A question irrelevant to the issue of gradual change in a direction of socialism.
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Cry of the Sheeple
- Thread starter Adramelek
- Start date
Alceste
Vagabond
Can you explain the basis for your argument that taxes and legislation are "moving in the direction" of public ownership of industries that are currently privately owned a little better? I'm not allowed to drive 150km/h down the highway, or drive drunk, and I have to wear a seatbelt, and I pay a huge amount of tax on gas, but I'm pretty sure the government has no designs on owning my car.
If my explanations haven't worked for you yet, no new ones will either.
Or the explanations are insufficient or inaccurate.
-America is socialistic or 'heading in the direction of socialism' only in the sense that all developed countries, practically by definition, have elements of socialism in their economies. Socialism is often used as a scary word in conservative circles but some of the most prosperous countries in the world are democratic socialists.
-Quantitatively, we do not have a large aspect of socialism. Top tax rates are lower than they have been historically over the last approximate century. Capital gains tax and dividend taxes are low. Citizens don't have universal single payer health care. Citizens don't have free access to higher learning. There is a greater divide of wealth in America than almost any other developed country in the world (with only a few small ones like Singapore rivaling us in that regard).
That really is Trump. Lots of people like him have twitter accounts. Patrick Stewart has a twitter account.
Twitter offers a service to high-profile people where they verify a profile, as shown by the blue and white checkmark on a person's twitter profile. This means that twitter confirms that who they say they are is really who they are.
I don't particularly want red states telling people in blue states what to do with their bodies or who they can marry, but red states keep trying to tell them.
Warren Buffet wants to pay more taxes. He doesn't think it's right that his tax rate is lower than his secretary's tax rate, and lower than the tax rate of anyone else in his office.I will tell you what you never see, someone suggesting we all pay a little more taxes. It's always someone who wants the other guy to get his check cut or program cut or some other person to start paying more taxes.
You hear the politicians say this all the time, "I will not affect your tax bill, I will stick it to the other guy."
Then there is the liberal screaming, I can't afford to pay more taxes, how will I pay to see the latest movie or buy that video game I want? The rich guy can afford it, stick it to him.
Which is no better than saying, lets give the rich man the tax break and cut the poor person's program.
The bottom line is, screw the other guy not me.
If we are ever going to solve this thing it will take a progressive shared sacrifice on every one's part. That idea will be received like a turd in a punch bowl.
I'm in favor of Bush tax-cut expiration which would send my taxes up. Especially my dividend taxes and capital gains taxes.
No....this is a poster specific issue, one best not explored in a thread.
As I've repeatedly said, I don't use "socialism" as a scary word or to denigrate that system in any way here. But there seems to be a
difficulty on the part of lefties to face the view that some leaders advance some policies which move us in that direction. To reiterate,
I use "socialistic" not to describe an economic state, but rather to describe a direction in which a leader or policy would move it.
Think of "socialistic" as a vector with magnitude & direction, but with no specified coordinates.
And this is something which I'm not disputing or even addressing in this thread.
I don't address economic status, but rather the first derivative thereof.
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That's fine as long as it is noted. But then again, you're a libertarian and not a conservative.
Obama is a socialist-leaning vector and first derivative compared to the status quo of Bush. But our overall magnitude of socialism, if you take into account things like top tax rates, dividend and capital gains tax rates, wealth inequality, education, and health care, we're not at our peak of socialism historically and we're rather on the bottom of socialism as far as developed countries go. Top federal tax rates (the biggest argument in politics and the one thing the GOP won't budge on due to the Norquist agreement they mostly all signed) are lower than they mostly have been throughout the 20th century.
But the majority of conservatives I encounter are under the incorrect assumption that Obama and the current state of taxes and regulation are far more liberal and socialistic than anything in this country's history, as though we're hitting some new peak. That he's "extreme". We did hit a peak of federal spending, but research will show that this occurred largely under Bush's last year and was continued by Obama, and that this is an unprecedented economic situation over the last century since the Great Depression.
The majority of Democrats including Obama generally would be fairly happy with a return to Clinton-era tax policies with a few fixes regarding civil liberties, 'free' trade, and the Glass-Steagall act, and folks like Obama are moderate compared to the leaders of the rest of the developed world. Even the progressive caucus, the most liberal elected subset of Congress (aka Bernie Sanders and crew), propose things that are in line with, or slightly to the right of, most other developed countries.
In other words, our left wing is globally and historically moderate and our right wing is globally extreme-right.
That's why my 70+ year old father (yeah he was old when I was born) views Obama and Eisenhower as basically the same person to vote for. Politics drifted right.
How dare you imply that Patric Stewart is anything like Donald Trump! Patrick Steward doesn't walk around with a dead ferret on his head.
I meant that they're both famous, and picked him as someone that people wouldn't generally picture as a "Twitter user". His awesomeness is generally without bounds.fantôme profane;3145537 said:
His twitter profile picture shows him in a vat of plastic balls (much like you'd see in a McDonald's play place), and his latest tweet is "@sallykohn A brilliant progressive voice in the wilderness of Fox News."
somethingNiftyhere
Squadoosh 1@ATime
There's no need to insult dead ferret's here. :areyoucrafantôme profane;3145537 said:
Dirty Penguin
Master Of Ceremony
And most of Americans agree with him....
Long term I think it may lead to another recession but that's if the expiration occurs without cutting various loopholes and deductions. I like Obama's approach better but even then we're still going to have to cut some loopholes and deduction.
No big arguent wit dat!
Any major deficit reduction is going to hurt the economy, but it's like pulling off of a band aid and has to happen at some point. There are messier ways and cleaner ways to do it.
When the government is running trillion dollar deficits, it means the government is basically injecting that much capital into the economy each year. It's spending on military stuff, health care, social security, domestic agencies, unemployment assistance, etc. while not withdrawing the same amount of money in the form of taxes. The upcoming fiscal cliff potentially simultaneously includes expiration of the Bush tax cuts and large spending cuts. This is good for reducing the deficit, but bad for the economy. If it's true that reducing the deficit would put us back into a recession, and it likely is true, then what this means is that that portion of the economy is an illusion to begin with.
Practically ever since 1980, the economy has been party growing due to debt. Before that, the growth was legit, but after that, it's been party fueled by debt, and this eventually has to stop.
In the short term, I think dividend taxes, capital gains taxes, and the top income tax rate should go up back to where they were 10 years ago. Long term, I think we need a much cleaner tax code with few or no loopholes.
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This sounds analogous to violating conservation of mass. Government creates no products (eg, crops, shoes, bacon).....except perhaps
license plates, so whatever it injects into the economy is taken by taxation, borrowing, or printing currency. The first 2 items injected
are acquired by removing them from the economy. The last (fiat currency) is taken from us all by lowering the value of dollars we have.
Now, this is not to say that we don't get value by having government performing useful functions (eg, cops, courts, consulates).
But let's not fool ourselves into thinking that money spent is without cost.
As well the privately owned federal reserve (private banking families) charges the government (ie, US-we the peoples' tax dollars) for the privilidge of using- (borrowing the use of) 'their' money. ie we pay interest on 'the money' straight from the running gate. To private families/citizens/'bankers'. It's mind blowing. (<my opinion)
Many people don't know this.
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Time for a Patrick Stewart interlude.....fantôme profane;3145537 said:
[youtube]Fg_cwI1Xj4M[/youtube]
Patrick Stewart on Extras - YouTube
It's not violated. It's conserved in this case because deficits lead to increases in debt as a percentage of GDP, which breaks the system eventually. That's why it has to stop. The system is tapping into money from outside the system.
Government doesn't create products but here is what they do:
-They pay for defense. This mean's soldiers' pay, and they can go spend it on houses and products and services and so forth. This also means defense contractor pay, and those employees can go spend it on houses and products and services, etc.
-They pay for medicare and medicaid. This means money that's injected into the health care system, into the salaries of medical professionals that can spend it on houses and products and services. This also means pay for the engineers that make the equipment, and they can spend it on houses, products, services.
-They pay for social security. That's money that people spend on houses, products, and services.
-They pay for domestic programs. Department of Transportation and things like that. They pay federal employees, who can spend money on houses, products, and services. They also pay contractors and makers of heavy equipment, and all of those various employees go spend their money on houses, products, and services.
Ideally this would be balanced: the government would take in taxes and then pay for things that are considered valuable. But since 1980 or so (the year that debt as a percentage of GDP began its upward rise), this has not been the case. Instead, government has been running deficits. Meaning the government is injecting more money than they're taking out. If this were immediately pulled away, the economy would suffer because taxes would go up and government spending would go down. Over $1 trillion per year would no longer be injected into the $15 trillion per year economy.
But the obvious downside of such a system is that debt is accumulating on the federal balance sheet. Debt as a percentage of GDP is rising, and it's not sustainable.
On temporary terms, the government can spend more money than it takes in. But it should be offset by surpluses in other years.
I didn't say it was without cost.
I don't think you read my post properly Rev because I was describing the deficit and capital injections in negative terms- things that have to stop at some point.
Balanced Budget Amendment anyone? Hell Fire, we have not even had a budget for the last few years. 
This is somewhat true over the short run with money borrowed from foreign sources. But unless we default on the loans (either directly or by
currency inflation), it's paid back, & there is no net injection of capital. (No wonder the Chinese complain about our profligate spending, eh?)
This exactly comports with the point I was making about government being (ideally) useful. But these services generally (a few isolated
exceptions) still result in no net injection of capital, since the capital is taken from the private sector. Typically, they just redistribute
what's available after covering overhead. Now this would be different if we plundered our vanquished foes instead of lavishing fortunes
upon them after lavishing bombs upon them.
To say that pulling away from providing non-essential gov services is an untestable theory. To do so
would have the advantage of freeing up capital in the private sector, which we desperately need.
Woo hoo! You are a fellow balanced budge type!
You definitely did not. But to recognize the costs calls into question the net amount of money injected.
It's my fault for ignoring areas where we agree. I take your reasonableness for granted, & am lazy in fully responding.
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