Teabagger waves Tenther flag in support of Rep. Matt Shea. (Fuse)
It’s not so surprising to see a Republican introduce far-right-wing legislation, but it is a little stunning to see the entire Republican caucus embrace the fringe constitutional theories of the Tenther movement, and with so little thought or hesitation.
As I’ve previously reported, two-thirds of the House Republican caucus has already signed on to bills sporting stock, Tentherist boilerplate, and on Wednesday they attempted a procedural motion to move two of these bills to the floor for a vote without hearings or debate: HB 2669, which would have exempted Washington from national health care reform, and HB 2708, which would have declared null and void any federal greenhouse gas or fuel economy regulations. The motions failed on a party-line vote, with every single House Republican voting in favor.
That’s just plain crazy, but what’s crazier still is that far from being a mere symbolic gesture, or ill-conceived effort at political gamesmanship, Republican legislators are eager to defend these measures on fringe Tentherist grounds, as Republican Minority Whip Rep. Bill Hinkle (R-13) recently did in an interview with Publicola:
“Have you heard of the 10th Amendment?” Rep. Hinkle begins when asked to explain the bill. (Answer: Yes. That’d be state’s rights.) Hinkle, the Republican minority whip, says the health care bill is a federal power grab that violates the 10th Amendment “because it would be a national system, preventing states from having our own system … and this kind of stuff is driving people crazy. People in my district are furious.”
Hinkle says, “It’s time for the states to excercise the power to remind the federal government of constitutional restrictions on their power.”
Yeah, well, good point, except that Hinkle’s interpretation of the 10th Amendment flies in the face of 220 years of Supreme Court rulings. And Hinkle is not the only one. Back in November, Rep. Matt Shea (R-Greenacres) wrote a prominent post on the tentherist website, the Tenth Amendment Center, apparently outlining the WSRP’s 2010 legislative agenda, entitled “Resist DC: A Step-by-Step Plan for Freedom,” in which he makes the rather blunt assertion:
If imposed, socialized health care and cap and trade will crush our economy. These programs are both unconstitutional, creating government powers beyond those enumerated by the Constitution. If those programs are nullified, it will give the individual states a fighting chance to detach from a federal budget in freefall and save the economies of the individual states.
That not only represents a rather dubious interpretation of the Constitution, it also appears to be an every-state-for-itself call for dissolving the union. No wonder at least one of the teabaggers at yesterday’s sparsely attended rally waved a Confederate flag in support of Rep. Shea’s agenda.
Really, read Shea’s post, for regardless of how wacky and fringe you think his constitutional theory might be, it reveals a dangerous political strategy that argues for states to act in defiance of both federal law and the federal courts. When teabaggers like Shea and Hinkle argue for what they call the “nullification doctrine,” they essentially argue for the dissolution of the union as we know it, for the power of this doctrine comes not from legal theory, but from the simple belief that if enough states were to defy Congress and the President, Congress and the President would be powerless to do much about it.
This isn’t the doctrine of constitutional scholars. It is the doctrine of rebels. As House Speaker Pro Tem Jeff Morris (D-Mount Vernon) succinctly put it in a recent press release:
“We want to lead the state out of recession. They want to lead the state out of the country.”
Rep. Morris’s snark would be funnier, if it weren’t apparently true.
When did the Paultards take control of the WSRP?
Actually, I think even Dr. Paul might think these guys are going too far.
With so few Republicans in the house of representatives it isn’t difficult to conceive all of them voting for these bills.
Re: Confederate flag comment
Goldy, please pick up a history book before you regurgitate your fourth-grade public school education.
The civil war was about power and trade. It was not about slavery. The emancipation proclamation only applied to slaves in the southern “rebel” states, not in the northern states. The southern residents didn’t go to war and give up their lives for slaves, they did it for freedom. For the right to trade with whomever they saw fit, and to live their lives the way they saw best. The only good thing to come out of the civil war was the early release of slaves, but for the north, that was just an added bonus.
Government-controlled education has morphed the civil war into a fairy tale about slavery. Things are rarely that black and white. You should know better.
@3 Perhaps you should read a book first.
Quick, what was every single major political battle about prior to the Civil War (Dred Scott trial, 3/5ths Compromise, Bleeding Kansas, etc etc)?
Slavery.
Only an idiot or a liar would try to claim the the Civil War was not about slavery.
@3 PS
One of the main reasons the Confederacy lost the Civil War was because of the notion of “state’s rights”. When Jefferson Davis attempted a draft, for instance, Georgia’s governor told him that his state would not participate. Other states refused to send Richmond money.
The Confederacy was doomed since it had a much less centralized war effort than the United States.
Also, that is not actually a Confederate Flag, at least not one that was used in land battles.
It is not one of the three Confederate national flags nor is it the battle flag (which was square). It is a bastardized version of the Second Naval Flag and was made popular during the early twentieth century by the Klan and by politicians favoring segregation and Jim Crow laws.
Most people who fly it don’t know a damn thing about it.
It makes these folks look stupid.
If I was in charge of this rally I would have asked him to put it away. If you’re doing a media event you need to control what the media will see and report on.
Freaking amateurs!
Forget the arguments and look at the flag. It deliberately resembles the Confederate flag that Klansmen used to wave. It’s a secessionist flag that stands for treason and racism.
The old guy probably with the flag probably doesn’t have a clue what all of this means. Someone told him “Obamacare” means “communizing America” and he swallowed it whole. Notice the expression of total uncomprehension on his face.
Basically what these people are saying is if they don’t like the laws that Congresses passes, they’re going to break the law. It’s almost time to call out the National Guard.
F**KING Republicans are just jokes now a days. I’ll wager that EVERY SINGLE one of these crazy Republican wingnuts lunatics has a parent or grandparent to gets F**KING social security and Medicare. I’d wager NONE OF THEM turn it down on ‘principle’. Let one of these child minded idiot Republicans get on TV and tell the public we’re shutdown down Medicare and social security…see how that goes over. Sure they’re big evil Federal programs (like the permanent standing full time Army that these wingnuts LIKE which our founding fathers never wanted….sigh)…but they’re really well liked big Federal programs.
When did Republicans go from William F. Buckley to Glen Beck? I’m embarrassed FOR the few sane Republicans left….they must be just shaking their heads in disbelief that this is what’s left of their party anymore.
Lola @3, the Civil War not about slavery? I suggest you read the Confederate Constitution which builds in the institution of negro slavery to the point of forbidding any law to eliminate it (Article I, Sec. 9). Furthermore, it required any new state joining the confederation to allow slavery throughout its territory.
Any more historical fiction you want to share with us??
I love how the Tea Party nuts picked the Washington Center for The Performing Arts to hold their Truckers for Jesus rally.
Yeah – the Center is owned by the state – supported by local and state taxpayers – and survives on grants from organizations like the NEA.
Seriously – do these barely literate talk radio addicts have a clue? Couldn’t they have just walked the talk, and held that rally at an R.V. Park in Yelm??
Rabbit: given the uneducated yahoos who make up the Tea Bagger movement, can’t you see how treason and racism could easily be confused with patriotism?
Did any of our local “media” bother to report on what the Republican caucus is up to?
And they wonder why no reads/watches them anymore.
Tea Party meets reality in Detroit:
DETROIT — Charlie Gennara thought there would be a sizable showing for a planned “tea party” protest outside the annual international auto show in Detroit on Monday.
For the first 45 minutes, though, it was just him and one other person voicing their displeasure with the billions in aid spent by the government on General Motors, Chrysler and auto lender GMAC Financial Services.
“I didn’t expect this,” said Gennara, a 58-year-old retired carpenter from Northville, Mich. “Most of the tea parties I’ve been to I’ve seen 300 or a couple hundred at least.”
So-called “tea parties” have become popular forums for conservatives to vent over government tax policies, the economic stimulus packages, bank bailouts and the health care overhaul. But a call to protest the auto show by a Virginia-based group, the National Taxpayers Union, was opposed by some Michigan conservatives, who said their economically battered state needs the jobs.
Interesting going ons in the National Tea Party. They say they’ve signed Sarah Palin, Michelle Bachman, and Marsha Blackburn as speakers at their “National Convention” in Nashville in February, and upon being questioned Palin has said she is waiving her usual $100,000 speaker’s fee.
But the price tag of $549.00 per person to attend the convention (food, lodging, travel, etc. are extra) has some within the Tea Party movement questioning where the money is going.
It turns out a good chunk is going into the pockets of Judson Philips, a Tennessee attorney who practices DWI and personal injury cases, has a history of financial troubles, and decided he wants to harness the Tea Party movement so he doesn’t have to practice law anymore.
After getting volunteers to work incredible hours setting up the organization and website for the movement, he filed the organization as a for-profit corporation with himself as the sole owner, and with the “contributions” going into his wife’s PayPal account. When the web designer initially said he would need at least $180,000 to set up the type of system he described, he talked him into doing a simple “one page” website for free, and then by making many multiple requests for changes, ended up with a social networking site which over which he claimed ownership and which he planned to use to compete with Facebook. You can read the web designer’s story here
The web designer is still a conservative idealist, but is outraged that this “grassroots movement” is being captured by someone he considers a profiteer.
I’ve studied a lot about the Civil War. It’s part of my history hobby.
If you get into discussion forums about the Civil War, there’s always somebody who will claim the war wasn’t about slavery. They will point out that at the beginning Lincoln said that if he could preserve the Union while keeping the slaves, he would choose to preserve the Union. They will point out that during the early years of the war, slavery was still allowed in the Union state of Maryland, in Washington D.C., and in the border states of Kentucky and Missouri. They will point out that the Emancipation Proclomation was a war powers device which only freed slaves in Confederate-held territory – the very places where it couldn’t be enforced (at that time).
But saying the dispute between the North and the South came down to a dispute between the perceived unfariness of tariffs and ideological philosophies of federalism ignore the really big elephant in the room. The big issue between the North and the South was slavery, and the expansion of slavery into the new territories in the west. The reason why the election of Lincoln set off the firestorm of seccessions among southern states was precisely because they believed he would act in a manner consistent with his previously-stated beliefs – that a Union could continue if divided between slave-holding and free states.
In short, the North wanted to preserve the Union – a Union without slaves. The South wanted to preserve States Rights – the right to own slaves. All the other statements made by each side are so much camoflauge over that main point. Remove slavery from the equation, and the North and South didn’t have that much to argue about – certainly not enough to justify seccession and civil war, costing hundreds of thousands of American lives.
I’m not supporting them. This is a question.
I thought that actually are very few SCOTUS decisions based in either the 9th or 10th amendments.
Nobody has really ever challenged Federal Law on those grounds.
Am I wrong, as IANAL
Re 10
“Shutting down” social security and medicare/medicaid would be a great idea, over time. Those, like my father, who’ve been taxed for it for 40 years have a reasonable expectation of collecting on it that no sane person would deny. But a progressive elimination of those programs over the next 2 decadedes with decreasing benefits over the time period would be workable and fair.
Young people starting out would be exponentially better off with private retirement accounts. The rate of return on your social security ‘investment’ is pitiful by any normal standard. Young to middle age people who purchase health insurance for their old age can buy at very reasonable rates. Those who choose not to made their choices and should live with the consequences. So should those who choose not to save for retirement. If that means living with your daughter in law, maybe you should have saved some money.
Shh… Nobody tell Shea that we already have both federal and regional cap and trade programs.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E.....ted_States
Or that people are making big money off cap and trade.
The Rs left in the legislature are, with few exceptions, crazy wingnuts.
They ARE the teabaggers.
They ARE crazy, twisted human beings — and (in my memory) have always been crazy, twisted human beings. They just stand out more now because their craziness is not filtered / controlled by more sensible Rs.
Anyone who has half a brain and some scruples is in the D “big” tent (big tents have their own problems) or is sitting on the sidelines.
And they have nothing to lose.
But my biggest fear is that “we” (not the folks who read HA) will be complacent because of the evident craziness. The MA-Sen (Coakely – Teddy’s seat!) race is a nailbiter for this reason.
Complacency will lose WA-03, and could severely impact D majorities in our legislature and congress.
In any case, Goldy, thanks for the attention you bring to this.
And make sure he doesn’t find out about the Western Climate Initiative
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W.....Initiative
@21
The non-nutters Republican’s seem to be hanging out in NP places like city councils.
If you click on the link to “Shea’s Post” what you’ll see is boilerplate militia stuff. Which raises the question of whether Rep. Shea himself is affiliated with the militia movement and may even be a member of a militia group. These groups are generally considered to be hate groups, and are tracked by civil rights organizations. There is quite a bit of information about the militia movement at this website:
http://www.adl.org/mwd/maillist.asp
Many of the comments posted on Shea’s website are from the usual suspects: Tax resisters, militiamen, sovereign citizens, and secessionists. Here’s a sample comment by a poster named Dean Jamison:
“We have not filed a tax form since 2002 and never will! yes they started billing us in the year 2008,But if they ever take me to court, I will state my case on SHOW ME THE LAW,as there is no LAW.My subjestion”
Assuming Mr. Jamison is required to file a federal income tax return (not everyone is), and further assuming that what he says is true, then he is breaking the law and the IRS not only will assess and collect back taxes and penalties, but he could be subject to criminal prosecution as well. And what he is exhorting the other readers of Mr. Shea’s website to do is literally a crime.
Re 21
Actually no.
Democrats are the party of making the planet safe for the Lily Livered Toad, but uninhabitable to humans.
Democrats are the party of fear. Obama won based on economic fear. He pushes through incredible invasions of basic economic rights on the same basis.
Democrats are the party of partisanship. Where are Republicans in the talks over his disastrous health care plans?
Democrats are the party of theft. Those who work must pay the housing costs, child care costs, food costs and now medical costs for those who won’t. Not can’t. Won’t.
Great ‘big tent’ you folks have going. All the worst elements of American politics under one ideological banner!
@19: That was a breathtakingly, pathetically ignorant post.
Thankfully anyone who wasn’t just completely blotto the last 8 years or so (or just the last couple for that matter) has been completely immunized against that bullshit.
@3 “The civil war was about power and trade. It was not about slavery.”
Yes and no. Technically, you’re correct, because Lincoln fought the war to preserve the union, and was even willing to let the South keep slavery if they would come back into the union. But to say the war wasn’t about slavery is to completely ignore the context. Slavery was the issue that provoked the Civil War.
“The emancipation proclamation only applied to slaves in the southern ‘rebel’ states, not in the northern states.”
That is also technically correct; but as there were no northern slave states, the EP applied to all states that had slavery.
“The southern residents didn’t go to war and give up their lives for slaves, they did it for freedom.”
It’s disingenuous to argue they didn’t go to war for the “freedom” to own slaves, because they had all the other freedoms that people in the northern states had, and the war occurred at a time when the federal government was much smaller, much less intrusive in local affairs, and federalism was much stronger in both sentiment and practice. “Big government” in today’s terms had not yet come along. This was a time when there was no income tax, no programs, and federal regulation to speak of.
“For the right to trade with whomever they saw fit, and to live their lives the way they saw best.”
What trade issues were there, other than tariffs? The Civil War was not fundamentally about trade. It was about fundamental cultural and economic differences between North and South. The North was industrialized; the South had an agrarian economy that depended on the cheap labor provided by slaves. The abolitionist movement threatened the economic survival of the South. They went to war to preserve their livelihood.
“The only good thing to come out of the civil war was the early release of slaves, but for the north, that was just an added bonus.”
This evinces a shallow understanding of history. Slavery was a dying institution that, without the war, eventually would have withered on the vine by its own accord. It’s extremely unlikely the practice of slavery would have survived into the 20th century if there had been no Civil War, no Emanicipation Proclamation, and no 13th and 14th Amendments.
What the Civil War really did was catapult America out of the agrarian age into the industrial age. The war was immediately followed by the building of the railroads, the settlement of the West, and the advent of mass industrialization. Preserving the union created a superpower that dominated the history of the century that followed.
The Civil War also created modern warfare. Trench warfare, machineguns, and submarines wee all used for the first time in this war. Both the offensive and defensive tactics of the First World War were born on the battlefields of the Civil War. The Civil War has been called by historians the first “modern war.” It has also been called a “railroad war” because railroads were a critical and dominant strategic factor in the war; but in a real sense, the railroads were only the instrument of what really was the invention of modern logistics and mass troop movements. The Civil War also was the last big cavalry war, and marked the beginning of the end of the cavalry age, which lingered on for a while in the Plains Wars against the Indians but horsed soldiers would never again be a major tactical factor in wars between nations. Much technology also emerged from the Civil War.
@24: Here’s another great site (Orcinus -happens to be local) which is great for following the militia / teabaggers. It’s run by Dave Niewert (author of several great books on the subject) who also posts at C&L on this stuff.
http://dneiwert.blogspot.com/
America is an inherently violent nation that has a violent history. It has always had highly contentious politics. This kind of stuff from the right is just talk — so far. But inflammatory rhetoric is potentially dangerous because it can incite physical violence. Sometimes it is a symptom, not a cause, of political turmoil but in the present case I think this kind of rhetoric is playing an inciting role in our society.
re 26
Some people would argue on substantive grounds. But knowing that there really is no argument keeps this from happening, so personal abuse is all Zotz has. Bravo.
Re 29
American politics have always been contentious, true. I personally think that the outlet in speech and written expresion keeps the US from the more violent expressions of political differenc.
And I don’t know that the US is any more or less violent than any other nation historically speaking. In fact I’d say we’re less.
@3
Your comment has no relation to Goldy’s comment. WTF???
Sorry Zotz. In the interest of educating an opponent so that their arguments might be worth countering here’s a primer.
You could say that in fact Social Security was a good investment compared to other private means of retirement savings. Wait, you couldn’t, because that wouldn’t be true.
You could say that no-one ought to have a responsibility for creating their own financial security including retirement savings and some form of health insurance. This is dodgy ethically and morally, but that should be okay with you.
You could have argued that millions did plan for retirement and were wiped out by the ongoing recession. This actually has some ground in evoking sympathy for the truly unlucky. Until you think that just about all of us have been told to diversify our investments so that such a thing couldn’t easily happen.
This concludes lesson one in basic argumentative strategy. You’re welcome.
“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”
So just exactly what part of this do you consider bullshit?
The plain reading of this is a constraint on Federal overreaching, like say the Feds forcing me to commit commerce with another private party (buying health insurance) or face jail time.
The calculated use of the phrase “teabagger” is also a homophobic slur and you supposed liberals should be aghast at the impropriety.
Here’s a teabagger.
http://images2.dailykos.com/im.....bagger.jpg
He’s wearing teabags. He’s a deluded member of an insane cult. End of story. Nothing to do with anyone’s sexuality – gay, straight or indifferent.
@35
What’s homophobic about it? Can straight people not tea bag?
@35 delbert 01/15/2010 at 6:09 pm,
The calculated use of the phrase teabagger started with teabaggers.
The fact that teabaggers were too stupid to find out about the other meaning of the term they chose to label themselves with is part and parcel to routine teabagger stupidity.
Be it calling yourself a teabagger, carrying the KKK flag to the capitol steps, or supporting the Tentherist agenda, teabaggers are routinely shown to be ignorant f**ks.
@38
But, by not doing research and ignoring their own use of the word the can pretend to be victims. Yes, those poor, suburban white guys are victims of those evil liburals who hate America and want the terrorists to win. They’re victims of the liberal media, while trying to stand up to the liberal-fascists, (oxy-moron) who drink white wine, (I prefer red) and drive hybrids and volvos (I drive a Ford- Ford owns Volvo, btw). Liberuls that don’t know a thing about running a business, like say, Google, Microsoft, REI, K2, Apple, Pretty much the whole bio-tech industry, and that according to George Will make on average about 6% more than conservatives. And so on and so forth.
Why does Goldy have a picture of somebody waving Strom Thurmond’s underpants?
@19
Lost, you’re becoming my new Puddy. Really easy target for making fun.
You’re 100% right. The rate of return for Social Security is fairly low. It’s a low risk/low yield investment. Let’s let all us youngin’s opt out and fend for ourselves and phase it out. That would have worked out awesomely for anyone who put their finances in the hands of Bernie Madoff. That works awesomely for those who reached retirement age in the last half of the 2000’s as their lifeling investments dropped 35%-50% of value right about the time you need to start selling them and living off them. That would have worked awesomely for anyone who tied their investments to real estate and didn’t pull out by 2007.
Oh, and you want to know how best to completely crash the U.S. economy? Have every American all their retirement investments out as the next down cycle begins. (Have you ever seriously considered economic theory as it relates to private, non-governmental, non-institutional investors?)
Investments are cyclicle. If all you have to retire on are your private investments, pray to whatever God in whom you believe that the market is up when you get to age 65-70. If you reach that age in a down cycle? Sucks to be you. That, in a nutshell, is how your post boils down.
@19 Complete fool:
Lost is up to her usual mindless comments that ignore facts. Comments like these make me realize how stupid this person really is:
Yeah, after the stock market crash retirees would have nothing to live on…..great idea, idiot!
Wow, I guess if you repeat stupid stuff enough times it will make it true? Is that how the puny little mind of Lost works?
@41: czech
sorry I did not read your comment beofer lambasting the fool lost for the same ideas that you raked her over the coals for….
Yes, it’s true. Investment is a poor idea, and no one should save atr all. My mistake.
Not.
Ever considered learning to read English Zotz or Notcorrectorright? It is the language used in the US and might be helpful to you.
A diversified retirement plan would have stood up under the last crisis. And yes, retirees are pulling out their savings, but here’s the thing. Not all at once. They do it over a period of decades.
And you don’t answer the fundamental question. Who decided the government was in charge of making my retirement possible? Who made it okay for them to steal 15% of my income to pay for someone else’ retirement? Well intentioned isn’t always right.
But maybe the two of you will learn how to utilise some elementary form of reasoned thought. Maybe.
BTW Zotz, I realize you’re counting on the government to do everything from paying your doctor bills to wiping your…sorry.
But private low risk/low yield investments do exist. Social Security isn’t the only one out there. Just thought you should know, as your financial planner seems to have told you nothing of any use.
And nevercorrectorright, I realize you’re on the recieving end of the proposed looting, but basic morals shouldn’t be completely beyond you. If you didn’t earn it it doesn’t belong to you. Is that clear enough even for the terminally misty mind of a liberal?
FDR and the United States Congress. Upheld by the Supremes in, Helvering v. Davis, Steward Machine Company v. Davis, & Flemming v. Nestor.
@19. lostinaseaofblue 01/15/2010 at 5:11 pm,
Young people starting out would be exponentially better off if they were not staring in the face of enormously high unemployment rates as a result of the Bush recession caused by the glibertarian Randroid deregulation and securitization of real estate mortgages in the United States which led to reckless and unsustainable lending practices and the complete meltdown of the banking and finance system.
But by all means, tell us more about your glibertarian Randroid fantasies.
@46
It looks like you can opt out of SS for religious reasons.
Check out IRS form 4029.
& #4361
Roger Rabbit Quiz
This quiz is a departure from the usual Roger Rabbit Quiz. It doesn’t have a right or wrong answer. It’s more like a Rorschach test.
Which do you trust more?
[ ] 1. Banks
[ ] 2. FDIC
Re 48
You know what Mike? Your success or failure in life is your choice, not my responsibility.
I realize this takes some explaining to a liberal unused to logical thought, so let’s start at the beginning.
When a young person starts out in a career or a trade they have choices. They can work hard for the money paid them or they can serve time at work. With the pay they recieve they can buy nice cars and vacations, or they can save and invest until they can properly afford those things.
It is not the responsibility of your fellow citizens if you choose poorly. It is not the responsibility of the government. It is yours. If you don’t like the results of your choices you have the right to try better next time. You have the responsibility to live with the consequences of your actions.
Being a liberal, I realize you were never taught this, and this seems strange to you. I realize that to you and your friends wealth and hard work are mysteries beyond your comprehension whose sources seem lost in impenetrable haze. But it is true, nonetheless. And expecting such behavior of citizens is the only way to build a decent culture.
BTW Mike,
The unemployment rate is less than 8% isn’t it. I mean Obama promised that if we spent federal money “saving or creating jobs” at a cost of nearly a trillion dollars unemployment wouldn’t exceed that number, so it must be below it, right?
This from the fool who can’t figger out one Mike Rogers from another Mike Rogers.
Lostinaseaofblue, keep the faith brotha, checkshisASSdailyforfissures has issues with facts.
Then he tries to play nice
Yes lostinaseaofblue provides factual presentations.
@53
It would seem to me that when the size of your economy is tied to the price of oil you’d have a smaller economy @$80 a barrel of oil than you would @ $40.
While I’m not super thrilled with Obama I do think that he was a better choice than McCain and is moving things in the right direction.
@34 I guarantee the provision you quote doesn’t make health care reform unconstitutional. That’ll be $250, please. Or, if you wish, you can hire Mr. Shea and pay him $250,000 to litigate the issue — and find out the same thing.
MikeDumbScout tells another whopper…
Keep da progressive playbook warm in your fingers fool.
@51
What, no none of the above?
I encountered a few wingnut lawyers during my career as a judge. Instead of presenting evidence and arguing legal points that worked in their clients’ favor, they put up fireworks — quoting the Constitution and so forth. These shows clearly were intended for consumption by their clients, and were not a serious attempt to persuade the judge (me). They did it to make the client believe the lawyer was worth what he was charging them; when, in fact, the lawyer hurt the client’s case, and the client would have been better off arguing his own case.
For example, one of these lawyers appeared before me in a child support adjustment case. He spent 45 minutes arguing the child support law was unconstitutional. Unfortunately, he didn’t present any evidence of his client’s earnings or other facts I could have used to reduce his client’s child support payment, so I entered what amounted to a default decision — the state got what it asked for because I had no facts on which to base a different decision. And the client, who undoubtedly was billed hundreds of dollars for this performance, almost certainly didn’t understand that the lawyer blew his case.
This lawyer now sits on our state supreme court, and while there, has engaged in a pattern of ethically questionable conduct. I won’t mention names; you know who I mean.
I don’t know anything about Mr. Shea, and I’m not making any insinuations or suggestions about how he practices law. He may be a very good and very effective lawyer, for all I know. All I’m saying is, you don’t win cases or get good results for clients with the kind of histrionics I saw in Mr. Shea’s “tenther” arguments. I hope, for the sake of his paying clients, that he has his feet on firmer ground when he’s representing his clients’ vital personal interests and getting paid for it.
You mention oil prices frequently, probably with good cause.
We are at war in the Middle East only because a steady supply of oil is necessary for our economy. We couldn’t power our industry, homes or vehicles without oil. We make political deals with dictators and tryants so that we can keep the supply of oil flowing.
However the last I read all the alternative sources of energy put together would supply 15%of our needs just in the US, so we’re kind of stuck with it for now.
And Obama is an educated man who could have drawn on virtually any source of information he wanted to find all this out. Before making promises he couldn’t keep.
But I agree. The last 3 presidential elections have been choices between the devil and the deep blue sea for voters.
@52
Lost is stuck in a 1930s mentality. Civilized, and yes, liberal, society has determined that making each generation care for the dotage of the previous is preferable to armies of homeless geriatrics depending on private charities for food. (Did you skip the great depression in your conservative education, Lost?)
Quick, name me a first world society that doesn’t have some form of pension or social security paid by the general taxation of the citizenry?
Choose poorly is what you fall back on. It’s all about your personal choice. I guess it is. In addition to choosing your field of work, every single American should also choose to be as educated in the investment field as a professional financial planner. Then they won’t choose to trust a professional (Madoff, Milken, Keating et all) who turn out to be common criminals. Madoff’s investors made a bad choice, effff ’em. Let them get in line at the soup kitchen.
Ever stop to ponder why your brand of conservatism is doomed?
@31 “I personally think that the outlet in speech and written expresion keeps the US from the more violent expressions of political differenc.”
I agree with this, to a point. Blowing off steam works, to an extent, like the safety valve on a pressure cooker. It can have a cathartic effect. But this works only to a point. When rhetoric incites, it can become a cause, not a preventative, of violence.
“And I don’t know that the US is any more or less violent than any other nation historically speaking. In fact I’d say we’re less.”
The U.S. has one of the highest violent crime rates in the world. The U.S. has a history of lynchings and Indian genocide. It has, at times, been a warmonger country. It’s true we haven’t had a Hitler or Pol Pot — yet — but that could change. Human nature is the same everywhere, and given the right conditions, there’s no reason why Americans wouldn’t do what humans in other societies have done.
@33 You make 3 major points in this comment, and every one of them is a falsehood.
“You could say that in fact Social Security was a good investment compared to other private means of retirement savings. Wait, you couldn’t, because that wouldn’t be true.”
Social security has never defaulted a payment. It has paid every cent of promised benefits on time since it began. How many private pensions are being bailed out by the government, with pensioners getting cents on the dollar? No corporate pension can be relied on anymore; not when there are incentives to defund them so they can be dumped on the government.
“You could say that no-one ought to have a responsibility for creating their own financial security including retirement savings and some form of health insurance. This is dodgy ethically and morally, but that should be okay with you.”
You could say that, but no one ever has. Social Security has always been intended to supplement pensions and individual retirement savings. It was not designed to be, and is not promoted as, a person’s only retirement income. Social Security doesn’t prevent people from working in jobs with pensions, saving in IRAs and 401(k)s, or acquiring stocks and other investments. In fact, most people do.
“You could have argued that millions did plan for retirement and were wiped out by the ongoing recession. This actually has some ground in evoking sympathy for the truly unlucky. Until you think that just about all of us have been told to diversify our investments so that such a thing couldn’t easily happen.”
Diversification was totally ineffective to prevent losses in this recession, because asset values went down across the board. If there is one thing this market decline has taught investors, it is that diversification doesn’t guarantee safety.
@34 I guarantee that clause doesn’t make the health care bill unconstitutional. That’ll be $250, please. Or, you can pay Mr. Shea $250,000 to litigate it for you, and get the same result.
@35 If teabaggers don’t want to be called that, they should stop using the term.
@36 Hey, Americans love a circus!
19, 42 — A young person who invested his retirement savings in an S&P 500 index fund 10 years ago would have lost money.
http://www.simplestockinvestin.....eturns.htm
When Bush was trying to sell “private investment accounts” to the public, he used two data sets to make his arguments. The returns he said savers would get from private investment accounts were based on a best-case economic growth scenario that most economists said was unrealistic and wouldn’t be attained. His warnings about the future solvency of Social Security were based on a worst-case economic growth scenario that most economists said was unduly pessimistic. He could not make his case using the same data for both private investment accounts and Social Security.
@44 “Yes, it’s true. Investment is a poor idea, and no one should save atr all. My mistake.”
No one said that, or anything remotely close to it.
“A diversified retirement plan would have stood up under the last crisis.”
That is patently false. People with diversified investment portfolios suffered major declines.
@44 (continued) “Who made it okay for them to steal 15% of my income to pay for someone else’ retirement?”
This is also a falsehood. No one is “stealing” your FICA contributions. If you live a normal lifespan, you’ll get back more than you paid in. That’s because Social Security benefits are pegged to rising prosperity and living standards. In addition, Social Security is more than retirement savings; your FICA taxes also pay for disability and survivor insurance. The truth is, you can’t find a similar combination of insurance and retirement annuity with equivalent benefits in the private sector at anything remotely close to the same cost.
@46 “If you didn’t earn it it doesn’t belong to you.”
Well, that argument also could be applied to the public education, public roads and infrastructure, government tax breaks and subsidies, and all the other public investments that make your job and income possible.
And it obviously could be applied to argue that no one should be allowed to inherit anything, because inheritances are unearned.
And, as a point of law, this assertion is another falsehood. Government has the power to tax. When government taxes me, and uses the money to pay a benefit to you (e.g., food stamps, unemployment benefits, social security, veteran’s benefits, or whatever), the benefit becomes your private property when you receive it, and in every practical and legal sense is “yours.” Whether you did anything to earn it is irrelevant.
@58 As I said, there is no right or wrong answer to that quiz — only revealing answers.
@61 Actually, before Social Security, children were expected to, and did, support their parents in old age. The Baby Boomers were the first generation to be freed of this financial burden by Social Security.
Lost @52,
I guess those tens of thousands of Haitians who just got crushed in an earthquake made some awfully bad choices.
Roger @ 59
As you know, too many clients want their lawyers to simply be “aggressive.” They want their lawyers to scream and yell; results be damned. Some lawyers decide that they can be that screamer and yeller. Screaming at a high hourly rate pays, apparently, the rent. I can’t do that.
On a different note, I know which Justice of our state’s Supreme Court you’re talking about–he would be the Ron Paul of our Court. I am prohibited from demeaning our judiciary, as you know. I would say about him that he does not even begin to compare to another member of our Supreme Court. The mix of her arrogance with her lack of understanding produces an existential picture that Sartre would have written a novel (a regular-sized novel) about.
Re 73
You are an intelligent man, whether I agree with your political worldview or not.
Therefore I assume you know the difference between the asian Tsunami or the Haitian earthquake and finances. I know for a certainty that the market will rise and fall and can plan accordingly. I know that I may get sick, or lose a job and can plan accordingly. I can’t control all the aspects of my financial life, but I can certainly plan for most of the bad things that could happen.
Should the infrastructure of Seattle be destroyed by an earthquake it would be illogical to expect people to help themselves find water or splint a broken arm. I can’t rebuild the streets or the electrical grid to my neighborhood. I can’t replace the mother or son or spouse lost in the wreckage. These are the legitimate province of government. The aid and assistance given by others are the decent response to the suffering of a fellow human being.
You ought to be ashamed of yourself for using the grief and pain of the Haitian people to score cheap political points.
Rabbit in general
10 years span doesn’t, for most, accurately reflect the investment lifespan of their retirement accounts. If you were using a 30 year data line that might be more relevant.
As for taking my money in taxes to give to the personal needs of another citizen this is simple theft. I pay taxes for roads, civil protection, schools and national defense among other things, as these are commonly enjoyed by all citizens. They are not the redistribution of wealth on misbegotten philosphical grounds.
The inheritance argument is specious. What’s mine is mine to distribute as I see fit, with a will being the instrument of that distribution.
The person who died paid the taxes, not the person who inherited the money. So, if one earns a million dollars, he should pay taxes, but if he inherits it, he shouldn’t pay any?
Grow up. What’s mine is mine is Walter Sobchek’s argument.
re 76: You’re out of your leagur here, negro. There are rules!
@75
“I know that I may get sick, or lose a job and can plan accordingly.”
But Rabbit has a salient point about the diversity of SSI services. Say you’re a recent college graduate. You just signed on with a Fortune 500 and in a few short years of hard work you can smell that promotion and six figure salary. You’ve enrolled in their 401k and you’ve even managed to squirrel some money into an IRA while paying your student loans. You’re responsible and making ALL the right choices.
Then one day an elk wanders into your path as you travel the sea to sky. Or a drunk leaving a bar runs you over in a crosswalk. Or someone at your office is negligent and the copier that’s being delivered tips over and pins you to the floor. Should have planned for that.
Your vision of the world, your money was stolen from you. To that paralyzed 23 year-old? F.U. Sorry. Hope your church can find you a closet to live in. Or you could just do your conservative duty and roll your wheelchair around and fend for yourself until you die from malnourishment, the elements or hell just stop being a burden on society and off yourself.
Yep. Must be soul-fulfilling to be your brand of conservative.
@52 lostinaseaofblue 01/15/2010 at 8:52 pm,
Please. Your inability to understand simple Aristotelian logic constructs has already been well documented.
But since you brought up what people are taught as a justification of ignorance, let me help educate you.
Choice does not equal responsibility. Try some self education. See if it helps.
All said, we are not hopeful.
Re 76
The person who died already paid taxes on that million prior to his death. This inheritance thing is a side not of Rabbits, but somehoow in the ‘wealth is evil’ mentality of the left being left money is particularly evil. Why is that?
Re 79
In the optomistic hope that some rudimentary form of basic reason can be attained by you, I’ll try to correct some of your misapprehensions.
By the way, make the most of one mis-type if you need to for your low self esteem. That replacement of argument with personal attack is very common with leftists, oddly enough. Must be something to do with subliminal messaging on MSNBC.
If I say ‘your apple is not my orange’ does it make it easier for you? I know words like ‘choice’ and ‘responsibility’ scare liberals. Maybe with less emotionally freighted words you can see the negation in the sentence which makes your choice the opposite of my responsibility.
Liberals and progressives think they practice compassion by ameliorating the lot of the less fortunate. Maybe in terms of the present moment this is true.
But in the long term that should be the focus of public policy the very opposite is what you practice.
You take from those who earn and work and plan part of the fruit of that planning and give it to those who don’t do any of those things. How is this compassionate to the one person in this equation deserving of compassion, the productive man?
You rob the public coffers, borrowing against the tax income from your children and their children after them to pay for poor choices now. How is this compassionate to your children and grandchildren?
You take from people the full value of being alive. In drinking to the dregs the bitterness of loss and error I learn lessons I would never have learned had someone taken the consequences of my choices away. I look back on choices good and bad, consequences good and bad and remember most clearly the bad. I try not to repeat those errors that resulted in time, resources and effort lost in repairing the damage of my mistakes. How in heavens’ name is the theft of this basic human experience ever capable of being construed as compassion?
Worst, you create a culture that passes on values to the next generation. Are these values thrift, hard work, responsibility, the joy of struggling through until by merit and effort you make it to the other side? No, of course not. They are laziness, reliance on others for the most basic of your needs and the inability to stay your course once any obstacle appears in your path.
That last is the Roosevelt generation. That is the Johnson generation that believed that government was the cure and a full and accomplished life the disease.
Don’t claim you are compassionate, my friends. You may be in the short run, but it isn’t the planting of the seeds that matters, it’s the harvest.
Lostinaseaofblue,
When someone mentions Haiti, ask them how much they are sending to relief agencies to help the survivors? Ask them will they leave their cushy environment and go help for a week or two or are they just using Haiti for political arguments? To say Haitians died over poor choices makes one wonder about their motives in life.
This from the fool who calls polls he doesn’t like outliers.
Lostinaseaofblue,
You are doing well here.
There is room for helping others as well. There is even a moral imperative to do so, Individually and by ones’ own volition.
Charity is a fundamental of Islam, I’m told. It is a commandment of Christ. I can’t speak to Eastern religions, but athiests and agnostics realize that helping others is the right thing to do, individually.
I have helped and been helped and was glad to do the one and grateful for the other.
For the government to take my money and redistribute it doesn’t meet my obligation to my fellow man. It is involuntary and I don’t get to know even where the money is going. It isn’t efficient either. Instead of me giving a dollar to my neigbor out of work the government takes my dollar and spends 30 cents of it giving it to that neighbor. He gets 70 cents and some otherwise useless beauracrat gets a job.
I realize the value of helping others, and do so through my church and with my time and money. I’ve been helped in my career and in my personal life, though not monetarily, and am deeply grateful for the assistance. I just think governmnet is the wrong vehicle for delivering such help.
Lostinaseaofblue,
Liberals always want to use other peoples monies to “ameliorate the lot of the less fortunate.” Puddy saw this on this blog when Katrina hit. No personal compassion, no opening their wallets and sending money to relief agencies; only yelling and screaming at Mike Brown and GWBush.
@81 lostinaseaofblue 01/16/2010 at 7:50 am,
Excellent and very coherent writing Lost!
Even more good writing!
Your ability to string together words in a willy-nilly incoherent style reminiscent of half term Governor Palin inspires me to follow your advice; if only one could understand it.
Re86
Ah, I see the confusion. My mistake.
Once you become a big boy and start the 7th grade, little Mikey, maybe the big words the grown-ups use will make sense! Won’t that be exciting Mikey?
LIAR!!
employed yet?
You’re talking about Iraq right?
“How is this compassionate to the one person in this equation deserving of compassion, the productive man?”
You just keep piling on the morally bankrupt statements don’t you. Those born with severe handicaps that by their nature prevent them from being productive. Not worthy of compassion. An orphaned child? Not deserving of compassion.
89 – You got your “work” cut out for you.
http://news.google.com/news/se.....employment
That is if your “job” is name-calling the unemployed.
It’ll work just great for your crowd come November. Heckuva job!
@92
unemployed is one thing..
unemployed and fucking off all day on the internet is another……
Even Raygun talked about tax money going to the “truly needy”.
Herbert Hoover harangued charities to “give more” to relieve the incredible deprivation during the Depression. The role of government is to make war, run prisons, give land to railroads.. In the long run everything will work out.
But in the long run we’re all dead.
Re 90
The subject was entitlement spending and the philosophy that leads to it. It was not military, although you can’t seem to talk about anything at all without reference to Iraq.
Have you got an answer to the meat of the post, or are you just going to pick at the garnish?
Re 91
I’ve consistently referred to those who won’t work, not those who can’t. If this was unclear I apologize. But, like YLB you don’t argue the basic points. I assume that this is because you know there to be no counter argument.
95 – You’re not worth it. You’re boring me to tears..
Re 92
Unemployment is 8% right? That’s what Obama promised it would peak at if we spent 1 trillion of taxpayer money on his stimulus program.
hey lost dude:
your philosophical notions that choice responsibility etc. mean all social programs and liberalism drives the economy downward are simply disproven by the gdp per capita rates of the nations of europe, canada, japan, etc.
any honest and knowledgeable accounting of the income levels and welfare levels (I mean longevity, housing, how much food people eat, how many are hungry, how many go to college, etc.) in those nations shows they do far, far better than our nation does, and this becuase idiotic ignorant morons like you stand in the way of progress, spouting cliches with no reference to what works in the real world.
freedom and choice led to the near calamity of the economy in teh financial crisis….as well as the great depression. freedom and choice mean in the USA half the population doesn’t get well fed well educated or stay healthy….this means half of assets are not well tended…this means the economy is smaller than it would be otherwise…..
so your notions and philosophy are bad for everyone.
the examples you pick of roads being a govt. responsibility is very telling. YOU ADMIT TO LIKING SOCIALISM in road building. thus in reality, you admit it’s okay when….it’s okay. there’s no difference between road building and getting people fed, housed, educated and productive, we all benefit, and you can’t explain why if road building works, and if the other social programs work, there’s any distinction.
At this point you likely response is predictable, it will be to lie about the statistics and point to some european nation that has ten percent unemployment. but the massive mountain of facts shows that all those nations with social democratic programs or nationalized health care are either pretty much as rich as us on a per capita gdp basis, with FAR higher levels of social equity and without the GRINDING POVERTY of 20% of our population, or, like Canada, have in the last decades reached total parity with us.
So your entire “philosophy” just crumbles. The Canadian socialized health care did NOT destroy the productive urges or abilities or competitiveness of that nation, and same with japan germany france switzerland sweden etc. etc. etc. The conservative response to all this is to lie, lie lie about facts and I fully expect you to do so, too, because it will just be too painful for you to tell the truth and say “oops, you’re right. I’ve been believing hogwash my entire life, how could I be so moronically stupid?”
Anotehr common conservative response is to say none of this data counts because “We pay for their defense!”
A good reason for us not too, wouldn’t you say?
As for the involuntary nature of taxes your argument is with democracy and our founding fathers themselves who created a govt. TO TAX YOU and me and that was a specific failure under art. of confed. that they specifically rememdied. so yes, it’s theft, robbery, double taxation, whatever you want to call it…but it’s also LEGITIMATE under our constitutional structure so if you are against it you’re basically a traitor to the ideals of the founders.
They even put in those words about the general welfare, too, I might add.
So to sum up:
we have a individualist and collectivist nature, both; the social democratic model of high taxes and lots of programs works purty darn well; conservative claims it leads to national bankruptcy are a pack of lies uttered by a pack of morons and idiots; and those nations also have plenty ‘o responsibility and initiative to keep the capitalist engines humming.
Your theory would only be true if Canada Japan and Europe were all like Russia under communism, or Cuba today. They’re not. That’s your big, big big fat lie. You ought to be ashamed of your lies, or your ignorance.
98 – I like this guy..
Re 98
Many words to miss the point entirely. Bravo.
To correct some of your more glaring misconceptions though-
I made no claim as to how welfare spending affects economies. The argument was entirely humanist in nature. The first half of your post is off point completely as it deals entirely with (erroneous) economic impact statistics.
I mentioned what most people call the commons in one post, and made the distinction you apparently lack the wit to comprehend. Taxes are legitimate, of course. They are levied to pay for those things that are constitutionally mandated for government to perform. You can call this socialism if you like. It would betray your complete lack of understaning of the term, but that’s your problem. Transportation infrastructure, civil defense, national security and such are within the umbrella of the commons. We collectively enjoy the use of those things. Taking a dollar from me to give to you isn’t a commons item. An individual enjoys the use of that specific money. That is theft.
I realize you’re too lost in the dream world of progressivism to understand any of this, but planting a mental seed can sometimes help the delusional, eventually.
Re 98
I keep mentioning this and somehow no progressive has rebutted it. Because they can’t.
In Canada your much vaunted health care system is a failure. Canadian workmans comp won’t use it. It’s slow, ineffecient and costs more in care due to long waits that make recuperation longer. In the words of the pro-socialist journalist who talked about it-A wait of up to 6 months for injury care means that recuperation times go up by a factor of as much as 6 times. Workmans Comp has gone to a private clinic system where care can be delivered quickly and cost effectively. This is unfair to those in the system who must endure the long waits. It’s unfair to the doctors who can’t get jobs at the private clinics which pay more because they’re not good enough. It’s just unfair damn it!
After this diatribe the fool of a Canadian journalist goes on to say that he can’t understand why we don’t adopt the socialist system!
So learn your facts before typing.
Re 99
I’m sure. He’s incoherent and spouts nonsensical numbers that appear to support your position without you needing to think. Handy.
@95
Go back to your ECON 101. Full employment (zero unemployment) is not desirable under the American capitalist system. There MUST be a willing and able work force ready to be hired by new business should the need arise. This is the economic policy of the nation in which you live. The fiscal policy of the past 50+ years of the United States strives to create unemployment levels between 3-4%
So tell me, if 3% of the working eligible are BY DESIGN unable to find work, are they worthy of compassion? Did they make poor choices that keep them from working?
You know, there are pure free-market, 100% de-regulated economies in this world. Living under such a system might suit you. Enjoy your new life in Somalia. There, you can make as much as you can grab and no one will take taxes from you. Where is this un-taxed, un-socialized first world free market paradise you’re looking for? (I hear the ghost of a dead political philosophy wispering to you. To borrow a phrase, “America, love it or leave it!”
I’m curious about the lack of basic English comprehension among the HA crowd. Is this an isolated thing, or leftists in general who can’t understand our natal tongue?
So, to teach you some econ 101, you don’t need “3% of the working eligible are BY DESIGN unable to find work.” Plenty of lazy folks who won’t work until the rent is 3 months overdue and the eviction notice is on the door. No design needed. That is simple “I hate wealthy people” rhetoric common to the far left.
Had you read my posts you would have seen a clear admission numerous times of a legitimate role for a taxing government.
Since you so clearly hate this country I might suggest to you- To borrow a phrase, “America, love it or leave it!”
@96…HAHAHAHAHAHHAHHAHAHAHHA…YLB gets his ass owned – and when he cant think of a response – he says “im bored”….
YLB keeps on proving why he is HA’s biggest loser.
105 – You lack historical context. In fact the only context you have is the Limbaugh show.
Our lost soul also believes that homosexuals are by definition mentally ill even though the psychiatric professions abandoned that canard ages ago. He also proclaimed his Obama derangement syndrome on the day Obama was elected. Obama has continued the policies of Bush in many areas much to progressive disappointment. Does the lost fool have anything postive to say about that? Obviously not. Just the same old knee jerk right wing foolishness. So I’m pretty much bored with just about anything he has to say.
I pity you right wing fools because your collective asses are “owned” by the likes of a Limbaugh whose fat ass in turn is owned by some pretty rich people.
The only thing Limbaugh ever supported Clinton on was NAFTA. Need I say more?
I heard “Slimebaugh” on the radio the other day.
I like that one..
Re 106
Logical error 1-
Straw man-I can’t argue with the reasoned position my opponent has taken so will attack some element of him instead to try to deflect attention from my lack of argument.
But I’ll bite. Just because the likes of you are afraid of their beliefs don’t assume I am. If I tell my friends I think I’m a hedgehog who was unfortunate enough to have been born human they would be rightly concerned about me. Homosexuality is analgous. It isn’t dangerous to the sufferer or anyone else so isn’t my business. But it is a mental illness.
Logical error 2-
Some conservatives listen to and believe Rush Limbaugh.
He is a conservative.
He listens to and believes Rush Limbaugh.
I don’t, never have. See, your error was in your assumptions made without support about what I or anyone else on the right believes about Limbaugh.
This concludes todays lesson in logic. Have a nice day.
Still waiting for a response on the following posted repeatedly about Obama-
The health care reform isn’t. It is a gift to insurance companies and pharmaceutical companies. About the only thing it does do is violate a campaign promise made by Obama. No mandate to purchase health insurance.
Obama spent a trillion dollars without allowing time for Congressional debate on a stimulus package. To push this through he promised unemployment would top at 8% if this passed. Yeah.
Obama had the nerve to travel around the world apologizing for the US for everything from the fall of the Roman Empire to the shortage of milk for breakfast cereal. Admitting error is one thing. In a dangerous world showing signs of weakness is quite another.
I could go on, and on and on. Obama is unfitted for the job he has. He’s go
Still waiting for a response on the following posted repeatedly about Obama-
The health care reform isn’t. It is a gift to insurance companies and pharmaceutical companies. About the only thing it does do is violate a campaign promise made by Obama. No mandate to purchase health insurance.
Obama spent a trillion dollars without allowing time for Congressional debate on a stimulus package. To push this through he promised unemployment would top at 8% if this passed. Yeah.
Obama had the nerve to travel around the world apologizing for the US for everything from the fall of the Roman Empire to the shortage of milk for breakfast cereal. Admitting error is one thing. In a dangerous world showing signs of weakness is quite another.
I could go on, and on and on. Obama is unfitted for the job he has. He’s go
108 – You pretty much ape Limbaugh.. pretty much the same attitude.
Yawwnnn…
Logic is wasted on the likes of you. YOU”RE JUST NOT WORTH IT.. OK???
Get over yourself. Like your fellow travellers here – we’re just not that into you…
110 – That tirade was really “logical”..
ylb owned again…..
Lost…
If you continue to simply parrot the conservative talking head / teabag rhetoric, WE will continue to ignore it.
Your distaste for appology is perfectly in keeping with a two year old’s temper tantrum.
“If we’re an arrogant nation, they’ll resent us; if we’re a humble nation, but strong, they’ll welcome us.” Dubya.
I’ll paraphrase another thing I read, might have been Franken. You love America like a two year old loves their mother. Absolutely and without question. I love America like an adult. I see that it has faults and makes mistakes but I love it anyway and work to make the relationship better.
So to sum up your position, your grasp of American economic policy and history is limited. You believe that only productive people are worthy of compassion. You believe taxation is theft. You believe that the institutionally imposed unemployment rate is just lazy people. You believe that because someone substantively argues against your economic theory you can just change the subject and expect us to follow. Confronted with substantive argument, you go to the last refuges of the poor debater, spelling and grammar.
@114….I agree: lets say “im sorry”…and then we keep every single fucking penny of foreign aid and use it at home instead of throwing it down the toilet of 2nd and 3rd world nations.
I like that idea….”im sorry – and your own your fucking own – no more foreign aid, no more free food shipments, no more anything”
have a nice day, world..lets see how well you do on your own.
115 – Bodies are stacked in the street in Port au Prince and the right wing equates a modicum of aid with “meals on wheels”..
We spend an inadequate amount on roads and bridges and other things to put some people back to work, things we’ve long needed and put off doing because of right wing ideology and by any measure not nearly enough to boot and the right wing calls that “pork”.
Wars of choice? That’s just fine.
Sure sucks to be a right winger.
RE
“So to sum up your position, your grasp of American economic policy and history is limited.”
I’m neither historian or economist, but I’m not ignorant either, whatever your opinion of the matter is.
“You believe that only productive people are worthy of compassion. You believe taxation is theft.”
No, and there are ESL courses to give you the reading comprehension you so clearly need.
“You believe that the institutionally imposed unemployment rate is just lazy people.”
No, there is no such beastie. There are the truly unfortunate and the lazy. Those terminally unemployed and able bodies are the latter.
“You believe that because someone substantively argues against your economic theory you can just change the subject and expect us to follow.”
When? I’ve been trying to get you folks to engage on Obamas’ lack of integrity for a month. No dice and never an answer. I’ve been trying to get a direct answer to the basic worthlessness of universal healthcare for months. No answer to any direct statements of how these systems realy work. You folks don’t like a fact, you simply ignore it. Changing the subject is a liberal trick, not a conservative one. You don’t like the argument? Just say ‘fuck you’ and that’ll do the trick!
“Confronted with substantive argument, you go to the last refuges of the poor debater, spelling and grammar.”
I’m waiting for any substantive argument of any kind. Still waiting. Still waiting.
ylb arschloch,
Produce multiple links from your HA Backup database where HA Libtardos said they helped in Katrina with their own money. We’ll wait.
@75 It is fruitless to debate with you not because you’re a condescending fuck, although you are, but because you stupidly assume you know what other people are thinking when you don’t pay even cursory attention to what they’re saying. These are your two overwhelming traits: You talk down to people, and you try to put words in their mouths that they never spoke. This comes through in nearly all your posts. To this must be added that, when you try to support your arguments with factual statements, you’re also often a liar.
Now, as for the specific content of #75, if society chooses to take care of its weakest or most unfortunate members by taxing all of its members, then you have the same obligation as everyone else to pay those taxes in return for the privilege of living in that society and enjoying its benefits. In this country, we make those decisions by the principle of majority rule.
As I’ve tried to point out before, as a business person you enjoy many benefits provided by taxpayers. Your business couldn’t exist if the public didn’t educate your workers to read and perform basic math. It couldn’t exist if the public didn’t provide roads for you to get men and materials to job sites. It couldn’t exist without many of the other things paid for by taxes. As a citizen, you don’t get to pick and choose which taxes you’re willing to pay, or what your taxes pay for, except at the ballot box when you vote for the people who make those decisions. That applies to you exactly as it applies to the rest of us.
Finally, if you don’t like the idea of paying money for benefits that are ultimately given to other people, then don’t buy home, car, or business insurance; because that’s exactly the principle that insurance operates on — the many pool resources to provide benefits for a few so that all are protected against life’s risks.
@80 “The person who died already paid taxes on that million prior to his death.”
You are either hugely ignorant or a huge liar. Most multimillion-dollar estates consist largely of untaxed capital gains. The heirs get a basis step-up, which means those gains will never be subjected to capital gains tax. Without an inheritance tax, that income would go completely untaxed.
Here’s how it works. Let’s say Joe Blow bought property outside Everett for $150,000 in 1955. The city has grown and the property is now prime commercial property worth $5,000,000. But Joe never sold it, so no taxes have been paid on the $4,850,000 gain. Then Joe dies and leaves the property to his son, Joe Jr., who immediately sells it for $5,000,000.
How much of Joe Jr.’s capital gain is taxable?
If you said $4,850,000, you’re wrong. The correct answer is $0. The reason is because when Joe Jr. inherited the property his basis for tax purposes was automatically bumped up to its current value of $5,000,000. Therefore, his capital gain is zero.
In fact, if Joe Jr. sells the property in 2010, the inheritance tax on Joe’s estate is zero, too, so Joe Jr. is getting a $4,850,000 tax-free windfall. Only the original $150,000 was ever taxed. The $4,850,000 capital gain has not been, and never will be, taxed.
That’s pretty goddam insulting to a wage earner doing dangerous and backbreaking work (e.g., installing a new roof on one of “lost’s” rebuilds) who gets only a $3,650 personal exemption and $5,700 standard deduction.
Lost, you can transfer $3,500,000 of capital gains to your heirs without either one of you ever paying any income, capital gains, or inheritance taxes on it. For you to complain about your heirs having to pay inheritance taxes on amounts above that is, shall we say, whiny.
But hey, I’m willing to make a deal. I’ll support abolishing the inheritance tax if you’ll support abolishing the basis step-up and subjecting inheritances to capital gains taxes. Deal?
@108 “But it is a mental illness.”
Do yourself a favor and read the American Psychiatric Association’s position statement on homosexuality before popping off on a subject you know nothing about, so you won’t look like an idiot.
” … the American Psychiatric Association … has maintained, since 1973, that homosexuality per se, is not a mental disorder.”
http://www.psych.org/Departmen.....00001.aspx
@115
You’re not real familiar with where your food and almost all your consumer products come from. Most of THEM would do better than US in a situation like that. Welcome to the global economy. ‘O and I hope you’re not a fan of coffee or chocolate.
Most of our aid goes to Israel and Egypt.
Believe me, there are things we need to cut. Like most of our overseas bases and our gun running business (most of the guns are made overseas as well).
Foreign aid should probably be mostly teacher, nurses, doctors and such teaching their third world counterparts. That’s what we did prior to WII and people liked us much better then.
Rabbit,
I tend to glance over most of lost’s posts, so I didn’t see him proclaiming homosexuality as “a mental illness.” Wow, he’s more mental than I thought he was. He actually thinks of himself as an intellectual. He abandons any thread, however, when thinking is required. I suspect lost is a divorced, aging, jobless, male whose kids don’t much care for him. That’s my guess.
@121
Welcome to 1915, Rog.
@110 You are a dunce without peer among the trolls on this blog, and that’s a bar so low it takes a gopher to get under it. This is what you said:
“Obama had the nerve to travel around the world apologizing for the US for everything from the fall of the Roman Empire to the shortage of milk for breakfast cereal. Admitting error is one thing. In a dangerous world showing signs of weakness is quite another.”
By contrast, this is what The Economist said:
“In his first 12 months in office Mr Obama has overseen the stabilising of the economy, is on the point of bringing affordable health care to virtually every American citizen, has ended the era of torture, is robustly prosecuting the war in Afghanistan while gradually disengaging from Iraq; and perhaps more precious than any of these, he has cleared away much of the cloud of hatred and fear through which so much of the world saw the United States during George Bush’s presidency.” (Emphasis added.)
http://www.economist.com/opini.....extfeature
The Economist is a highly respected magazine — Bill Gates says it’s his first choice for news.
Frankly, I’m glad Obama is president, and I’m equally glad you’re not.
@115 I like your idea, since the biggest chunk of our foreign aid goes to Israel and I think Israel is a bully.
@117 “but I’m not ignorant either”
You continually prove otherwise.
@117 “I’ve been trying to get a direct answer to the basic worthlessness of universal healthcare for months.”
Here’s your direct answer: It takes a real shit to believe some people should do without health care.
@123 “I tend to glance over most of lost’s posts”
Trust me, you’re not missing anything worth reading.
@124 “Welcome to 1915, Rog.”
I was thinking he’s more like 1692 or thereabouts.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salem_witch_trials
Wow Herr Goebbels Dumb Bunny… Projection 101. Puddy’s critique of your “This is how it works” series is one of your stupidly assume you know what other people are thinking diatribes. Better yet, this thread has many of your stupidly assume you know what other people are thinking diarrhea commentaries now!
@131 Well, let’s see. We have 3 persistent trolls who elevate stupidity to an art form, each in his own unique way.
First there’s Mr. Cynical, who sounds like a broken record, but whose fortitude you can’t help but admire; he has endured on HA for years despite all the deserved abuse we heap on him.
Then there’s “lost,” who raves like a fool, but is impervious to our slings and arrows because he has armored himself with the arrogance of the ignorant dolt who knows absolutely nothing of the subjects on which he expounds.
And finally, here’s our good friend puddy, who like Klown is still here too, although the long months of verbal combat on HA have reduced him to a babbling idiot who writes in tongues. You’d better stand well clear of him, because his head is going to explode any day now.
@39 Actually, I’m not all that impressed by how REI is run these days. Unwilling to trust their members to nominate directors, candidates for the board of directors are now chosen by — the board of directors. With not even one seat on the board reserved for a popular candidate. This self-perpetuating cabal has turned REI into a virtual corporate monarchy in which the members are merely customers; it can hardly be considered a member-controlled cooperative anymore. I’m not saying it’s badly run, but it’s even the most obtuse corporations have better governing structures than this.
It used to be — I don’t know if it still is — that a vintage REI membership numbers was quite the status symbol. For what it’s worth, my REI number dates to about 1960 and is in the low five digits. In the entire history of The Co-Op, there have been only about 35,000 members before me. For those of you unfamiliar with REI (do such people exist outside the Amazon rainforest?), the list of past and present REI members now numbers in the plural millions. So, all you wingnuts with 7-digit REI numbers greedily waiting for your dividend coupons, please bow down and kiss my cute cottontail when I come hopping by.
@52 “They can work hard for the money paid them or they can serve time at work.”
Generally speaking, the more you pay people the harder they work for you; and when cheap labor conservatives insist on paying third world wages, they can expect to get what they paid for.
@81 Here’s a man drowning in a sea of wingnut platitudes, all of them false. “Lost” is striving to become the biggest HA liar of all time. And that’s no small feat.
what exactly is so backwater about the 10th?
It’s no surprise that liberals hate the constitution (to include the 10th amendment), but to take pride in that fact? Well, that’s another level of ignorance I can’t necessarily understand.
…now back to regularly scheduled Roger Rabbit chat room activity