"the GOP would win easily."
Your opinion varies diametrically with a majority of Americans:
"Americans are increasingly downcast about the state of the economy."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...v=most_emailed
Of course, if you're part of the super-rich, you're very happy about your tax cuts, and basically don't care about the economy. or a job, because "you've got yours" so well you can buy anything you want.
166,000 jobs without health insurance, paid sick days, or retirement benefits. yay.
well they better be putting together an IRA because we don't to support their asses when they retire. they also better pay for their healthcare because they shouldn't expect their govt to be there for them.
Gee I had a couple myself this afternoon, but you post
doesn't make much sense.
you don't get it ray? i am playing a happy conservative republican..
Good advice.
I just think Bush has f----d up Iraq so badly that people will find fault in everything else he touches.
'will find fault in everything else he touches."
... because there is fault in everything dubya has touch. Inverse Midas touch.
I don't think Iraq is as ed up as you think.
Funny because it is true.well they better be putting together an IRA because we don't to support their asses when they retire. they also better pay for their healthcare because they shouldn't expect their govt to be there for them.
No right. Homeboy needs to quit buying HDTVs and put some money into an IRA.
90% of kids these days don't understand that 40 years of compounded interest in a rothIRA THAT THE GOVERNMENT CAN'T TOUCH > financing those 22" rims on your 300c Bentley wannabe.
Let the economy turn to ...some people are able to make most of their money during these times.
I'm sure Hillary will save the economy LOLIf increasing taxes and attacking the upper class while you really hurt the middle class doesn't fix it...I don't know what will.
One day it'll just be upper class and lower class. Those who were smart and adapted...and those who will rely on the government for everything.
Last edited by Walter Craparita; 11-05-2007 at 08:12 PM.
That sums up EVERYBODY Boutons, and that is the point.
Everyone is self-interested, and can't see much beyond their own pocketbook. That's why socialism is a drag on an economy, and why it will always, eventually, doom one.
"socialism"
what is that? and how is America socialist? and why is socialism bad?
aka, I'm calling your bluff as all y'all spew right-wing straw-man words and code phrases
Last edited by boutons_; 11-06-2007 at 11:21 AM.
Socialism, according to Webster:
Socialism isn't bad per se. The problem with socialism is it does not give an INDIVIDUAL the ability to fully reap the rewards of his or her own fortune or work. It does not provide enough incintive to self-interested people to be productive; therefore production suffers. The vast majority of people are motivated not by the common good, but by personal gain. As a major proponent and believer in evolution, I would think you would recognize this truism.any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods
So, the more the government, or society, takes of a person's fruits, the more that person will be disinclined to produce more fruit. Couple that with the general wastefulness of beuracratic organizations and resources, and you have a compound problem of economic stagnation and inefficiency.
There are obviously thresholds at work in this, and the production changes might be subtle; but at the extremes, the results are OBVIOUS.
In fact, Boutons, your own arguments support what I am saying.
The economic news looks good, yet most people claim that they don't think the economy is good because of THEIR OWN CIR STANCES! They can't see beyond the nose at the end of their face.
So they sit around and about the president or the government, or some outside factor that is keeping them down! What would happen if they were told (or simply realized) that NOTHING WAS GOING TO CHANGE, THAT THEIR LOT IN LIFE WILL NOT IMPROVE UNTIL THEY DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT THEMSELVES? I bet more than is happening waiting for the president to be swapped out, and for the government to magically make them change places with that doctor down the street (or I guess as a conciliation prize, we can just make the doctor sell his Lexus; that'll make us feel better .
Maybe if you told him the "Grasshopper and the Ant" story, he'd better understand.
Or, he could rent "A Bug's Life."
Yay, new jobs. Who gives a ?
The bigger concern is the fact the dollar is on its way to being worth about as much as a peso, and our government (that means both sides of the aisle) isn't doing to address it, just printing more money, lowering the prime interest rate, and bailing out people with credit problems.
It's really going to suck when the credit bubble finally bursts, it may make the Great Depression look like a bump in the road.
This is fact.
Buy Euros
"isn't doing "
maybe the $'s value is out of the hands of the US govt?
Lowering interest to prop up the scamming financial industry doesn't help the $ value.
US exports are cheaper, and foreign investors are pouring many $Bs into USA.
The situation is very complex. Bogus "pride" in a "strong $" doesn't help.
That was a sidetrack, B. I thought we were talking about the merits of Socialism. You accused me of setting up a straw man, I proved you were full of crap....you're next.
No mention of "services"? (Health Care)
The problem with this line of thinking is it wrongly ascribes artifice to governments and the instict for the common good even while you ascribes "nature" to free trade and self interest. If people were really as completely self interested and as you claim, governments, societies, even family units wouldn't exist.
Here's a crazy, heretical idea...maybe the psychological makeup of human beings are a little more complicated than your cloistered economics professor thinks they are. Maybe humans exhibit a variety of insticts, many of which seem to contradict each other. Maybe animals with instincts that drive them to work together socially have an evolutionary advantage.
I would say those would be included
I didn't start from the psychological as you suggest; I used the evidence of the extreme economic structures that have existed in the past 200 years. We have had nearly unabashed, unabated, dog-eat-dog capitilism, replete with sweat shops and child labor; and we have had total government control of the means of production, the distribution of wealth, and the ownership of property. The relative economic, and innovative success of those two ideologies, in practice, led me to the conclusion I have drawn. If you see some other conclusion there, let me know.
LOL. Got my degree 20 years ago, and NEVER took an economics course. From a cloistered professor or otherwise. Enlightened self-interest certainly exists, and our brains are certainly capable of understanding the necessity of community, government, and beyond. However, as a motivator to generate economic gain and "progress"; nothing is better than greed.
wikipedia:
"Socialism refers to a broad array of doctrines or political movements that visualize a socio-economic system in which property and the distribution of wealth are subject to control by the community for the purposes of increasing social and economic equality and cooperation."
... or the dictionary definition,
is what we have in USA?
is what the Dems are proposing?
Of course not, socialism is just another slime term spewed at non-right-wingers to confuse, over-simplify, polarize, inflame.
btw, if you want an example of confiscatory socialism, google for the US govt attempt to confiscate millions of acres of private property in Colorado, to feed the Army monster.
That's a GOOD example of government control run amok. Thank you. We agree that Socialim is generally NOT something that we would want to work toward. It will bring more of the same.
Exactly, and what the democrats want more of.
Think about who has to pay for all these programs they want to "help the people" with! Us, that right, the tax payers. Don't be fooled by where they get the taxes from. In the end, consumers pay for the tax hikes.
How many social programs has Hillary proposed? How many programs have the republican candidates proposed? How many has president Bush proposed? There is a vast difference.
Real per capital income (the true measure of the standard of living) is down since Bush took office, but this is somehow a victory?
Who is going to pay to help all the home owners who screwed up and bought a home with a ARM and Bush wants to help out?
There are currently 1 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 1 guests)
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
