I think anyone can look at those graphs and see there is a problem. A very small group of people are rising above the rest and there's just no way this whole country can function with just that small group of people's skill set, earnings and knowledge. They want the money and the power, but the responsibility falls to "everyone" when it comes to keeping infrastructure and protections in place to safely keep their wealth rolling in.

If the laws weren't being enforced, what would keep the large group of people from simply taking everything from that small group of people?

Yet on the other side of it, why are policies being changed in favor of the rich at a substantial cost to the rest?

What will they do when a jury of your peers won't convict you no matter what you do as long as it's against a politician or 1% member?

Policies, laws, and infrastructure benefit us all, but I think those 1% get a much bigger benefit of not having everything simply taken from them by the 99%, yet they keep toying with policy and causing market instability and blaming the 99%s protections (unions, ss, welfare, medicare, medicaid, etc).

Dude, stimulus does not immediately kick in. It takes time to take effect. And considering the economic data that suggests that this was the worst economic downturn in since the Great Depression, where unemployment reached 25%, how is it "balderdash" unemployment would have climbed into the teens?

You also failed in your economic analysis. To say that the stimulus jobs created 1 job for every $200,000 is the most absurd thing I've ever read. First off, it assumes that the only jobs created are the jobs of people it directly contributed to hiring without taking into account the residual effects of said hiring, or the results of whatever goods and services produced from the work they did. How many jobs are created or preserved by building infrastructure? How many jobs were created or preserved by providing all workers hired through stimulus programs, which in turn spent that income on goods and services produced by private sector workers? What about workers producing goods and services necessary for these programs that wouldn't immediately show up?

"...the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released a report in August that said the stimulus bill has '[l]owered the unemployment rate by between 0.7 percentage points and 1.8 percentage points' and '[i]ncreased the number of people employed by between 1.4 million and 3.3 million.'"

http://www.factcheck.org/2010/09/did-the-stimulus-create-jobs/

The economy is cyclical in nature. Stopping the bleeding is a big deal. And most economists believe the stimulus bill wasn't as successful as it should have been is because it wasn't big enough, not because it was too big or was done at all.

Again, I challenge you to show me a recession in modern times that was not ended after a period of deficit spending. You can't name one, can you?

http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/include/us_deficit_100.png

So there's completely DUH obvious undeniable, there's no other way to explain it, basic US historical fact that we've ALWAYS ended recessions with deficit spending. How can you possibly argue that "when government steps into the market, it creates an artificial bubble that PROLONGS an economic downturn." So what was WWII?! What were the 1980's?! You have no factual claims to stand on! Explain how in the world deficits prolonged the Great Depression! We deficit spent quite a bit leading up to WWII, still didn't get out of the Great Depression, massive record deficit spent, THEN got out of the Depression. It is undeniable that's what did the trick.

I don't for the life of me understand why people like you will literally argue the sky isn't blue if it fits your ideological narrative.

>> ^Winstonfield_Pennypacker:

You can't say it didn't work before because unemployment was skyrocketing and then stopped when the stimulus kicked in.
The facts...
http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS14000000
Unemployment started going up a bit in May of 2008 (5.4%). By February of 2009 (Stimulus bill passes) the rate was 8.2%. By October of 2009, unemployment was 10.1%. +2%. After. The. Stimulus. Unemployment hit 9%+ in May of 2009 and has stayed in that zone ever since.
Unemployment did spike a total of +4% between May of 2008 and May of 2009. 60% of that spike took place before the stimulus, and 40% of the spike took place AFTER the stimulus. In order for anyone to claim that the stimulus 'stopped' unemployement from rising, they would have to conclusively prove that unemployment WOULD HAVE RISEN to 13.4% by May of 2010, then to 17.4% by May of this year without the passage of the stimulus. Balderdash. Unemployment hit a natural free market peak in late 2009, and it was going to do that with our without the stimulus.
Let's assume the stimulus DID 'create jobs'. Is that backed up by facts?
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/09/13/us-usa-campa
ign-stimulus-idUSTRE78C08R20110913
http://web.econ.ohio-state.edu/dupor/arra10_may11.pdf
Economic data is open to debate. On the one side here we have the CBO which gave the stimulus a very generous amount of credit (based on some very questionable interpretations of job 'creation') for 'creating or preserving' 3 million jobs. Then we have an OSU study which uses statistics to prove the stimulus 'created' 450,000 government jobs and KILLED a million private sector jobs.
I personally I think the OSU study hits the nail on the head. "ARRA funds were largely used to offset state revenue shortfalls and Medicaid increases rather than directly boost private sector employment." That is a statement that reflects reality. The stimulus mostly plugged up budgeting gaps that had nothing to do with employment. In fact, the CBO itself freely admitted, "it is impossible to determine how many of the reported jobs would have existed in the absence of the stimulus package.” QUOTE!
But let's be really nice and use the CBO's figures - even though they are highly questionable. 3 million jobs were 'created or preserved' by the stimulus bill. Even in this very rosy scenario, the stimulus made 1 job for every $200,000 dollars. It can be credibly argued that doing NOTHING would have generated a better result in an overall analysis compared to spending $200K for 1 job.
But for the sake of discussion let's take a good hard look at the jobs that were 'created'. After all, 200K a job might make sense if they were GOOD jobs...
http://reason.com/archives/2009/12/11/did-the-stimulus-create-jobs
They weren't. Most of the jobs were government jobs. And most of them were temporary construction jobs or other seasonal gigs for make-work projects scheduled to complete in a year or less (at which point they are fired). The private sector - where jobs are needed most - got virtually NO boost from the stimulus.
I could keep on going for hours, but suffice it to say that the stimulus didn't 'stop' unemployment. There is solid, real, credible evidence that the government's interference in the free market did far more harm than good. That's what happens. When government steps into the market, it creates an artificial bubble that PROLONGS an economic downturn.

You can't say it didn't work before because unemployment was skyrocketing and then stopped when the stimulus kicked in.

The facts...

http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS14000000

Unemployment started going up a bit in May of 2008 (5.4%). By February of 2009 (Stimulus bill passes) the rate was 8.2%. By October of 2009, unemployment was 10.1%. +2%. After. The. Stimulus. Unemployment hit 9%+ in May of 2009 and has stayed in that zone ever since.

Unemployment did spike a total of +4% between May of 2008 and May of 2009. 60% of that spike took place before the stimulus, and 40% of the spike took place AFTER the stimulus. In order for anyone to claim that the stimulus 'stopped' unemployement from rising, they would have to conclusively prove that unemployment WOULD HAVE RISEN to 13.4% by May of 2010, then to 17.4% by May of this year without the passage of the stimulus. Balderdash. Unemployment hit a natural free market peak in late 2009, and it was going to do that with our without the stimulus.

Let's assume the stimulus DID 'create jobs'. Is that backed up by facts?

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/09/13/us-usa-campaign-stimulus-idUSTRE78C08R20110913

http://web.econ.ohio-state.edu/dupor/arra10_may11.pdf

Economic data is open to debate. On the one side here we have the CBO which gave the stimulus a very generous amount of credit (based on some very questionable interpretations of job 'creation') for 'creating or preserving' 3 million jobs. Then we have an OSU study which uses statistics to prove the stimulus 'created' 450,000 government jobs and KILLED a million private sector jobs.

I personally I think the OSU study hits the nail on the head. "ARRA funds were largely used to offset state revenue shortfalls and Medicaid increases rather than directly boost private sector employment." That is a statement that reflects reality. The stimulus mostly plugged up budgeting gaps that had nothing to do with employment. In fact, the CBO itself freely admitted, "it is impossible to determine how many of the reported jobs would have existed in the absence of the stimulus package.” QUOTE!

But let's be really nice and use the CBO's figures - even though they are highly questionable. 3 million jobs were 'created or preserved' by the stimulus bill. Even in this very rosy scenario, the stimulus made 1 job for every $200,000 dollars. It can be credibly argued that doing NOTHING would have generated a better result in an overall analysis compared to spending $200K for 1 job.

But for the sake of discussion let's take a good hard look at the jobs that were 'created'. After all, 200K a job might make sense if they were GOOD jobs...

http://reason.com/archives/2009/12/11/did-the-stimulus-create-jobs

They weren't. Most of the jobs were government jobs. And most of them were temporary construction jobs or other seasonal gigs for make-work projects scheduled to complete in a year or less (at which point they are fired). The private sector - where jobs are needed most - got virtually NO boost from the stimulus.

I could keep on going for hours, but suffice it to say that the stimulus didn't 'stop' unemployment. There is solid, real, credible evidence that the government's interference in the free market did far more harm than good. That's what happens. When government steps into the market, it creates an artificial bubble that PROLONGS an economic downturn.

So, these statistics are from the IRS and isn't internet hearsay. Medicare makes the percentages paid by top earners go up. So do property taxes. (Sales tax and state taxation is another discussion and doesn't involve the Federal government. In any case there's no way to enforce a progressive sales tax. So if this is unfair, then the only thing to do is eliminate it altogether. But that is a state-by-state decision.) Medicare along with Medicaid and some other mandatory taxes account for 33% of Federal expenses/budget, while social Security for 21% (even thoug Social Security is a separate Trust Fund).

Social security is capped for various reasons and it doesn't have anything to do with current tax debates or legislative proposals. Social security tax is about 15%, half of which is paid by the employer. Social Security is in theory a separate budget from the rest of the federal budget. And for 2011, the total tax is reduced with the employee paying only 4.2% of it and the employer paying 6.2%.
Medicare, as mentioned, is not capped at any income. On a million dollar income you pay about $14,500. On a 45K income you pay about $652.

Unemployment taxes are paid fully by employers not employees.

The complaint that the bottom 80% pay 13% is misleading because the bottom 50% (half the population) pay between only 0-3%.

Top 10% (not top 20%) - pay 70%
Bottom 50% - pay 3%
Everyone else - 27%

But it gets a bit more complicated because about 47% of households pay 0% income tax, a majority in the bottom 40% of earners.

Top 10% earners have to pay more (70%) for the roads, government salaries, wars, national parks, Airforce One, NPR, corporate welfare, bank bailouts, and most other government services (the bottom 50% pay less than 3% of it) but when buying goods (with or without sales tax), like coffee or an iPhone or pumping gas or a movie ticket, it does cost top earners a smaller percentage of their income.

Some other "taxes" are, in effect, flat taxation like business license, car registration, bridge toll, sanitation and flood control, parking meters, etc.

Fairness in this is a matter of opinion (and self-interest). I'm not an accountant so I can't really go into all the various loopholes in our tax code.

And I'm talking mostly about taxation at the Federal level of which income tax accounts for about half. Like I said, sales tax is a state matter and so are fees like parking meters etc. Taxation at the state level seems to draw less controversy because Democratic states will "happily" pay more and Republican states will "happily" pay less and you can select a state to live in at just the right taxation for you.

And as we all know on the Sift, you have that statists on one side who think more taxation is better because the government is here to help and anti-statists on the other who think "that government is best wich governs least" (or not at all). And also the hybrids like Lyndon Johnson, Larry King, Jon Stewart, and others, including most corporatists.

>> ^Ariane:

>> ^Trancecoach:
The Top 1% also pays nearly 40% of the Federal Income Tax
>> ^ghark:
Some interesting facts about the top 1%:
The Top 1 Percent Of Americans Owns 40 Percent Of The Nation’s Wealth
The Top 1 Percent Of Americans Take Home 24 Percent Of National Income
The Top 1 Percent Of Americans Own Half Of The Country’s Stocks, Bonds, And Mutual Funds
The Top 1 Percent Of Americans Have Only 5 Percent Of The Nation’s Personal Debt
The Top 1 Percent Are Taking In More Of The Nation’s Income Than At Any Other Time Since The 1920s
http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2011/10/03/334156/top-five
-wealthiest-one-percent/


Umm, no.
"The Internet is awash with statements that the top 1 percent pays, depending on the year, 38 percent or more than 40 percent of taxes.
It’s true that the top 1 percent of wage earners paid 38 percent of the federal income taxes in 2008 (the most recent year for which data is available). But people forget that the income tax is less than half of federal taxes and only one-fifth of taxes at all levels of government.
Social Security, Medicare and unemployment insurance taxes (known as payroll taxes) are paid mostly by the bottom 90 percent of wage earners. That’s because, once you reach $106,800 of income, you pay no more for Social Security, though the much smaller Medicare tax applies to all wages. Warren Buffett pays the exact same amount of Social Security taxes as someone who earns $106,800."
http://wweek.com/portland/article-17350-9_thin
gs_the_rich_dont_want_you_to_know_about_taxes.html
Sales taxes and other flat taxes are even more unfair. We low income people pretty much spend all the money we make and as a result pay (in my state) 8% of my income in sales taxes, while the top 1% only spend a small fraction of their wealth on items likely to collect sales tax, so I would not be surprised if the average top 1% pays even 1% on sales tax.
The top 20% earn 93% of the wealth, yet only pay 70% of the taxes, leaving the other 13% to the bottom 80% who only earn 7% of the wealth. THAT is what needs to be corrected.

This is BS. Utter BS. Underlying social contract? - I think the government broke that contract a long damn time ago!!!
I hire workers that paid way to damn much for their college education.
I, and their parents, paid taxes for them to get a crappy public education before that.
I ship product on poorly maintained roads, where the person standing with the stop/go sign gets more per hour than my warehouse workers.
My employees pay taxes on the money I pay them, which I have paid taxes as well.
I pay taxes on every cent I earn and my employer pays taxes on every product we sell.
I pay for every damn thing I use and pay taxes on every damn thing I buy.
If I should happen to work my a$$ off and get rich, guess what I did it by my own damn self DESPITE the government - not because of. And it's not luck - it's hard damn work. You make your own luck.
As far as incentive's for investing by giving a lower tax rate - yep that's what we do and there is nothing wrong with that. I make money and pay taxes on it. I buy something and I pay taxes on it. I save money and I pay taxes on the interest. I put some of what I have left in the Stock market - I TAKE RISKS on investing in companies which promotes their growth and the strengthening of our economy and IF I should happen to make money off of it then that is the reward for taking the risk. I shouldn't have to pay the same tax rate as if I had gotten it from my employer. My job doesn't incur risk, investing does. If you don't give an incentive to someone for taking risk, then you have no investment. I'd just buy government bonds at some crappy interest rate- just not in California or Illinois.
Yet we all focus on the part where she mentions capital gains tax and not the other part where she mentions Medicare, Medicaid, and 2 wars? How about we focus on changing those first couple of things and get our government to run EFFICIENTLY and then come back asking for more money.

You like the piechart because you already agree with the author. I wish people would stop letting others do math for them. I can claim that defense is 100% of federal spending by making up some reason that all the other programs "don't count". And why does it even matter? Look at the dollar amount. We have a 1.4 trillion dollar deficit. Your exceedingly inclusive anti-war activist source says we spend 1.449 trillion on "defense." But even if we fire every soldier, cancel every pension, and shut down the VA, we're still hosed. All the defense contractors will stop paying taxes, and all the veterans will just collect medicare/medicaid.

I am totally sick of the the whole attitude of "We can fix our finances by cutting my pet peeve." It goes right up there with "I pay plenty of tax, someone else should be paying more," and "I should get $20 and hour plus benefits with my GED." McCain's strategist was right: we're a country of whiners.

>> ^blankfist:

>> ^NetRunner:
>> ^blankfist:
One thing that's never mentioned in these cases is that the majority of our taxes goes to militarism, nation-building, corporate welfare and wars.
I haven't actually read all the comments on this thread yet, but I already see you've repeated this line twice here, and recently aimed it at me elsewhere, so let me just step in and point out that it's "never mentioned" because it's utterly and completely false.
Here's a breakdown of what our taxes go to. You'll notice that the slice of the pie for defense (including the wars) is 20%. That's not a "majority".
If you add together Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, SCHIP, and other safety net programs, you get 55%. That happens to actually be a majority.
Also keep in mind that the Republicans don't want the defense budget cut at all, while the Democrats are putting most of their proposed cuts in defense.

The great thing about statistics is they change depending on where you get them. Here's one that claims defense spending is 25%.
But then there's this piechart which not only accounts what they claim to be 36% current defense spending budget (based on 2009), but also the past military expenses plus interest on that debt. That brings the percentage up to a majority of money spent on militarism. As I said.

1) i'd like to know what unskilled labor jobs the government pays 100k/yr

I'm happy to expand your mind.

http://www.downsizinggovernment.org/overpaid-federal-workers

Keep in mind that the bulk of these jobs are make-work jobs and bureaucrats who serve no function except to warm a chair and internacinely war for budget share of the federal pie. There's tons more. Teacher union administrators, the construction worker supervisor who stands around 90% of the day, and on and on and on. Even a cursory google search will bag you thousands on thousands of federal and state employees that are unskilled, overpaid leeches on the economy.

2) the solvency of pensions/health care is quite well documented

Supply the data proving that. The Postal Service is due to collapse in November because it can't pay its operating costs AND keep up the retirement benefits of its retirees. Social Security isn't solvent. Medicare isn't solvent. Medicaid isn't solvent. The benefit programs of federal employees is banked entirely on debt spending. "Solvency" is when the program is in the black.

i know you've been led to believe that only private business could figure out a way to make it work, but who instituted these services in the first place?

Private companies. Long before 'government' ever came along, private individuals performed these tasks for money or goods. Government apes private companies - not the other way around. And 99 times out of 100, government does a lousy job at them because they don't operate logically. Case in point...

the education thing just BLOWS my mind

Yes - I have no difficulty believing that a person steeped in leftist theory would have a hard time understanding the concept that education can take place quite easily and well without government subsidies. The best colleges are private, and people who go to private shools (or are homeschooled) do just as well (or better) than students in public schools. And our public schools do such a good job, don't they? Regardless, I don't have a problem with government providing a "School". I have a problem with government meddling in cirriculum, and the associated teacher's union. Have the government provide the 'school', and then get out of the way.

its CLASS WARFARE when the victim speaks up and demands justice

First - there's no victim here. Second, it is class warfare when pinheads like Obama and his supporters talk out both sides of their mouths, lie, and deceive on this issue. Buffet didn't pay 'less than his secretary' on his income - he paid MORE - but he and Obama are lying and equating capital gains as income as a means to raise taxes NOT on "millionaires", but on the middle class. THAT is class warfare.

"Bailing out the rich". Pht - what a crock. Obumma is only wanting to bail out government, which has overspent and overpromised and he wants to sock it to the middle class. If he was serious then he's freeze all government spending today to 2011 levels and keep them there until the system was in the black. Then he'd pass a balanced budget ammendment and everyone would praise him as the greatest president ever. But no - he's a leftist idiot and all he wants is to raise taxes in a recession - which even he said was a stupid thing to do. Stupid is as stupid does - and the stupid people that agree with it.

>> ^blankfist:

>> ^NetRunner:
>> ^blankfist:
One thing that's never mentioned in these cases is that the majority of our taxes goes to militarism, nation-building, corporate welfare and wars.
I haven't actually read all the comments on this thread yet, but I already see you've repeated this line twice here, and recently aimed it at me elsewhere, so let me just step in and point out that it's "never mentioned" because it's utterly and completely false.
Here's a breakdown of what our taxes go to. You'll notice that the slice of the pie for defense (including the wars) is 20%. That's not a "majority".
If you add together Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, SCHIP, and other safety net programs, you get 55%. That happens to actually be a majority.
Also keep in mind that the Republicans don't want the defense budget cut at all, while the Democrats are putting most of their proposed cuts in defense.

The great thing about statistics is they change depending on where you get them. Here's one that claims defense spending is 25%.
But then there's this piechart which not only accounts what they claim to be 36% current defense spending budget (based on 2009), but also the past military expenses plus interest on that debt. That brings the percentage up to a majority of money spent on militarism. As I said.


That's why you have to pay attention to what you're looking at. My link and your first link are pretty much doing the same thing -- looking at the actual budget, and rolling things up into broad categories, while still telling you how the categories are comprised. Both show military spending to be sizable, but far less than a "majority" of spending. They both show a majority of spending going to social saftety net programs, too.

Your second link does claim military spending is a majority of government spending, but to do that they have to really twist the numbers. For example, they refuse to count outlays from "Trust Fund" programs as spending. That means they don't include Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid in their pie chart at all. Add that back in, and even their doubled figure for military spending still falls short of 50% of all spending.

The majority of our taxes go towards social safety net programs, not the military.

>> ^NetRunner:

>> ^blankfist:
One thing that's never mentioned in these cases is that the majority of our taxes goes to militarism, nation-building, corporate welfare and wars.
I haven't actually read all the comments on this thread yet, but I already see you've repeated this line twice here, and recently aimed it at me elsewhere, so let me just step in and point out that it's "never mentioned" because it's utterly and completely false.
Here's a breakdown of what our taxes go to. You'll notice that the slice of the pie for defense (including the wars) is 20%. That's not a "majority".
If you add together Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, SCHIP, and other safety net programs, you get 55%. That happens to actually be a majority.
Also keep in mind that the Republicans don't want the defense budget cut at all, while the Democrats are putting most of their proposed cuts in defense.


The great thing about statistics is they change depending on where you get them. Here's one that claims defense spending is 25%.

But then there's this piechart which not only accounts what they claim to be 36% current defense spending budget (based on 2009), but also the past military expenses plus interest on that debt. That brings the percentage up to a majority of money spent on militarism. As I said.

>> ^blankfist:

One thing that's never mentioned in these cases is that the majority of our taxes goes to militarism, nation-building, corporate welfare and wars.

I haven't actually read all the comments on this thread yet, but I already see you've repeated this line twice here, and recently aimed it at me elsewhere, so let me just step in and point out that it's "never mentioned" because it's utterly and completely false.

Here's a breakdown of what our taxes go to. You'll notice that the slice of the pie for defense (including the wars) is 20%. That's not a "majority".

If you add together Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, SCHIP, and other safety net programs, you get 55%. That happens to actually be a majority.

Also keep in mind that the Republicans don't want the defense budget cut at all, while the Democrats are putting most of their proposed cuts in defense.

I'm not disagreeing with you, but I'm going to argue it in a different way and see if it changes your opinion.

I believe the war is maintained not for our safety, not for other nations safety, not to catch terrorists, not to prevent anything, but to directly funnel money into corporate pockets and in turn the very same people who support the war going on via donations and lobbyists.

Now, these same people are more than willing to cut benefits of teachers, government unions, and also seem to keep bringing up social security/medicare/medicaid. Plus the other myriad of programs they want to cut or eliminate........or PRIVATIZE, which is their word for turning public facilities to private gains that the government still has to pay for but has a company squatting over taking profits off the top of everything.

Now, here's where my other argument comes in. What if the tax rate was high enough on every person in these little "money circle jerks" that they couldn't keep enough of it to make it worthwhile and still bribe/donate to people?

I mean look at the ForaTV top15 video right now where he says in the 50s people making over 200k were taxed at 91 percent, so that would basically mean that making 2 million today would be the cut off for the sub 91 percent rate.

It would mean that people getting bribed and making in excess of a million dollars would need more bribe money to get the same benefit. It would mean people doing the bribing would have less money to bribe with.

I mean let's put it this way:

If you were working a job making 100 grand a year. New tax law comes in and now they want to take 75% of earnings after 100 grand. It would effectively make it so that you earning more money at your job would result in almost no benefit to you, so now money is off the table as an effective bargaining tool to use with you. That leaves other things to take into consideration when the money can't really be factored in anymore, and for politicians the only other things I can imagine as bargaining tools would be giving them houses/cars/etc and offering them jobs after their political career.....where they would be limited by the tax rates on their earnings. It'd make me a lot less willing to be a dirtbag if I could only make 1 million dollars versus the 60 some odd million some of these CEOs are getting without the majority of it being taken in taxes.


>> ^blankfist:

>> ^messenger:
>> ^blankfist:
I'm still not sure why people think taxing income is okay. And I'm speaking about federal income tax, not state and local. I think in times like this when the country is running record deficits, it should cut spending instead of looking elsewhere for more money.

So you understand there's a deficit, and the only way to reduce it is increase income (taxes), and/or reduce spending (cuts). Take a look at where the spending cuts are going to come from, and then decide if you want those cuts to be made. Cronyism, imperialism, war and all those other things we both hate are what the government does for fun. Until a true statesman is elected, they're never going to be cut. So what will get cut instead? Things that actually benefit the people living in the country. I'm not American so I don't know what your federal government provides in that regard, but either you're glad those services exist and are happy to pay for them with your taxes, or you need to include them in the list of things you'd like to have cut.

This is the part I don't understand. Yes, there are services that are useful, but the majority of what they spend their money on are immoral things I disagree with that put our lives in jeopardy over here. Wars and occupation have made us less safe. I don't care that they spend some of the money on things I agree with. They spend the most of it on things I don't.
I voluntarily support the ACLU, but if they started drowning kittens, I'd most likely pull my money from them. This is the ideological discussion we should be having about government right now. They're spending more than we as the people can afford and yet both parties are refusing to cut defense spending.
If we cut a large portion of our defense spending (the portion that puts us in overseas entanglements) we might be able to balance the budget and cut income tax completely. Why aren't we having that discussion instead of being defeatists about what the government will cut? Because people in favor of raising taxes are scared that cutting income tax may lead to less entitlement programs, so they're willing to bomb people over it. That's why.

>> ^JiggaJonson:

Nevermind the fact that Washington University, the school that created the Foldit program, is a public (that is to say, funded by the state; a.k.a. statist) institution.


Right, and I'm sure the researchers there are fantastic. Still, they opened the market to allow more people to work on what they themselves and others weren't able to succeed at.

>> ^JiggaJonson:

Nevermind the fact that healthcare, up until very recently, has been privatized (excluding medicare and medicaid) for a substantial time now; yet the lifetime cost of HIV medications and treatment is roughly $385,000.


And available only from big pharma. And that's thanks to government regulations. Jonas Salk developed the polio vaccine privately and offered it without patent. If he were to bring the same drug to market today by FDA restrictions he'd have to pay millions.

>> ^JiggaJonson:

Shouldn't free market generic meds have landed in your local Wally World for $5 a month by now? Why is the free market dictating these insane prices where how much you can pay is directly relational to how long you get to live.


The pharmaceutical industry is heavily regulated. I think you're erroneously conflating corporatism with free market.

>> ^JiggaJonson:

Now, as we know, if the market was not worthy, pharmaceutical businessmen would not get involved with it and essentially let the project die. The logical solution to these huge dilemmas in cost then is to create a larger customer base. All they need now is a furtive way to deliver the virus to a sect of the population that is either expendable and large or rich and small.


Again, you're claiming the current market is free. If it was, people like Salk could enter and compete (much like the gamers in the article above) without retribution from government. What you have today is a limited amount of pharma companies that can compete in the market, and because there's less competition, you have higher prices.

>> ^Ryjkyj:

I don't see where the "market" part comes in. Just the "free" part.


The market is just a system of exchange. Look at my example of Salk above. He developed and released a cure to polio, but today the restrictions on the market makes this kind of charitable action illegal. But in regards to the article specifically, Wash. Univ. opened their system of exchange and asked the online gaming community to help in figuring out a complex structure of an AIDS protein. The exchange was charitable. That's the free market.

Now if there was a regulation against this sort of thing because the online gamers weren't "licensed" for instance, then that would be a restrictive market. Right?

Nevermind the fact that Washington University, the school that created the Foldit program, is a public (that is to say, funded by the state; a.k.a. statist) institution.

Nevermind the fact that healthcare, up until very recently, has been privatized (excluding medicare and medicaid) for a substantial time now; yet the lifetime cost of HIV medications and treatment is roughly $385,000.

Shouldn't free market generic meds have landed in your local Wally World for $5 a month by now? Why is the free market dictating these insane prices where how much you can pay is directly relational to how long you get to live.

Maybe if these drugs were mass produced... but herein lies a new problem: New HIV infections have been reduced by 17% over the past eight years! Urgh that's what you get with big government. Free market thinkers know the bigger your customer base is, the better it is for business, and the consumer therefore is the ultimate winner.

Now, as we know, if the market was not worthy, pharmaceutical businessmen would not get involved with it and essentially let the project die. The logical solution to these huge dilemmas in cost then is to create a larger customer base. All they need now is a furtive way to deliver the virus to a sect of the population that is either expendable and large or rich and small.

What's that little Timmy? Blankfist's bullshit posts give you AIDS of the eyes when you read them? Well it's a start. FREEDOM!

From The Slate Column: "Ron Paul worked in Brazoria County and delivered from 40 to 50 babies a month. His practice refused Medicare and Medicaid payments, and Paul instead worked pro bono, arranged discounted or with custom payment plans for patients in need."

Ron Paul has done something tangible to help people without the means to pay for medical treatment. What has this loudmouth done?

I know he votes against the appropriation. So? He KNOWS the appropriation will never fail, and he will get his funding requests despite his vote. The more principled stance would be to not request the earmarks in the first place. Or to not be a so-called libertarian masquerading as a federal fucking legislator (or is it the other way around?).

You're very in love with Mr. Paul if you can't see the rancid hypocrisy of him actively benefiting from something he vehemently condemns. (It runs in the family too, as his son hates medicaid but loved taking medicaid money from his patients).

And Mr. Paul is the one who says in this very video that spending on FEMA is harmful to the debt. I point out above, like you, that such spending is really miniscule.