That's not what progressive means, in this context. A progressive tax system is one where you pay a (progressively) higher rate when you have more income. What you have is a regressive tax system.

Do you happen to know what percentage of U.S. companies actually pay tax at the stated high rate? How does that compare to other countries? I know that quite a few of your companies weasel their way out of paying any tax at all, but I don't know how many overall manage this.

The ancient Roman empire also had social welfare, of a sort, increased after 122 B.C. See http://www.roman-empire.net/society/society.html for an overview. Then, as now, it was expensive to run.

The comparison is actually quite fair, except that in ancient Rome it was expected that wealthy citizens would give back to society and the idea of unbounded avarice as a virtue would have been quite foreign to them... so in a sense it's back to front.
>> ^Winstonfield_Pennypacker:

Not quite sure how comparing that to the US economy makes any sense. The US has the highest corporate tax rate on Planet Earth now. We have very high capital gains taxes (compared to global averages). Our income tax is so "Progressive" right now that the bottom 50% of taxpayers only pay 5% of the taxes. Over 75% of the Federal Government's 1.6 trillion dollar budget is dedicated to social programs for the poor.
Only way comparing it to the vid makes sense if if you contextualize it by stating that it is the GOVERNMENT that is deciding the screw the poor by the process of its own incredible incompetence, malfeasence, and mismanagement. Since only about 20 cents on the dollar comes 'out' of government versus what goes in, then yes - the U.S. Federal Government is entirely oriented around screwing the poor.
But of course, that's not what Prog-Lib-Dytes mean. To a leftist, the video means "tax breaks for the rich" ... (insert liberal talking point) et al.

Not quite sure how comparing that to the US economy makes any sense. The US has the highest corporate tax rate on Planet Earth now. We have very high capital gains taxes (compared to global averages). Our income tax is so "Progressive" right now that the bottom 50% of taxpayers only pay 5% of the taxes. Over 75% of the Federal Government's 1.6 trillion dollar budget is dedicated to social programs for the poor.

Only way comparing it to the vid makes sense if if you contextualize it by stating that it is the GOVERNMENT that is deciding the screw the poor by the process of its own incredible incompetence, malfeasence, and mismanagement. Since only about 20 cents on the dollar comes 'out' of government versus what goes in, then yes - the U.S. Federal Government is entirely oriented around screwing the poor.

But of course, that's not what Prog-Lib-Dytes mean. To a leftist, the video means "tax breaks for the rich" ... (insert liberal talking point) et al.

>> ^jonny:

dead


Fixed and thanks.

>> ^jonny:

dead


Fixed and thanks.

>> ^A10anis:

>> ^criticalthud:
@A10anis
WWII was an economic and resource war. As was every war the US has been in.
"Just" is a matter of perspective.
Vast sums were made by war profiteering during the war, but that paled in comparison to the influx of wealth following WWII and american global domination.

For you to say; "WWII was an economic and resource war. As was every war the US has been in." leaves you in the unenviable position of being an utterly ignorant commentator on issues you don't understand. Shush.


really? you think WWI started simply because franz ferdinand was shot, ...or WWII had nothing to do with Hitler's push into the middle east and western russian oilfields? or that vietnam and korea had nothing to do with the collision of economic systems (communist totalitarianism and capitalism). or Iraq has nothing to do with oil and Afghanistan has nothing to do with rare earth deposits? good vs. evil is just fine for star wars and the lord of the rings, but on planet earth, it's about competing economic interests.
"Just" war is another term for wrapping brutality in red white and blue and selling it to the masses.

Phenomena such as Faith Healing, Glossolalia and Snake Handling existed in US christian movements as early as the 1800's. It seems like the video you replied with is more like one christian group trying to distance itself to the embarrassment that is evangelicals, and it's easy to rope in foreign adaptations of Pentecostalism to use as evidence.

Pentecostalism itself is a foreign adaption which is based on a heresay known as montanism (now neo-montanism). It got its start in the early 1800's by the "Irvingites", who followed an outcast pastor teaching heretical christology doctrines. The father of the modern movement (early 1900s), John Alexander Dowie, believed he was the prophet Elijah and the first restored apostle to the church. It also has links with free masonry.

Ultimately your embed is just commentary on internal strife in an overall larger movement that I don't care about, and is a distraction from the real issue. What all of these have in common is the fact that human beings have a fundamental inability to avoid large scale social misdirection, and that is observable through every aspect of our existence regardless of culture, religion, social structure, lifestyle, sports team, et al.

The embed is about the false spirit which has invaded the church, which is the same spirit working in the video above. It is highlighting the abberant behavior that people who don't know much about Christianity assume is normal for Christians. This is due to the proliferation of the pentecostal and charismatic churches. This is not a judgement against pentecostals or charismatics, it is simply to say that this spirit of disorder is not from God.

Yes, there is a herd mentality, which is why the bible tells us to discern all things. Human beings are fundementally vulnerable to spiritual deception. Only God can protect us from this delusion that society is steeped in.

While I wholeheartedly agree with you that the obsession over materialism, commercialism and sexuality as exploited by modern media, such as the original video portrays, is in many ways a poison to the human condition, there are many worse examples of this in every society. Least of which would be this exact scenario played out in Western culture when a pop-star pays a charity visit to support their government sanctioned killers in places like Iraq and Afghanistan.

Evil doesn't often come dressed in red skin and armed with pitchforks. Evil can be banal and mundane, and it will usually come camouflaged as something good. I don't condemn the good deed, but I think you have to admit there is something profoundly disturbing about seeing grown men, soldiers no less, lose their minds as if someone flipped a switch. And yes, there are worse things, but that isn't really the point. I was pointing out the strings so someone might notice the puppeteer.

I really feel like you come here to show other people your belief as a way to convince yourself. Having a personal crusade to publicly disclaim everything that you judge as contradicting to the beliefs you were raised with makes it easy to put the doubt you have about your own faith out of mind.

I grew up without any religion in my life. I was formally agnostic, and so I understand your perspective. You don't see any evidence of a spirit, and none of it adds up in your mind. To you it's all some kind of mass delusion or hysteria. That's what I used to think until God showed me He is very real, and very much involved in what is going on on Planet Earth. I found that material existence is but a veil to a much larger reality. I pray that God will give you that experience as well, and show you that Jesus loves you, and that He is the way, the truth and the life. I am not here to prove something, I am here to do the will of God and tell you that Jesus died for your sins so you can be reconciled to God and have eternal life. I am here to warn you that the wages of sin is death, and that if you die in your sins without Gods pardon, you face Gods judgement, and hell. I say these things out of love, because I care about what happens to you.

PS - have you ever seen Japanese tentacle porn?

Hell vomited up that garbage, there is no doubt. I find though that true corruption comes by 1000 cuts. By the time a child is six years old, they will have spent more time in front of the Television/media than they will have spent quality time with their dads in a whole lifetime. That is what is really disturbing, and no one is standing in the gap. Modern parenting is putting your kid in front of a TV and giving them whatever the TV programs them to ask for. Sadly, this is just scratching the surface.

>> ^artician

You have been awarded 1 Power Point for fixing the embed code for Dead Pool video Planet Earth - Jungles. Thank you for helping maintain VideoSift's reliability.

The thing that put me off was suddenly being a floating head in front of the sun, all i could guess is that it was a bit like hallucinations hence mania. The rest of it works for depression i think - if you imagine that the "happy" bits are non-depressed and the "unhappy" bits are depressed. The artist perhaps had to over exaggerate both sides a touch because it's hard to describe feelings in words. In the non-depressed bit, life looks like it should; birds sing, leaves fall, you don't feel at odds with the world (1st bit), things seem alive for a change, the world spins and there are things to enjoy (the town scene). In the depressed bits everything feels uncomfortable and unsatisfying and generally grim (1st bit), constant reminder of there being no real purpose, no reason to do anything before you die, the world spins on, your life and death were irrelevant (grave surrounded by planet earth bit).

LAAAAAAZZZZZYYYYYYY

In reply to this comment by dystopianfuturetoday:
doop

>> ^mgittle:
The problem with fractional reserve systems using fiat currency is their reliance on growth. It should be obvious even to children that "growth" cannot be sustained indefinitely in a closed system (the planet Earth). You can argue technology will fix our problems before nature fixes them for us, but that's gambling, IMO.
The biggest problem with growth, IMO, is a moral and philosophical one reflected by its influence on our culture. People talk about growth and progress as being some sort of universally good thing. cough AynRandobjectivism cough Growth needs to be a means to an end, not an end in itself. The problem with growth and progress being an end in itself is that we cannot have a conversation about what we're growing into or why we're even bothering to grow in the first place.


You're talking about economic growth. I don't see the planet Earth being a limit like you're describing. That's more of a close-minded assumption. We've always been able to invent and innovate with the opportunity. Putting a limit on that, is denying ourselves that opportunity. Surely a 100 years ago, people never envisioned our present world. And a 100 years from now, I hope people can say the same about us.

The problem with fractional reserve systems using fiat currency is that it's fiat. Even if you could match inflation with economic growth (which you can't), you would still have an elite class collecting interest from loans of magically created cash.

@davidraine @NetRunner @marbles

I think these videos explains it better:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dc3sKwwAaCU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCu3fpg83TY&feature=related

They're much longer and the animation is terrible, but they have better content, IMO.

As for banking without a fractional reserve system...you could have a system that utilized self-issued credit traded on an exchange. Money and credit could be based on the amount of valuable goods and services you (or a company) can provide rather than based on promises to pay back debt.

Yeah, it's the same guy's video, but you can learn about the idea here:
http://www.digitalcoin.info/

The problem with fractional reserve systems using fiat currency is their reliance on growth. It should be obvious even to children that "growth" cannot be sustained indefinitely in a closed system (the planet Earth). You can argue technology will fix our problems before nature fixes them for us, but that's gambling, IMO.

The biggest problem with growth, IMO, is a moral and philosophical one reflected by its influence on our culture. People talk about growth and progress as being some sort of universally good thing. *cough*AynRandobjectivism*cough* Growth needs to be a means to an end, not an end in itself. The problem with growth and progress being an end in itself is that we cannot have a conversation about what we're growing into or why we're even bothering to grow in the first place.

*dupeof=http://videosift.com/video/Overview-of-BBCs-Planet-Earth

This video has been nominated as a duplicate of this video by lucky760. If this nomination is seconded with *isdupe, the video will be killed and its votes transferred to the original.

@lucky760 I don't know who else to tell about this, so you're it.
This video is a 3 year old dupe of this 4 year old video.

dupe of
http://videosift.com/video/Overview-of-BBCs-Planet-Earth

@ChaosEngine

The only one out of those that doesn't use prior material is islam, and the creation story from the quron is just a rip off of Genesis, so I don't think it really counts.

As far as the age of the Earth goes, there are plenty of evidences to indicate a young earth just in the fossil record. You have polystrate fossils all over the place, which traverse multiple layers that were supposedly laid down over hundreds of millions of years. You have fossils supposedly millions of years old found with intact DNA, which has a max decay rate of 20 thousand years. You have fossils like these: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/wiltshire/8208838.stm

Radiometric dating is also not proven reliable. It is predicated on a number of assumptions (guesses), such as a constant rate of decay, the amount of the elements, etc. Particularly, it must be assumed to have been within a closed system. Since there is no such thing on planet Earth, there is no way of telling what the original condition of the rock was. Whether it was contaminated by heat, or groundwater, or leeching etc. That makes all such measurements extremely problematic. The different methods used also almost never agree with eachother. Frequently, they provide a wide range of dates which the scientist will cherry pick from to match his particular theory. Radiometric dating has also been proven to be inaccurate by testing on samples that have known ages. Tests run on rocks known to be a few hundred years old will come back with estimates ranging from a few million to over a billion years old. If you can't get reliable results on known ages, how can you trust results on samples with unknown ages?

You have the problem of the geologic column being a complete mess, where layers appear in different places in different parts of the world, sometimes in reverse order. You also have the circular logic of the fossils dating the rocks and the rocks dating the fossils. You have human and dinosaur tracks in the same strata. You even have ancient artifacts found which show human/dinosaur interaction and even domestication.

http://www.mondovista.com/dinostone.ica2.html
http://www.mtblanco.com/ForSale/2006/ICAStones.html

There are many reasons to think that the scientific timeline is grossly inaccurate, and these are just a few of those reasons.