patrick.net

Right on! Doublespeak - straight out of 1984. The Department of War is now The Department of Defense. Soon it will be the Ministry of Love.

The Navy - a Global force for good...armed with weapons of mass destrction.

BTW - common sense (an attribute missing in liberals)SCREAMS all the groups mentioned in the original thread above WILL VOTE democRAT.

Cheers.

Honest Abe says

BTW - common sense (an attribute missing in liberals)SCREAMS all the groups mentioned in the original thread above WILL VOTE democRAT.

Common sense is often wrong--as in this case. People, surprisingly, vote against their own self interests.

Yes, voting against your own interest is the primary Republican strategy. The psychology is very simple and reliable: use the declining status of the white middle class and their confusion about who is actually taking their money (the rich, duh) to stoke white-hot hatred for liberals, Mexicans, blacks, gays, and people who can spell. Then the declining white middle class will not only vote to keep the capital gains tax at 15% for the ultra-rich, but they will go out with guns and shoot Jewish women Democratic congresswomen in the head! It has been done. The strategy works!

Anyway, the title of othis thread should be WHOM will they vote for. :-)

Seriously, grammar and spelling are exceptionally bad among hard-core Republicans. And they are very sensitive about it. Makes them very angry.

So where did the money go and why are whites losing status?

The real question is what alternate vision of the future for the declining white middle class would get them to stop self-destructing on command for the benefit of the 1%?

I personally have a vision of the future where people are allowed to keep the fruits of their own labor, and not be forced to give it to non-productive parasites.

Sounds like the angry white vision, the only difference is that they are looking down at the pennies going to minorities, and not the mega-dollars going upward to the 1%. Why don't they ever look upward?

Let's all be clear here!

There is no interest of OURS in the current race, on the Republican side or the Democrat side. Unless your Huffington Moneysworth that is.

You guys are confusing "Default Vote" vs conscious decisions of selecting a Leader that represents your interests. You're voting for Obama because it's the default standard media issued candidate. Same as the Republican voters. But don't stand there and sing "My dog is better than yours.".

It's like two Crows arguing over who is going to make the best Pie.

I'm not voting for Obama. I'm a registered Republican now!

But OK, how can we get unified against the corporate interests that have taken over DC?

What vision can you offer that will get a solid majority to really want to change things?

Honest Abe says

Right on! Doublespeak - straight out of 1984. The Department of War is now The Department of Defense. Soon it will be the Ministry of Love.

The Navy - a Global force for good...armed with weapons of mass destrction.

BTW - common sense (an attribute missing in liberals)SCREAMS all the groups mentioned in the original thread above WILL VOTE democRAT.

Cheers.

Still waiting for that evidence. If it's so clear that they're going to vote democrat, it shouldn't be hard to find.

I'm a white male, well educated, married with three children, and I make north of $300,000 a year. I'll be voting for Obama for these reasons:

+ Obama
* Killed bin Laden.
* Ended one of the wars.
* Managed to get through some semblance of health care reform despite a congress that opposed it as though it was a call to eat our children.
* Ended DADT
* At least gives lip service to fixing the gross tax imbalance between the rich and the middle class.

- His likely opponents (Romney / Santorum / Gingrich; Sorry RP fans, he's got no chance)
* All anti-science luddites
* All extremely homophobic
* All in favor of more military macho bullshit posturing that will lead to at least one more war
* All believe that poor people don't pay enough tax and rich people pay too much.

Claiming that they're the same is just wrong. They may be the same to you if you're a single issue voter, but there is a wide gap in their policies.

Obama isn't my ideal president, but compared to the guys he's going to be running against he's washington, lincoln, and both roosevelts rolled into one.

Patrick - didn't the guy who shot the jewish congress women in the head turn out to be a democ rat?

Honest Abe says

Kevin,

I'm a person of color, uneducated, bad grammur and spellin, unmarried but the father of 9 childern. I don't have to work cause the government gives me free money.

I'm votin Obama four 3 reasons:

1) He's a person of color

2 He gives us free money, section 8 housing and food stamps

3) He promised to give us even mor free stuff.

I ain't votin for no cracker's - they'll take my free stuff away.

I'm glad that people like you are the last of your kind.

Sorry guys, but isn't that whats really happening? Its the ugly truth, but you won't admit it. Its too painful.

Honest Abe says

Sorry guys, but isn't that whats really happening?

No.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/7709852.stm

Some sites say 95% of blacks voted for obama for no other reason than "he's black" Some reported the figure as high as 97%

Want more? Google: 95% of blacks voted for Obama.

Hahaha. Its reverse racism, but you can't recognize it due to the fact that you are burdened with the double standard liberal mentality.

To be fair, most blacks vote overwhelmingly Democratic in every presidential election. That's been true for quite awhile now.

I do know a few (white) people who supported Obama because they felt it would compensate for the racism of the past. Not sure how common that sentiment is overall.

My two cents on Obama: he hasn't started any unwinnable wars, so he's already better than Bush. As for the economy, I can't really blame him for that. There was a massive real-estate bubble in the U.S. and western Europe. We're still suffering the debt hangover and will be for several more years, regardless of who is in office. As for ObamaCare, I think the intentions were good but only time will tell if it really makes things better.

Anyway, the title of othis thread should be WHOM will they vote for. :-)

Hey now, one should never end a sentence with a preposition! The title should be, "For Whom Will They Vote?" ;-)

They will vote Democ Rat regardless of how the question is phrased.

Honest Abe says

They will vote Democ Rat regardless of how the question is phrased.

Again--don't let facts get in the way of your story, Abe.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/25/us/politics/uaw-tries-to-help-obama-win-working-class-voters.html

United Auto Workers Union members supporting obama, what a surprise!!!

Tatupu - wrong...again.

Honest Abe says

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/7709852.stm

Some sites say 95% of blacks voted for obama for no other reason than "he's black" Some reported the figure as high as 97%

Want more? Google: 95% of blacks voted for Obama.

Hahaha. Its reverse racism, but you can't recognize it due to the fact that you are burdened with the double standard liberal mentality.

Yes, black people will vote for Obama. Black people always vote for white presidents, even if they're only half white.

But that's not what you asked in the original post.

Kevin,I asked "Who will they vote for". But was admonished for bad grammer. I guess it should have been "Whom will they vote for". Then that got shot down and replaced with "For whom will they vote" (I've always been bad with grammer...and spelling)

Can you think why any of the groups I named would NOT vote democ-rat? Other than brain damage? If thats the case, no wonder the country is in shambles...people with brain damage are making the decisions. Maybe thats where this quote came from: "The inmates are in charge of the Asylum".

Its a sad state of affairs when the people can vote themselve
the treasury, and destroy our country's economic foundation because of financial irresponsibility - which is what is happening, isn't it?

Honest Abe says

United Auto Workers Union members supporting obama, what a surprise!!!
Tatupu - wrong...again.

Nope--not wrong.

Honest Abe says

Its a sad state of affairs when the people can vote themselve
the treasury, and destroy our country's economic foundation because of financial irresponsibility - which is what is happening, isn't it?

Are you talking about welfare queens or wall street?

Honest Abe says

Can you think why any of the groups I named would NOT vote democ-rat?

- The "'20% of Americans rely [sic] 100% (One Hundred Percent) on Government assistance"

- "millions of other government dependents"

- "the nearly 50% of Americans who pay no Federal Income tax"

- "all the government employees" (hey, who's the largest government employer again?)

[fantasyland AM talk radio groups omitted because they're not any more relevant than the white supremacists or abortion clinic bombers to national politics]

I keep asking, you keep failing to provide: Provide some evidence that these groups are going to vote for Obama. Hell, provide some evidence that any of those groups vote majority democrat.

Honest Abe says

Who will the nearly 50% of Americans who pay no Federal Income tax vote for?

So all the ahole white trash rednecks walking around with signs that say "keep the government out of my medicare" voted for Obama. Is that what you are saying here?

Honest Abe says

Who will all the government employees vote for?

The military, CIA, FBI, NRO, Secret Service, etct. all voted for Obama? Really? Got any evidence of that?

Get a life.

Honest Abe says

It is reported that 20% of Americans rely 100% (One Hundred Percent) on Government assistance. Who do you think they will vote for?

Who is this 20%? I suspect that if this number actually exists, the prototypical member is an old white retiree. There is nothing inherently wrong with this, as those Federal income taxes you claim they didn't pay were the highly regressive social security and Medicaid taxes.

The difference between Income taxes and FICA is just a name. They both go to the general fund. This means some poor sop making 50K a year pays 41% federal taxes (income and FICA) while Mitt enjoys sub 20% FICA and Income taxes. Very fair.

The 20% number was pulled out of his ass.

From what data I can find, about 3% can clearly be stated to be in this category; social security recipients with no other income, and prison inmates. TANF is trickier, since there isn't any good data on people who rely entirely on it, but the worst case would be 4.3 million, which would only be about 2% of the adult population.

So, we're looking at maybe 5%, tops, and probably much less than that.

oliverks1 says

The difference between Income taxes and FICA is just a name. They both go to the general fund.

That's not true. Fica goes to SS/MC payments and the excess gets loaned to the general fund. There is a bond saying SS/MC is owed the money. It's worthless of course, but technically SS/MC have a reserve of funding.

The good news here is that eventually you will be funding this all from you IRA. At some point IRA's will be required to purchase a percentage of their value in Treasury bills. Once the foot is in the door the percentage will increase. It's already done in other countries, and is been proposed a couple times here already.

ThreeBays says

Physical units of 'stuff' as a currency is no more stable in value than legal tender.

Exactly right. The value of everything constantly changes, because the world is a dynamic, changing place. Oil is discovered and depleted, crops succeed and fail, new technologies change how things are done, etc, etc...

Even if we define a dollar as some kind of absoute, unchanging "frame of reference", the value of everything priced in dollars will constantly change.

It's sort of like high-school physics when we learn about motion. All motion is relative. We typically use the earth as our frame of reference, but even the earth is moving relative to the sun, the sun is moving relative to the galaxy, etc.

Yes, there's a good graph in a Ron Paul book ("End the Fed" I think) that shows that the purchasing power of gold varies over a ten-fold range. It doesn't go to zero, but it isn't really that stable either. And now we're back near the top of that range.

The real value of gold is that the Fed can't print more of it. Takes power away from them, and gives it you.

I've got no problem with a gold standard per se. Gold is naturally scarce, rather than "artificially scarce" (i.e. at the mercy of the Fed). Sounds good to me.

But even with a gold standard, the value of a dollar (relative to the value what it can buy) wouldn't necessarily stay constant. Am I right? If world population grows faster than the supply of gold, there would be deflation. Or if huge deposits of gold were discovered and mined, there would be inflation. Honest Abe seems to want a dollar that always buys the same amount of stuff (and who can blame him?). But I don't think that's possible in a dynamic, changing, unstable world.

Right, the value of even a gold-backed dollar would change.

Mining and population would change the value, but even more, changes in the amount of credit would change the value. A lot. There were booms and busts even under a gold standard.

There were booms and busts even under a gold standard.

Even under a fixed gold standard, debt levels can go way beyond where they can be meaningfully serviced. But a hard currency will force a depression when that happens no matter what. That's the nature of the hard currency.

What we really need is to resolve FOFOA's dilemma.

When a single medium is used as both store of value and medium of exchange it leads to a conflict between debtors and savers. FOFOA's dilemma holds true for both gold and fiat , the solution being Freegold, which incidentally also resolves Triffin's dilemma.

We need to separate the two functions: medium of exchange and store of value of money, to resolve this endless conflict between debtors and savers.

Here's more on the debtors vs. savers struggle: http://fofoa.blogspot.com/2010/07/debtors-and-savers.html

Freegold would mean gold flows freely across national borders. Gold is never used as a medium of exchange, Never denominate credit in a weight of gold. No capital controls, no punitive taxes etc. Gold functions well as a constant store of value, no return and zero counterparty risk .

Then we will know truly which countries are fiscally healthy and which ones are not.

Fractional reserve fiat currency for every day use
Long term savings are held in unencumbered physical gold.

Due to inflation and deflation that naturally arise through variations in the rates of borrowing, payback, and growth of the economy, currency fluctuations lead to bank runs which are frankly too disruptive and are not to be tolerated. Fortunately, they are rendered completely meaningless under a fiat currency regime. National fiat currencies allow governments to manage their own national economies to the extent that that are able, and to take whatever efforts needed to avoid falling into those most destructive currency deflations that wreak havoc on economies.

Gold must remain a pure monetary asset , bought and sold and owned outright--nothing else would be allowable. National fiat currencies will ably serve the market's various needs to borrow funds...after all, that's how fiat currency is born in the first place.

changes in the amount of credit would change the value. A lot. There were booms and busts even under a gold standard.

uomo_senza_nome says

Even under a fixed gold standard, debt levels can go way beyond where they can be meaningfully serviced. But a hard currency will force a depression when that happens no matter what. That's the nature of the hard currency.

So maybe our longing to return to the gold standard is a fallacious "yearning for an idealized past"?

Still, it seems we have a protected class of big banks with access to free money from "uncle Ben" when they skrew up. The rest of us, including smaller banks, don't get this perk.

Under a gold standard, the big banks would suffer with everyone else, unlike now.

wthrfrk80 says

Still, it seems we have a protected class of big banks with access to free money from "uncle Ben" when they skrew up. The rest of us, including smaller banks, don't get this perk.

Yes, which is why prudent savers should be encouraged to save in gold. Nothing is stopping you from buying unencumbered physical gold at this point, although you'd stop and think a bit if I told you IRS would take 28% of your capital gains (no matter what the term of holding is) for gold.

Gold functions best as a long term store of value. This store of value factor is derived from people holding it still as their wealth reserve (households in asia, all central banks, hedge funds such as Kyle Bass etc.) And the beauty is, it has no counterparty risk.

All savers today have Fed as their counterparty risk. Every dollar added to the monetary base dilutes the savers dollars today!.

Just go to Costco, if you want more proof that real inflation is worse than what is stated :-).

wthrfrk80 says

Under a gold standard, the big banks would suffer with everyone else, unlike now.

True, but there will be too much collateral damages. Even good, prudent businesses would get tremendously hurt (like the last Great Depression).

That is why fiat currencies do work well when the managers (fiscal and monetary policy makers) manage it prudently, as much as they are able to do so.

To recognize the benefits of fiat currency while at the same time remove its disadvantage as a terrible long-term store of value would mean that we need a medium that simply serves the function of storing value alone.

That way, Dan and his dad can safely sock away their savings without getting ravaged by inflation or deflation ;)

uomo_senza_nome says

Gold functions best as a long term store of value.

In some cultures, land ownership is prized much more than gold because land actually produces crops, energy, and rents. And it's tangible.

Downsides of land:

* property taxes
* not portable
* public record, hard to hide

Land ownership is prized much more than gold because land actually produces crops, energy, and rents. And it's tangible.

Most definitely. I have to think more about how this freegold system fits in with the parasitic rent-extraction concept. Whether they just both work well together or not. What if I had a lot of gold? I can extract more out of the system through freegold, but I always have to take risk with my capital though, which is a good thing. Parasitic rent-extraction = no risk and real reward, which is bad.

Land is a privilege, nobody is born with it. So it is a bit different, in that I do see it as an equal resource shared by the commons. But your productive effort is your own and nobody else. I view gold as a medium to store your productive effort and transport it safely through the ravages of time.

Of course on one of the other threads, we said land ownership was "bad" since no person created the land ;-)

Land ownership itself it not bad. The bad part is using that ownership to make other people into your servants. Which is what pretty much all cultures have done throughout history.

If land ownership is taxed by exactly the amount of rent you could get out of it without work, then it evens out.

How to find that amount of rent you could get? One idea is to let people bid on how much tax they would pay to own the land. But then what? Transfer title to the highest bidder?

I should read more of Henry George's works. I'm sure he must have addressed all this.

Sounds a lot like Georgism, yes. I first heard of Georgism on Patrick.net

Patrick, if "land is taxed by exactly the amount of rent" who would want to own rental property?

If no one wants something, it disappears (like buggy whips - which for the most par,t have disappeared). If rental property disappeared, where would the approx 50% of Americans who rent, live???

Read it more closely: LAND would be taxed by the amount rent you could get on the LAND.

But if you build or buy a HOUSE, that's actually the work of human beings and not purely parasitical, so there would be a justified profit in renting that out.

In fact, a Georgist would say the rent on the HOUSE should be completely untaxed.

So if I own 60 acres of unimproved land in Marin county which is not rented out, the tax would be zero? I'm good with that !

BTW - have you noticed how the president is pandering to the UAW union workers ? Union workers, as noted in the original post. Wink-wink.