patrick.net

I own that house. I wish I sold it about purchased gold. Oh well, I have to say I feel like a slave in my own country. I can never retire, I can’t afford health care, I can’t move. I think this is common

Liberty for a conservative means doing what he wants with his labor and money. Liberty for a liberal means the taking from others their labor and money and using it as they see fit (takeing liberty).

For the former, liberty means freedom. The ability to do as he wishes within the boundry of the law. For the latter liberty means taking advantage of others. In other words the manipulation of others for their own uses.

Honest Abe says

Liberty for a conservative means doing what he wants with his labor and money. Liberty for a liberal means the taking from others their labor and money and using it as they see fit (takeing liberty).
For the former, liberty means freedom. The ability to do as he wishes within the boundry of the law. For the latter liberty means taking advantage of others. In other words the manipulation of others for their own uses.

I disagree, we all want the same thing in terms of public services the only difference is that the political parties use a lot of rhetoric to divide and conquer the people. Politics is about convincing the parties supporters that the other side is a "socialist" or "anti-abortion" ....when in reality both parties are not much different.

Your dirty little secret is that you like AM talk radio? That's it? Borrrrrrrrrrrrrring!

But you're right about people quoting what they've heard as gospel. It's dangerous.

Kind of like watching a "true crime story" on Lifetime Movie Network (I lovingly call LMN the "ladie's man-hating network). Man bad, Woman good. Woman is always the victim, wins against insurmountable odds and overcomes the adversity created by a lying, horrible evil man. It always ends with a crescendo of inspirational music, the woman stronger for the experience and the man left crushed & devastated in her wake. People buy into that shit, and that's what it is, pure crap.

We're left wanting drama in life. There's always a hero and something to fight for & against. It's entertainment designed to tug at emotions, and it works for some. That's AM talk radio for you. That's Faux News. And MSNBC programming too. It's called the entertainment industry for a reason. Every one of the anchors/hosts is in it for the ratings. They're spouting their opinions, and we all know that opinions aren't fact.

Intelligent people with the ability to reason should make up their own minds. It's okay to quote a sound bite, but not to trust it as gospel.

My dirty little secret? I like reading Nomo's posts. I usually do it in a comfy pair of sweats, and often have a glass of wine. I think that if I met Nomo, I would spend a fair chunk of the time laughing at his acerbic wit.

Similarly, Mark Levin is another east coast Jew who entered the entertainment world to make his fortune. In order to conceal his Jewish background (which wouldn’t set well with conservative Christians), he pronounces his name with a French sounding accent (Le Vin), apparently in the hope that people will think of a fine Bordeaux rather than a cheap bottle of Manischewitz concord grape wine.

Conservative christians are to Christianity as extremist mulims are to Islam. They hate everyone based on the fact that you dont look and sound like them. There is nothing wrong with AM radio like there is nothing wrong with attend a religious ceremony. The issue occurs when we blindly follow everything cited as the gospel of a prophet.

Your right, AM radio hosts are men/women who are attempting to sell advertising anyway possible.

I hate NPR, the Diane Rehm show especially.

I listen to it when WDNA the Public radio Jazz station, has some lame neo crap musical wanking on passing it off as legitimate Jazz. WDNA is NPR news with out the pontificating douches, instead they play Jazz until the next news update. Which I must say most of their news segments are good, as long as it isn't some liberal glad-handing journalist making the piece a political affiliation issue.

Their editorials and shows hosts are more skewed than Fox news on steroids IMHO.

An example Fox business news had a CEO from a solar panel mfg the other day. The girl I forget her name the chick on Happy Hour, was asking the CEO some tough questions and not the typical Rightwing BS talking point questions. This CEO told her that stimulus for his industry is crutial to develop this new technology. The lady interupted him and remided him that it is not new, it's been around since she was a kid in the 70's because her dad installed solar panels on their roof growing up. They've had well over 30-40 years to do so. What is different now.

This guy then retorted that "THEY" keep taking their funds away for 40 years...

Now right there, right or wrong. This is where "ALL" Americans whining and waiting for government incentives and credits to develop technologies that the rest of the world is just doing. This is why weren't going to end up sucking hind tit on Battery technology and solar as well, if it hinges on the Pork barrels from Washington to innovate.

But this guy thinks the tax payers are responsible to produce energy to scale on our dime.

NPR has guys like this on almost hourly and all they do is suck his shtick.
Never once have they asked the questions that I'm shouting at the radio mounted in my dashboard.

Wait a minute. You think Americans are smart enough to spend their money on the things they want and need? Don't we NEED the long arm the the law to force us at gunpoint (er.. I mean guide us lovingly with the threat of imprisonment for non-compliance) to misallocate resources properly?

Just drink the KOOLADE man, we need government programs (the more, the bigger the better). We need taxes for roads and schools and condoms. We NEED these things and Government is the MOST efficient way to get them to everyone who didn't earn them themselves.

What. Has Helicopter Ben Bernanke's printing presses been put out-of-action? Has the military taken over the executive branch?

Don't YOU GET IT? As long as the Asians et. al (the World) continue to support our Finance porn, this goes on indefinitely. You have a fascist dictator in power, the elites run the country, and they will change the qualifications at their pleasure. We really never liked you anyway.... is their attitude.

The GAME IS RIGGED. Think Bilderburg, CFR Council on Foreign Relations, TARP, Congress, etc.

Be Grateful you have shelter and the electricity is still on. The water may be drugged but....

I read Gunther is studying Politics. He needs to crack open a dayum Economics book and raise the interest rates, and turn off the nanny hose.

We've seen over the last 8 years that there is very little relation between what the government spends and what it takes in, so what makes you think if they took in less money that they'd spend less money?

http://www.ksfo.com

KSFO 560 AM here in the San Francisco Bay area is great! A breath of fresh air on the Left Coast.

You failed to include the need for a military which costs us 1 trillion dollars....are you willing to do without a military?

Heck no, we shouldn't be without a military. I have read, however, that the USA spends more than the next 16 largest military budgets of other countries combined. I think we could drastically reduce military spending and still have the strongest defensive military in the world.

Its pretty clear that reckless, irresponsible spending has put us on the brink of financial collapse. Thats not prosperity as I see things, thats servitude. Something our kids and grandkids will be paying the price for. To me thats irresponsible and morally bankrupt. Wouldn't you agree?

It seems to me, we're not supposed to do any thing with out a UN sanction anyhow.

So what in the hell do we or any country need an army for?

I think all countries should have just enough military personnel to contribute to the UN peace keepers.

And the UN soldiers collectively from all countries should be the strongest military in the world. If not only one allowed to police other countries.

I hope Banco Magnifico doesn't fall.

Tenouncetrout says

It seems to me, we’re not supposed to do any thing with out a UN sanction anyhow.
So what in the hell do we or any country need an army for?
I think all countries should have just enough military personnel to contribute to the UN peace keepers.
And the UN soldiers collectively from all countries should be the strongest military in the world. If not only one allowed to police other countries.

Why, to maintain our dominance. There has never been a country in the history of this planet that hasnt maintained the #1 military. How long do you think it would be before Russia or China decided to invade after we abolished our military?...I thnk 3 weeks. Just enough time to figure out how they will divide the country into colonies.

Honest Abe says

Heck no, we shouldn’t be without a military. I have read, however, that the USA spends more than the next 16 largest military budgets of other countries combined. I think we could drastically reduce military spending and still have the strongest defensive military in the world.
Its pretty clear that reckless, irresponsible spending has put us on the brink of financial collapse. Thats not prosperity as I see things, thats servitude. Something our kids and grandkids will be paying the price for. To me thats irresponsible and morally bankrupt. Wouldn’t you agree?

I read that too, but I am hoping that most of the money is going on innovation and maintaining our dominance in oil bearing territories.

Did anyone bet on three? Let's start a league.

I think the income tax should be eliminated if we can have a single tax on land values.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgism

No one made land, so why should some people get the benefit from it while others don't?
It's impossible to hide land, so tax evasion becomes impossible.
The tax should be a fixed % of market value for the land.
Farmers will not pay any more, unless they have really valuable land.

Seems like it fixes all sort of problems, and it is totally fair, and it doesn't discourage work or sales, like income and sales taxes do.

Patrick, first of all I want to say "thank you" for your site, and the ability for all to share their opinions. I'm happy to see you agree that the income tax should be eliminated.

I'm not so sure about a land tax. People who own land should get the benefit from it because they own it. They bought it by exchanging their money (their labor) for it. Its no different than if someone bought a car by exchanging their money (labor) for it and expected EXCLUSIVE USE of their car because they own it.

I have read that a low flat tax in other countries actually netted more revenue to "the state" and at the same time lowered the burden, and resulted in higher compliance (fewer tax cheats).

The solution, I'm afraid, will never come from a two party political system (meet the new boss - same as the old boss). Somehow we need to get a third choice which, in my opinion, will force the other two parties to become "competitive" to the needs of THE PEOPLE. not to the needs of the corperations, cronnies, unions, lawyers, and lobbies. Thats my two cents for today.

I'm all for cutting income taxes. But Patrick? You need to come off that doofus land tax theory already. We should tax value, and our society gets great value from technology, information and services. I suspect that you're enamored with a land tax simply because you're a techie who would then get a free ride. The land of George's era more closely approximates different productive assets today.

4X says

Tenouncetrout says

It seems to me, we’re not supposed to do any thing with out a UN sanction anyhow.

So what in the hell do we or any country need an army for?

I think all countries should have just enough military personnel to contribute to the UN peace keepers.

And the UN soldiers collectively from all countries should be the strongest military in the world. If not only one allowed to police other countries.

Why, to maintain our dominance. There has never been a country in the history of this planet that hasnt maintained the #1 military. How long do you think it would be before Russia or China decided to invade after we abolished our military?…I thnk 3 weeks. Just enough time to figure out how they will divide the country into colonies.

Nice satire. At least I hope it was satire. Hell Russia can barely invade Georgia and China still hasn't figured out how get 110 miles across the Formosa Strait to invade Taiwan.

Depending on whose numbers you care to believe the US military budget is 60-70% of the total military budget for the entire world. I am not convinced that is necessary. Especially since so much of US military spending is for high tech gee whiz weapons systems with the huge logistical tail these systems require (for example I seem to remember that the F14 required 50 hours of maintenance for every hour of flight time) and so little money is spent on maintaining adequate numbers of basic line doggie grunt infantrymen. We need boots on the ground for chasing guys with 40 year AK 47's hiding in caves, not nuclear submarines.

If you include all the US military spending that is hidden in dark nooks and crannies of the federal budget the military spending is somewhere between 60-65% of the total federal budget. This means that making any significant cut in federal spending without cutting military spending is at best a neocon wet dream. It also means that balancing the budget without cutting military spending will involve eliminating the entire rest of the federal government. Not a bad idea in the case of congress , but it would make air travel pretty dicey.

It's tough to compare "modern" countries without theories. Jets, satellites and missiles really changed the face of warfare in the present era. That said, I find it preposterous that we could maintain our society without an incredibly powerful military. There are a lot of bad guys in the world, and you never know when another Hitler is going to crop up. Present European nations gain tremendous protection from NATO and other alliances, so even if you're switzerland, it's impossible to separate out that effect.

I say this as a libertarian, btw. Our present military spending can be wasteful and mismatched with our low tech adversaries, but a porcupine needs its needles.

"There are a lot of bad guys in the world, and you never know when another Hitler is going to crop up. "

Ask Iraqi and Afghan civilians who the bad guys are. I mean if you were Mongolian in the 1200's then in your mind you were on the side of right. at Even though the rest of that world, thought, Genghis Khan and the Mongols were monsters.

staynumz says

Clarence 13X says

Similarly, Mark Levin is another east coast Jew who entered the entertainment world to make his fortune. In order to conceal his Jewish background (which wouldn’t set well with conservative Christians), he pronounces his name with a French sounding accent (Le Vin), apparently in the hope that people will think of a fine Bordeaux rather than a cheap bottle of Manischewitz concord grape wine.

Conservative christians are to Christianity as extremist mulims are to Islam. They hate everyone based on the fact that you dont look and sound like them. There is nothing wrong with AM radio like there is nothing wrong with attend a religious ceremony. The issue occurs when we blindly follow everything cited as the gospel of a prophet.
Your right, AM radio hosts are men/women who are attempting to sell advertising anyway possible.

Conservative Christians are strapping explosives to themselves and and walking in to crowds of people?

No, conservative christians are:

Lynching black people
Dragging black people behind their pickups
Calling black people monkeys
Voting against civil rights
voting against women rights

Conservative Chrisitians do whatever it takes to keep the ***** man in power. You fill in the blanks.

Clarence 13X says

staynumz says

Clarence 13X says

Similarly, Mark Levin is another east coast Jew who entered the entertainment world to make his fortune. In order to conceal his Jewish background (which wouldn’t set well with conservative Christians), he pronounces his name with a French sounding accent (Le Vin), apparently in the hope that people will think of a fine Bordeaux rather than a cheap bottle of Manischewitz concord grape wine.

Conservative christians are to Christianity as extremist mulims are to Islam. They hate everyone based on the fact that you dont look and sound like them. There is nothing wrong with AM radio like there is nothing wrong with attend a religious ceremony. The issue occurs when we blindly follow everything cited as the gospel of a prophet.
Your right, AM radio hosts are men/women who are attempting to sell advertising anyway possible.

Conservative Christians are strapping explosives to themselves and and walking in to crowds of people?

No, conservative christians are:

Lynching black people
Dragging black people behind their pickups
Waving the Rebel flag to signify their support of southern slavery
Calling black people monkeys
Voting against civil rights
voting against women rights
Claim Obama is not a citizen
Claim Obama is a muslim
Challenge Obama birth rights

Conservative Chrisitians do whatever it takes to keep the ***** man in power. You fill in the blanks with your stupidity.

Nomograph says

elvis says

Hi Nomo, I guess the example could be America in 1997.

The US had a progressive tax system in 1997 that was identical to that of today. Any real examples? I suspect that you will have to look to the third world to find one, but here is your chance to sway people with fact.

Free market capitalism has been proven throughout history to be by far the best method of creating wealth for every class of society.

As Milton Friedman stated when asked about the merits of capitalism by Phil Donahue, "In the only cases in which the masses have escaped from the kind of grinding poverty that you speak of, the only cases in recorded history, are where they had capitalism and largely free trade. If you want to know where the masses are worst off, it is exactly iin the kinds of societies that depart from that. The record of history is crystal clear."

The best example is the US in the 1800's.

The third world example has been brought up by opponents of free market capitalism for at least the last few decades. This is intellectual slight of hand, and is at best a distraction which some, like Nomo, blindly parrot. Perhaps he heard it on AM talk radio.

Progressive taxation hurts all wage earning individuals (99% of americans) and helps those that are politically well connected (.00001% of americans).

CBOEtrader says

Progressive taxation hurts all wage earning individuals (99% of americans) and helps those that are politically well connected (.00001% of americans).

How do you figure? I don't think you understand what progressive taxation is...

And noone is claiming that capitalism is bad. This discussion is about the fairest way to collect revenues for the government.

I thought the discussion was how to achieve prosperity. BTW - "taxing the rich" is a false promise. The rich always seem to find ways to dodge the taxes. Government always seems to find ways to raise the revenue - like raising the cigarette tax, the alcohol tax, the gas tax...wait a minute, those taxes fall on everyone. TRICKED YET AGAIN.

Taxes is the largest expense item for most families...taxes are more than food, more than rent, more than auto expense. I SAY CHANGE ELECTION DAY TO APRIL 16 th. That way people would still remember their pain and vote accordingly. Limited government plus freedom will lead to prosperity.

thunderlips11 says

Only a moron would invade a country with 500M Firearms in private hands. It would make Afghanistan look like Mr. Roger’s Land of Make Believe. The Gun Nuts would have a field day.
“Hey Elmo, just like Red Dawn. How many Ruskies you didja prang, good buddy? I gots me 5 last night.”

I would like to see how your "Gun Nuts" would fair against Tanks. Although I agree the sheer size of the military should be reduced, to eliminate it would be a major mistake.

No question, the gun nuts would get crushed. You can't put up an effective resistance against a technologically superior opponent. At best, it would be harassment tactics like we're suffering in Iraq and Afghanistan. But harassment tactics also rely heavily on the honor of the conqueror. Americans aren't just going to start blasting buildings---adversaries like the old Soviets have no qualms about absolutely crushing a resisting populace.

I'd like to see us have a mostly defensive military. Our ICBM nukes are a pretty big deterrent to large adversaries. A real missile shield would round that out nicely. It's certainly important to protect ourselves in space, and probably to have credible air strike capability. But we're projecting massive force around the world with fairly questionable results.

To the point about fair taxation, I think the conversation is getting pointed in the wrong direction. It should never be the purview of government to deliberately redistribute wealth from one party to another. That's a titanic moral hazard, especially in a democratic society. People are fundamentally petty, so creating a situation of jealousy and gain is extremely unwise. It's true that a few billionaires made their fortunes through corrupt means, but that corruption would be diminished if we removed the moral hazards in the first place. The simple fact is that the vast majority of millionaires in this country built their own fortunes by intelligence and hard work. It's unfair that their wealth should be asymmetrically confiscated by their fellow citizens.

Citizens should vote for government benefits and services as if they had to pay for it themselves. It should likewise be illegal to roll massive debts forward, because you are simply foisting the bill onto future generations. Responsibility has fallen out of fashion in this country, but that's not a fault of our government. Any elected government is a reflection of the voters.

elvis says

The worker puts in just enough labor so he doesn’t get fired and the boss pays just enough that the worker doesn’t quit. But the millionaire above works his butt off. One hardly works, the other works hard. The American dream is alive and well but its not the government that will provide a standard of living which people desire.

If only that were the case.... There is a LOT of "luck" involved in becoming wealthy. Right place, right time. For example, does the secretary at Microsoft who got stock options work harder than the secretary at Enron? or at GM?

I would be interested to see the correlation between hard work and income. I suspect it is very weak. A lot of people work very hard in crappy jobs for crappy pay

@elvis--

I think you missed the point of my post. LOTS of self employed people work 16 hours a day and see no benefit. LOTS of small business owners work their butts off and still go under. Like I said--the correlation between long hours, hard work, and becoming a millionaire is probably very weak.

I think you live a different world than I do. Everything is very simple, black and white there. My world is full of many grays...

tatupu70 says

@elvis–
I think you missed the point of my post. LOTS of self employed people work 16 hours a day and see no benefit. LOTS of small business owners work their butts off and still go under. Like I said–the correlation between long hours, hard work, and becoming a millionaire is probably very weak.

Some people can eat a ton and not get fat. That doesn't mean there is no correlation between overeating and obesity. The same goes for finacial success. There is a direct connection between hard work and financial prosperity. Of course, luck plays an enormous role for all of us.

That is somewhat besides the point though. The government is enormously wasteful, and their programs typically hurt all americans (via taxes) or is used to kill brown people around the globe, while only helping a tiny fraction of the politically well connected.

People that argue for higher income tax rates, even if it only for the "rich", can only morally justify themselves by discussing how many people those taxes are helping. If the US government were actually a successful charity, there would be some individuals that donate to the US government rather than to charities. Empirically, private charities are a much more efficient method of wealth distribution than the US government. Besides, it is beyond the scope of the government's role to legislate vague, corruptible concepts like fairness.

tatupu70 says

CBOEtrader says

Progressive taxation hurts all wage earning individuals (99% of americans) and helps those that are politically well connected (.00001% of americans).

How do you figure? I don’t think you understand what progressive taxation is…
And noone is claiming that capitalism is bad. This discussion is about the fairest way to collect revenues for the government.

Try to stay with us tat. The discussion is about "how to achieve prosperity." Nomo suggested that a progressive income tax is necessary to have a vibrant middle class. I disagree. I feel that any income tax has much more potential to hurt the middle class than help it, and is only guaranteed to help a small fraction of the super rich.

I would like to add if we want to increase the opportunities, then we must bring manufacturing jobs back to the United States and reduce government spending. Who cares how much we are taxing when we will only spend more than we take in....we could tax 5 trillion dollars and still find a way to spend 5.1 trillion.

The bull-mooose rears its ugly head once again....Hope, Change and Progress should come in the form of social reform..

I am still waiting to see how things turn out.

1. Pull our troops from Iraq, Afghanistan
2. Cut government spending
3. Reduce national defense spending by 1/2
4.Re-enact regulations of 1929
5. Reform social programs as a for profit entity in order to force them to be accoutable for their spending.
6. Increase educational spending
7. Regulate the negative imagery on television
8. Lock up all the gangbangers (KKK, Crips, Blood, Mexican Mafia) that transport dope
9. Bring manufacturing jobs back to USA

Lets quit being silly, attacking each other is not going to do anything for our country.

Brand says

No question, the gun nuts would get crushed. You can’t put up an effective resistance against a technologically superior opponent. At best, it would be harassment tactics like we’re suffering in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Really? Not true. What about the russians in afganastan, america in vietnam, the french in vietnam, the chinese communists against the nationalists, fidel castro against batista, albanians against the turkish ottomans, marathas against the mughals in india, robert the bruce in scotland, tito against the nazi's in yugoslavia to name a very few of the successful guerrilla wars fought against technological superior opponents in history. It helps for the technologically superior opponent to be massively stupid like america in vietnam, but not totally necessary.

Even with that said, I totally agree we could easily reduce the military by half or more which would do a lot to balance the budget. There are no countries in the world capable of directly attacking america since the war of 1812 other than with ICBM's or through terrorists. That kind of reduction will never happen though. The military is a huge cash cow to allow politicians to buy votes at home and the military budget is a honey pot of power and prestige for the politicians who have control over it. No politician in the world is going to give up that kind of power voluntarily.

CBOEtrader says

Try to stay with us tat. The discussion is about “how to achieve prosperity.” Nomo suggested that a progressive income tax is necessary to have a vibrant middle class. I disagree. I feel that any income tax has much more potential to hurt the middle class than help it, and is only guaranteed to help a small fraction of the super rich.

Where did I lose you? I was stating that I think you must not understand what a progressive tax is because it is specifically designed so that the rich(and super rich) pay more taxes. I don't see how it would benefit the super rich. Now--if it is bastardized like our current system with a million loopholes, then I see your point. The solution is to get rid of the loopholes, not to change the system...