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Barry A. - 10-28-2011 at 10:37 AM

----------but Fish and Goat-----you never commented on David K's original point, namely where can you cite an example of the Socialist/Communist System really working without liberal amounts of Capitalist doctrines being also used to spur their economies??

Barry

(ed. to correct at least some spelling errors)

[Edited on 10-28-2011 by Barry A.]

mtgoat666 - 10-28-2011 at 10:52 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Barry A.
----------but Fish and Goat-----you never commented on David K's original point, namely where can you cite an example of the Socialist/Communist System really working without liberal amounts of Capitalist doctrines being also used to spur their economies??


Quote:
Originally posted by David K
Re-distribution (communism/ socialism) has failed everywhere it was tried... but the left doesn't learn from the past.


Barry: define "failed."

Many commy/socialist systems have succeeded in improving the lives of their citizens over multiple generations. Yes, governments have failed, but persistence of governments are irrelevant in the big picture. Governments come and go, and capitalist governments come/go too.

I can cite many examples of capitalist societies where the majority of citizens still live in poverty and isolation. I can cite many commy/socialist countries where resulted in modernized/educated populace. Yes, governments may have failed in the end, but big whoop! The people are still doing OK under new govt.

Nothing says the USA government will persist forever. And who is to say the next government won't be better? I can think of many things that need improvement, and perhaps a revolution is only way to get past our dysfunctional government hamstrung by special interests bankrolled by the 1%.

[Edited on 10-28-2011 by mtgoat666]

Iflyfish - 10-28-2011 at 10:53 AM

Barry A.

"you never commented on David K's original point, namely where can you cite an example of the Socialist/Communist System really working without liberal amounts of Capitalist doctrines being also used to spur their economies??"

If this is true then the inverse is also true. You have never seen an example of a Capitalist System really working with out liberal amounts of Socialist/Communist elements in place.

There are no totally Socialist, Communist or Capitalist countries. All economies are comprised of a mixture of elements of these economic philosophies.
http://bizfinance.about.com/od/smallbusinessissues/qt/CapvsS...

The issue is how one balances these PHILOSOPIES into a system that works.

I have not reponded to David K's assertion before because it is based upon a false assumption. Economics at the macro level are not an either/or Socialist/Communist proposition as the Corporate Media would have us believe. This is the logical fallacy of "False Dichotomy".

Iflyfish

TMW - 10-28-2011 at 10:56 AM

If the Occupy Wall Street movement people want changes and jobs they are pretty dumb because they are in the wrong place. They need to move about 225 miles southwest to a place called Washington DC. They must have been listening to Joe and Goats instruction for the protest. Like the AT&T Flash commercial.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bd8ppk0UCx8

mtgoat666 - 10-28-2011 at 10:57 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Barry A.
----------but Fish and Goat-----you never commented on David K's original point, namely where can you cite an example of the Socialist/Communist System really working without liberal amounts of Capitalist doctrines being also used to spur their economies??

Barry

(ed. to correct at least some spelling errors)

[Edited on 10-28-2011 by Barry A.]


barry:
cite one example where pure libertarian capitalism has succeeded in absence of all centralized govt control. maybe the best solution is blend of socialism and capitalist market economy. some of the european countries have created quite nice conditions for their citizens.

mtgoat666 - 10-28-2011 at 10:59 AM

never measure success in terms of the persistence of a govt or the oligarchs.

success should be measured in terms of the success of the most disadvantaged.

TMW - 10-28-2011 at 11:01 AM

Yea, Greece is doing very well. Italy and Spain not far behind. Ireland in the mix somewhere.

mtgoat666 - 10-28-2011 at 11:17 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by TW
Yea, Greece is doing very well. Italy and Spain not far behind. Ireland in the mix somewhere.


compare the human poverty index of spain vs USA.

spain looks like a better place relative to USA.

Cypress - 10-28-2011 at 11:27 AM

Once more!:lol: Liberals aren't ignorant, they just believe a lot that is untrue.;D

Iflyfish - 10-28-2011 at 12:46 PM

Cypress

"Once more! Liberals aren't ignorant, they just believe a lot that is untrue."

Saying that something is untrue with out offering refutation of the points in contention is simply offering an opinion. We all have opinions we can't all have different facts.

Iflyfish

Barry A. - 10-28-2011 at 02:16 PM

Fish said, "If this is true then the inverse is also true. You have never seen an example of a Capitalist System really working with out liberal amounts of Socialist/Communist elements in place."

-----and there in lies the BIG problem------we (righties and lefties) define "success" differently!!!

I have been led to believe, and do believe, that the USA is the most successful Country on Earth, throughout all of history. We are a magnet, or at least we always have been until lately. Of course no "system" is perfect, but we come the closest, so far, IMO. My family started with nothing----just my Mom, me, and my sister-----and we ALL made it just fine, using diferent methods, but all accomplished the same relative success utilizing all the advantages this Country gave us. In my case, I used the Stock Market.

I, and my family, have no wish to change things in this Country as it "worked" for us. It can "work" for anyone if they look around, utilize the advantages and skills they have at their disposal, and work hard at it. It is a lot easier here in the USA to do that than in most (all?) other Countries. As for Europe, I and my family have no wish to live in a society such as Europe---------that is scary, and so obviously unsustainable.

The Socialism that has slowly crept into our USA society WILL be our undoing, as it too is UNSUSTAINABLE.

Barry

Cypress - 10-28-2011 at 02:52 PM

Iflyfish, Yea, the old facts vrs. opinions inigma. I operate in my reality and you operate in yours. We'll soon see who's reality is, in fact, real.:lol:

MitchMan - 10-28-2011 at 03:32 PM

David K and others are framing the wrong question. The issue is not whether socialism/communism is successful at being a viable economy or not, nor is the issue whether or not one can find a socialist/communist regime that succeeded at redistribution anywhere it was tried.

The real issue is whether or not our economic system, as it has been since 1980, is untowardly biased in favor of the top in such a way that is squeezing the middle class and increasing the ranks of the poor while the top is garnering a lopsided share of income and wealth.

Identifying the failures of our economy, fixing those failures and that lopsided bias so that the working class, the 95% of the population that does most all the work that produces products for consumption, can earn an income that will enable them to afford and consume what they produce.

Right now, our economy, since 1980, has continually gotten worse and the result is a lopsided concentration of wealth and income at the top not seen since the depression. That lopsidedness is what is hurting our economy, and it is what is the foundation of the current great recession the we find ourselves in and which we exported to the rest of the world.

To approach this issue by asking "...where can you cite an example of the Socialist/Communist System really working ...?? " is taking the discussion in the wrong direction. Whether or not one can find such an example is irrelevant. The issue is not between only two possible approaches, e.g., socialism/communism Vs our US market based capitalistic economy. To those of you who continually posit the contention inherent in these types of questions that if you are unsatisfied with our current US economy, then you must be a socialist/communist, that is simply a ruse and a cheap deflection.

The issue is, what are we going to do about the untoward bias in our economy that has led to the lopsided concentration of wealth and income at the top and which has also led to this great recession?

The rewards at the top should be more balanced with the rewards of the rest of us. That way the working class could afford to consume what it produces. Right now that is not the case and the whole economy is suffering. A better balance and lack of bias would be healthier for the economy, healthier for the poeple as a whole, and would reduce the frequency and depths of the boom and bust tendency of our market economy. There are definitely ways to have prevented the bust of 2007/8 and there are definitely ways for the dysfunctional bias in favor of the top to be corrected for good, all within a market based capitalistic economy.

One of the obvious problems is that there is way too much money in politics which has enabled certain monied interests to have way too much influence in government and policy. These policies have allowed the realization of moral hazards reflected in Wall Streets' behavior and which led to this latest economic disaster which has wrecked main street and enriched Wall Street all at the expense of the working class, which, BTW, is you and me.

[Edited on 10-28-2011 by MitchMan]

Barry A. - 10-28-2011 at 03:51 PM

Mitch said----------"The rewards at the top should be more balanced with the rewards of the rest of us. That way the working class could afford to consume what it produces. Right now that is not the case and the whole economy is suffering. A better balance and lack of bias would be healthier for the economy, healthier for the poeple as a whole, and would reduce the frequency and depths of the boom and best tendency of our market economy. There are definitely ways to have prevented the bust of 2007/8 and there are definitely ways for the dysfunctional bias in favor of the top to be corrected for good, all within a market based capitalistic economy. "



Hmmmmmmm, and I say, "ok Mitch------lay them out." So far everything I see from those who want "change" doesn't impress me as reality.

Barry

[Edited on 10-28-2011 by Barry A.]

Cypress - 10-28-2011 at 03:55 PM

MitchMan, Our society;politically, economically, racially, religiously and by every other factor is becoming more bipolar. Our president preaches class warfare. Both houses of Congress are disfunctional. And the Supreme Court? We can only reach for a better day. And that day will come in Nov. 2012.

MitchMan - 10-28-2011 at 04:15 PM

Got to go for now Barry, Cypress, David K, but I am coming back with a vengeance. I look forward to answering your question Barry. Just completed 6 paragraphs and hit something on this darn laptop and lost it. Don't go away, I am coming back at you with glee. Rubbing my hands with anticipation.
MitchMan

[Edited on 10-28-2011 by MitchMan]

Barry A. - 10-28-2011 at 04:34 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by MitchMan
Just completed 6 paragraphs and hit something on this darn laptop and lost it. MitchMan

[Edited on 10-28-2011 by MitchMan]


-------don't you just hate it when that happens??? Arghhhhhhhh!!!!!

OK, I am standing by. (but it's world series time, so may be some delays) :lol:

Barry

A Certainty is .....................

MrBillM - 10-28-2011 at 05:21 PM

That NOTHING said here is going to change ANYTHING.

But, it's fun and free.

Iflyfish - 10-28-2011 at 05:40 PM

One consequence of all of the resources accumulating at the top of a society without any way to redistribute that wealth is that it has historically led to revolution. What you see happening on the streets is what the beginning of a revolution looks like. I am not saying that there will be a revolution, I sincerely doubt this, however when the discontent of the people is sufficient they will demand change.

The Chinese are the oldest Capitalist economy in history, and wealth accumulated so much to the top that the people finally fomented a revolution. The people chose Communism because it offered the common man a fairer shot at having what the wealthy had. I am not an apologist for Communism, however many people in China were indeed better off than under Capitalism. Ditto for the Soviet Union and France.
In Russia many would like to restore Communism as their economy has been taken over by free boot Capitalists and a Cleptocracy. Many felt they were much better off under Communist rule.

The basic flaw in Socialism and Communism, is that by providing the basic necessities for everyone the incentive for creativity and entrepreneurial activities are stifled. Centralized planning as found in Socialist/Communist countries has proved to be inefficient and ineffective as it does not take into considerations local realities.

The basic flaw of Capitalism is that wealth accrues to a few. If methods for redistribution
are not developed some one owns the whole monopoly board and the game is over.

These people we see in the streets right now are a very real threat to the monied class in this country. They know that they are vulnerable to the have not’s if things don't get better. The Romans gave the people games to mollify them and keep them in line. They gave away flour and bread to ward off revolt. These are examples of historical measures used to address issues like we are now facing.

The anger at Wall Street and the Banks and their bail out, the reality of decreasing income for the working class, coupled with high unemployment and the loss of the American Dream of home ownership as well as disillusionment with Obama's promise to change how politics happened in this country has mobilized the anger of a great number of people and they have taken to the streets. They have taken to the streets as both Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street. If you look closely the complaints are very much the same. They are angry with the raw deal they have gotten from both their government and Corporations. They are starting to see that their individual problems are part of a larger whole. We are in that process right now.

The game is rigged and people are starting to get it. They have been screwed by deregulation (supposed to protect the public against unscrupulous, greedy interests) and by Corporations that have lowered real wages and sent their jobs overseas. They have seen Wall Street and the Banks prosper in the crisis they created while the holders of 401 K's and mortgages got screwed. Young people graduated from college to find there were no jobs. These are now aware that the future looks very dim indeed since Wall Street and the Banks took the money from their government bailed them out and left them and their children to hold the bag.

There is real anger in America now and the Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street are manifestations of that anger. The inchoate nature of both the Tea Party (Government is bad, but don’t touch my Medicare or Social Security) and the various and at times inconsistent complaint of the Occupy Wall Street folks, are simply manifestations of people taking their individual discontent to the streets.

C. Wright Mills, the father of Sociology famously said:

“Men do not usually define the troubles they endure in terms of historical change and institutional contradiction...
They do not possess the quality of mind essential to grasp the interplay of man and society, of biography and history, of self and world. They cannot cope with their personal troubles in such ways as to control the structural transformations that usually lie behind them (Mills, 1959: 3-4).

When a society becomes industrialized, a peasant becomes a worker; a feudal lord is liquidated or becomes a businessman. When classes rise or fall, a man is employed or unemployed; when the rate of investment goes up or down, a man takes new heart or goes broke. When wars happen, an insurance salesman becomes a rocket launcher; a store clerk, a radar man; a wife lives alone; a child grows up without a father. Neither the life of an individual nor the history of a society can be understood without understanding both.
Yet men do not usually define the troubles they endure in terms of historical change. . . . The well-being they enjoy, they do not usually impute to the big ups and downs of the society in which they live. Seldom aware of the intricate connection between the patterns of their own lives and the course of world history, ordinary men do not usually know what this connection means for the kind of men they are becoming and for the kinds of history-making in which they might take part. They do not possess the quality of mind essential to grasp the interplay of men and society, of biography and history, of self and world. . . “
In Mills view when personal problems become public issues then social change can occur.
In my view the single most important issue is that how government operates now is based upon Corporate agendas and the Corporations own Congress and the media that informs us. The vote of the individual doesn’t count for that much when the elected Public Servants are beholding to the Corporations that funded their elections and fill the war chests and their political party’s war chests. Corporate Media plays its role by becoming very wealthy as these campaign funds are paid to them for political advertising. This is how the game is rigged.
There are very few politicians who think outside of this Corporate/Political/Media game and really address the very real structural problems that now have a strangle hold on our political landscape and institutions. This is why a politician like Buddy Roemer is so important. He will never become elected, however if his ideas can at least affect the debates and narrative of the next election, real change, they type Obama promised but did not deliver, might actually happen. What if the Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street collectively understood how the game is rigged and how they could change it? That would be change we all could believe in.
Wouldn’t you want to see Obama and the Republican candidates confronted with who really owns them? Who pays their bills? Who funds them? It ain’t you and me I can tell you that!
I would invite you to watch and listen to these interviews with the Republican Governor, 4 times Congressman who personally founded a bank worth Billions of dollars.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V0avh34Drt8
Iflyfish

Skeet/Loreto - 10-28-2011 at 05:59 PM

Fish; You want see reveloution from this bunch of Wimps.
They are already crying about the cold Weather in Denver fresseing their little Butts.

It takes People With Guts and no fear of Death to start a Revolution.

Cypress - 10-28-2011 at 06:06 PM

A revolution? No way. The citizens have to be united against the govt. for a revolt. The situation that's brewing in the US is citizen vrs. citizen. If unresolved it will lead to civil war.

krafty - 10-28-2011 at 06:56 PM

Citizen vs. citizen? Wrong, on so many levels-I would suggest you start reading some signs out there.

MitchMan - 10-28-2011 at 07:08 PM

Bravo Iflyfish, well said.

Barry you asked me to lay it out, here is just some of it.

Quote:
Originally posted by MitchMan
One of the obvious problems is that there is way too much money in politics which has enabled certain monied interests to have way too much influence in government and policy. These policies have allowed the realization of moral hazards reflected in Wall Streets' behavior and which led to this latest economic disaster which has wrecked main street and enriched Wall Street all at the expense of the working class, which, BTW, is you and me.


Next, as those at the very top have used the economy more and gained income and wealth from the economy that has under compensated the working class, a more progressive tax structure is in order. Those, particularly in the top 2%, should be subject to a much higher marginal tax rate.

Next, close the tax loop holes that both sides of the aisle have acknowledged as not serving the economy as intended.

Next, pass legislation that corrects for tax and regulation havens offshore by redefining taxable nexus using apportionment and allocation computations similar to what the states use in combined unitary tax reporting of business entities that operate in more than one state.

Grant an amnesty of sorts to companies with offshore billions to repatriate their cash abroad, but stipulate that such cash repatriated must be invested in industry at home, penny for penny.

Next, hire more Medicare fraud auditors to crack down on Medicare fraud.

Next, overturn Citizens United.

Next, pass legislation to prohibit the "revolving door" that results in big business lobbyists being able to influence legislation buy providing cushy unbelieveably lucrative jobs, perqs, and political contribution funding as rewards to congressmen and women "playing ball" and towing the corporate directives while in office.

Next, repeal the 1999 Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA) that effectively repealed the Glass-Steagall Act of 1933. The 1933 act is what separated the commercial banks from investments banks such that Joe Public FDIC guaranteed pass book savings deposits and checking deposits could not be co-mingled with capital used in risky investment bank investments.

Encourage and make it easier for collective bargaining and unionization to return to pre 1980 levels.

Next, rewrite the Bush Drug Act that disallows Medicare from negotiating drug prices with the pharma companies and allow Medicare to negotiate for drug pricing.

Next, provide a public option for healthcare or more stringently regulate HMOs and PPOs claim payout and % of costs allowed for admin costs or mandate that a certain percentage of HMOs/PPOs be returned to non-profit organization status. Same with hospitals.

Next, Establish an auditing fund managed by the government or a regulated non-profit company or agency that pays for and monitors annual audits of publicly held corporations instead of allowing such companies to pay for and select their own auditors (I can't think of a more "conflict of interest" situation than what exists today where a public company, say like Enron, selects and hires and pays their own auditors).

Make the current Sarbanes Oxley Act even stronger than it is today and make sure that shareholders know exactly how much their CEOs are getting paid and how much their stock options can dilute their (the shareholders') stock.

Next, protect our market economy by enforcing much more rigourously than in the past 30 years, the Anti Trust laws and orderly break up the too big to fail companies, particularly in the financial sector.

Next, make sure that our regulatory agencies do not get agency head appointees that are hostile to the mission and purpose of the agency as was done during the Reagan and Bush I and Bush II years. Stop the sabotaging of our country and our government. That way our regulatory agencies can do their job effectively.

Put those dam CDOs, derivatives, particularly the CDSs (credit default swaps) under insurance regulations and reporting where they should have been all along.

Do something about those dam commodity markets and the runaway speculation that has made our food and oil prices skyrocket. Instead, our commodity markets should be in whole, or at least in part, limited to those parties that truly represent only the consumers and producers.

Put a reasonable cap on CEO and executive salaries that relate to the size of the company and profitability requiring reserves taken from the compensation to be set aside so that a recapture of the earnings can be retrieved from the withholdings in the reserve should future profitability wane within a reasonable time period. Some type of measure should be taken to eliminate as much as possible the ruinous risky short term profit motivation and moral hazard behavior that has contributed to the current economic near collapse.

Furthermore, our culture has to stop deifying wealth for wealth's sake alone and start looking at our country and its economy as a means to benefit the whole country in an economically healthy way instead of the current culture of "winner takes all" and to hell with everyone else.

How's that for starters, Barry?

[Edited on 10-29-2011 by MitchMan]

Lessons from the Revolution

MrBillM - 10-28-2011 at 09:04 PM

I especially liked the Filthy Fem Occupier who was asked if she knew the differences between North and South Korea who replied "Well, in NORTH Korea they treat the people better and pay them a decent wage".

OK.

It's amazing the wisdom to be culled from those in the streets.

MitchMan - 10-28-2011 at 10:00 PM

"Filthy Fem Occupier", nice language Mr Bill. Also, indictment by innuendo. Wow, you sure know how to build an air tight case. Nice work. Very, very persuasive... for some.

Iflyfish - 10-28-2011 at 10:26 PM

Thank you MitchMan

MrBillM
"Lessons from the Revolution
I especially liked the Filthy Fem Occupier who was asked if she knew the differences between North and South Korea who replied "Well, in NORTH Korea they treat the people better and pay them a decent wage".

Americans are terrible with geography and our test scores demonstrate that. Americans score among the lowest in the world in knowledge of geography. This person confused North and South Korea but got the distinction correct. If that is all you take away from what these fellow citizens are saying then you are going to a dinner and eating the menu.
“After more than three years of combat and nearly 2,400 U.S. military deaths in Iraq, nearly two-thirds of Americans aged 18 to 24 still cannot find Iraq on a map, a study released Tuesday showed.
The study found that less than six months after Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, 33 percent could not point out Louisiana on a U.S. map.
The National Geographic-Roper Public Affairs 2006 Geographic Literacy Study paints a dismal picture of the geographic knowledge of the most recent graduates of the U.S. education system.”http://articles.cnn.com/2006-05-02/politics/geog.test_1_map-geographic-knowledge-young-people?_s=PM:EDUCATION

There are many voices in the Occupy Wall Street Movement:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AOGMJaHHRVs
The underlying theme is inequality and there are lots of ways of saying that and many different voices who are doing just that. Some are in the Tea Party and some in Occupy Wall Street and some in the very square in Egypt where their revolutoin started.
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/need-to-know/the-daily-need/egyptian...

The Arab Spring was started by a slap in the face of one street peddler. That event triggered a revolution in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and a number of other Middle East countries. There were demonstrations in Egypt today, thousands of people marching in solidarity with the Occupy Wall Street demonstrators. On the week end there were demonstrations by thousands of people all over Europe.

Do you imagine that all members of the Tea Party are intelligent and articulate? Do you imagine that all who participate in any social movement have the same level of knowledge and motivation? You again revert to a logical fallacy by attributing to the entire Occupy Wall Street movement the lack of knowledge of this one person.

Because Herman Cain can't tell you who are the leaders of foreign nations does that mean that all Republican candidates are ignorant or uninformed? No, it doesn't. This sort of argument is the logical fallacy of ad hominum argument. If you can't come up with a cogent argument attack the person. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zmkvtfEEFT0

I have not said the Occupy Wall Street group is becoming a revolution, neither I nor you can know that at this point. I do know that the Tea Party, even with relatively small numbers has hijacked the Republican Party. There are many bricks in a building and some are cornerstones.

Those scruffy, smelly people are living on the streets, in bad weather, with poor sanitation facilities. I would say that these fellow Americans must have very important beliefs and grievances that I hope for the sake of us all are listened to and understood.

I recall how long it took in the 60's to stop the self defeating Viet Nam War. I recall clearly how the protesters were vilified. I recall that these demonstrations started out very small. I think that now in hind sight most know we were right.

1945
•First protests against U.S. involvement in Vietnam take place in 1945, when United States Merchant Marine sailors condemn the U.S. government for the use of U.S. merchant ships to transport French troops whose express purpose is to "subjugate the native population" of Vietnam. These protesters oppose the "recolonization" of Vietnam.
1963
•May 1963, the first coordinated Vietnam War protests occur in London and Denmark. These protests are mounted by American pacifists during the annual remembrance of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombings.
1964
•May 2, In the first major student demonstration against the war, hundreds of students march through Times Square in New York City, while another 700 march in San Francisco. Smaller numbers also protest in New York; Seattle; and Madison, Wisconsin.
•May 12, twelve young men in New York publicly burn their draft cards to protest the war.[1][2]
•August: the Gulf of Tonkin Incident and Gulf of Tonkin Resolution.
•In December 1964, Joan Baez led six hundred people in an antiwar demonstration in San Francisco.[3]

1970
Kent State/Cambodia Incursion Protest, Washington, D.C.: A week after the Kent State shootings, on May 4, 100,000 anti-war demonstrators converged on Washington, D.C. to protest the shooting of the students in Ohio and the Nixon administration's incursion into Cambodia. Even though the demonstration was quickly put together, protesters were still able to bring out thousands to march in the Capital. It was an almost spontaneous response to the events of the previous week. Police ringed the White House with buses to block the demonstrators from getting too close to the executive mansion. Early in the morning before the march, Nixon met with protesters briefly at the Lincoln Memorial but nothing was resolved and the protest went on as planned.
National Student Strike: more than 450 university, college and high school campuses across the country were shut by student strikes and both violent and non-violent protests that involved more than 4 million students, in the only nationwide student strike in U.S. history.
A Gallup poll in May shows that 56% of the public believed that sending troops to Vietnam was a mistake, 61% of those over 50 expressed that belief compared to 49% of those between the ages of 21–29.[24]
On June 13, President Nixon established the President's Commission on Campus Unrest. The commission was directed to study the dissent, disorder, and violence breaking out on college and university campuses.[25]
On August 24, 1970, near 3:40 a.m., a van filled with ammonium nitrate and fuel oil mixture was detonated on the University of Wisconsin-Madison in the Sterling Hall bombing.
Vortex I: A Biodegradable Festival of Life: To avert potential violence arising from planned anti-war protests, a government-sponsored rock festival was held near Portland, Oregon from August 28 to September 3, attracting 100,000 participants. The festival, arranged by the People's Army Jamboree (an ad hoc group) and Oregon governor Tom McCall, was set up when the FBI told the governor that President Nixon's planned appearance at an American Legion convention in Portland could lead to violence worse than that seen at 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago.
The Chicano Moratorium: on August 29, some 25,000 Mexican-Americans participated in the largest anti-war demonstration in Los Angeles. Police attacked the crowd with billyclubs and tear gas; two people were killed. Immediately after the marchers were dispersed, sheriff's deputies raided a nearby bar, where they shot and killed Rubén Salazar, KMEX news director and Los Angeles Times columnist, with a tear-gas projectile.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opposition_to_the_U.S._involvem...

Iflyfish

[Edited on 10-29-2011 by Iflyfish]

krafty - 10-28-2011 at 11:31 PM

Thanks, to you Iflyfish......

krafty - 10-28-2011 at 11:36 PM

we are all the 99% and this is a revolution. Wake the heck up!

Barry A. - 10-29-2011 at 08:48 AM

To Fish and Mitch------

Fish----Your first long post of 10/28 @ 5:40pm was quite brilliant, but I am sure glad that "Mills" was not one of my professors at San Diego State in the Geography and History depts. (my Major/Minor) because I would not have learned much--------I guess I am one of those without the "quality of mind" to comprehend much of what he is saying, which means his intellectual ramblings would have gone over my head, most likely, and done no good at all.

I enjoyed what YOU had to say in both your long posts, tho, and it makes a lot of sense. I am not one who reacted over the many years the way you state "most" did, but I do recognize that many did react that way----but I don't believe that "most" did.

MitchMan----------very well thought out post, I must say. Thank you. I saw about (19) different suggestions on how to improve things-------(7) I agree with---(3) I conditionally agree with----and the rest (9) I really don't agree with at all. So, I guess that is progress!?!?!?!

Unrelated subject: I got my annual flu shot 14 days ago, and have just gone thru 3 days of classic flu symptoms including spending most of that time in bed-------what's with THAT? It has me slowed down for sure, so my response to you guys is less than what it might have been. (cop-out time)

In classic poor "quality of mind" style, I have often thought that the over-complication of the reality of man's relation to each other and the earth, and society in general, does more harm than good, and seldom leads to solutions to problems, rather just mires mankind down in endless mind-games with those that disagree------but I am sure that "Mills" would not agree with me, or listen to me.

I am a simple man without a "quality mind"-------and I want simple solutions-------that mostly work, and then I want to get on with it. There will ALWAYS be those that just won't, or can't, prosper------and THAT is a problem that I don't believe society will EVER solve!

Barry

MitchMan - 10-29-2011 at 09:03 AM

Get well, Barry. I, for one, appreciate your reliably earnest input.

Barry A. - 10-29-2011 at 09:24 AM

Thanks, MitchMan------I appreciate that. When we all mostly work together, we CAN solve most of the problems we have------I am convinced of that.

First and formost the "paid" Lobbyists HAVE TO GO, along with no-limit Corp. campaign contributions, even if it takes a Constitutional Amendment-------that will be a HUGE start.

Barry

MitchMan - 10-29-2011 at 09:27 AM

Iflyfish, another excellent post; brought back memories.
Quote:
Originally posted by krafty
we are all the 99% and this is a revolution. Wake the heck up!


Spot on Krafty, spot on!

It is absolutely amazing to me that many on the right mouth support for the very policies and warped economic/political points of view that have have directly hurt them. The top 1% own 41% of the nation's wealth, the top 10% own 71% of the nation's wealth, the bottom 60% own only 4% of the wealth, and the bottom 40% have less than 1/4 of 1% of the nation's wealth. GDP has grown at an average of nearly $1/2 a trillion per year since 1980 giving nearly all that growth (and then some) to the top 1% while the average real income of the working class (bottom 97%) has decreased.

There are alot of right wingers in that 97% that persistently vote against their own best interest in spite of the glaring facts.

[Edited on 10-29-2011 by MitchMan]

David K - 10-29-2011 at 09:51 AM

The top 1% also pay 40% of the taxes!
50% of Americans now pay NO federal taxes!!

A flat tax is the most fair as everyone pays the same rate... make more money, pay more taxes, make less then pay less.

This multi-tiered nightmare has got to go... All Americans should be treated with the same respect and equality.

Getting ONE thing right

MrBillM - 10-29-2011 at 10:03 AM

The Marxist Occupation is FILLED with confused people.

They should (and probably will) put together a loop featuring those Simpletons. A feature could easily run a couple of hours and bring hilarious counterpoint to the mainstream news.

BTW, my characterization was accurate. THAT Fem WAS Disheveled and FILTHY looking.

Iflyfish - 10-29-2011 at 10:51 AM

Barry A.

Get well soon. I am on the tail end of a two week virus that similarly laid me low.

I appreciate your thoughtful posts and agree that we all do better when we all work together.

What Mills was saying was that when Personal Problems become Public Issues then real social change can happen. Examples of this are many in the history of our country. When individual women who had been disenfranchised from the vote, they joined together and the Suffragette movement was started and history was changed. Ditto the AA movement where people who are Alcoholic were one viewed as having a individual poor moral character until it was recognized that Alcoholism is a disease. People by the thousands died their individual deaths until it became clear that tobacco smoking was a public health risk and the stop smoking movement was started. When individual people of color banded together the Civil Rights Movement was launched.

We can blame those who are unemployed or poor for their plight. It is easy to do so especially if we “have ours”. It is easy to claim moral superiority over those who are part of the permanent underclass and point to examples of individuals who have risen above their circumstances. However it is difficult to apply the same logic to those whose images we saw standing in soup lines during the Great Depression, or the Dust Bowl, or in New Orleans after Katrina. We are just now coming out of a recession that went nearly as deep as the Great Depression. Those of us who have either prospered or whose situation remained relatively the same ought to pause for a moment and consider that not everyone was so blessed. We ought to accept the fact that a majority of Americans agree with the Occupy Wall Street Protestors.

“In fact, the majority supports the protesters. According to a National Journal poll, 59 percent of Americans agree with Occupy Wall Street, while 31 percent disagree — a level of support comparable to that found by a Time magazine survey last week.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/its-hard-to-hate-thes...

These people are not taking to the streets to focus our attention on Illegal Immigration, what people do with their sex organs, what women do with their uteruses (New laws are being drafted in states that would outlaw the IUD and other forms of birth control that interfere with a zygotes attachment to the womb), what industry should receive the next round of deregulation or a balanced budget plan. They have taken to the streets to confront Wall Street and the Banks for tanking their futures and leaving us with the bill. They are also confronting the corruption at the core of our Congress and the Corporate money that now owns Washington and our Public Servants.

Iflyfish

JoeJustJoe - 10-29-2011 at 11:07 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by David K
The top 1% also pay 40% of the taxes!
50% of Americans now pay NO federal taxes!!

A flat tax is the most fair as everyone pays the same rate... make more money, pay more taxes, make less then pay less.

This multi-tiered nightmare has got to go... All Americans should be treated with the same respect and equality.


It's amazing Nomad ultra conservative blind members just repeat things that other crazy extremists in the GOP, aka nut "tea party" say, and actually think it's true and others should believe them.

I don't know what world that David K lives on, but it's certainly not Earth, because I don't know one person who doesn't pay any taxes one way or another.

It's a shame the " Tax Policy Center" reported 47 percent of Americans don't pay any taxes, and then the right-wingers jumped on that saying "see it's true the rich pay all the taxes and pay for welfare of those poor lazy people who don't want to work.

The tax policy is talking about Federal taxes, and tax credits which give the impression that half Americans aren't paying taxes. The tax credits reduces the taxes a little bit different than tax loopholes the ultra rich is very familiar with and use all the time.

The fact is the 47 percent of Americans that supposedly isn't paying any taxes....Do pays payroll taxes, state and local taxes. The middle class and poor also pay taxes when they go to the store to buy things from stores like "Home depot" or go out and eat dinner. You can't get away from paying taxes.

Flats taxes favor the rich disproportionally and that's why you see ultra rich fat cats like Steve Forbes calling for flax taxes. Herman Cain's stupid 999 plan which everybody hates including the GOP Candidates would raise taxes on 84 percent of all Americans according independent analysis including the "Tax Center policy" Republicans quote all the time. Cain is a typical Republican and is only looking out for the ultra rich.

Everybody pays taxes. Here is a graph that shows all tax brackets paying taxes in proportion to their income.

Ateo - 10-29-2011 at 11:08 AM

Iflyfish rules.

Iflyfish - 10-29-2011 at 11:11 AM

David K

"The top 1% also pay 40% of the taxes!
50% of Americans now pay NO federal taxes!!

A flat tax is the most fair as everyone pays the same rate... make more money, pay more taxes, make less then pay less."

Your stats don’t add up:
Who Pays Income Taxes and How Much?
Tax Year 2009
Percentiles Ranked by AGI AGI Threshold on Percentiles Percentage of Federal Personal Income Tax Paid
Top 1% $343,927 36.73
Top 5% $154,643 58.66
Top 10% $112,124 70.47
Top 25% $66,193 87.30
Top 50% $32,396 97.75
Bottom 50% <$32,396 2.25
Note: AGI is Adjusted Gross Income
Source: Internal Revenue Service

http://ntu.org/tax-basics/who-pays-income-taxes.html

Guess who takes it in the shorts under a flat tax, hint, it ain’t the top 1%!!!
http://www.nationofchange.org/cain-s-plan-minimum-wage-earne...
The graduated income tax exists so that the burden of taxation is spread out over the population based upon their income. Those who make more profit more from the benefits purchased by our collective tax dollars. No one gets rich in this country on their own.

Elizabeth Warren explains this very clearly:
http://boingboing.net/2011/09/23/elizabeth-warren-explains-w...

We do agree that the tax code, as written and modified to protect the top 1% and Corporations from paying their fair tax burden, ought to be changed to eliminate corporate welfare and loop holes.

Iflyfish

Barry A. - 10-29-2011 at 11:44 AM

Fish------either I am reading your "chart" wrong, or the "chart" IS showing that about 50% of the tax payers (the top 50%) are paying almost all the taxes.

Where am I going wrong here?

I listen to Eliz. Warren, and I read her stuff---------all pure poppy-c-ck as near as I can tell, and a near complete mis-interpretation of the facts.

Barry

MitchMan - 10-29-2011 at 11:46 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by David K
The top 1% also pay 40% of the taxes!
50% of Americans now pay NO federal taxes!!

A flat tax is the most fair as everyone pays the same rate... make more money, pay more taxes, make less then pay less.

This multi-tiered nightmare has got to go... All Americans should be treated with the same respect and equality.


I was waiting for someone to take that position. You're the lucky guy.

Flash! Wealth and consumption ARE NOT LINEAR! Human behavior is NOT LINEAR! You just haven't thought through what you already know. Ofen times, in the real world, things are NOT LINEAR. That is the major, major flaw in your argument.

The only waya flat tax would make any real sense in the real world and have any possibility of being 'fair' is if EVERY BODY HAD THE SAME INCOME, and that isn't going to happen any time soon.

Just to illustrate, ever watch a really tall tree fall? Notice how long it takes to fall and lie flat on the ground, yet, a two inch tall match will fall almost instantly? Ever drop an ant from 5 feet above the ground and notice the ant is not harmed at all, yet if you were to drop an elephant to the ground from a proportionate distance to the ant's 5 foot fall that the elephant would be splattered? NOT EVERYTHING IS LINEAR in the real world. Many, many things in economics are NOT LINEAR.

Most all humans consume and require approximately the same quantity of food, shelter, and clothing. Most all humans, on the average, are similar in strength, intelligence, and metabolism. And, most all humans are within a very specific range of size, amount of sleep required, amount of physical and energy levels produced. And, ofcourse, there are only 24 hours in a day. All these attributes are basically LINEAR. What is very non-linear is our skewed and lopsided economy, the range of incomes and wealth are multiple times different. At the top income and wealth levels, exponentially different. That's not LINEAR! And, it just so happens that those with extremely high incomes (top 2%, certainly the top 1%, absolutely for the top 1/10 of 1%) and net worth got that lopsided income and wealth by successfully "arranging" things in their favor which most often resulted in being able to inordinately benefit from the economy and the labor of the many, both directly and indirectly, and thereby inordinately exponentially benefitting from the economy. And, that is NON-LINEAR.

Ever hear of the widely acknowledged principle in "Engel's Law"? It states that as personal income goes up, the person consumes less of a proportion of their income in food. The field of economics has extended that concept to be one of the main bases for understanding consumption.

For example, for those lucky Americans that own their home, the equity in the home is their largest source and proportion of their net worth and the price is usually multiples of the household's annual income. Bill Gates' home cost $147 million is about 1/4 of 1% of his net worth. David K, ask yourself, what is the proportion of your home to your networth. Maybe, just maybe you will start to get the idea. However, knowing how the right wing mind commonly works, it is doubtful. Facts and logic usually isn't persuasive enough, it usually takes a catchy simple slogan, and the slogan must be repeated often by people around you.

This NON-LINEAR characteristic of our skewed economy that lopsidedly rewards the few at the top at the expense of the working class by the economy's overcharging and underpaying the working class, and thereby siphoning off excessive wealth and income from the production of and by the many. As I have written before, this lopsided concentration of wealth and income at the top has left the working class without enough money to pay for the consumption of what they produced. That's a bad thing, David K, not a good thing. The economy needs to be more in balance. It's being out of balance is the malaise inherent in the great recession we find ourselves in. Unless, you don't think that we are in a recession.

The problem with the economy is lack of consumer demand, not lack of available investment money. Businesses are sitting on $2.5 Trillion, and there is another $1.2 Trillion overseas. How is it that Americans have worked hard enough to produce and support a GDP that has grown for the last thirty years, the wealthy have gotten profanely wealthy, corporate earnings continue to break records, yet the working class doesn't have enough money to buy necessiities and the bottom 60% only have 4% of the wealth, and 50 million can't afford healthcare ... an absolute necessity?

In view of the linear sameness of the human race and the lopsided operation of our economy inordinately and ruinously favoring the wealthy, your concept of a a flat tax is an abomination. You don't have a clue to what is fairness. A flat tax that would generate the same revenues would tax someone $300,000 at the same rate that the bottom 50% would be taxed at. David K, did you know that the bottom 50% of taxpayers have an average income of under $16,000? You are going to tax them at 9% and you are going to tax the top 2% at 9% (break point = $250,000 annual income) and tax the top 1% at 9% (break point annual income of $344,000, average for the top 1% is $960,000) and the top 1/10 of 1% (breakpoint = $1.7 Million, average income for the top 0.1%=$8 Million). How marooonic.

The top earners were able to get inordinate benefits from the skewed economy, more than they can consume, more than they need, actually, more than they earned. They were just successful at "arranging" finances in their favor. You can't tell me that a hedge fund manager who made over $100 million in one year actually "earned" it. The working class "earns" most all their money, and the vast working class produced most all of the goods and services with their own hands and minds. Can't say that most of the top 2% "earned" most of their money. They were successful at gaming the economy to legally "arrange" for that income to flow into their pockets. Even the IRS makes a definitional distinction between "earned income" and "unearned income".

Don't make the assumptive mistake that I am against a market capitalist economy. I am absolutely for such an economy. But not a skewed one. Also, I am not at all against people earning more than one another. A reasonalbe disparity in income serves to provide the incentives toward efficiency, work motivation, increased productivity, and much needed creativity and invention. The operative word is "reasonable" and in a great economy, there is plenty of room for income and wealth disparity to a "reasonable" level that would provide all the incentives a society could want and need all the while appropriately and adequately compensating the working class with more than the bare livable wage.

Did you know that for the top 1%, the average amount of income left over after paying federal income taxes was $923,000? Tax the bottom 50% that had an average of only $14,900 on income BEFORE income tax? What, are you crazy David K?

David K - 10-29-2011 at 11:48 AM

gee, sorry I was wrong... the top 1% don't pay 40% of all America's taxes... just 36.73%!!! :lol::lol::lol:

excuuuuse me for rounding up! :light:

Barry A. - 10-29-2011 at 11:49 AM

Fish---to carry on with my rant--------if the top 50% are paying most of the taxes, how is it that you think that they are "not paying their fair share"??? Seems to me that they ARE paying for the infrastructure they use "to get rich", and then some. !?!?!?!?!?

Barry

Barry A. - 10-29-2011 at 12:01 PM

MitchMan-------

My Gawd, Mitch, what you are talking about is in reality SOCIALISM. And you think we in this Nation can make that work out???? It never has any place else, and no Country can afford it even if it would work, and personally I don't want to live in a SOCIALIST society, period!!!

Again, I am with David K on this one!!! (I am astounded at what I hear from you, and it IS revealing)

Barry

jakecard - 10-29-2011 at 12:23 PM

On illegal immigration nothing distinguishes Buddy Roemer from the majority of his Republican colleagues. Roemer is in favor of sealing the border and he opposes amnesty:

http://www.issues2000.org/2012/Buddy_Roemer_Immigration.htm

Latinos on the other hand have mixed views on what to do about illegal immigrants, although an overwhelming majority (81%) oppose wholesale deportation:

http://pewhispanic.org/reports/report.php?ReportID=128


(And just as an aside, if you think Buddy Roemer is any different from other politicians who want to legislate marriage, then please look again.)






Jake

MitchMan - 10-29-2011 at 12:27 PM

yes, Barry, the top 50% pay all the income taxes. The economy is skewed to wildly over reward those at the very top and under reward the bottom 60% for sure and most of the bottom 80%. In such a skewed economy, it only makes sense to tax those at the top more. I mean, it makes numbers sense.

When you take into account the actual similar (linear) consumption capacity of humans and the disparity of incomes, the reasonable mind has to take pause. The bottom 80% are not getting their just compensation/income commensurate with their contribution to production to the point that the bottom 60%, 50% for sure, cannot afford to buy necessities and that the wealth that they produced is disproportionately finding its way to the top where they cannot consume it all and, since these at the top are successful at using more of the economy's and country's resources and getting so much income out of the economy that they cannot use it all, this excess should be taxed at a higher rate.

They are successful at using the economy more and getting more money out of it, so much money that they have an excess they cannot consume. That would be fine if they weren't getting much of their excess from the bottom 80% that actually created the wealth with their own hands and minds. But, that's where it is coming from. GDP and already created wealth and income are zero-sum games.

I am for a more balanced economy, that is not what we have right now. In fact, were are the second worst offenders of disparity of wealth in the world, worse than corrupt Mexico. That aught to give you some pause. Hopefully.

I think that the fact that the top 1% pay 40% of the taxes but that they have 40% of the nation's wealth and the fact that the top 10% pay 70% of the taxes while they have 71% of the nation's wealth is getting close to a numeric match up should make you feel better. But, keep in mind, that the wealth that the top 1% and 10% have, much of it is excess wealth that they cannot consume after paying for a very, very fat lifestyle. The bottom 40% have NO NETWORTH at all and the bottom 60% have only 4% after living a meager and often lower than bare subsistance life style! You want to tax them? What's the matter with you?

[Edited on 10-29-2011 by MitchMan]

MitchMan - 10-29-2011 at 12:37 PM

False claim, Barry. False claim. Not in any way calling for or promoting a socialist economy. You need to look up socialism in detail. Look up formal economics of a market society as well so that you can speak intelligently about your accusation. Then, come back and prove, point by point your contention that I am talking about "Socialism". Read very carefully,

When you make accusations like that, the burden of proof is in your court. I am asking you to live up to fair play responsibility. You make an accusation, prove or retract. To do otherwise would be wreckless, careless, shows a lack of integrity, and is irresponsible. If you fail to meet your responsibility and cop out, well, that would be very revealing about you, Barry. Don't disappoint.

[Edited on 10-29-2011 by MitchMan]

Cypress - 10-29-2011 at 01:08 PM

Socialism is a losing proposition. Has never worked. It's the rich against the poor game. Anybody that has more than me is rich. I'm due some of your's, and the govt. is gonna help me get it. Next thing you know the mob will be chasing folks that have managed their finances down the street. Might even be similar to the end of Kaddafy.

Skeet/Loreto - 10-29-2011 at 01:09 PM

Gentlemen and Scholars and you too Mitch!

It is not the"Who Pays Taxes bunch" but Where do those Taxes go and who has the Control.
THE PEOPLE OR THE GOVT ?


The People of this Great County have become so Greedy that they have lost the ability to use the Election Process to change things in the Govt.They become more and more depend on Govt Programs to take care pf all their needs.

the 911 Emergency, the So called School consulars, Emergency Services, and many others.

We must start thinking and acting in a Positive Manner and start changing our local Congressmen. It can be done!!!

MitchMan - 10-29-2011 at 01:19 PM

Socialism is an economic system. Not talking about that, not supporting it, never have, not here, not anywhere. But, Cypress and Barry, you are barking up the wrong tree, and jumping to an unsupported conclusion about what was written here. Please, read more carefully.

Wow, Skeet, I agree with every single word you just wrote. Government, actually, politics has to be revised here. Simply stated, and everything that I have written in this thread would be remedied by getting money out of politics. Period.

Cypress - 10-29-2011 at 01:33 PM

MitchMan, Barking up the wrong tree? Which tree?:D

mtgoat666 - 10-29-2011 at 01:36 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by David K
The top 1% also pay 40% of the taxes!
50% of Americans now pay NO federal taxes!!

A flat tax is the most fair as everyone pays the same rate... make more money, pay more taxes, make less then pay less.


not true, dk. not fair. you are a good example. you don't make much money as a sprinkler guy, and under flat tax of cain, you would pay
9% fed income tax
17% sales tax (9% fed + 8% state)
10% state income tax
1.5% property tax

at the end of the day, you, DK, would be paying much higher proportion of your income to taxes than "rich" people.

flat taxes result in poor paying highest percentage of their income as taxes, because they use a higher proportion of their income to buy basic items like food, clothes, etc.

if rich people try to sell you on flat income and sales tax with no cap gains tax, you poor and middle class are suckers to accept it.

the current progressive tax system is actually working pretty well. dk, why do you personally want to pay higher taxes??????????

Cypress - 10-29-2011 at 02:00 PM

mtgoat666,You're a tax expert?:biggrin: Who would've thunk it?:biggrin:

Iflyfish - 10-29-2011 at 02:07 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Barry A.
Fish---to carry on with my rant--------if the top 50% are paying most of the taxes, how is it that you think that they are "not paying their fair share"??? Seems to me that they ARE paying for the infrastructure they use "to get rich", and then some. !?!?!?!?!?

Barry


You are correct in your refutation of my interpretation of the statistics. My error.

I think that MitchMan much better addressed this issue than my post did.

I appreciate your correction of my post.

Iflyfish

Barry A. - 10-29-2011 at 02:18 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by MitchMan
Socialism is an economic system. Not talking about that, not supporting it, never have, not here, not anywhere. But, Cypress and Barry, you are barking up the wrong tree, and jumping to an unsupported conclusion about what was written here. Please, read more carefully.

Wow, Skeet, I agree with every single word you just wrote. Government, actually, politics has to be revised here. Simply stated, and everything that I have written in this thread would be remedied by getting money out of politics. Period.


I agree with Skeet (as usual) too.

MitchMan--------ok, I very rapidly searched "Socialism", "Zero-sum game", and "formal economics of a market society"------could not find anything on "formal econ. of a market society", but lots on the other two.

Yeah, right----like I am going to understand all that????

The most cogent of the look-ups was the one on Socialism, and I concluded that much falls under the heading "Socialism", but the common theme to me was "state controlled", like, the Government. What you described above, like I said previously, sounds like Socialism, walks like Socialism, and talks like Socialism--------thus I concluded it WAS SOCIALISM. (duh)

I want no part of that. My wife and I go to a lot of garage sales----we buy things that we resell on the internet for markups of like 300% to 1000%, and my wife makes a respectable amount of money from that----------are we cheating those that we buy from??? I get the impression from you that we may be. I don't think so------the person at the garage sale gets what they want and expect, and we get what we want and expect------ that is certainly not equal but we both are happy. Now if somebody came along (a lefty, for instance) and told that garage sale person what we sold the stuff for, well they would be REALLY upset (why, I don't know, but they would)---we both got what we wanted and expected so nobody would be upset, but now that the lefty has stirred up a hornets nest, NOW people are upset. :rolleyes: That's how business works, much of the time. Nobody (the 'seller' or the 'buyer') in their right mind would expect the transaction to be equal monetarily, or they would never make or propose the transaction in the first place, would they??

TAXES: I want everybody to be involved in paying taxes so that they have a stake in this Country, and will pay more attention, and VOTE, and because it seems "fair" to me. And if THAT costs me a little more in taxes, then so be it. I much prefer the Steve Forbes FLAT TAX concept (and always have), but was very excited that Herman Cain introduced his "999 plan" to begin the discussion and start the process for totally changing the present tax system. Hopefully that happens. I dislike the very idea of a "progressive tax system" as it is creeping socialism, to me anyway, and unfair, and counter to human nature, and I have long seen that as a route to the ruin of any society, for all the reasons stated ad infinidum by the Right..

(man, that 'economics theory' stuff is exhausting to read and try to comprehend--------I have always been 'mathamatically challenged')

It is so easy to make money the old fashion way, and WISELY AND UNEMOTIONALLY invest it in the Stock Market and live the good life later on-----you know, the AMERICAN DREAM, and all that!?!?!?!? Lots of ways to get there, but I chose this way.

Barry

Cypress - 10-29-2011 at 02:19 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Iflyfish
Quote:
Originally posted by Barry A.
Statistics? I'll just settle for facts!!!

Barry


You are correct in your refutation of my interpretation of the statistics.


Iflyfish

Barry A. - 10-29-2011 at 02:59 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Cypress
Quote:
Originally posted by Iflyfish
Quote:
Originally posted by Barry A.
Statistics? I'll just settle for facts!!!

Barry


You are correct in your refutation of my interpretation of the statistics.


Iflyfish


Cypress--------I don't recall that as a "quote" of mine in this context????? There must be some mistake------------?????

Barry

Iflyfish - 10-29-2011 at 03:41 PM

Barry A.

Fellow Nomads

You seem to forget that there is no pure Socialist, Communist or Capitalist State. All economies are mixed economies; the issue is how these systems are integrated.

You may want more of one and less of the other but all economies contain elements of Socialism and Capitalism.

In a pure Capitalist state there would be no public roads, public sewers, public water systems, public fire departments, public libraries, public police, public military etc. These enterprises would all be private. I very much doubt that any on this board would want to live in such a system.

Iflyfish

Cypress - 10-29-2011 at 03:45 PM

Barry A, Your's or mine?:yes:

Cypress - 10-29-2011 at 03:56 PM

Iflyfish, Right! We're to thank socialism for the good things of modern society. And all the bad aspects? We'll just blame the capitalists. Life isn't that simple. But far too many people are.:bounce:

Iflyfish - 10-29-2011 at 04:02 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Barry A.
Quote:
Originally posted by Cypress
Quote:
Originally posted by Iflyfish
Quote:
Originally posted by Barry A.
Statistics? I'll just settle for facts!!!

Barry


You are correct in your refutation of my interpretation of the statistics.


Iflyfish


Cypress--------I don't recall that as a "quote" of mine in this context????? There must be some mistake------------?????

Barry


I appreciate your clarification of this. We don't need straw men to burn in this particular discussion, which is complicated enough. I try to take responsibility for my errors in thinking and reporting of facts. I would hope that others would do the same.

Iflyfish

Cypress - 10-29-2011 at 04:14 PM

Barry, My apologies. You and Iflyfish can now make nicee-nicee.:lol:

Barry A. - 10-29-2011 at 04:17 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Cypress
Barry, My apologies. You and Iflyfish can now make nicee-nicee.:lol:


Thanks, Cypress-----------sure beats yelling, and calling each other idiots, at least it does in my book. :lol: ( "nicee-nicee"?????? :o )

Barry

Iflyfish - 10-29-2011 at 04:24 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Cypress
Iflyfish, Right! We're to thank socialism for the good things of modern society. And all the bad aspects? We'll just blame the capitalists. Life isn't that simple. But far too many people are.:bounce:


So then you do understand that our system is a mixed system with Socialist and Capitalist components. I appreciate your acknowledging this fact.

I would invite you to find any quote of mine on any post I have ever made on Baja Nomads where I say that Socialism is responsible for the good things of modern society. And all the bad aspects.

I have stated and will state again that the inherant flaw of Socialism is that it that it saps generativity and creativity. I have further stated that central planning has been demonstrated to not be an effective way of managing production.

I have also stated that the inherant flaw of Capitalism is that wealth accrues to the few and can lead to revolution when the under class is not able to afford the goods and services they require. The danger of an imbalanced Capitalist system is revolution i.e. the French, Chinese and the Soviet revolutions. Before all of these revolutions wealth had accumulated at the top and the poor rose up against the inequality.

You and I grew up in a time of peace and prosperity after WWII that was unprecidented in history. The economic engines of production of our chief economic rivals, Germany and Japan, lay in rubble leaving America without an ecomomic or productive rival. This produced the greatest period of economic growth in the history of the US. Returning soldiers needed homes, washer/dryers, cars and all of those things that went with being middle class. Trade Unions bargained for a living wage for workers and a solid middle class emerged. We ate the heart of the water melon.

Unfortunately the situation today is much different. China and India now are the hubs of production as their populations gain employement and in turn require the material goods that we did after WWII. The USofA is in decline relative to these countries and their economies. A new reality faces us, or rather faces the next generation. I have mine as do you but alas the prime affect will be on the next generation.

Over the past 30 years we have engaged in three primary wars; Viet Nam, Iraq I, Iraq II and Afghanistan.

I lived through Viet Nam and served my country as a Conscientious Objector. What I saw happen as a result of that war was that it now requires two parents to work in order to support a family. In the day of our greatest prosperity one working parent could support a family.

The cost of the Iraq wars and Afghanistan war have been "off the books" so the real cost has been hidden. It will be our children and grandchildren who will be forced to pay for these misadventures. I believe that combined with the pillage of our economy by the Banks and Wall Street that the people now on the streets are seeing what their lives will be like if things continue as they go. Personaly I don't know if we can pull out of this with a middle class intact.

I travel a lot in Mexico and have done so for the past 50 years and see how the USofA can easily look like Mexico does with its very wealthy and very poor. However I do see in my latest travels to both the mainland and Baja that there is a growing prosperity and the emergance of a middle class. Good for Mexico.

Iflyfish

MitchMan - 10-29-2011 at 04:32 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Cypress
Socialism is a losing proposition. Has never worked. It's the rich against the poor game. Anybody that has more than me is rich. I'm due some of your's, and the govt. is gonna help me get it. Next thing you know the mob will be chasing folks that have managed their finances down the street. Might even be similar to the end of Kaddafy.


What tree? Are you kidding? Your post addresses Socialism. Not talking about socialism, not proposing socialism as a remedy to our current screwed up,right wing hijacked economy. That tree. Your positing an argument against socialism as your response to certain posts in this thread, specifically my post since you repeated my use of the word "tree". Aren't you paying attention?

You go on to state "it's a rich against the poor game". Never advocated pitting anybody against anybody. My message is that the structure and outcome of our economic system dsyfunctionally over rewards the rich at the expense of the working class and the economic health itself. You obviously suffer from some imagined persecution complex. Your inferences that what is written is an advocation of pitting one class against the other is a product of your own imagination, off-track logic and inability to read carefully. To reiterate in hopes that you will finally get it, the problem is that the economy is structured and skewed to benefit the few at the top at the expense of the working class (the rest of the population, the bottom 96 to 98% of us) and at the expense of a healthy economy.

Rich/wealthy people for the greater most part are good, solid Americans, good citizens, disciplined, usually intelligent, generally quite moral. The economy has been hijacked by certain, I repeat, certain few and powerful factions (a vastly small % of the overall population). With great amounts of money, certain individuals, certain companies and their CEOs and executives employing money in the hands and control of lobbyists that they dispatch, have been able to influence legislation and policy with the "revolving door" and political contributions and perqs that have succeeded in turning the heads of legislators and government agencies and yes, even presidents, to do their bidding. These factions have been extremely successful in their pursuit at skewing the economy. I would say it is just about a "fait accomplis" at this point. It has hurt you, me, and everyone else in this forum. The wrong tree you are wrongly climbing is positing that those that disagree with you are pitting one class against the other. You are off the mark, and dammit, Cypress, it just insn't as simple as you would like to make it.

Cypress, do you call Hedge fund managers that have made $100s of Millions of dollars in one year gambling with depositors' money on risky credit default swaps that crashed, losing their companies and investors millions and yet they still got their bonuses as, to quote you, "... folks that have managed their finances..."? I don't. Do you?

What tree? Are you kiddng me?

Barry A. - 10-29-2011 at 04:39 PM

http://www.marketminder.com/s/fisher-investments-us-manufact...

My daughter-in-law, a CA teacher, is the sole breadwinner in her family as my son is a stay-at-home dad taking care of the two little girls. They live in a nice 3 bdrm, 2 bath home w/ a 2 car garage that they are buying in a nice neighborhood in Chico, CA. They own an SUV and a Toyota Camry, both about 7 years old. They don't have many "extras", but then none of us did either at their age, and believe me they have WAY MORE than I did at that age.

I am just saying--------------don't believe everything you hear.

Barry

MitchMan - 10-29-2011 at 04:48 PM

Barry,
I appreciate your doing some research. That will help alot. Man, I find it fascinating stuff, I can't get enough of it. It's all so relevant.

Where one can go sideways in all this is by going on "impressions" and what "seems" to be the case. That will quickly get you off track and going in the wrong direction from truth and fact. As a science and math guy, I have learned that many things in the real world work in a progression of a body of developing, evolving fact going from the simple and progressively becoming more complex. Like math, if you miss a part of a buiding block in theory, it is impossible to go forward. It's like a chain with a missing link.

Economics in not a simple "impression".

MitchMan - 10-29-2011 at 04:51 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Iflyfish
Barry A.

Fellow Nomads

You seem to forget that there is no pure Socialist, Communist or Capitalist State. All economies are mixed economies; the issue is how these systems are integrated.

You may want more of one and less of the other but all economies contain elements of Socialism and Capitalism.

In a pure Capitalist state there would be no public roads, public sewers, public water systems, public fire departments, public libraries, public police, public military etc. These enterprises would all be private. I very much doubt that any on this board would want to live in such a system.

Iflyfish


Bravo, Iflyfish, bravo. Right on target, again.

Cypress - 10-29-2011 at 05:04 PM

I'm not defending the Wall Street crooks that got a free pass. They're actually more honest than the elected officials that take contributions/gifts from lobbiest. Rich vrs. poor? You must not have been watching the news. The Dems are playing the same old game again. They're bag of tricks isn't very deep. The worst Repub candidate is better than what we now have for Prez.

Barry A. - 10-29-2011 at 05:07 PM

Here's a "fact", not an "impression"--------the MSCI WORLD INDEX on an annualized basis has returned 14.9% on average over long term up until the end of 2007--------I can't seem to find any more current data, but that "return" has got to be lower now after all the turmoil of the past 2 + years, or so. But still, that is a GREAT return. My benchmark for my portfolio is the MSCI WORLD INDEX, and my portfolio has beat the Index long term.

What's not to love?? Things are NOT as bad as the Media would have you believe. My personal experience backs that up.

Barry

MitchMan - 10-29-2011 at 05:31 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Cypress
I'm not defending the Wall Street crooks that got a free pass. They're actually more honest than the elected officials that take contributions/gifts from lobbiest.


Man, am I glad and heartened to hear you say that. Couldn't agree with you more.
Quote:
Originally posted by Cypress
Rich vrs. poor? You must not have been watching the news. The Dems are playing the same old game again. They're bag of tricks isn't very deep. The worst Repub candidate is better than what we now have for Prez.


I will admit that liberal pundits frequent use of the term rich and wealthy in describing the inequities of income and wealth, it does "sound" like a distaste for the rich and wealthy and may well contribute to adversarial tension. I wish that liberal pundits would make it clear that it is the skewed economy and the hijacked government that is the culprit and not specifically wealthy/rich people as a monolithic broad single responsible entity. I don't believe that for one second. All my clients were wealthy people and the vast majority were/are very good people. Can't blame the vast majority of them for trying and succeeding in maximizing their income and wealth through an existing economic system that was not of their specific making. Don't blame them at all; it's the system we find ourselves in, individually.

But, make no mistake, this talk of "class warfare" is solely the responsibility of the right. They are the ones that brought up the term, they are the ones using and accusing with the term, they are the ones framing it, not the left. IT is a form of right wing spin and inflamatory tactic. Very disingenuous, extremely misleading, and intellectually dishonest. Its use is a ruse and a deflection trying to take the offense when it is their skewing and hijacking of the economy in favor of a bias toward the top income earners tha is the culprit. The right wing pundits know this, and they are fiercely afraid of discovery by the general public. But, the discovery is on the way.

I am seeing the liberal pundits finallydisclosing the salient points: massive disproportionate concentration of wealth and income at the top and the resultant lack of income and wealth at the bottom. A situation that has progressively gotten worse since 1980 and really beginnng in real terms with the Reagan administration. Not opinion, the smple income tax stats of income and tax liabilities bare this out. It's a matter of objective IRS record.

The cancer in government began with the Reagan adminstration and their subvesive intent of destroying the government by defunding it, privatization, income tax emasculation, safety net cut back, deregulation by deliberately stacking government regulating agencies with department heads whose agenda it was to scrap the agency itself. Also, the complicit behavior of the government with the handouts to those in the utility and healthcare industry in compliance with the right wing's agenda of privatization.

There are specific people and specific companies that do and are responsible for the problem, past and present, and they should be singled out, identified, and disclose exactly what they are doing and what they have done. But, they are but a fraction of the wealthy and powerful, AND, there are those bad players that are not among the wealthy that are powerful politically and socially. They should be similarly outed.

An unfortunate circumstance also exists and it is that those few have succeeded in hood winking the majority of the right wing in mimicking and babboting their wrong headed messaging. They are very good at messaging and making their wrong headed notions simple, catchy, easy to understand and back it up with relentless repeated consistant broad casting in the media.

[Edited on 10-30-2011 by MitchMan]

[Edited on 10-30-2011 by MitchMan]

Cypress - 10-29-2011 at 06:14 PM

So if a dem plays the rich vrs. poor game(class warfare) and a repub. points it out, it's the repubs fault? I see! Don't forget about Halliburton, Cheney, and Bush.:lol:

Barry A. - 10-29-2011 at 06:17 PM

Mitch---------"subversive intent of destroying the government"--------are you kidding???? I am particularily offended by the term "subversive"---------the GOP has never wanted to "destroy the goverment", they just want govt. to stay as the Constitution requires it to be, and get out of the way of private enterprise to a degree necessary in order for it (and all Americans) to prosper. How is that "subversive"??? We really really beleave this stuff we spout, regardless of what you think. We don't believe that the Government is even capable of managing the economy, let alone improve it, and the latest couple of years has , once again, proven that, to us anyway. To the contrary, we think the left is actually trying to tear the existing system down, to all our detriment, and replace it with something that has been proven over and over again not to work (like the system in Europe is accomplishing). That is not "subversive" to anything but the Liberal agenda, it seems to me.

By the way, I should have added to my last post that at 14.9% annualized return, one's portfolio doubles every 5 years, I am told---------------now THAT is impressive in my book, and close to my experience.

Barry

Iflyfish - 10-29-2011 at 06:56 PM

Well said MitchMan.

What is not in dispute is that Rupert Murdock's FOX has at its head Roger Ailes. It is infomrative to read Roger Ailes bio. He worked as a media consultant for Nixon and was involved in his dirty tricks.
http://tinyurl.com/3lvy2zj

Ailes Bio:
http://theglobalrealm.com/2011/06/16/how-roger-ailes-built-t...

Roger Ailes provides talking memos to his "news" talent each day according to people who have worked there.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0418038/

FOX "News" is the most watched source of "news" in this country and has led the poles for a very long time. FOX is the source of "news" for a majority of Americans.
http://www.mediaite.com/tv/fox-news-most-watched-cable-news-...

Is it news or propoganda when a "news/entertainment" Media Corporation provides talking points for its talent?
http://www.truth-out.org/14-propaganda-techniques-fox-news-u...

http://www.outfoxed.org/

What do you think of a "news" Media Corporation directly funding political campaigns?
http://www.mediaite.com/online/news-corp-enters-into-politic...

http://www.commonblog.com/2011/05/16/hat-tip-fox-is-going-pu...

What do you think about Corporations having the same rights as human beings?
http://reclaimdemocracy.org/personhood/

What do you think about Corporations, including "News Corporations" having unlimited right to make political donations?
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/01/21/supreme-court-sid...

Is it possible that we have been the recipients of propaganda that supports Corporate interests over those of the majority of the people in the USofA?

Is it possible that Corporate Media feeds on conflict and pits us against eachother in order to take the focus off fundamental structural problems in the US, i.e. Illegal Immigration, what people do with their sex organs, womans control of their uturuses etc.?

Is it possible that it is not in Corporate Media interest to pay attention to underlying structural problems in the economy and to the fact that Public Servants now spend their time making money to fund their war chests that are then paid to Corporate Media for air time via political adds?
2-3 Billion dollars are spent each year on political advertising.
http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/12/02/about-26-billi...

Do you know who owns the airwaves?
http://www.commoncause.org/site/pp.asp?c=dkLNK1MQIwG&b=4...

Do you think it would be good to get money out of politics?
http://peopleforpolity.blogspot.com/2011/09/half-of-congress...

Iflyfish

Barry A. - 10-29-2011 at 07:16 PM

Holy Toledo, after reading most of that, Fish (and perhaps ONLY that) it's no wonder that you guys are up in arms, I guess. DUHHHHHHHHH, of course all this goes on, and there is always symphathetic "news organizations" to quote the propaganda that supports their leanings--------what else is new??? That is politics, at least that is the politics of the radicals that want their point of view presented, and the other point of view skewed and spun to their advantage. Again, DUHHHHHH.

I will stick with FOX NEWs, but watch the others closely to see what they are spinning today.

I notice that no one is addressing what I have been posting on this thread lately-------I must assume that you think me a loon, or that you don't have any answers, or that you think my personal stories are irrelevant----------so be it---------I am only trying to help in trying to show "the other side of the story", and all that. :lol:

----but, there IS another side of the story, you know. :light:

Barry

[Edited on 10-30-2011 by Barry A.]

Iflyfish - 10-29-2011 at 09:39 PM

Here is the latest on the original question:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/10/27/gop-immigration_n_1...

Iflyfish

MitchMan - 10-29-2011 at 10:42 PM

I don't think that you are a loon, Barry, I just think that you are mistaken. But, then again, you think that I am mistaken as well. What is making me chuckle right now is the realization that neither of us, nor any of us has changed our minds. After all that was written, no one is seeming to have budged.

Now, that's funny!

This article articulates the Latino Republicano

Ken Cooke - 10-29-2011 at 11:07 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by Iflyfish
Here is the latest on the original question:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/10/27/gop-immigration_n_1...

Iflyfish


This is an excellent article - explaining the Latino Republicano, Ronald Reagans compassion towards the Latino people, and now the GOP shift that has taken place. Excellent article!

Iflyfish - 10-30-2011 at 07:05 AM

Barry A

I also don't think you are avian. I have not responded to your personal story, which I find very interesting, because it is an individual story, a great story, but however a single story, like that of George Soros, who made his fortune in speculating on currency, or Rupert Murdock who made his fortune on a media empire. The issues we are addressing are macro rather than micro in scale.

There is money to be made in the stock market whether it is going up or down. The people on Wall Street who bundled the mortgages and sold them at inflated values, bet against their own instruments. There is nothing new there. I am very glad that you were smart enough to figure out how to prosper using the stock market; few of us have the knowledge or tools to accomplish this though I sure wish I had. I for one would like to spend time with you over a camp fire, your personal story and that of your family is a wonderful story. You are a reasoned and respectful person and it is always good to spend time with someone like that.

MitchMan

I have also noticed also that there has been little if any change in viewpoints expressed on this thread. I did however acknowledge that I had erred on the issue what percentage of the population pays the most taxes and I learned something in that part of the dialogue. I also have noticed that this thread has had wide readership and a spirited exchange of ideas and perspectives and this is a good thing in my view. Change takes place over time and cultural change takes even longer, witness the Civil Rights Movement, Woman's Rights etc.

It has taken the masses in this country a very long time to awaken and see what has happened to them in the last 30 years. It took decades for most people to recognize that the Viet Nam War was a mistake. We are now seeing people take to the streets over the inequality that exists in the USofA.

I have found your posts to be informative and well thought out. I notice that many people post slogans and epitaphs that masquerade as knowledge and are prone toward the personal attack. I think if you were to take a cross section of the population you would find most of those perspectives represented here. I believe that we each do have a voice and it is important to have a place and time to use that voice. Baja Nomad is providing us a forum to have an exchange of ideas and in my view this is a very good thing. People who have read this thread have been exposed to some very in-depth analysis of our current situation and that discussion has generally maintained at least a modest decorum and we have been even able to address unconscious racism while hurling few personal invectives at each other. This is better than what one can expect these days in a country that has been poisoned and polarized by a 24/7 “news” cycle that generates its audience by inflaming differences and spinning “news”. We have also been able to maintain this dialogue long enough for the original question to be answered if the polls I quoted in my last post are to be believed.

Iflyfishconmibajanomadamigos

liberal is a good word

mtgoat666 - 10-30-2011 at 07:12 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by David K
The liberals are always going to blame business (corporations) and want to take other peoples' money (taxes) so a big nanny government can take care of them and their new age projects.

Liberals believe compassion is people receiving government assistance.


dk: your statements are ludicrous hyperbole.

new age projects? :lol::lol::lol: remember that us liberals also like the old age projects like medicare and social security and human rights. as you get a few years older and start to rely on medicare and SS, you will thank us liberals for protecting your benefits and creating a humane government.

si, se puede!

MitchMan - 10-30-2011 at 08:15 AM

Barry, referring to your earlier post on page 14, I applaud your hard work, going to garage sales and engaging in pure market capitalism. Can’t find fault in that, only admiration and praise. The prospect that some may be upset with your making a profit by reselling is totally irrelevant and is their problem for not fully understanding how market capitalism really works, and there is nothing wrong at all with a pure version of market capitalism. I’m a lefty and I am not mad at your business activity and I have not read any economists, lefty or otherwise that would have any problem at all with your activity. So, your supposition of a lefty being angry with you is not a well-founded accusation on your part. It’s just another example of your willingness to “suppose, assume” your way into your own conclusions, building your own case on assumptions, not fact, then making a wrong headed conclusion which you take as fact while all along it was based on faulty assumptions of your own imagination
Quote:
Barry A.
Mitch---------"subversive intent of destroying the government"--------are you kidding???? I am particularily offended by the term "subversive"---------the GOP has never wanted to "destroy the goverment", they just want govt. to stay as the Constitution requires it to be, and get out of the way of private enterprise to a degree necessary in order for it (and all Americans) to prosper.


Do your remember one of the Reagan’s first appointees James Watt as sec. of the Interior? Before his appointment, he directed a legal foundation dedicated to fighting the Interior Department’s conservation policies with donations from wealthy ranchers, oil companies, and timber interests. This is not the only example of Reagan’s deliberately subversive appointments. Reagan similarly appointed a rancher to run the Bureau of Land Management, a former coal executive to run the strip mining office, and a lumber industry lawyer to run the Forest Service. Each had been deliberately hand picked for their hostility and indifference to the respective agency. William Bennett, Reagan’s boy as Secretary of Education, wanted to WITHHOLD resources from public schools in order to force his agenda of vouchers and religious schools to replace public education.

Reagan appointed Ann Gorsuch to run the EPA; she had no experience in environmental issues. In two years she wrecked the agency by stripping the agency’s efficient and experienced employees of their authority and concentrating power in the hands of her cronies who she got from the ranks of industry lobbyists. She reduced personnel down by 80 to –90% in one year by firings and demotions at a time when the workload was increasing. Also, Reagan stopped actions against air polluters and reversed actions already settled.

Reagan replaced Volker with Greenspan because Volker wasn’t enough of a deregulator and wouldn’t play ball. As we all know, Greenspan has been fully discredited and admitted his egregious flaws publicly and he apologized for the wreckage he spurned due to his reckless monetary policies and mismanagement and complete dereliction of duty to regulate as FED chairman that directly contributed a great deal to the 2007/8 crisis.

There are other examples of right wing sabotage: the undermining of the FDA, Dept of Labor, OSHA, Consumer Product Safety Commission, The Mine Safety and Health Administration, The Department of Health and Human Services, The SEC, etc., etc., etc. I could go on for months on this with regard to the deliberate destruction of the federal government from within by Nixon, Reagan, Bush I and II by using privatization (rewarding their political contribution base), hostile appointees, defunding the government by tax cuts and government cut backs to only specific gov agencies, and reckless deregulation (again rewarding their political contribution base). But, just one more, remember John Bolton? The guy Bush II appointed as Ambassador to the UN… a guy who is on record as despising the UN.

Barry, there are so many examples of right wing administrations’ deliberate, express and explicit actions to undermine and destroy the federal government, our country’s government, from within that a mere sampling is sufficient to emaciate your defense to the contrary and show your taking “offense” is without real foundation and not in sync with the realities at hand; certainly misplaced sentiment in view of the preponderance of facts at anyone’s finger tips.
Quote:
Barry A.
…we think the left is actually trying to tear the existing system down…

Oh yeah, that makes a lot of sense, in view of the preceding and actual history. As usual, Barry, you got it a$$ backwards…. again.

David K,
Your entire post is nothing more than accusations without citations to support your contentions, and repetition of banal right wing dogma in single sentence staccato (again without factual support and citation). The most egregious and intellectually dishonest thing you always do is falsely and incorrectly frame your twisted take of liberal ideology, and, as always without support and citation. No wonder why your side is so screwed up and consistently wrong headed; you guys rely on faith alone and believe each other’s single sentence crap. Hence, your posts are not worthy of complete quotation. By glaring contrast, Iflyfish’s posts are as those posts are full of citation and support, yours are not. Snap out of it, you’re embarrassing yourself.

BTW, Goat, you're a good warrior. Keep up the good work.

[Edited on 10-30-2011 by MitchMan]

ELINVESTIG8R - 10-30-2011 at 08:42 AM

The legitimate Latino votes will be seen in the Republican column. Vas a ver!

MitchMan - 10-30-2011 at 08:45 AM

Iflyfish,
just read your most recent post, and, as usual, I learn from your words. Every time I read one of your more lengthy contributions, I am amazed at how well integrated your thoughts and knowledge are.

However, after reading it, I became a bit embarrassed by my own contentious tone compared to your reasoned magnanimous prose. It is serving to remind that winning an argument and proving a point doesn't necessarily change hearts and minds. And, actually, that is what is really important; to win a war and not just the battles. And, futhermore, the agenda of winning a war may even be a misplaced mission here in this forum. Maybe and merely the "engagement" in this platform of the exchange of contrasting ideas, here, in this forum which is so rich with so many quality Nomads, may be a more fitting goal than winning a war.

I'm working on it.
MitchMan

Iflyfish - 10-30-2011 at 08:47 AM

MitchMan

I appreciate the clarity of your most recent post. The stunning thing to me about all of the agencies that were undermined is that they exist to protect the air, water, environment, public health, education and safety that we all need. Most of these agencies grew out of crisis that affected the country as a whole and were in response to egregious behavior on the part of Trusts or Corporations who denigrated these resources. The job of Public Servants is to ensure the Life, Liberty and Safety of those who elected them not to destroy the very institutions that provide those services.

History of EPA
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Environmental_Pro...

History of the Department of Labor
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=--aQMVJH1xA

History of OSHA
http://www.dol.gov/oasam/programs/history/mono-osha13introto...

Example of the work of the Consumer Product Safety Commission
http://www.cpsc.gov/cpscpub/prerel/prhtml01/01119.html

I would encourage you to inform yourself of the history of these agencies and the public crisis that created them.

One can argue that their budgets are too large, that there is waste in these agencies etc. I understand and appreciate these arguments and some are well founded. However to appoint heads of these agencies as Reagan et. al. did, whose sole purpose was to do away with these agencies and the protection they provide, in circumvention of the needs of the people, in support of Corporate Interests, is in my view an insufferable breach of public trust and an excellent example of how the rights and needs of the public are trampled by the very Public Servants who are elected to Protect and Defend the interests of the people. None of this will change until we take the money out of Politics.

Iflyfish

Barry A. - 10-30-2011 at 09:22 AM

MitchMan-------after THAT last post you can still indicate that "you are surprised that no mind changes have resulted", or words to that effect?? Amazing!!! You just lost about 60% of your credibility with me with THAT post, and your rant DOES sound loony to me from my perspective!

You will be SHOCKED to learn that I support all (or most of) the Reagan appointees-----I worked for the National Park Service and BLM for those years, and the direction we were headed in those organizations before Reagan was scary to me----his appointees at least stemmed the tide for a little while.

I religiously read most of (all?) the cites that you and Fish provided, and disagreed with a large percentage of those articles and the interpretation of the "stats" (not the stats themselves), not to a small degree because of the authors, and/or the organizations that published them-----all left-wing folks and think-tanks, or so it appeared to me, and seldom or inadaquately presented the opposing points of view.

As for my "success", I do not consider myself "unique", or a "micro example" of what is possible in this great Country-------ANYBODY can duplicate what I have done if they take a little time to observe, and apply what they learn. Believe me, if I can do it, anybody can! And that is exactly what I am trying to convey to people-----what the left is telling you is largely a bunch of bull, backed up by a bunch of intellectuals distorted & cherry-picked facts and mostly erroneous conclusions, (the 'dots' don't really connect) and I have no idea why they are doing it, and have given up trying to figure that out. Some of my best friends are in your camp, one in particular a Harvard grad and professor at Emory U in Atlanta, and we daily go at it on these subjects, each of us NEVER convincing the other of the error of their ways, even when personal absolute facts that refute what the other is saying are presented (I present the facts, and he does not believe they are applicable because his Harvard buddies have CONVINCED him that THE Harvard folks are always correct). It is amazing-----these guys (like you and Fish???) are supposedly research and fact-based guys, yet you refuse to see any validity in obvious examples of where you are going wrong, and discount them as "unique" and not applicable.

What you accuse the GOP of doing, "tearing down" or "destroying" Government, we see as restoring Government to it's proper and Constitutional place in the scheme of things------two completely different viewpoints. We in the GOP are guilty of the same claims of "you guys" (oooops, that is a prejudicial, and probably racial comment) of course, but both groups are convinced that "we are right and correct, and the other side is so mis-lead". It is a wonder that we can even talk to each other with the mind-sets that we both are coming from. But, thank God, we do "talk" as I think each of us wants to solve problems way down deep in our brains, and we know that the only rational way to do that is to "talk", despite the fact that we almost NEVER appear to get anywhere. However, we have got to defend our positions, don't we, as to just give up dooms us to utter failure in the way things eventually turn out-----we have got to do our part in defending what we in our gut feel is RIGHT, I believe----and that is a good thing.

So, I and my little family will go on, prosper one way or another, and vote, and try to counter the rantings of the organisers and supporters of the "victim" mentality that demands that the successful and rich help SUPPORT them, regardless. This despite the FACT that all the rich that I know give overwhelmingly to the charities OF THEIR CHOICE a large percentage of their earnings (in my brother-in-laws case about 70% of his total yearly earnings).

As Dennis would say, "JEEEEEZO, what a dilemma", or something like that. :lol:

Cheers to all of you, (and you lefties, too---except for Goat) :lol:

Barry

MitchMan - 10-30-2011 at 09:52 AM

Quote:
Iflyfish
One can argue that their budgets are too large, that there is waste in these agencies etc. I understand and appreciate these arguments and some are well founded. However to appoint heads of these agencies as Reagan et. al. did, whose sole purpose was to do away with these agencies and the protection they provide, in circumvention of the needs of the people, in support of Corporate Interests, is in my view an insufferable breach of public trust and an excellent example of how the rights and needs of the public are trampled by the very Public Servants who are elected to Protect and Defend the interests of the people. None of this will change until we take the money out of Politics.


Absolutely golden! You summarized it perfectly and accurately. If only the general public would step back from the trees and look at this forest as you just did.

I have been saying for the past year to people around me that the one thing that would go the furthest in curing the situation is to "take the money out of politics". After all is said and done, that is the one action that would turn the tide most completely.

The "money" problem got its genesis in the mid 70s when Jack Abramoff figured out that the conservative agenda benefits big business directly and specifically and that he could make big bucks by persuading big business to contribute to him and he would in turn promote specific agendas. I believe one of the first agendas was to campaign specifically against unions for which he got plenty of contributions for his association from big business. He paid himself handsomely. This whetted his appetite and the rest is history. His efforts found complicity with Ralph Reed, Grover Norquist, Carl Rove, and soon Tom Delay in government. The interesting facet of this is that Ralph Reed and Abramoff saw this activity more as a money maker for them personally than merely furthering a pure political agenda. They actually viewed it as a money making "industry".... i.e., lobbying. It worked!

What the right wing fails to realize is that in the realm of real world economics, there are actual realities called eonomic "externalities". An externality is a negative consecquence not anticipated such as pollution from an automobile, or contamination of ground water from industrial waste. For instance, a customer voluntarily buys a car. The car manufacture voluntarily manufactures the car and voluntarily sells it to the customer. Closed transaction, free trade. Fine. Since the goal of any business in a market based capitalistic economy is to maximize profits by lowering costs while gettng the highest price possible, the manufacturer is not inclined (nor is it a good business decision) to spend money ona clean engine. There is a third party to this, the general public who has to breath in the pollution spewed into the air by the car that was made without the expense of manufacturing a clean air engine. Now, the public is/was not in privaty of contract in the transaction between the seller and the buyer and so had no say mandating that the manufacturer spend more money to make a cleaner engine. Air pollution = externality of buy/sell/manufacture market transaction.

Since business's goal is to maximize profits, there is no profit motive to produce a clean engine. The society and the public has to protect itself, among other things, that is the role of government. So it is up to the government to mandate and enforce the manufacture of only clean engines. The government has many such roles: safe drugs, clean air, safe cars, planes and railroads, clean water, clean oceans, eco balance, safe house and buidling construction. Another role for government is to protect the market itself from "too big to fail", from runaway risky behavior of businesses (CEOs and executives) that are in charge of banks, monopolies and monopolistic behavior, from boom and bust applying sound monetary policy and fiscal policy, regulation of the banking industry especially since government guarantees deposits, the military, etc., etc., etc.

Virtually all economists recognize that there is a role for government. Most people do too. The argument is over how much of a role. Well, we saw what lack of government role did via the right wing deregulation agenda in the S&L debacle, the bursting of the dot com bubble and more recently in the 2007/8 near collapse of the all too deregulated financial sector. Such deregulation was a direct result of successful lobbying, which brings us back to getting money out of politics which hopefully will get us statesemen in government instead of "politicians" who are solely interested in getting re-elected and will do and say things based solely on "political" motivation. Getting re-elected makes them amenable to pandering to sources of money for their campaigns. Congressmen spend 1/4 of their time campaining for funds for their campaigns.

Do we have a billion dollar lobbying industry? Ooops, yes we do.

[Edited on 10-30-2011 by MitchMan]

Barry A. - 10-30-2011 at 10:04 AM

Mitch--------

I TOTALLY AGREE that we need to get big money our of politics-----I am with you on that.

And I TOTALLY AGREE with you that the Government has a roll in protecting the public

And I TOTALLY AGREE with you that "the problem" is just how much power we actually give to these Public Agencies to control stuff------

You appear to think More Power is good, and I believe that minimal power is good (else they destroy the very system that provides us with prosperity)

OK, now what--------------------?????? :?:

Barry

Cypress - 10-30-2011 at 10:04 AM

MitchMan, I see, in your opinion, the bottom line is that the right wing is responsible for the present economic situation, the housing collapse, the high unemployment rate, and every other malady that plagues the US.

Iflyfish - 10-30-2011 at 10:29 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Barry A.
Mitch--------

I TOTALLY AGREE that we need to get big money our of politics-----I am with you on that.

And I TOTALLY AGREE with you that the Government has a roll in protecting the public

And I TOTALLY AGREE with you that "the problem" is just how much power we actually give to these Public Agencies to control stuff------

You appear to think More Power is good, and I believe that minimal power is good (else they destroy the very system that provides us with prosperity)

OK, now what--------------------?????? :?:

Barry


I appreciate your clarifying the points were we do agree. I think that the Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street share some of the same frustrations with the status quo.

I do not say that increasing the power of a government or a government agency is necessarily a good thing. I am saying that these agencies exist for a genuine reason and have been denigrated via fiat and that is unjust. An unbridled government is as dangerous as unregulated Corporations. The difference is one of degree, not of kind.

My point is that Corporate money has so corrupted the means of rationally oversight of these agencies that they are sorely limited in providing their function. The Supreme Court decision to allow UNLIMITED funding of political activity was in my view the final unbalancing of the political playing field that has cemented the corruption in our political system. My beef is with Corporatism of our government and the undermining of its role as protector of the peoples interest.

Ditto with Corporate media that has slanted “news” in such a way that it is very hard for the general public to obtain an unbiased perspective and now facts have been denigrated into “opinion” to the demise of reasonable debate.

Iflyfish

MitchMan - 10-30-2011 at 10:37 AM

Barry,
I get it that you disagree with us liberals. I just hope ... someday ... that you will start actually posting some facts, clear verifiable facts to support your disagreements and contentions.

Can't you see that simply declaring your disagreement is neither proof nor substantiation? There is no credibility in unsupported assertions. And, accordingly, there is no credibility in those who perpetuate such unsupported assertions ... over and over and over again.... as you do.

Fore example:
Quote:
Barry A.
-----what the left is telling you is largely a bunch of bull, backed up by a bunch of intellectuals distorted & cherry-picked facts and mostly erroneous conclusions


Barry, which statements are a bunch of crap? Which specific intellectuals? Which cherry picked facts? Which erroneous conclusions? Be specific, then provide the factual proof and citations sufficient to prove your point. You never do this. Never.

Reckless, Barry, reckless, unconvincing, unpersuasive, not credible, irresponsible, vacuous = 'hot air".

Look at your post. Where's the beef? All you wrote were iterations of your opinions and disagreements. No facts. No stats, no verifiable quotes, nada.

BTW, how can you disagree with something but not the "stats"?

Here's some stats for you: 1% of the top own 40% of the wealth, 10% of the top own 71% of the wealth, 60% at the bottom only have 4% of the wealth, and the bottom 40% own only 1/4 of 1% of the nation's wealth. Conclusion: there is too great a disparity of wealth and income in this country. Fact: the USA ranks second worst in the world for disparity of wealth.

Barry, do you disagree with my above conclusion? I supported my conclusion with verifiable fact. If you disagree, support your conclusion with verifiable fact.

All I am asking for is a little fair play here, Barry. You believe in fairness, right? If not, we'll have to eliminate the judicial system.

[Edited on 10-30-2011 by MitchMan]

MitchMan - 10-30-2011 at 10:51 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Cypress
MitchMan, I see, in your opinion, the bottom line is that the right wing is responsible for the present economic situation, the housing collapse, the high unemployment rate, and every other malady that plagues the US.


Almost, Cypress. I believe that the right wing is primarily responsible and that the right wing agenda is totally virtually totally responsible for the present economic situation, the high unemployment rate, the housing collapse, and that there was/is certainly complicity by certain democrat elected politicians in Congress and elsewhere that aided and abetted the problem(s). Blue Dogs comes to mind among others. As far as "... every other malady that plagues the US". That's obviously far too broad to blame on either liberals or the right wing.

Barry A. - 10-30-2011 at 11:08 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Iflyfish
Quote:
Originally posted by Barry A.
Mitch--------

I TOTALLY AGREE that we need to get big money our of politics-----I am with you on that.

And I TOTALLY AGREE with you that the Government has a roll in protecting the public

And I TOTALLY AGREE with you that "the problem" is just how much power we actually give to these Public Agencies to control stuff------

You appear to think More Power is good, and I believe that minimal power is good (else they destroy the very system that provides us with prosperity)

OK, now what--------------------?????? :?:

Barry


I appreciate your clarifying the points were we do agree. I think that the Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street share some of the same frustrations with the status quo.

I do not say that increasing the power of a government or a government agency is necessarily a good thing. I am saying that these agencies exist for a genuine reason and have been denigrated via fiat and that is unjust. An unbridled government is as dangerous as unregulated Corporations. The difference is one of degree, not of kind.

My point is that Corporate money has so corrupted the means of rationally oversight of these agencies that they are sorely limited in providing their function. The Supreme Court decision to allow UNLIMITED funding of political activity was in my view the final unbalancing of the political playing field that has cemented the corruption in our political system. My beef is with Corporatism of our government and the undermining of its role as protector of the peoples interest.

Ditto with Corporate media that has slanted “news” in such a way that it is very hard for the general public to obtain an unbiased perspective and now facts have been denigrated into “opinion” to the demise of reasonable debate.

Iflyfish


All great points, Fish.

The Supreme Court (IMO) HAD to come to the decision that they came too on Campaign Finance because of their defined job of protecting the Constitition. I agree that the financing of campaigns needs to be curtailed drastically, but in order to do that we must amend the Constitution, and if the Country really wants to do that it has been proven that it CAN BE DONE on fast-track mode.

I don't fault "Corporate Media" so much (all Media with any impact is run by Corporations) but the problems occur in that most Media Management hires folks in a non-balanced way, do not declare their bias (thus lose credibility), and they do so with relative impunity-----a very poor Management decision, by the way. As ALWAYS HAPPENS, the Market (reads the 'listening Public' in this case) corrects that over time (thus the public are more and more moving to FOX NEWS, a more "fair and balanced" organization that declares it's bias) I believe that CNN, PBS and FOX handle news the best, but of course that is just my feeling, but I do believe that PBS should admit their gemeral bias, which is so obvious..

Striking a balance with the various regulating Agencies is a much more challenging problem, but I believe that we MUST always defer decisions that tend to subdue the capital markets until the truth is absolutely known less we stop or hinder the engine of prosperity. Where that "line" is, is debatable of course. I do not reject "science" ever, but so far the track record on science being correct on their short term assumptions and conclusions on things like Climate Change is not that impressive, so implementing monumental decisions with chaotic consequences and expense must always be deferred, in my opinion. I studied Climatology in College, and have followed developments since, and we are a long way from really understanding it, in my opinion------there are so many variables.

I believe we know where you stand on all these issues, Fish and Mitch, so it is refreshing and hopeful that you both are able to moderate your "real" feelings and beliefs for the benefit of this discussion, and hope that I and others on "the other side" can do the same.

Barry

Iflyfish - 10-30-2011 at 11:14 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by MitchMan
Quote:
Originally posted by Cypress
MitchMan, I see, in your opinion, the bottom line is that the right wing is responsible for the present economic situation, the housing collapse, the high unemployment rate, and every other malady that plagues the US.


Almost, Cypress. I believe that the right wing is primarily responsible and that the right wing agenda is totally virtually totally responsible for the present economic situation, the high unemployment rate, the housing collapse, and that there was/is certainly complicity by certain democrat elected politicians in Congress and elsewhere that aided and abetted the problem(s). Blue Dogs comes to mind among others. As far as "... every other malady that plagues the US". That's obviously far too broad to blame on either liberals or the right wing.


I beleive that the policies of deregulation, three unfunded wars in the middle east, lowering taxes on Corporations and the wealthy, the 5/4 Supreme Court decision to allow Unlimited Political Contributions by Corporations, all supported by FOX and the Republican Party have indeed made major contributions to the problems we now face.

I believe that both Democrats and Republicans are beholding to Corporate sponsors and no longer represent the interests of the general public.

I believe that the deregulation of the ownership of Corporate Media and the elimination of the Fareness Doctrinee have robbed us of an unbiased media. What we are fed as "news" is generated and shaped by Corporate Media that excludes candidates like Republican Buddy Roemer who advocate taking the money out of politics. I am not advocating a vote for Buddy Roemer, due to many of his domestic positions I would not vote for him, but I would very much like to see him on the national stage where people could hear his inside perspective on the corruption in Congress and the White House. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rkvsn-oNz5s

The reason you have not yet seen this guy is that he only accepts donations of $100. It takes MILLIONS of dollars to now buy Corporate Media time so that ideas like this can be discussed in the election cycle. I would think that this guy would be embraced by the Republican right if he had any national forum for his ideas to be heard.

"Washington is not about the people it's about money and re-election".

Iflyfish

BajaGringo - 10-30-2011 at 11:22 AM

I don't blame all of our problems solely on the left or right. BOTH sides have sold us out to the highest bidder. Politicians of BOTH parties have spent us into financial ruin and paved the way for globalization - the true enemy of the US economy.

A global economy will take us to a global standard of living and all the political fighting resembling a high school football game reminds me of Nero fiddling while Rome burned...

Iflyfish - 10-30-2011 at 11:22 AM

Here is an excellent example of how our views are shaped and who is shaping them on the right. On the left there is a parallel system. The entire system is corrupt to the core.

http://www.timesunion.com/news/article/Independent-groups-pu...

Iflyfish

Cypress - 10-30-2011 at 11:41 AM

BajaGringo, The global standard of living? Would be interesting to know exactly what that is. Under those conditions, I suspect most Nomads wouldn't be doing much traveling, have vacation homes, or worry about which restaurant is up to par. :biggrin:

toneart - 10-30-2011 at 11:43 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by MitchMan
I don't think that you are a loon, Barry, I just think that you are mistaken. But, then again, you think that I am mistaken as well. What is making me chuckle right now is the realization that neither of us, nor any of us has changed our minds. After all that was written, no one is seeming to have budged.

Now, that's funny!


Mitchman,
You are quite correct in that "no one is seeming to have budged". While that is a desired accomplishment, it is a futile one.

Gentlemen:

You may have noticed, I have grown tired of posting political opinion on this forum. (That I have been missed has been communicated by a few U2Us and email by those who have the email address. Thank you!). In the past I believe I have made some contributions that, hopefully, have helped to open minds, but it was ultimately an unrequited personal endeavor. For the time that it was challenging, I enjoyed it. However, I have concluded that this is the wrong medium for the great effort and time it takes to pour out one's heart and soul.

The Bajanomad still remains the best place of reference for staying informed on all things Baja. Many here still feel like family.

Iflyfishinallthingstoperfection and Mitch-The-Man's postings are so well researched, substantiated and articulated that I really enjoy reading them. :light::light:

If I were just born yesterday, with no preconceived or experiential political inklings, you guys would be the light that mentors my direction. Barry, while providing "the other side" to bounce off of, would merely serve the fledgling newborn by clarifying the mistaken and flawed ideology of that "other side". I like and respect him as a good human being, which I believe most people are in other forms of encounter.

(edited to correct ego driven punctuation errors). :o

[Edited on 10-30-2011 by toneart]

Barry A. - 10-30-2011 at 11:43 AM

We are "cross-posting" here which makes it hard to follow-----


Mitch said,
"BTW, how can you disagree with something but not the "stats"?

Here's some stats for you: 1% of the top own 40% of the wealth, 10% of the top own 71% of the wealth, 60% at the bottom only have 4% of the wealth, and the bottom 40% own only 1/4 of 1% of the nation's wealth. Conclusion: there is too great a disparity of wealth and income in this country. Fact: the USA ranks second worst in the world for disparity of wealth.

Barry, do you disagree with my above conclusion? I supported my conclusion with verifiable fact. If you disagree, support your conclusion with verifiable fact. "


I can "disagree" with the conconclusions reached because NEVER are all the "FACTS" presented, all the stats presented, which of course they never can be. Facts themselves are what they are------facts------and cannot be disputed on their face. But as we ALL know, you can quote facts & stats to support any theory that you want, but that does not make the theory necessarily true. Facts & stats help, for sure, but reasonable people leave room for interpretation of facts & stats, conflicting facts, mis-leading facts, limited facts, etc. thus the arguments and disagreements (but you know that, and the fact that I don't cite "facts" to back up my statements is, to me, a RED HERRING).

'Facts' and 'stats' are the things we look at in order for us to reach a conclusion-----like 'science', facts and stats are simply tools in the process of thinking-people reaching a conclusion, and I normally believe that a person making statements that are to be taken seriously are made by those that have ALREADY done their homework. My Gawd, do you really want to wade thru all the 'facts'?? You may, as a scholar, but not me--------when I look at many stats and facts all they usually do is bring up more questions in my mind then what they resolve. Again, the most powerful evidence that I have is my personal experience, and what I have observed relative to things that I absolutely know because I have seen it with my own eyes, heard it from people I trust, or generally appear to be really obvious to me when I study history.

Perhaps that is a flawed method, but it has always worked for me, and I like & trust the results. I am not a researcher, nor a scholar, or a scientist, and have never presented myself as one. I have lived a reasonably long time, have experienced some stuff, suceeded and failed at stuff, and have come to some conclusions which I sometimes like to share, hoping that someone will benefit.

By the way, your question above on the stats just presented--------I generally agree with those stats with some quibbles about how they were obtained that I won't go into, and frankly I don't remember the details anyway, and have no idea where to look up the citations.

Barry

David K - 10-30-2011 at 11:48 AM

Wow, if only so much energy could go into writing about Baja! :o:wow::rolleyes:

TMW - 10-30-2011 at 11:49 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by MitchMan

Here's some stats for you: 1% of the top own 40% of the wealth, 10% of the top own 71% of the wealth, 60% at the bottom only have 4% of the wealth, and the bottom 40% own only 1/4 of 1% of the nation's wealth. Conclusion: there is too great a disparity of wealth and income in this country. Fact: the USA ranks second worst in the world for disparity of wealth.


Those facts are correct and liberals want to redistribute the upper wealth to the bottom. The people at the top earned what they have which is lost on liberals.

There are many reasons why the bottom 60% have only 4% of the wealth. Some people are mentally or physically unable to make it as they say and they need help. There are others that for whatever reason are disconnected from society being a drunk, on drugs, various criminal behavior etc.

Divorce is probably the largest single factor as it drags down both parties. Women don't earn as much as men and a single mom is usually on some form of welfare or assistance at some point. Men most often pay child support and when they remarry their salary can't support two households at the level it did for one household. 70% of the black children are born to a girl/woman not married. Latinos are not far behind.

Over the past 40 or more years people stopped saving as much as they use too. But everybody wants the toys. Their eyes override their brains. Gotta have a new car, truck or SUV often more than one. As a society we too often live above our means. If you invested $100 per month from age 20 to 65 with compound interest you would have a million dollars when you retire. How many people do you know in their 20s and 30s are saving money or investing it?

Schooling, roughly 25% of the kids in CA high schools drop out. Of those that do finish high school on the average they read and do math at a 5th grade level.

Many high schools do not offer classes for auto mechanics, HVAC, and other building trades like they once did and now a kid out of high school must attend a trade school or Jr college to get the skills. Not all kids are college material but they can learn a skill that can make them a good living.

For those able to work it becomes the choices they make as to what they will have in life and to have someone take from you and give it to someone who made bad choices is not right and all the stats in the world won't change that.

By the way I don't believe the USA ranks second worst in the world for disparity of wealth. I know of a lot of countries including Mexico that are worse.

[Edited on 10-30-2011 by TW]

toneart - 10-30-2011 at 12:07 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by BajaGringo
I don't blame all of our problems solely on the left or right. BOTH sides have sold us out to the highest bidder. Politicians of BOTH parties have spent us into financial ruin and paved the way for globalization - the true enemy of the US economy.

A global economy will take us to a global standard of living and all the political fighting resembling a high school football game reminds me of Nero fiddling while Rome burned...


Ron,
I have to separate the ideologies of Right and Left from the corporate and banking lackey politicians of both parties who are ruining the global economy. Thankfully, the Occupy Wall Street movement is gaining, worldwide. :bounce:

One can find merit in all ideologies. It is when put into practice by greedy career politicians who do NOT represent We The People, that the ideals become corrupted. That is compounded and made indelible in peoples' minds who get all their information from corporate controlled media. The way they reinforce is a calculated form of brainwashing called Branding.. The Rupert Murdock media agenda has been especially effective by being the opinion breeder for the Republican political party.

Our dilemma is that our ideological choices are channeled through two political parties which command our vote, but do not represent us.

[Edited on 10-30-2011 by toneart]
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