What is Wrong With These People!? - The U.S. Politics Discussion Thread

[aj1701]

Perhaps "completely paralyzed" would have been a better term. Also, let it be known that I'm not exactly of the "my college professor told me about all the evil corporations" persuasion. I have opinions that lean left on some issues and right on others, like most people.

Regardless, The debt ceiling should never have come down to the wire like that, and the reason it did was because of immovable tea partiers tying an increase to a radical balanced budget amendment. The whole world was watching with horror as we approached default and we're seeing the repercussions of it today (yea, concerns about the Eurozone are driving fears too but the downgrade is definitely a big factor). S&P isn't off the mark when they claimed their reasoning for a downgrade stemmed from a lack of faith in the current state of Washington.

I see what you mean by the tea party being a symptom not the cause in general, but in this specific case I can't see any other argument made especially with tea party darlings like Bachmann flat out refusing to vote to increase the ceiling regardless of whether there was a budget deal. I'm no democrat, I find both parties infuriating but to different degrees and for different reasons.

And yea, it's probably a pipe dream to vote them out en masse and start fresh but that's the only thing that can be done to get the everyday person back into their minds. If we really want to make a statement that we're pissed off and want a change people have to vote.

Otherwise, your outlook is similar to mine. Maybe even more nihilistic. Kudos.

Its weird, I found the tea partiers the only sane one. Why is no one else worried that BOTH sides want to keep borrowing and spending? Neither side really wants spending cuts, they just disagree what to do with our money.

 

[aj1701]

Screw the USA. 2 mins outside my house a supermarket is being looted!

Ya, Europe with its more socialist leanings managed to outborrow the US even, and now its paying the price. Greece, Italy, Ireland, Spain, Portugal. UK is getting close. Which country will collapse first?! opcorn:

 

[HurlingDervish]

Ya, Europe with its more socialist leanings managed to outborrow the US even, and now its paying the price. Greece, Italy, Ireland, Spain, Portugal. UK is getting close. Which country will collapse first?! opcorn:

lol if you think that the US is exempt from psychotic kids/people fucking shit up, for no particular reason.

On the bright side, it seems the riots finally gave sociologists a calling in life... .

They've needed a good riot.

 

[D_Matt_Ma]

When Obama said "Hope and Change," Quan- Chi responded with "Ooohhhh Yeah."

I am a Republican, but at heart, I'm really more of an anti-Democrat. That being said, I'll be impartial for a second and tell you the one reason why our Congress sucks.

When Obama got elected, he assembled a "bi-partisan committee" to give recommended changes to reduce the deficit. They came back, he said "No, I don't like it." Pretty much, it involved raising taxes, cutting subsidies, simplifying the tax code, and cutting medicare.

Then Rand Paul Came up with a deficit reduction plan. Similar suggestions. Obama goes, "No I don't like it."

And now they are forming a "bi-partisan SUPER committee" to come up with a list of deficit cuts. Anyone want to bet how it will end?

We don't need anymore committees. We all know what needs to be done to cut the deficit. Everyone overseas knows it too. Now simply admit that you aren't willing to do it because it's mean and that we will rather raise taxes on the young people like myself to pay for it, or say screw you old people and we're doing the cuts to medicare. Because by forming yet another "bi-partisan committee" all they're doing is proving how "impotent" they are.

As for the Tea Party, it will inevitably lead to a decade of Republican dominance at the expense of the Democrats. The Tea Party is simply the fiscal conservative libertarian side of the GOP. With the GOP now split between the Tea Party and the traditional Republicans, they have become one-dimensional and easy targets of criticism for being "stupid." But what you don't see is how nimble they have become in creating plans for current problems.

Contrast that to the Democrats, who, as people have correctly pointed out, become social-issue centric. Anyone can tell you that when you look at the faces of the Democrats, Pelosi, Reid, Obama, Schumer, Frank, Dodd (okay, maybe not Dodd), they are Social Democrats first and foremost, not fiscal ones. They find a social issue which they care about and then justify it fiscaly after the fact. If they didn't have to focus on the economy at all, they wouldn't, because their party has become dominated by social issues. Look at any policy the Democrats have pushed in the last few years, and you will notice the Keynsian justifcations economically are the same things from text books 20 years ago. That's what happens when your party doesn't get a Tea Party splinter. Your party develops stagnant positions that don't adapt to the current times.

What's the consequence? If you have a few bad decisions, such as National Health Care, Stimulus, and Bail Outs that end up not working, the entire Democratic Party gets kicked out. If the Democrats had a Tea Party equivalent, what you would have seen is an emphasis on raising taxes and very old school down to earth stimulus (roads and infrastructure renovations only). No Health care. No unemployment extension. No Bail Outs. And no stimulus that that was anywhere near as controversial. Face it, the Tea Party is working. You may call them stupid, but stupid will beat obsolete once people finally realize that none of the policies pushed by the Democrats will work this time around. Because their Keynsian models are outdated.

 

[aj1701]

lol if you think that the US is exempt from psychotic kids/people fucking shit up, for no particular reason.

Nope, I know full well the US does too. I grew up in Philly ya know.

 

[SlickDicMagnum]

When Obama said "Hope and Change," Quan- Chi responded with "Ooohhhh Yeah."

I am a Republican, but at heart, I'm really more of an anti-Democrat. That being said, I'll be impartial for a second and tell you the one reason why our Congress sucks.

When Obama got elected, he assembled a "bi-partisan committee" to give recommended changes to reduce the deficit. They came back, he said "No, I don't like it." Pretty much, it involved raising taxes, cutting subsidies, simplifying the tax code, and cutting medicare.

Then Rand Paul Came up with a deficit reduction plan. Similar suggestions. Obama goes, "No I don't like it."

And now they are forming a "bi-partisan SUPER committee" to come up with a list of deficit cuts. Anyone want to bet how it will end?

We don't need anymore committees. We all know what needs to be done to cut the deficit. Everyone overseas knows it too. Now simply admit that you aren't willing to do it because it's mean and that we will rather raise taxes on the young people like myself to pay for it, or say screw you old people and we're doing the cuts to medicare. Because by forming yet another "bi-partisan committee" all they're doing is proving how "impotent" they are.

As for the Tea Party, it will inevitably lead to a decade of Republican dominance at the expense of the Democrats. The Tea Party is simply the fiscal conservative libertarian side of the GOP. With the GOP now split between the Tea Party and the traditional Republicans, they have become one-dimensional and easy targets of criticism for being "stupid." But what you don't see is how nimble they have become in creating plans for current problems.

Contrast that to the Democrats, who, as people have correctly pointed out, become social-issue centric. Anyone can tell you that when you look at the faces of the Democrats, Pelosi, Reid, Obama, Schumer, Frank, Dodd (okay, maybe not Dodd), they are Social Democrats first and foremost, not fiscal ones. They find a social issue which they care about and then justify it fiscaly after the fact. If they didn't have to focus on the economy at all, they wouldn't, because their party has become dominated by social issues. Look at any policy the Democrats have pushed in the last few years, and you will notice the Keynsian justifcations economically are the same things from text books 20 years ago. That's what happens when your party doesn't get a Tea Party splinter. Your party develops stagnant positions that don't adapt to the current times.

What's the consequence? If you have a few bad decisions, such as National Health Care, Stimulus, and Bail Outs that end up not working, the entire Democratic Party gets kicked out. If the Democrats had a Tea Party equivalent, what you would have seen is an emphasis on raising taxes and very old school down to earth stimulus (roads and infrastructure renovations only). No Health care. No unemployment extension. No Bail Outs. And no stimulus that that was anywhere near as controversial. Face it, the Tea Party is working. You may call them stupid, but stupid will beat obsolete once people finally realize that none of the policies pushed by the Democrats will work this time around. Because their Keynsian models are outdated.

Well said. My issue with the President is that he does a lot of talking and criticizing of other people's plans but he has yet to come up with one himself? How can you talk shit when you are sitting on your ass not making any decisions? Again, people will say that the Tea Party personnel are nuts and "terrorists" but at least they are the only group of politicians that have stuck to their principles and what got them elected.

 

[D_Matt_Ma]

Well said. My issue with the President is that he does a lot of talking and criticizing of other people's plans but he has yet to come up with one himself? How can you talk shit when you are sitting on your ass not making any decisions? Again, people will say that the Tea Party personnel are nuts and "terrorists" but at least they are the only group of politicians that have stuck to their principles and what got them elected.

Precisely. Pretty much the entire Democratic Party is now dependent on a few key policies passed by them the last few years. If those policies don't work, it doesn't matter how "crazy" the Tea Party is. The blame gets put entirely on the Democratic Party. Whereas for the GOP, the Tea Party has allowed distribution of blame for different policies, which allows the public to identify with a face for each policy rather than putting the blame entirely on a single party.

 

[G4S KT]

http://pragcap.com/how-the-republicans-can-win-the-white-house

So, today I am putting my Republican campaign strategist hat on. What could we do to ensure that President Obama gets kicked out of the White House in 2012? Well, the obvious answer is that we want to make the economy really stink no matter what. We want the unemployment rate to remain high so we can run advertisements non-stop that say:

“The unemployment rate is higher today than when President Obama took office!”

That will resonate with people.

The Republican Strategy for the White House 2012.

It's actually pretty genius.

 

[G4S KT]

I hope people are listening...

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/15/opinion/stop-coddling-the-super-rich.html?_r=1&src=tp&smid=fb-share

My friends and I have been coddled long enough by a billionaire-friendly Congress. It’s time for our government to get serious about shared sacrifice.

 

[D_Matt_Ma]

Warren Buffet is the biggest BS hypocrite ever for that article/statement.

The reason he pays low taxes isn't because he has a low tax rate. It's because he has a low income. Don't mistake the two.

1) His wealth is mostly in Stock
2) He stated that he will never pay a dividened.
3) He pushes for higher dividend taxes (so he isn't affected)
4) He pushes for higher income taxes for $250k+ (he isn't affected because he makes less than that)
5) He pushes for higher capital gains taxes (but he never sells stock)
6) He wants capital gains tax exemptions for donations of stock (which is all he does)

See what he did there? Warren Buffet gets points for ethics, but when it comes to tax policy, he is to be ignored all day every day, because unlike him, most people have to sell stock to pay for expenses. People need dividends to prevent corrupt management. And people need incomes over $250k if they do not have access to stock options.

And the Republican strategy is to make the economy suck leading into elections? You sure that's not a Democratic strategy? I mean, maybe the GOP is just taking a play out of the Obama campaign when he ran in 08 no?

 

[Lyuben]

BACHMAN 2012!

 

[G4S KT]

Warren Buffet is the biggest BS hypocrite ever for that article/statement.

The reason he pays low taxes isn't because he has a low tax rate. It's because he has a low income. Don't mistake the two.

1) His wealth is mostly in Stock
2) He stated that he will never pay a dividened.
3) He pushes for higher dividend taxes (so he isn't affected)
4) He pushes for higher income taxes for $250k+ (he isn't affected because he makes less than that)
5) He pushes for higher capital gains taxes (but he never sells stock)
6) He wants capital gains tax exemptions for donations of stock (which is all he does)

See what he did there? Warren Buffet gets points for ethics, but when it comes to tax policy, he is to be ignored all day every day, because unlike him, most people have to sell stock to pay for expenses. People need dividends to prevent corrupt management. And people need incomes over $250k if they do not have access to stock options.

I'm not retarded. I don't think that he gets paid a $600 million salary. It would be BS if the article was titled "Warren Buffet for Shared Sacrifice: higher Dividend taxes, Income Taxes"

He may or may not be affected by what he claims in the article (raising rates on $1million+ earners and more so on $10million+. I find it very hard to believe that he wouldn't fall into those categories). Even so, I'm not sure that he implied that those rates were what he would be "sacrificing". There are other ways that the "super committee" could rearrange finances to stop the coddling.

it's a more general sentiment; that he and his friends shouldn't be given these breaks. 99% of Americans should agree with this. We're being forced to eat it while being fed lines like "oh but business leaders need tax cuts or else they can't create jobs." bullshit.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/25/corporate-profits-2011-all-time-high_n_840538.html

Where are the jobs, then? Coming soon? lol.

The more that gets dumped onto the working class, middle class, (and most importantly) small businesses in the short term, the worse it will be for big businesses in the long term.

*speaking of payroll tax, who wants to bet that the Republicans will (at least try) to block the extension of the payroll tax cut in an effort to leverage something. No tax raises ever, huh.

And the Republican strategy is to make the economy suck leading into elections? You sure that's not a Democratic strategy? I mean, maybe the GOP is just taking a play out of the Obama campaign when he ran in 08 no?

Blaming the democrats for the '08 crash? Lmao.

Note: I have no party affiliation; I just call it how I see it.

BACHMAN 2012!

 

[D_Matt_Ma]

He isn't affected AT ALL BY ANY OF THE SUGGESTIONS HE IS MAKING. Hence the hypocricy. Buffet makes $100k/year to my knowledge. He wouldn't even qualify under the 250k+ or more tax hike the Dems are pushing. Hence his criticism is to be ignored because it's all political posturing to make the public like him.

I'll be honest and say the honest truth. Rich people should pay more taxes. POOR PEOPLE SHOULD GET LESS. I have no problem with cutting welfare programs and raising taxes on the rich and giving all middle class people a tax cut. I don't care if poor people who feel entitled to a second chance suffer more, because it's nothing compared to what the middle class is going through after getting everything right the first time around.

You can quote me on that. "I DON'T CARE ABOUT THE RICH OR THE POOR PEOPLE. IF THEY ALL HAVE TO SUFFER TO HELP THE MIDDLE CLASS, I'M FOR IT."

Let's face it. We all already know what's going to happen. Poor people will still get their programs. Rich and Old people will still get their benefits. Nobody is going to help the middle class because they are now the smallest demographic segment in the country, and politicians care about votes, not about what's right or best.

 

[G4S KT]

He isn't affected AT ALL BY ANY OF THE SUGGESTIONS HE IS MAKING. Hence the hypocricy. Buffet makes $100k/year to my knowledge. He wouldn't even qualify under the 250k+ or more tax hike the Dems are pushing. Hence his criticism is to be ignored because it's all political posturing to make the public like him.

I'll be honest and say the honest truth. Rich people should pay more taxes. POOR PEOPLE SHOULD GET LESS. I have no problem with cutting welfare programs and raising taxes on the rich and giving all middle class people a tax cut. I don't care if poor people who feel entitled to a second chance suffer more, because it's nothing compared to what the middle class is going through after getting everything right the first time around.

You can quote me on that. "I DON'T CARE ABOUT THE RICH OR THE POOR PEOPLE. IF THEY ALL HAVE TO SUFFER TO HELP THE MIDDLE CLASS, I'M FOR IT."

Let's face it. We all already know what's going to happen. Poor people will still get their programs. Rich and Old people will still get their benefits. Nobody is going to help the middle class because they are now the smallest demographic segment in the country, and politicians care about votes, not about what's right or best.

I didn't mean to seem like I was defending Buffet personally; I'm sure he's a giant douche. I just hope people take up the sentiment and run with it.

Otherwise, I more or less agree.

 

[D_Matt_Ma]

I don't know what the sentiment is from the people, but unless it's the middle class, I don't care. That's right, I don't care what poor/rich people say. I say the best stimulus you can do is cut the middle income tax bracket and just have a flat tax rate for lower and middle income, and then kick in a higher rate for the poor/rich. Does that mean the rich/poor get screwed? Yup, and I don't care.

The sentiment of the poor/rich is the same. Spoiled entitled brats. The poor think they should get free stuff and that's why they're mad at Congress, because they're not getting it. The rich are mad at Congress because they want the life of luxury for the rest of their lives and higher taxes stops that. Seriously, a middle class family like mine only wants a tax cut. THAT'S ALL. We don't want any subsidies or welfare. Just give us a break already.

Maybe I'm biased because I live in crazy CA where taxes are uber high.

 

[Abra Kapocus]

The sentiment of the poor/rich is the same. Spoiled entitled brats. The poor think they should get free stuff and that's why they're mad at Congress, because they're not getting it.

Couldn't be any more of a strawman here, and a gloriously insensitive one at that. Your myopic disdain for your fellow man is noted.

They just want a fair shot like everybody else. A chance to be able to find work that pays a living wage and to put food on their table. The right to not have to declare bankruptcy from medical costs just because little Johnny contracted leukemia. Moreover, they want to be free from condemnation to squalor should their primary breadwinner be rendered unable to work. They want a fair shot at higher education, etc. You know, basically everything we take for granted. You can't pull yourself up by your own bootstraps if you can't afford to buy any boots.

Maybe I'm biased because I live in crazy CA where taxes are uber high.

No. You're not allowed to complain about taxes when we have among the lowest tax rates in the industrialized world. Moreover, it's not the taxes themselves, it's where they're going that's the problem. Even if we revert the tax rates to their Clinton-era levels, that would not be enough. If we divert the tax dollars away from corporate welfare, subsidies to big oil and big agriculture, subsidies to pet projects like Michelle Bachman's "pray the gay away" clinic, the top 1% tax cuts, and the bloated military budget that spends millions on weapon and vehicle systems that not even the pentagon wants, it would certainly be a start. Of course then you'd still have to be able to appoint regulators who would actually do their goddamn jobs and put a stop to the unmitigated extraction going on in our banking sector.

There's a lot of work ahead of us.

[edit] You know why Obama wants a Free Trade agreement with Panama? It's nothing at all to do with free trade. All you need to do is a quick Google search of Panama Tax Havens. Writing's on the wall.

 

[D_Matt_Ma]

And your point is now brought up. Why are idiots having kids if they can't afford to put them through school (assuming that you would do that for your kids) or have health care. I'm serious. If you can't afford having kids, don't have them. The fact that I have to put food on their table, put their kids through school, and pay for their health care is the dumbest sense of entitlement EVER. I don't see how you can possibly justify people simply wanting a chance when the majority of people feel they are entitled to those things.

And you need to check your facts if you think we have the lowest tax rates in the industrialized world. Seriously, we are near the top. I'm not sure where you're getting that figures from. I can use myself as an example. In California, I get a 10% income tax right off the bat on all earned income (CA isn't brackets, it's a flat rate once you hit a benchmark). Now, add the ~20% federal income tax for people making under 80k/year (averging between 15-25% on the brackets). Right off the bat, for someone like me who isn't even making six figs who gets no welfare benefits, I'm shelling out 30%. Now if I own my own business, well, I'm not even going to get into corporate tax rates, which are high.

Your assumption that we can move taxes back to the Clinton era and above is also a false argument. We shouldn't even have to go anywhere near those levels if we simply didn't take care of every old person in our country. It's the dumbest stupidest philosophy to be paying into social security and medicare that supports old people who don't work when we could be using that money to give kids better education and health care. FLAT OUT STUPID. I don't know where people got this stuck up mentality that they matter simply because they're a human being and they are by default special. NO! If you don't have enough money to live into uber old age doing nothing, SUCKS FOR YOU! I'd rather pay taxes into helping young people who have a productive life ahead of them.

Your point on tax subsidies being too high. I'll give you that. But in return, why don't you give me acknowledgement that us taking care of every person who is poor simply because they deserve it is rubbish. How about you live within your means, no matter how miserable that may be. You are not entitled to be happy in life. If you can barely afford to get by, you get by.

 

[Abra Kapocus]

Once again, your disdain for your fellow man is noted. If you honestly don't believe that everyone is entitled to basic human necessities, then I personally find you to be repulsive.

I never said THE lowest tax rate, but among the lowest. Here's some support.

http://topforeignstocks.com/2011/01/13/personal-and-corporate-tax-income-tax-rates-by-country/ <----Look at the column One Earner, Married Couple, Two Children, in particular.

Corporate tax rate is right about where it should be, I think. Now if we just fixed the tax code to not only close the loopholes and havens, but so as to end the practice of no longer counting you as a "small business" as soon as you can move your operation out of your garage and into an actual store so they can tax you into oblivion, then we'd really be on a roll. We might actually have real competition in the marketplace, and cheaply made goods with planned obsolescence sold for dozens of times their worth would be laughed off the face of the earth.

 

[D_Matt_Ma]

http://topforeignstocks.com/2011/01/13/personal-and-corporate-tax-income-tax-rates-by-country/ <----Look at the column One Earner, Married Couple, Two Children, in particular.

Corporate tax rate is right about where it should be, I think. Now if we just fixed the tax code to not only close the loopholes and havens, but so that they could stop counting you as a "small business" as soon as you can move your operation out of your garage and into an actual store, so they can tax you into oblivion, then we'd really be on a roll. We might actually have real competition in the marketplace, and cheaply made goods with planned obsolescence sold for dozens of times their worth would be laughed off the face of the earth.

Like the link, but the only tax rate that matters is the single no child. Not everyone can and should have kids or get married. Our tax code really needs to stop doing that.

I completely lost you in the sarcasm on the last part. Sarcasm in more than two setences in text format gets lost online because there's no context, so I don't know what you're trying to say on the last part other than there's too many tax loopholes and some reference to cheap foreign imported goods.

 

[Abra Kapocus]

There was no sarcasm, just a slight mis-phrasing, which I have since corrected.

And I still find you repulsive.

 

[D_Matt_Ma]

There was no sarcasm, just a slight mis-phrasing, which I have since corrected.

And I still find you repulsive.

Don't really care if people hate me, and I never will. The other "repulsive" people that think like me simply do care and won't say what they really think.

 

[JrK]

And your point is now brought up. Why are idiots having kids if they can't afford to put them through school (assuming that you would do that for your kids) or have health care. I'm serious. If you can't afford having kids, don't have them. The fact that I have to put food on their table, put their kids through school, and pay for their health care is the dumbest sense of entitlement EVER. I don't see how you can possibly justify people simply wanting a chance when the majority of people feel they are entitled to those things.

Children are a lifelong commitment. When they're born you might be sitting very well. That can change, literally, in an instant. Not everyone that is poor fits your obviously biased stereotypical description. There are a lot of good, honest, and very poor people that refuse help or at the least don't expect it. Of course since you've likely grew up with everything handed to you, you wouldn't know about the real world.

 

[Noob Saibot]

Bringing up the point that some people "should not have kids" is pointless; it's uncontrollable, and is essentially the very meaning of life. It doesn't help anything.

 

[MKF30]

All I'm going to say is Obama Administration=FAIL

 

[GNG Iniquity]

I don't see why people still continue beating the democratic vs republican proverbial drum, you think there's an actual difference these days? One man or political party won't sway the massive corporations who they're funded and influenced by.

You people are naive if you don't think our corrupt government is ran by corporations. It's all a show for the cameras. Follow the money and take off the blindfolds already.