Meet your new thread, same as the old thread.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy
How did I get stuck being a Taurus liberal?

Principles.

[Replaced_Texan]

Originally posted by sebastian_dangerfield
As the limousine liberals of the Democratic Party show with glaring examples daily.

What, exactly, is wrong with having money and also being liberal?

ETA: Ty has my proxy...

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by sebastian_dangerfield
As the limousine liberals of the Democratic Party show with glaring examples daily.

I don't understand how you got on your high horse so quickly. Someone like Robert Rubin, who is filthy rich but who advocates higher taxes, clearly believes in things that, if enacted, would cost him money. There's no hypocrisy or convenience there. So what's the problem?

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Secret_Agent_Man
I don't know about that. You seem to be presuming he believes the argument and considers it a winner. I'd tend to think he was looking for positions that are at least facially legally defensible, because any dispute (even when it finally went public) would likely not get resolved until after he was out of office. So, he will have succeeded in his principal goal -- historical secrecy as to what HE did -- even though future VP's go back to normal procedures.

At this point it should be clear that Cheney can do whatever the fuck he wants, because the only person who can tell him otherwise is Bush, and Bush isn't going to. Though I appreciate the spirit in which that guy at the Archives tried to do his job.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
But if you have lot of money, you can buy really good principles.

If you have a lot of money, you make other people pay for your principles.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy
How did I get stuck being a Taurus liberal?

By living in taxachussetts.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
I don't understand how you got on your high horse so quickly. Someone like Robert Rubin, who is filthy rich but who advocates higher taxes, clearly believes in things that, if enacted, would cost him money. There's no hypocrisy or convenience there. So what's the problem?

It's easy to believe in high taxes when you have so much money that it doesn't really affect your material well being when the tax man cometh several times.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by Replaced_Texan
What, exactly, is wrong with having money and also being liberal?

ETA: Ty has my proxy...

Nothing. The problem is, most of them are clueless imbeciles who get their politics from Ralph Nader or Paul Krugman. Accountants and planners and agents handle their finances and they have no clue about how the absurd govt programs they advocate or radical plans they get behind work or impact people not in their limited airspace.

Robert Rubin is not a limousine liberal. And if you look closely at what he advocates, it is far less naive and radical than anything you'll hear from Rob Reiner or Barbara Streisand or Leo DiCaprio.

It's real easy to say "we should all give back a lot more" when you're getting $5 mil a picture.

The only smart limousine liberals I see out there in the political sphere are Bloomberg and Schwarzenegger. I'd vote for either tomorrow because I think they both have the business acumen necessary to recognize the impact of govt policies instead of getting trippedup by the ignorance and self righteousness that tends to define the classic limousine liberal.

Ted Kennedy's a great example of a limousine liberal. The man's an idiot. The only thing he's been right about is immigration.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
I don't understand how you got on your high horse so quickly. Someone like Robert Rubin, who is filthy rich but who advocates higher taxes, clearly believes in things that, if enacted, would cost him money. There's no hypocrisy or convenience there. So what's the problem?

None. I like Rubin and respect his positions. He has backed up his argument against tax cuts with much evidence.

But then, economists are almost by definition more wrong than they're ever right. It's a science akin to betting on baseball.

When I say limousine liberal I mean the annoying jackass executive's wife who'll sit across from me at dinner and chide me for voting with my pocketbook. True ardent liberals are driven by ideology, and their ideology is that we should have fairness in society. They never know when to stop with their interferences, which makes a person interested most in individual liberty very fucking queasy. I don't trust them, even if I'm with them 100% on their social policies. They want a National Mommy. I'd rather let survival of the fitest play out. Neither of us is Right or Wrong, but they seem to like to claim moral superiority a lot, which is really fucking annoying.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
It's easy to believe in high taxes when you have so much money that it doesn't really affect your material well being when the tax man cometh several times.

And yet so many rich people oppose high taxes! A conundrum!

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
It's easy to believe in high taxes when you have so much money that it doesn't really affect your material well being when the tax man cometh several times.

I just left an accountant's office. I had to run numbers in my head to figure out all the different risks I was taking with the IRS. How annoying.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by sebastian_dangerfield
None. I like Rubin and respect his positions. He has backed up his argument against tax cuts with much evidence.

But then, economists are almost by definition more wrong than they're ever right. It's a science akin to betting on baseball.

When I say limousine liberal I mean the annoying jackass executive's wife who'll sit across from me at dinner and chide me for voting with my pocketbook. True ardent liberals are driven by ideology, and their ideology is that we should have fairness in society. They never know when to stop with their interferences, which makes a person interested most in individual liberty very fucking queasy. I don't trust them, even if I'm with them 100% on their social policies. They want a National Mommy. I'd rather let survival of the fitest play out. Neither of us is Right or Wrong, but they seem to like to claim moral superiority a lot, which is really fucking annoying.

I gather that any ideology bothers you, as opposed to the clarity and honesty of voting one's own self-interest.

But when you go off on limousine liberals, I gather that the only way in which wealth factors in is that you meet these people in social situations in which you can't tell them to fuck off. I mean, if you encounter a homeless person or a Target cashier with the same views, from what you've said those views should be no less obnoxious, but they don't irk you in those circumstances.

Unless your point is that in those circumstances, liberalism is nothing more than redistributionist self-interest, and then you applaud those folks for looking out for themselves.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
And yet so many rich people oppose high taxes! A conundrum!

A fair criticism. How much do some people need? When I see the hyper-rich gaming the system to keep the difference between $30 and $30.25 million in yearly income, I have to wonder WTF these people are thinking.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by sebastian_dangerfield
I just left an accountant's office. I had to run numbers in my head to figure out all the different risks I was taking with the IRS. How annoying.

It's all those principled Ds and Rs in Washington who gum up the tax code with special exemptions and credits.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
And yet so many rich people oppose high taxes! A conundrum!

that's my favorite screw top wine.