Meet your new thread, same as the old thread.

[SlaveNoMore]

Greedy,Greedy,Greedy
Take Ron Paul, for instance. It's not just "I got mine"; it's also "We whites got ours". It's not just about greed.

Are you paying attention Do you not realize that most Paul supporters are young, moronic, "disenfranchised" leftists?

Here in SF, for instance, they are almost exclusively Berkeley types who (i) would normally either sit out an election entirely or vote for some other nutjob like Lyndon Larouche and (ii) have nothing whatsoever to do with the Republican party.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally posted by sebastian_dangerfield
Is there any piece of low hanging fruit you won't grab? I mean, really, do you honestly think Paul's a racist? No, you don't. But you're happy to try to confuse the fact that he has some loathsome folowers with the man's message. Do you think you can pull off that cheap confusion, even in jest, on a board full of fucking lawyers?

At best, he actively encourages the troglodyte followers. At worst, he embraces many of their views.

Unless, of course, you objectively believe that 95% of all black men in D.C. have criminal tendancies. Or think freeing the slaves wasn't that positive a thing.

But, yeah, on this board, the softballs need to be hit.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally posted by SlaveNoMore
Are you paying attention Do you not realize that most Paul supporters are young, moronic, "disenfranchised" leftists?

Here in SF, for instance, they are almost exclusively Berkeley types who (i) would normally either sit out an election entirely or vote for some other nutjob like Lyndon Larouche and (ii) have nothing whatsoever to do with the Republican party.

OK, so who do you blame Huckabee on? Or Romney?

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy
At best, he actively encourages the troglodyte followers. At worst, he embraces many of their views.

Unless, of course, you objectively believe that 95% of all black men in D.C. have criminal tendancies. Or think freeing the slaves wasn't that positive a thing.

But, yeah, on this board, the softballs need to be hit.

Dennis Kucinich's poll numbers track Ron Paul's favorably. Of course, when Slave or someone else here posts shit he says "we are focusing on some irrelevant extreme.

You should go find some David Duke stuff to post next week.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
Dennis Kucinich's poll numbers track Ron Paul's favorably. Of course, when Slave or someone else here posts shit he says "we are focusing on some irrelevant extreme.

You should go find some David Duke stuff to post next week.

Find me a poll where DK is north of 5%; Ron Paul is showing up as high as 10%, and is topping Fruitcake in Iowa polls. While I suspect he'll fade a bit and end up around 5th in Iowa, he conceivably could go as high as third.

I hope you Rs are not quite as batshit crazy as current poll numbers suggest, but let's revisit the discussion this time tomorrow.

[taxwonk]

Originally posted by sebastian_dangerfield
Personally, your experience is obviously pretty fucking limited. I'm more than willing to allow certain minimal safety nets for people.

And by the way, what exactly is wrong with wanting to keep what you have? Do you think we live in a world where the aim is wealth parity? Do you think that's anything but absurd given what we know from thousands of years of exeperience with human nature? From the reality that we live in a Darwinian world?

What I do have I intend to keep, and that's not greedy in the least. It's fucking rational. My first allegiance is to the people closest to me. Do you offer the govt more money than you're taxed every year? Do you eschew aggressive tax strategies that preserve your family' wealth? Of course you don't. You'd be an idiot to do that.

You have a lot of stones to make a comment like that, and what's really amazing is you live in one of the biggest glass houses. If people didn't want to keep their money you'd be sweeping floors.

I don't think there is anything per se wrong with wanting to keep what you have. My objection is the people who pay $20,000 a year to put a kid in private school, but vote against a $250 increase in their property tax bill to pay for building a public school.

I think that people, especially people who are born white, middle-class, and professionally trained, who speak of Darwin as a social construct are trying to foool themselves, because they certainly aren't fooling anyone with intelligence. I don't pay more to the gov't than my taxes as due, but I also don't favor taxing dividends and capital gains more favorably than the wages of honest labor.

I don't counsel my clients to take overly-aggressive stances regarding taxes. I follow the law, much like I assume you do. And I think you've got a lot of stones to suggest otherwise.

[taxwonk]

Originally posted by SlaveNoMore
Is there something inherently wrong with wanting to keep what one has?

One thing you "has" is an Army, doing what you have asserted all over this board is the right thing. Is there something inherently wrong about not being willing to pay for it?

[taxwonk]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
Dennis Kucinich's poll numbers track Ron Paul's favorably. Of course, when Slave or someone else here posts shit he says "we are focusing on some irrelevant extreme.

You should go find some David Duke stuff to post next week.

I'll give you Kucinich. And Edwards. I think they're both idiots. And if either one of them were pulliing the same kind of numbers Paul is, I'd be as afraid of their supporters, too.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by taxwonk
I don't think there is anything per se wrong with wanting to keep what you have. My objection is the people who pay $20,000 a year to put a kid in private school, but vote against a $250 increase in their property tax bill to pay for building a public school.

I think that people, especially people who are born white, middle-class, and professionally trained, who speak of Darwin as a social construct are trying to foool themselves, because they certainly aren't fooling anyone with intelligence. I don't pay more to the gov't than my taxes as due, but I also don't favor taxing dividends and capital gains more favorably than the wages of honest labor.

I don't counsel my clients to take overly-aggressive stances regarding taxes. I follow the law, much like I assume you do. And I think you've got a lot of stones to suggest otherwise.

In order:

1. I agree with you there. Under that limited hypo, that is greedy.

2. I think people who are born white, middle class and favor wealth redistribution are irrational, and suffering undiagnosed a self-loathing or guilt of some kind I've happily avoided. I also think gains on money already taxed once should be taxed at a discount rate. I do NOT agree with the current taxation of carried interest that Scwartzman and his industry are exploiting. That's a gain on someone else's money. But I do think the gains he makes on his own money which is pooled with the funds of others should be taxed at a lower rate. That's just fair.

By the way, what's "honest" labor? Are your capital gains dishonest? Were your granparents' CSX dividends the fruits of chicancery? Is your 401K a fraud device? And if that's dishonest, what about interest? Are banks dishonestly charging that? Nobody toils in the mines for those monthly interest payments on loans. I guess that's just more dishonest money being made off other money.

3. I didn't say you violated the law. Aggressive and illegal are not synonyms. If they are in your industry, excuse my ignorance on that.

BTW, you know I like you. We just really don't see eye to eye on this.

[SlaveNoMore]

Greedy,Greedy,Greedy
Find me a poll where DK is north of 5%; Ron Paul is showing up as high as 10%, and is topping Fruitcake in Iowa polls. While I suspect he'll fade a bit and end up around 5th in Iowa, he conceivably could go as high as third.

I hope you Rs are not quite as batshit crazy as current poll numbers suggest, but let's revisit the discussion this time tomorrow.

You really are disconnected from all reality.

Ron Paul's supporters have spammed every poll, every chart, every blog - hell, everything - to make his numbers appear high.

Say what you will about the "unibomber" set - they know how to scam mass media.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by taxwonk
One thing you "has" is an Army, doing what you have asserted all over this board is the right thing. Is there something inherently wrong about not being willing to pay for it?

Not me, brother. I'd never have sent them into Iraq, and I am ashamed at how they're paid. Every bit of pork should be abolished and given to them. They ought to be paid as much as our economy will bear. I can't think of a higher risk premium deserving a better return. That filth like Ted Stevens can lard up bills with billions in pork while soldiers don't have the right fucking armor and are losing their houses and jobs because of a war a pack of bought and paid for degenerates supported makes me want to vomit.

I'm not against paying a fair share of taxes. I'm just against paying them to the people in DC. If I could pay my taxes directly to soldiers but it would cost me a few thousand more I'd sign up tomorrow and happily write the check.

[SlaveNoMore]

taxwonk
I'll give you Kucinich. And Edwards. I think they're both idiots. And if either one of them were pulliing the same kind of numbers Paul is, I'd be as afraid of their supporters, too.

Uh, Edwards is running second in Iowa - close to first.

http://www.reuters.com/article/newsO...64367920080103

PS - the most important line in that article is that "only 250,000 Iowans are expected to vote"

Repeat that again, and think about the disproportionate power a few Big 10 corn farmers have on the political discourse in this country. Utterly disgusting.

[SlaveNoMore]

Greedy,Greedy,Greedy
OK, so who do you blame Huckabee on? Or Romney?

Huckabee is yet another smiley, centrist from Arkansas. I thought the Democrat party loved smiley, centrists from Arkansas?

What's generally wrong with Romney? Although I'm a Rudy guy, I'd damn well trust the founder of Bain Capital over a no-experience, empty suit like Obama or [pick an adjective] like Hillary.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by taxwonk
I'll give you Kucinich. And Edwards. I think they're both idiots. And if either one of them were pulliing the same kind of numbers Paul is, I'd be as afraid of their supporters, too.

Uh, read a lot of what you've written today, then Google some of Edwards' "Two Americas" stuff. Perhaps it's an inability to draw the nuanced differences between your positions in a rapid fire medium like this, but what you've argued today and what he argues look pretty similar.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by SlaveNoMore
Huckabee is yet another smiley, centrist from Arkansas. I thought the Democrat party loved smiley, centrists from Arkansas?

What's generally wrong with Romney? Although I'm a Rudy guy, I'd damn well trust the founder of Bain Capital over a no-experience, empty suit like Obama or [pick an adjective] like Hillary.

Romney's a robot. He's a soulless shitbag who doesn't have the balls to stick by a single conviction. David Brooks destroyed him in a Times editorial this week that said it all:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/01/op...=1&oref=slogin

Yes, I'd vote for him, but only as a last resort. They're all scumbags, but even Hillary and Rudy have the decency to stand by some of their core beliefs.