1st Term Obama Approval

[formergothardite]

If he was really just doing a quick copy/paste of a piece and forgot to say where he got it from, he would have hit the enter key to make a new line or a paragraph or something like that. But instead he had his words flow seemlessly into someon elses words making it look like he wrote it.

And I bet that despite wanting the government to get out of his life and not make him give to the poor, he isn't voting for gay marriage. Are you Jericho?

[jericho]

Perhaps another graduate of the SOTDRT... one who was never taught how to cite sources, and was taught that regurgitating the views of others is the same as thinking for yourself.

I'm sorry, is this forum a study course of some kind? Give me an F then. Will that go on my permanent record?

[Guest Anonymous]

That's what I ask myself many times. It's so hard to read the things that most people believe here. It makes me sad for the future of this country.

Aww, we gave jericho a sad. :cry:

That's ... hilarious, actually.

[emmiedahl]

A lot has been discussed since I was last here and I don't have time to respond to it all, but this post made me the most upset. Let me give you a stat. 80% of Americas millionaires are 1st generation rich. Let me translate that for you...they started from nothing. They didn't inherit their wealth; they earned it.

I didn't say they inherited it, merely that they did not work for it. They are taking the fruits of other people's labor. Other people are working for them. These people are working hard and doing without basic things like health care so someone else who is not working as hard can take the profit and buy a jet with it.

And to say that they started with nothing is wrong. They started with either a tax-payer-funded education or a private education funded by well-off parents. Ditto with health care. Someone, somewhere GAVE them the means to climb to the top. No infant emerges from the womb with money in their pocket. Either their parents gave them skills, or society did. Either they were born with an advantage, or they were given one by someone else.

You say the wealthy are hoarding, but most would call it investing, and look where that has gotten the wealthy in the last few years.

Again, investing is simply a way of earning money without actual labor. And for some reason, people think that this income should be taxed at roughly half the rate that earned income is.

Because so much of their income is tied up in investments, the recession has hit the rich especially hard.

Call a waaambulance. Some rich guy has lost some of the money that he did not even work for. I feel worse for a family that loses $20K of a $50K income than a billionaire who loses half of their wealth. Why? Because the first family can no longer meet their expenses, but the rich person is merely loses a minor part of discretionary income. One less trip to Monte Carlo vs. being able to pay for running water... are you really saying the rich person was harder hit on a personal level?

And as far as taxes go, maybe Warren Buffett is paying a lower tax rate than his secretary, as he claims. But the comparison is misleading because Buffett's income comes mostly from capital gains, which were already taxed at their origin through the corporate-income tax.

Capital gains were not already taxed. The principal was taxed, but not the earnings. The earnings are the only part considered taxable income.

Why do you think the wealthy should pay lower taxes on unearned income than a middle class family does on earned income? That sound fair to you?

Beyond taxes, the rich also pay in terms of private charity. Households with more than $1 million in income donated more than $150 billion to charity last year, roughly half of all US charitable donations. Greedy? It hardly seems so.

Giving to the Mormon church, the opera, etc does nothing to improve the everyday lives of workers who are being paid subsistence wages so their CEO can have more money for his house in the Hamptons.

Steven Covey says the #1 habit of highly effective people is that they are proactive. They happen to things, things don't happen to them. If you are successful, you will decide at some point that you are in charge of your destiny. If you do not decide this, then you will sit around and continue to complain about how the rich are snobs, and hope that the government continues to give you freebies.

Yeah, I am in college to become a doctor and working full time. Is that proactive enough for you? My family is one of those that lost a measly $50K per year in this recession. Just a few of those people whose livelihoods count for less than a billionaire's mad money.

[Witsec7]

Aww, we gave jericho a sad. :cry:

That's ... hilarious, actually.

Maybe he needs cake?

[Witsec1]

Wow that cake is very... pink. Did they use Pepto-Bismol in the frosting?

[Witsec7]

Wow that cake is very... pink. Did they use Pepto-Bismol in the frosting?

Wilton makes some very nasty colors.

Gosh I really want cake now, regardless of color.

[formergothardite]

You know, he might be sad for us, but at least the people here can look at history, see that the wonderful idea that private charities can care for the poor doesn't work and can result in many, many people living in horrible conditions or dying, and then understand why the government IS needed to be in charge of caring for the poor.

Don't think we are the brainwahsed ones.

[jericho]

I didn't say they inherited it, merely that they did not work for it. They are taking the fruits of other people's labor. Other people are working for them. These people are working hard and doing without basic things like health care so someone else who is not working as hard can take the profit and buy a jet with it.

How can you say they didn't earn it? These 80% are people that built their own company from the ground up. Health care is provided with many companies. Don't make that a blanket statement.

And to say that they started with nothing is wrong. They started with either a tax-payer-funded education or a private education funded by well-off parents. Ditto with health care. Someone, somewhere GAVE them the means to climb to the top. No infant emerges from the womb with money in their pocket. Either their parents gave them skills, or society did. Either they were born with an advantage, or they were given one by someone else.

There's a big difference between getting an education and inheriting millions of dollars or a CEO position on a silver plate. It's still a big achievement to rise to the top basically on your own.

Again, investing is simply a way of earning money without actual labor. And for some reason, people think that this income should be taxed at roughly half the rate that earned income is.

That's because the income was already taxed before it was invested. The government is double dipping even with half the tax rate.

Call a waaambulance. Some rich guy has lost some of the money that he did not even work for. I feel worse for a family that loses $20K of a $50K income than a billionaire who loses half of their wealth. Why? Because the first family can no longer meet their expenses, but the rich person is merely loses a minor part of discretionary income. One less trip to Monte Carlo vs. being able to pay for running water... are you really saying the rich person was harder hit on a personal level?

This just means that the wealthy will not be able to hire as many lower income workers, invest as much to new upstart companies, or donate as much to charity. So yes, it does have a direct effect the lower income when the wealthy are hit by a recession.

Why do you think the wealthy should pay lower taxes on unearned income than a middle class family does on earned income? That sound fair to you?

YES! The money invested was already taxed! In fairness, don't tax the interest that anyone makes, no matter their income.

Giving to the Mormon church, the opera, etc does nothing to improve the everyday lives of workers who are being paid subsistence wages so their CEO can have more money for his house in the Hamptons.

You are hit picking at the definition of a charity. That is a entirely different topic.

Steven Covey says the #1 habit of highly effective people is that they are proactive. They happen to things, things don't happen to them. If you are successful, you will decide at some point that you are in charge of your destiny. If you do not decide this, then you will sit around and continue to complain about how the rich are snobs, and hope that the government continues to give you freebies.

Yeah, I am in college to become a doctor and working full time. Is that proactive enough for you? My family is one of those that lost a measly $50K per year in this recession. Just a few of those people whose livelihoods count for less than a billionaire's mad money.

How much money should we take from the wealthy? What amount is enough?

[Witsec1]

How much money should we take from the wealthy? What amount is enough?

How about we restore the tax rate on the wealthiest Americans back to what it was in the Eisenhower era?

[Sola]

Nobody in my family blogs and we are not fundy. Just a typical evangelical Christian family.

Sorry but your attitude screams fundy to all of us.

[notsocommon]

_M8fOwHnwg0

[Sola]

I just don't understand how the majority of America supports public education and takes it a given but balks at universal healthcare.

I think this photo sums up the ultra rich:

QFT

Trickle down economics don't work. By the time the flow of wealth has trickled down, it has spread so thinly that nobody on the bottom rung benefits. Tax cuts for the rich only benefit the rich.

Now trickle up economics on the other hand, works very well indeed. You make sure the poor have more disposable income, they then dispose of that income. That income generates more orders for the products that are being bought, those products generate more profit for the companies involved and more profit for the share holders and bigger bonuses for the company directors. Everybody is happy.

Of course to kick the whole thing off you need to tax the wealthier members of society to the pressure off the poor. That's the bit our friend Jericho doesn't like.

[Witsec1]

I just don't understand how the majority of America supports public education and takes it a given but balks at universal healthcare.

Oh, people like Jericho want to get rid of public schools too.

[debrand]

I don't get the knee jerk defense of the rich. It sounds as if some people on the right believe that the wealthy are a protected species.

Being a member of a society means that you get to use roads, bridges, schools etc that were built by the taxes that citizens pay. Because we recognize that it hurts a poor family more to pay a certain percentage of their income than someone more wealthy, we expect the well off to pay a little more percentage wise in taxes.

No one is asking that the wealthy give up all their wealth. Most people are just asking for some loop holes to be closed, regulations to be tightened on businesses and the rich to pay a slightly higher share of taxes. That is fair.

In the past, our economy has done well when the rich pay a slighty higher tax rate.

[Guest Anonymous]

I don't get the knee jerk defense of the rich. It sounds as if some people on the right believe that the wealthy are a protected species.

Being a member of a society means that you get to use roads, bridges, schools etc that were built by the taxes that citizens pay. Because we recognize that it hurts a poor family more to pay a certain percentage of their income than someone more wealthy, we expect the well off person to pay a little more percentage wise in taxes.

No one is asking that the wealthy give up all their wealth. Most people are just asking for some loop holes to be closed, regulations to be tightened on businesses and the rich to pay a slightly higher share of taxes. That is fair.

In the past, our economy has done well when the rich pay a slighty higher tax rate.

Absolutely, debrand. But jericho flails and denies in the face of history and facts, so pointing that out is unfortunately not going to get you anywhere.

...

And since we already had cake upthread, I now offer you all a brief video of two attractive men snogging.

Us1CO16yYqA

[formergothardite]

I just wish people like Jericho would just admit that they are so self-centered that they would rather risk the lives of the poor on this utopian idea that private charities can care for all of them, than be forced to give some of their money to the government for welfare that has flaws, but works better in practice.

[emmiedahl]

How can you say they didn't earn it? These 80% are people that built their own company from the ground up. Health care is provided with many companies. Don't make that a blanket statement.

Obviously we have a different version of the word "earn". You think you have earned anything you did not receive as an inheritance. I guess Bernie Madoff earned his money, according to Republicans at least. I think that when you victimize employees with low wages to increase your profits, outsource to 4 year olds in the Philippines, and generally trash the environment in the name of earning a buck, you should be accountable for that.

Health care is provided by some companies to some workers. But the average working class family does not have it except through Medicaid. So obviously a lot of employers are *not* providing it. If they are making massive profits while the taxpayers are paying to keep the workers alive, then FUCK YEAH I think they need to pay a higher rate of taxes than a middle class family.

There's a big difference between getting an education and inheriting millions of dollars or a CEO position on a silver plate. It's still a big achievement to rise to the top basically on your own.

So you think that someone who was born to a doctor, received private school and top notch health care and a free ride through college had the same chance as a poor child born to a disabled mother in the ghetto? Do you think that the CEO does not benefit disproportionately from the work of low-paid employees? Is it okay to pay people as little as possible so you can have more frills? And then to bitch about those people needing immunizations?

That's because the income was already taxed before it was invested. The government is double dipping even with half the tax rate.

You obviously don't understand the concept of capital gains. Let me make it clear for you.

The government taxes only GAINS from capital gains. Not the principal. You already paid taxes on the principal. But not on the GAIN. That is why they call it "capital GAINS".

This just means that the wealthy will not be able to hire as many lower income workers, invest as much to new upstart companies, or donate as much to charity. So yes, it does have a direct effect the lower income when the wealthy are hit by a recession.

Trickle down has already been proven a fallacy. You can keep believing in it and repeating it, but it has been proven wrong.

YES! The money invested was already taxed! In fairness, don't tax the interest that anyone makes, no matter their income.

See my explanation of capital gains above.

So you believe, honestly, that a working class family should be paying a higher tax rate while a person who lays in Cabo collecting interest should pay nothing? How Christly is that?

How much money should we take from the wealthy? What amount is enough?

I believe that the wealthy should pay a higher tax rate than the middle class on ALL income.

I believe that unearned income should be taxed at a higher rate than earned income because no one is earning it.

I believe that the wealthy gain their wealth from the labor of underpaid workers. Those workers have the right to health care and a decent standard of living, and that should come out of the pocket of the people who made their fortunes on that underpaid labor.

I believe there is no way a CEO is working 450 times as hard as the person who cleans his toilet, that she has just as much a right to antibiotics and chemotherapy as he does.

[debrand]

This might seem weird but I'm glad that Jericho is on this thread. There are people who listen to one sided news and radio shows who never hear another viewpoint. They've been told those who disagree with them are naive, emotional and hate our country.

By itself, this thread might not change their views but it can begin the process of them questioning their own beliefs.

Afterall, I used to lean much more to the right but reading debates between different sides did change my perspective.

[PokaDot]

That's what I ask myself many times. It's so hard to read the things that most people believe here. It makes me sad for the future of this country. But reading this forum does help me understand why Obama is doing what he is doing in office. He honestly believes in the socialistic, anti-prosperous views that most on this forum believe in. I can't understand why anyone would want to tear down the successful in this country.

And BTW, for the last time, I'm not against helping the poor (as so many like to say here). I against government control helping the poor. A few safeguards for the poor I would be happy with, but the government is way too involved the way it is now.

Most of us say that about people who think like you. We don't want a theocracy. We also don't want your religion shoved down our throat, and most of also don't believe the founding fathers founded the USA to be a Christian nation (honestly-if they wanted us to be a Christian nation it would be in the constitution in plain fucking English as in this: "WE THE PEOPLE, WHO ARE ABOVE ALL ELSE CHRISTIAN").

Also, you are against helping the poor. You don't believe in helping the poor unless you get something out of it (tax break, a "good feeling", bragging rights, etc).

[emmiedahl]

I'm glad Jericho is here, too. Every time a conservative discussed his viewpoints, I get a little more liberal. :D Also, it feels so much more productive than mumbling at my television.

Jericho is against helping the poor with basics like food and health care because some poor CEO might have to save up a month to be able to buy a new helicopter. That's totally what Jesus would do. :roll:

[jaynie]

That's what I ask myself many times. It's so hard to read the things that most people believe here. It makes me sad for the future of this country. But reading this forum does help me understand why Obama is doing what he is doing in office. He honestly believes in the socialistic, anti-prosperous views that most on this forum believe in. I can't understand why anyone would want to tear down the successful in this country.

And BTW, for the last time, I'm not against helping the poor (as so many like to say here). I against government control helping the poor. A few safeguards for the poor I would be happy with, but the government is way too involved the way it is now.

I don't live in your country, Jericho, I live in Canada, where Obama would be considered right wing (though infinitely better than our current right-wing PM). My parents are British immigrants; again, the UK would consider Obama right wing, and even my very conservative UK family would support him, but never your republicans. I have just recently spent an extended period in Denmark, which is so socialist they have a hard time, in my experience, even grasping being as right wing as Obama -- and the Swedes, Norwegians, Finns, and Dutch I met were much the same. In the scandinavian countries especially, taxes for the wealthy are extremely high. And yet, most of these countries are surviving -- and, curiously, the more socialist they are, the better they are doing. Some are even prospering, despite global recession. Why do you think the USA is doomed to fail if it becomes slightly less right-wing, when so many democratically-socialist countries are thriving?

[emmiedahl]

Jericho, we have already discussed the condition of the poor back when they were dependent on private assistance. That system did not work for millennia; what makes you think it would work now? Are you willing to risk the lives of millions of people just to see if maybe it will work now?

I used to work for a Catholic charity and we were swamped with need, even though TANF and food stamps are available. The poor are not starving anymore, but their lives are still very difficult. I think you are just worried that someone, somewhere might get something they did not earn. Except for rich people; their unearned income is somehow more moral :?

[Austin]

You obviously don't understand the concept of capital gains. Let me make it clear for you.

The government taxes only GAINS from capital gains. Not the principal. You already paid taxes on the principal. But not on the GAIN. That is why they call it "capital GAINS".

Friggin' duh, dude. Seriously. What is it about "GAINS" that you and other GOPers do not understand? Do you guys think that if you just repeat this false talking point over and over (the ebil government is double-dipping!) that it will make it true? You are either not that bright or just dishonest. It's one or the other.

[JesusFightClub]

I have bitten nearly through my lip reading this thread and said "Come the revolution" about a hundred times. Jericho, I like my blood pressure being at a steady level. Gonnae no talk absolute shite?

First of all, Jesus never told you to piss and moan about being taxed. You are supposed, as I understand it, to let what is Caesar's be Caesar's and set your eyes on the heavenly kingdom, not be overconcerned with an earthly one.

As for the issue of compulsion, it makes absolutely no difference. Jesus didn't ask what was going to be done with his taxes or whine about the rate he was taxed at. He just paid them, and the man who advocated giving others your coat, feeding the hungry, giving a drink to the thirsty and visiting prisoners doesn't seem like a good bet to be someone who would think a higher tax rate on the wealthy is unfair.

Secondly *WARNING, COMMUNISM AHEAD AND JFC IS A LONG WAY FROM BEING THE VOICE OF THE HIVE VAGINA* yeah, I would seize all the ill gotten gains of the wealthy and redistribute them. I've got a poster up in my room which says "Behind every fortune lies a crime" and in many cases so many crimes that you would weep to see them (were you capable of it.)

You don't get to be wealthy by being an altruist. Capitalism is an economic system, not a moral one. You get the top designer clothes and the yacht because somewhere in Bangladesh there are factories full of kids sucking their fingers and rubbing their eyes as they work. Only another 14 hours to go of the work day, and then they might be permitted to sleep.

Wealth is an obscenity in itself and the huge rich/poor divide we have is, well, I don't know how anyone can look at it and be on the side of the CEO and still call themselves Christian. If you are closer to Ayn Rand than to Jesus, what god are you really worshipping?