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Osama wins., Game over.
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Roark
post Jun 12 2008, 11:03 AM
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oh puhlease. I never heard any 'maybes' or 'possibly' when you stated very clearly that 'lower capital gains taxes increase tax revenue'. You state that like it is a solid fact, well documented, but then when contradictory data is presented... oh well I guess this is up for debate, there are thousands of economists, who knows what the answer is.... (throws hands into the air)

I will restate my honest opinion on that topic for the 100th time, and you can determine whether I've backtracked.

1) Obama wants to increase spending by an asston
2) In the past, capital gains rate cuts have led to increased revenues
3) In the past, capital gains rate increases have led to decreased revenues.
4) Obama wants to raise capital gains taxes to offset his increase in spending
5) Obama refuses to justify the revenue aspect of his proposal, instead banking on the "fairness" of it.
6) You, I, and economists in general don't know what the optimum tax rate is (if we did, we wouldn't be debating this with each new president over the last 3 decades).
7) I am against a capital gains increase for revenue-neutral reasons... I believe they are confiscatory and present a huge disincentive to investment at a time when capital markets are not liquid and we are attempting to right the ship.

Let me put it this way, Zorn. Why would conservatives care about increasing revenues? We want smaller govt. Our approach is concerned more with what the rate does to the capital economy, and as such, we think a hike right now is a very bad idea. The reason I opened that topic was not to say "gogo capital rate cut to increase revenues" but to say that Obama should have a damn good reason for increasing it, and doesn't.

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larky
post Jun 12 2008, 02:20 PM
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Roark why do you think that he is raising it only for fairness? i've read and heard him say that he thinks the market is gonna stabilise and more people will invest. Besides why does every policy have to benefit the economy for you to agree with it? You're critiquing a politician not an economist.

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Orion_Zorn
post Jun 12 2008, 02:23 PM
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I wasn't talking about your point on Obama, i just told bttb the part on capital gains taxes (that they do not increase revenue in the long run) was in that thread.

Real conservatives want to decrease spending. Have you seen any conservative in office over the past 30 years decrease spending? Every Republican president increased the debt and had budget deficits. Has Bush decreased government spending? Did his father? You really think that Republican candidates/presidents/senators etc really want to decrease government spending?

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bridarshy
post Jun 12 2008, 06:30 PM
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It doesn't seem anyone wants to decrease spending. At least nobody who is prominent is Washington politics.

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Hazard
post Jun 12 2008, 09:55 PM
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QUOTE(krags @ Jun 7 2008, 12:16 PM)
I can't speak for other countries, but as one of the gorillas here in the US, duh its a retarded system. But thats only because TSA cares more about PR then actual security. Prime example, this faggotry here.

Hazard, is that you in the glasses modeling the new uniform?  Dam you is sexy...
*



Haw, no.

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KS_Rockstar
post Jun 13 2008, 08:33 AM
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Not that it's not entertaining but you guys are turning this into an, "I'm right and your wrong" debate. Smarter people than us debate this siht until they are blue in the face. Not only does it not get us any where, it actually moves us a step backwards.

I think the only thing we can state for a 'fact' is that none of us are perfect and none of our policy decisions are perfect. Even the things we as a country that are 'right' are not always do for the right reasons.

I don't think Bush got up one morning and said, "fcuk it, I'm going to kill some innocent children!" but I also think you would be a fool not to recognize that US foreign policy has been directly responsible for innocent civilian deaths (both foreign and domestic) and that it as least a fair argument that we could have done things differently and prevented many of those deaths.

But let’s forget about the peas and focus on the meat. What can we do to improve our (the collective our) situation. What can we do as a country and as an individual? Surely we can accomplish more by putting our minds together and focusing on the solutions to the world’s problems.

Argue all you want about tax policy but when a dude can’t get through airport security because he has a Transformers shirt on we have bigger fish to fry.


Rockstar’s 2 cents….. (I’m going to have to change that to 4 cents to account for the higher price of gas.)

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Orion_Zorn
post Jun 13 2008, 10:12 AM
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Hmm. Well rockstar I would say that the reason I bring up things like the 500K dead iraqi children is because if people don't know about things like this, we can't make this a better world. See what I mean?

The US has put dictators in power in the past, they have allowed children to die by the hundreds of thousands, all for political reasons. As long as people don't know this stuff goes on, the people in the US will be more concerned about transformer t-shirts, Obama fist jabs, whether or not Hawaii might secede from the US, etc.

You say 'lets figure out how to improve out collective situation'. I say 'lets all admit how poopiety our politicians are, start holding them and the media accountable, so that we can make smart decisions - to improve our collective situation.' The 'meat' is that since people here in the US don't know half of the bad things the US government has done, they won't ever demand real change. Not Obama's type of change, real change. Just as that book said that you recommended here months ago. People do not know the real history of the US, so they go on with their lives thinking we are a benevolent government out to really help other countries.

ANd most importantly, *because of this* when something happens like... a guy not being let on a plane for having a shirt with a gun on it, they don't see it as just another move toward Totalitarianism or Fascism, and get scared knowing all the horrible crap our government has done in the past, they see it as a minor glitch in the system, nothing more. "everything is fine here, move along, move along."

Anyway, just trying to say, I bring this stuff up to make people look at information they might normally be exposed to. If they can prove me wrong, fine, but at least look at the information.

This post has been edited by VnX_Zorn: Jun 13 2008, 10:14 AM

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KS_Rockstar
post Jun 13 2008, 05:20 PM
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Right and I dig your position. I'm just saying, there is a productive way and a (less productive) way to go about things. You and Rork and BtTb seem to be focusing on the things you disagree on and not the facts. As both of you stated, for every economist that can swear up and down that it's, "xyz" there are ten others that will swear its "zyx".

@....Bad to The Bone....... Our country is great. I'm proud to be an American and I think (and I've traveled quite a bit) that we do things better here than pretty much most of the other places on the planet. That being said, I'm skeptical of the motives of our politicians (red and blue) and I'm critical of some of their decisions (particularly the ones we have made over the last few years). Our country was founded on that type of criticism and skepticism, it's why we have 3 branches of government, checks and balances........ And oh yea, the media (who I also think have sold out like 3 dollar wohres). Some of the old school reporters (Dan Rather comes to mind) out right say that the media is no longer controlled by the reporters, it's controlled by the sponsors. Right wrong or indifferent, that is pretty much the way it is.

Now, you could argue that (Zorn for example) goes over the top in reporting the dirt. Well maybe that's true. But realize that sombody does need to point out big foot, the loc ness monster, area 51, et. Because (in the example I just gave) on of the stories is actually true.

Back to my original comment about being open minded, think, "ok, why is this guy saying we killed 500k babies?". There are a lot of people that will say the same thing. Again, I don't think we got up one morning and said, "let’s kill some babies" but I do think some of our decisions have led to deaths that could have and should have been prevented. Now, did we maliciously and intentionally kill innocents, probably not but there should at least be some review of how things have gone down if for no other reason than to prevent them from happening again.

I'm of the opinion that if we really had our siht together, we could take Sadam out of the picture, encourage democracy or some form of stable government in the middle east, catch Osama bin Laden, mend the fences between Pakistan and Afghanistan, keep Israel from going postal on the rest of the middle east and do all of this without killing innocent people. Heck, I think we could even keep the price of gas below 2 bucks a gallon.

But we spend so much (basically all) of our collective political and individual energy fighting each other and trying to prove one is wrong and the other is right and basically covering our asses, that real progress gets pushed aside to make space for 'winning'. We loose sight of the better goals.

Imagine what good we could do if the money spent campaigning just on the 2008 election went to say cancer research or ending drought in Afghanistan.

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sKiLLfrEE
post Jun 14 2008, 02:16 PM
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QUOTE(KS_Rockstar @ Jun 13 2008, 10:20 PM)
I'm of the opinion that if we really had our siht together, we could take Sadam out of the picture, encourage democracy or some form of stable government in the middle east, catch Osama bin Laden, mend the fences between Pakistan and Afghanistan, keep Israel from going postal on the rest of the middle east and do all of this without killing innocent people.  Heck, I think we could even keep the price of gas below 2 bucks a gallon. 




My opinion is that the US shouldnt try to reach those goals single-handedly....because they would fail like they did with almost all their foreign affairs during the last decades.

We need to act in concert if we want a worldwide sustainable change. Of course this doesnt only require the US to get rid of their self-centered picture of the world. It also requires a strong and fair world organisation (not like the current United Nation piece of poopie), based on democracy and equality which really has the power and legitimation (latter in opposite to the US) to be the "world police".

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Orion_Zorn
post Jun 14 2008, 11:39 PM
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the point of the 500K iraqi children is that Clinton's Sec of State said 'it was worth it' - on 60 minutes even.

Also the link i provided notes two of the UN inspectors quit during that time, one of them calling it 'genocide'.

I am not just making this stuff up, or looking at 500K dead iraqi children and just arbitrarily making the decision that the US did it knowingly - the UN inspectors in Iraq quit. how often do you think that happens? This is what they do. I have also read 4 different times that Hussein's food program during that time was stellar. not that he cared, he wanted the people's support, so he kept them fed. BTTB's claim that he just ignored his people and bought weapons is just him pulling poopie out of his ass.

Anyway, I am not just looking at the single fact that 500K iraqi children died and saying 'the US did it on purpose!' Do some reading about it. the only source that says we didn't do it knowingly is the US media - if they even covered it.

I am just trying to say I am not looking at things pessimistically. The facts are there.

imo the US does not care to be the world police. It's all about profit.

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KS_Rockstar
post Jun 14 2008, 11:39 PM
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I agree 100%..... By saying, "If we really had our siht together", I mean just that.



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