lets keep in mind a good bunch of uninsured Americans are uninsured by choice. Many young, healthy people choose to remain uninsured because they believe it's not worth the cost. Many people who are not college/high school graduates and who don't have steady jobs are not insured either. Unemployed people have trouble getting insurance at a reasonable rate, but why wouldn't they? They're not working, so the motivations to insure them over someone who is working a stable job are not the same.
The media likes to glorify insurance horror stories and take shots at big business in general for being the culprit. The truth is that while sometimes bad things happen and people get screwed, the large vast majority of policyholders never experience something that bad. The average joe is going to perhaps have to call up their company to fix a billing error every now and then, but that's no reason to abandon our system altogether.
In fact, capitalism ensures that if a company is being abusive, corrupt, or malicious people will just leave. It happens all the time. Employers, under pressure from employees, will switch providers. What happens if the gov't is being abusive, corrupt, or malicious? What if they're just not up to par in quality? The people cannot switch to a new provider. That's why socialist systems are so dangerous - they don't fix themselves.
I think there are much better ways to improve our system than turning to gov't control. When the gov't starts acting as a free market entity it breaks the mechanics of capitalism and often makes things much much worse.
Just remember, it's life, liberty, and happiness. It's not life, liberty, happiness, and healthcare =D
I work in the healthcare product development...and with lots of doctors. You nailed one of the biggest problems on the head: Malpractice. The AMA was pretty pissed that malpractice caps were not introduced in the healthcare bill. One surgeon I work with pays over $100,000 per year in malpractice. He got sued once (pretty pathetic case) and his insurance settled out of court for $40,000...and then tacked that on to his next annual bill. Ridiculous.
Look up what Canada did to malpractice insurers. They suffocated them in their infancy by having the government fight every single suit tooth and nail. The business did not become profitable, and so it mostly died out. Malpractice in Canada costs, to my knowledge, around $3k a year for your average physician. Ridiculous. Especially since I am in med school, it makes me want to GTFO of this country.
The second problem is most definitely product development costs. And this problem is a Catch-22. Anyone who knows anything about medical device regulations knows that the FDA is the most strictest of all regulators (minus Japan's FDA equivalent). In fact, most new medical products start out in Europe, since the CE mark is much cheaper and faster to get for emerging products (ie drugs, surgical tools).
You can get a CE mark in under a year. FDA approval of a Class III medical device, or a drug, can take 5-10 years. And costs well over $250 million on average for the company. You have massive, multi-armed trials, which are very costly. Which is exactly why they charge massive amounts to the customer. You think that bottle of amoxicillin really costs 30 bucks? It costs the pharmacy companies like 5 cents to make. And your neighborhood pharmacy buys it for like 3 bucks. But the company has to charge those insane rates, because they have to make back that initial investment (and they only have a few years to do so before the generics hit the market). And this fucks patients. Want another example? Look at a heart pump (called a VAD) like the Heartmate II. Costs around $10k for the titanium based ones. Charged to the patient for over $100k. And that doesn't include surgery. Ouch.
Sure, FDA approved products are generally safer, but they haven't been without their foul-ups (Vioxx?). And most products in the EU are generally as safe. And definitely more cutting-edge. Some of the new-age anticoagulants for patients with heart disease are still only available in EU. Check Dabigatran (although this was recently, conditionally approved for a very limited population in the US).
I'm all for reducing FDA regulatory requirements. They are suffocating the industry and the medical technology is quickly rushing to European markets. The cost-benefit ratio is worth it, IMHO. Most of the advances in medicine were made decades ago. John Gibbons Heart lung machine? Debakey's Roller pump? All made by doctors who were literally winging it. With minimal regulations. In fact, most devices didn't have heavy regulations until 1990 (!).
The joke in the medical product development community is that Penicillin would not be approved by the FDA if it was run through today.
Cut malpractice, scale back the FDA a little bit (of course not entirely!), and it would have a major impact on healthcare in the US.
my mind is blown that some people really can think of Obama as a socialist. i dont want to offend you, really. but please stop listening to right wing media propaganda and read a serious book on the topic. it's complete nonsense. and it is complete nonsense that there is socialism in europe. not in the slightest...
It is still the best healthcare system in the world though. The quality of care, the quality of medication, the variety of doctors and medicines available, and of course the wait times for surgeries and procedures are phenomenal and unobtainable through a gov't health care system.
Not to be rude, but that is one of the most ignorant things I've heard regarding the United States on these forums.
The USA isn't even in the top 30 countries regarding health care, and for such a developed nation your life expectancy isn't even in the top 10.
There are many, many many many European countries in particular with superior health care systems, and any survey from a reputable and unbiased organization will give you lists of them. I'll save you the trouble of a google search...
1 France 2 Italy 3 San Marino 4 Andorra 5 Malta 6 Singapore 7 Spain 8 Oman 9 Austria 10 Japan 11 Norway 12 Portugal 13 Monaco 14 Greece 15 Iceland 16 Luxembourg 17 Netherlands 18 United Kingdom 19 Ireland 20 Switzerland 21 Belgium 22 Colombia 23 Sweden 24 Cyprus 25 Germany 26 Saudi Arabia 27 United Arab Emirates 28 Israel 29 Morocco 30 Canada 31 Finland 32 Australia 33 Chile 34 Denmark 35 Dominica 36 Costa Rica 37 United States of America
Please please please don't make claims based off of patriotism. The United States is not and has not been at the top of the world for many years regarding health, democracy, living conditions, and other related topics.
It is very easy to feel like your country is the best when it's all you've ever known, experienced, or had the care to research... but it is also very stupid.
I am very happy to be Canadian, perhaps even proud, but I do not suffer from the illusion that Canada is the best country in the world.
To the people thinking the black vote has historically gone to Democrats because they are selfish or whatever: It's actually because the historical Republican strategy is "fuck black people." See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_strategy
Are you insane? Abraham Lincoln was a Republican and the Democrats historically wanted to keep slaves.
As for ignorant non-economist who talk about Tea-Party and Reps suck because they want to cut taxes and at the same time balance the budget. You think that rich people pay a lot of taxes even if we raised it on them? Get real. They have so many loopholes, lawyers, and accountants. Increased taxes will always have the middle-class and small business owner paying the bulk.
Purely on economics, cutting taxes does help the economy. (Yes, I do have strong education in economics.) The private sector creates all the growth in the US. The government is the biggest destroyer of wealth. Look at social security, the post-office, and the DMV. They all run deficits even though they have a monopoly. You think they are going to fix health-care, get real.
You bleeding hurt liberals make me sick. Go take a macro-economic class based on math. Keynesian economics is a joke.
To the people thinking the black vote has historically gone to Democrats because they are selfish or whatever: It's actually because the historical Republican strategy is "fuck black people." See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_strategy
Are you insane? Abraham Lincoln was a Republican and the Democrats historically wanted to keep slaves.
As for ignorant non-economist who talk about Tea-Party and Reps suck because they want to cut taxes and at the same time balance the budget. You think that rich people pay a lot of taxes even if we raised it on them? Get real. They have so many loopholes, lawyers, and accountants. Increased taxes will always have the middle-class and small business owner paying the bulk.
Purely on economics, cutting taxes does help the economy. (Yes, I do have strong education in economics.) The private sector creates all the growth in the US. The government is the biggest destroyer of wealth. Look at social security, the post-office, and the DMV. They all run deficits even though they have a monopoly. You think they are going to fix health-care, get real.
You bleeding hurt liberals make me sick. Go take a macro-economic class based on math. Keynesian economics is a joke.
Vote Ron Paul 2012!
I have hard these arguments so many times before. Just privatize everything and soon the world is a happy paradise. We tried that in Germany with public transport and with energy providers. Guess what. Train rides are becoming more epensive every year and the only thing that has changed is that the trains arive late more often and that their climatization stops working when its more then 33°C outside (to save money, of course).
The energy sector is even better. Privatization has lead to four big companies dividinv the majority of the market and creating quasi-monpolies. Although these corporations sacked a lot of employees and althogh they have frequently profited from better oil/gas prices, proces for the consumers have about doubled in the last 10 years. However, these companies are now among those with the most profit in Germany and their CEOs are the best-earning.
Since you are so well-educated in economics, do you think it is a good idea to allow monopolies or oligopoles in markets with low to no elasticy?
Go take an economy class based on behavioral economics. Homo oeconomicus is as real as santa, so better start incorporating the idea that markets don't work as you propagate they do.
Yeah, nice trick. If you do not like the outcome of an analysis, complain about the dependent variable to maintain your unrealisitic opinion. Shakes head. I do not know about you, but the WHO can probabaly considered somewhat expert in these matters, don't you think?
Edit: Just to give you one more thing to think about: How much profit doe your private healthcare sector generate each year? Take that number and imagine you spent that on medical personnel, medicine and equipment and you have the standard a "socialist" health care system would provide.
“I don’t mean to imply that all people who work for health insurance companies are greedier or more evil than other Americans,” he writes. “In fact, many of them feel — and justifiably so — that they are helping millions of people get they care they need.” The real problem, he says, lies in the fact that the United States “has entrusted one of the most important societal functions, providing health care, to private health insurance companies.” Therefore, the top executives of these companies become beholden not to the patients they have pledged to cover, but to the shareholders who hold them responsible for the bottom line.
On January 08 2011 21:48 TributeBoxer wrote: I dont know why all these Europeans are in here complaining about the US. Your countries will be Islamic Republics in your lifetimes.
Yeah, right. Take some time and check what "we Europeans" are complaning about. It is not the US but rather some people from the US stating - contrary to all obtainable objective facts - that the US is #1 in all imaginable fields. Imagine a fat kid among a lot of well-trained ones who brags that he is the most sportiest and ridicules the others for not being as sporty as he is, would you take that kid sriously? Didn't think so.
On a side note, I am pretty sure that you do not have nay clue about Islam in Europe, do you? In Germany there are probabaly 30,000 muslims who are member or extreme Islamist groups out of about 4,000,000 muslims living here. That is even less than the percentage of the Germans voting for the NPD (Neonazi party), so i guess our muslims are pretty sane people who enjoy their freedoms as much as the average bloke.
“I don’t mean to imply that all people who work for health insurance companies are greedier or more evil than other Americans,” he writes. “In fact, many of them feel — and justifiably so — that they are helping millions of people get they care they need.” The real problem, he says, lies in the fact that the United States “has entrusted one of the most important societal functions, providing health care, to private health insurance companies.” Therefore, the top executives of these companies become beholden not to the patients they have pledged to cover, but to the shareholders who hold them responsible for the bottom line.
This pretty much sums it up and is exactly what I said before. Corporate greed is the problem in a privatized healthcare system. If all the money that is deducted as profit went directly into the system, I would probabaly move ot the US instantly and anticipate a good 120 years long life.
To the people thinking the black vote has historically gone to Democrats because they are selfish or whatever: It's actually because the historical Republican strategy is "fuck black people." See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_strategy
Are you insane? Abraham Lincoln was a Republican and the Democrats historically wanted to keep slaves.
As for ignorant non-economist who talk about Tea-Party and Reps suck because they want to cut taxes and at the same time balance the budget. You think that rich people pay a lot of taxes even if we raised it on them? Get real. They have so many loopholes, lawyers, and accountants. Increased taxes will always have the middle-class and small business owner paying the bulk.
Purely on economics, cutting taxes does help the economy. (Yes, I do have strong education in economics.) The private sector creates all the growth in the US. The government is the biggest destroyer of wealth. Look at social security, the post-office, and the DMV. They all run deficits even though they have a monopoly. You think they are going to fix health-care, get real.
You bleeding hurt liberals make me sick. Go take a macro-economic class based on math. Keynesian economics is a joke.
Vote Ron Paul 2012!
I have hard these arguments so many times before. Just privatize everything and soon the world is a happy paradise. We tried that in Germany with public transport and with energy providers. Guess what. Train rides are becoming more epensive every year and the only thing that has changed is that the trains arive late more often and that their climatization stops working when its more then 33°C outside (to save money, of course).
The energy sector is even better. Privatization has lead to four big companies dividinv the majority of the market and creating quasi-monpolies. Although these corporations sacked a lot of employees and althogh they have frequently profited from better oil/gas prices, proces for the consumers have about doubled in the last 10 years. However, these companies are now among those with the most profit in Germany and their CEOs are the best-earning.
Privatising a monopoly and giving it to a private company is just slack, at least sell it off to as many firms as you can and or deregulate that market so as others can jump in.
On January 08 2011 22:06 ShroomyD wrote: Privatising a monopoly and giving it to a private company is just slack, at least sell it off to as many firms as you can and or deregulate that market so as others can jump in.
Yes, that is what should have been done. Free markets are beautiful and good when they work but, sadly, they so rarely do.
On January 08 2011 21:26 Balthasar wrote: Purely on economics, cutting taxes does help the economy. (Yes, I do have strong education in economics.) The private sector creates all the growth in the US. The government is the biggest destroyer of wealth. Look at social security, the post-office, and the DMV. They all run deficits even though they have a monopoly. You think they are going to fix health-care, get real.
You bleeding hurt liberals make me sick. Go take a macro-economic class based on math. Keynesian economics is a joke.
I really don't know whether to take this seriously, but I'll bite.
1. You claim to have a strong education in economics; did you seriously just advocate a strong belief in trickle down economics? Cutting taxes may help the economy, but it depends strongly on where the cuts are. The current cuts that are being extended do nothing to help the economy. All philosophical debate about the wealth of individuals and the need to keep grubby government hands away from it, they do nothing to help the economy.
2. The debate that rages on now have absolutely nothing to do with macroeconomics. As much as I love economics (my major), I realise that the macroeconomics side is deeply flawed, especially if you try to take it as a precisely correct model of the real world. Every school of macroeconomics has its issues. The one thing I have to say is that don't try to make it out like either parties economic policies make a great deal of economic sense. The Republican rhetoric on the "free market" and its miracles worry me greatly for their impact on the rest of the world. I haven't decided where to cast my "vote" as it were in the macroeconomics world, though before I am preempted I'll agree that Keynesian economics has its failures, which I personally believe come from their interpretation of Keynes himself. Modern macroeconomic models fails in several assumptions, such as money illusion (and you're really pushing it if you try to argue people don't suffer from it), and a lack of adherence of principles of methodological individualism which would go a long way to further discussion of economics as a 'scientifically rigourous' subject.
I want to leave with one last comment: correct me if I'm wrong but is there not a current running around that monetary policy should be taken out of the hands of the central bank? This is several Republicans seeming advocacy of the Gold Standard make me really, really worry that they've taken control of the largest economy in the world. There's a reason the world moved on from the Gold Standard, and a reason why monetary policy lies outside the hands of politicians. I just want to stress on the second point; the independence of monetary policy from government is a hallmark of economic liberalisation in the world, why? Because technocrats job do a better one than self-serving politicians. I'll be happy to argue this point if anyone cares to disagree.
On January 08 2011 21:35 Electric.Jesus wrote: I have hard these arguments so many times before. Just privatize everything and soon the world is a happy paradise. We tried that in Germany with public transport and with energy providers. Guess what. Train rides are becoming more epensive every year and the only thing that has changed is that the trains arive late more often and that their climatization stops working when its more then 33°C outside (to save money, of course).
You guys also tried socializing everything and you got East Germany. More free-market, the more successful the country.
On January 08 2011 21:39 Electric.Jesus wrote: Just to give you one more thing to think about: How much profit doe your private healthcare sector generate each year? Take that number and imagine you spent that on medical personnel, medicine and equipment and you have the standard a "socialist" health care system would provide.
First of all, don't try to argue with me in a language you can barely speak. I don't maintain US health care does not have its problems. But, so does many social health care programs in Europe and in Canada. I'm not totally free-market to say you can't have socialized health-care and it will not work. You have to first be able to afford it. Increased deficit spending is not the answer. Most countries that are somewhat successful in socialized health-care run low deficits as a percentage of GDP compared to U.S. I wish we all everything had free including health-care, however we can't afford it.
On January 08 2011 23:44 Croaker wrote: Modern macroeconomic models fails in several assumptions, such as money illusion
Personally, my school of economics is Neo-classical and Austrian. Those do not really suffer from money illusion, actually it protects from it. Most economic majors are full of crap anyways. Unfortunately, most economic majors are math illiterate, sure they know some, but they study too much theory and history without the math behind it. You only get half the picture at best.
On January 08 2011 23:44 Croaker wrote: Correct me if I'm wrong but is there not a current running around that monetary policy should be taken out of the hands of the central bank? This is several Republicans seeming advocacy of the Gold Standard make me really, really worry that they've taken control of the largest economy in the world.
You say your major is in economics, don't you know your economic history? The currency was supposed to be backed up by gold and that was our promise to the world during Bretton Woods, so we wouldn't be printing money of out of thin air without anything backing it up, which is going on right now. This is what everyone wanted, a solid currency without crazy inflation. Unfortunately, we reneged on the agreement during Vietnam and that's why we have crazy rising prices and huge deficit. Gold is boring and limits what we can do financially, but it keeps governments more honest about their accounting. I agree with you on one thing that politics and monetary policy should not be mixed, just honest and straightforward.
On January 09 2011 07:34 Balthasar wrote: You guys also tried socializing everything and you got East Germany. More free-market, the more successful the country.
Being from what you may know as West Germany I don't get the point - if there is any - in your remark.
First of all, don't try to argue with me in a language you can barely speak.
Now you are just being a prick. Have I done anything to deserve this insult? We can continue in German if you wish. I promise not to insult you if your german is not perfect.
I don't maintain US health care does not have its problems. But, so does many social health care programs in Europe and in Canada. I'm not totally free-market to say you can't have socialized health-care and it will not work. You have to first be able to afford it.
But were there not enough sepcialists who did some math and showed that "Obamacare" would save the US about half a billion dollars a year? Basically offering a state-run alternative forces free-market competitors to lower their prices while maintaining the level of service which leaves cutting profits as the only alternative.
Increased deficit spending is not the answer. Most countries that are somewhat successful in socialized health-care run low deficits as a percentage of GDP compared to U.S. I wish we all everything had free including health-care, however we can't afford it.
You know, this is the weirdest thing. The numbers I researched show that the US has, by far, the highest healthcare cost as measured in percent of the GDP. I have linked an interesting graph from the respective wikipedia-entry HERE.
What I find surprising is that all other countires that are in this graph behave basically the same, that is you get a strong linear relation between healthcare spending and life expectancy. The US is the only country to totall differ from that pattern. Frankly said, compared to how much money you spend on healthcare, you get a pretty crappy product, on average (note: on average. Rich people are pretty well cared-for, I bet.).
1. Praising the medical practise for the increase in life expectancy? Hah hoh heh hih. Try sanitation, lower crime rates, penicillin, and that we can deliver babies without killing them as much now. The differences between life expentancies between countries nowadays has nothing to do with healthcare. Which brings me to my next point:
2. Medical spending has no correlation with health. There's been numerous studies and experiments about this, most notably the RAND experiment by the US government. Results show that extra spending on medicine gives *no* benefits.
There are more important things than medicine for health, like diet and exercise. Food is even necessary to live. But we don't go to a government funded building to eat, but yet we need just that for our healthcare?
On January 09 2011 09:18 Mayfly wrote: 1. Praising the medical practise for the increase in life expectancy? Hah hoh heh hih. Try sanitation, lower crime rates, penicillin, and that we can deliver babies without killing them as much now. The differences between life expentancies between countries nowadays has nothing to do with healthcare. Which brings me to my next point:
2. Medical spending has no correlation with health. There's been numerous studies and experiments about this, most notably the RAND experiment by the US government. Results show that extra spending on medicine gives *no* benefits.
There are more important things than medicine for health, like diet and exercise. Food is even necessary to live. But we don't go to a government funded building to eat, but yet we need just that for our healthcare?
I would like to see evidence that differences in life expetancy have nothing to do with healthcare. I think that is utter bullshit but I am happy to be convined otherwise by reliable data. Could you link to the source your statement is based on so I can check it? The data I linked above seems to suggests otherwise: unless there is some severe confound, it suggests that there is in fact a strong colletation between healthcare spending and life expectancy.
Maybe whjat you say is accurate within the US system. If so, then the study you talk about is pretty meaningless in this context since you talk about a within-system-analysis while I am referring to a between-systems-comparison.
Also, the US has an unusually high infant mortality (6.7 out of 1000) compared with other industrialized countries (ranging from 2.6 to 5.0). So even if you use one of the alternative indicators of health-care quality you proposed, the US still scores badly which, again, makes me think you pay too much for too little in return.
On January 09 2011 09:18 Mayfly wrote: 1. Praising the medical practise for the increase in life expectancy? Hah hoh heh hih. Try sanitation, lower crime rates, penicillin, and that we can deliver babies without killing them as much now. The differences between life expentancies between countries nowadays has nothing to do with healthcare. Which brings me to my next point:
2. Medical spending has no correlation with health. There's been numerous studies and experiments about this, most notably the RAND experiment by the US government. Results show that extra spending on medicine gives *no* benefits.
There are more important things than medicine for health, like diet and exercise. Food is even necessary to live. But we don't go to a government funded building to eat, but yet we need just that for our healthcare?
I would like to see evidence that differences in life expetancy have nothing to do with healthcare. I think that is utter bullshit but I am happy to be convined otherwise by reliable data. Could you link to the source your statement is based on so I can check it? The data I linked above seems to suggests otherwise: unless there is some severe confound, it suggests that there is in fact a strong colletation between healthcare spending and life expectancy.
Maybe whjat you say is accurate within the US system. If so, then the study you talk about is pretty meaningless in this context since you talk about a within-system-analysis while I am referring to a between-systems-comparison.
Also, the US has an unusually high infant mortality (6.7 out of 1000) compared with other industrialized countries (ranging from 2.6 to 5.0). So even if you use one of the alternative indicators of health-care quality you proposed, the US still scores badly which, again, makes me think you pay too much for too little in return.
Actually, the US has higher rates of other things that are contributing to most of those low life expectancies obesity teenage pregnancy* significant reason for the high infant mortality violence/accidents
Which indicates that people in the US aren't using their health care to live longer, they are using it to live fatter or have their babies early or do extreme sports or live in a violent area (although that last is much less of a choice). This doesn't mean the healthcare is worse, it just isn't producing the same type results. (Like saying an SUV isn't a good buy since it has poor gas milage, or a bike is a poor transportation option because it has poor towing capacity)
However, While I Agree that "privatizing" by itself is not a good idea... the key is to break up monopolies, regardless of control by the state or otherwise.
On January 09 2011 10:48 Krikkitone wrote: Actually, the US has higher rates of other things that are contributing to most of those low life expectancies obesity teenage pregnancy* significant reason for the high infant mortality violence
Which indicates that people in the US aren't using their health care to live longer, they are using it to live fatter or have their babies early or live in a violent area (although that last is much less of a choice). This doesn't mean the healthcare is worse, it just isn't producing the same type results. (Like saying an SUV isn't a good buy since it has poor gas milage, or a bike is a poor transportation option because it has poor towing capacity)
Tanks for the info. I had not taken that into account. However, with regards to obesity we are quickly catching up to you guys. ^^
However, While I Agree that "privatizing" by itself is not a good idea... the key is to break up monopolies, regardless of control by the state or otherwise.
This! Its all about creating frameworks in which markets can actually work the way they are supposed to.
On January 09 2011 10:48 Krikkitone wrote: Actually, the US has higher rates of other things that are contributing to most of those low life expectancies obesity teenage pregnancy* significant reason for the high infant mortality violence
Which indicates that people in the US aren't using their health care to live longer, they are using it to live fatter or have their babies early or live in a violent area (although that last is much less of a choice). This doesn't mean the healthcare is worse, it just isn't producing the same type results. (Like saying an SUV isn't a good buy since it has poor gas milage, or a bike is a poor transportation option because it has poor towing capacity)
Tanks for the info. I had not taken that into account. However, with regards to obesity we are quickly catching up to you guys. ^^
However, While I Agree that "privatizing" by itself is not a good idea... the key is to break up monopolies, regardless of control by the state or otherwise.
This! Its all about creating frameworks in which markets can actually work the way they are supposed to.
Yes, a big part of the problem is that the healthcare market was not designed for individuals, it was designed with the assumption that you would get healthcare insurance through your job.
However, that causes complications when changing jobs or part-time employed or retired or self-employed
essentially times that you have money (so a private system should work) but not a Job.
Because there was no good system set up for an individual healthcare insurance market. Many of those that don't have private care is not because they can't afford it, its because insurance companies won't accept them at all or won't cover some significant condition of theirs.
On January 09 2011 10:48 Krikkitone wrote: Actually, the US has higher rates of other things that are contributing to most of those low life expectancies obesity teenage pregnancy* significant reason for the high infant mortality violence
Which indicates that people in the US aren't using their health care to live longer, they are using it to live fatter or have their babies early or live in a violent area (although that last is much less of a choice). This doesn't mean the healthcare is worse, it just isn't producing the same type results. (Like saying an SUV isn't a good buy since it has poor gas milage, or a bike is a poor transportation option because it has poor towing capacity)
Tanks for the info. I had not taken that into account. However, with regards to obesity we are quickly catching up to you guys. ^^
However, While I Agree that "privatizing" by itself is not a good idea... the key is to break up monopolies, regardless of control by the state or otherwise.
This! Its all about creating frameworks in which markets can actually work the way they are supposed to.
Yes, a big part of the problem is that the healthcare market was not designed for individuals, it was designed with the assumption that you would get healthcare insurance through your job.
However, that causes complications when changing jobs or part-time employed or retired or self-employed
essentially times that you have money (so a private system should work) but not a Job.
Because there was no good system set up for an individual healthcare insurance market. Many of those that don't have private care is not because they can't afford it, its because insurance companies won't accept them at all or won't cover some significant condition of theirs.
I see. That is one of the dilemmas I guess. If you make healthcare mandatory, you force some people into it that to not wish to get insurance, on the other hand you make it avilable to those who would not be accepted by any insurance company.
Do you happen to know how effective and efficient the state-sponsored heathcare progams in the US are, like medicare or heathcare for veterans? Would be intersting to know whsther they are comparable to private healthcare with regards to quality.
On January 09 2011 09:18 Mayfly wrote: 1. Praising the medical practise for the increase in life expectancy? Hah hoh heh hih. Try sanitation, lower crime rates, penicillin, and that we can deliver babies without killing them as much now. The differences between life expentancies between countries nowadays has nothing to do with healthcare. Which brings me to my next point:
2. Medical spending has no correlation with health. There's been numerous studies and experiments about this, most notably the RAND experiment by the US government. Results show that extra spending on medicine gives *no* benefits.
There are more important things than medicine for health, like diet and exercise. Food is even necessary to live. But we don't go to a government funded building to eat, but yet we need just that for our healthcare?
I would like to see evidence that differences in life expetancy have nothing to do with healthcare. I think that is utter bullshit but I am happy to be convined otherwise by reliable data. Could you link to the source your statement is based on so I can check it? The data I linked above seems to suggests otherwise: unless there is some severe confound, it suggests that there is in fact a strong colletation between healthcare spending and life expectancy.
Maybe whjat you say is accurate within the US system. If so, then the study you talk about is pretty meaningless in this context since you talk about a within-system-analysis while I am referring to a between-systems-comparison.
Also, the US has an unusually high infant mortality (6.7 out of 1000) compared with other industrialized countries (ranging from 2.6 to 5.0). So even if you use one of the alternative indicators of health-care quality you proposed, the US still scores badly which, again, makes me think you pay too much for too little in return.
http://www.jstor.org/pss/145166The relationship of mortality of whites to both medical care and environmental variables is examined in a regression analysis across states in 1960.Conclusion: Environmental variables are far more important than medical care.
http://www.jstor.org/pss/3350295The impact of medical care on the quality and length of lifeConclusion: An aggregate effect of medical care on life expectancy is found to be roughly five years during this century (Note: of the increase from 45 to 75 years)
http://www.ppge.ufrgs.br/giacomo/arquivos/eco02072/mckinlay-mckinlay-1977.pdfThe Questionable Effect of Medical Measureson the Decline of Mortality in the United States in the Twentieth CenturyConclusion: Analysis of United States data shows that introduction of specific medical measures and expansion of services account for only a fraction of the decline in mortality since 1900.
http://www.amazon.com/Role-Medicine-Dream-Mirage-Nemesis/dp/0691082359Role of MedicineConclusion: The growth in population in the industrialized world from the late 1700s to the present was due not to life-saving advancements in the field of medicine or public health, but instead to improvements in overall standards of living, especially diet and nutritional status, resulting from better economic conditions.
http://www.jstor.org/pss/144876Resources devoted to healthConclusion: None of the treatment variables were significantly related to life expectancy. Data from the United States also suggest a low marginal productivity of medical treatment in terms of life expectancy
----
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10509822?dopt=CitationThe impact of public spending on health (on child and infant mortality)Independent variation in public spending explains less than one-seventh of 1% of the observed differences in mortality across countries
http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~db=all~content=a758521831~tab=linkingHealth care funding levels and patient outcomes Conclusion: Previous studies find little or no relationship between the availability of health care and health status. Consistent with previous studies, no clear relationship is found in metropolitan areas
http://www.annals.org/content/138/4/288.abstractThe Implications of Regional Variations in Medicare Spending Conclusion: Medicare enrollees in higher-spending regions receive more care than those in lower-spending regions but do not have better health outcomes or satisfaction with care.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=10654835&dopt=AbstractPlusAssociations among hospital capacity, utilization, and mortality of US Medicare beneficiariesConclusion: Residence in areas of greater hospital capacity is associated with substantially increased use of the hospital, even after controlling for socioeconomic characteristics and illness burden. This increased use provides no detectable mortality benefit.
http://www.nber.org/papers/w6513Efficiency and Medicare Spending in the Last Six Months of LifeConclusions: (i) Regions providing more intensive care are not gaining net health benefits over regions providing less care, and (ii) allocative inefficiency may be present, in that patients are not necessarily matched with the treatment they prefer.
On January 09 2011 16:34 Mayfly wrote: http://www.jstor.org/pss/145166The relationship of mortality of whites to both medical care and environmental variables is examined in a regression analysis across states in 1960.Conclusion: Environmental variables are far more important than medical care.
http://www.jstor.org/pss/3350295The impact of medical care on the quality and length of lifeConclusion: An aggregate effect of medical care on life expectancy is found to be roughly five years during this century (Note: of the increase from 45 to 75 years)
http://www.ppge.ufrgs.br/giacomo/arquivos/eco02072/mckinlay-mckinlay-1977.pdfThe Questionable Effect of Medical Measureson the Decline of Mortality in the United States in the Twentieth CenturyConclusion: Analysis of United States data shows that introduction of specific medical measures and expansion of services account for only a fraction of the decline in mortality since 1900.
http://www.amazon.com/Role-Medicine-Dream-Mirage-Nemesis/dp/0691082359Role of MedicineConclusion: The growth in population in the industrialized world from the late 1700s to the present was due not to life-saving advancements in the field of medicine or public health, but instead to improvements in overall standards of living, especially diet and nutritional status, resulting from better economic conditions.
http://www.jstor.org/pss/144876Resources devoted to healthConclusion: None of the treatment variables were significantly related to life expectancy. Data from the United States also suggest a low marginal productivity of medical treatment in terms of life expectancy
----
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10509822?dopt=CitationThe impact of public spending on health (on child and infant mortality)Independent variation in public spending explains less than one-seventh of 1% of the observed differences in mortality across countries
http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~db=all~content=a758521831~tab=linkingHealth care funding levels and patient outcomes Conclusion: Previous studies find little or no relationship between the availability of health care and health status. Consistent with previous studies, no clear relationship is found in metropolitan areas
http://www.annals.org/content/138/4/288.abstractThe Implications of Regional Variations in Medicare Spending Conclusion: Medicare enrollees in higher-spending regions receive more care than those in lower-spending regions but do not have better health outcomes or satisfaction with care.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=10654835&dopt=AbstractPlusAssociations among hospital capacity, utilization, and mortality of US Medicare beneficiariesConclusion: Residence in areas of greater hospital capacity is associated with substantially increased use of the hospital, even after controlling for socioeconomic characteristics and illness burden. This increased use provides no detectable mortality benefit.
http://www.nber.org/papers/w6513Efficiency and Medicare Spending in the Last Six Months of LifeConclusions: (i) Regions providing more intensive care are not gaining net health benefits over regions providing less care, and (ii) allocative inefficiency may be present, in that patients are not necessarily matched with the treatment they prefer.
Thanks a lot. The effort is appreciated. I will check them out asap.
On January 09 2011 16:34 Mayfly wrote: http://www.jstor.org/pss/145166The relationship of mortality of whites to both medical care and environmental variables is examined in a regression analysis across states in 1960.Conclusion: Environmental variables are far more important than medical care.
http://www.jstor.org/pss/3350295The impact of medical care on the quality and length of lifeConclusion: An aggregate effect of medical care on life expectancy is found to be roughly five years during this century (Note: of the increase from 45 to 75 years)
http://www.ppge.ufrgs.br/giacomo/arquivos/eco02072/mckinlay-mckinlay-1977.pdfThe Questionable Effect of Medical Measureson the Decline of Mortality in the United States in the Twentieth CenturyConclusion: Analysis of United States data shows that introduction of specific medical measures and expansion of services account for only a fraction of the decline in mortality since 1900.
http://www.amazon.com/Role-Medicine-Dream-Mirage-Nemesis/dp/0691082359Role of MedicineConclusion: The growth in population in the industrialized world from the late 1700s to the present was due not to life-saving advancements in the field of medicine or public health, but instead to improvements in overall standards of living, especially diet and nutritional status, resulting from better economic conditions.
http://www.jstor.org/pss/144876Resources devoted to healthConclusion: None of the treatment variables were significantly related to life expectancy. Data from the United States also suggest a low marginal productivity of medical treatment in terms of life expectancy
----
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10509822?dopt=CitationThe impact of public spending on health (on child and infant mortality)Independent variation in public spending explains less than one-seventh of 1% of the observed differences in mortality across countries
http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~db=all~content=a758521831~tab=linkingHealth care funding levels and patient outcomes Conclusion: Previous studies find little or no relationship between the availability of health care and health status. Consistent with previous studies, no clear relationship is found in metropolitan areas
http://www.annals.org/content/138/4/288.abstractThe Implications of Regional Variations in Medicare Spending Conclusion: Medicare enrollees in higher-spending regions receive more care than those in lower-spending regions but do not have better health outcomes or satisfaction with care.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=10654835&dopt=AbstractPlusAssociations among hospital capacity, utilization, and mortality of US Medicare beneficiariesConclusion: Residence in areas of greater hospital capacity is associated with substantially increased use of the hospital, even after controlling for socioeconomic characteristics and illness burden. This increased use provides no detectable mortality benefit.
http://www.nber.org/papers/w6513Efficiency and Medicare Spending in the Last Six Months of LifeConclusions: (i) Regions providing more intensive care are not gaining net health benefits over regions providing less care, and (ii) allocative inefficiency may be present, in that patients are not necessarily matched with the treatment they prefer.
Thanks a lot. The effort is appreciated. I will check them out asap.
On January 08 2011 10:03 [Eternal]Phoenix wrote: In fact, capitalism ensures that if a company is being abusive, corrupt, or malicious people will just leave.
That is absolutely wrong. Monsanto is a perfect contradiction to that notion and there are thousands of other examples.
On January 09 2011 08:24 Electric.Jesus wrote: Being from what you may know as West Germany I don't get the point - if there is any - in your remark.
Meaning that socializing stuff, by in-large doesn't work. Look at North Korea vs. South Korea, Mainland China vs. Hong Kong, East Germany vs. West Germany, capitalism works better than socialism. You should be glad you're from West Germany.
On January 09 2011 08:24 Electric.Jesus wrote: Now you are just being a prick. Have I done anything to deserve this insult? We can continue in German if you wish. I promise not to insult you if your german is not perfect.
I didn't actually call you a name, I just made a statement of fact that your English is poor. You just called me a prick. Who's insulting who?
But were there not enough sepcialists who did some math and showed that "Obamacare" would save the US about half a billion dollars a year? Basically offering a state-run alternative forces free-market competitors to lower their prices while maintaining the level of service which leaves cutting profits as the only alternative.
There's actually research on both sides of the argument. I can list you some for the other-side if interested. But, common sense dictates more services from government increases deficits which is a no brainer.
You know, this is the weirdest thing. The numbers I researched show that the US has, by far, the highest healthcare cost as measured in percent of the GDP. I have linked an interesting graph from the respective wikipedia-entry HERE.
What does that have to do with deficit spending? It's been brought up by other forum contributors that the real problem with health-care in the US is the much needed tort-reform. Unfortunately socialized health-care isn't the solution that the US needs. Actually, there's many problems with Obamacare. Many liberals believe that what the government provides is free. It isn't, we pay for it one way or another, and unfortunately the government is grossly inefficient. During a recession we can't afford it.
You probably don't feel the heavy recession that is going in on US right now b/c you live in Germany where they run low deficits and have trade-surpluses. But, right now the biggest problem is not paying for health-care at the moment in the US, it's paying for rent. It's unemployment and underemployment. That's the real reason the Tea-party exists. People are sick of the government spending money we don't have.
On January 09 2011 19:13 Barca wrote: Republicans pledge to lower the deficit! They become voted into office!
Republicans increase deficit by extending Bush tax cuts for the wealthy!
Oh ok
I'll grant you that most Republicans suck like most politicians suck. But, tax cuts don't necessarily mean higher deficits in the long run. In fact, the more money the private sector gets to keep, the more money it can give to the government later on through reinvestment. Why start strangling the goose that lays the golden egg?
Milton Friedman gave a great example of why the people should be able to keep the money and choose where to spend it instead of the government. There are four types of spenders in the world.
1. People who spend money they didn't earn for other people 2. People who spend money they didn't earn for themselves. 3. People who earn money and spend it on themselves. 4. People who earn money and spend it on other people.
The most responsible is obviously 3 & 4 ie the private sector. 1 & 2 leads to irresponsible spending patterns ie Governments.
On January 09 2011 08:24 Electric.Jesus wrote: Being from what you may know as West Germany I don't get the point - if there is any - in your remark.
Meaning that socializing stuff, by in-large doesn't work. Look at North Korea vs. South Korea
If you think that North Korea is actually socialist then you're insane. This is probably the favorite fallacious argument that people employ against socialism; pointing to a horrible nation that purports to be socialist but doesn't even come close to the actual definition.
Then name me a socialist nation where socialism worked.
I'll give you more examples of failed socialism, China, but it's turning more capitalist everyday because they know socialized markets don't work. I already stated East Germany, but how about the Soviet Union. Shall I go on? Socialism has never worked. The only place where semi-socialism works is where they have a strong private-sector that supports it based on meritocracy and capitalism.
On January 09 2011 20:14 Balthasar wrote: Then name me a socialist nation where socialism worked.
I'll give you more examples of failed socialism, China, but it's turning more capitalist everyday because they know socialized markets don't work. I already stated East Germany, but how about the Soviet Union. Shall I go on? Socialism has never worked. The only place where semi-socialism works is where they have a strong private-sector that supports it based on meritocracy and capitalism.
You see, the problem is that people have different definitions of socialism. What you refer to as socialist states, most people would call a fascistoid surveillance state. It is charatceristic for the countries you name to have a political elite that has access to luxury and personal liberties while the majority of the people do not. Most poeple here on tl that argue in favor of socialism are in favour of its core principles "equality, justice, solidarity". I, for my part do not know any state that implemented actual socialism, hence it is quite difficult to name one where socialism succeeded.
On January 09 2011 20:14 Balthasar wrote: Then name me a socialist nation where socialism worked.
I'll give you more examples of failed socialism, China, but it's turning more capitalist everyday because they know socialized markets don't work. I already stated East Germany, but how about the Soviet Union. Shall I go on? Socialism has never worked. The only place where semi-socialism works is where they have a strong private-sector that supports it based on meritocracy and capitalism.
There is a slight problem with that request. When looking to a Socialist State, well, there is none. There are examples of attempts to create one, but never has there been a true Socialist State. So asking to give an example of one is simply misleading. And because there has be no true Socialist regime, using China as an example is flawed.
Finally, using that example on face value simply is irresponsible and does not help the topic. The reason for this is simple, You take something that is mimicking a Socialist regime, and you have it mixed with non Socialistic regimes. Now, is it honestly fair to say that the reason for it 'failing' is merely due to it being Socialistic in nature? Or is it possible that because it is in a sense, a lone. And its ventures and means of income (trade, production, etc.) are all reliant on non Socialistic regimes. It would stand to reason that it would inevitably fail at one point.
So your argument would only work if it was accepted that Socialism fails due it the nature of it, and not the outer influences and worldly political regimes.
In the end, I do no think your argument is able to stand on its own. It is far too weak and cannot address the many variables at hand. Also, as there has not been a true, full fledged Socialistic State in history, asking for an example is misleading. I am not arguing for either side of the aisle, just pointing out the weak reasoning I see.
@Electric.Jesus: Curse you, you beat me to it. This is what I get for typing out a long winded post.
its only 160 pages and it will explain, with evidence, why a pure free market is retarded. it has a lot to do with allocation of resources and corporate practices getting more corrupt more quickly than you'd expect.
also, life expectancy as a statistic means absolutely nothing. cultural diets and habits (like killing each other) often factor in more to that number than a country's healthcare system, so life expectancy does not reflect quality of healthcare in the slightest. not. in. the. slightest.
its only 160 pages and it will explain, with evidence, why a pure free market is retarded. it has a lot to do with allocation of resources and corporate practices getting more corrupt more quickly than you'd expect.
also, life expectancy as a statistic means absolutely nothing. cultural diets and habits (like killing each other) often factor in more to that number than a country's healthcare system, so life expectancy does not reflect quality of healthcare in the slightest. not. in. the. slightest.
Seems an interesting book. Do you have any idea what a better idicator of healthcare-quality is? I thought if the WHO uses it, it cannot be that bad, but I am, admittetly, no expert on this topic.
Also, I think there is a clever alternative to a pure free-market approach that I find rather promising, namely libertarian paternalism. You can read about it here:
basically it is about shaping decision in a way that uninformed people will per default chose what is best for the average joe while still maintaining free choice.
On January 06 2011 11:24 t3hwUn wrote: Wow I love how TL hates on right wingers... I get flamed for being a troll for posting unpopular political opinions elsewhere and then I read this... Fail.
And to get back on topic +1 for no more obama socialist policies. If I wanted to live in Europe I'd move there...
the word "socialist" gets thrown around waaaaaay too much. problem with people like you is that all you do is throw around talking points and cover your ears whenever people say anything rational.
what has obama done that can be classified as "socialist"?
I like how some republicans have even called him a Nazi and a socialist in the same sentence. (not in this article).
The nazi party was a national socialist party ( NSDAP ) what you're thinking about is neo nazi's which is something different again.
Although calling someone a nazi is still something preposterous to do.
I liked this one very much. It was infromative without being too technical or boring. The sad thing is that our health system in germany tried to implement preventive programs to support healthy behavior. 1% of the health budget was spent on preventive measure. but since most people abused it to get free massages by physiotherapists, they abandonded the program again.
its only 160 pages and it will explain, with evidence, why a pure free market is retarded. it has a lot to do with allocation of resources and corporate practices getting more corrupt more quickly than you'd expect.
also, life expectancy as a statistic means absolutely nothing. cultural diets and habits (like killing each other) often factor in more to that number than a country's healthcare system, so life expectancy does not reflect quality of healthcare in the slightest. not. in. the. slightest.
I read a few reviews and any excerpts I could find. The main thesis seems to be that government has to respond to "failures of market-based approaches" with regulations, and therefore that a belief in that market-based approach will only lead to an even bigger government.
That is partly true, but if you increase regulations because something fails, then you have to decrease regulations when something does not fail. They regulated charter schools because one school was mismanaged. Why not deregulate the other charter schools? It's a clear bias and a failure of democracy, not a failure of markets. Humans will always fuck up some things, and if you only increase regulations when they do so you might as well increase regulations all-around, hell, even outlaw the thing you regulate, because that's where that bias will take you anyway.
There's also a bias on blaming the lack of regulation for failure rather than the abundance of regulation. I don't see any deregulations of banks despite pretty good evidence that over-regulation was a big factor in the latest financial crisis. Yet it is more regulation that is called for...
Also, when was the last time you witnessed something like a big hairdressing scandal? I'd call that a pretty free market. I don't see any calls for it to be further deregulated though. Weird.
So to me it basically carries an anti-democratic message which I could certainly sign.
its only 160 pages and it will explain, with evidence, why a pure free market is retarded. it has a lot to do with allocation of resources and corporate practices getting more corrupt more quickly than you'd expect.
also, life expectancy as a statistic means absolutely nothing. cultural diets and habits (like killing each other) often factor in more to that number than a country's healthcare system, so life expectancy does not reflect quality of healthcare in the slightest. not. in. the. slightest.
There's also a bias on blaming the lack of regulation for failure rather than the abundance of regulation. I don't see any deregulations of banks despite pretty good evidence that over-regulation was a big factor in the latest financial crisis. Yet it is more regulation that is called for...
You make some interesting points, but I disagree with the above statement. The banks failed because they took on too many risky investments. No more, no less. It was just a matter of time until too many people defaulted on their risky loans.
No regulation forced the banks to make these risky loans, and obviously regulation could be made to prohibit excessive amounts of risk. So therefore I question why you think that 1) more regulation wouldn't have prevented the banking collapse 2) over-regulation was the cause?
edit: to me, what is more debatable is the motivation behind the banks making these horribly risky loans that were just bound to backfire eventually. Was it a mere mixture of stupidity and greed (most likely) or was it because the banks knew they were "too big too fail" and that they would get bailed out if anything happened?
Sadly, if they didn't know that they were "too big to fail" previously, well, they know it now. Makes that abuse all the more likely in the future.
On January 10 2011 06:52 Mayfly wrote: There's also a bias on blaming the lack of regulation for failure rather than the abundance of regulation. I don't see any deregulations of banks despite pretty good evidence that over-regulation was a big factor in the latest financial crisis. Yet it is more regulation that is called for...
You got warned for trolling in the "congresswoman shot" thread, yet continue to troll here? I don't know if that is a very smart decission.
There is a slight problem with that request. When looking to a Socialist State, well, there is none. There are examples of attempts to create one, but never has there been a true Socialist State. So asking to give an example of one is simply misleading. And because there has be no true Socialist regime, using China as an example is flawed.
There is no true socialist state and there is no true free-market state. The truth is that there is no way to have a purely socialist state b/c everyone believes in meritocracy. You receive what you deserve. All those countries like USSR start with lofty goals of a nation where everyone gets an equal share, but they always transform into fascism. The book Animal Farm is a good allegory of how this happens. The true flaw of socialism is that everyone needs a reason to go to work and do a good job. In capitalism there is higher wages and bonuses. Socialism you get it even if you work or not that's why China is changing. Socialism can work with political theory where everyone has an equal say, which we call a democracy, but economically non-viable. (Although, I'm not in favor of an uneducated democracy we have now, where too few people know too little economics and history, which leads them to vote emotionally instead of logically.)
There will be never be a purely socialist states, but all the experiments in history for a socialist state has failed miserably. That's why I cite those examples (ie USSR and East Germany) inferring socialism doesn't and will never work. Although, I'm in favorable for a well-educated democracy, I'm not in favor of socialist economics. It's too expensive and we can't afford it now more than ever.
On January 10 2011 07:02 MforWW wrote: to me, what is more debatable is the motivation behind the banks making these horribly risky loans that were just bound to backfire eventually. Was it a mere mixture of stupidity and greed (most likely) or was it because the banks knew they were "too big too fail" and that they would get bailed out if anything happened?
Sadly, if they didn't know that they were "too big to fail" previously, well, they know it now. Makes that abuse all the more likely in the future.
I heard a talk from a financial analyst about the reasons for the banks massive failure. Part of it was greed, part was just gambling but another severe fact was that risk assessment was based on a flawed model.
Basically it all came down to estimating the intercorrelation of the risk of the mortages. The problem is that no one knows how high that correlation is and small differences in correlation coefficients have a tremdous impact on the distribution of risk in the model. The correlation was set to a too low level in the model, leading to on overly positive evaluation of the risks which, in turn, encouraged more speculative investment in financial derivates.
On January 10 2011 07:02 MforWW wrote: to me, what is more debatable is the motivation behind the banks making these horribly risky loans that were just bound to backfire eventually. Was it a mere mixture of stupidity and greed (most likely) or was it because the banks knew they were "too big too fail" and that they would get bailed out if anything happened?
Sadly, if they didn't know that they were "too big to fail" previously, well, they know it now. Makes that abuse all the more likely in the future.
I heard a talk from a financial analyst about the reasons for the banks massive failure. Part of it was greed, part was just gambling but another severe fact was that risk assessment was based on a flawed model.
Basically it all came down to estimating the intercorrelation of the risk of the mortages. The problem is that no one knows how high that correlation is and small differences in correlation coefficients have a tremdous impact on the distribution of risk in the model. The correlation was set to a too low level in the model, leading to on overly positive evaluation of the risks which, in turn, encouraged more speculative investment in financial derivates.
Right, that sounds pretty close to the answer I come up with. It was a mixture of stupidity/greed, with more of an emphasis on the stupidity side (aka, the flawed model based on flawed assumptions).
Once the risk was too high, it was simply a matter of time until it all combusted.
On January 10 2011 07:53 MforWW wrote: Right, that sounds pretty close to the answer I come up with. It was a mixture of stupidity/greed, with more of an emphasis on the stupidity side (aka, the flawed model based on flawed assumptions).
Once the risk was too high, it was simply a matter of time until it all combusted.
The biggest problem now is that the guys in charge have learned that failure will be rewarded with taxpayer-financed bail-outs. Ergo, we now see business as usual.
its only 160 pages and it will explain, with evidence, why a pure free market is retarded. it has a lot to do with allocation of resources and corporate practices getting more corrupt more quickly than you'd expect.
I read a few reviews and any excerpts I could find. The main thesis seems to be that government has to respond to "failures of market-based approaches" with regulations, and therefore that a belief in that market-based approach will only lead to an even bigger government.
That is partly true, but if you increase regulations because something fails, then you have to decrease regulations when something does not fail. They regulated charter schools because one school was mismanaged. Why not deregulate the other charter schools?
I couldn't say it better that Mayfly. You have deregulate bad regulations as well as add good regulation. You can't create laws to the point where most people can't understand it without a good lawyer. There are too many nonsensical laws to the point where people are afraid to try something new like open up a new business because they don't want to get sued. My friend's father's small business got sued recently for lack of handicap facilities in the bathroom in small restaurant. They fought and lost paying out 50,000 dollar. No wonder people are afraid. This is a family run restaurant where dad and mom work the kitchen and their kids work the service. The guy that sued many other small businesses as well. This guy with his lawyer basically goes around exploiting bad regulation to hurt small businesses.
And SpiritoftheTuna, I read some of that book. But, it just seems to bash republicans. Yeah, Republicans sucks, but so do the Democrats. Obama is doing the same stuff that Bush did. What does that have to do with the failure of the free-market? Nothing.
The recession was a direct cause from poor monetary management by the Federal Reserve and policies enforced by Congress to promote Freddy Mac and Fannie Mae. The huge banks go crazy because they know they'll get bailed out. Bailing out people because they make mistakes is not the structure of the free-market, it's actually against everything it stands for. All people want a fair chance to succeed and fail on their own merits. But, governments has allied themselves to big corporate interests and has caused major inequities in the market.
Contrary, to what some liberals believe, free-market libertarians are not for big corporations, we're for the small little guy working out of his garage trying to start-up a new business. Unfortunately regulations hurt small guys more than big guys because the big guys make the regulations.
On January 10 2011 06:52 Mayfly wrote: There's also a bias on blaming the lack of regulation for failure rather than the abundance of regulation. I don't see any deregulations of banks despite pretty good evidence that over-regulation was a big factor in the latest financial crisis. Yet it is more regulation that is called for...
You got warned for trolling in the "congresswoman shot" thread, yet continue to troll here? I don't know if that is a very smart decission.
I didn't troll there and I don't troll here. Opinions other than yours do not equal trolling. Good day, sir.
On January 09 2011 19:13 Barca wrote: Republicans pledge to lower the deficit! They become voted into office!
Republicans increase deficit by extending Bush tax cuts for the wealthy!
Oh ok
I'll grant you that most Republicans suck like most politicians suck. But, tax cuts don't necessarily mean higher deficits in the long run. In fact, the more money the private sector gets to keep, the more money it can give to the government later on through reinvestment. Why start strangling the goose that lays the golden egg?
Milton Friedman gave a great example of why the people should be able to keep the money and choose where to spend it instead of the government. There are four types of spenders in the world.
1. People who spend money they didn't earn for other people 2. People who spend money they didn't earn for themselves. 3. People who earn money and spend it on themselves. 4. People who earn money and spend it on other people.
The most responsible is obviously 3 & 4 ie the private sector. 1 & 2 leads to irresponsible spending patterns ie Governments.
Well one of the problems with corporations is that they sometimes fall into # 1+2. Because The CEOs of the companies spend the "corporation's" money. The CEOs didn't earn the "corporation's" money, the "corporation" earned it. In the same way that "the People" don't spend their tax money, the legislators + executive bureaucrats spend it.
As for a perfect free market, corporations hate it (as do unions/workers) Anyone that wants to make money Hates a free market. And one of the best ways to stop a free market is the government. There are also some things the government is needed for a free market which makes pure laissez-faire not work and lead to distorted markets...but government can also be used to distort markets.
Well one of the problems with corporations is that they sometimes fall into # 1+2. Because The CEOs of the companies spend the "corporation's" money. The CEOs didn't earn the "corporation's" money, the "corporation" earned it. In the same way that "the People" don't spend their tax money, the legislators + executive bureaucrats spend it.
In Germany it is even worse. If CEOs perform really bad, their contracts are dissolved and they get a nice severance payment. Also they are insured against managment errors, meaning that if someone actually would sue them for mismanagement, their insurance company would cover the costs. That means that, in fact, CEOs have the same power as entrepreneurs do and often earn more money but do not take the same risk. This is outrageous for three reasons: 1. it promotes short-term profit maximizing, often at the cost a company's substance 2. it actually rewards mismanagement 3. it devalues entrepreneurship (which is the worst of all three)
I can only hope that the situation is not the same in the US or other countries.
Well one of the problems with corporations is that they sometimes fall into # 1+2. Because The CEOs of the companies spend the "corporation's" money. The CEOs didn't earn the "corporation's" money, the "corporation" earned it. In the same way that "the People" don't spend their tax money, the legislators + executive bureaucrats spend it.
In Germany it is even worse. If CEOs perform really bad, their contracts are dissolved and they get a nice severance payment. Also they are insured against managment errors, meaning that if someone actually would sue them for mismanagement, their insurance company would cover the costs. That means that, in fact, CEOs have the same power as entrepreneurs do and often earn more money but do not take the same risk. This is outrageous for three reasons: 1. it promotes short-term profit maximizing, often at the cost a company's substance 2. it actually rewards mismanagement 3. it devalues entrepreneurship (which is the worst of all three)
I can only hope that the situation is not the same in the US or other countries.
That's pretty much it, its probably the case for all countries with anything like the modern corporation. That is perhaps the biggest problem with the structure, a disconect between the decision maker and the results of the decisions.
Another is the fact that any connection that is there is only short term... an executive can come and "turn around" a company for 5 years, and then move on to another company, but having left the first one in a poor long-term position they don't care.
Ideally managers would only be compensated for long-term results.. but that is hard to do, since they need some compensation before long-term results are available.
On January 06 2011 11:24 t3hwUn wrote: Wow I love how TL hates on right wingers... I get flamed for being a troll for posting unpopular political opinions elsewhere and then I read this... Fail.
And to get back on topic +1 for no more obama socialist policies. If I wanted to live in Europe I'd move there...
What's funny is that Obama is about as socialist as Sarkozy...
its only 160 pages and it will explain, with evidence, why a pure free market is retarded. it has a lot to do with allocation of resources and corporate practices getting more corrupt more quickly than you'd expect.
also, life expectancy as a statistic means absolutely nothing. cultural diets and habits (like killing each other) often factor in more to that number than a country's healthcare system, so life expectancy does not reflect quality of healthcare in the slightest. not. in. the. slightest.
There's also a bias on blaming the lack of regulation for failure rather than the abundance of regulation. I don't see any deregulations of banks despite pretty good evidence that over-regulation was a big factor in the latest financial crisis. Yet it is more regulation that is called for...
You make some interesting points, but I disagree with the above statement. The banks failed because they took on too many risky investments. No more, no less. It was just a matter of time until too many people defaulted on their risky loans.
No regulation forced the banks to make these risky loans, and obviously regulation could be made to prohibit excessive amounts of risk. So therefore I question why you think that 1) more regulation wouldn't have prevented the banking collapse 2) over-regulation was the cause?
edit: to me, what is more debatable is the motivation behind the banks making these horribly risky loans that were just bound to backfire eventually. Was it a mere mixture of stupidity and greed (most likely) or was it because the banks knew they were "too big too fail" and that they would get bailed out if anything happened?
Sadly, if they didn't know that they were "too big to fail" previously, well, they know it now. Makes that abuse all the more likely in the future.
Well, you could look at the legal action against banks that declined more mortgage loans to minorities than they did to whites. Regulators wanted racial equality and it didn't matter that minorities didn't qualify for loans as much as whites according to the standards set, it simply looked bad that were declined more. The guarantees on Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae didn't help, either.
I have absolutely no respect for bankers, stockbrokers, most economists or anyone in finance really, but first blame in this case should go to the regulators.
On another note I think everyone is being pretty unfair to big corporations. This could be understood evolutionary speaking, since there were no big corporations until very recently in human history. We have no built-in method of understanding them. They are big, weird, and shady to us. So we regulate the hell out of them and tax them more than we do smaller corporations or households (when was the last time you had someone knock at your door to inspect what you were doing?). I don't think this is fair considering:
1. Big corporations are more transparent than small, since whatever they do will involve more people.
2. Big corporations are easier to monitor, since "bad things" that are done in one place will probably be done in many places.
3. Big corporations are easier to discourage from doing "bad things" (just look at the green thing going on in most big corps).
its only 160 pages and it will explain, with evidence, why a pure free market is retarded. it has a lot to do with allocation of resources and corporate practices getting more corrupt more quickly than you'd expect.
I read a few reviews and any excerpts I could find. The main thesis seems to be that government has to respond to "failures of market-based approaches" with regulations, and therefore that a belief in that market-based approach will only lead to an even bigger government.
That is partly true, but if you increase regulations because something fails, then you have to decrease regulations when something does not fail. They regulated charter schools because one school was mismanaged. Why not deregulate the other charter schools?
And SpiritoftheTuna, I read some of that book. But, it just seems to bash republicans. Yeah, Republicans sucks, but so do the Democrats. Obama is doing the same stuff that Bush did. What does that have to do with the failure of the free-market? Nothing.
That's a terrible way to approach the book; no matter how strongly a book is framed at democrats vs republicans (and I didn't think this was that strongly framed as such), you should be reading the content/evidence, not worrying about the partisanship. I think both democrats and republicans are being retarded, but that has nothing to do with the actual content of the book itself. Who cares which party enacted the stupidity? The point is that it was stupid in the first place.
Also, do you have an idea how to prevent the historically-way-too-quick speed at which small businesses merge into large corrupt ones? That's one of the biggest issues with the libertarian approach, in my opinion. It doesn't matter how strong your "small businesses are best at meeting market demands" argument looks on paper, it's usually easier/more efficient to get large and start forgetting about some of the market. Especially given that capitalism encourages mergers because it makes all the managers and CEOs rich.
edit: to the post above, yeah okay not all big corporations may be bad, but the nature of large is that they are best at slimming down everywhere that's not profitable. I feel that that axiom makes them shady by nature, though I have no evidence for that tbh. I'd have to do more research.
by the way, how do you feel about agribusiness? i know it's been a huge success in feeding people, but is factory farming worth it? (random tangent, you don't have to answer this question haha)
Also, another issue of libertarianism I feel is that, no matter how transparent corporations are, there is no guarantee that the average consumer will have the time/energy/knowhow to access relevant information as to whether to support such a corporation (by consuming their goods/services). That in itself is a lack of transparency. It doesn't matter if 40% of the country knows that walmart is fucked up, if the other 60% keep buying, walmart will survive. Speaking of walmart, isn't it a case where their sales are greatly driven by the poverty of their consumers? If you're on minimum wage, you don't get to care how immoral your wholesaler is, you just buy the cheap shit. How do you get around that without regulation?
edit oh wait you guys dont think walmart is evil do you... i guess this is why liberals and conservatives can never get along.
its only 160 pages and it will explain, with evidence, why a pure free market is retarded. it has a lot to do with allocation of resources and corporate practices getting more corrupt more quickly than you'd expect.
also, life expectancy as a statistic means absolutely nothing. cultural diets and habits (like killing each other) often factor in more to that number than a country's healthcare system, so life expectancy does not reflect quality of healthcare in the slightest. not. in. the. slightest.
Seems an interesting book. Do you have any idea what a better idicator of healthcare-quality is? I thought if the WHO uses it, it cannot be that bad, but I am, admittetly, no expert on this topic.
Also, I think there is a clever alternative to a pure free-market approach that I find rather promising, namely libertarian paternalism. You can read about it here:
basically it is about shaping decision in a way that uninformed people will per default chose what is best for the average joe while still maintaining free choice.
This looks like a really interesting book, I love psychologically-integrated approaches. Too many people seem to underestimate the power of our psychological tendencies, it's pretty refreshing to see an approach based around that power.
As for indicators of healthcare quality, I don't think there is an objective/quantitative measure that covers everything. I mean one measure could be how much a country successfully encourages its residents to exercise and eat well (and that'd be a really important one), but that measure would be (mostly) outside the hospital, so such a measure lies in a different realm entirely. Do you know what I mean? Health has such a broad scope that trying to measure it with one number is a completely flawed and misleading approach.
On January 09 2011 20:14 Balthasar wrote: Then name me a socialist nation where socialism worked.
You see, the problem is that people have different definitions of socialism. What you refer to as socialist states, most people would call a fascistoid surveillance state. It is charatceristic for the countries you name to have a political elite that has access to luxury and personal liberties while the majority of the people do not. Most poeple here on tl that argue in favor of socialism are in favour of its core principles "equality, justice, solidarity". I, for my part do not know any state that implemented actual socialism, hence it is quite difficult to name one where socialism succeeded.
There are some examples of (anti-authoritarian) socialism. It worked, but it always got destroyed by outside forces pretty quickly. these are examples of actual socialism as it was intended once ("equality, justice, solidarity").
On January 10 2011 13:04 Balthasar wrote: @Ido. Yeah still no such thing as socialist state. Apparently according to the wiki on Spanish Revolution 1936, they were part libertarian.
Yeah thats where it gets tricky. true socialism is meant to be libertarian (-> libertarian socialism). but this has nothing to do with free market capitalism and all this stuff. maybe this sounds strange to someone from the United States where "libertarian" gets equated with free market capitalism. one has to get things straight here.
Mikhail Bakunin said in 1867: "liberty without socialism is privilege, injustice; and socialism without liberty is slavery and brutality" - and oh, how he hit the mark back then. and this is how socialism was meant to be.
On January 10 2011 10:45 Mayfly wrote: On another note I think everyone is being pretty unfair to big corporations... considering:
1. Big corporations are more transparent than small, since whatever they do will involve more people.
Look at Enron and Worldcom, they cooked their books. Just because a company puts out a bogus 10K (annual income statement, doesn't mean they are transparent.
2. Big corporations are easier to monitor, since "bad things" that are done in one place will probably be done in many places.
Are you kidding me? Morality has nothing to do with size. There are evil small businesses and big corporations. In fact the corporate structure can be more evil because stakeholders and management have limited liability while sole proprietorship and partnerships have unlimited liability.
Look at AIG one small department (credit-derivatives) almost took down their whole company.
3. Big corporations are easier to discourage from doing "bad things" (just look at the green thing going on in most big corps).
There's many green small businesses as well. What's your point?
4. Big corporations are the reason you are rich.
Are u *beep*ing insane? Big corporations don't make anyone rich unless you work for one. Everyone makes themselves rich by working hard and getting (hopefully honest) paycheck.
Not to say, all big corporations are evil. We need some corporations. But, your points lack consistency, cogency, and fact.
We can argue with what socialism really means forever... I'm not arguing against socialized politics which is essentially a democracy, but I'm against socialized economic system where people are rewarded not by merit. Look I understand they are poor people, handicapped, people in need. The free-market isn't necessarily fair, but the truth is the market is us. We only have ourselves to blame when a free market does not go right. In a free-market everyone gets to vote whats important to them (we vote with our dollars/won). Unfortunately, our culture values pop-stars over helping the homeless. By spending money, we choose to embrace values of the products we buy. That's not the free-market's fault, its us. So, if you value helping the homeless, the poor, the needy, please donate to a worthy cause and I commend you if you did.
But, the free-market is not to blame for all the inequities. It's what actions we take as society and the values we practice in the market that really creates all that unfairness.
It's interesting how just about every person arguing from a right wing point of view in this thread refuses to respond to challenges. Phoenix, then Scruffy, and now you Balthasar. You should defend the points you made or admit that you were wrong. Just ignoring contradictions is extremely dishonest.
As I told you, and you seemed unwilling to respond to directly, North Korea is not a socialist state. Yet that is exactly what you claimed earlier. It's not socialist, it's not an attempt at socialism, it has absolutely nothing to do with it beyond the completely empty claim from that insane government that it is. Either you were lying earlier or you were wrong. I would like to hear just once in this thread one of you say "Ok, you know what, I was wrong about that".
North Korea is at least an attempt at socialism. USSR which also is a socialist experiment heavily influenced the region after WWII. China was also influenced by the Soviets. North Korea's biggest allies was socialist China and the Soviets in the Korean War. While South Korea was allied with US.
I'll say this much. To my knowledge there is no form of perfect socialism in any nation, but I contend it's a Utopian concept.
Also you should realize libertarian isn't considered right wing. Many actually contest its left of center. (Please admit you were wrong =) haha.)
On January 10 2011 14:04 Lefnui wrote: It's interesting how just about every person arguing from a right wing point of view in this thread refuses to respond to challenges. Phoenix, then Scruffy, and now you Balthasar. You should defend the points you made or admit that you were wrong. Just ignoring contradictions is extremely dishonest.
As I told you, and you seemed unwilling to respond to directly, North Korea is not a socialist state. Yet that is exactly what you claimed earlier. It's not socialist, it's not an attempt at socialism, it has absolutely nothing to do with it beyond the completely empty claim from that insane government that it is. Either you were lying earlier or you were wrong. I would like to hear just once in this thread one of you say "Ok, you know what, I was wrong about that".
North Korea is definitely socialist in the broadest sense of the word, ie public/common ownership of the means of production+distribution of resources.
The state in this case that does the public/common ownership is basically a theocratic monarchy, so its a form of dictatorial/totalitarian socialism.
Now you are probably limiting your definition to democratic socialism, or even as specific as a liberal democratic socialism (ie a democracy where there are civil rights guaranteed), or possibly some form of anarchy. By that means there aren't many highly socialist states. (although many are more or less socialist)
However, socialism has one of the same problems that caused the financial meltdown... entities existed that were "too big to fail", so there were few means of replacing them with others.
The state is innately an entity that is "too big to fail" (especially because 'state failing' generally involves violence) so having the state control as little as possible is the same idea as having any one corporation control as little as possible.
On January 10 2011 14:04 Lefnui wrote: It's interesting how just about every person arguing from a right wing point of view in this thread refuses to respond to challenges. Phoenix, then Scruffy, and now you Balthasar. You should defend the points you made or admit that you were wrong. Just ignoring contradictions is extremely dishonest.
As I told you, and you seemed unwilling to respond to directly, North Korea is not a socialist state. Yet that is exactly what you claimed earlier. It's not socialist, it's not an attempt at socialism, it has absolutely nothing to do with it beyond the completely empty claim from that insane government that it is. Either you were lying earlier or you were wrong. I would like to hear just once in this thread one of you say "Ok, you know what, I was wrong about that".
North Korea is definitely socialist in the broadest sense of the word, ie public/common ownership of the means of production+distribution of resources.
If you go back in history, the core of socialism has always been workers' self management. That is the core. Not much of that in North Korea.
On January 10 2011 13:53 Balthasar wrote: Look I understand they are poor people, handicapped, people in need. The free-market isn't necessarily fair, but the truth is the market is us. We only have ourselves to blame when a free market does not go right. In a free-market everyone gets to vote whats important to them (we vote with our dollars/won).
in the "free market" there is no such thing like voting. yes you can choose between different products but you have no influence on what corporations do. they can act like private tyrannies and even employees have no say on policies. let alone the public who often is drastically affected from those decisions that are being made by corporations (for example environment issues etc.)
On January 10 2011 14:33 Ido wrote: in the free market there is no such thing like voting. yes you can choose between different products but you have no influence on what corporations do. they can act like private tyrannies and even employees have no say on policies. let alone the public who often is drastically affected from those decisions that are being made by corporations (for example environment issues etc.)
It's the mass consumers who empower those corporations. If we stopped spending in those supposed tyrannical companies then they would be dis-empowered.
On January 10 2011 14:33 Ido wrote: in the free market there is no such thing like voting. yes you can choose between different products but you have no influence on what corporations do. they can act like private tyrannies and even employees have no say on policies. let alone the public who often is drastically affected from those decisions that are being made by corporations (for example environment issues etc.)
It's the mass consumers who empower those corporations. If we stopped spending in those supposed tyrannical companies then they would be dis-empowered.
the problem is i would probably die of hunger if i stopped spending in those tyrannical companies.
Frankly, I thought this debate was basically settled.
Look at the entire 20th century. I think it's obvious that in every practical matter:
free market > socialism
No need to cite facts... it's common knowledge. The history of socialism is one of colossal failures. And even if it could be implemented perfectly, I would still think that a meritocracy would be arguably a more "fair" system.
its not a moral question. its because big corporations have to stay competetive on the national and global markets and therefore they will most likely lower the wages of their workers, produce bad working conditions, ignore environmental issues and so on...
Then buy from those that won't do all that stuff. Buy fair-trade products or green products. There are even companies who are going green and fair-trade, support those. There are many companies who donate to worthy causes as well. Become an educated consumer.
On January 10 2011 15:11 Balthasar wrote: Then buy from those that won't do all that stuff. Buy fair-trade products or green products. There are even companies who are going green and fair-trade, support those. There are many companies who donate to worthy causes as well. Become an educated consumer.
As a rich guy i can do that. 99% of the people in the world cant. its just ridiculous. the whole fair-trade thing is built on rich peoples guilty conscience.
Hey Balthasar, can you stop arguing in a language you can barely speak or write? I'm having a hard time making out anything you're saying due to your dreadful use of grammar and punctuation. Pretty funny how you were telling a guy from Germany that he shouldn't argue with you because his english is supposedly worse than yours (hint: it's actually better).
On January 10 2011 14:04 Lefnui wrote: It's interesting how just about every person arguing from a right wing point of view in this thread refuses to respond to challenges. Phoenix, then Scruffy, and now you Balthasar. You should defend the points you made or admit that you were wrong. Just ignoring contradictions is extremely dishonest.
As I told you, and you seemed unwilling to respond to directly, North Korea is not a socialist state. Yet that is exactly what you claimed earlier. It's not socialist, it's not an attempt at socialism, it has absolutely nothing to do with it beyond the completely empty claim from that insane government that it is. Either you were lying earlier or you were wrong. I would like to hear just once in this thread one of you say "Ok, you know what, I was wrong about that".
I responded to your "challenges" till you called me a racist. Its a common move from the left, attack the person since you have no real argument. /exits general forum ignorance till another day.
On January 10 2011 14:04 Lefnui wrote: It's interesting how just about every person arguing from a right wing point of view in this thread refuses to respond to challenges. Phoenix, then Scruffy, and now you Balthasar. You should defend the points you made or admit that you were wrong. Just ignoring contradictions is extremely dishonest.
As I told you, and you seemed unwilling to respond to directly, North Korea is not a socialist state. Yet that is exactly what you claimed earlier. It's not socialist, it's not an attempt at socialism, it has absolutely nothing to do with it beyond the completely empty claim from that insane government that it is. Either you were lying earlier or you were wrong. I would like to hear just once in this thread one of you say "Ok, you know what, I was wrong about that".
I responded to your "challenges" till you called me a racist. Its a common move from the left, attack the person since you have no real argument. /exits general forum ignorance till another day.
im pretty sure that is a common move no matter what side you are on.
On January 10 2011 11:41 SpiritoftheTunA wrote: Also, another issue of libertarianism I feel is that, no matter how transparent corporations are, there is no guarantee that the average consumer will have the time/energy/knowhow to access relevant information as to whether to support such a corporation (by consuming their goods/services). That in itself is a lack of transparency. It doesn't matter if 40% of the country knows that walmart is fucked up, if the other 60% keep buying, walmart will survive. Speaking of walmart, isn't it a case where their sales are greatly driven by the poverty of their consumers? If you're on minimum wage, you don't get to care how immoral your wholesaler is, you just buy the cheap shit. How do you get around that without regulation?
balthasar can you respond to this please? also the post that was above this? are you purposely ignoring my posts now or was it an accident?
On January 10 2011 14:13 Balthasar wrote: North Korea is at least an attempt at socialism.
No, it is not. Not remotely, not in any way, shape or form. When a country claims that it's socialist, that's not enough. It actually has to be socialist in order to be an example of socialism, crazy concept huh?
Notice how you have now shifted your argument without even a word of recognition. Before North Korea was an example of socialism, now it's not, but it's an attempt at it. How much weaker will this pathetic point become until you just drop it altogether? If you think that North Korea represents socialism then you simply don't understand what the word means. You don't care about that though, you're just applying the oldest and most ridiculous argument against socialism. Point to a horrible nation, attach it to socialism, and wait for everyone to accept the idea that socialism made it horrible. That is basically the argument that you'll hear from 10 year olds in the United States:
"America is capitalist, North Korea is socialist. America is good, North Korea is bad. So capitalism is good, and socialism is bad." Or insert Cuba, China or the Soviet Union in North Korea's place.
Also you should realize libertarian isn't considered right wing. Many actually contest its left of center. (Please admit you were wrong =) haha.)
Nice attempt at being cute but again you're blatantly wrong. First of all, I was including Phoenix and Scruffy who have spouted extremely far right wing rhetoric. So as a group it was a very appropriate description, I wasn't even referring to libertarianism. Secondly, libertarianism in the sense that you and the others have argued in this thread is very far right of center. That is the American definition of the word. Seeing as that you live in the United States it's bizarre that you would have such confusion over it(especially when you seem to consider yourself a libertarian). The exact opposite of what you said is true, the vast majority believe that it's right of center. And the vast majority of Americans who consider themselves libertarian mean exactly that, the modern, twisted American form of the word. Now, a very strict and original definition of libertarianism, the type that Noam Chomsky applies to himself; that could certainly be considered left of center. But that is not what you have been presenting in this thread, not even remotely. Here's a video on that topic:
On January 10 2011 11:41 SpiritoftheTunA wrote: Also, another issue of libertarianism I feel is that, no matter how transparent corporations are, there is no guarantee that the average consumer will have the time/energy/knowhow to access relevant information as to whether to support such a corporation (by consuming their goods/services). That in itself is a lack of transparency. It doesn't matter if 40% of the country knows that walmart is fucked up, if the other 60% keep buying, walmart will survive. Speaking of walmart, isn't it a case where their sales are greatly driven by the poverty of their consumers? If you're on minimum wage, you don't get to care how immoral your wholesaler is, you just buy the cheap shit. How do you get around that without regulation?
balthasar can you respond to this please? also the post that was above this? are you purposely ignoring my posts now or was it an accident?
Yes, that is their technique. As I said earlier:
"It's interesting how just about every person arguing from a right wing point of view in this thread refuses to respond to challenges. Phoenix, then Scruffy, and now you Balthasar. You should defend the points you made or admit that you were wrong. Just ignoring contradictions is extremely dishonest".
On January 10 2011 14:04 Lefnui wrote: It's interesting how just about every person arguing from a right wing point of view in this thread refuses to respond to challenges. Phoenix, then Scruffy, and now you Balthasar. You should defend the points you made or admit that you were wrong. Just ignoring contradictions is extremely dishonest.
As I told you, and you seemed unwilling to respond to directly, North Korea is not a socialist state. Yet that is exactly what you claimed earlier. It's not socialist, it's not an attempt at socialism, it has absolutely nothing to do with it beyond the completely empty claim from that insane government that it is. Either you were lying earlier or you were wrong. I would like to hear just once in this thread one of you say "Ok, you know what, I was wrong about that".
I responded to your "challenges" till you called me a racist. Its a common move from the left, attack the person since you have no real argument. /exits general forum ignorance till another day.
I challenged about a dozen things you said which weren't even related to the topic of racism, and you refused to respond to those as well. As I explained to you earlier, I didn't call you a racist. However, I did refer to what you said as racist, because it was. Here is what I'm talking about:
Scruffy wrote: Do you really think African-American's poverty demographics have shifted in the past 50 years? They have probably gotten worse. Its almost like the Dems want to tell them (although more covertly, obviously) "Hey, guess what guys, vote us in, and we will pay you to not work!" Pretty sweet deal if you can get it I guess.
When you say something that's racist, people are going to say "Hey, that's racist". Seems pretty fair to me.
its only 160 pages and it will explain, with evidence, why a pure free market is retarded. it has a lot to do with allocation of resources and corporate practices getting more corrupt more quickly than you'd expect.
also, life expectancy as a statistic means absolutely nothing. cultural diets and habits (like killing each other) often factor in more to that number than a country's healthcare system, so life expectancy does not reflect quality of healthcare in the slightest. not. in. the. slightest.
I read a few reviews and any excerpts I could find. The main thesis seems to be that government has to respond to "failures of market-based approaches" with regulations, and therefore that a belief in that market-based approach will only lead to an even bigger government.
That is partly true, but if you increase regulations because something fails, then you have to decrease regulations when something does not fail. They regulated charter schools because one school was mismanaged. Why not deregulate the other charter schools? It's a clear bias and a failure of democracy, not a failure of markets.
Can you qualify this? I read the book and it wasn't just one charter school that failed, but the whole system. Charter schools, while good on paper and successful in very few cases, have generally failed to create choice for impoverished areas. In fact, all school voucher programs have enrollment rates below 10% among eligible citizens because even with vouchers, inner-city families often cannot afford the expenses to attend anything other than the crappy little public school in their area. So yes, the market approach failed there. If you have solid evidence to the contrary, please present it. (My evidence is all in the book, which I still encourage you to read)
edit: note that my definition of "failure" is probably a little more broad than yours in this case. Please read the book though. I advocate good charter schools, and I've even volunteered at one (KIPP Heartwood), but as a system designed to help the impoverished, it's success has been extremely limited and the whole concept is distracting from real education reform, in my opinion.
Lefnui, is this your idea of fun? Using your time to feed right wing trolls who came here without any willingness to budge on their ignorance? You can reason all you want with them but in the end it's going to end up with the right wingers equivocating the faults of the right with faults of the left. That is the best you're going to get out of them, if at all.
Yeah, I guess the Republican party is pretty bad - but the Democrats are bad too! Yeah, Fox news is pretty biased - but MSNBC is too!
Any sane person should know the massive difference in the amount and quality of bullshit pouring out of either side... too bad everyone always tries to make it look like both sides are equally bad.
Scruffy, just admit to being a racist. It'll make it easier to believe that you're an actual right winger instead of a troll.
On January 10 2011 16:28 Tasteful123 wrote: Lefnui, is this your idea of fun? Using your time to feed right wing trolls who came here without any willingness to budge on their ignorance? You can reason all you want with them but in the end it's going to end up with the right wingers equivocating the faults of the right with faults of the left. That is the best you're going to get out of them, if at all.
Yeah, I guess the Republican party is pretty bad - but the Democrats are bad too! Yeah, Fox news is pretty biased - but MSNBC is too!
Any sane person should know the massive difference in the amount and quality of bullshit pouring out of either side... too bad everyone always tries to make it look like both sides are equally bad.
Scruffy, just admit to being a racist. It'll make it easier to believe that you're an actual right winger instead of a troll.
I'm not speaking for Lefnui, but I'm certainly not ideologically aligned with all democrats (though I couldn't find a point of contention with Obama's 2010 state of the union). I just happen to think the current wave of libertarian thought is one of the worst things for the US at this point. And who the fuck are you to sit on a pedestal and say "you're all idiots?" Do you have a superior ideology or are you just in the "we're all doomed" camp, because if the latter case is true, I'm pretty sure "we're all doomed" is worse than both Republican and Democrat ideology. misread your post LOL yeah i completely agree
I mean again and again I've found that people don't tend to give up their ideologies, especially through online debate, but there's always hope ;____;. (actually i think there was a study at one point showing that when confronted with evidence that disagrees with / disproves one's ideology, people, on average, just get more angry rather than switch sides)
On January 10 2011 16:28 Tasteful123 wrote: Lefnui, is this your idea of fun? Using your time to feed right wing trolls who came here without any willingness to budge on their ignorance? You can reason all you want with them but in the end it's going to end up with the right wingers equivocating the faults of the right with faults of the left. That is the best you're going to get out of them, if at all.
On January 10 2011 11:41 SpiritoftheTunA wrote: Also, another issue of libertarianism I feel is that, no matter how transparent corporations are, there is no guarantee that the average consumer will have the time/energy/knowhow to access relevant information as to whether to support such a corporation (by consuming their goods/services). That in itself is a lack of transparency. It doesn't matter if 40% of the country knows that walmart is fucked up, if the other 60% keep buying, walmart will survive. Speaking of walmart, isn't it a case where their sales are greatly driven by the poverty of their consumers? If you're on minimum wage, you don't get to care how immoral your wholesaler is, you just buy the cheap shit. How do you get around that without regulation?
balthasar can you respond to this please? also the post that was above this? are you purposely ignoring my posts now or was it an accident?
I'll do it!
In regard to transparency, the alternatives to a purely free market all involve varying degrees of governmental control. All those same arguments (lack of time/energy/know how) could be made about governments and a citizen casting votes during an election, so in that respect we break even when arguing between the two (very broad) possibilities, based on transparency alone (considering the mitigating factors you're applying). I'm assuming you'd prefer some degree of governmental regulation from your posts, if I'm wrong please correct me, and if I'm right, further specification on your part would be nice so that I can know what I'm arguing against.
I have specific arguments for why I prefer free markets, but I just wanted to answer your question first.
You're putting up an implicit strawman for the second part there. Give me something concrete to argue against as opposed to speculative assumptions about Wal-Marts immoral behaviors that people buying things cheaply at their store's contributes to. Are we talking about Chinese sweat shops? Textile mills in India? What? If that's the case you're making, then those are all out of nation anyway, and our laws can't/shouldn't effect them.
On January 10 2011 11:41 SpiritoftheTunA wrote: Also, another issue of libertarianism I feel is that, no matter how transparent corporations are, there is no guarantee that the average consumer will have the time/energy/knowhow to access relevant information as to whether to support such a corporation (by consuming their goods/services). That in itself is a lack of transparency. It doesn't matter if 40% of the country knows that walmart is fucked up, if the other 60% keep buying, walmart will survive. Speaking of walmart, isn't it a case where their sales are greatly driven by the poverty of their consumers? If you're on minimum wage, you don't get to care how immoral your wholesaler is, you just buy the cheap shit. How do you get around that without regulation?
balthasar can you respond to this please? also the post that was above this? are you purposely ignoring my posts now or was it an accident?
I'll do it!
In regard to transparency, the alternatives to a purely free market all involve varying degrees of governmental control. All those same arguments (lack of time/energy/know how) could be made about governments and a citizen casting votes during an election, so in that respect we break even when arguing between the two (very broad) possibilities, based on transparency alone (considering the mitigating factors you're applying). I'm assuming you'd prefer some degree of governmental regulation from your posts, if I'm wrong please correct me, and if I'm right, further specification on your part would be nice so that I can know what I'm arguing against.
Yeah I want regulation :D
Ideally in the case of elections, people aren't voting for specific changes within each corporation, they're voting for broad ideologies that their politicians represent. I.E. if one politician says "I am for regulation against companies that do x y and z," then voting for that politician would (ideally) bring regulation against x y and z. Therefore, whereas in a free market, individuals have to research every corporation they're consuming from and intelligently decide how to consume, with politicians promising specific reforms, it's up to just that politician/party to figure out what to regulate. It's still less research on the part of the individual citizen in the regulation case, non?
You're putting up an implicit strawman for the second part there. Give me something concrete to argue against as opposed to speculative assumptions about Wal-Marts immoral behaviors that people buying things cheaply at their store's contributes to. Are we talking about Chinese sweat shops? Textile mills in India? What? If that's the case you're making, then those are all out of nation anyway, and our laws can't/shouldn't effect them.
Actually that's a good point that I hadn't thought about before (that we shouldn't be allowed to stop out-of-country immoral behavior). However, I'm not for free-trade either, so that's not to say the government wouldn't have some power over each corporation's resources in my ideal vision. However, I'm pretty fuzzy on trade dynamics in general, so I'll just spiritually concede this point because I can't argue it further. If anyone would like to pick up for me, feel free :D.
However I believe you still haven't addressed the problem of lack of choice among the poor in our country.
On January 10 2011 14:13 Balthasar wrote: North Korea is at least an attempt at socialism.
No, it is not. Not remotely, not in any way, shape or form. When a country claims that it's socialist, that's not enough. It actually has to be socialist in order to be an example of socialism, crazy concept huh?
On January 10 2011 11:41 SpiritoftheTunA wrote: Also, another issue of libertarianism I feel is that, no matter how transparent corporations are, there is no guarantee that the average consumer will have the time/energy/knowhow to access relevant information as to whether to support such a corporation (by consuming their goods/services). That in itself is a lack of transparency. It doesn't matter if 40% of the country knows that walmart is fucked up, if the other 60% keep buying, walmart will survive. Speaking of walmart, isn't it a case where their sales are greatly driven by the poverty of their consumers? If you're on minimum wage, you don't get to care how immoral your wholesaler is, you just buy the cheap shit. How do you get around that without regulation?
balthasar can you respond to this please? also the post that was above this? are you purposely ignoring my posts now or was it an accident?
I'll do it!
In regard to transparency, the alternatives to a purely free market all involve varying degrees of governmental control. All those same arguments (lack of time/energy/know how) could be made about governments and a citizen casting votes during an election, so in that respect we break even when arguing between the two (very broad) possibilities, based on transparency alone (considering the mitigating factors you're applying). I'm assuming you'd prefer some degree of governmental regulation from your posts, if I'm wrong please correct me, and if I'm right, further specification on your part would be nice so that I can know what I'm arguing against.
Yeah I want regulation :D
Ideally in the case of elections, people aren't voting for specific changes within each corporation, they're voting for broad ideologies that their politicians represent. I.E. if one politician says "I am for regulation against companies that do x y and z," then voting for that politician would (ideally) bring regulation against x y and z. Therefore, whereas in a free market, individuals have to research every corporation they're consuming from and intelligently decide how to consume, with politicians promising specific reforms, it's up to just that politician/party to figure out what to regulate. It's still less research on the part of the individual citizen in the regulation case, non?
You're putting up an implicit strawman for the second part there. Give me something concrete to argue against as opposed to speculative assumptions about Wal-Marts immoral behaviors that people buying things cheaply at their store's contributes to. Are we talking about Chinese sweat shops? Textile mills in India? What? If that's the case you're making, then those are all out of nation anyway, and our laws can't/shouldn't effect them.
Actually that's a good point that I hadn't thought about before (that we shouldn't be allowed to stop out-of-country immoral behavior). However, I'm not for free-trade either, so that's not to say the government wouldn't have some power over each corporation's resources in my ideal vision. However, I'm pretty fuzzy on trade dynamics in general, so I'll just spiritually concede this point because I can't argue it further. If anyone would like to pick up for me, feel free :D.
However I believe you still haven't addressed the problem of lack of choice among the poor in our country.
Yes, I'll admit that it takes more time and energy to research all of those corporations properly, but it's still all just numbers. Numbers, unless the books have been cooked, don't lie! People do. And they'll lie through their teeth on Easter Sunday, in their best suit, straight to the priests face in front of their mother, and God, and everyone because that's how people are when they want something. It's not always even malicious or intentional, but it happens. This adds a whole new dimension to electing with your ballot instead of your dollar because you suddenly have something as esoteric and abstract as "character" involved, which can't be quantified and pointed at and let you say, "Here is a solid piece of evidence as to what is going on in this mans head!"
Even reaction time by the public I feel is superior when you look at corporations vs governments.
When a news story breaks that a politician has done something wrong, unless it's big enough to get him impeached or ostracized by his party, we have to deal with him until his term runs out. If the former is indeed the case, then we have to STILL deal with him since he still holds his position until he can be proven guilty.
When a news story breaks that a corporation is fucking up, people can vote IMMEDIATELY about how they feel regarding what that corporation did. With their money. By not spending it. If they still spend it despite what ever transgression, clearly you are alone in your outrage, or at the very least a minority.
In the end, I feel like you're going to have bullshit going on at both ends, but you have more threatening control over a corporation as a consumer, than you do over the government as a citizen.
And as to your second point, it's a sad fact of life, that our choices are limited in part by our possession of land, labor, and capital. Obviously individual ambition and talent plays a huge role, but anyone can have that. That being said, I need you to be more specific about what you mean by choices so that I can address what you're getting at in detail. If you mean economic choice, well, that's how it's always going to be. Perfectly even distribution of wealth can only realistically be achieve in one way, and that didn't work so great last time they tried it. If you mean socially, then I don't think there's anything to be DONE about it, at least not consciously. That's more of a matter of societal perceptions that judge based on material wealth and appearance as opposed to personal ability and potential. But like I said, I don't know what your context is.
As a broad generalization I honestly, don't think their lack of choice is that much of an issue. That may be cold hearted, but that's how I feel.
(This is an interesting conversation. Its probably one of the first time's I've ever had a discussion like this where the points were actually addressed in detail before the other person attempted to alternate the subject in some way. I'm quite enjoying it.)
On January 10 2011 10:45 Mayfly wrote: On another note I think everyone is being pretty unfair to big corporations... considering:
1. Big corporations are more transparent than small, since whatever they do will involve more people.
Look at Enron and Worldcom, they cooked their books. Just because a company puts out a bogus 10K (annual income statement, doesn't mean they are transparent.
I said they are more transparent, not that "no big corporation ever did anything to fool anyone".
2. Big corporations are easier to monitor, since "bad things" that are done in one place will probably be done in many places.
Are you kidding me? Morality has nothing to do with size. There are evil small businesses and big corporations. In fact the corporate structure can be more evil because stakeholders and management have limited liability while sole proprietorship and partnerships have unlimited liability.
I never mentioned morality. You are replying to a fantasy in your head.
They are easier to monitor, that's all I said. Imagine one store in a corporation of hundreds handling their trash wrong. It's a rather safe bet then that more stores in the chain are doing the same thing.
3. Big corporations are easier to discourage from doing "bad things" (just look at the green thing going on in most big corps).
There's many green small businesses as well. What's your point?
My point was that big corporations are easier to discourage from doing "bad things". Employment growth and rate of sales correlates negatively with environmental crime in a corporation. Bigger corporations have less crime.
Also, the pressure to follow green trends and such is obviously bigger on a big corporation than a small one.
4. Big corporations are the reason you are rich.
Are u *beep*ing insane? Big corporations don't make anyone rich unless you work for one. Everyone makes themselves rich by working hard and getting (hopefully honest) paycheck.
Mmhuh, guess you don't benefit from their taxes and cheap products, or their higher wages if you do happen to work for them? Guess you don't benefit from the industrial economy that depends on big corporations, either.
I'm actually quite split when it comes to big corporations. I don''t believe they're evil and I do believe they do alot for us, but I certainly believe they can become too big. There do exist diseconomies of scale in both businesses and governments. I also believe they can be overcome in the future, much like obstacles in the past were overcome that allowed organizations to grow as much as they have. Whether that will be good or not I don't know.
Many problems with big corporations can be solved if the government allowed easier take-overs. Overpaid CEOs and managers would be replaced. Now outside acquisitions require a shareholder supermajority to vote for it, and those shareholders can then buy shares at a discount. There's also huge delays put in place, as well as silly disclosure rules.
With that said, I focused on the good things about big corporations because I think everyone was pretty unfair against them for no really good reason.
its only 160 pages and it will explain, with evidence, why a pure free market is retarded. it has a lot to do with allocation of resources and corporate practices getting more corrupt more quickly than you'd expect.
also, life expectancy as a statistic means absolutely nothing. cultural diets and habits (like killing each other) often factor in more to that number than a country's healthcare system, so life expectancy does not reflect quality of healthcare in the slightest. not. in. the. slightest.
I read a few reviews and any excerpts I could find. The main thesis seems to be that government has to respond to "failures of market-based approaches" with regulations, and therefore that a belief in that market-based approach will only lead to an even bigger government.
That is partly true, but if you increase regulations because something fails, then you have to decrease regulations when something does not fail. They regulated charter schools because one school was mismanaged. Why not deregulate the other charter schools? It's a clear bias and a failure of democracy, not a failure of markets.
Can you qualify this? I read the book and it wasn't just one charter school that failed, but the whole system. Charter schools, while good on paper and successful in very few cases, have generally failed to create choice for impoverished areas. In fact, all school voucher programs have enrollment rates below 10% among eligible citizens because even with vouchers, inner-city families often cannot afford the expenses to attend anything other than the crappy little public school in their area. So yes, the market approach failed there. If you have solid evidence to the contrary, please present it. (My evidence is all in the book, which I still encourage you to read)
edit: note that my definition of "failure" is probably a little more broad than yours in this case. Please read the book though. I advocate good charter schools, and I've even volunteered at one (KIPP Heartwood), but as a system designed to help the impoverished, it's success has been extremely limited and the whole concept is distracting from real education reform, in my opinion.
Can't comment on that since I haven't read the book.
All I can note is that voucher schools seem to work pretty good elsewhere, for instance in Sweden of all places.
Now schools in general are a joke but if you have to compare...
On January 09 2011 22:29 SpiritoftheTunA wrote:
by the way, how do you feel about agribusiness? i know it's been a huge success in feeding people, but is factory farming worth it? (random tangent, you don't have to answer this question haha)
Do you mean morally, environmentally, qualitiative, or something else?
On January 10 2011 14:04 Lefnui wrote: It's interesting how just about every person arguing from a right wing point of view in this thread refuses to respond to challenges. Phoenix, then Scruffy, and now you Balthasar. You should defend the points you made or admit that you were wrong. Just ignoring contradictions is extremely dishonest.
As I told you, and you seemed unwilling to respond to directly, North Korea is not a socialist state. Yet that is exactly what you claimed earlier. It's not socialist, it's not an attempt at socialism, it has absolutely nothing to do with it beyond the completely empty claim from that insane government that it is. Either you were lying earlier or you were wrong. I would like to hear just once in this thread one of you say "Ok, you know what, I was wrong about that".
I responded to your "challenges" till you called me a racist. Its a common move from the left, attack the person since you have no real argument. /exits general forum ignorance till another day.
Samezies. I have no reason to discuss anything further because I know that I'll just be insulted and deemed a "right wing racist" for my views. Why bother arguing with a parrot?
its only 160 pages and it will explain, with evidence, why a pure free market is retarded. it has a lot to do with allocation of resources and corporate practices getting more corrupt more quickly than you'd expect.
also, life expectancy as a statistic means absolutely nothing. cultural diets and habits (like killing each other) often factor in more to that number than a country's healthcare system, so life expectancy does not reflect quality of healthcare in the slightest. not. in. the. slightest.
I read a few reviews and any excerpts I could find. The main thesis seems to be that government has to respond to "failures of market-based approaches" with regulations, and therefore that a belief in that market-based approach will only lead to an even bigger government.
That is partly true, but if you increase regulations because something fails, then you have to decrease regulations when something does not fail. They regulated charter schools because one school was mismanaged. Why not deregulate the other charter schools? It's a clear bias and a failure of democracy, not a failure of markets.
Can you qualify this? I read the book and it wasn't just one charter school that failed, but the whole system. Charter schools, while good on paper and successful in very few cases, have generally failed to create choice for impoverished areas. In fact, all school voucher programs have enrollment rates below 10% among eligible citizens because even with vouchers, inner-city families often cannot afford the expenses to attend anything other than the crappy little public school in their area. So yes, the market approach failed there. If you have solid evidence to the contrary, please present it. (My evidence is all in the book, which I still encourage you to read)
edit: note that my definition of "failure" is probably a little more broad than yours in this case. Please read the book though. I advocate good charter schools, and I've even volunteered at one (KIPP Heartwood), but as a system designed to help the impoverished, it's success has been extremely limited and the whole concept is distracting from real education reform, in my opinion.
Can't comment on that since I haven't read the book.
All I can note is that voucher schools seem to work pretty good elsewhere, for instance in Sweden of all places.
Now schools in general are a joke but if you have to compare...
Sweden is a completely different story because they're pretty good at the whole combating disparity thing. I can tell you that vouchers won't work in the US unless it starts to look like welfare though (i.e. the poor get more voucher credit for transportation/book/etc costs). Obviously conservatives won't support that. Otherwise, the ability for the middle class and above to use their tax money on private school only fucks the public school system more, which needs tons of reform. (What the fuck is tenure below college anyway?)
On January 10 2011 11:41 SpiritoftheTunA wrote: Also, another issue of libertarianism I feel is that, no matter how transparent corporations are, there is no guarantee that the average consumer will have the time/energy/knowhow to access relevant information as to whether to support such a corporation (by consuming their goods/services). That in itself is a lack of transparency. It doesn't matter if 40% of the country knows that walmart is fucked up, if the other 60% keep buying, walmart will survive. Speaking of walmart, isn't it a case where their sales are greatly driven by the poverty of their consumers? If you're on minimum wage, you don't get to care how immoral your wholesaler is, you just buy the cheap shit. How do you get around that without regulation?
balthasar can you respond to this please? also the post that was above this? are you purposely ignoring my posts now or was it an accident?
I'll do it!
In regard to transparency, the alternatives to a purely free market all involve varying degrees of governmental control. All those same arguments (lack of time/energy/know how) could be made about governments and a citizen casting votes during an election, so in that respect we break even when arguing between the two (very broad) possibilities, based on transparency alone (considering the mitigating factors you're applying). I'm assuming you'd prefer some degree of governmental regulation from your posts, if I'm wrong please correct me, and if I'm right, further specification on your part would be nice so that I can know what I'm arguing against.
Yeah I want regulation :D
Ideally in the case of elections, people aren't voting for specific changes within each corporation, they're voting for broad ideologies that their politicians represent. I.E. if one politician says "I am for regulation against companies that do x y and z," then voting for that politician would (ideally) bring regulation against x y and z. Therefore, whereas in a free market, individuals have to research every corporation they're consuming from and intelligently decide how to consume, with politicians promising specific reforms, it's up to just that politician/party to figure out what to regulate. It's still less research on the part of the individual citizen in the regulation case, non?
You're putting up an implicit strawman for the second part there. Give me something concrete to argue against as opposed to speculative assumptions about Wal-Marts immoral behaviors that people buying things cheaply at their store's contributes to. Are we talking about Chinese sweat shops? Textile mills in India? What? If that's the case you're making, then those are all out of nation anyway, and our laws can't/shouldn't effect them.
Actually that's a good point that I hadn't thought about before (that we shouldn't be allowed to stop out-of-country immoral behavior). However, I'm not for free-trade either, so that's not to say the government wouldn't have some power over each corporation's resources in my ideal vision. However, I'm pretty fuzzy on trade dynamics in general, so I'll just spiritually concede this point because I can't argue it further. If anyone would like to pick up for me, feel free :D.
However I believe you still haven't addressed the problem of lack of choice among the poor in our country.
Yes, I'll admit that it takes more time and energy to research all of those corporations properly, but it's still all just numbers. Numbers, unless the books have been cooked, don't lie! People do. And they'll lie through their teeth on Easter Sunday, in their best suit, straight to the priests face in front of their mother, and God, and everyone because that's how people are when they want something. It's not always even malicious or intentional, but it happens. This adds a whole new dimension to electing with your ballot instead of your dollar because you suddenly have something as esoteric and abstract as "character" involved, which can't be quantified and pointed at and let you say, "Here is a solid piece of evidence as to what is going on in this mans head!"
That's very true, the fact that our government has to be mediated by, ugh, politicians, is probably one of everybody's universal gripes with the US politics. However, once legislation passes for regulation, the regulatory agencies can (and definitely should) be at least as transparent as the sectors they're trying to regulate.
I can actually bring up a few examples of failure, which we'll need to avoid in the future: the FDA, which lets in employees of pharmaceutical companies (I think over 50% of FDA employees have ties to big pharm, in fact). The USDA, which currently is trying to shut down small farms more often than the huge, inhumane factory farms that produce over 70% of our country's meat (most of that meat riddled with e.coli and other unsavory substances). The TSA, which has failed every congressionally ordered safety test since ever (they got guns, knives, all sorts of explosives through TSA. also the whole policy of going for 100% security is just making the whole thing stupid expensive). Our defense department, which has been in bed with Lockheed for quite awhile (though that's less a problem of regulation than the military-industrial complex). However, despite all these concessions I'm making, I still believe that good regulation is possible. I'd personally propose requiring employees of such agencies to sacrifice a bit of privacy, to ensure that there are no monetary conflicts of interest. (FDA employees owning pharmaceutical stock was uncovered once, so disgusting).
As long as we prevent that in the future, I feel that good regulatory agencies are possible. We just need to learn from our mistakes and enforce a higher standard of quality in the public sector than the private sector. Which kind of brings me to my next point: despite all your talk of transparency in the private sector, our banking industry, pharmaceutical companies, food companies, etc are still lobbying hardcore to be as opaque as possible, and often succeeding. (Watch food, inc. if you haven't, it's amazing what can get under the public's noses). Pharmaceutical companies in particular have managed to keep their right to advertise directly to physicians and advertise prescription drugs directly to consumers (New Zealand is the only other country that allows this). Shadiness is definitely going on in the private sector, shadiness that can't be revealed by numbers.
Even reaction time by the public I feel is superior when you look at corporations vs governments.
When a news story breaks that a politician has done something wrong, unless it's big enough to get him impeached or ostracized by his party, we have to deal with him until his term runs out. If the former is indeed the case, then we have to STILL deal with him since he still holds his position until he can be proven guilty.
When a news story breaks that a corporation is fucking up, people can vote IMMEDIATELY about how they feel regarding what that corporation did. With their money. By not spending it. If they still spend it despite what ever transgression, clearly you are alone in your outrage, or at the very least a minority.
In the end, I feel like you're going to have bullshit going on at both ends, but you have more threatening control over a corporation as a consumer, than you do over the government as a citizen.
True, our government is, by design, fucking slow. In the case of corrupt individual politicians, that's an issue that will never go away. However, we can design the bureaucracies that regulate our private sector to be much more efficient in public response than our actual legislative branch is. All it takes is good bill-drafting. Of course this is theorycrafting, but I'm a centrist/proregulation optimist at heart.
And as to your second point, it's a sad fact of life, that our choices are limited in part by our possession of land, labor, and capital. Obviously individual ambition and talent plays a huge role, but anyone can have that. That being said, I need you to be more specific about what you mean by choices so that I can address what you're getting at in detail. If you mean economic choice, well, that's how it's always going to be. Perfectly even distribution of wealth can only realistically be achieve in one way, and that didn't work so great last time they tried it. If you mean socially, then I don't think there's anything to be DONE about it, at least not consciously. That's more of a matter of societal perceptions that judge based on material wealth and appearance as opposed to personal ability and potential. But like I said, I don't know what your context is.
As a broad generalization I honestly, don't think their lack of choice is that much of an issue. That may be cold hearted, but that's how I feel.
By choice, again, I'm just referring to the weakness of the free-market ideal of "people choose via putting their money where they want." People with sufficient money can use their money to control the private sector, sure, but a corporation that preys on people without that choice will likely never go down (i.e. McDonalds, and again, Walmart).
its only 160 pages and it will explain, with evidence, why a pure free market is retarded. it has a lot to do with allocation of resources and corporate practices getting more corrupt more quickly than you'd expect.
also, life expectancy as a statistic means absolutely nothing. cultural diets and habits (like killing each other) often factor in more to that number than a country's healthcare system, so life expectancy does not reflect quality of healthcare in the slightest. not. in. the. slightest.
I read a few reviews and any excerpts I could find. The main thesis seems to be that government has to respond to "failures of market-based approaches" with regulations, and therefore that a belief in that market-based approach will only lead to an even bigger government.
That is partly true, but if you increase regulations because something fails, then you have to decrease regulations when something does not fail. They regulated charter schools because one school was mismanaged. Why not deregulate the other charter schools? It's a clear bias and a failure of democracy, not a failure of markets.
Can you qualify this? I read the book and it wasn't just one charter school that failed, but the whole system. Charter schools, while good on paper and successful in very few cases, have generally failed to create choice for impoverished areas. In fact, all school voucher programs have enrollment rates below 10% among eligible citizens because even with vouchers, inner-city families often cannot afford the expenses to attend anything other than the crappy little public school in their area. So yes, the market approach failed there. If you have solid evidence to the contrary, please present it. (My evidence is all in the book, which I still encourage you to read)
edit: note that my definition of "failure" is probably a little more broad than yours in this case. Please read the book though. I advocate good charter schools, and I've even volunteered at one (KIPP Heartwood), but as a system designed to help the impoverished, it's success has been extremely limited and the whole concept is distracting from real education reform, in my opinion.
Can't comment on that since I haven't read the book.
All I can note is that voucher schools seem to work pretty good elsewhere, for instance in Sweden of all places.
Now schools in general are a joke but if you have to compare...
Sweden is a completely different story because they're pretty good at the whole combating disparity thing. I can tell you that vouchers won't work in the US unless it starts to look like welfare though (i.e. the poor get more voucher credit for transportation/book/etc costs). Obviously conservatives won't support that. Otherwise, the ability for the middle class and above to use their tax money on private school only fucks the public school system more, which needs tons of reform. (What the fuck is tenure below college anyway?)
I wouldn't say Sweden is good at the "whole combating disparity" thing, but then again I'm not exactly sure what you mean by that.
What is bad about reform? I don't see why schools need to be public. Everyone paying the same no matter how much you consume is terrible. I sure wouldn't want to share my lunch bill with everyone else, I would have to eat lobster every day in order not to get abused.
If it was up to the parents to decide, I'm sure not many would pay what it costs to put their children through some random history or litterature class when that information is free to get elsewhere. Yet with the current system you need a teacher plus a place to be (school) for that. Teachers are also overpaid. Just imagine how much a teacher would get if he simply advertised his expertise. Unless he was specialized in a very narrow field and was a super skilled pedagogue -- not much.
If the cost of school instead was what everyone was willing to pay, schools would be more effective and shorter.
It's not like schools are for teaching anyway. It's mainly about signalling that you can do soulless work for hours on end and that you are willing to be dominated by an authority, and not to forget: a place for the parents to put their kids so they can go to work.
By the way, did you see that I edited my post above to ask about what you meant specifically with your question about agribusiness?
its only 160 pages and it will explain, with evidence, why a pure free market is retarded. it has a lot to do with allocation of resources and corporate practices getting more corrupt more quickly than you'd expect.
also, life expectancy as a statistic means absolutely nothing. cultural diets and habits (like killing each other) often factor in more to that number than a country's healthcare system, so life expectancy does not reflect quality of healthcare in the slightest. not. in. the. slightest.
I read a few reviews and any excerpts I could find. The main thesis seems to be that government has to respond to "failures of market-based approaches" with regulations, and therefore that a belief in that market-based approach will only lead to an even bigger government.
That is partly true, but if you increase regulations because something fails, then you have to decrease regulations when something does not fail. They regulated charter schools because one school was mismanaged. Why not deregulate the other charter schools? It's a clear bias and a failure of democracy, not a failure of markets.
Can you qualify this? I read the book and it wasn't just one charter school that failed, but the whole system. Charter schools, while good on paper and successful in very few cases, have generally failed to create choice for impoverished areas. In fact, all school voucher programs have enrollment rates below 10% among eligible citizens because even with vouchers, inner-city families often cannot afford the expenses to attend anything other than the crappy little public school in their area. So yes, the market approach failed there. If you have solid evidence to the contrary, please present it. (My evidence is all in the book, which I still encourage you to read)
edit: note that my definition of "failure" is probably a little more broad than yours in this case. Please read the book though. I advocate good charter schools, and I've even volunteered at one (KIPP Heartwood), but as a system designed to help the impoverished, it's success has been extremely limited and the whole concept is distracting from real education reform, in my opinion.
Can't comment on that since I haven't read the book.
All I can note is that voucher schools seem to work pretty good elsewhere, for instance in Sweden of all places.
Now schools in general are a joke but if you have to compare...
Sweden is a completely different story because they're pretty good at the whole combating disparity thing. I can tell you that vouchers won't work in the US unless it starts to look like welfare though (i.e. the poor get more voucher credit for transportation/book/etc costs). Obviously conservatives won't support that. Otherwise, the ability for the middle class and above to use their tax money on private school only fucks the public school system more, which needs tons of reform. (What the fuck is tenure below college anyway?)
I wouldn't say Sweden is good at the "whole combating disparity" thing, but then again I'm not exactly sure what you mean by that.
What is bad about reform? I don't see why schools need to be public. Everyone paying the same no matter how much you consume is terrible. I sure wouldn't want to share my lunch bill with everyone else, I would have to eat lobster every day in order not to get abused.
Schools not being public inherently gives up on the idea of equal opportunity, something that Americans generally do not want to embrace. http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/013/702uscvj.asp wait i linked the wrong article if you clicked on it it probably actually encourages your view :D. But my main point is that no private schools would want to cater to the impoverished, since they have no money to spend. Thus taking away one of their only opportunities to... not be impoverished.
I agree that schools currently overemphasize standardization and soulless work, but that's a result of how Americans have attempted to measure our schools' success, not a result of schools being public in the first place. The more we test our kids to make sure they're doing well, the more we'll teach to those tests (and lose our souls). It's a case of observation greatly interfering with the actual process, and Americans need to wisen up and stop it.
To the agribusiness question: yeah, qualitative everything. Do you think their practices are a problem? If you were suddenly the dictator of everything food-related, would you reform it at all?
its only 160 pages and it will explain, with evidence, why a pure free market is retarded. it has a lot to do with allocation of resources and corporate practices getting more corrupt more quickly than you'd expect.
also, life expectancy as a statistic means absolutely nothing. cultural diets and habits (like killing each other) often factor in more to that number than a country's healthcare system, so life expectancy does not reflect quality of healthcare in the slightest. not. in. the. slightest.
I read a few reviews and any excerpts I could find. The main thesis seems to be that government has to respond to "failures of market-based approaches" with regulations, and therefore that a belief in that market-based approach will only lead to an even bigger government.
That is partly true, but if you increase regulations because something fails, then you have to decrease regulations when something does not fail. They regulated charter schools because one school was mismanaged. Why not deregulate the other charter schools? It's a clear bias and a failure of democracy, not a failure of markets.
Can you qualify this? I read the book and it wasn't just one charter school that failed, but the whole system. Charter schools, while good on paper and successful in very few cases, have generally failed to create choice for impoverished areas. In fact, all school voucher programs have enrollment rates below 10% among eligible citizens because even with vouchers, inner-city families often cannot afford the expenses to attend anything other than the crappy little public school in their area. So yes, the market approach failed there. If you have solid evidence to the contrary, please present it. (My evidence is all in the book, which I still encourage you to read)
edit: note that my definition of "failure" is probably a little more broad than yours in this case. Please read the book though. I advocate good charter schools, and I've even volunteered at one (KIPP Heartwood), but as a system designed to help the impoverished, it's success has been extremely limited and the whole concept is distracting from real education reform, in my opinion.
Can't comment on that since I haven't read the book.
All I can note is that voucher schools seem to work pretty good elsewhere, for instance in Sweden of all places.
Now schools in general are a joke but if you have to compare...
Sweden is a completely different story because they're pretty good at the whole combating disparity thing. I can tell you that vouchers won't work in the US unless it starts to look like welfare though (i.e. the poor get more voucher credit for transportation/book/etc costs). Obviously conservatives won't support that. Otherwise, the ability for the middle class and above to use their tax money on private school only fucks the public school system more, which needs tons of reform. (What the fuck is tenure below college anyway?)
I wouldn't say Sweden is good at the "whole combating disparity" thing, but then again I'm not exactly sure what you mean by that.
What is bad about reform? I don't see why schools need to be public. Everyone paying the same no matter how much you consume is terrible. I sure wouldn't want to share my lunch bill with everyone else, I would have to eat lobster every day in order not to get abused.
Schools not being public inherently gives up on the idea of equal opportunity, something that Americans generally do not want to embrace. http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/013/702uscvj.asp wait i linked the wrong article if you clicked on it it probably actually encourages your view :D. But my main point is that no private schools would want to cater to the impoverished, since they have no money to spend. Thus taking away one of their only opportunities to... not be impoverished.
Sure, and I have an equal opportunity to eat lobster every day if everyone shared (not that I really like lobster). I dont view trading money for education or health or food as immoral. If the cost of public education is a wildly ineffective education, and the cost of private education is that some would get a worse education than others (but most a better education than if it was public), my decision is clear.
And don't underestimate charity. I'm sure a school run on donations could cater to the poor. There's also home-schooling, but I guess that's more for the rich and smart.
I agree that schools currently overemphasize standardization and soulless work, but that's a result of how Americans have attempted to measure our schools' success, not a result of schools being public in the first place. The more we test our kids to make sure they're doing well, the more we'll teach to those tests (and lose our souls). It's a case of observation greatly interfering with the actual process, and Americans need to wisen up and stop it.
Yup, I didn't really say it was because they were public. That leads to other ineffective solutions. I kind of agree with everything here.
To the agribusiness question: yeah, qualitative everything. Do you think their practices are a problem? If you were suddenly the dictator of everything food-related, would you reform it at all?
That's a tough question. We are certainly evolutionary adapted to an environment that came before agriculture, i.e. hunter-gatherers/foragers. I guess there's some validity to saying foraging is about quality of life, and farming quantity of life. But it's also true that as we have been getting richer we have been moving more toward the hunter-gatherer way of life: we do more traveling and moving, less work but the work requires more creatitivity; we are more promiscuous (but also monogamous; we are more accepting of pre-marital and extra-marital sex) and more prone to divorce; we accept abortion and homosexuality, etc. Oh yeah, and we use/abuse more alcohol and drugs.
But the wealth is created by the industry. So "modern hunter-gatherers" will have to accept the agribusiness if they want to be rich enough to afford their ways to be happy. The shift from foraging->farming->industry is what made us rich. With it came workplace ranking, order, less creative jobs, stronger marriages and less acceptance of divorce (and factors that made people more prone to cheat, i.e. alcohol), wars and organized violence, a stronger sense of honor, politeness and shame, organized religion, an acceptance of authority and hierachy, fear of other cultures, etc.
Poor people are more like farmers and rich people are more like foragers, but the reasons are pretty unclear to me other than rich people can "afford it".
Maybe I'm not talking about anything that you meant, but that's pretty much how I see it. It's one big conflict. If we banned industrial farming consequences would be pretty dire so far as I can understand. It's a business with a lot of faults in it but it creates wealth and feeds us, but requires some pretty unnatural attitudes from us to do so. Also, farming is more adaptive. Hunter-gatherers didn't change much over the years compared to farmers. Moving into an uncertain future, we'd better be prepared.
But if I were a dictator I wouldn't ban anything, I would be too busy with my harem of chicks.
By choice, again, I'm just referring to the weakness of the free-market ideal of "people choose via putting their money where they want." People with sufficient money can use their money to control the private sector, sure, but a corporation that preys on people without that choice will likely never go down (i.e. McDonalds, and again, Walmart).
Totally agree. The problems with our markets is that they are broken (in an econmic sense) because: - the consumers do not have the capability and/or motivation to act rational - the producers abuse the system wherever they can (out of a rational striveing to maximize profit)
Personally, I think, the challenge we face consists in creating a framework that creates markets that are as close as possible to an economically perfect market. Without outside regulation, I do not think that is possible due to the problems above. What form could such a regulation take? Basically, one could start with two simple rules:
- no company is allowed a market share of greater than 10% to ensure sufficient competition (I arbitrairly chose 10%, maybe some simluations or economic experiments can provide a better number) - products need to be comparable (prices must be stated so that consumers can instantly compare them, despite differenmt package size etc., e.g. price per 100 grams in addition to the package price)
I guess people can come up with a lot of additional or better ideas to bridge the gap between perfect markets as we know them from the economics books and the 'broken' markets we have in real life.
By choice, again, I'm just referring to the weakness of the free-market ideal of "people choose via putting their money where they want." People with sufficient money can use their money to control the private sector, sure, but a corporation that preys on people without that choice will likely never go down (i.e. McDonalds, and again, Walmart).
Totally agree. The problems with our markets is that they are broken (in an econmic sense) because: - the consumers do not have the capability and/or motivation to act rational - the producers abuse the system wherever they can (out of a rational striveing to maximize profit)
Personally, I think, the challenge we face consists in creating a framework that creates markets that are as close as possible to an economically perfect market. Without outside regulation, I do not think that is possible due to the problems above. What form could such a regulation take? Basically, one could start with two simple rules:
- no company is allowed a market share of greater than 10% to ensure sufficient competition (I arbitrairly chose 10%, maybe some simluations or economic experiments can provide a better number) - products need to be comparable (prices must be stated so that consumers can instantly compare them, despite differenmt package size etc., e.g. price per 100 grams in addition to the package price)
I guess people can come up with a lot of additional or better ideas to bridge the gap between perfect markets as we know them from the economics books and the 'broken' markets we have in real life.
Well saying that consumers do not act rationally assumes that you know what "Good" they are consuming. It can be argued that "irrational" purchases are providing the consumer with some emotional/psychosocial good... ie going to the more well marketed movie provides a better 'experience' than going to the less well marketed movie.
I'd say there are problems with it... but much more of the problems are with the producer side... since most producers are corporations which are distinctly Not rational (as I said earlier, because the corporation isn't what makes decisions, the managers of the corporations make decisions)
I do think the free market needs some level of redistribution/safety net to work well [given that people don't eat in the long term]. Ideally that would be provided by individual charity, but I can see a role for some government redistribution (even if just through progressive taxation).
However, your two ideas are already in place in most cases. -anti-trust laws... should be better enforced, and probably stricter (they're not based purely on a % market share) -truth in advertising.. and if you have ever gone to the grocery, all products have those prices per oz listed. In many other cases, products can be innately difficult to compare (SC2 v. WC3 would you compare the prices in $ per kilobyte? probably not... there is no objective comparison of the value)
By choice, again, I'm just referring to the weakness of the free-market ideal of "people choose via putting their money where they want." People with sufficient money can use their money to control the private sector, sure, but a corporation that preys on people without that choice will likely never go down (i.e. McDonalds, and again, Walmart).
Totally agree. The problems with our markets is that they are broken (in an econmic sense) because: - the consumers do not have the capability and/or motivation to act rational - the producers abuse the system wherever they can (out of a rational striveing to maximize profit)
Personally, I think, the challenge we face consists in creating a framework that creates markets that are as close as possible to an economically perfect market. Without outside regulation, I do not think that is possible due to the problems above. What form could such a regulation take? Basically, one could start with two simple rules:
- no company is allowed a market share of greater than 10% to ensure sufficient competition (I arbitrairly chose 10%, maybe some simluations or economic experiments can provide a better number) - products need to be comparable (prices must be stated so that consumers can instantly compare them, despite differenmt package size etc., e.g. price per 100 grams in addition to the package price)
I guess people can come up with a lot of additional or better ideas to bridge the gap between perfect markets as we know them from the economics books and the 'broken' markets we have in real life.
Well saying that consumers do not act rationally assumes that you know what "Good" they are consuming. It can be argued that "irrational" purchases are providing the consumer with some emotional/psychosocial good... ie going to the more well marketed movie provides a better 'experience' than going to the less well marketed movie.
I'd say there are problems with it... but much more of the problems are with the producer side... since most producers are corporations which are distinctly Not rational (as I said earlier, because the corporation isn't what makes decisions, the managers of the corporations make decisions)
I do think the free market needs some level of redistribution/safety net to work well [given that people don't eat in the long term]. Ideally that would be provided by individual charity, but I can see a role for some government redistribution (even if just through progressive taxation).
However, your two ideas are already in place in most cases. -anti-trust laws... should be better enforced, and probably stricter (they're not based purely on a % market share) -truth in advertising.. and if you have ever gone to the grocery, all products have those prices per oz listed. In many other cases, products can be innately difficult to compare (SC2 v. WC3 would you compare the prices in $ per kilobyte? probably not... there is no objective comparison of the value)
Hm, consumers not acting rationally is, for a psychologist, something liek a proven fact. Humans employ what we would call "fast and frugal" heursitics (I can highly recomend the works of Gerd Gigerenzer on this topic). Problem with these heusristics is that they can be abused, especially by advertising.
I agree with the rest of your points. Comparable prices are quite new in germany (we have them since a few years, only), did not know that they were standard in the US. And I also agree that the producer-side is the one with the higher potential to break the market.
The last point you raised is especially interesting because it concerns intellectual property. Regarding one product, you can certainly not create a market with the current IP laws because they are supposed to generate a monopoly in order to reward creativity or innovation. I have thought about this a lot and I wonder whether a system might be better in which the creator/innovator sets a price for his/her new product and companies can buy the rights to produce/reproduce for that price if they want to (driven, of course by rational cost-benefit-analysis).
That way, a creative person who is too greedy will not be able to sell her product, whereas competition among the companies distributing the product will ensure fair prices in the sense of the market. Just my random ssociations, though. I am pretty certain that this is utopian thinking and that there are a lot of reasons why it may not work. But since it kinda worked with book printing in 19th century Germany, maybe it would be wirth a try.
On January 10 2011 16:28 Tasteful123 wrote: Lefnui, is this your idea of fun? Using your time to feed right wing trolls who came here without any willingness to budge on their ignorance? You can reason all you want with them but in the end it's going to end up with the right wingers equivocating the faults of the right with faults of the left. That is the best you're going to get out of them, if at all.
Yeah, I guess the Republican party is pretty bad - but the Democrats are bad too! Yeah, Fox news is pretty biased - but MSNBC is too!
Any sane person should know the massive difference in the amount and quality of bullshit pouring out of either side... too bad everyone always tries to make it look like both sides are equally bad.
Scruffy, just admit to being a racist. It'll make it easier to believe that you're an actual right winger instead of a troll.
Awww. How cute. Did you make a new account JUST to say that? I'm flattered, really. Anyone want to get a bet going that Lefnui and this new guy will/will not call me a racist to my face at the next big U.S. tournament? (they wouldn't show).
I'm a conservative/libertarian. Call that "XTREEM RIGHT" if you wish. You call people trolls because of your lack of argument/functioning brain.
On January 10 2011 16:28 Tasteful123 wrote: Lefnui, is this your idea of fun? Using your time to feed right wing trolls who came here without any willingness to budge on their ignorance? You can reason all you want with them but in the end it's going to end up with the right wingers equivocating the faults of the right with faults of the left. That is the best you're going to get out of them, if at all.
Yeah, I guess the Republican party is pretty bad - but the Democrats are bad too! Yeah, Fox news is pretty biased - but MSNBC is too!
Any sane person should know the massive difference in the amount and quality of bullshit pouring out of either side... too bad everyone always tries to make it look like both sides are equally bad.
Scruffy, just admit to being a racist. It'll make it easier to believe that you're an actual right winger instead of a troll.
Awww. How cute. Did you make a new account JUST to say that? I'm flattered, really. Anyone want to get a bet going that Lefnui and this new guy will/will not call me a racist to my face at the next big U.S. tournament? (they wouldn't show).
I'm a conservative/libertarian. Call that "XTREEM RIGHT" if you wish. You call people trolls because of your lack of argument/functioning brain.
Yeah, it's insanely disgusting calling people trolls just because they aren't leftist or just doesn't share your opinion. Sadly, it's common on these forums.
On January 11 2011 03:35 Mayfly wrote: Yeah, it's insanely disgusting calling people trolls just because they aren't leftist or just doesn't share your opinion. Sadly, it's common on these forums.
Well, a few bad apples may do that. On the other hand I have witnessed people calling others trolls when their forum behavior exactly matched the definition of "troll" and refraining from calling them trolls, even complimenting them on quality posts, when they started partitipating in the discussions in a mature way (even if the yrgued pro right-wing positions). Don't give up.
Edit: Seriously, don't give up. We all need dissenters to check whether we can back up our erguments with reason and evidence. Or as my students use to say "Mehr Dissens führt zu weniger Nonsens" (translated: more dissent lead to leass nonsnse).
On January 11 2011 03:35 Mayfly wrote: Yeah, it's insanely disgusting calling people trolls just because they aren't leftist or just doesn't share your opinion. Sadly, it's common on these forums.
Don't give up.
No I didn't say it so I could be the martyr or anything. Just an observation.
If you argue for right-wing/controversial ideas you're also way more likely to be banned if you're even close to stepping over the line in a heated argument than if you're arguing left-wing/uncontroversial ideas.
To step into the martyr role for I while: I was warned in another thread for mentioning that Mein Kampf wasn't right-wing (when someone brought it up as an exampe of a right-wing book) and that you can't easily place the ideas expressed in that book on the political compass. The mod disagreed with me and warned me for "trolling". Some guy in here said I was trolling when I said I thought unfair regulation on banks forced them into creative solutions that caused the financial crisis. I guess it's controversial, but I can back it up, and it's my honest belief. If controversial = trolling = bannable offense, then many rightist ideas = bannable offense, as well as a few far-left ideas and a lot of other beliefs people may have.
But yeah, the mods do what they want of course, I'm not saying they have to adhere to free speech or anything since it's their forums. Just saying it would be nice.
On January 11 2011 03:35 Mayfly wrote: Yeah, it's insanely disgusting calling people trolls just because they aren't leftist or just doesn't share your opinion. Sadly, it's common on these forums.
Don't give up.
No I didn't say it so I could be the martyr or anything. Just an observation.
If you argue for right-wing/controversial ideas you're also way more likely to be banned if you're even close to stepping over the line in a heated argument than if you're arguing left-wing/uncontroversial ideas.
To step into the martyr role for I while: I was warned in another thread for mentioning that Mein Kampf wasn't right-wing (when someone brought it up as an exampe of a right-wing book) and that you can't easily place the ideas expressed in that book on the political compass. The mod disagreed with me and warned me for "trolling". Some guy in here said I was trolling when I said I thought unfair regulation on banks forced them into creative solutions that caused the financial crisis. I guess it's controversial, but I can back it up, and it's my honest belief. If controversial = trolling = bannable offense, then many rightist ideas = bannable offense, as well as a few far-left ideas and a lot of other beliefs people may have.
But yeah, the mods do what they want of course, I'm not saying they have to adhere to free speech or anything since it's their forums. Just saying it would be nice.
Your willfully ignorant of the meaning of terms and words when reading a dictionary or encyclopedia clearly shows that your ideas have no merit or basis in reality. Your position on what is consider right wing is just one example of your definition not matching up with the actual definition.
On January 11 2011 03:35 Mayfly wrote: Yeah, it's insanely disgusting calling people trolls just because they aren't leftist or just doesn't share your opinion. Sadly, it's common on these forums.
Don't give up.
No I didn't say it so I could be the martyr or anything. Just an observation.
If you argue for right-wing/controversial ideas you're also way more likely to be banned if you're even close to stepping over the line in a heated argument than if you're arguing left-wing/uncontroversial ideas.
To step into the martyr role for I while: I was warned in another thread for mentioning that Mein Kampf wasn't right-wing (when someone brought it up as an exampe of a right-wing book) and that you can't easily place the ideas expressed in that book on the political compass. The mod disagreed with me and warned me for "trolling". Some guy in here said I was trolling when I said I thought unfair regulation on banks forced them into creative solutions that caused the financial crisis. I guess it's controversial, but I can back it up, and it's my honest belief. If controversial = trolling = bannable offense, then many rightist ideas = bannable offense, as well as a few far-left ideas and a lot of other beliefs people may have.
But yeah, the mods do what they want of course, I'm not saying they have to adhere to free speech or anything since it's their forums. Just saying it would be nice.
People think your trolling because your willfully ignorant of the meaning of terms and words when reading a dictionary or encyclopedia clearly shows that your ideas have no merit or basis in reality. Your position on what is consider right wing is just one example of your definition not matching up with the actual definition.
Give me one example and I'm sure I can defend my stance. I think you're the one being ignorant.
On January 11 2011 03:35 Mayfly wrote: Yeah, it's insanely disgusting calling people trolls just because they aren't leftist or just doesn't share your opinion. Sadly, it's common on these forums.
Don't give up.
No I didn't say it so I could be the martyr or anything. Just an observation.
If you argue for right-wing/controversial ideas you're also way more likely to be banned if you're even close to stepping over the line in a heated argument than if you're arguing left-wing/uncontroversial ideas.
To step into the martyr role for I while: I was warned in another thread for mentioning that Mein Kampf wasn't right-wing (when someone brought it up as an exampe of a right-wing book) and that you can't easily place the ideas expressed in that book on the political compass. The mod disagreed with me and warned me for "trolling". Some guy in here said I was trolling when I said I thought unfair regulation on banks forced them into creative solutions that caused the financial crisis. I guess it's controversial, but I can back it up, and it's my honest belief. If controversial = trolling = bannable offense, then many rightist ideas = bannable offense, as well as a few far-left ideas and a lot of other beliefs people may have.
But yeah, the mods do what they want of course, I'm not saying they have to adhere to free speech or anything since it's their forums. Just saying it would be nice.
Put your posts where your mouth is: paste these posts that you got warned for. I'll go ahead and argue that you were warned for blatant troll tactics, not because of whatever ideas you were arguing being deemed right-wing and thus unacceptable. Also, it doesn't help your case when you martyr yourself, question account actions in unrelated threads, and accuse moderators of political bias.
On January 10 2011 16:28 Tasteful123 wrote: Lefnui, is this your idea of fun? Using your time to feed right wing trolls who came here without any willingness to budge on their ignorance? You can reason all you want with them but in the end it's going to end up with the right wingers equivocating the faults of the right with faults of the left. That is the best you're going to get out of them, if at all.
Yeah, I guess the Republican party is pretty bad - but the Democrats are bad too! Yeah, Fox news is pretty biased - but MSNBC is too!
Any sane person should know the massive difference in the amount and quality of bullshit pouring out of either side... too bad everyone always tries to make it look like both sides are equally bad.
Scruffy, just admit to being a racist. It'll make it easier to believe that you're an actual right winger instead of a troll.
Awww. How cute. Did you make a new account JUST to say that? I'm flattered, really. Anyone want to get a bet going that Lefnui and this new guy will/will not call me a racist to my face at the next big U.S. tournament? (they wouldn't show).
I'm a conservative/libertarian. Call that "XTREEM RIGHT" if you wish. You call people trolls because of your lack of argument/functioning brain.
Yeah, it's insanely disgusting calling people trolls just because they aren't leftist or just doesn't share your opinion. Sadly, it's common on these forums.
Uhm right. Yes I've never seen Scruffy actively try to derail threads trying to provoke people into calling him an idiot/racist so he can claim ad hominem and therefore magically win the argument even though his claims have no evidence and no basis in reality. /sarcasm. I mean come on, it may not be trolling, but it's pretty damn close.
How did this thread get derailed so badly? It seemed pretty straightforward to me. Democrats instituted federal spending limits to balance the budget and be fiscally responsible. Republicans take congress and immediately try to unbalance that by exempting tax cuts from the law. This is fiscally irresponsible of the Republicans. This makes balancing the budget that much harder and makes federal spending less transparent.
Why are the "right-wingers" in favor of the Republicans in this case (especially libertarians)? This is can make the federal debt much larger. Why not have stricter regulations on federal spending? Which the democrats instituted under Obama!
On January 11 2011 03:35 Mayfly wrote: Yeah, it's insanely disgusting calling people trolls just because they aren't leftist or just doesn't share your opinion. Sadly, it's common on these forums.
Don't give up.
No I didn't say it so I could be the martyr or anything. Just an observation.
If you argue for right-wing/controversial ideas you're also way more likely to be banned if you're even close to stepping over the line in a heated argument than if you're arguing left-wing/uncontroversial ideas.
To step into the martyr role for I while: I was warned in another thread for mentioning that Mein Kampf wasn't right-wing (when someone brought it up as an exampe of a right-wing book) and that you can't easily place the ideas expressed in that book on the political compass. The mod disagreed with me and warned me for "trolling". Some guy in here said I was trolling when I said I thought unfair regulation on banks forced them into creative solutions that caused the financial crisis. I guess it's controversial, but I can back it up, and it's my honest belief. If controversial = trolling = bannable offense, then many rightist ideas = bannable offense, as well as a few far-left ideas and a lot of other beliefs people may have.
But yeah, the mods do what they want of course, I'm not saying they have to adhere to free speech or anything since it's their forums. Just saying it would be nice.
Put your posts where your mouth is: paste these posts that you got warned for. I'll go ahead and argue that you were warned for blatant troll tactics, not because of whatever ideas you were arguing being deemed right-wing and thus unacceptable. Also, it doesn't help your case when you martyr yourself, question account actions in unrelated threads, and accuse moderators of political bias.
Them: *Alot of flaming* It's obviously right-wing. It's the EPITOME of right-wing. Look at wiki or something.
Me: Wiki says it's hard to place, and has been placed left, right and centre by different people.
Them: wikiquote: "Nazism presented itself as politically syncretic, incorporating policies, tactics and philosophies from right- and left-wing ideologies; in practice, Nazism was a far right form of politics."
Me: Mein Kampf wasn't practical. (Which would make the first part valid in the point we argued, i.e. hard to place.).
On January 11 2011 03:35 Mayfly wrote: Yeah, it's insanely disgusting calling people trolls just because they aren't leftist or just doesn't share your opinion. Sadly, it's common on these forums.
Don't give up.
No I didn't say it so I could be the martyr or anything. Just an observation.
If you argue for right-wing/controversial ideas you're also way more likely to be banned if you're even close to stepping over the line in a heated argument than if you're arguing left-wing/uncontroversial ideas.
To step into the martyr role for I while: I was warned in another thread for mentioning that Mein Kampf wasn't right-wing (when someone brought it up as an exampe of a right-wing book) and that you can't easily place the ideas expressed in that book on the political compass. The mod disagreed with me and warned me for "trolling". Some guy in here said I was trolling when I said I thought unfair regulation on banks forced them into creative solutions that caused the financial crisis. I guess it's controversial, but I can back it up, and it's my honest belief. If controversial = trolling = bannable offense, then many rightist ideas = bannable offense, as well as a few far-left ideas and a lot of other beliefs people may have.
But yeah, the mods do what they want of course, I'm not saying they have to adhere to free speech or anything since it's their forums. Just saying it would be nice.
Put your posts where your mouth is: paste these posts that you got warned for. I'll go ahead and argue that you were warned for blatant troll tactics, not because of whatever ideas you were arguing being deemed right-wing and thus unacceptable. Also, it doesn't help your case when you martyr yourself, question account actions in unrelated threads, and accuse moderators of political bias.
Them: *Alot of flaming* It's obviously right-wing. It's the EPITOME of right-wing. Look at wiki or something.
Me: Wiki says it's hard to place, and has been placed left, right and centre by different people.
Them: wikiquote: "Nazism presented itself as politically syncretic, incorporating policies, tactics and philosophies from right- and left-wing ideologies; in practice, Nazism was a far right form of politics."
Me: Mein Kampf wasn't practical. (Which would make the first part valid in the point we argued, i.e. hard to place.).
Obvious trolling, right?
Yes, actually. You got people into a stupid argument. They responded with detailed explanation and evidence as to why you are wrong. You respond with a stupid one-line post dismissing everything they just said. Yes, that is trolling. If you provided more explanation and discussion, you probably would not have been warned.
However, none of this has to do with this thread, just like none of that had anything to do with that thread.
On January 11 2011 03:35 Mayfly wrote: Yeah, it's insanely disgusting calling people trolls just because they aren't leftist or just doesn't share your opinion. Sadly, it's common on these forums.
Don't give up.
No I didn't say it so I could be the martyr or anything. Just an observation.
If you argue for right-wing/controversial ideas you're also way more likely to be banned if you're even close to stepping over the line in a heated argument than if you're arguing left-wing/uncontroversial ideas.
To step into the martyr role for I while: I was warned in another thread for mentioning that Mein Kampf wasn't right-wing (when someone brought it up as an exampe of a right-wing book) and that you can't easily place the ideas expressed in that book on the political compass. The mod disagreed with me and warned me for "trolling". Some guy in here said I was trolling when I said I thought unfair regulation on banks forced them into creative solutions that caused the financial crisis. I guess it's controversial, but I can back it up, and it's my honest belief. If controversial = trolling = bannable offense, then many rightist ideas = bannable offense, as well as a few far-left ideas and a lot of other beliefs people may have.
But yeah, the mods do what they want of course, I'm not saying they have to adhere to free speech or anything since it's their forums. Just saying it would be nice.
Put your posts where your mouth is: paste these posts that you got warned for. I'll go ahead and argue that you were warned for blatant troll tactics, not because of whatever ideas you were arguing being deemed right-wing and thus unacceptable. Also, it doesn't help your case when you martyr yourself, question account actions in unrelated threads, and accuse moderators of political bias.
Them: *Alot of flaming* It's obviously right-wing. It's the EPITOME of right-wing. Look at wiki or something.
Me: Wiki says it's hard to place, and has been placed left, right and centre by different people.
Them: wikiquote: "Nazism presented itself as politically syncretic, incorporating policies, tactics and philosophies from right- and left-wing ideologies; in practice, Nazism was a far right form of politics."
Me: Mein Kampf wasn't practical. (Which would make the first part valid in the point we argued, i.e. hard to place.).
Obvious trolling, right?
You made a useless one-line response that was in essence an offhand dismissal. This was after a series of likewise one-line responses continuing the derailment of the thread with an off-topic stupid argument over books. This was after the person who originally started that stupid argument was banned for doing so. At that point I'm actually kind of surprised you weren't just outright banned for derailing a thread, posting worthless one-liners, and generally being an obnoxious poster/troll, on top of the obvious trolling. And this was all in a very serious thread.
Then to top that off, now you're martyring, derailing another thread, and trolling again. Your posting never fails to impress!
On January 11 2011 03:35 Mayfly wrote: Yeah, it's insanely disgusting calling people trolls just because they aren't leftist or just doesn't share your opinion. Sadly, it's common on these forums.
Don't give up.
No I didn't say it so I could be the martyr or anything. Just an observation.
If you argue for right-wing/controversial ideas you're also way more likely to be banned if you're even close to stepping over the line in a heated argument than if you're arguing left-wing/uncontroversial ideas.
To step into the martyr role for I while: I was warned in another thread for mentioning that Mein Kampf wasn't right-wing (when someone brought it up as an exampe of a right-wing book) and that you can't easily place the ideas expressed in that book on the political compass. The mod disagreed with me and warned me for "trolling". Some guy in here said I was trolling when I said I thought unfair regulation on banks forced them into creative solutions that caused the financial crisis. I guess it's controversial, but I can back it up, and it's my honest belief. If controversial = trolling = bannable offense, then many rightist ideas = bannable offense, as well as a few far-left ideas and a lot of other beliefs people may have.
But yeah, the mods do what they want of course, I'm not saying they have to adhere to free speech or anything since it's their forums. Just saying it would be nice.
Put your posts where your mouth is: paste these posts that you got warned for. I'll go ahead and argue that you were warned for blatant troll tactics, not because of whatever ideas you were arguing being deemed right-wing and thus unacceptable. Also, it doesn't help your case when you martyr yourself, question account actions in unrelated threads, and accuse moderators of political bias.
Them: *Alot of flaming* It's obviously right-wing. It's the EPITOME of right-wing. Look at wiki or something.
Me: Wiki says it's hard to place, and has been placed left, right and centre by different people.
Them: wikiquote: "Nazism presented itself as politically syncretic, incorporating policies, tactics and philosophies from right- and left-wing ideologies; in practice, Nazism was a far right form of politics."
Me: Mein Kampf wasn't practical. (Which would make the first part valid in the point we argued, i.e. hard to place.).
Obvious trolling, right?
Yes, actually. You got people into a stupid argument. They responded with detailed explanation and evidence as to why you are wrong. You respond with a stupid one-line post dismissing everything they just said. Yes, that is trolling. If you provided more explanation and discussion, you probably would not have been warned.
However, none of this has to do with this thread, just like none of that had anything to do with that thread.
I dismissed it because they were wrong. That's not trolling. They said Mein Kampf was right-wing which it isn't and which the wiki quote certainly didn't say.
It's the same thing as saying The Communist Manifesto promotes mass-murder. No it doesn't, no matter how many communist states ends up commiting mass murders. Mein Kampf is not right-wing, no matter how many nazi states end up right-wing in practise.
On January 11 2011 03:35 Mayfly wrote: Yeah, it's insanely disgusting calling people trolls just because they aren't leftist or just doesn't share your opinion. Sadly, it's common on these forums.
Don't give up.
No I didn't say it so I could be the martyr or anything. Just an observation.
If you argue for right-wing/controversial ideas you're also way more likely to be banned if you're even close to stepping over the line in a heated argument than if you're arguing left-wing/uncontroversial ideas.
To step into the martyr role for I while: I was warned in another thread for mentioning that Mein Kampf wasn't right-wing (when someone brought it up as an exampe of a right-wing book) and that you can't easily place the ideas expressed in that book on the political compass. The mod disagreed with me and warned me for "trolling". Some guy in here said I was trolling when I said I thought unfair regulation on banks forced them into creative solutions that caused the financial crisis. I guess it's controversial, but I can back it up, and it's my honest belief. If controversial = trolling = bannable offense, then many rightist ideas = bannable offense, as well as a few far-left ideas and a lot of other beliefs people may have.
But yeah, the mods do what they want of course, I'm not saying they have to adhere to free speech or anything since it's their forums. Just saying it would be nice.
Put your posts where your mouth is: paste these posts that you got warned for. I'll go ahead and argue that you were warned for blatant troll tactics, not because of whatever ideas you were arguing being deemed right-wing and thus unacceptable. Also, it doesn't help your case when you martyr yourself, question account actions in unrelated threads, and accuse moderators of political bias.
Them: *Alot of flaming* It's obviously right-wing. It's the EPITOME of right-wing. Look at wiki or something.
Me: Wiki says it's hard to place, and has been placed left, right and centre by different people.
Them: wikiquote: "Nazism presented itself as politically syncretic, incorporating policies, tactics and philosophies from right- and left-wing ideologies; in practice, Nazism was a far right form of politics."
Me: Mein Kampf wasn't practical. (Which would make the first part valid in the point we argued, i.e. hard to place.).
Obvious trolling, right?
You made a useless one-line response that was in essence an offhand dismissal. This was after a series of likewise one-line responses continuing the derailment of the thread with an off-topic stupid argument over books. This was after the person who originally started that stupid argument was banned for doing so. At that point I'm actually kind of surprised you weren't just outright banned for derailing a thread, posting worthless one-liners, and generally being an obnoxious poster/troll, on top of the obvious trolling. And this was all in a very serious thread.
Then to top that off, now you're martyring, derailing another thread, and trolling again. Your posting never fails to impress!
Hey ho. Making up lies to make me look bad. No he wasn't banned for that, nor is he even banned. I wasn't derailing since it was a fair point to bring up and I wasn't warned for derailing, I was warned for trolling.
Not gonna continue responding to this since it's derailing the thread and people are clearly idiots anyway.
On January 11 2011 06:25 Mayfly wrote: Hey ho. Making up lies to make me look bad. No he wasn't banned for that, nor is he even banned. I wasn't derailing since it was a fair point to bring up and I wasn't warned for derailing, I was warned for trolling.
Not gonna continue responding to this since it's derailing the thread and people are clearly idiots anyway.
On January 09 2011 08:18 SnK-Arcbound wrote: Here is a list of his favorite books: I had favorite books: Animal Farm, Brave New World, The Wizard Of OZ, Aesop Fables, The Odyssey, Alice Adventures Into Wonderland, Fahrenheit 451, Peter Pan, To Kill A Mockingbird, We The Living, Phantom Toll Booth, One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest, Pulp,Through The Looking Glass, The Communist Manifesto, Siddhartha, The Old Man And The Sea, Gulliver’s Travels, Mein Kampf, The Republic, and Meno.
Sorry guys, just like the guy who flew the plane into a IRS building, surprise it's someone from the far left. But just remember, the left is peaceful, no matter how many people they kill.
SnK-Arcbound was just temp banned for 2 days by p4NDemik.
That account was created on 2005-03-18 15:52:12 and had 626 posts.
Reason: Stop derailing a serious thread with your bullshit.
Haha still making up stuff. That's not the post he was banned for, nor is he the one that started the derailing. He was banned for something completely different, just check his post history.
On January 11 2011 06:25 Mayfly wrote: Hey ho. Making up lies to make me look bad. No he wasn't banned for that, nor is he even banned. I wasn't derailing since it was a fair point to bring up and I wasn't warned for derailing, I was warned for trolling.
Not gonna continue responding to this since it's derailing the thread and people are clearly idiots anyway.
... ?
On January 09 2011 08:18 SnK-Arcbound wrote: Here is a list of his favorite books: I had favorite books: Animal Farm, Brave New World, The Wizard Of OZ, Aesop Fables, The Odyssey, Alice Adventures Into Wonderland, Fahrenheit 451, Peter Pan, To Kill A Mockingbird, We The Living, Phantom Toll Booth, One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest, Pulp,Through The Looking Glass, The Communist Manifesto, Siddhartha, The Old Man And The Sea, Gulliver’s Travels, Mein Kampf, The Republic, and Meno.
Sorry guys, just like the guy who flew the plane into a IRS building, surprise it's someone from the far left. But just remember, the left is peaceful, no matter how many people they kill.
SnK-Arcbound was just temp banned for 2 days by p4NDemik.
That account was created on 2005-03-18 15:52:12 and had 626 posts.
Reason: Stop derailing a serious thread with your bullshit.
Mayfly, don't lose any sleep over these guys. Thanks for defending me as well.
Best case scenario: They end up teaching and converting a few brainless drones at your local community college with their Art History degrees from Devry.
On January 07 2011 00:06 Scruffy wrote: "They showed the WORST fiscal responsibility in our nation's history" - about Republicans
Have you not seen how much the Democrats have spent so far? (its 3.4 TRILLION by the way) And if you read the article I posted instead of assuming,
"Fact: The real threat is the projected future debt from entitlement spending." Pretty much sums it up. You think wars are expensive...The US has about 72 trillion in assets for all citizens combined. The problem is that there is 112 trillion in unfunded liabilities.
The economy has grown more than spending has (inflation adjusted) over the years.
"A key lesson for lawmakers: Avoid debt-reduction strategies that would significantly reduce economic growth-thereby preventing significant debt ratio improvement. In particular, tax increases may reduce the nominal debt yet also slow economic growth. The better way to reduce the debt ratio is by combining pro-growth tax policies with spending restraint."
Tell a Democrat to look up restraint in the dictionary. It seems they don't know the definition.
A) I'm not defending the Democrats except to say they have a better record of fiscal responsibility than the Republicans, which, if you look at any website dealing with the National Debt that ISN'T the Heritage Foundation, you'd see is absolutely true.
B) "The better way to reduce the debt ratio is by combining pro-growth tax policies with spending restraint."
Right.... Right.... We've been hearing that since Reagan came into office. This exact philosophy. History speaks for itself. Reaganomics has sunk this country into debt. Republicans want to act like it's Welfare's fault. Or healthcare's fault. But really, it's because Reagan completely revamped the tax-code and sunk our government's revenue.
The Heritage Foundation will tell you that Reagan's tax cuts DOUBLED government revenue (while providing no credible sources for that claim). Ergo, the Heritage Foundation is either full of complete morons, or liars. Take your pick. Just don't go posting their articles and expect people to take them at their word.
On January 11 2011 09:34 Scruffy wrote: Mayfly, don't lose any sleep over these guys. Thanks for defending me as well.
Best case scenario: They end up teaching and converting a few brainless drones at your local community college with their Art History degrees from Devry.
And by the way, it's to be expected, but I can see this thread took some wrong turns into something ugly.
Just know I don't mean to insult you ever, and I don't feel you've insulted me ever. We just disagree, obviously. But that's okay, right?
If there's any serious, serious problem in this country right now, it's that we have so much certitude and vitriol in our politics that it's literally making people crazy. I like to talk politics, respectfully, and so far I've enjoyed reading your perspective. Peace.
How is scruffy racist? I don't understand. Stop cheapening the debate with insults. How is saying African American had it tough for the last 50 years a racist comment? Did i misinterpret something?
I'll admit a mea culpa for being derogatory to that German's guy English. It's was off-handed cheap shot as well, but he did call me a prick, so I think we're even. And to the guy who inferred my English sucked, I thought my spelling was pretty good for the amount of posts I put up recently. I do bend the rules of grammar, but it's a forum post, not a research paper.
On January 11 2011 05:50 DoubleReed wrote: How did this thread get derailed so badly? It seemed pretty straightforward to me. Democrats instituted federal spending limits to balance the budget and be fiscally responsible. Republicans take congress and immediately try to unbalance that by exempting tax cuts from the law. This is fiscally irresponsible of the Republicans. This makes balancing the budget that much harder and makes federal spending less transparent.
Why are the "right-wingers" in favor of the Republicans in this case (especially libertarians)? This is can make the federal debt much larger. Why not have stricter regulations on federal spending? Which the democrats instituted under Obama!
What more is there to it people?
Well, Obama is spending like there's no tomorrow, maybe, that's why libertarians are mad at him. "according to the Office of Management and Budget, the debt held by the public will grow by $3.3 trillion. In 20 months, Mr. Obama will add as much debt as Mr. Bush ran up in eight years" - WSJ.
On January 07 2011 00:06 Scruffy wrote: "They showed the WORST fiscal responsibility in our nation's history" - about Republicans
Have you not seen how much the Democrats have spent so far? (its 3.4 TRILLION by the way) And if you read the article I posted instead of assuming,
"Fact: The real threat is the projected future debt from entitlement spending." Pretty much sums it up. You think wars are expensive...The US has about 72 trillion in assets for all citizens combined. The problem is that there is 112 trillion in unfunded liabilities.
The economy has grown more than spending has (inflation adjusted) over the years.
"A key lesson for lawmakers: Avoid debt-reduction strategies that would significantly reduce economic growth-thereby preventing significant debt ratio improvement. In particular, tax increases may reduce the nominal debt yet also slow economic growth. The better way to reduce the debt ratio is by combining pro-growth tax policies with spending restraint."
Tell a Democrat to look up restraint in the dictionary. It seems they don't know the definition.
A) I'm not defending the Democrats except to say they have a better record of fiscal responsibility than the Republicans, which, if you look at any website dealing with the National Debt that ISN'T the Heritage Foundation, you'd see is absolutely true.
B) "The better way to reduce the debt ratio is by combining pro-growth tax policies with spending restraint."
Right.... Right.... We've been hearing that since Reagan came into office. This exact philosophy. History speaks for itself. Reaganomics has sunk this country into debt. Republicans want to act like it's Welfare's fault. Or healthcare's fault. But really, it's because Reagan completely revamped the tax-code and sunk our government's revenue.
The Heritage Foundation will tell you that Reagan's tax cuts DOUBLED government revenue (while providing no credible sources for that claim). Ergo, the Heritage Foundation is either full of complete morons, or liars. Take your pick. Just don't go posting their articles and expect people to take them at their word.
Reaganonmics did not sink the country into debt, the tax cuts were good but there was no spending restraint. That caused the debt.
Reps have stated that Tax cuts repay themselves. If that is the case, why shouldn't we abolish taxation. It pays itself right?
Economically speaking, Tax cuts & Public spending are not bad for the economy per se. Both can benefit a depressed economy. The problem is that when this Expenditures & the Tax cuts don't create future benefits.
American economy needs a jump-start so Private capitals can take over from there.
My question for you the forumers is : Are we cutting where we should?
Ideologicaly speaking, both parties are very flexible as Political Institutions it terms of the people's Demands they channel into the Political Agenda. The truth is there is no much difference between a Rep & a Dem. There is also what we see on TV that has little to do with reality. Every single Media producer is lying to you.
“IF there were such a thing as Chapter 11 for politicians, the Republican push to extend the unaffordable Bush tax cuts would amount to a bankruptcy filing.” – by David Stockman former Budget Director under Reagan.
On January 11 2011 12:21 misaTO wrote: Idiots argue over semantics.
Reps have stated that Tax cuts repay themselves. If that is the case, why shouldn't we abolish taxation. It pays itself right?
That's a completely fallacious argument, I'm pretty sure the gop doesn't say all tax cuts pay for themselves.
Economically speaking, Tax cuts & Public spending are not bad for the economy per se. Both can benefit a depressed economy. The problem is that when this Expenditures & the Tax cuts don't create future benefits.
American economy needs a jump-start so Private capitals can take over from there.
My question for you the forumers is : Are we cutting where we should?
Ideologicaly speaking, both parties are very flexible as Political Institutions it terms of the people's Demands they channel into the Political Agenda. The truth is there is no much difference between a Rep & a Dem. There is also what we see on TV that has little to do with reality. Every single Media producer is lying to you.
The rest of this post makes little sense and then goes off into another strawman: the media. All reps and dems are the same? What kind of world are you living in? I'll agree that party politics is bogged with stuff that doesn't have to do with the ideologies of either side, but making sensationalist statements like that is just as bad.
I'm sorry but I don't want posters like you representing the liberal side. (or any side for that matter)
On January 11 2011 05:50 DoubleReed wrote: How did this thread get derailed so badly? It seemed pretty straightforward to me. Democrats instituted federal spending limits to balance the budget and be fiscally responsible. Republicans take congress and immediately try to unbalance that by exempting tax cuts from the law. This is fiscally irresponsible of the Republicans. This makes balancing the budget that much harder and makes federal spending less transparent.
Why are the "right-wingers" in favor of the Republicans in this case (especially libertarians)? This is can make the federal debt much larger. Why not have stricter regulations on federal spending? Which the democrats instituted under Obama!
What more is there to it people?
Well, Obama is spending like there's no tomorrow, maybe, that's why libertarians are mad at him. "according to the Office of Management and Budget, the debt held by the public will grow by $3.3 trillion. In 20 months, Mr. Obama will add as much debt as Mr. Bush ran up in eight years" - WSJ.
Just google Obama and Pay-As-You-Go. It was a policy instituted while Clinton was president and republicans had the congress. Many say it helped with balancing the budget during those years in office (which is debatable, but it certainly doesn't hurt). It was abandoned by Bush because the republicans roamed free spending money on everything with little oversight. Obama wants Pay-As-You-Go actually to be signed into law.
Almost all of Obama's spending initiatives actually outline how they're being paid for, including the stimulus plan and things like that. They have openly said that short term spending is necessary, but the actual bills signed and everything actually declare how they are going to get that money back. Obama is not actually "spending like there's no tomorrow," because additionally he plans on getting that money. For instance, we did kind of have a huge bank crisis...
Republicans are literally taking Pay-As-You-Go and saying "Okay, sounds good, except for tax cuts." THAT is fiscally stupid. That doesn't make sense. If you have a tax cut, you should still plan where you're going to get that money. Otherwise, we're not actually reducing government spending! It's as simple as that.
It's things like that why I am confused why Libertarians are on the Republican side of things. Both socially and fiscally, republicans have just not shown me any libertarian values whatsoever. They talk the talk, but there are more Democrats that actually walk the walk.
Edit: That amendment just looks silly, imo. Completely impractical. America has changed a bit since Thomas Jefferson's time. Social Security and Defense alone probably breaks that.
On January 11 2011 05:50 DoubleReed wrote: How did this thread get derailed so badly? It seemed pretty straightforward to me. Democrats instituted federal spending limits to balance the budget and be fiscally responsible. Republicans take congress and immediately try to unbalance that by exempting tax cuts from the law. This is fiscally irresponsible of the Republicans. This makes balancing the budget that much harder and makes federal spending less transparent.
Why are the "right-wingers" in favor of the Republicans in this case (especially libertarians)? This is can make the federal debt much larger. Why not have stricter regulations on federal spending? Which the democrats instituted under Obama!
What more is there to it people?
Well, Obama is spending like there's no tomorrow, maybe, that's why libertarians are mad at him. "according to the Office of Management and Budget, the debt held by the public will grow by $3.3 trillion. In 20 months, Mr. Obama will add as much debt as Mr. Bush ran up in eight years" - WSJ.
Just google Obama and Pay-As-You-Go. It was a policy instituted while Clinton was president and republicans had the congress. Many say it helped with balancing the budget during those years in office (which is debatable, but it certainly doesn't hurt). It was abandoned by Bush because the republicans roamed free spending money on everything with little oversight. Obama wants Pay-As-You-Go actually to be signed into law.
Almost all of Obama's spending initiatives actually outline how they're being paid for, including the stimulus plan and things like that. They have openly said that short term spending is necessary, but the actual bills signed and everything actually declare how they are going to get that money back. Obama is not actually "spending like there's no tomorrow," because additionally he plans on getting that money. For instance, we did kind of have a huge bank crisis...
Republicans are literally taking Pay-As-You-Go and saying "Okay, sounds good, except for tax cuts." THAT is fiscally stupid. That doesn't make sense. If you have a tax cut, you should still plan where you're going to get that money. Otherwise, we're not actually reducing government spending! It's as simple as that.
It's things like that why I am confused why Libertarians are on the Republican side of things. Both socially and fiscally, republicans have just not shown me any libertarian values whatsoever. They talk the talk, but there are more Democrats that actually walk the walk.
Edit: That amendment just looks silly, imo. Completely impractical. America has changed a bit since Thomas Jefferson's time. Social Security and Defense alone probably breaks that.
Well an amendment that removed Congress authority to borrow money (unless War or 2/3 vote might be better)
On January 11 2011 04:41 Mayfly wrote: To step into the martyr role for I while: I was warned in another thread for mentioning that Mein Kampf wasn't right-wing (when someone brought it up as an exampe of a right-wing book) and that you can't easily place the ideas expressed in that book on the political compass. The mod disagreed with me and warned me for "trolling". Some guy in here said I was trolling when I said I thought unfair regulation on banks forced them into creative solutions that caused the financial crisis. I guess it's controversial, but I can back it up, and it's my honest belief. If controversial = trolling = bannable offense, then many rightist ideas = bannable offense, as well as a few far-left ideas and a lot of other beliefs people may have.
I would be interested to hear more about your opinion that too much regulation caused the financial crisis. What kind of regulation was there? and what kind of problems did it cause?
Here in Australia, the banks are heavily regulated. They have to keep reserves of liquid assets, they need government approval before they can merge, and there are limits on who they can lend to. They can't lend money to people unless the person can demonstrate an ability to pay the money back.
During the financial crisis, the 4 main Australian banks were still turning over profits. They never came close to insolvency despite the problems in the international money markets.
On January 11 2011 04:41 Mayfly wrote: To step into the martyr role for I while: I was warned in another thread for mentioning that Mein Kampf wasn't right-wing (when someone brought it up as an exampe of a right-wing book) and that you can't easily place the ideas expressed in that book on the political compass. The mod disagreed with me and warned me for "trolling". Some guy in here said I was trolling when I said I thought unfair regulation on banks forced them into creative solutions that caused the financial crisis. I guess it's controversial, but I can back it up, and it's my honest belief. If controversial = trolling = bannable offense, then many rightist ideas = bannable offense, as well as a few far-left ideas and a lot of other beliefs people may have.
I would be interested to hear more about your opinion that too much regulation caused the financial crisis. What kind of regulation was there? and what kind of problems did it cause?
Long, trolling (according to some) text inc:
Studies in the early 90's showed that blacks were denied mortage loans more so than whites, and this caused an outrage in the media. The Attorney General (Janet Reno) and the HUD threatened legal action against any bank that declined a higher percentage of minority applicants than white applicants. So the banks lowered their down payment- and income requirements. Now of course loans are not a favor from the banks to us, they do make money off of it, so it would be very strange of them to all of a sudden not like money in favor of discrimination.
Nevertheless, regulations and policies were put in place that lowered the mortgage loan approval standards so that more low- and moderate-income borrowers could be approved. (It's not even clear if this helped the minority situation, but that's what they did). HUD also pressured Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to purchase more mortagages made to those low- and moderate-income borrowers. In fact, 42 percent of the mortgages bought had to be financed for those with an income below the median income where they lived. So FM & FM, too, had to lower their standards.
So they were pushed to buy more subprime mortgages and increase their risks -- normally that would discourage investors to buy into that enterprise. But FM & FM's survival were all but guaranteed by the government, and they were pretty good about hiding their risks, too, i.e. being risky morons.
Anyway, lenders had to resort to "creative" solutions, like interest-only mortgages and adjustable-rate mortgages that made risky speculators of regular people. There's a lot of information available on exactly how those mortgages and derivatives work, I'm not going on that tangent here.
The result of all this was that over half of African-Americans and 40 percent of Hispanics received subprime loans, a disproportionate share. And yeah, they were harder hit by the bust. Thanks alot, government?
So you see that those regulations had quite the different effect than what was planned. They seem to be very different to what you describe in those Australian banks, as well. No wonder that they survived, then. They prove good regulation can stop what happened. But you know what else could have stopped it? A free market and less land use restrictions that were imposed by the government.
The problem with regulation is that it needs to be just that, good, and be put in place by *people*. That those people work for the government doesn't make them any better or worse than any other people. Well, maybe worse. After all, there's an election to think of, so a quick fix is often better than a slow one. Those "fixes" then lead to new problems that need to be fixed. And there ya go, a ratchet of government intervention that turns only one way.
To shout for regulation you have to ask and answer the following questions: With what accountability? With what power? By whom? Simply shouting for regulation isn't gonna help. If we had a few hundred thousand well-educated, incorruptible, poltically insulated regulators to keep the market in check then maybe it'd be worth it. Or maybe people entering the market can watch their own backs and not trust government intervention that may or may not be effective or even present.
Just google Obama and Pay-As-You-Go. It was a policy instituted while Clinton was president and republicans had the congress. Many say it helped with balancing the budget during those years in office (which is debatable, but it certainly doesn't hurt). It was abandoned by Bush because the republicans roamed free spending money on everything with little oversight. Obama wants Pay-As-You-Go actually to be signed into law.
Almost all of Obama's spending initiatives actually outline how they're being paid for, including the stimulus plan and things like that. They have openly said that short term spending is necessary, but the actual bills signed and everything actually declare how they are going to get that money back. Obama is not actually "spending like there's no tomorrow," because additionally he plans on getting that money. For instance, we did kind of have a huge bank crisis...
Republicans are literally taking Pay-As-You-Go and saying "Okay, sounds good, except for tax cuts." THAT is fiscally stupid. That doesn't make sense. If you have a tax cut, you should still plan where you're going to get that money. Otherwise, we're not actually reducing government spending! It's as simple as that..
Yeah, I give props for Paygo to a Democratic Legislature and Republic Executive for enacting it. But, the Reps never got rid of it, it expired. Obama has no way of paying for anything. I don't want to bash on Obama too much, but his administration is already full of missteps. Personally, I'm annoyed we still have troops in Iraq which was a campaign promise to start removal August 2010 (also a key reason why many Americans voted for him). As for spending he's on pace to outspend every president before him.
As for Republicans, who walk the walk and talk the talk: Governor Christie and Representative Ron Paul who have had excellent track records for just that. In the state of Washington the Democratic party controlled assembly and governor got rid of Washington's paygo last year by voting it out which was greatly opposed by the public at large.
Also why are you so confused Libertarians prefer Reps in general? Don't you know a key principle of libertarianism is low taxes and low spending? Many who prefer no income taxes altogether.
Again, I'm not saying all Reps are good. Those neo-cons need to go.
Just google Obama and Pay-As-You-Go. It was a policy instituted while Clinton was president and republicans had the congress. Many say it helped with balancing the budget during those years in office (which is debatable, but it certainly doesn't hurt). It was abandoned by Bush because the republicans roamed free spending money on everything with little oversight. Obama wants Pay-As-You-Go actually to be signed into law.
Almost all of Obama's spending initiatives actually outline how they're being paid for, including the stimulus plan and things like that. They have openly said that short term spending is necessary, but the actual bills signed and everything actually declare how they are going to get that money back. Obama is not actually "spending like there's no tomorrow," because additionally he plans on getting that money. For instance, we did kind of have a huge bank crisis...
Republicans are literally taking Pay-As-You-Go and saying "Okay, sounds good, except for tax cuts." THAT is fiscally stupid. That doesn't make sense. If you have a tax cut, you should still plan where you're going to get that money. Otherwise, we're not actually reducing government spending! It's as simple as that..
As for spending he's on pace to outspend every president before him.
You mean, he has already outspent every single president... combined.
I just want to say, "it's good we're having this debate." One of the biggest problems with American politics is that we get only riled up about it during election season and many voters are uninformed. We need to learn about things like the free-market, regulations, and actions taken by our government. As voters we have to make sure politicians keep campaign promises and vote them out next election if they fail to deliver. Even if you don't agree with my personal political principles, keep engaged in the discourse, hear both sides and make up your own mind. Even though I can't stand it, I listen to extreme radio on both sides.
It's might seem to many of the opposing viewpoints, I am pigheaded. But, perhaps you're the one who's being pigheaded. The reason I am so sure on my stance is I have done immense research on economics, finance, politics, and US history. I have also questioned my beliefs time and time again. I actually used to be a bleeding hurt liberal three-four years ago until I really learned about economics and learned the math behind the principles. The free-market was the best solution because although it doesn't divide the pie fairly, it grows the pie. When the government steps in to divide the pie, it often shrinks the pie and often divides it unfairly as well. The free-market will probably never give us fair, but it will give us progress meaning in ten years later most of us will live better than we do now that's the promise of free-market capitalism.
Just google Obama and Pay-As-You-Go. It was a policy instituted while Clinton was president and republicans had the congress. Many say it helped with balancing the budget during those years in office (which is debatable, but it certainly doesn't hurt). It was abandoned by Bush because the republicans roamed free spending money on everything with little oversight. Obama wants Pay-As-You-Go actually to be signed into law.
Almost all of Obama's spending initiatives actually outline how they're being paid for, including the stimulus plan and things like that. They have openly said that short term spending is necessary, but the actual bills signed and everything actually declare how they are going to get that money back. Obama is not actually "spending like there's no tomorrow," because additionally he plans on getting that money. For instance, we did kind of have a huge bank crisis...
Republicans are literally taking Pay-As-You-Go and saying "Okay, sounds good, except for tax cuts." THAT is fiscally stupid. That doesn't make sense. If you have a tax cut, you should still plan where you're going to get that money. Otherwise, we're not actually reducing government spending! It's as simple as that..
As for spending he's on pace to outspend every president before him.
You mean, he has already outspent every single president... combined.
Yes, if you don't put spending into context and compare it to GDP, per capita or any other number than he has outspent any other president, just like Bush did before him. But such useless comparisions are only done by trolls, anybody seriously interested in this argument would bother seeing the numbers in a relative way, as the absolut number has no real meaning.
Just google Obama and Pay-As-You-Go. It was a policy instituted while Clinton was president and republicans had the congress. Many say it helped with balancing the budget during those years in office (which is debatable, but it certainly doesn't hurt). It was abandoned by Bush because the republicans roamed free spending money on everything with little oversight. Obama wants Pay-As-You-Go actually to be signed into law.
Almost all of Obama's spending initiatives actually outline how they're being paid for, including the stimulus plan and things like that. They have openly said that short term spending is necessary, but the actual bills signed and everything actually declare how they are going to get that money back. Obama is not actually "spending like there's no tomorrow," because additionally he plans on getting that money. For instance, we did kind of have a huge bank crisis...
Republicans are literally taking Pay-As-You-Go and saying "Okay, sounds good, except for tax cuts." THAT is fiscally stupid. That doesn't make sense. If you have a tax cut, you should still plan where you're going to get that money. Otherwise, we're not actually reducing government spending! It's as simple as that..
As for spending he's on pace to outspend every president before him.
You mean, he has already outspent every single president... combined.
Yes, if you don't put spending into context and compare it to GDP, per capita or any other number than he has outspent any other president, just like Bush did before him. But such useless comparisions are only done by trolls, anybody seriously interested in this argument would bother seeing the numbers in a relative way, as the absolut number has no real meaning.
Yes OMG you got me! I'm so ashamed. You totally took my joke and like, debunked it, man. Good trolling as usual. Stop following me around now?
edit: Obama still has outspent every other president if you look at spending/GDP since WW2. Bush has not, in fact he's below the average.
On January 12 2011 16:10 Balthasar wrote: Also why are you so confused Libertarians prefer Reps in general? Don't you know a key principle of libertarianism is low taxes and low spending? Many who prefer no income taxes altogether.
Again, I'm not saying all Reps are good. Those neo-cons need to go.
I think the confusion is caused by the facts that both republicans and democrats have libertarian aspects to their agenda. Reps are more economically liberal and more in favor of small government (with the exception of external and internal security) and dems are more liberal with regards to personal freedoms and civil rights.
Perhaps the US needs a third party which combines both aspects of liberalism. That would be pretty close to reps without the neo-cons and probabaly also without the religious extremists.
On January 12 2011 16:10 Balthasar wrote: Also why are you so confused Libertarians prefer Reps in general? Don't you know a key principle of libertarianism is low taxes and low spending? Many who prefer no income taxes altogether.
Again, I'm not saying all Reps are good. Those neo-cons need to go.
Reps are more economically liberal and more in favor of small government (with the exception of external and internal security)
Kind of a big exception.
On January 12 2011 18:11 Rflcrx wrote: First it was a joke (ofc!), than you are for real. Maybe pick one before you post?
I mean, you have to decide. Oh and: Correcting your mistakes != trolling
Yep, I was joking and I was later serious. Wow. A person capable of both joking and being serious, how can that be?
The "outspent every other president combined" thing was a common bullshit line for a while that was quoted in various anti-Obama camps.
That he outspent every other president (since WW2; not combined) if you look at spending total AND spending/gdp is true (if you extrapolate the remaining years or just compare year per year).
On January 12 2011 16:10 Balthasar wrote: Also why are you so confused Libertarians prefer Reps in general? Don't you know a key principle of libertarianism is low taxes and low spending? Many who prefer no income taxes altogether.
Again, I'm not saying all Reps are good. Those neo-cons need to go.
Reps are more economically liberal and more in favor of small government (with the exception of external and internal security)
On January 12 2011 18:11 Rflcrx wrote: First it was a joke (ofc!), than you are for real. Maybe pick one before you post?
I mean, you have to decide. Oh and: Correcting your mistakes != trolling
Yep, I was joking and I was later serious. Wow. A person capable of both joking and being serious, how can that be?
The "outspent every other president combined" thing was a common bullshit line for a while that was quoted in various anti-Obama camps.
That he outspent every other president (since WW2; not combined) if you look at spending total AND spending/gdp is true (if you extrapolate the remaining years or just compare year per year).
I can't wait till Obama tries to explain away all the money the last Congress spent (and he approved) in the upcoming 2012 election. Will he blame Bush still? I hope not, Bush is long gone. Its Obama's economy now. If Obama had been a centrist from the get go, I think it would have been much more likely that he gets re-elected.
I just want to see real solutions in government. Don't care if there is an R, D, I, or L by their names (we've seen that they ALL like spending that cheese, and not their cheese, mind you, OUR cheese) No hope or change or any other buzzword. And if they can't fix the problem, at least don't make it worse!
Just google Obama and Pay-As-You-Go. It was a policy instituted while Clinton was president and republicans had the congress. Many say it helped with balancing the budget during those years in office (which is debatable, but it certainly doesn't hurt). It was abandoned by Bush because the republicans roamed free spending money on everything with little oversight. Obama wants Pay-As-You-Go actually to be signed into law.
Almost all of Obama's spending initiatives actually outline how they're being paid for, including the stimulus plan and things like that. They have openly said that short term spending is necessary, but the actual bills signed and everything actually declare how they are going to get that money back. Obama is not actually "spending like there's no tomorrow," because additionally he plans on getting that money. For instance, we did kind of have a huge bank crisis...
Republicans are literally taking Pay-As-You-Go and saying "Okay, sounds good, except for tax cuts." THAT is fiscally stupid. That doesn't make sense. If you have a tax cut, you should still plan where you're going to get that money. Otherwise, we're not actually reducing government spending! It's as simple as that..
Yeah, I give props for Paygo to a Democratic Legislature and Republic Executive for enacting it. But, the Reps never got rid of it, it expired. Obama has no way of paying for anything. I don't want to bash on Obama too much, but his administration is already full of missteps. Personally, I'm annoyed we still have troops in Iraq which was a campaign promise to start removal August 2010 (also a key reason why many Americans voted for him). As for spending he's on pace to outspend every president before him.
As for Republicans, who walk the walk and talk the talk: Governor Christie and Representative Ron Paul who have had excellent track records for just that. In the state of Washington the Democratic party controlled assembly and governor got rid of Washington's paygo last year by voting it out which was greatly opposed by the public at large.
Also why are you so confused Libertarians prefer Reps in general? Don't you know a key principle of libertarianism is low taxes and low spending? Many who prefer no income taxes altogether.
Again, I'm not saying all Reps are good. Those neo-cons need to go.
Well the main part of this is all pretty rational, I agree with most of that.
But Libertarians are for low taxes and low spending. The Republicans have certainly not impressed me with that. And definitely not in this specific case.
And of course there are all the social issues, which libertarian ideals almost universally go against republican policy in general.
In general I get the idea that the republicans are much more united and homogeneous than the democrats, so that also plays a strong role in my opinion btw. I feel like the democrats disagree with each other a lot and have a lot of differing opinions, but the republicans don't. So the democrats has always seemed much more on the libertarian side of things to be honest.
In general I get the idea that the republicans are much more united and homogeneous than the democrats, so that also plays a strong role in my opinion btw. I feel like the democrats disagree with each other a lot and have a lot of differing opinions, but the republicans don't. So the democrats has always seemed much more on the libertarian side of things to be honest.
Libertarians like fiscal conservative message of Republicans. Although most Republicans (not all mind you) in the Bush Administration sucked since they supported his policies. But, a Democrat was in control of the legislative branch at the time, so, they are also equally to blame.
What really pisses me off at the Democratic party in general is there failure to adhere to their own principles. They were supposed to be for civil liberties, but they went along with the patriot act and even voted to extend it. They voted for the wars.
Even in health-care where they were supposed to give a public option, failed to give us one. The health-care bill that came out Democratic Legislative and Executive branch is a total mess where everyone has to buy into private insurance. It was a win for private insurers, not the American people. There is no controls or negotiated premiums. I'm not for social health-care in the least, but at least they can be consistent in their politics and principles.
For the last two years, the Democrats essentially had a blank check. They had control of the legislative and the presidency. They could of gotten any bill they wanted, but what did they give us: a ****ed up stimulus bill and equally ****ed up health care bill.
Geez... no wonder, Republicans took control of Congress.
In general I get the idea that the republicans are much more united and homogeneous than the democrats, so that also plays a strong role in my opinion btw. I feel like the democrats disagree with each other a lot and have a lot of differing opinions, but the republicans don't. So the democrats has always seemed much more on the libertarian side of things to be honest.
Libertarians like fiscal conservative message of Republicans. Although most Republicans (not all mind you) in the Bush Administration sucked since they supported his policies. But, a Democrat was in control of the legislative branch at the time, so, they are also equally to blame.
What really pisses me off at the Democratic party in general is there failure to adhere to their own principles. They were supposed to be for civil liberties, but they went along with the patriot act and even voted to extend it. They voted for the wars.
Even in health-care where they were supposed to give a public option, failed to give us one. The health-care bill that came out Democratic Legislative and Executive branch is a total mess where everyone has to buy into private insurance. It was a win for private insurers, not the American people. There is no controls or negotiated premiums. I'm not for social health-care in the least, but at least they can be consistent in their politics and principles.
For the last two years, the Democrats essentially had a blank check. They had control of the legislative and the presidency. They could of gotten any bill they wanted, but what did they give us: a ****ed up stimulus bill and equally ****ed up health care bill.
Geez... no wonder, Republicans took control of Congress.
To be fair to the Democrats in the legislature, they didn't want to push their principles so far they wouldn't get reelected. And also some Democrats have different principles than others... there are some Democrats for whom that health care bill and/or stimulus was an almost perfect embodiment of their principles. Republicans took control because some Democrats pushed too hard (for their district) and some didn't press hard enough (so they lost support for their district)
On January 10 2011 16:28 Tasteful123 wrote: Lefnui, is this your idea of fun? Using your time to feed right wing trolls who came here without any willingness to budge on their ignorance? You can reason all you want with them but in the end it's going to end up with the right wingers equivocating the faults of the right with faults of the left. That is the best you're going to get out of them, if at all.
Yeah, I guess the Republican party is pretty bad - but the Democrats are bad too! Yeah, Fox news is pretty biased - but MSNBC is too!
Any sane person should know the massive difference in the amount and quality of bullshit pouring out of either side... too bad everyone always tries to make it look like both sides are equally bad.
Scruffy, just admit to being a racist. It'll make it easier to believe that you're an actual right winger instead of a troll.
Anyone want to get a bet going that Lefnui and this new guy will/will not call me a racist to my face at the next big U.S. tournament? (they wouldn't show).
On January 13 2011 07:43 Krikkitone wrote: To be fair to the Democrats in the legislature, they didn't want to push their principles so far they wouldn't get reelected.
That's the problem with these politicians. They worry too much about getting reelected and not stay true to their own principles. Politicians should vote for bills that best serve the nation, not their political careers.
On January 13 2011 07:43 Krikkitone wrote: To be fair to the Democrats in the legislature, they didn't want to push their principles so far they wouldn't get reelected.
That's the problem with these politicians. They worry too much about getting reelected and not stay true to their own principles. Politicians should vote for bills that best serve the nation, not their political careers.
The Politicians that do that don't stay long in office. Its a race to the bottom
On January 13 2011 07:43 Krikkitone wrote: To be fair to the Democrats in the legislature, they didn't want to push their principles so far they wouldn't get reelected.
That's the problem with these politicians. They worry too much about getting reelected and not stay true to their own principles. Politicians should vote for bills that best serve the nation, not their political careers.
If a politician can't convince voters that their plans/actions/principles are best for the nation, then that politician is not suited for democratic government. They would do better as warlords/despots. Just like a prosecuter that can't convince a jury the accused is guilty, is not suited for a free government.
Laffer curve was created by Arthur Laffer, Reagan economic advisor.
Laffer currently teaches at the Stanford School of Business and Economics.
The curve certainly is somewhat inaccurate, but the GOP doesn't argue that large tax cuts will increase revenue: the curve is a parabola instead of a linear line
On January 13 2011 07:43 Krikkitone wrote: To be fair to the Democrats in the legislature, they didn't want to push their principles so far they wouldn't get reelected.
That's the problem with these politicians. They worry too much about getting reelected and not stay true to their own principles. Politicians should vote for bills that best serve the nation, not their political careers.
The Politicians that do that don't stay long in office. Its a race to the bottom
You think most politicians keep true to their campaign promises? You think politicians are honest and don't get re-elected? Do you live on an island? Are you delusional? Do I have to even give evidence to the contrary? Howabout Pelosi, who lied about not knowing the use of torture, who promised fiscal conservative ideals and had a private plane fly her back and forth.
On January 13 2011 10:27 Krikkitone wrote: If a politician can't convince voters that their plans/actions/principles are best for the nation, then that politician is not suited for democratic government. They would do better as warlords/despots. Just like a prosecuter that can't convince a jury the accused is guilty, is not suited for a free government.
The problem isn't that they aren't convincing. They say one thing during election period and act totally different when in power.
On January 13 2011 07:43 Krikkitone wrote: To be fair to the Democrats in the legislature, they didn't want to push their principles so far they wouldn't get reelected.
That's the problem with these politicians. They worry too much about getting reelected and not stay true to their own principles. Politicians should vote for bills that best serve the nation, not their political careers.
The Politicians that do that don't stay long in office. Its a race to the bottom
You think most politicians keep true to their campaign promises? You think politicians are honest and don't get re-elected? Do you live on an island? Are you delusional? Do I have to even give evidence to the contrary? Howabout Pelosi, who lied about not knowing the use of torture, who promised fiscal conservative ideals and had a private plane fly her back and forth.
On January 13 2011 10:27 Krikkitone wrote: If a politician can't convince voters that their plans/actions/principles are best for the nation, then that politician is not suited for democratic government. They would do better as warlords/despots. Just like a prosecuter that can't convince a jury the accused is guilty, is not suited for a free government.
The problem isn't that they aren't convincing. They say one thing during election period and act totally different when in power.
Then the problem isnt the politicians it is the people who are stupid for reelecting them. (or perhaps the people are compromising on the politicians, just like the politicians are compromising on the laws... a Democratic Congressman figures voting for a law they don't like much is better than not getting that law at all... a Democratic voter figures the Democratic candidate will represent their individual interests better than any other candidate that might actually get elected)
Part of it is the nature of compromise... the only time principles are undefiled when making laws is when someone has absolute power.
In a democratic government with a population>1 we have to compromise. (that doesn't mean that politicians aren't scum and voters aren't stupid, but it opens up that possibility)
On January 12 2011 16:10 Balthasar wrote: Also why are you so confused Libertarians prefer Reps in general? Don't you know a key principle of libertarianism is low taxes and low spending? Many who prefer no income taxes altogether.
Again, I'm not saying all Reps are good. Those neo-cons need to go.
Reps are more economically liberal and more in favor of small government (with the exception of external and internal security)
Kind of a big exception.
On January 12 2011 18:11 Rflcrx wrote: First it was a joke (ofc!), than you are for real. Maybe pick one before you post?
I mean, you have to decide. Oh and: Correcting your mistakes != trolling
Yep, I was joking and I was later serious. Wow. A person capable of both joking and being serious, how can that be?
The "outspent every other president combined" thing was a common bullshit line for a while that was quoted in various anti-Obama camps.
That he outspent every other president (since WW2; not combined) if you look at spending total AND spending/gdp is true (if you extrapolate the remaining years or just compare year per year).
I just want to see real solutions in government. Don't care if there is an R, D, I, or L by their names (we've seen that they ALL like spending that cheese, and not their cheese, mind you, OUR cheese)
That is an extremely stupid thing to point out. That's how the country works. That's how it's designed, organized, everything. They are meant to use our tax money, that's not a problem.
On January 11 2011 12:21 misaTO wrote: Idiots argue over semantics.
Reps have stated that Tax cuts repay themselves. If that is the case, why shouldn't we abolish taxation. It pays itself right?
That's a completely fallacious argument, I'm pretty sure the gop doesn't say all tax cuts pay for themselves.
You should really read Paul Krugman's collumn. He explains it much better than I do. We just follow Rep Logic. At first they were anti-deficit, and then they went all crazy over tax cuts.
The reps are fallacious, and Im not even liberal. Just logical sense.
Economically speaking, Tax cuts & Public spending are not bad for the economy per se. Both can benefit a depressed economy. The problem is that when this Expenditures & the Tax cuts don't create future benefits.
American economy needs a jump-start so Private capitals can take over from there.
My question for you the forumers is : Are we cutting where we should?
Ideologicaly speaking, both parties are very flexible as Political Institutions it terms of the people's Demands they channel into the Political Agenda. The truth is there is no much difference between a Rep & a Dem. There is also what we see on TV that has little to do with reality. Every single Media producer is lying to you.
The rest of this post makes little sense and then goes off into another strawman: the media. All reps and dems are the same? What kind of world are you living in? I'll agree that party politics is bogged with stuff that doesn't have to do with the ideologies of either side, but making sensationalist statements like that is just as bad.
I'm sorry but I don't want posters like you representing the liberal side. (or any side for that matter)
How do you explain that in the most socially diverse enviroment, you only need two parties?
Just tell me. How can we scientifically explain it?
On January 11 2011 12:21 misaTO wrote: Idiots argue over semantics.
Reps have stated that Tax cuts repay themselves. If that is the case, why shouldn't we abolish taxation. It pays itself right?
That's a completely fallacious argument, I'm pretty sure the gop doesn't say all tax cuts pay for themselves.
You should really read Paul Krugman's collumn. He explains it much better than I do. We just follow Rep Logic. At first they were anti-deficit, and then they went all crazy over tax cuts.
The reps are fallacious, and Im not even liberal. Just logical sense.
Economically speaking, Tax cuts & Public spending are not bad for the economy per se. Both can benefit a depressed economy. The problem is that when this Expenditures & the Tax cuts don't create future benefits.
American economy needs a jump-start so Private capitals can take over from there.
My question for you the forumers is : Are we cutting where we should?
Ideologicaly speaking, both parties are very flexible as Political Institutions it terms of the people's Demands they channel into the Political Agenda. The truth is there is no much difference between a Rep & a Dem. There is also what we see on TV that has little to do with reality. Every single Media producer is lying to you.
The rest of this post makes little sense and then goes off into another strawman: the media. All reps and dems are the same? What kind of world are you living in? I'll agree that party politics is bogged with stuff that doesn't have to do with the ideologies of either side, but making sensationalist statements like that is just as bad.
I'm sorry but I don't want posters like you representing the liberal side. (or any side for that matter)
How do you explain that in the most socially diverse enviroment, you only need two parties?
Just tell me. How can we scientifically explain it?
We have way more than 2 parties. There are 2 major ones, but that's just how our political system has evolved over the years. Despite the fact that there are 2 major parties, each party is diverse enough that they represent the majority of political beliefs in this country.
On January 13 2011 22:41 LegendaryZ wrote: We have way more than 2 parties. There are 2 major ones, but that's just how our political system has evolved over the years. Despite the fact that there are 2 major parties, each party is diverse enough that they represent the majority of political beliefs in this country.
Hehe, maybe you should just start voting Green. Would be some sort of shock if they got like 50% of the votes. :D Or vote Pirates! Harr.
On January 12 2011 16:10 Balthasar wrote: Also why are you so confused Libertarians prefer Reps in general? Don't you know a key principle of libertarianism is low taxes and low spending? Many who prefer no income taxes altogether.
Again, I'm not saying all Reps are good. Those neo-cons need to go.
Reps are more economically liberal and more in favor of small government (with the exception of external and internal security)
Kind of a big exception.
On January 12 2011 18:11 Rflcrx wrote: First it was a joke (ofc!), than you are for real. Maybe pick one before you post?
I mean, you have to decide. Oh and: Correcting your mistakes != trolling
Yep, I was joking and I was later serious. Wow. A person capable of both joking and being serious, how can that be?
The "outspent every other president combined" thing was a common bullshit line for a while that was quoted in various anti-Obama camps.
That he outspent every other president (since WW2; not combined) if you look at spending total AND spending/gdp is true (if you extrapolate the remaining years or just compare year per year).
I just want to see real solutions in government. Don't care if there is an R, D, I, or L by their names (we've seen that they ALL like spending that cheese, and not their cheese, mind you, OUR cheese)
That is an extremely stupid thing to point out. That's how the country works. That's how it's designed, organized, everything. They are meant to use our tax money, that's not a problem.
If you would stop trying to troll me and actually read what I wrote, you would see that I meant they are spending too much of our money. Guessing the trillions of debt is a non-issue for you anyways.
On January 11 2011 12:21 misaTO wrote: Idiots argue over semantics.
Reps have stated that Tax cuts repay themselves. If that is the case, why shouldn't we abolish taxation. It pays itself right?
That's a completely fallacious argument, I'm pretty sure the gop doesn't say all tax cuts pay for themselves.
You should really read Paul Krugman's collumn. He explains it much better than I do. We just follow Rep Logic. At first they were anti-deficit, and then they went all crazy over tax cuts.
The reps are fallacious, and Im not even liberal. Just logical sense.
Economically speaking, Tax cuts & Public spending are not bad for the economy per se. Both can benefit a depressed economy. The problem is that when this Expenditures & the Tax cuts don't create future benefits.
American economy needs a jump-start so Private capitals can take over from there.
My question for you the forumers is : Are we cutting where we should?
Ideologicaly speaking, both parties are very flexible as Political Institutions it terms of the people's Demands they channel into the Political Agenda. The truth is there is no much difference between a Rep & a Dem. There is also what we see on TV that has little to do with reality. Every single Media producer is lying to you.
The rest of this post makes little sense and then goes off into another strawman: the media. All reps and dems are the same? What kind of world are you living in? I'll agree that party politics is bogged with stuff that doesn't have to do with the ideologies of either side, but making sensationalist statements like that is just as bad.
I'm sorry but I don't want posters like you representing the liberal side. (or any side for that matter)
How do you explain that in the most socially diverse enviroment, you only need two parties?
Just tell me. How can we scientifically explain it?
Very easily... just like you can only have one set of laws passed by a diverse Congress, a given District only has 1 representative... so Nationally there are only 2 general groupings that can get enough to beat the others.
People don't for the Democrat/Repupblican candidate because they best represent their views (the only way to best represent your views is to be the Congressman yourself) instead they vote for that candidate because they Represent their views better than any other Viable* candidate *Viable.. meaning can win because the more people you have agreeing on the candidate the better.. so candidates are compromises made by the voter.
With many Europeans having the proportional representation mechanism, You still end up with "two parties" ie the ruling party and the 'others' but the representatives choose whether Green will support the Conservative Party or the Liberal Party... since you need one set of laws. In the US the individual Green voter decides whether to 1. Vote Democrat 2. Vote Republican 3. Vote Green so as to encourage the Republicans/Democrats running in their district to try and get more Green votes next election. (that's really the only impact of voting for/having a third party.. altough it is a real impact, Pay as you go was largely a result of Ross Perot running.. who didn't win anything, but let the parties know that the american people were interested in the deficit/debt by the way they voted)
Now I think a good way to capture this would be in a bicameral system where one house was winner take all (for the district) and one house where it was proportional representation. In that case you would only have 2 parties in the first house (it would be better for making compromises), and there would be multiple parties in the second house.
On January 12 2011 16:10 Balthasar wrote: Also why are you so confused Libertarians prefer Reps in general? Don't you know a key principle of libertarianism is low taxes and low spending? Many who prefer no income taxes altogether.
Again, I'm not saying all Reps are good. Those neo-cons need to go.
Reps are more economically liberal and more in favor of small government (with the exception of external and internal security)
Kind of a big exception.
On January 12 2011 18:11 Rflcrx wrote: First it was a joke (ofc!), than you are for real. Maybe pick one before you post?
I mean, you have to decide. Oh and: Correcting your mistakes != trolling
Yep, I was joking and I was later serious. Wow. A person capable of both joking and being serious, how can that be?
The "outspent every other president combined" thing was a common bullshit line for a while that was quoted in various anti-Obama camps.
That he outspent every other president (since WW2; not combined) if you look at spending total AND spending/gdp is true (if you extrapolate the remaining years or just compare year per year).
I just want to see real solutions in government. Don't care if there is an R, D, I, or L by their names (we've seen that they ALL like spending that cheese, and not their cheese, mind you, OUR cheese)
That is an extremely stupid thing to point out. That's how the country works. That's how it's designed, organized, everything. They are meant to use our tax money, that's not a problem.
If you would stop trying to troll me and actually read what I wrote, you would see that I meant they are spending too much of our money. Guessing the trillions of debt is a non-issue for you anyways.
You stressed that they are spending "OUR cheese".
Again, for the millionth time, calling racist statements racist is not trolling.
In general I get the idea that the republicans are much more united and homogeneous than the democrats, so that also plays a strong role in my opinion btw. I feel like the democrats disagree with each other a lot and have a lot of differing opinions, but the republicans don't. So the democrats has always seemed much more on the libertarian side of things to be honest.
Libertarians like fiscal conservative message of Republicans. Although most Republicans (not all mind you) in the Bush Administration sucked since they supported his policies. But, a Democrat was in control of the legislative branch at the time, so, they are also equally to blame.
What really pisses me off at the Democratic party in general is there failure to adhere to their own principles. They were supposed to be for civil liberties, but they went along with the patriot act and even voted to extend it. They voted for the wars.
Even in health-care where they were supposed to give a public option, failed to give us one. The health-care bill that came out Democratic Legislative and Executive branch is a total mess where everyone has to buy into private insurance. It was a win for private insurers, not the American people. There is no controls or negotiated premiums. I'm not for social health-care in the least, but at least they can be consistent in their politics and principles.
For the last two years, the Democrats essentially had a blank check. They had control of the legislative and the presidency. They could of gotten any bill they wanted, but what did they give us: a ****ed up stimulus bill and equally ****ed up health care bill.
Geez... no wonder, Republicans took control of Congress.
Honestly, this sounds like more what I'm saying. The Democrats often disagree with one another. There are many fiscally conservative democrats who go against the big government thing and want to mostly encourage private enterprise. That's precisely what I mean. Democrats went against the public option thing BECAUSE of their principles. Otherwise, they would have gone down party lines.
Republicans on the other hand, tend to stick together, and vote much harder along party lines. Not necessarily because that's what they believe, but because they want party support. Take Healthcare. The republicans pretty much stalemated the entire thing throughout. No compromise. Nothing. They just kept voting hard party lines. The Democrats were NOT voting hard party lines, and were trying to compromise something that did not destroy free enterprise blah blah blah.
If anything, that says to me that the republicans are more full of shit.
Politicians SHOULD be disagreeing with each other a lot! They SHOULD be compromising. These are complicated issues with multiple sides. The idea that all the republicans vote so much with the party is not comforting in the least.
On January 11 2011 12:21 misaTO wrote: Idiots argue over semantics.
Reps have stated that Tax cuts repay themselves. If that is the case, why shouldn't we abolish taxation. It pays itself right?
That's a completely fallacious argument, I'm pretty sure the gop doesn't say all tax cuts pay for themselves.
You should really read Paul Krugman's collumn. He explains it much better than I do. We just follow Rep Logic. At first they were anti-deficit, and then they went all crazy over tax cuts.
The reps are fallacious, and Im not even liberal. Just logical sense.
Economically speaking, Tax cuts & Public spending are not bad for the economy per se. Both can benefit a depressed economy. The problem is that when this Expenditures & the Tax cuts don't create future benefits.
American economy needs a jump-start so Private capitals can take over from there.
My question for you the forumers is : Are we cutting where we should?
Ideologicaly speaking, both parties are very flexible as Political Institutions it terms of the people's Demands they channel into the Political Agenda. The truth is there is no much difference between a Rep & a Dem. There is also what we see on TV that has little to do with reality. Every single Media producer is lying to you.
The rest of this post makes little sense and then goes off into another strawman: the media. All reps and dems are the same? What kind of world are you living in? I'll agree that party politics is bogged with stuff that doesn't have to do with the ideologies of either side, but making sensationalist statements like that is just as bad.
I'm sorry but I don't want posters like you representing the liberal side. (or any side for that matter)
How do you explain that in the most socially diverse enviroment, you only need two parties?
Just tell me. How can we scientifically explain it?
Very easily... just like you can only have one set of laws passed by a diverse Congress, a given District only has 1 representative... so Nationally there are only 2 general groupings that can get enough to beat the others.
People don't for the Democrat/Repupblican candidate because they best represent their views (the only way to best represent your views is to be the Congressman yourself) instead they vote for that candidate because they Represent their views better than any other Viable* candidate *Viable.. meaning can win because the more people you have agreeing on the candidate the better.. so candidates are compromises made by the voter.
With many Europeans having the proportional representation mechanism, You still end up with "two parties" ie the ruling party and the 'others' but the representatives choose whether Green will support the Conservative Party or the Liberal Party... since you need one set of laws. In the US the individual Green voter decides whether to 1. Vote Democrat 2. Vote Republican 3. Vote Green so as to encourage the Republicans/Democrats running in their district to try and get more Green votes next election. (that's really the only impact of voting for/having a third party.. altough it is a real impact, Pay as you go was largely a result of Ross Perot running.. who didn't win anything, but let the parties know that the american people were interested in the deficit/debt by the way they voted)
Now I think a good way to capture this would be in a bicameral system where one house was winner take all (for the district) and one house where it was proportional representation. In that case you would only have 2 parties in the first house (it would be better for making compromises), and there would be multiple parties in the second house.
On January 11 2011 12:21 misaTO wrote: Idiots argue over semantics.
Reps have stated that Tax cuts repay themselves. If that is the case, why shouldn't we abolish taxation. It pays itself right?
That's a completely fallacious argument, I'm pretty sure the gop doesn't say all tax cuts pay for themselves.
You should really read Paul Krugman's collumn. He explains it much better than I do. We just follow Rep Logic. At first they were anti-deficit, and then they went all crazy over tax cuts.
The reps are fallacious, and Im not even liberal. Just logical sense.
Economically speaking, Tax cuts & Public spending are not bad for the economy per se. Both can benefit a depressed economy. The problem is that when this Expenditures & the Tax cuts don't create future benefits.
American economy needs a jump-start so Private capitals can take over from there.
My question for you the forumers is : Are we cutting where we should?
Ideologicaly speaking, both parties are very flexible as Political Institutions it terms of the people's Demands they channel into the Political Agenda. The truth is there is no much difference between a Rep & a Dem. There is also what we see on TV that has little to do with reality. Every single Media producer is lying to you.
The rest of this post makes little sense and then goes off into another strawman: the media. All reps and dems are the same? What kind of world are you living in? I'll agree that party politics is bogged with stuff that doesn't have to do with the ideologies of either side, but making sensationalist statements like that is just as bad.
I'm sorry but I don't want posters like you representing the liberal side. (or any side for that matter)
How do you explain that in the most socially diverse enviroment, you only need two parties?
Just tell me. How can we scientifically explain it?
We have way more than 2 parties. There are 2 major ones, but that's just how our political system has evolved over the years. Despite the fact that there are 2 major parties, each party is diverse enough that they represent the majority of political beliefs in this country.
Exactly my point. It doesn't matter how many parties you have. You only need the 2 main ones to work efficiently. The two parties are flexible enough to handle diverse POVS but they do not necesarilly represent the interest of the people. THey just acknowledge some of the Demands (needs) of the american people.
They are both Liberal parties, run by the USA's Elite (or richest guys in America if you like) that can channel the most broad expectrum of Demands into the Public Agenda.
and this is not just my opinion. If you are interested search any Politcal Science Books about Bipartidism in America. Specially the ones that were written @ Harvard.
On January 12 2011 16:10 Balthasar wrote: Also why are you so confused Libertarians prefer Reps in general? Don't you know a key principle of libertarianism is low taxes and low spending? Many who prefer no income taxes altogether.
Again, I'm not saying all Reps are good. Those neo-cons need to go.
Reps are more economically liberal and more in favor of small government (with the exception of external and internal security)
Kind of a big exception.
On January 12 2011 18:11 Rflcrx wrote: First it was a joke (ofc!), than you are for real. Maybe pick one before you post?
I mean, you have to decide. Oh and: Correcting your mistakes != trolling
Yep, I was joking and I was later serious. Wow. A person capable of both joking and being serious, how can that be?
The "outspent every other president combined" thing was a common bullshit line for a while that was quoted in various anti-Obama camps.
That he outspent every other president (since WW2; not combined) if you look at spending total AND spending/gdp is true (if you extrapolate the remaining years or just compare year per year).
I just want to see real solutions in government. Don't care if there is an R, D, I, or L by their names (we've seen that they ALL like spending that cheese, and not their cheese, mind you, OUR cheese)
That is an extremely stupid thing to point out. That's how the country works. That's how it's designed, organized, everything. They are meant to use our tax money, that's not a problem.
If you would stop trying to troll me and actually read what I wrote, you would see that I meant they are spending too much of our money. Guessing the trillions of debt is a non-issue for you anyways.
You stressed that they are spending "OUR cheese".
Again, for the millionth time, calling racist statements racist is not trolling.
EPT
But I'd have to look it up again heh
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