cateyes said:

we could sit here and ponder what would be fair for them to pay like for ever and ever... what would be fair? go back to the system that smith proposed... you know the fucking one that seemed to be working out fine for like for fucking ever!!! i'm not going to get into a debate with you over this... let's just say if your really feel the rich are paying too much already.. then fine, they're  paying too fucking much...

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Quote:

we're a society, we always were, only now we're faced with dismantling a social net when other countries are quickly developing theirs...

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cateyes said:

only now we're faced with dismantling a social net when other countries are quickly developing theirs.

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fireworks_god said:

cateyes said:

it's just getting progressively worse and guys like zappa are freaking out leave me the fuck alone with just cause, because things have deteriorated so badly we need to raise taxes the problem is the rich will not bare their fair share...

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How does one determine what constitutes a fair share? My impression was that the rich were already footing the bill for the vast majority of taxes.

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cateyes said:

imachavel said:

http://www.bayoubuzz.com/buzz/latest-buzz/316341-obama-gets-title-worst-us-president-in-history

why is jimmy carter and Obama in the top worst U.S. presidents but not George Bush. ALL the bail outs were retarded. We did not ever depend on all the companies simply because they were in the s&p 500, some we did really want, some huge companies give the world cars, etc. But this did not mean, that if you were Donald trump, that you deserved to just get a nice hand out, the world was in chaos on the brink, and no one in the world needs the nicest hotels in the world.

from another perspective the biggest businesses provide the most jobs, but for whom? Should wall mart get bailed out? Well maybe. If trump towers got shut down, could people find another hotel to stay in?? YES! and what sucks, the system showed how corrupt it was, people paying for things should be allowed to keep what they have. Even during bail out time structures were being torn down and new ones put up. Even right now I see new mansions being built all around my city. I guess rich people need to keep spending money and poor people need to keep losing it.

Have you noticed? The quality for poor people keeps lowering, and for rich people keeps rising. Not everyone is suffering through this. I know zappa thinks he is robin hood or something, but just because someone owns a business doesn't mean they do shit, it doesn't mean they contribute. Some people own businesses and simply bought out another company, are new owners, hire new managers, and run a decent company into the ground. If I start a 7-11, and run it into the ground, why in the fucking world should I get a bail out? I probably won't? But if I own every 7 11 in the world, then I for sure get a bail out.

hypocrisy much?

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the standard of living has failed the middle class as well as the poor... if you adjust for inflation American middle class are earning less now then ever before... it's just getting progressively worse and guys like zappa are freaking out leave me the fuck alone with just cause, because things have deteriorated so badly we need to raise taxes the problem is the rich will not bare their fair share... Adam Smith is credited with creating the capitalist model... in it he clearly stated there must be a progressive tax rate in order to provide for a growing society but scumbags like Friedman and Greenspan and the rest of that ilk, what a word, ilk... like a fucking bad taste in your mouth!! yeah, their ilk... saying this tax system was long out dated and they have a new model to follow and worship... worship at the alter of the rich man.... like Greenspan said, his reality... his reality has turned out to be quite the fucking nightmare for my country... and i'm using the word my now to drive home how personal i'm taking this... fucking scumbags... and now they want to completely dismantle our government... the only thing they are interested in expanding is our military... fuck every social program...


maybe if there was a real attempt to determine what tax policies and social issues were important to the people instead of letting scumbags who spend 5 hours or more of their working day in office generating money for their next campaign and focused on real issues we'd be better served... yeah, that's the fucking ticket... that's what i think... god i've avoided this forum for this very reason... this gut wrenching feeling i get trying to reason with fearful men who are worried about their pitiful accomplishments in the big picture because when the shit hits the fan they'll be on soup lines too if they haven't covered all of their bases... base on the economists i respect we're in for quite a ride, unlike anything the world has ever seen before... am i being paranoid now? nope... i'm being a fucking realist!

Kensho

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Shill said:

I advocate a great depression for this country

The family needs it, the young ones/middle aged ones need it, the currency needs it.

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please explain why we need this. i know it's coming and i believe it's coming a lot sooner then most are willing to want to come to terms with.

i have one other question too... recently you laid out the policies that occurred from nixon to the invasion of iraq and you wondered why zappa wasn't taking you up on your challenge to debate you or at least make a comment on what you put up there? have you given up on that already? that post can be resurrected you know. all it would take is for zappa to make a post explaining why your full of shit. zappa is smart in the sense he knows when not to say anything, and you not only let him off the hook, you asked me why i have no respect for him, why i'm willing to throw him under the bus. or was that someone else with the bus analogy?

what kind of lesson do you think is going to be learned by a collapse of our economy? i'm assuming it's some kind of lesson because i can't think of any other reason why it would be good for a collapse to occur. there will be no US currency... as a matter of fact you yourself made this prediction, so how is this going to be good for our currency when our currency will no longer exist? when our economy finally collapses we will become an extension of south America while the rest of the world continues to grow and prosper. they'll be the rich, a tiny segment of middle class left if any exists at all and a monstrous poor class. this is the scenario some of the economists envision who i pay heed to.


Kensho

fireworks_god said:

I'm not interested in pondering all day what would be fair; I'm simply interested in understanding exactly how one forms the idea that they aren't paying a fair amount. There clearly must be some sort of standard by which this is being judged, after all, since that is what the adjective refers to. Thinking in terms of fairness requires the clarification as to the standards by which the matter is being judged.

You mention a system by Smith (Adam?) as a good standard. I'm not familiar with it... why does that exemplify fairness?


Actually, some countries are now faced with the necessity of making cuts on social spending that was much more generous than in the United States, possibly because these policies were unsustainable. The truth is that, as a whole, federal spending in the United States is a very serious problem, and it isn't a problem that can be remedied by any amount of taxes levied on the rich anyhow.

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yes, you're correct, adam... what makes future economists correct. why is every aspect of smiths economy other then a progressive tax system ideal? to simply break it down smith saw it was necessary to have a progressive tax in order to prevent a lopsided accumulation of wealth while having revenue to build bridges and damns and schools and so forth. and now all of a sudden it seems to make more sense to do away with the progressive tax system. if we didn't do away with the progressive tax system we wouldn't be in the position we're in now. and you can't argue that progress wouldn't have occurred because everything was fine up until they made the change. the change was made because the wealthy controlled the situation and probably helped form the language of this legislation.

these generous policies are unsustainable because they aren't following the rules set by smith. if you tax wealth you prevent an extraction of currency available to work in the economy. and if you're going to say that the wealthy just wouldn't put their money to work, well if they weren't let off the hook they would have never been given the power to do that. because at that point we would have a thriving middle class and the wealthy would be faced with a decision... either participate and make more money at a controlled rate or sit back and allow others to accumulate more wealth on their own... see, back then then rich didn't have the option to set up sweat shops in Asia, but once they passed these trade laws and paid people to move factories to other area's of the world, they were in the position to change the rules and that they and then some...

so if they/you insist on calling it capitalism, go back to the rules the way they were set up originally...


Kensho

luvdemshrooms said:

cateyes said:

only now we're faced with dismantling a social net when other countries are quickly developing theirs.

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So you haven't been paying attention to what's going on in Europe?

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no you're right, i wasn't ignoring europe, i was pointing to china and all of the rapidly developing asia and india... i realize that things were generous but if we actually followed the rules set up by Adam Smith, and set up social programs that were sustainable from the beginning, which didn't need much more tweaking, there would be funds in place.


Kensho

zappaisgod said:

Ohh poor baby.  The poor and the middle class have more today than ever.  Fearful?  Me?  I don't really give a shit what the rules are.  I win and so will the 1 percenters.  You can't fix a game enough to stop us.  We adapt and conquer.  You can't fix a game enough to make losers winners.  NO matter where it has been tried you cannot stop cream from rising.  Who's fearful?  I think it's you, polishing your participation trophies from Montessori school.  Why are you so sure you will fail, anyway?

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i fucking looooove this!! you can't stop US!!! us as in zappa is really important... aren't you the one that said: "i just want everyone to just leave me the fuck alone!!"? or something along those lines... this isn't fear that the poor were out for what you have? you're/i am riding the coat tails of the wealthy right now so stop with the deluded US already. and the rules are set by power, so they'll never be a level playing field.

Montessori school? born and raised in jersey city... high school in harrison nj and educated at rutgers. made the right moves by following instructions from elders. and i'm not worried about me failing, when the shit hits the fan, i'll have a roof and guns, investments in hard assets and only two stocks, two places to live at in opposite areas of the country and land in the elevations of a state where weather is pretty stable... was i paranoid for making these moves? man my dad saw this shit coming decades ago, so i'm not really worried that i'll fail personally but i'm a realist zappa, there is going to be a mess in the wake of this coming depression and compassion for others aside, what makes you so sure what we've achieved will have any worth? and this coming depression may be something unlike the world has ever seen before. you must have one hell of a an amount of mre's stored, because if you don't, you're going to be growing your own food to eat...

  <---- this is my small army...


Kensho

qman said:

fireworks_god said:

cateyes said:

it's just getting progressively worse and guys like zappa are freaking out leave me the fuck alone with just cause, because things have deteriorated so badly we need to raise taxes the problem is the rich will not bare their fair share...

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How does one determine what constitutes a fair share? My impression was that the rich were already footing the bill for the vast majority of taxes.

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The rich do pay the majority of the taxes, and it is disproportionate, but do people ask why?  It's not because the rich are doing us a favor, it's because they have a disproportionate amount of the wealth.

In a healthy capitalistic economy, tax revenues come from not just the top 5% of the income scale, but from all parts of the working class, today that is not the case.

It's a sad state of affairs when it is so disproportionate, to brag like some do that the rich "carry the load" is not a good thing economically.

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smith proposed a progressive tax system in order to be able to continuously develop a society, but somewhere along the line a new breed of economists thought this was wrong and made recent changes that pretty much leave us where we are today.


Kensho

Quote:

Who's fearful?  I think it's you, polishing your participation trophies from Montessori school.  Why are you so sure you will fail, anyway?

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