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Then so be it. Perhaps more people would demonstrate a higher level of personal responsibility if their "safety net" weren't large enough to cover Lake Superior.
Hyperbole is most effective when it has some factual basis. The so-called safety net, having been under direct attack by the compassionate right for nearly 30 years, is itself unable to cope with our levels of social need, levels that have only increased over the years of upward wealth redistribution and increasing income disparity that have resulted from eight years of George W Bush.
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Originally Posted by swagger
Nor should we. You disagree? People would have less to give, you know.
Yes, I'm good at math, and the point was raised in order to note that this wellspring of private charity that you suppose to exist is in fact heavily subsidized by government at all levels, yet it still generates a supply of funds that is grossly insufficient to address the levels of demand that exist. Your impression that the private sector is now, or ever has been, capable of actually handling social needs on its own is an entirely false one.
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Originally Posted by swagger
Go ahead and write your FOIA letter requesting any and all information about the projects taking place at the Groom Lake facility, or the contracts given to Skunkworks. Let me know how that goes.
Not much of an answer, is it. Private sector transparency pales in comparison to that in the public sector. What tales of waste, fraud, abuse, corruption, and criminality lie hidden among those protected preserves of proprietary information? We, the consumers who foot the bill for the corporate sector in just the same manner that we foot the public sector bill in our role as taxpayers, are not allowed to know.
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Originally Posted by swagger
You completely, totally missed the point there. Woosh - right over your head... If you'll go back and read my posts, you'll find that I have never suggested that the government be run by private entities.
Short-term memory problems? Ok, show me something that the government has done on a large scale that was done more efficiently than the private sector could have done. That was your request. What you might or might not have suggested at any point in time does not at all enter into the matter. What does enter directly into the matter at every point is the fact that the private sector is quite incapable of either efficiently or effectively providing public goods and services.
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Originally Posted by swagger
I don't like the politics of a very loud and vocal group of crybabies and now I don't like democracy? Keeping with your straw man tactics, I see. Another good job.
Each of us has the right to express disagreement with decisions made by our elected representatives as to how and where public funds should be spent. Statements such as I think the point is that people don't want other people (such as yourself) forcing them to make such donations betray either an ignorance or a denial of the facts of how a representative democracy actually works. Take your pick.
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Originally Posted by swagger
Seriously, do you really believe that tripe you're saying? Do you honestly believe that because I feel that I'm being overtaxed and that our government spends OUR money foolishly, I'm a morally corrupt person who wants people to die? If you really believe that, then let me know now, because if that's the case, this conversation is over. If it's the case, then you're so wrapped up in your hatred (of me, apparently) that you're being totally irrational, and I don't deal with people who are totally irrational - it's a waste of my time.
If I am not mistaken, you have invested some time and energy in maintaining that the government should constrain itself to performance of those tasks and functions that are required of it, though you have so far resisted all calls to enumerate any task or function at all that you feel actually is required of it. You have been particularly vocal in opposition to a range of programs that in fact DOES end up providing the means for basic dietary and other forms of sustenance to little old ladies. You can continue the practice of one logical evasion after another if you choose, but at some point in any rational argument, one gets around to addressing the evident implications of the choices that one has recommend. We are still patiently awaiting your arrival at that point...
In the past 28 years.....8 have been democratic.....20 were republican....
How can one that has "piles" of money be complaining about the folks that helped him get there.....or did you just get rich during the Carter and Clinton years only?
Over the past 39 years only 12 have been under a democrats control....
Hyperbole is most effective when it has some factual basis. The so-called safety net, having been under direct attack by the compassionate right for nearly 30 years, is itself unable to cope with our levels of social need, levels that have only increased over the years of upward wealth redistribution and increasing income disparity that have resulted from eight years of George W Bush.
What hog wash! What "increasing income disparity"? George Bush been responsible for no such thing, and no such thing even exists.
In America there is every opportunity for those in the lower income brackets to move up. Some simply choose not to, prefering to wallow in their own self pitty and to blame someone else for their condition.
Slothfulness should not be rewarded, nor does it deserve help.
Time and time again the democrats have gotten the chance to be in office and time and time again they screw it up and republicans to take it for another 8-12 years...
Citizens Against Government Waste: (http://www.cagw.org/site/PageServer?pagename=reports_pigbook1991 - broken link)
Start at 1991 and move forward...it hasn't gotten any better. Obama won't change it....he will put it into full gear.
Oh, it's fact now, is it? When did that happen? Who proved it? If it is, why is it called a "theory".
Show me the evidence!
It just doesn't exist. Never been proven, won't be, can't be.
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Originally Posted by saganista
The ridiculous pseudo-science that conservatives have been forced to invent due to an inability to cope with the implications of evolution is just plain bunk.
Well, you're free to call it what you wish. And I'm free to reject the ridiculous notion of evolution.
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Originally Posted by saganista
Not that it matters, but I'm comfortably into the top 1% of income earners
I wonder how you ever made it?
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Originally Posted by saganista
..., and my taxes are, and long have been, substantially higher than the median household income in this country. And that's counting just the federal income tax. Much more to the point is the fact that my taxes are NOT MY MONEY. They are my share of the bill for public goods provided and public services rendered.
Well, at least I can see where some of your twisted thinking is coming from.
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Originally Posted by saganista
... They are no different from the bill that the waiter graciously leaves on the table at the end of a five-course dinner. I have eaten food. I have drunk beverages. All of that was provided to me under the assumption that I would pay for it at the end of the meal. What all you It's My Money!!! people want me to do is go climb out the men's room window and vanish into the night. Big morality people, you guys are! What a freaking joke.
You're free to believe whatever you wish about who your money belongs to. But don't fault those of us who believe otherwise.
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Originally Posted by saganista
You've let greed and selfishness warp your sense of reality.
I am not a greedy person. Far from it. But I don't believe in your socialist philosophy, and I don't like the class envy that the Democrat Party promotes and perpetuates.
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Originally Posted by saganista
What part of all this Accountability and Personal Responsibility I keep hearing about encourages you to leech off society like some disgusting parasite?
I don't "leach off society". But what the Democrat Party promotes certainly encourages it.
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Originally Posted by saganista
Why should they be given ANY reduction?
Because when taxes are too high, it hurts the economy as a whole, which is why the tax reductions stimulated the economy to rebound from the Clinton recession (Yes, I said it ... the Clinton recession)
Because unfairly high taxation penalizes achievement.
The tax structure is unfairly disproportionate.
Last, but not least, it's their money.
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Originally Posted by saganista
From a personal point of view, I have everything I need, and I have everything I want, and I still have substantial piles of money lying around. I have to think up stuff to do with it. There are many, many families whose situations a very different from that. Why would you want to hand me more money that I don't need at their expense?
Well, I don't agree that it is at somebody else's expense. Besides, it absolutely did (and always does) result in an increase in Federal revenue.
[quote=saganista;4917688]How can you begin to excuse giving me $15,000 worth of it year after year after year?[quote]
Because it's your money (I know you don't agree that it is).
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Originally Posted by saganista
90% of the Bushie tax cuts should never have been passed to begin with and should be done away with at the earliest possible opportunity. Meanwhile, the wealthy are supposed to pay a higher proportion of their income in taxes. That's called progressivity. Maybe you need to go read up on some marginal utility theory. It will help you understand why taking money from the middle class and giving it to me instead was a really, really stupid idea.
I couldn't dissagree more, and nothing was taken from the middle class.
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Originally Posted by saganista
Class envy? Pathetic. Maybe it's Bush Derangement Syndrome. Or maybe you can come up with some other clever buzzword to cover for your own greed and grossly underdeveloped skills at playing with others.
Now, there you go again.
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Originally Posted by saganista
Calm down. The First Step is to admit that you have a problem...
Originally Posted by swagger
Seriously, do you really believe that tripe you're saying? Do you honestly believe that because I feel that I'm being overtaxed and that our government spends OUR money foolishly, I'm a morally corrupt person who wants people to die? If you really believe that, then let me know now, because if that's the case, this conversation is over. If it's the case, then you're so wrapped up in your hatred (of me, apparently) that you're being totally irrational, and I don't deal with people who are totally irrational - it's a waste of my time.
Quote:
Originally Posted by saganista
If I am not mistaken, you have invested some time and energy in maintaining that the government should constrain itself to performance of those tasks and functions that are required of it, though you have so far resisted all calls to enumerate any task or function at all that you feel actually is required of it. You have been particularly vocal in opposition to a range of programs that in fact DOES end up providing the means for basic dietary and other forms of sustenance to little old ladies. You can continue the practice of one logical evasion after another if you choose, but at some point in any rational argument, one gets around to addressing the evident implications of the choices that one has recommend. We are still patiently awaiting your arrival at that point...
$137 million or 29% of the total, which more than doubles the amount of money allocated to West Virginia under the state-by-state formula for federal aid to the highways, for four projects to “relieve traffic congestion, improve highway safety and promote economic benefits” in counties, cities and towns which have declined in population over the past ten years, at the behest of Senator Robert Byrd (D-WV).
$38 million for the state of Michigan, including $850,000 for a bicycle path in Macomb County, form Rep. David Bonior (D-MI).
$30 million for the state of New York, including $6.8 million for a series of highway railroad grade crossings in Mineola, on which 31 million taxpayer dollars have already been wasted, by Rep. Bob Mrazek, (D-NY).
$1.7 million for the preliminary engineering on an $18.6 million project to turn Biscayne Boulevard in downtown Miami into “an exotic garden for people to enjoy the richness of city life,” with 90 foot wide medians sculpted with tropical plants, broad sidewalks and miles of brick walkways, with the help of Rep. William Lehman (D- FL).
$1 million for a study of bicycling and walking safety, to “determine current levels of bicycling and walking and identify the reason why they are not better used as a means of transportation,” put in by Rep. Martin Olav Sabo (D-MN).
$13 million for “America’s Industrial Heritage,” a theme park covering 9 industrial sites in southwestern Pennsylvania, courtesy of Rep. John Murtha (D-PA).
$590,000 for planning a park and museum at the Cordell Hull National Historic Site in Tennessee, at the behest of Sen. Albert Gore, Jr. (D-TN), at the birthplace of FDR’s Secretary of State. The park service has never funded any home for any secretary of state, only presidents.
$4.5 million to renovate the Keith-Albee Theater in Huntington, West Virginia, and turn it into a four-screen multiplex theater, with the help of Sen. Robert Byrd (D-WV).
$2 million for the Native Hawaiian Culture and Arts Program to construct and sail and ancient canoe to depict what native Hawaiians had to do to migrate, courtesy of Senators Daniel Inouye and Daniel Akaka (D-HI).
$1.3 million to assist in job retention for agricultural workers at the privately-owned Hamakua sugar cane mills in Hawaii, courtesy of Sen. Daniel Inouye (D-HI).
$995,000 for a private performing arts center in North Miami Beach, Florida, from Rep. William Lehman (D-FL).
$10 million for the Federal Executive Training Center in Avondale, Maryland, added by Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-MD).
$3.4 million for a medical/ dining facility for the Air National Guard in Reno, Nevada, which includes a $1 million add-on by Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV).
$2.8 million for construction and renovation of facilities at the Stuttgart Faring Experimental Station in Stuttgart, Arkansas, by Sen. Dale Bumpers (D-AR).
$94,000 for apple quality research in Michigan to evaluate factors affecting apple quality, including surface color, shape, ripeness, firmness, texture, flavor, sugar to acid ratio and blemishes, by Rep. Bob Traxier (D-MI).
$15 million for a four-year $105 million program of Natural Resources Development, which consists of grants to states to contract with small businesses to plant trees on land owned by state or local governments. This project, previously rejected in small business legislation, was put in conference by Rep/ Neal Smith (D-IA), former chairman of the house Small Business Administration budget.
$200,000 to Central Arkansas University to establish a national communications and data center for the Small Business Institute program, from Sen. Dale Bumpers (D-AR).
$2.5 million for the removal of asbestos and site clearing activities at the privately-held Rath Packing Plant in Waterloo, $2 million for site work for economic redevelopment in Sioux City, and $2 million for completing demolition of the privately-owned Old Morrel site in Ottumwa, Iowa, by Rep. Neal Smith (D-IA). VS
$10.2 million for ramp and reconstruction to improve access privately-owned stadium in Milwaukee, with the help of Sen. Bob Krasten (R-WI).
$11 million for “Steamtown,” in Scranton, called a “third-rate collection in a place to which it has no relevance” by a former transportation curator from the Smithsonian Museum, by Rep. Joe McDade (R-PA).
$795,000 to rehabilitate the Old Spot Office Building in Lynn, Massachusetts, by Rep. Silvio Conte (R-MA).
Those are from 1991.....They don't include pork that was co sponsored by both dem. & rep.....and are only the ones that have someones name and party affiliation attached to it.
Citizens Against Government Waste: (http://www.cagw.org/site/PageServer?pagename=reports_pigbook1991 - broken link)
It only gets worse as it get's more current....and equals out to where both parties are blowing about the same amount.....
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