TWCL

[WriterWhoCantDraw]

Ah, the "I've got mine, screw you" mentality, eh?

Let's see...what's getting cut, potentially? For starters, student loans and Pell grants. A poor kid can't get into college without those...and yet they cut 'em, despite the fact that education is what keeps people OFF the government dole.

Here's the thing...I USED to be a Republican, but I stopped drinking the Kool-Aid. Because of shit like that. A lack of forward thinking, just blind defense of the corporate masters at the expense of everybody else. Think for yourself for a change, rather than repeating Fox News talking points. Damned near every "conservative" I meet up with anymore is like that. Christ, it gets old. Figure it out, people...Reagan's dead, and these current Repub SOB's ain't Reagan. If you're not a bigot, a nutjob holy-roller, or rich, you have no place in the conservative movement today. It saddens me, but that's what it's become. Leave while you still can, or check your brain at the door.

Libertarians (which I'd assumed you were, although you're sounding more like a Republican all the time), are a little better, but not much. Way too little of the Penn Jillette-style "live and let live" libertarianism, which is better on social issues, and way too much of the "me too, Tea Party!" brigade, with the same annoying strain of anti-intellectualism and fear of anyone different. Meh, at least they tend to get it right on foreign policy most of the time.

Don't get me wrong, I'm far from a huge fan of OWS. They get as much, if not more, wrong as they get right, in my opinion, and their message is incoherent at best, nearly non-existent at worst. But my point is that the tax burden needs to swing back the other way. While you can certainly say that the rich were getting screwed 50 years ago, it's not the case anymore. Swing that pendulum back a little.

One thing that I must ask...if you keep taxing the fuck out of the middle class (or for that matter, if you start taxing the poor, which some Repubs are suggesting), how in the hell are they going to be able to buy the corporations' products? Nobody ever seems to ask THAT one, which I think is more than fair.
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[Casual Notice]

No one has suggested taxing either the poor or the middle class. I've been ignoring that statement because, I assumed you were just using hyperbole for effect. I'll repeat, though, no one has said, "let's tax the poor and middle class."

The only way you get a tax on the middle class is if you try to tax the rich. They have access to accountants and lawyers to help them reduce their burden that the middle class doesn't, so any tax on "the rich" ends up a tax on the middle class.

My attitude is not, "I've got mine, screw you." My attitude is I fought long and hard for what little I've got. I've been poor. Actually poor where you don't eat for a couple of days because it's a choice between that and paying the rent. As it stands right now, my wife and I stand right at the national average; however, through personal austerity, we have managed to build our savings to the point where we might be able to retire and live without sweating the property tax bill every year.

Iam neither a Republican nor a Libertarian. I find the Republicans care too much about what other people are doing and not enough about the consequences f their faith-based or security-based initiatives. On the other hand, the Libertarians lack a healthy cynicism toward the inevitable abuses of corporate oligopolies. I think of myself as an informed independent. If my financial leanings are of a conservative strain, it is only because I made my own way and don't see why others can't be expected to make theirs.

Socially, I'm much more liberal. I believe in the legalization of recreational drugs, the freedom of a woman to control her own body, and the right of spousal benefits to any competent adult person or persons who can reasonably claim to be a life partner of any other competent adult person or persons.

I believe the corporation serves a valid purpose, but modern corporations have been allowed to violate standing US law under the excuse of the "global economy". I believe there's no such thing as "Too Big to Fail" in a free market economy. To say such a thing about a company is just a euphemism for "Too big to Exist" in my book.

I'm going to stop writing now. You've managed, through your self-righteous ad hominem attacks on my character and philosphies, to piss me off, something very few people manage to do these days.
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What I lack in sincerity, I make up for in sarcasm.
S*P*Q*R

[WriterWhoCantDraw]

Listen, if I came across that way, sorry. But consider it a compliment...if I thought you were just some random idiot, I wouldn't bother trying to convince you.

And while you may not have suggested raising taxes on the poor and middle class (which I never said YOU PERSONALLY did), plenty of Republican candidates/talking heads have, which a quick and scary Google search will reveal. THAT is my problem. If you disagree with that, good on ya. And please understand, my attacks here weren't on you, but the current conservative movement. If it didn't come across that way, I'm sorry. I regret a few things that were said, but I stand by my basic points. This issue (taxation, not OWS) is, admittedly, kind of a "thing" with me. I will hand it to you...usually, anybody who disagrees with me runs away after I invoke the Ike 90% tax thing. You held up, which I think threw me off. Normally, it's an argument ender, like saying "1908" to a Chicago Cubs fan.

Let's bury the hatchet...I have no issue with you, although I'd wager to guess that I'm not alone in thinking that maybe you should just ignore the OWS-related threads from now on. In fact, maybe people should just refrain from posting that stuff here, period. I smell a really nasty flame war coming on, otherwise...not just two passionate people getting a bit carried away in an argument.

Anyway, I'm done, too. Peace out, bros and sisses.
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[perk_daddy]

Definitely have to side with Casual Notice myself. Of course the rich have a moral obligation to give a larger proportion of their income to the poor. But a moral obligation on their part does not constitute an entitlement on my part.

If Americans have become so corrupted that we have to force redistribution of income to the level that the Occupy crowd demand, then we deserve the totalitarianism that that entails. Because that's what it is. Real fairness lies in everyone paying the same percentage of their income, and helping our neighbors out as citizens and human beings to eradicate poverty among us where taxes don't (and never will).

I'm not normally a pessimist, but I don't see a winning situation here. The only thing I see the Occupiers accomplishing is bringing us closer to some kind of civil war. If the best Americans can do is blaming others for our problems, and demanding that our government punish them, then we're done. It saddens me so much.

[Dutch]

Hmm... so I see Railing Against The Right is not just an easy option for people to do in Australia. It's much more widespread than that.

Anyway, so what CN is saying is that, already, the richer are paying higher tax percentages than the poor... to me, they have no reason to be expected to pay more then. That's just punishing those who've found a way up and out of the poorer brackets, to me. Yep, some up there will have been born into it, but you can't be punishing those who've succeeded in climbing their own ladders by telling them now they need to pay even more.

I do agree with trying not to cut scholarships and stuff, though. That retards your nation's intellectual growth, but I have to be a realist and say that at times there may not be anything else you can do. I don't know anywhere near enough about the situation over there, but it may be that you've already reached that point. I don't know.



At the risk of being hounded out, though, here's a little catechism I always found rather poignant and possibly devastatingly accurate. I don't necessarily agree with it, because both sides at times have the best answer, but...


If you're not a socialist when you're 20 you haven't got a heart. If you're still a socialist when you're 40 you haven't got a brain.
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[Casual Notice]

Much calmer now, had a day at the Renn Fest and a good night's sleep.

Quote:

plenty of Republican candidates/talking heads have, which a quick and scary Google search will reveal.

So, I went ahead and did a Google Search on "Raise Taxes on Poor" and, instead of getting a number of conservatives actually saying "let's raise taxes n the poor" as you suggest, I found (on the fist two pages--I'm lazy, and let's be honest, if you're searching beyond page two, you're picking nits) nothing but LIBERAL blogs and editorials saying that republicans want to raise taxes on the poor, including one dated 2005 from DU that claimed that Texas changing snacks like chips and hostess cakes and pies from "food" to "non-food" in the Tax code was tantamount to a tax on the poor (Texas has no sales tax on food items).

@Dutch: The items being reduced are not scholarships, they're Grants and loans, that are handed out, not on merit, but to anyone who can show that they would be unable to attend the college of their choice without them. They don't benefit the poor any more than subsidized champagne does.
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What I lack in sincerity, I make up for in sarcasm.
S*P*Q*R

[afterthedream]

Frank Miller had this to say about the Occupy movement:

Quote:

“Occupy” is nothing but a pack of louts, thieves, and rapists, an unruly mob, fed by Woodstock-era nostalgia and putrid false righteousness. These clowns can do nothing but harm America.

This is the guy who turned Batman into "The Goddamn Batman" because a billionaire vigilante who beats up disenfranchised freaks and outcasts just wasn't right-wing enough.

[afterthedream]

Here's one webcomic response to Miller:

http://www.thewebcomicfactory.com/2011/11/14/the-antiwar-comic-in-response-to-frank-miller/

[Casual Notice]

Interesting. Except for the webcomic rebuttal linked by afterthedreem, almost every response to Miller's rant has been an ad hominem attack on his recent works, his patriotism, and (for some reason) his (assumed) choice of news media. No attempt has been made to coherently dissect and discredit his polemic, which is odd, because it is a polemic.

It's 150 words of personal opinion and attacks against people ho doesn't know, not even to name. He misunderstands the issues and veers quickly off on a tangent about the War on Terror, then he ends his rant suggesting that these kids join the military (which is a good way for young people to learn discipline, earn money for college, and learn a trade, but is not for everyone--I doubt that most of the Occupy protestors--particularly the ones who go home during the day--would thrive in a military environment). Honestly, I don't know why he doesn't just run down to the Occupy site in his boxers and a wifebeater and tell those crazy kids to get off his lawn.
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What I lack in sincerity, I make up for in sarcasm.
S*P*Q*R

[Dutch]

Would knowing who Frank Miller is add anything to my understanding of the debate?
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[Casual Notice]

Frank Miller is a comic book writer and artist, and a screenwriter. He wrote DareDevil when it was good, Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, Sin City, and 300.

He's a native New Yorker, so it is possible that 9-11 left him with some unattended psychological scarring.
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What I lack in sincerity, I make up for in sarcasm.
S*P*Q*R

[Clint Wolf]

He's also allegedly been hitting the bottle pretty heavily for the last decade or so. Film Noir lifestyle may not be doing his faculties any favors.
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[smbhax.com]

"I'm the goddamn Frank Miller!" :D
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[rocketpig]

Casual Notice wrote:

So, I went ahead and did a Google Search on "Raise Taxes on Poor" and, instead of getting a number of conservatives actually saying "let's raise taxes n the poor"

Michele Bachmann says hi. I believe she put it "everyone should have their hand in", meaning that poor people should have to pay taxes and that there should be no level in which you pay zero dollars in federal tax (as there currently is).

She's not the only one who has said it, she's just the one I remember because that &$#@wit is from Minnesota and I reserve a special kind of hate for people that stupid who live in close proximity to me.
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[rocketpig]

WriterWhoCantDraw wrote:

Here's the thing...I USED to be a Republican, but I stopped drinking the Kool-Aid. Because of shit like that. A lack of forward thinking, just blind defense of the corporate masters at the expense of everybody else. Think for yourself for a change, rather than repeating Fox News talking points. Damned near every "conservative" I meet up with anymore is like that. Christ, it gets old. Figure it out, people...Reagan's dead, and these current Repub SOB's ain't Reagan. If you're not a bigot, a nutjob holy-roller, or rich, you have no place in the conservative movement today. It saddens me, but that's what it's become. Leave while you still can, or check your brain at the door.

Hell, one of the major problems in the GOP right now is that they worship Reagan, who was a terrible conservative and did much of the work that led us to where the party is today (a corporate state full of religious zealots).

If the GOP wanted to "worship" someone worthy of their adulation, they'd look no further than Eisenhower or Roosevelt (the first). Ike was a military man but refused to abuse that power. He was a fiscal moderate who thought that the best way for the rich to get richer was to support a strong middle class. In short, he didn't have his head up his ass and had the ability to look beyond his own nose, something the modern GOP lacks entirely.

And Teddy Roosevelt just rocked. One of the most under-appreciated Presidents the US has had in its time.

Like you, I used to be a Republican. Then, as the religious nutjobs took over, I moved to Libertarianism. Then as regulation after regulation was removed and put the economy into the state it is today, I don't know what I am anymore. Probably a hybrid of Libertarianism and Democrat, whatever that means. I just can't vote Republican anymore without wanting to vomit profusely (barring a few exceptions such as Huntsman, one of the few men in the party with a brain and the courage to use it). Just look at the GOP debates over the past month. Those are not Presidential candidates. Those are just people are standing in a room for an hour to see who can shout the most inane (and/or crazy) answers to serious problems. They play out more like a stupid-off with 10 winners than a serious Presidential debate. Outside of Romney (meh) and Huntsman (never had a shot because he has an IQ over 100), that field was full of insane people, the mentally challenged, and Newt Gingrich, who pretty much gets his own category at this point.
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