Indiana Dems go AWOL

[compshmoe]

Beyond what Maddow did or didn't say and how it has been parsed is the debate about whether unions in the public sector are good or bad.
I think they are bad for state budgets and taxpayers and are slothful and gluttonous as pictures of all the fat @ssed demonstrators show while you think they are good because of your utopian opinion of what is fair.
Why is it fair to take money from the earners and give it to the loafers.
CEO pay may seem outrageous but with a few exeptions is mostly based on a successful business model.
There are only so many good leaders who have what it takes.
We pay our sports superstars and hollywood celebrities even more money than CEO's because it makes money and since you like mixing metaphors....where's the outrage about that.

WE don't pay our sports superstars, the patrons of the team gladly give up their money for support which in turn pays the millions a year to the players, BUT what you forget is, like Chris Rock said ... there is RICH and there is WEALTH, Shaq is rich, but the man that signs his check is the wealth.

What really kills me is, as John Stewart pointed out last night, the same people that argued for CEO's to get their millions and billions in bonuses right after the bottom fell out of the economy, and how taking money away from CEO's the industry would lose " the brightest and the best CEO's" ( like they weren't the ones that got us into this mess in the first place) AND state or federal govt should never get involved in the way employees are paid, are now fighting to get rid of ALL unions, not just public ones. And you say there's no class warfare.

IT all boils down to this::::: IF the elected officials are doing the people's bussiness and are there to VOICE the people's need WHY are they ignoring EVERY single pole that says the people by MAJORITY want to leave unions alone, AND the people don't want their services cut AND what they want is to increase taxes on the rich, get rid of Bush era tax cuts, get rid of corporate tax breaks, and increase estate tax.....WHY do they choose to ignore that for the 1st time in many moons these aren't only one party or the other these polls show REP and DEM by a majority over 65% want this.
http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2010/pollcenter/
http://abcnews.go.com/PollingUnit/

 

[shagdrum]

... there is RICH and there is WEALTH, Shaq is rich, but the man that signs his check is the wealth.

I WISH I was rich...

Do you have ANY idea where wealth comes from? Do you know how it is created?

What really kills me is, as John Stewart pointed out last night, the same people that argued for CEO's to get their millions and billions in bonuses right after the bottom fell out of the economy

Funny thing is, no one actually argued that. They argued that the free market should be left to it's own devices to determine what works.

As usual, Stewart is creating a characterize of free market thinking to mislead. If Stewart is actually a source of information for you (which is not surprising) then this truly is a waste of time...

 

[shagdrum]

IT all boils down to this::::: IF the elected officials are doing the people's bussiness and are there to VOICE the people's need WHY are they ignoring EVERY single pole that says the people by MAJORITY want to leave unions alone

That is not what the polls say. In fact, this issue has pretty well become impossible to poll on because it is so highly politically charged. Most any question about it is unavoidably biased.

Word of advise; check the actually sampling in the polls you cite. More often then not the sampling itself is highly biased making the poll utterly worthless.

Rasumssen is a reliable polling company, but most any poll by a news organization is utterly worthless because the sampling is almost always biased.

 

[04SCTLS]

The majority of voters voted in the Republicans and their platform.
Here in NY even democrat Mario Cuomo who was elected is taking an axe to spending on education to get the 10 billion deficit under control to the howls of special interest groups.
This is what the voters elected him for.

Besides the quality of the polling and the bias of the questions the majority of those polled includes the 50% of people who didn't vote. Since they were too lazy to vote their opinion does not count and they are not entitled to complain.

The politicians listen to voters.
Those who didn't vote should sit down and shut up.
If the voters don't like the results of Walker's policies they are free to vote him out and elect someone who will restore government worker privileges if that is what they want.
Democracy in action.
Elections have consequences and Walker has a mandate from the voters.

 

[shagdrum]

If the voters don't like the results of Walker's policies they are free to vote him out and elect someone who will restore government worker privileges if that is what they want.
Democracy in action.
Elections have consequences and Walker has a mandate from the voters.

:I

Something is wrong here. I keep agreeing with you in this thread, '04.

 

[04SCTLS]

You realize of course that many private sector unions have huge pension liabilities they carelessly dug themselves into and with their dwindling membership need to recruit new members to keep paying old ones their pensions and benefits.
It looks like Card Check will never come to pass so without new members unions will have to file for bankruptcy or some kind of protection from their own members.

 

[04SCTLS]

:I

Something is wrong here. I keep agreeing with you in this thread, '04.

Well shag you pegged me as a Goldwater Conservative.
Remember I like to argue sometimes just for sport and to sharpen up my rhetorical skills which agruing with you and foss for the last 3 1/2 years before he left has done.
Didn't you ever do the argue the other side assignment as an exersize?

Other than keeping religion and moral conservatives out of the republican party we could be twin sons of different mothers about unions



As a private businessman in the group that pays almost all the taxes to fund the government
I have to compete and risk and fight to keep my earned millions almost every day.
I'm one of the good CEOs and only earn 80 times the avg worker wage not the 3-400 of the worst examples.
Even I don't sometimes know how the business model justifies the 3-400 times number.
All that income money I earn gets plowed back in to the company other than the relatively modest 60-100k money I live on ( I have no personal debt or mortgage and can live off my assets) for this kind of income so I'm able to self finance expansion and inventory.
My bank will happily lend me a million dollars if I want it because I don't need it and am low risk and a good bet.They love and admire me as a successful manufacturer right here in the USA.
My old boy banker(who looks like Dick Cheney ) said to me it is such a pleasure visiting a thriving expanding american manufacturing company.
For us it's morning in America.
It fills him with pride
We provide a good work environment and pay production workers on piece work a wage that well exceeds anything they could negotiate in a union.
They work 6 hours straight then go home (30 hr work week for full weeks pay) so we can run 4 shifts a day when busy.
These workers would not want to give the hourly paid material handlers more money if there was a negotiation as they would have to take a pay cut and 30 hr work weeks are sweet.
They are getting paid for their abilities in the purest form.
Produce more get paid more immediately.
A union would never agree to piece work as it is akin to merit pay where the better workers earn more and seniority doesn't count for more money.
They don't want workers competing with other workers.
Conversely our piece workers would not want to give up some of their better earnings to the lower paid material handlers.
(We're training them to be conservatives )
If we hire a new production worker he either takes to these methods and does well almost right away or leaves after 1 or 2 days because monotonous repetitive physical work loading and running a machine does not suit him.
A new guy who's a star can immediately make more money than an ok guy who's been around 5 years or longer
Some of our electrician maintainance workers had worked in a union environment before and did not like the ethic of only working so fast, covering for the slackers so they could slack off on another day and paying dues.
Our supervisors are trained at our attorney firm sponsored seminars how to take measures to prevent unions by fairly treating employees equally on the work floor to nip anything in the bud that may cause trouble.
Somebody once trespassed and dumped union cards in the lunch room but our own workers brought it to our attention and quickly disposed of them.
Our workers are also divided into whites, hispanics and blacks spread over the shifts who naturally don't associate much with each other due to cultural differences.
So we're pretty well secure using equal opportunity to our advantage by not discriminating and hiring minorities but seredipitiously dividing our workers by default.
Priceless.
The UAW is taking another kick at the can again this year to try and unionize a southern foreign car plant.
If they fail again like they have for 20 years they won't get the new members they need to fund their retirees by dunning them with dues.
Businesses have figured out how to keep their workers happy enough not to want to go and form a union.
Those union dues are a huge chunk of money over the year.
Workers would rather have the dues money if they are otherwise not unhappy.
The private sector unions were a nessesary development of the industrial revolution but were too successful for their own good by carrying things too far only thinking of themselves which has led business to adopt practices that co opt them and make them obsolete in the contemporary business environment.
The workers do not want to pay the union a commision for what they already have.
They have been cut out in a commisiondectomy.

 

[compshmoe]

I WISH I was rich...

Do you have ANY idea where wealth comes from? Do you know how it is created?



Funny thing is, no one actually argued that. They argued that the free market should be left to it's own devices to determine what works.

As usual, Stewart is creating a characterize of free market thinking to mislead. If Stewart is actually a source of information for you (which is not surprising) then this truly is a waste of time...

As I've said before, I watch ALL news, not just what makes me feel better, the tape doesn't lie, the words come out of their mouth and later contradict themselves as if tape never existed, if everyone would watch or read opposite views, we would see BOTH sides of an argument, not just keep arguing the same spoon fed talking point without understanding the cause, THEREFORE I don't waste my time disecting word for word your one view answers when, if you look at each of my replies I only argue the one point, the haves -VS- the have nots. After all, isn't that what Jesus would do? I see republicans are the chosen christians, so Jesus would take away from the poor and give to the rich right? I remember reading Jesus saying give to Caesar what is Caesars, i didn't see anything about bending over and taking it with a smile too.

Wealth used to come from hard work, but since the 80's the rules were changed where now there's pad locks on those doors and wealth is separated; the American dream is now tied on a stick and rope dangling infront of your face so you can continue to make someone else rich, while at the same time losing a little more each time.

But, the good news is history repeats itself, just as in Roman times we see nowadays people are getting fed up and the rich are losing their asses , when it gets here, I'll have the popcorn ready. I see it as Karma, the same hippies that fought in the 60's for what was right, are the same ones that now wanna screw everyone else, they went from weed to fiber and LSD to EKG's so before they're completely gone (soon) karma will bend them over once or twice; with your views? start practicing.

 

[04SCTLS]

As I've said before, I watch ALL news, not just what makes me feel better, the tape doesn't lie, the words come out of their mouth and later contradict themselves as if tape never existed, if everyone would watch or read opposite views, we would see BOTH sides of an argument, not just keep arguing the same spoon fed talking point without understanding the cause, THEREFORE I don't waste my time disecting word for word your one view answers when, if you look at each of my replies I only argue the one point, the haves -VS- the have nots. After all, isn't that what Jesus would do? I see republicans are the chosen christians, so Jesus would take away from the poor and give to the rich right? I remember reading Jesus saying give to Caesar what is Caesars, i didn't see anything about bending over and taking it with a smile too.

Wealth used to come from hard work, but since the 80's the rules were changed where now there's pad locks on those doors and wealth is separated; the American dream is now tied on a stick and rope dangling infront of your face so you can continue to make someone else rich, while at the same time losing a little more each time.

But, the good news is history repeats itself, just as in Roman times we see nowadays people are getting fed up and the rich are losing their asses , when it gets here, I'll have the popcorn ready. I see it as Karma, the same hippies that fought in the 60's for what was right, are the same ones that now wanna screw everyone else, they went from weed to fiber and LSD to EKG's so before they're completely gone (soon) karma will bend them over once or twice; with your views? start practicing.

The hippies grew up from partying and became cynical about trying to change the facts of life when it comes to the rich making money off the poor which is the general human history going all the way back in time.
Dropping Acid may lead to an epiphamy of revelations that suggest setting up a leftist paradise and everyone was doing it on campuses on the advice of Timothy Leary but after the drugs wear off one still has to deal with sober human nature of people not experienced of psychedelics.
Also you're lumping in the minority of scoundrels along with the hardworking junior millionaire manufacturers contractors and suppliers of services.
The rich are not just the monolithic multinational corporations that have greater revenues than some countries and are players and powers of their own.
Ultimately this is all a symptom of the decline of the wealth of our country that has been masked by the huge defecits that started with Reagan when he taught americans that defecits don't matter.

 

[compshmoe]

Well shag you pegged me as a Goldwater Conservative.
Remember I like to argue sometimes just for sport and to sharpen up my rhetorical skills which agruing with you and foss for the last 3 1/2 years before he left has done.
Didn't you ever do the argue the other side assignment as an exersize?

Other than keeping religion and moral conservatives out of the republican party we could be twin sons of different mothers about unions



As a private businessman in the group that pays almost all the taxes to fund the government
I have to compete and risk and fight to keep my earned millions almost every day.
I'm one of the good CEOs and only earn 80 times the avg worker wage not the 3-400 of the worst examples.
Even I don't sometimes know how the business model justifies the 3-400 times number.
All that income money I earn gets plowed back in to the company other than the relatively modest 60-100k money I live on ( I have no personal debt or mortgage and can live off my assets) for this kind of income so I'm able to self finance expansion and inventory.
My bank will happily lend me a million dollars if I want it because I don't need it and am low risk and a good bet.They love and admire me as a successful manufacturer right here in the USA.
My old boy banker(who looks like Dick Cheney ) said to me it is such a pleasure visiting a thriving expanding american manufacturing company.
For us it's morning in America.
It fills him with pride
We provide a good work environment and pay production workers on piece work a wage that well exceeds anything they could negotiate in a union.
They work 6 hours straight then go home (30 hr work week for full weeks pay) so we can run 4 shifts a day when busy.
These workers would not want to give the hourly paid material handlers more money if there was a negotiation as they would have to take a pay cut and 30 hr work weeks are sweet.
They are getting paid for their abilities in the purest form.
Produce more get paid more immediately.
A union would never agree to piece work as it is akin to merit pay where the better workers earn more and seniority doesn't count for more money.
They don't want workers competing with other workers.
Conversely our piece workers would not want to give up some of their better earnings to the lower paid material handlers.
(We're training them to be conservatives )
If we hire a new production worker he either takes to these methods and does well almost right away or leaves after 1 or 2 days because monotonous repetitive physical work loading and running a machine does not suit him.
A new guy who's a star can immediately make more money than an ok guy who's been around 5 years or longer
Some of our electrician maintainance workers had worked in a union environment before and did not like the ethic of only working so fast, covering for the slackers so they could slack off on another day and paying dues.
Our supervisors are trained at our attorney firm sponsored seminars how to take measures to prevent unions by fairly treating employees equally on the work floor to nip anything in the bud that may cause trouble.
Somebody once trespassed and dumped union cards in the lunch room but our own workers brought it to our attention and quickly disposed of them.
Our workers are also divided into whites, hispanics and blacks spread over the shifts who naturally don't associate much with each other due to cultural differences.
So we're pretty well secure using equal opportunity to our advantage by not discriminating and hiring minorities but seredipitiously dividing our workers by default.
Priceless.
The UAW is taking another kick at the can again this year to try and unionize a southern foreign car plant.
If they fail again like they have for 20 years they won't get the new members they need to fund their retirees by dunning them with dues.
Businesses have figured out how to keep their workers happy enough not to want to go and form a union.
Those union dues are a huge chunk of money over the year.
Workers would rather have the dues money if they are otherwise not unhappy.
The private sector unions were a nessesary development of the industrial revolution but were too successful for their own good by carrying things too far only thinking of themselves which has led business to adopt practices that co opt them and make them obsolete in the contemporary business environment.
The workers do not want to pay the union a commision for what they already have.
They have been cut out in a commisiondectomy.

See?? here we are arguing a point with one another and as it turns out, you are the perfect model. Your workers aren't getting screwed, so therefore they find no need to get into a union, NOW you take a case, where you work for a company that reports at least $5.5 million in profits every qtr, the CEO gets $1 million as a bonus , but then asks it's workforce to take a pay cut or else, to cover the other guy's duty that was laid off with a reduction in your pay or else, when said company puts a freeze on raises since 2009 and then gives you the choice of pay cut or else, when they take a lower coverage insurance and make you pay more for it or else, closes down 75 stores that sold chinese sheet rock, fires more than 12,000 hardworking employees ONLY because he fears he's gonna get sued:::thats the worker that wants to join a union, power in numbers, and you wont get fired for being the only one to speak up.When I spoke of rich, I should've said Wealth, the $350 billion and above, the ones that get $3 million as a bonus for their money to burn pile. SO who are we to take the rights of anyone from forming a union and taking the lesser evil? After all,being in a union is not forced on anyone, so the ones that join do so on their own free will, its the same as saying only people with $1 million and above income can have full coverage insurance on house and home, all others, we'll tell you what you can and can't have.

 

[compshmoe]

The hippies grew up from partying and became cynical about trying to change the facts of life when it comes to the rich making money off the poor which is the general human history going all the way back in time.
Dropping Acid may lead to an epiphamy of revelations that suggest setting up a leftist paradise and everyone was doing it on campuses on the advice of Timothy Leary but after the drugs wear off one still has to deal with sober human nature of people not experienced of psychedelics.
Also you're lumping in the minority of scoundrels along with the hardworking junior millionaire manufacturers contractors and suppliers of services.
The rich are not just the monolithic multinational corporations that have greater revenues than some countries and are players and powers of their own.
Ultimately this is all a symptom of the decline of the wealth of our country that has been masked by the huge defecits that started with Reagan when he taught americans that defecits don't matter.

Well we find a talking point in which we both agree on the decline of the wealth of our country , except it's not a decline, a decline would suggest that we at one time had it and have slowly lost it, no, it's a mass hoarding by a few and rewritting the rules so the few can build a higher wall. As i said earlier, 70% of americans want to raise taxes on the upper 2%, they want to do away with the Bush era tax cuts as a failed policy, they want to get rid of corporation tax breaks, and they want to raise the estate tax, that's 70% including left right and center!!! as far as the leftist paradise bit, I disagree, the only paradise there is, would be as in what Alvin lee from 10 years after wrote in a song, tax the rich, feed the poor, till there are no rich no more; Like a utopia on star trek once the riches are gone, so is the greed and the trampling of the poor, and the need for elders to have to greet people at walmart even after they become mummies. No , it's never going to happen, but level the field a bit, everyone pay their fair share, and everyone take a hit, don't have anyone above the realm of paying taxes or paying less than the person making 300% less.

 

[compshmoe]

THIS was an interesting read for left, right and center. scroll down to the "When words lose their meaning ....." section http://arizona.typepad.com/#

 

[shagdrum]

It always amazes me how the most ignorant and passionate people in political discourse always brag about how much news they consume and that they consume it from "both" sides (though their arguments are almost always mindlessly leftist).

As I've said before, I watch ALL news...

if everyone would watch or read opposite views, we would see BOTH sides of an argument, not just keep arguing the same spoon fed talking point without understanding the cause

The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but newspapers.
–Thomas Jefferson​

If you only consume news then you simply allow yourself to be a useful idiot for whatever political agenda dominates the news.

News outlets function in a fast paced environment where the focus is on the immediate stories of the day. The competitive nature of the industry necessitates self-promotion, sensationalism and moving quickly to new stories. Critical analysis of not only the stories but of the interpretations of the stories is almost never seriously attempted.

Instead, the worldviews that dictate those interpretations are taken for granted and all we get is rhetoric aimed at promoting a certain narrative favorable to one side of the aisle. The premises behind that viewpoint and the theories of social causation are ignored if not intentionally hidden. The focus is more on perpetuating one viewpoint and delegitimizing all others.

This is how we get these false caricatures of political points of view (which is what you are functioning under).

The actual viewpoints involved are hidden in favor of emotionally appealing rhetoric that keeps people ignorant of the truth and allows the media to do the thinking for their audience.

This is how we get a focus on, "the have's vs. the have-not's" which completely ignores reality in favor of emotionally gratifying narrative that gives one a false sense of moral superiority.

We also get comments like this...

Wealth used to come from hard work, but since the 80's the rules were changed where now there's pad locks on those doors and wealth is separated

If wealth had stopped being created in the 1980's, the world would be a much different place then it is today. We would have had a bottomless depression and anarchy. Instead we had huge economic booms (proving that wealth is in fact being created).

But it is easier to buy into the simplistic anti-capitalist narrative of villain ("the rich") and hero (egalitarian minded politicians). Never mind the fact that you are being lead around by the nose through manipulative rhetoric.

Without a foundation in political thought as a reference point, it is impossible to accurately cut through rhetoric and get to the truth. You only end up enabling the media to do your thinking for you.

My recommendation is to pick up a book and start reading. Get some basic understanding of economic and an accurate understanding of the different ideological points of view (not the caricatures promoted in the media).

Also, get away from Jon Stewart as a news source. HE has even said he is not a credible news source. As a satirist he distorts the truth on a nightly basis. Typically it is setting up a false caricature of a conservative or of conservative thought and mocking it for being absurd. It is a very effective comedic technique because it misleads.

 

[04SCTLS]

See?? here we are arguing a point with one another and as it turns out, you are the perfect model. Your workers aren't getting screwed, so therefore they find no need to get into a union, NOW you take a case, where you work for a company that reports at least $5.5 million in profits every qtr, the CEO gets $1 million as a bonus , but then asks it's workforce to take a pay cut or else, to cover the other guy's duty that was laid off with a reduction in your pay or else, when said company puts a freeze on raises since 2009 and then gives you the choice of pay cut or else, when they take a lower coverage insurance and make you pay more for it or else, closes down 75 stores that sold chinese sheet rock, fires more than 12,000 hardworking employees ONLY because he fears he's gonna get sued:::thats the worker that wants to join a union, power in numbers, and you wont get fired for being the only one to speak up.When I spoke of rich, I should've said Wealth, the $350 billion and above, the ones that get $3 million as a bonus for their money to burn pile. SO who are we to take the rights of anyone from forming a union and taking the lesser evil? After all,being in a union is not forced on anyone, so the ones that join do so on their own free will, its the same as saying only people with $1 million and above income can have full coverage insurance on house and home, all others, we'll tell you what you can and can't have.

Your all over the place painting a composite image of the bad guy.
Are you describing some personal experience with an employer?
You could at least name some scoundrels and link to their scoundrelness.
Being in a union can be forced upon workers.
Card Check would have allowed unions to intimidate workers to join a union by eliminating the secret ballot, a cornerstone of democracy.
The private sector unions are desperate to get new members for their ponzi scheme obligations.

 

[compshmoe]

"I am more and more convinced that man is a dangerous creature; and that power, whether vested in many or a few, is ever grasping, and, like the grave, cries, "Give, give!" The great fish swallow up the small; and he who is most strenuous for the rights of the people, when vested with power, is as eager after the prerogatives of government. You tell me of degrees of perfection to which human nature is capable of arriving, and I believe it, but at the same time lament that our admiration should arise from the scarcity of the instances"
.
Abigail Adams (1744–1818), U.S. matriarch; wife and mother of United States President. Familiar Letters of John Adams and His Wife Abigail Adams, During the Revolution, letter dated November 27, 1775 (1875).

In a letter to her husband John Adams, who was away fighting in the American colonies' revolution against Britain.

 

[compshmoe]

"These are times in which a genius would wish to live. It is not in the still calm of life, or in the repose of a pacific station, that great characters are formed. The habits of a vigorous mind are formed in contending with difficulties. Great necessities call out great virtues. When a mind is raised, and animated by the scenes that engage the heart, then those qualities which would otherwise lay dormant, wake into life and form the character of the hero and the statesman."
"If we do not lay out ourselves in the service of mankind whom should we serve?"

Letter to John Quincy Adams (19 January 1780)

 

[04SCTLS]

"I am more and more convinced that man is a dangerous creature; and that power, whether vested in many or a few, is ever grasping, and, like the grave, cries, "Give, give!" The great fish swallow up the small; and he who is most strenuous for the rights of the people, when vested with power, is as eager after the prerogatives of government. You tell me of degrees of perfection to which human nature is capable of arriving, and I believe it, but at the same time lament that our admiration should arise from the scarcity of the instances"
.
Abigail Adams (1744–1818), U.S. matriarch; wife and mother of United States President. Familiar Letters of John Adams and His Wife Abigail Adams, During the Revolution, letter dated November 27, 1775 (1875).

In a letter to her husband John Adams, who was away fighting in the American colonies' revolution against Britain.

Like I said the facts of life can be hard to accept but you should try to figure out how to use them to your advantage in your life instead of lamenting about unfairness for the untalented and unlucky.
There's a warlike streak in us and its appropriate she sent her letter of despair and observation of the human condition to a warzone where men become heroes and get medals from the government for commiting what in other circumstances is called murder.
As a species we celebrate noble homicide.

 

[04SCTLS]

Well we find a talking point in which we both agree on the decline of the wealth of our country , except it's not a decline, a decline would suggest that we at one time had it and have slowly lost it, no, it's a mass hoarding by a few and rewritting the rules so the few can build a higher wall. As i said earlier, 70% of americans want to raise taxes on the upper 2%, they want to do away with the Bush era tax cuts as a failed policy, they want to get rid of corporation tax breaks, and they want to raise the estate tax, that's 70% including left right and center!!! as far as the leftist paradise bit, I disagree, the only paradise there is, would be as in what Alvin lee from 10 years after wrote in a song, tax the rich, feed the poor, till there are no rich no more; Like a utopia on star trek once the riches are gone, so is the greed and the trampling of the poor, and the need for elders to have to greet people at walmart even after they become mummies. No , it's never going to happen, but level the field a bit, everyone pay their fair share, and everyone take a hit, don't have anyone above the realm of paying taxes or paying less than the person making 300% less.

George Bernard Shaw once said the underclass has no business being alive (because they subtract from society)but I'm not as harsh.
I'm talking about the top 1% and you're dragging it down to the top 2.
The US has one of the highest corporate tax rates at 35%.
Most other developed countries are around 28% and lower.
This is one reason corporations that are able to shuffle their money around
to minimize their tax exposure.
The high corporate rate is why there are so many S corporations where the profits are regarded as personal income of the owners and taxed only once.
I'm already paying 45% tax rate with the bush tax cuts and NY 9% taxes.
My rate would go up to 50% if they were not renewed but I've already made plans to restructure my company in such a way that would neutralize that.
If I do the restructuring and pay the corporate rate on profits I leave in the company anyways I could pay myself a dollar a year and avoid paying any SS Medicare and state and federal taxes and live on the millions taxes have already been paid on for at least the next 10 years.
I can also put some of my money into projects that are regarded as capital gains and taxed at only 15%.
When the tax rate was 90% nobody paid that rate since people with money can and do hire accountants and attorneys who are smarter than the government bunch.
I already have a plan for me if my taxes go up.
Since 2012 will be an election year it is almost impossible to run on a tax increase I predict the Bush tax cuts will be extended again when the time comes.

 

[04SCTLS]

"These are times in which a genius would wish to live. It is not in the still calm of life, or in the repose of a pacific station, that great characters are formed. The habits of a vigorous mind are formed in contending with difficulties. Great necessities call out great virtues. When a mind is raised, and animated by the scenes that engage the heart, then those qualities which would otherwise lay dormant, wake into life and form the character of the hero and the statesman."
"If we do not lay out ourselves in the service of mankind whom should we serve?"

Letter to John Quincy Adams (19 January 1780)

The real national religion of the US is the worship and serving of the Almighty Dollar

 

[shagdrum]

"I am more and more convinced that man is a dangerous creature; and that power, whether vested in many or a few, is ever grasping, and, like the grave, cries, "Give, give!" The great fish swallow up the small; and he who is most strenuous for the rights of the people, when vested with power, is as eager after the prerogatives of government. You tell me of degrees of perfection to which human nature is capable of arriving, and I believe it, but at the same time lament that our admiration should arise from the scarcity of the instances"
.
Abigail Adams (1744–1818), U.S. matriarch; wife and mother of United States President. Familiar Letters of John Adams and His Wife Abigail Adams, During the Revolution, letter dated November 27, 1775 (1875).

In a letter to her husband John Adams, who was away fighting in the American colonies' revolution against Britain.

Do you realize how this statement fundamentally undercuts the views you have been espousing here?

"These are times in which a genius would wish to live. It is not in the still calm of life, or in the repose of a pacific station, that great characters are formed. The habits of a vigorous mind are formed in contending with difficulties. Great necessities call out great virtues. When a mind is raised, and animated by the scenes that engage the heart, then those qualities which would otherwise lay dormant, wake into life and form the character of the hero and the statesman."

"If we do not lay out ourselves in the service of mankind whom should we serve?"

Letter to John Quincy Adams (19 January 1780)

[I separated them for you; the first quote was in a Letter to John Adams (27 November 1775), and the second was in a Letter to John Thaxter (29 September 1778)]

???
What are you trying to say with these two SEPARATE quotes?

If you want to get into a back and forth on the thinking of the Framers, feel free. It's been a while since I read through the Federalist Papers.

However, I will warn you that is a losing battle for you because the Framers were strongly against the big government ideas that you are promoting here and most were very well read in the political thought of the day. Trying to cite them as justification for your ignorance will only further discredit you...

 

[shagdrum]

Well we find a talking point in which we both agree on the decline of the wealth of our country , except it's not a decline, a decline would suggest that we at one time had it and have slowly lost it, no, it's a mass hoarding by a few and rewritting the rules so the few can build a higher wall.

Again, do you not see how this view is built on the zero sum fallacy?!

Since you clearly did not look at the links I gave you, here is the rundown...

In economics, the lump of labour fallacy (or lump of jobs fallacy) is the contention that the amount of work available to labourers is fixed. It is considered a fallacy by most economists, who hold that the amount of work is not static. Another way to describe the fallacy is that it treats a quantity as if it were an exogenous variable, when it is not. It may also be called the fallacy of labour scarcity, or the zero-sum fallacy...

One of the worst ideas that affect public policy around the world is that wealth is somehow zero sum – that it can be stolen or taken or moved or looted but not created.

A zero-sum fallacy is a logical error committed by assuming that some quantity is constant when it is not.​

Your entire argument is premised on the notion that the pie is a fixed quantity and the rich have an unfair share of that pie. This is a notion that completely ignores reality. It have been thoroughly discredited and dis-proven long before your parents were born yet you keep assuming it.

The truth is that capitalism is the ONLY economic system that actually creates wealth and because of that the "pie" is NOT a fixed quantity, but is constantly growing. To try and redistribute the pieces of that "pie" in a more "equitable" fashion only inhibits the market systems that create wealth and leads to austerity.

It is BECAUSE of the innovativeness and investment of entrepreneurs like 04SCTLS that wealth is created in the market, not in spite of them.

 

[04SCTLS]

If you have to borrow to maintain your lifestyle then you're not as rich as you used to be.
This is what has happened in the last 25 years.
We've been running huge deficits since Reagan borrowed against the future.
We may be richer but it's because we've borrowed the money to have those riches.

we also import 40-50% of our oil which also drains our wealth over the 25 years while allowing us our lifestyle.

 

[shagdrum]

If you have to borrow to maintain your lifestyle then you're not as rich as you used to be.

The ultimate result of the flawed assumptions our governmental institutions are built around.

Savings are not important and can even be a drag on the economy. What matters is government "investment" and reducing the interest rate to zero.

Look where that got us.

And then we were foolish enough to elect a Keynesian to the presidency in 2008!!

 

[04SCTLS]

Well at least he's not a Kenyan though he is Keynesian

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703559604576175881248268272.html

In his best-selling history of the 20th century, "Modern Times," British historian Paul Johnson describes "a significant turning-point in American history: the first time the Great Republic, the richest nation on earth, came up against the limits of its financial resources." Until the 1960s, he writes in a chapter titled "America's Suicide Attempt," public finance was run in all essentials on conventional lines"—that is to say, with budgets more or less in balance outside of exceptional circumstances.
"The big change in principle came under Kennedy," Mr. Johnson writes. "In the autumn of 1962 the Administration committed itself to a new and radical principle of creating budgetary deficits even when there was no economic emergency." Removing this constraint on government spending allowed Kennedy to introduce "a new concept of 'big government': the 'problem-eliminator.' Every area of human misery could be classified as a 'problem'; then the Federal government could be armed to 'eliminate' it.
______________________________________________________

Creating budget deficits even when there is no economic emergency to fix "problems" in society.
This is the essence of Democratic policy.
There were already limits to our economic might by the early 60's when we owned 50% of world GNP and instead of heeding that as caution and humility we decided to get high on ourselves and borrow against the future.
What started out as borrowing for "noble" stuff has now become borrowing just to maintain our lifestyle.
The noble idealism inspired in part and reinforced by psychedelics (John Lennon is purported to have dropped acid 1000 times- Strawberry Fields Forever)) has turned into the reality of smoking crack.
Obviously the government cannot be a social crack smoker like Charlie Sheen but has become a full blown spending addict.
that vows to stop smoking crack(the euphoria and elation of spending money it doesn't have) soon in the future...(just not right this second)

 

[shagdrum]

Well at least he's not a Kenyan though he is Keynesian

a distinction that Stewart followers do not generally seem to grasp...

YouTube - Obama Is Not A Keynesian, He's An American!


I am reading a book right now called, "Where Keynes Went Wrong" that is rather enlightening. Worth picking up, IMO.