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Boris Godunov
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Portland, OR
Aug 2001
time: 00:26
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quote:
Originally posted by SKILORD
I never said there should be no taxation, i simply opposed Taxation without representation, Taxation in which only an elite few reap rewards while everyone foots the bill. If you wish to have a government they must offer services for all taxpayers, not just a few. |
Uh, we have taxation with representation. Read what I wrote about being part of a representative Democracy. And what do you mean "elite few?" Everyone benefits from what taxes pay for, ya know. The government does offer services to all taxpayers. They all get military protection, public education, social security, medicare, etc.
quote:
I think half the stuff our government offers is totally uneccesarry, governments are designed to provide freedoms and maintin them (and, i will concede) grant those things out of the individual's reach, not to serve the poor, not to do anything other than simply protect rights and help everyone not a select few, every taxpaying citizen. |
There are plenty of unneccessary government programs that benefit the rich as well. Remember that senators and congressman are constantly greasing up their donors with the old quid pro quo. Ever heard of corporate welfare?
quote:
As for Boris's teaher: I'll bet you the factory wouldn't have had to close if it had less taxes to pay (weak argument here, but i might as well throw it up) |
You're right, it's a weak argument (and you shouldn't throw those up, because it just makes all your points look weaker). As I mentioned, it was during the recession in the early 90s. Taxes on the company had nothing to do with it (especially since, like most companies, I am sure Campbell's had found tons of ways to avoid paying most taxes, if any at all).
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SKILORD
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Live free or Die
Mar 2002
time: 05:26
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quote:
Originally posted by Boris Godunov
Uh, we have taxation with representation. Read what I wrote about being part of a representative Democracy. And what do you mean "elite few?" Everyone benefits from what taxes pay for, ya know. The government does offer services to all taxpayers. They all get military protection, public education, social security, medicare, etc.
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No, we don't all get welfare. Who would give unemployment benefits to the employed?
quote:
governments are designed to provide freedoms and maintin them (and, i will concede) grant those things out of the individual's reach, not to serve the poor, not to do anything other than simply protect rights and help everyone not a select few, every taxpaying citizen.
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I mean that all programs which do not benefit, or are unavailable to each and every taxpayer, is taxation without representation. I don't mind those things which we all get, and stop whining about them, this thread is about welfare and unemployment benefites.
quote:
There are plenty of unneccessary government programs that benefit the rich as well. Remember that senators and congressman are constantly greasing up their donors with the old quid pro quo. Ever heard of corporate welfare?
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Get rid of that too then! I don;t care which elite few benefits, i just want them to stop benefitting from me.
quote:
You're right, it's a weak argument (and you shouldn't throw those up, because it just makes all your points look weaker). As I mentioned, it was during the recession in the early 90s. Taxes on the company had nothing to do with it (especially since, like most companies, I am sure Campbell's had found tons of ways to avoid paying most taxes, if any at all). |
Well then I shall ignore the line of inquiry 
I could say that all recessions are caused by government. Though I wouldn't, and i shan't don't quote me on that, because i cannot say it with conviction.
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Spiffor
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CPA - Evil Clone brigade
Nov 2001
time: 06:26
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Oh, and if you want a rebuttal to you first post, here it comes.
1
The comparison between the feudal nobility and the current poor is inherently flawed. And I'm being polite. The feudal nobility concentrated all powers in its hands : financial, military, and a strong alliance with the religious power (which can be compared with today's media in terms of opinion making)
Feudal lords ruled ruthlessly on their serfs, who ruined themseleves and fell into famine for the sake of the lord, who considered deserving it, because Feudal lords were the military elite (the army you love so much).
Serfs had no ways to oppose the views or the power of the lord, except for some peasant revolts which always ended in bloodbath, with the peasant's victory of course.
Of course the nobility didn't pay taxes, despite being the richest people around : they were serving the King's militarily, so it was deemed a sacrifice great enough (of course, peasants were cannon fodder during medieval battles, but they still paid taxes).
Stretch the current taxpayer's situation however you want, it has by no means the same oppression than what happened to the serfs. And stretch the situation of welfare recievers however you want, it has no comparison with the outstanding wealth the lords lived in.
Especially in the US, welfare recievers are the worst-off. The state never had an ambition of equating incomes like in Sweden for example, and the welfare only adressed to the very poorest.
2.
Why are there still traces of welfare in the free-market fanatical country that is the US ? Not because of moral grounds. Not because the socialists own you. But because welfare somehow soothes the gap between poorest and the rest of the population.
It is a well documented case that poverty is a major cause of crime and family unstability. Lone mothers are outstandingly overrepresented in the poor population : indeed, it is much harder to pay fixed charges (rent, food for children, misc.) alone than when married. To make the ends meet, these people would have to work all day, without being able to raise their children, leaving them to themselves. See my point ?
OTOH, there are also not miserous people who have to rely on welfare at some point, because of some accident in their lives. Boris told you about his friends. Welfare is a safety net whose purpose is to serve those in need, rather than to make profit, unlike insurance companies. It provides a much better safety net for those who need a short-term support before becoming useful to society again. Hadn't Boris' friends this safety net, they might have tanked now, and wouldn't be any useful to America. I suppose it is not what you want.
Many people, encountering a career incident, have tanked to the bottom, i.e becoming a bum, because of the lack of safety nets. I hardly call a bum useful for the US, at least not as much as, say, a teacher.
It doesn't have to be a career incident. A friend of mine, who'll have a brilliant career no doubt, had a terrible accident a year ago. He needed 2 full weeks at hospital to survive. His parents, despite being doctor and teacher, could have never afforded the cost of this operation (we are talking about hundreds of thousands here). Hadn't be welfare present, this guy wouldn't have survived, and wouldn't have produced wealth for his country for the rest of his career.
Like it or not, safet nets are useful, they are necessary.
3.
Safety nets are a necessity, sure. But why not use charity instead of welfare to give safety ents to the poor ? The answer is simple : bad distribution. Charity comes from an emotion of goodwill (which is a good thing), and this emotion is both flawed and manipulable.
[Short story] : I was once in a train shortly before the journey started. A guy comes and holds his speech like he has no job and no resources to feed his family. Clients aboard the train were relatively wealthy, and gave big coins. He exited with more than 20$ earned in 5 minutes. OTOH, I've seen just before a woman begging in the subway station, and I didn't see anybody giving to her. I was a fool too, because I gave to the train guy.[/short story]
This was an illustration on how mislead charity can be, when acting on individual level. But maybe we could trust the churches to handle it more rationally ? NO, and here is why: The irrationality of these churches will be less terrible than the individual's ones, but their allocation of funds will remained biased nonetheless. Do you think churches will give charity to well known pro-choice people ? Do you think churches will not use this help to lure the poor in their preaching ? And more importantly : how rational would be the distribution of wealth if "richer" churches have much more money than "poorer" churches ? How would Flint's church help the people of Flint, for example ?
This is why we a nationwide welfare system is the only modern tool to provide the safety net I proved the necessity above (point 2)
4.
The tricky part is : "Should this welfare system be mandatory ?". The answer is YES, and here is why. The people who will obviously profit from such a welfare system are the poorest, so they'll sign up immediately. The richest have almost everything to lose, because it is extremely unlikely they fall to the same low as the poorest anytime in their lives. The middle-class have a risk, like when signing up for an insurance : some people will have career accidents, bad luck, savings thrown out the toilet after a bad financial move, terrible disease which will cost thousands to heal, but some will not.
The natural reflex will be for these people to say "heck no ! I keep my money" (exactly like you're doing right now). It would then prove dramatic for them and their families should they have an accident their resources couldn't ever repay.
In the end, if such a system was voluntary, the poor people would be the only one signing up, and hence there wouldn't be any money to fund the safety net. It would also plunge numbers of lower-classes and middle-classes to the hell of misery because of their short term refusal to pay for it, which is bad for the society overall, and can be bad for you in particular.
For such a system to be funded and to work, it has to be compulsory.
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SKILORD
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Live free or Die
Mar 2002
time: 05:26
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quote:
Especially in the US, welfare recievers are the worst-off. The state never had an ambition of equating incomes like in Sweden for example, and the welfare only adressed to the very poorest.
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Did, or did not, Sweden have to scale back their efforts at Welfare because they were wrecking themselves?
quote:
Feudal lords ruled ruthlessly on their serfs, who ruined themseleves and fell into famine for the sake of the lord, who considered deserving it, because Feudal lords were the military elite (the army you love so much).
Serfs had no ways to oppose the views or the power of the lord, except for some peasant revolts which always ended in bloodbath, with the peasant's victory of course.
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The current poor are not the militarry elite, but they are protected by them, the poor are protected by the US far better than the rich are, meaning that if it came down between them the government would side with the poor.
quote:
The comparison between the feudal nobility and the current poor is inherently flawed. And I'm being polite. The feudal nobility concentrated all powers in its hands : financial, military, and a strong alliance with the religious power (which can be compared with today's media in terms of opinion making)
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Financial power is the case i will assume I have made by the tone of this post.
Military I have said above.
Media of course.
What you see here is that all the powers have been greatly weakened over the years which is nice. I would rather they awere abolished from monopoly.
quote:
It is a well documented case that poverty is a major cause of crime and family unstability. Lone mothers are outstandingly overrepresented in the poor population : indeed, it is much harder to pay fixed charges (rent, food for children, misc.) alone than when married. To make the ends meet, these people would have to work all day, without being able to raise their children, leaving them to themselves. See my point ?
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You didn't read my post on the subject, did you?
The post's tone is exasperation. It concedes defeat with it's diction and even you must realise how thin you've stretched things at some points.
Next I suppose come the personal insults. 
Anyway, most is obsolete since the last few posts of mine anyway.
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Spiffor
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CPA - Evil Clone brigade
Nov 2001
time: 06:26
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I wonder why I continue, but...
You continue to believe the poorest are the modern equivalent of the nobles. So of course, the only resistance CEOs could oppose is a peasant revolt ! 
It is unfathomable the CEOs use their media to attack welfare and progressive taxation. We have never seen a news network attacking those in the US ! After all, all news networks and opinion-making emissions are all pushing for more welfare. Especially this Rush Limbaugh one. You should get rid of this socialist.
We cannot imagine one second the CEOs and big businesses will use their extensive relation networks in the white house and the congress to push against the oppressive poor. It's not like your politicians are good acquaintances with them, nor do they come from their milieu. Your politicians all come from the poor and only think about defending their egoistical interests, like old Kings.
By the same token, your politicians, corrupted by the poors, will never dismantle welfare for the greater good of opressed big businesses. They will not send the police to break strikes, but they will rather burn corporate offices to the ground.
I have been swayed by your strong arguments. The police, the military, the media, the government. Everybody will staunchly defend the poor against the opressed ig businesses. CEOs better prepare their forks if they want to revolt now...
Oh, and to answer your question seriously, I do think the police and the military will crush riots, should they happen. But it is more likely the media will be successful in its brainwashing campaign on how better for the poor the disappearance of welfare will be, thus hindering riots to emerge.
Last edited by Spiffor on 21-03-2003 at 10:31
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SKILORD
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Live free or Die
Mar 2002
time: 05:26
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quote:
CEOs better prepare their forks if they want to revolt now...
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quote:
milieu. Your politicians all come from the poor and only think about defending their egoistical interests, like old Kings.
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Thy want to be reelected, they view the majority as poor, though this is far from true.
quote:
It is unfathomable the CEOs use their media to attack welfare and progressive taxation. We have never seen a news network attacking those in the US ! After all, all news networks and opinion-making emissions are all pushing for more welfare. Especially this Rush Limbaugh one. You should get rid of this socialist.
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Well, you see, each side of the political spectrum views the opponents as controlling the Media. I won't say which side is right, because i don't now.
Rush Limbaugh is awesome, it will fall to unsurprised ears that i am subscribed to his magazine.
Ayn Rand wrote an essay on this subject: Big Business: America's Persecuted Minority. I'll read it, I'm sure I have it somewhere, and reply tomorrow to whatever you may have chosen to post while I sleep.
I no longer hope this thread dies. No, to Compile my ponts we shall go, to ensure that you have plenty to whine about :
quote:
Q: do you think it is better for the society to let a lone mother raise her 2 kids, or is it better to have her work all day, thus leaving the children without parental monitoring ?
A: She could very easily form some sort of Mothership Union, a 'Coalition', if you will, of like troubled persons working for the benifit of the group, since they each are inherintly equal (to a negligable degree) they would be able to divide time between mothering and working, doing so in shifts.
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Q:Too bad she isnt a mother. Their problems were financial, and welfare kept them from total poverty long enough for her husband to get back on his feet.
A: Anyway, why couldn't he get a part time job and eke out for a little while on that? Jobs aren't so hard to find, i mean my god, we have illegal immigrants piling up at the border filing our jobs, maybe if we were protected from them as our government should do he would have been able to find a job more quickly. Maybe he would have been able to get a small job to fill his mouth and that of his family while he searched for a career.
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Q: Uh, we have taxation with representation. Read what I wrote about being part of a representative Democracy. And what do you mean "elite few?" Everyone benefits from what taxes pay for, ya know. The government does offer services to all taxpayers. They all get military protection, public education, social security, medicare, etc.
A: No, we don't all get welfare. Who would give unemployment benefits to the employed?
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Q: There are plenty of unneccessary government programs that benefit the rich as well. Remember that senators and congressman are constantly greasing up their donors with the old quid pro quo. Ever heard of corporate welfare?
A: Get rid of that too then! I don;t care which elite few benefits, i just want them to stop benefitting from me.
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I won't do anything with the nonsence on this page, last page was fun though. :nogistalia:
Good Night,
-SKILORD
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Urban Ranger
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Apolyton Duke of Off-Topic
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quote:
Originally posted by SKILORD
I never said there should be no taxation, i simply opposed Taxation without representation, Taxation in which only an elite few reap rewards while everyone foots the bill. If you wish to have a government they must offer services for all taxpayers, not just a few. |
I don't know about you, but from where I can see, the rich in the US is over-represented, not under-represented. Let me just point to one example, the DMCA, which was mainly pushed through by RIAA and MPAA. The DMCA clearly violates the spirit of the copyright law, as it erodes fair use. What about the Sonny Bono Act that extended copyright another 20 years, just right when Mickey Mouse was about to fall into public domain? If you don't think the rich has the upperhand, you are not seeing reality.
quote:
Originally posted by SKILORD
I think half the stuff our government offers is totally uneccesarry, governments are designed to provide freedoms and maintin them (and, i will concede) grant those things out of the individual's reach, not to serve the poor, not to do anything other than simply protect rights and help everyone not a select few, every taxpaying citizen. |
So, what are freedoms to you? Is freedom from dying of starvation not a good thing? Do you think keeping the poor relatively healthy by providing socialised medicine not a lofty goal?
OTOH, why do you think of corporate welfare, farm subsidies, and the like?
quote:
Originally posted by SKILORD
As for the CEO's that's sad, but you know what? It's nothing to with me. I don't pay their salaries. I pay the salaries of everyone on welfare. |
Okay, but sometimes the government sees that letting a large corporation go belly up will send shockwaves across the economy, so it is bailed out. For example, the whole Savings and Loans fiasco, why did these companies go kaput, and who ended up footing the bill for saving their skins? You have this strange, skewed view that the rich is being robbed. It's not that simple. The rich end up with more breaks than the poor ever could. I heard that Bill Gates doesn't have to pay income taxes...
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MRT144
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Seattle Washington
Oct 2002
time: 21:26
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quality of life never boards a libertarian's train of thought. sure the poor do benefit from the rich, but they certainly dont live better than the rich because of it.
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SKILORD
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Live free or Die
Mar 2002
time: 05:26
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quote:
quality of life never boards a libertarian's train of thought. sure the poor do benefit from the rich, but they certainly dont live better than the rich because of it. |
Thank you for explaining things for them. No, it never does board my train of thought.
I'm not saying, did not say, that they lived better than the wealthy, only that they don't deserve what they get from this corrupt system.
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A small revelation: I am not a big fan of welfare which doesn't go to the old or the disabled.
*prepares to be exectuted by stoning in the communist thread* |
Good for you! Thank you for the small show of middle ground support.
My point is simply this: The Government, in order to have the Social Equity the rest of you want, has to turn a blind eye to the wealth factor of it all, there cannot be equality and sight. The blind alone can ignore appearances, if you could see and dated ugly chicks that wouldn't make them any less ugly, just torturing yourself and them because you likely don't care much for them, since this example requires you to be shallow, and are only doing it out of some perceived debt.
The metaphor isn't very good, i will admit, but it's simple enough for you to understand what i mean in some crude way.
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21-03-2003 08:40
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