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Bitter Thorn wrote:
Bitter Thorn wrote:
Doodlebug Anklebiter wrote:
Bitter Thorn wrote:

NY Rep. Lee resigns after shirtless photo surfaces

D-bag!

Hee hee! Doesn't he know you're supposed to put pictures of your junk on Craigslist.

Stupid Republicans.

It's only a matter of time before some elected cretin does it.

OK it was twitter not Craigslist.

Congressman Wants Weiner Probe

I couldn't pass up that headline.

ROTFL

If possible, I would rename this thread thus.


one of the comments on the page:
"Isn't this what they do when you get on an airplane?"


Here's a fun article.


Comrade Anklebiter wrote:
Here's a fun article.

Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.


Bitter Thorn wrote:
Comrade Anklebiter wrote:
Here's a fun article.
Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.

More than a few lines are being drawn here that should not be [/ooc]


Senate Rejects Efforts to Protect Gun Records from ATF


Obama's GM Bailout Costs Taxpayers $14 Billion


Bitter Thorn wrote:
Obama's GM Bailout Costs Taxpayers $14 Billion

They paying back the 14? That's main question.


61 trillion?!? Really?


Bitter Thorn wrote:
Obama's GM Bailout Costs Taxpayers $14 Billion

Incorrect statement -- The government's (Republican, Independents, and Democrats alike) Automobile bailout costs Taxpayers a possible $14 billion -- down from the originally projected $50 billion dollars.

Still a lot of money -- but saying, "Hey we aren't likely[/b] to lose as much as we thought" is not the same as you are suggesting.

If you really wanted we could just as easily say, "Of the $17 billion President Bush loaned the Automobile industry we are losing $14 billion."

It would be just as accurate of a statement.

(The [i]accuracy of the intent and direction of your statement is what bothers me -- you are right -- we probably will lose money. But lets be honest about what amount we are losing compared to what we were expected to lose. The unstated is every much a lie as the overstatement or outright lie in my opinion and damages the very purpose of this thread -- To tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth about what is going on in government.)


TheWhiteknife wrote:
61 trillion?!? Really?

Wouldn't be lagging so much if we actually paid the taxes we are supposed to instead of accepting the continuous "temporary" tax cuts the republicans keep pushing.

"We have debt going up -- I know lets cut out income! That's a GREAT way of saving money and paying what we owe!"

What's really funny is the fact that if the tax cuts were lifted I would pay about $1,500 more a year -- someone making twenty times what my family income is would only pay about 12 times more in additional taxes than I would.

I am a very large supporter of the flat tax.


Abraham spalding wrote:
Bitter Thorn wrote:
Obama's GM Bailout Costs Taxpayers $14 Billion

Incorrect statement -- The government's (Republican, Independents, and Democrats alike) Automobile bailout costs Taxpayers a possible $14 billion -- down from the originally projected $50 billion dollars.

Still a lot of money -- but saying, "Hey we aren't likely[/b] to lose as much as we thought" is not the same as you are suggesting.

If you really wanted we could just as easily say, "Of the $17 billion President Bush loaned the Automobile industry we are losing $14 billion."

It would be just as accurate of a statement.

(The [i]accuracy of the intent and direction of your statement is what bothers me -- you are right -- we probably will lose money. But lets be honest about what amount we are losing compared to what we were expected to lose. The unstated is every much a lie as the overstatement or outright lie in my opinion and damages the very purpose of this thread -- To tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth about what is going on in government.)

i wholeheartedly agree with this.


Abraham spalding wrote:
TheWhiteknife wrote:
61 trillion?!? Really?

Wouldn't be lagging so much if we actually paid the taxes we are supposed to instead of accepting the continuous "temporary" tax cuts the republicans keep pushing.

"We have debt going up -- I know lets cut out income! That's a GREAT way of saving money and paying what we owe!"

What's really funny is the fact that if the tax cuts were lifted I would pay about $1,500 more a year -- someone making twenty times what my family income is would only pay about 12 times more in additional taxes than I would.

I am a very large supporter of the flat tax.

As well as with everything here save for the flat tax part. I think it is open to abuse, just as a wholesale switch to gold might be.


Freehold DM wrote:
As well as with everything here save for the flat tax part. I think it is open to abuse, just as a wholesale switch to gold might be.

Perhaps I should say flat percentage tax, on all incomes as they come in.

I don't mind a company spending its money on paying workers better or improving its shops/mines/whatever to avoid taxes -- or using it on charities to avoid taxes in most cases as then the money is going to the use that the government *should* be using it towards in the first place (helping the people that constituent the country).

Personally I don't think we citizens of the USA pay enough taxes and expect far too much for far too little from our government.

IF our government was a business and running like it runs now it would be charging much more for its services and paying its employees more as well.

Its time we are realistic about the costs of running a government and about the costs involved with having the quality of life that we have come to expect.

This problem is most exemplified in our crumbling roadways and infrastructure. We want the best but we refuse to pay for the best and then refuse to pay to maintain it -- we use the cheapest materials with the cheapest labor then proceed to completely ignore it for the next several decades and finally have the gall to complain when it falls apart.


Abraham spalding wrote:
Bitter Thorn wrote:
Obama's GM Bailout Costs Taxpayers $14 Billion

Incorrect statement -- The government's (Republican, Independents, and Democrats alike) Automobile bailout costs Taxpayers a possible $14 billion -- down from the originally projected $50 billion dollars.

Still a lot of money -- but saying, "Hey we aren't likely[/b] to lose as much as we thought" is not the same as you are suggesting.

If you really wanted we could just as easily say, "Of the $17 billion President Bush loaned the Automobile industry we are losing $14 billion."

It would be just as accurate of a statement.

(The [i]accuracy of the intent and direction of your statement is what bothers me -- you are right -- we probably will lose money. But lets be honest about what amount we are losing compared to what we were expected to lose. The unstated is every much a lie as the overstatement or outright lie in my opinion and damages the very purpose of this thread -- To tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth about what is going on in government.)

I thought Bush and/or Obama said we would get every penny back with interest, or am I confusing that with TARP?


Abraham spalding wrote:
Freehold DM wrote:
As well as with everything here save for the flat tax part. I think it is open to abuse, just as a wholesale switch to gold might be.

Perhaps I should say flat percentage tax, on all incomes as they come in.

I don't mind a company spending its money on paying workers better or improving its shops/mines/whatever to avoid taxes -- or using it on charities to avoid taxes in most cases as then the money is going to the use that the government *should* be using it towards in the first place (helping the people that constituent the country).

Personally I don't think we citizens of the USA pay enough taxes and expect far too much for far too little from our government.

IF our government was a business and running like it runs now it would be charging much more for its services and paying its employees more as well.

Its time we are realistic about the costs of running a government and about the costs involved with having the quality of life that we have come to expect.

This problem is most exemplified in our crumbling roadways and infrastructure. We want the best but we refuse to pay for the best and then refuse to pay to maintain it -- we use the cheapest materials with the cheapest labor then proceed to completely ignore it for the next several decades and finally have the gall to complain when it falls apart.

There are definitely two competing visions in this country. One wants a massive expansion in government power and massive tax increases. The other wants massive cuts in the role and power of government and thinks we are over taxed.

I continue to be mystified by people who want to give more power and money to the people who have done such an abysmal job with the power and money they already have.

BTW shall we have $61,000,000,000,000 in tax increases just to maintain the governments current spending projections? IIRC that's close to 5 times GDP.


Bitter Thorn wrote:
I thought Bush and/or Obama said we would get every penny back with interest, or am I confusing that with TARP?

You are -- TARP was set up through the -- (damn it forgot the agency we were talking about earlier) which borrowed the money and promised more back.


The problem with competing views as you put them forth bt is that this too easily sounds like gi Joe and cobra /autobots and decepticons. One side is not all goodness and light and the other all legbreakers and neer do wells.


Abraham spalding wrote:
Bitter Thorn wrote:
I thought Bush and/or Obama said we would get every penny back with interest, or am I confusing that with TARP?
You are -- TARP was set up through the -- (damn it forgot the agency we were talking about earlier) which borrowed the money and promised more back.

IIRC TARP was managed by the Treasury Secretary with very little oversight by congress. Were the auto bailouts funded out of TARP or did they get funded by different legislation?


Freehold DM wrote:
The problem with competing views as you put them forth bt is that this too easily sounds like gi Joe and cobra /autobots and decepticons. One side is not all goodness and light and the other all legbreakers and neer do wells.

Even if we assume the big government types have their hearts in the right place it's not going to be very compassionate when social security and medicare collapse entirely. That is exactly what we are headed for.


Bitter Thorn wrote:
Freehold DM wrote:
The problem with competing views as you put them forth bt is that this too easily sounds like gi Joe and cobra /autobots and decepticons. One side is not all goodness and light and the other all legbreakers and neer do wells.
Even if we assume the big government types have their hearts in the right place it's not going to be very compassionate when social security and medicare collapse entirely. That is exactly what we are headed for.

Except that problem has nothing to do with government size.

You keep harping on "GOVERNMENT SIZE" as if it's a binary issue. It's not.

The problem is where that size is and isn't.

I'll give you a hint: there's one vision in the US amongst office holders, and that's "How much can I give to the corporations before I lose my office?" It's got nothing to do with size. Those tax cuts have nothing to do with a smaller federal government.


ProfessorCirno wrote:
Bitter Thorn wrote:
Freehold DM wrote:
The problem with competing views as you put them forth bt is that this too easily sounds like gi Joe and cobra /autobots and decepticons. One side is not all goodness and light and the other all legbreakers and neer do wells.
Even if we assume the big government types have their hearts in the right place it's not going to be very compassionate when social security and medicare collapse entirely. That is exactly what we are headed for.

Except that problem has nothing to do with government size.

You keep harping on "GOVERNMENT SIZE" as if it's a binary issue. It's not.

The problem is where that size is and isn't.

I'll give you a hint: there's one vision in the US amongst office holders, and that's "How much can I give to the corporations before I lose my office?" It's got nothing to do with size. Those tax cuts have nothing to do with a smaller federal government.

I disagree to some extent. I think government is far to big in what I consider the right areas. For instance, national defense is a legitimate role for federal government, but our current military is insanely huge and over committed. I think the government is far too large and invasive in everything it does.

I also think it's somewhat binary in the sense that the more power and money we give to corrupt and incompetent politicians the less freedom we all have.


Obamanomics: Money Well Wasted

Hope isn't hiring.

Do the links in the second RNC one work for any one else?


Bitter Thorn wrote:

Obamanomics: Money Well Wasted

Hope isn't hiring.

Do the links in the second RNC one work for any one else?

Got something like that from a more independent source? I'm not wading through the RNC's paper to find any actual facts personally (not that I think they are entirely wrong -- just that they are at more of a slant than a rhyme to the truth). I still remember their bridge to nowhere among other issues too much to trust anything they say... especially after their many omissions and 'factual errors' in such statements in the past.

The RNC has way too much of a history of making similar statements to your above one where you stated the loss of 14 billion dollars without pointing the much higher initial cost or their own part in scuttling major parts that were there to prevent exactly what happens with these sorts of bills.

Also the TARP program was indeed separate and included much tighter methods of control than the bail outs for the auto industry that where pushed through (please note the auto industry bail out was already primed and ready for the vote before Obama even took office -- the only reason the republicans didn't push it through before him was they were sure it would pass with him in office and they didn't want their hands on their bill -- they quite literally passed the buck on their own bill -- so much for accountability and personal responsibility for what they present in office eh?)

I imagine that the truth of the stimulus package (which again is separate from TARP or the automobile industry bail out) is somewhere between Obama's representation of it and the RNC's.


Bitter Thorn wrote:
I also think it's somewhat binary in the sense that the more power and money we give to corrupt and incompetent politicians the less freedom we all have.

The problem is the incompetence extends well beyond the government.

IF you were right and the free market would somehow fix and prevent these sorts of things then none of this would have happened. The regulators wouldn't have been needed and nothing would have been found wrong because the free market would have self-regulated and prevented it in the first place.

Which it didn't do. In fact when faced with lax regulation it instead waded in as deeply in the corruption, greed, and scandals as it could get.

The very idea that these same people would turn around and then blame the regulators for not catching them and the victims for [/b]not knowing that this was too good to be true[/b] shows us that these supposed 'free market capitalist' simply are not good people.

Dark Archive

Pathfinder Lost Omens Subscriber
Freehold DM wrote:
Bitter Thorn wrote:
Obama's GM Bailout Costs Taxpayers $14 Billion
They paying back the 14? That's main question.

They are paying back most of it supposedly. I believe that tax payers will be on the hook for 1.5 billion, although I am not sure why seeing as how there is no need for any drop dead date to end payments.

Dark Archive

Pathfinder Lost Omens Subscriber
ProfessorCirno wrote:

Except that problem has nothing to do with government size.

You keep harping on "GOVERNMENT SIZE" as if it's a binary issue. It's not.

The problem is where that size is and isn't.

I'll give you a hint: there's one vision in the US amongst office holders, and that's "How much can I give to the corporations before I lose my office?" It's got nothing to do with size. Those tax cuts have nothing to do with a smaller federal government.

I can't speak for what our politicians actually think, however, people have to remember not to confuse too related issues. The issues here are government size and economic growth. Some politicians believe the way to grow the economy is with government (read taxpayer money) investment (mainly deficit spending). Other politicians believe that the way to grow the economy is with private investment (let the people keep and invest their own money).

Tax cuts for corporations of course fall into the second catagory of letting the private sector grow the economy. However, they also serve as a limit on the size of government. Less money less governemnt.


Pyrrhic Victory wrote:
Freehold DM wrote:
Bitter Thorn wrote:
Obama's GM Bailout Costs Taxpayers $14 Billion
They paying back the 14? That's main question.
They are paying back most of it supposedly. I believe that tax payers will be on the hook for 1.5 billion, although I am not sure why seeing as how there is no need for any drop dead date to end payments.

This isn't quite accurate -- the government actually 'made' all of its money back... in a form that everyone loves -- stock.

See the government *technically* loaned the auto industry less than is imagined -- instead it bought stocks and such in the companies (or accepted stock for the purposes of collateral) for the money the industry received.

Now it has this stock which it wants to slowly sell back into the market. The problem is the market knows the government wants to sell the stock back, and is purposefully keeping the price low in order to get the best starting buys on the stock when it is sold (again so much for a 'free market' since the players are rigging the game -- again).

So the government either needs to hold on to the stock (a legal if icky choice politically speaking) or sell it at a loss.

If it was a company and sells at a loss no big deal -- that's a tax write off so they don't loss money (again really 'free market capitalism' there, but try and get rid of it and watch the 'free market capitalists' fight tooth and nail over their welfare net!) -- however the government doesn't have that option and therefore needs to get a good price for its stock.


Pyrrhic Victory wrote:


I can't speak for what our politicians actually think, however, people have to remember not to confuse too related issues. The issues here are government size and economic growth. Some politicians believe the way to grow the economy is with government (read taxpayer money) investment (mainly deficit spending). Other politicians believe that the way to grow the economy is with private investment (let the people keep and invest their own money).

Tax cuts for corporations of course fall into the second catagory of letting the private sector grow the economy. However, they also serve as a limit on the size of government. Less money less governemnt.

Actually its even more complicated than that -- the government is not legally allowed to run a large surplus. When it starts doing so it literally has to throw the money away in the form of grants, infrastructure projects -- anything... including business investments (a legal obligation once the surplus hits a high enough level).

We have the anti-federalist to thank for this, as it was their idea to limit the government in such a way in order to prevent it from taking over the world.

Fortunately we have enough tax cuts currently to keep the government in the red for a long time.

Honestly killing those stupid 'Bush era' tax cuts would do more for our debt than all the program cuts in the republican suggestion box.


Pyrrhic Victory wrote:

I can't speak for what our politicians actually think, however, people have to remember not to confuse too related issues. The issues here are government size and economic growth. Some politicians believe the way to grow the economy is with government (read taxpayer money) investment (mainly deficit spending). Other politicians believe that the way to grow the economy is with private investment (let the people keep and invest their own money).

Tax cuts for corporations of course fall into the second catagory of letting the private sector grow the economy. However, they also serve as a limit on the size of government. Less money less governemnt.

The first got us out of the great depression and has been used with incredible success with most other first world countries.

The second has seen the US economy - and the US everything else - fall in a downward spiral for the past twenty-thirty years.

I think we've actually solved which one works.


Abraham spalding wrote:
Bitter Thorn wrote:

Obamanomics: Money Well Wasted

Hope isn't hiring.

Do the links in the second RNC one work for any one else?

Got something like that from a more independent source? I'm not wading through the RNC's paper to find any actual facts personally (not that I think they are entirely wrong -- just that they are at more of a slant than a rhyme to the truth). I still remember their bridge to nowhere among other issues too much to trust anything they say... especially after their many omissions and 'factual errors' in such statements in the past.

The RNC has way too much of a history of making similar statements to your above one where you stated the loss of 14 billion dollars without pointing the much higher initial cost or their own part in scuttling major parts that were there to prevent exactly what happens with these sorts of bills.

Also the TARP program was indeed separate and included much tighter methods of control than the bail outs for the auto industry that where pushed through (please note the auto industry bail out was already primed and ready for the vote before Obama even took office -- the only reason the republicans didn't push it through before him was they were sure it would pass with him in office and they didn't want their hands on their bill -- they quite literally passed the buck on their own bill -- so much for accountability and personal responsibility for what they present in office eh?)

I imagine that the truth of the stimulus package (which again is separate from TARP or the automobile industry bail out) is somewhere between Obama's representation of it and the RNC's.

Investigations of Stimulus Waste, Fraud, and Abuse (propublica)

We were told borrowing hundreds of billions of dollars for infrastructure would help create millions of jobs and bring the unemployment rate down below 8%. We were lied to.


Abraham spalding wrote:
Bitter Thorn wrote:
I also think it's somewhat binary in the sense that the more power and money we give to corrupt and incompetent politicians the less freedom we all have.

The problem is the incompetence extends well beyond the government.

IF you were right and the free market would somehow fix and prevent these sorts of things then none of this would have happened. The regulators wouldn't have been needed and nothing would have been found wrong because the free market would have self-regulated and prevented it in the first place.

Which it didn't do. In fact when faced with lax regulation it instead waded in as deeply in the corruption, greed, and scandals as it could get.

The very idea that these same people would turn around and then blame the regulators for not catching them and the victims for [/b]not knowing that this was too good to be true[/b] shows us that these supposed 'free market capitalist' simply are not good people.

You and cirino keep making these arguments against free markets as if we actually had free markets. You do understand that is utterly absurd right?

You seem to continue to be confused by the fact that wanting less government is not the same as wanting no government.

The banks and financial corporations did bad things, but neither administration has prosecuted anyone that I know of. I think they should have been held accountable by at least allowing them to collapse. Instead both administrations have incentivized this bad behavior by subsidizing it with bailouts. To call this some kind of failure of the free market is a silly contradiction of the facts. People respond to incentives. The government that won't enforce the law and creates these insane incentives shares part of the blame.

Large corporations almost never have any kind of "free market capitalist" view. Quite the opposite in most cases. They are the leading beneficiaries of large corrupt government. This notion that if government were smaller then evil giant corporations would take over is deeply problematic. Aren't they already basically running the show now in our current era of massive, invasive, corrupt, and incompetent government? Big government not only didn't fix the problem; it rewarded it. Why then would we accept the argument that even bigger government is the solution?

That seems fairly insane to me.


Abraham spalding wrote:
Pyrrhic Victory wrote:


I can't speak for what our politicians actually think, however, people have to remember not to confuse too related issues. The issues here are government size and economic growth. Some politicians believe the way to grow the economy is with government (read taxpayer money) investment (mainly deficit spending). Other politicians believe that the way to grow the economy is with private investment (let the people keep and invest their own money).

Tax cuts for corporations of course fall into the second catagory of letting the private sector grow the economy. However, they also serve as a limit on the size of government. Less money less governemnt.

Actually its even more complicated than that -- the government is not legally allowed to run a large surplus. When it starts doing so it literally has to throw the money away in the form of grants, infrastructure projects -- anything... including business investments (a legal obligation once the surplus hits a high enough level).

We have the anti-federalist to thank for this, as it was their idea to limit the government in such a way in order to prevent it from taking over the world.

Fortunately we have enough tax cuts currently to keep the government in the red for a long time.

Honestly killing those stupid 'Bush era' tax cuts would do more for our debt than all the program cuts in the republican suggestion box.

What do you think is in the Republican suggestion box?

How much revenue do you think such an across the board tax increase would yield?


No Really: SWAT Team Raids House at 6 AM and Handcuffs Father of Three Young Kids to Execute a Dept. of Education Search Warrant for Estranged Wife's Defaulted Student Loans


Bitter Thorn wrote:


Investigations of Stimulus Waste, Fraud, and Abuse (propublica)

We were told borrowing hundreds of billions of dollars for infrastructure would help create...

I like to point out in the interest of being fully honest that the CEO of that company sold his loans and savings bank to Wells Fargo -- a situation that could suggest a conflict of interests in any story about the financial markets (Wells Fargo and many other such companies have quite the Axe to grind with any part of the government since they are constantly being proven to have taken fraudulent and nasty illegal steps to foreclose and charge extra in every case possible -- you know you are bad off when Florida stops all your court cases due to the level of fraud involved in addition to simple honest errors).

I would like to remind you of one of my personal rules of life:
"Never assume Malice where ignorance will suffice."

I try to give everyone (even the very corporations that I often find myself in disgust over) the benefit of the doubt before accusing them of lying.

For example: I honestly believe that President Bush believed what he was doing was in the best interest of the USA and our allies both times he took us to war. I believe that the people in Congress thought they were doing what was best for everyone when they passed the No Child Left Behind Act -- and the Patriot Act. That doesn't mean they were right -- simply that they were doing what they thought was best. Also it is far to early to have any real clue what the real costs of the stimulus package is, and what impact it has or has not had.

However: In the future any time you can get the information from Propublica please quote and link them first.

However I would like to point out this again hurts your free market stance. If it worked the way you want it to work then that money would have been taken and applied the way it should of been instead of in ways that were not directly in the best interests of the corporations and CEOs involved. The government believed these very people when these people told the government that by giving them this money it would help save jobs in the USA -- obvious those businesses lied.


Our complicity in the devastating war on crime


Abraham spalding wrote:
However I would like to point out this again hurts your free market stance. If it worked the way you want it to work then that money would have been taken and applied the way it should of been instead of in ways that were not directly in the best interests of the corporations and CEOs involved. The government believed these very people when these people told the government that by giving them this money it would help save jobs in the USA -- obvious those businesses lied.

Whether it stupidity or corruption on the part of the government that contributed to the waste fraud and abuse that characterized the stimulus, these are all arguments against large wasteful corrupt government. The fact that there are scumbags and swindlers in our not so free markets is hardly an argument against free markets. Again I would say the fact that the government won't prosecute theft and fraud, but instead directly incentivizes companies with awful business, tax, safety, and environmental records argues against the current big government system.


Reason also has quite a few pieces on the stimulus.

Reason: Stimulus


How to Balance the Budget Without Raising Taxes
The 19 Percent Solution

I think 19% is much too high, but at least it might not be suicidal.


Bitter Thorn wrote:
No Really: SWAT Team Raids House at 6 AM and Handcuffs Father of Three Young Kids to Execute a Dept. of Education Search Warrant for Estranged Wife's Defaulted Student Loans

You have got to be kidding me.


Freehold DM wrote:
Bitter Thorn wrote:
No Really: SWAT Team Raids House at 6 AM and Handcuffs Father of Three Young Kids to Execute a Dept. of Education Search Warrant for Estranged Wife's Defaulted Student Loans
You have got to be kidding me.

There is an update at the bottom, and I'd like to know more, but I'm sure the feds will hide behind the ongoing investigation excuse until folks lose interest just like the Jones shooting.


Bitter Thorn wrote:
Abraham spalding wrote:
However I would like to point out this again hurts your free market stance. If it worked the way you want it to work then that money would have been taken and applied the way it should of been instead of in ways that were not directly in the best interests of the corporations and CEOs involved. The government believed these very people when these people told the government that by giving them this money it would help save jobs in the USA -- obvious those businesses lied.
Whether it stupidity or corruption on the part of the government that contributed to the waste fraud and abuse that characterized the stimulus, these are all arguments against large wasteful corrupt government. The fact that there are scumbags and swindlers in our not so free markets is hardly an argument against free markets. Again I would say the fact that the government won't prosecute theft and fraud, but instead directly incentivizes companies with awful business, tax, safety, and environmental records argues against the current big government system.

I'm sorry you can't apply the very argument against the government and then hand wave it when it comes to the markets.

As I pointed out if the markets worked the way you suggest they do (or at least 'should') then the fraud wouldn't happen even if the government was inept -- since the market wouldn't allow it.

Until you come up with a legitimate reason on why the market isn't to blame for continuing in the very same sins you point at the government I'm afraid the free market is just as much a failure as the government.

In fact the only thing the markets have ever proven is that they will be corrupt, incompetent, negligent, self-serving, criminal, and liars at every turn possible.

There isn't a single case where that has proven false to date. To say that because people in the free market are swindlers and scumbags and then to say the very institution based on these people isn't faulty or to blame is well below your intelligence level.

I can use that very same argument against your position that big government is bad: "Just because there are scumbags and swindlers in big government is hardly an argument against big government"

It's hypocrisy at worse and simply naivety to the point of stupidity at its best.


Bitter Thorn wrote:

How to Balance the Budget Without Raising Taxes

The 19 Percent Solution

I think 19% is much too high, but at least it might not be suicidal.

That ignores the fact that currently the only way to drop spending in medicare or medicaid is to not pay the bills... same for social security. It also doesn't address what to cut or where -- in fact it is every bit as useless as the republican suggestions it scorns.

What are we going to cut? Are we not going to fix the roads? Perhaps not ensure clean water? Maybe simply not pay teachers? Perhaps we should simple not pay the seniors on social security -- that will go over well right?

In short this provides no actual solution and ignores the fact that the very things it suggests "holding even" are things that do not remain even.

Without changing the very infrastructure of society and the programs our society currently rests on that supposed 'budget' (which isn't even a budget) is dead before birth.


Taxes and movement:
doesn't happen
still not happening
still not moving
points and links
another article

In fact raising taxes seems to have one effect -- it gets the rich to spend their money instead of letting it go to taxes... and not just spend it but spend it on things like hiring more people, expanding their business, giving their employees more benefits (which are tax deductible), and charity.

Indeed the times when the rich were are their most generous, respectable, and nicest have been the times when they have been taxed the most. A fact that poor President Hoover would have probably liked to know and something that served President Roosevelt very well.

Indeed if we simply let half of the tax cuts from 2000~2008 end we would collect enough revenue to quite easily bring us back to the black with only about an 9% cut in spending total.


Abraham spalding wrote:

I'm sorry you can't apply the very argument against the government and then hand wave it when it comes to the markets.

As I pointed out if the markets worked the way you suggest they do (or at least 'should') then the fraud wouldn't happen even if the government was inept -- since the market wouldn't allow it.

Until you come up with a legitimate reason on why the market isn't to blame for continuing in the very same sins you point at the government I'm afraid the free market is just as much a failure as the government.

In fact the only thing the markets have ever proven is that they will be corrupt, incompetent, negligent, self-serving, criminal, and liars at every turn possible.

There isn't a single case where that has proven false to date. To say that because people in the free market are swindlers and scumbags and then to say the very institution based on these people isn't faulty or to blame is well below your intelligence level.

I can use that very same argument against your position that big government is bad: "Just because there are scumbags and swindlers in big government is hardly an argument against big government"

It's hypocrisy at worse and simply naivety to the point of stupidity at its best.

"In fact the only thing the markets have ever proven is that they will be corrupt, incompetent, negligent, self-serving, criminal, and liars at every turn possible."

This statement in particular is simply false, and it's intellectually indefensible.

Most people who do business still do it honestly whether for personal reasons or because it's good business or both. Your statement is too grossly general to defend. Some individuals, corporations and markets will behave like you said some will not.

Free markets are likely to be superior to government control precisely because people tend to act in their own self interest and they are better qualified to determine their own interests that some central planner. Capitalism doesn't require everyone to be a saint to work. When you give bureaucrats power over peoples lives and property the out comes as we have seen can be very bad even if they mean well. fraud, recklessness, and theft in commerce can do terrible damage, but I believe it's a legitimate role of government to prosecute or adjudicate harm to others, but that simply does not not take place with any consistency in our current big government system.

I have also never argued that freedom of choice in never faulty. I do argue that it is almost always better than centralized government control.

I'm usually pretty careful about qualifying my statements, and I just don't think your hypocrisy argument holds up.


I've not met an honest businessman.

Free markets are not superior precisely for their larger control over the individual. A free market owes you nothing. It can deny you everything you can't pay for at the price it demands. There is no such thing as a 'free' market -- everything costs and if you can't meet the costs and you die because if it -- no one is to blame since they don't owe you a thing.

You can't 'rebel' against a free market -- they own it why should they simply give it to you? You want it? Pay what they tell you to. Indeed the very concept doesn't match -- in a truly 'free market' monopolies would be legal, business practices such as union busting, script payments, and the return of indebted servants would once again be legal. Your very body would be the tender you use -- today it is merely your labor.

The only way a free market is anything but an oligarchy is when it is forced to be by regulation. The only way that happens is when people rise together to demand that the market does indeed owe it something and it will submit to their will or they will use something other than money... force and violence.

The very nature of government is to control markets -- that is the honest purpose to government -- without control of the economy there is no control of a nation.

Every nation that has ever failed has failed because the government did not control the economy -- once there are rich that are so rich they can ignore the government (which I point out corporations do on a regular basis today) then that government is doomed if it doesn't use force to regain control of its economy.

The only times corporations or the rich obey is when forced and the only times they are generous is when they will be forced to anyways.

People acting in their own self interests is the very core of the problem with free markets -- their self interests doesn't care if you die making them money -- their self interest includes paying you as little as possible to keep more money for themselves. Their self interest doesn't involve your well being at all.

So long as they are in a position to control you through wages and prices you remain their slave.

Honestly this is your very argument against big government applied to the markets -- and it applies over and over and over again.

This very thing is what led to the rebellions in France, the downfall of Rome, The forcing of the King to sign the Magna Carta. It is the point that led to rebellion in the Colonies of America.

You are arguing that you can't trust the government because the people involved are corrupt, greedy and acting in their own self interests -- how or why are the corporations going to do otherwise?

They didn't in the 1920's they didn't in the civil war, they never have acted in anything other than their own self interests.

At least the government can be reelected.


Abraham spalding wrote:

Taxes and movement:

doesn't happen
still not happening
still not moving
points and links
another article

In fact raising taxes seems to have one effect -- it gets the rich to spend their money instead of letting it go to taxes... and not just spend it but spend it on things like hiring more people, expanding their business, giving their employees more benefits (which are tax deductible), and charity.

Indeed the times when the rich were are their most generous, respectable, and nicest have been the times when they have been taxed the most. A fact that poor President Hoover would have probably liked to know and something that served President Roosevelt very well.

Indeed if we simply let half of the tax cuts from 2000~2008 end we would collect enough revenue to quite easily bring us back to the black with only about an 9% cut in spending total.

I acknowledge your point about physical mobility in the face of modest tax increases on the wealthy which I still oppose. I notice they don't seem to address whether or not the tax increases generated the the projected revenue or if the wealthy just modified their shelter tactics.

I don't think it's the governments job to make rich people nice at gunpoint.

I'm going to need a citation for your last sentence please. I don't think it's correct.


Abraham spalding wrote:

I've not met an honest businessman.

Free markets are not superior precisely for their larger control over the individual. A free market owes you nothing. It can deny you everything you can't pay for at the price it demands. There is no such thing as a 'free' market -- everything costs and if you can't meet the costs and you die because if it -- no one is to blame since they don't owe you a thing.

You can't 'rebel' against a free market -- they own it why should they simply give it to you? You want it? Pay what they tell you to. Indeed the very concept doesn't match -- in a truly 'free market' monopolies would be legal, business practices such as union busting, script payments, and the return of indebted servants would once again be legal. Your very body would be the tender you use -- today it is merely your labor.

The only way a free market is anything but an oligarchy is when it is forced to be by regulation. The only way that happens is when people rise together to demand that the market does indeed owe it something and it will submit to their will or they will use something other than money... force and violence.

The very nature of government is to control markets -- that is the honest purpose to government -- without control of the economy there is no control of a nation.

Every nation that has ever failed has failed because the government did not control the economy -- once there are rich that are so rich they can ignore the government (which I point out corporations do on a regular basis today) then that government is doomed if it doesn't use force to regain control of its economy.

The only times corporations or the rich obey is when forced and the only times they are generous is when they will be forced to anyways.

People acting in their own self interests is the very core of the problem with free markets -- their self interests doesn't care if you die making them money -- their self interest includes paying you as little as possible to...

"Every nation that has ever failed has failed because the government did not control the economy -- once there are rich that are so rich they can ignore the government (which I point out corporations do on a regular basis today) then that government is doomed if it doesn't use force to regain control of its economy."

Am I to understand that your position is that communist countries and the axis fell because their governments did not have enough control of their economies?


Ten Myths About the Bush Tax Cuts
Published on January 29, 2007 by Brian Riedl


What Would Happen if the Bush Tax Cuts Just Disappeared in Some Scary Version of The Rapture?Nick Gillespie | February 3, 2010

The projections for Obama's plan cited ~ 1 trillion in tens years.

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