REAL WORLD EVENT DISCUSSIONS

Double-dip recession

POSTED BY: SIGNYM
UPDATED: Tuesday, August 31, 2010 13:09
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Friday, August 27, 2010 12:17 PM

MINCINGBEAST


Quote:
Originally posted by Bytemite:
Quote:

He's a murderer, a liar, and a patsy of people with power and money, just like all the others. But hey, I hear that he's working on some bills now that will allow Comcast and a couple other companies to divide up the internet like a couple conquerers over their spoils. Seeing as these companies had no qualms whatsoever turning over private information for the patriot act, which Obama did not repeal, absolutely nothing can go wrong ever.

It might be time to consider feeling alienated. No one in office from either party has the interests of the American people at heart. No one running for office from either party has the interests of the American people at heart. It is my objective assessment we've handed over control of our lives long ago, and that the future is royally boned.


Is that a hint of nihilism, or just alienation? Alienation loses its buzz by adolescence; then you need stronger stuff to bum out.

"We've" never had control of our lives, ever, and the future has always been as royally boned as the past. Life continues, anyway, and people hope, and fail, and die, and none of it means a damned thing (quoth Mal).

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Friday, August 27, 2010 1:00 PM

BYTEMITE


In fairness, now that I think about it, I'm not sure it's Obama who's working on the Comcast bill. But the rest applies.

I'm not quite to nihilism, yet. Just alienation.

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Friday, August 27, 2010 2:04 PM

TWO

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly


Quote:
Originally posted by Bytemite:
In fairness, now that I think about it, I'm not sure it's Obama who's working on the Comcast bill. But the rest applies.

I'm not quite to nihilism, yet. Just alienation.
An explanation for Bytemite of why Obama is bad and may get his ass kicked in November. It's only 1600 words.

Ethnic Exploitation of Economic Insecurity
by Glenn Greenwald
That crisis presented a huge opportunity for Obama and the Democrats to bring about real change in Washington -- the central promise of his campaign -- by capitalizing on (and becoming the voice of) populist anger and using it to wrestle away control from Wall Street and other financial and corporate elites who control Washington. Had they done so, they would have been champions of populist rage rather than its prime targets. But, as John Judis argues in his excellent New Republic piece, they completely squandered that opportunity. Rather than emphatically stand up to the bankers and other oligarchical thieves, they coddled and served them, and thus became the face of the elite interests oppressing ordinary Americans rather than their foes. How can an administration represented by Tim Geithner and Larry Summers -- and which specializes in an endless stream of secret deals with corporate lobbyists and sustains itself with Wall Street funding -- possibly maintain any pretense of populist support or changing how Washington works? It can't.

There are few more bitter ironies than watching the Republican Party -- controlled at its core by the very business interests responsible for the country's vast and growing inequality; responsible for massive transfers of wealth to the richest; and which presided over and enabled the economic collapse -- now become the beneficiaries of middle-class and lower-middle-class economic insecurity. But the Democratic Party's failure/refusal/inability to be anything other than the Party of Tim Geithner -- continuing America's endless, draining Wars while plotting to cut Social Security, one of the few remaining guarantors of a humane standard of living -- renders them unable to offer answers to angry, anxious, resentful Americans. As has happened countless times in countless places, those answers are now being provided instead by a group of self-serving, hateful extremist leaders eager to exploit that anger for their own twisted financial and political ends. And it seems to be working.
www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/08/27/krauthammer

The Unnecessary Fall - A Counter-History of the Obama Presidency.
John B. Judis August 12, 2010

Contrast Obama’s attempt to develop a politics to justify his economic program with what Reagan did in 1982. Faced with steadily rising unemployment, which went from 8.6 percent in January to 10.4 percent in November, Reagan and his political staff, which included James Baker, Mike Deaver, and Ed Rollins, forged a strategy early that year calling for voters to “stay the course” and blaming the current economic troubles on Democratic profligacy. “We are clearing away the economic wreckage that was dumped in our laps,” Reagan declared. Democrats accused them of playing “the blame game,” but the strategy, followed to the letter by the White House for ten months, worked. The Republicans were predicted to lose as many as 50 House seats, but they lost only 26 and broke even in the Senate.

Some commentators have noted Reagan’s popularity was even lower than Obama’s. But, on key economic questions, he did much better than Obama and the Democrats are currently performing–and voters expressed far greater patience with Reagan’s program. According to polls, even as the unemployment rate climbed, a narrow plurality still expressed confidence that Reagan’s program would help the economy. On the eve of the election, with the unemployment rate at a postwar high, a New York Times/CBS News poll found that 60 percent of likely voters thought Reagan’s economic program would eventually help the country. That’s a sign of a successful political operation. If Obama could command those numbers, Democrats could seriously limit their losses in November. But Obama has not been able to develop a narrative that could convince people to trust him and the Democrats.

Why has the White House failed to convince the public that it is fighting effectively on its behalf? The principal culprit is clearly Barack Obama. He has a strange aversion to confrontational politics. His aversion is strange because he was schooled in it, working as a community organizer in the 1980s, under the tutelage of activists who subscribed to teachings of the radical Saul Alinsky. But, when Obama departed for Harvard Law School in 1988, he left Alinsky and adversarial tactics behind.

The young lawyer who returned to Chicago and won a seat in the Illinois state Senate in 1996 practiced a very different style of politics. Obama’s principal accomplishments in Springfield were bills restricting lobbying and requiring videotaping of confessions in potential death penalty cases. He was not a typical blue-collar, bread-and-butter Chicago Democrat, but the kind of good government liberal that represents the upscale districts of the city, seeing in politics a higher calling and ill at ease with (although not in open opposition to) the city’s Democratic machine. He was also a post-racial politician who eschewed the hard-edged, angry rhetoric of Jesse Jackson. (That, too, is oddly reminiscent of Carter, who partly campaigned in 1976 as the white Southern antidote to George Wallace’s angry racial populism.)

Obama carried this outlook into the U.S. Senate, into his campaign for the presidency, and then, into the presidency itself. He is a cerebral, dispassionate, post-partisan; he wants to “end the political strategy that has been based on division,” to “turn the page” on the culture wars of the 1960s and the partisan battles of the 1990s. During the campaign, his aides jokingly referred to him as the “black Jesus.” While he can tolerate and even brush aside conflict, he is reluctant to actively foment it. “In a time of crisis, we can’t afford to govern out of anger,” he declared in February 2009. During his campaign and his first year in office, he held to a blind faith in bipartisanship, even as the Republicans voted as a bloc against his legislation. He is, perhaps, ill-suited in these respects for an era of bruising political warfare.

His advisers have clearly reinforced these inclinations. In the campaign, they fashioned him as the outsider candidate of “hope” and “change” and have extended this strategy into the presidency itself. They see him as standing above party. In a meeting with congressional leaders last April, senior adviser David Axelrod rejected the complaint that Obama accorded equal blame to Democrats and Republicans with his descriptions of the “cynical politics in Washington.” Within the White House, top aides still speak of promoting the Obama “brand.” Organizing for America, the administration’s campaign organization, which is supposed to be focusing on the 2010 elections, recently devoted its resources to organizing parties across the country to celebrate Obama’s forty-ninth birthday.

These efforts to elevate Obama above the hurly-burly of Washington politics have been disastrous. Obama’s image as an iconic outsider has become the screen on which Fox News, the Tea Party, radical right bloggers, and assorted politicians have projected the image of him as a foreigner, an Islamic radical, and a socialist. He has remained “the other” that he aspired to be during the campaign, but he and his advisers no longer control how that otherness is defined.

The White House and cabinet officials he appointed have reinforced his aversion to populism. As Jonathan Alter recounts in The Promise: President Obama, Year One, Geithner and Summers repeatedly blocked attempts to get tough on Wall Street on the grounds that doing so would threaten the recovery itself by upsetting the bankers. For most of his first year, Alter writes, “Obama bought the Geithner-Summers argument that the banks were fragile and couldn’t be confronted while they remained in peril.” Its reluctance to come down on the bankers crippled the administration politically, making it far more difficult for it to get its way with Congress on a second stimulus program that would have boosted the recovery and Democrats’ political prospects. Bad politics can trump good policy.

Populism has profound shortcomings as a worldview. It tends toward demagoguery. In its relentless focus on the middle class, it can ignore or stigmatize those below it. It can prove hostile to a long-range scientific outlook. A more populist Obama, for instance, might have postponed the battle for climate change legislation or national health insurance and probably would have taken a weaker stand on immigration. But populism has been an indelible part of the American political psyche, and those who are uncomfortable making populist appeals, like Hoover or Carter–or, more recently, presidential candidate John Kerry–suffer the consequences at the polls.

If Obama’s politics leads to a Republican takeover of one or both houses of Congress, and even to a Republican president in 2012, then much of what Obama has accomplished could be undone. It’s unlikely that a new Republican president and Congress would actually repeal the health care or the financial reform bill. But the former could be starved of public funds and deprived of regulatory oversight; and the latter could be neutered by a hostile treasury secretary and by weak or hostile presidential appointees to the Securities and Exchange Commission or the new Consumer Financial Protection Agency. Reform legislation needs administrations and congresses committed to reform. That is where politics has to come in; and that’s where the Obama administration, with its aversion to populism, has fallen short.

John B. Judis is a senior editor of The New Republic and a visiting scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

The Joss Whedon script for "Serenity", where Wash lives, is
Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/two

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Friday, August 27, 2010 3:46 PM

BYTEMITE


Hmm. I think I want to check out the sources who wrote those articles before I say much.

The second one reads to me as a reasons why Obama's popularity dropped, without addressing the feasibility of his policies. I'm not prepared to address the feasibility of ALL of his policies, though there's a couple of big ones I'm annoyed about.

We really can't do much good in the Middle East until we work out a fair peace deal between Israel and the surrounding nations and get BOTH sides to stop trying to kill each other. I want to see more effort made towards this. I see us really as just mucking things up and getting people killed over there right now.

Second, the PATRIOT act. Very pissed off about this, and it still being around.

Misgivings about the clause in the healthcare bill making insurance mandatory for everyone. I don't particularly like mandatory auto insurance, so of course I'm going to hate that.

Economy, didn't like the bail-outs. The insurance companies and banks that got bail-outs did put a freeze on things, but considering the bonuses they gave out to the execs after that, and how fast they reportedly paid the debt... I don't know. Clearly Fanny Mae was a goner, but I'm not sure about the others, that they weren't just ripping us all off.

There's a few more, but those are the big ones.

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Friday, August 27, 2010 3:58 PM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important


"I don't know. Clearly Freddy Mae was a goner, but I'm not sure about the others, that they weren't just ripping us all off."

Hello,

I can tell you with confidence that the financial institution I work for did NOT need those funds. I can also tell you that the government felt very strongly about giving them the funds anyway. So they took the money, and OF COURSE they found something to do with it.

Wouldn't you?

The whole bailout was maddening.

--Anthony

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Friday, August 27, 2010 4:09 PM

KWICKO

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." -- William Casey, Reagan's presidential campaign manager & CIA Director (from first staff meeting in 1981)


Quote:
The whole bailout was maddening.


Especially how much blame Obama seems to get for the TARP program which was committed by Dubya...

AURaptor's Greatest Hits:

Friday, May 28, 2010 - 20:32 To AnthonyT:
Go fuck yourself.
On this matter, make no mistake. I want you to go fuck yourself long and hard, as well as anyone who agrees with you. I got no use for you.

Friday, May 28, 2010 - 18:26 To President Obama:
Mr. President, you're a god damn, mother fucking liar.
Fuck you, you cock sucking community activist piece of shit.
... go fuck yourself, Mr. President.

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Friday, August 27, 2010 4:12 PM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important


Hello,

He gets no blame from me for starting it.

But I do blame him for continuing it. Kind of like continuing the Patriot Act. Kind of like continuing the Wars.

The man was dirty the moment he decided not to wash his hands of that nonsense.

The only stimulus program I had any appreciation for was the clunker thing, and it was the one program the Republicans had the most fun tearing into.

--Anthony

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Friday, August 27, 2010 4:15 PM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/01/15/tarp-vote-obama-wins-350_n_15
8292.html

Hello,

And there's this. He wanted the thing. A lot. So not only did he fail to wash his hands...

He originated some of the dirt.

--Anthony

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Friday, August 27, 2010 4:42 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


TONY
Quote:
You do realize when you say things like "Tax these particular people more" and "raid insurance companies for money" that you sound like a thief, right?
Do you realize that when people say "make a profit from people's ill health" and "charge what the market will bear" THEY sound like thieves?

Of course you don't realize it, because it's expected, it's the norm for YOU. People have NO right to represent their interests. Only corporations do. So any talk of increasing taxes on the rich is .. wow, you react with a frisson of fear. Talk of real regulation or even (GASP!) competition by the government in the health-care arena elicits the same reaction. It's just so far out of the norm... for you... that you don't realize taxes are the exact equivalent of what companies are doing TO YOU in the form of profits, and that regulations are whatever we make of them and grossly favor corporations right now. You have a viewpoint that is biased; the frustrating thing is that you are a bright, articulate guy who can't for whatever reason see the illogic of your position.

So let me put the exact same points to you in different vocabulary that may make more sense: Corporations currently have significant tax and legal advantages. Unlike us poor working slobs, they're taxed on their PROFITS. I wished I were taxed like a corporation! I could deduct all of my expenses... my food, utilities, insurances, and all of the everyday costs of living... depreciate my home and car and any other significant asset that I own, and be taxed on the remainder. Does that seem fair to you? After all, am I not the "owner" of MY "means of production"... ie. myself? What makes "me" less them "them"? Why cannot I not vote myself a big raise? Why didn't the government bail ME out when my finances went awry? Why do the corporate officers get the big bucks when things go right, but only the peons get laid off when things go sour? Why do "they" get to write draft legislation, but not me? Why do banks get to "create" money and make 15% on it? If I tried that, wouldn't I be brought up on fraud charges?

Where is the "fairness" in that?

Since corporations and the wealthy get such big advantages, why shouldn't they pay AT LEAST as much in taxes, if not more??

Or does that seem "unfair"?

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Friday, August 27, 2010 4:52 PM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important


Hello,

So you are advocating taxing a corporation in exactly the same way human beings are taxed?

--Anthony

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Friday, August 27, 2010 4:57 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Sure, why not? Tax them on their income, just like we are. In fact, I would just wave off taxes on ANY entity that made less than $20,000 a year. Really, why go thru the bother of the paperwork? After that, just start taxing on gross income. More than a million? 40% More than a billion? 50%.

Furthermore, I would treat them JUST LIKE people. If I deliberately kill someone, I'm charged with murder. If through carelessness I allow someone to die, negligence. If I snoop into my neighbor's property or into their records, I'm charged with trespass. If I steal from them, theft. If I dump my trash on their lawn, or smoke them out of their backyard, and cause them illness, criminal mischief... or worse.

Have you seen any corporations charged with murder lately? Given the death penalty: Have its assets seized, it's name removed from registration, and it's governing board dispersed?

If THEY have right like "freedom of speech" then they should have responsibilities just like people.

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Friday, August 27, 2010 5:00 PM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important


Hello,

I would support taxing corporations identically to people, especially since they have person status.

Just like I advocate health care providers earning a living.

And I advocate a person charging what they like for their goods and services, as long as they don't discriminate on sex/race/ethnicity/belief system.

--Anthony



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Friday, August 27, 2010 5:04 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


I did my usual add after-the-fact.

I'm telling you, Tony, if corporations were treated JUST LIKE individuals it would be a big step down for them and a BIG step up for us.

Quote:
Just like I advocate health care providers earning a living.
Of course. What I DON'T advocate is health insurances doing NOTHING except being the middle-man and taking a 20% cut out of what they deny YOU. That's not "earning a living", that really IS piracy.
Quote:
And I advocate a person charging what they like for their goods and services, as long as they don't discriminate on sex/race/ethnicity/belief system.
In a free market, when workers and owners, buyers and sellers have equal power... sure. Find me that market.

"We" are asked to sacrifice in times of war and economic distress. Why aren't corporations asked to do the same?

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Friday, August 27, 2010 5:18 PM

KWICKO

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." -- William Casey, Reagan's presidential campaign manager & CIA Director (from first staff meeting in 1981)


Quote:
Originally posted by AnthonyT:
Hello,

He gets no blame from me for starting it.

But I do blame him for continuing it. Kind of like continuing the Patriot Act. Kind of like continuing the Wars.

The man was dirty the moment he decided not to wash his hands of that nonsense.

The only stimulus program I had any appreciation for was the clunker thing, and it was the one program the Republicans had the most fun tearing into.

--Anthony

Due to the use of Naomi 3.3.2 Beta web filtering, the following people may need to private-message me if they wish to contact me: Auraptor, Kaneman, Piratenews. I apologize for the inconvenience.


Semi-agreed. I say "semi" because the clunker thing was really a clunker. I just hated the way the did it, completely destroying cars and engines. Look up the list of some of the cars that were turned in. I'm a car lover, and there were some fine collectibles destroyed for no good reason. They could have been salvaged, parted out, etc.

The other thing that griped me about it was that it took an awful lot of cars off the market for the working poor.

With the bailouts, though, I do get a bit tired of Obama getting blamed for 100% of them. Did he PARTICIPATE? Yes. Did he ORIGINATE? Hardly. And I've noticed quite an effort by the GOP to try to rewrite history and claim that all of the bailouts were Obama's idea.

AURaptor's Greatest Hits:

Friday, May 28, 2010 - 20:32 To AnthonyT:
Go fuck yourself.
On this matter, make no mistake. I want you to go fuck yourself long and hard, as well as anyone who agrees with you. I got no use for you.

Friday, May 28, 2010 - 18:26 To President Obama:
Mr. President, you're a god damn, mother fucking liar.
Fuck you, you cock sucking community activist piece of shit.
... go fuck yourself, Mr. President.

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Friday, August 27, 2010 5:54 PM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important


"With the bailouts, though, I do get a bit tired of Obama getting blamed for 100% of them. Did he PARTICIPATE? Yes. Did he ORIGINATE? Hardly. And I've noticed quite an effort by the GOP to try to rewrite history and claim that all of the bailouts were Obama's idea."

Hello,

Well, you can argue percentages, but it's rather moot. If Hitler advocates Death Camps and Mengele says, "Hey, that's great, sign me up" then who cares which was shittier?

That's the typical hyperbole Nazi example of interwebs doom, but honestly the principle stands. There's no point in arguing the details because Obama was a willing and eager soldier on that front. I don't like demonizing folks, but they are responsible for what they've done.

As to the Clunkers, it did what it was designed to do- and there are plenty of cheap crap cars left for people to buy in the 500-5000 dollar range.

I do lament any classic cars that witless people traded in, and I lament the destruction of working automobiles. However, preservation, rehabilitation, and resale was never a goal of the program. It did what it said on the tin: It got people to upgrade vehicles when they otherwise may not have, and stimulate the car market.

--Anthony




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Friday, August 27, 2010 5:56 PM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important


""We" are asked to sacrifice in times of war and economic distress. Why aren't corporations asked to do the same?"

Hello,

You remember when Bush and Obama got on the television and asked the American people to sacrifice something?

I don't.

No matter the war, the economy, the natural disaster, this country has stopped asking its citizens to sacrifice anything.

--Anthony



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Friday, August 27, 2010 6:06 PM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important


Hello Signy,

Now that we've established agreement on the basic principle of treating everyone equally...

Why do you advocate a sliding tax system? Why not a uniform taxation method?

--Anthony


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Friday, August 27, 2010 7:55 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:
""We" are asked to sacrifice in times of war and economic distress. Why aren't corporations asked to do the same?"

Hello, You remember when Bush and Obama got on the television and asked the American people to sacrifice something?

I don't.

No matter the war, the economy, the natural disaster, this country has stopped asking its citizens to sacrifice anything.
You OTOH are a "rip-the-bandaid off" kinda guy... except the only peeps you seem intent on ripping off are the usual non-rich people who usually get ripped off anyway. Just sayin'.

Quote:
Now that we've established agreement on the basic principle of treating everyone equally... Why do you advocate a sliding tax system? Why not a uniform taxation method?
Well, apparently you haven't been paying attention to the fist 60 or so times I've said it: Because it makes ECONOMIC sense. Because as the rich get richer, as they are wont to do, money starts piling up and not being circulated through the economy. And therefore the economy collapses for almost everyone ... INCLUDING the moderately-wealthy.

But I know that doesn't make any sense to you, even tho the catastrophic consequences of trickle-down are all around us.

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Friday, August 27, 2010 8:02 PM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important



"But I know that doesn't make any sense to you, even tho the catastrophic consequences of trickle-down are all around us."

Hello,

I don't care a whit about trickle down, sorry.

The reason you have trouble communicating with me, I think, is because I have a moralistic view of economic behavior and you have one based on scientific economic theory and (apparently) a healthy amount of anger at the rich people and corporations.

So I have a hard time swallowing anything I can't justify morally. I have trouble justifying the idea of taking more from Tom than I take from Bill simply because Tom is richer. It seems immoral for there to be an unequal contribution rate, and I have trouble embracing the idea that the world requires me to be inequitable.

I mean, if everyone is paying 10%, aren't we already getting more out of the rich guy? Yet he's paying proportionately the same as everyone else, so I can dig it.

What I can't dig is making him pay twice the percentage, or three times, or four times, or more, just because I judge he can afford to be stripped of that extra money. It seems we're asking more than his share.

--Anthony



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Friday, August 27, 2010 8:22 PM

SHINYGOODGUY


Well, it looks like these institutions want to control wealth (money) to the fullest extent, thereby creating slavery; or ?????????????????
________________________________________________

"This will not be solved until income and wealth are more equitably redistributed, as it was during the last Great Depression"

You speak blasphemy! No one says the S word.
_________________________________________________

The great consumer society needs new horizons to exploit. Housing will continue to go thru their flux and once again become the huge cash cow it was in the recent past (S&L Scandal) so be patient. Electronics, medical and insurance fields will do their part.

What a world!


SGG

Tawabawho?

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Friday, August 27, 2010 8:38 PM

BYTEMITE


I'm concerned about corporate personhood. If we were to tax the organization like a person, charge the organization with crimes like a person, there's no reason they can't argue they should also have the same rights and privileges as an average person. And with a pool of resources they can use against anyone seeking justice or compensation, I'm concerned this might legitimize corporations obstructing justice to protect wrongdoers among their number.

If you give a powerful group more power, doesn't it just reinforce might makes right? Also, if you punish a group, instead of the individual, aren't there individuals in that group who might be innocent? For the tobacco industry, I think the knowledge cigarettes were bad was pretty pervasive. Other industries...?

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Friday, August 27, 2010 8:52 PM

BYTEMITE


Trickle down pretty much certainly goes into more speculation, not into wages for poorer people. As for how to solve this, whether by taxes, or some other means, or whether it will resolve itself, I'm not sure.

I think approaching the issue from the top might not be the right solution. I think it may be up to the consumer to get smart and support local and sustainable wherever they can to bring some sanity back into the market. But I'd also be open to companies starting up that internally work on a different economic system. Or guilds, to help small businesses compete with large businesses? America is all about choices.

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Friday, August 27, 2010 9:08 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


BYTE:
Quote:
there's no reason they can't argue they should also have the same rights and privileges as an average person. And with a pool of resources they can use against anyone seeking justice or compensation, I'm concerned this might legitimize corporations obstructing justice to protect wrongdoers among their number.
Do you think this doesn't happen already? Corporations already have significant legal advantage over ordinary people: they can invade YOUR privacy, but THEY'RE protected by privacy rights. If a corporation steals from you it's a possible misdemeanor, but if you steal from a corporation it's an automatic felony (look it up). They can pollute YOUR environment... but heaven help you if you interfere with theirs.

That's enshrined in law, but not even taking into account the fact that most larger businesses have lawyers on staff... it costs them nothing extra to drag out any lawsuit, grinding you down with legal expenses until you're willing to settle for anything, just to get out of the situation! That's why I'm saying, if corporations really WERE treated like us average people, they'd lose a lot of power!

TONY: I have to get up tomorrow, so I'm going to make this short and sweet: There is no way that any single person can possibly "earn" a billion dollars. Well.. maybe if they found the universal cure for cancer, or developed cold fusion, or found the magic formula to make people really rational and not just rationalizing. But aside from being able to walk on water... not really.

People get rich by STEALING, not working.

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Friday, August 27, 2010 9:11 PM

KANEMAN


Quote:
Originally posted by Kwicko:
Quote:
The whole bailout was maddening.


Especially how much blame Obama seems to get for the TARP program which was committed by Dubya...

AURaptor's Greatest Hits:

Friday, May 28, 2010 - 20:32 To AnthonyT:
Go fuck yourself.
On this matter, make no mistake. I want you to go fuck yourself long and hard, as well as anyone who agrees with you. I got no use for you.

Friday, May 28, 2010 - 18:26 To President Obama:
Mr. President, you're a god damn, mother fucking liar.
Fuck you, you cock sucking community activist piece of shit.
... go fuck yourself, Mr. President.


Really? Obama gets blamed for TARP? He gets blamed for the stimulus not TARP. That's in your head.

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Friday, August 27, 2010 9:33 PM

KANEMAN


Quote:
Originally posted by Kwicko:
Quote:
Originally posted by AnthonyT:
Hello,

He gets no blame from me for starting it.

But I do blame him for continuing it. Kind of like continuing the Patriot Act. Kind of like continuing the Wars.

The man was dirty the moment he decided not to wash his hands of that nonsense.

The only stimulus program I had any appreciation for was the clunker thing, and it was the one program the Republicans had the most fun tearing into.

--Anthony

Due to the use of Naomi 3.3.2 Beta web filtering, the following people may need to private-message me if they wish to contact me: Auraptor, Kaneman, Piratenews. I apologize for the inconvenience.


Semi-agreed. I say "semi" because the clunker thing was really a clunker. I just hated the way the did it, completely destroying cars and engines. Look up the list of some of the cars that were turned in. I'm a car lover, and there were some fine collectibles destroyed for no good reason. They could have been salvaged, parted out, etc.

The other thing that griped me about it was that it took an awful lot of cars off the market for the working poor.

With the bailouts, though, I do get a bit tired of Obama getting blamed for 100% of them. Did he PARTICIPATE? Yes. Did he ORIGINATE? Hardly. And I've noticed quite an effort by the GOP to try to rewrite history and claim that all of the bailouts were Obama's idea.

AURaptor's Greatest Hits:

Friday, May 28, 2010 - 20:32 To AnthonyT:
Go fuck yourself.
On this matter, make no mistake. I want you to go fuck yourself long and hard, as well as anyone who agrees with you. I got no use for you.

Friday, May 28, 2010 - 18:26 To President Obama:
Mr. President, you're a god damn, mother fucking liar.
Fuck you, you cock sucking community activist piece of shit.
... go fuck yourself, Mr. President.


Hey Spelling Fairy, you forgot a "y"....fag.

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Saturday, August 28, 2010 5:24 AM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important


"People get rich by STEALING, not working."

Hello,

You'll never convince me to conjoin our system of law enforcement to our system of taxation. You sure as heck will never convince me that I must assume any rich person is guilty of a crime, and must be punished without trial by a tax system on that premise.

--Anthony



Due to the use of Naomi 3.3.2 Beta web filtering, the following people may need to private-message me if they wish to contact me: Auraptor, Kaneman, Piratenews. I apologize for the inconvenience.

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Saturday, August 28, 2010 5:46 AM

BYTEMITE


Quote:
Do you think this doesn't happen already? Corporations already have significant legal advantage over ordinary people: they can invade YOUR privacy, but THEY'RE protected by privacy rights. If a corporation steals from you it's a possible misdemeanor, but if you steal from a corporation it's an automatic felony (look it up). They can pollute YOUR environment... but heaven help you if you interfere with theirs.


I know. And my answer to that is "it shouldn't be like this," not, "well fuck! It's already like this so why don't we go all the way?"

I know what you're thinking, you're looking at, say, the profit margin of an insurance company and thinking "oh my god, this is obscene, look at the money they've made off of taking advantage of people's illness" or maybe it's just a company in general and decrying the general exploitation of the workers or the consumer or the environment. Then the next thought is, "man, this company is bunch of thieves and vultures, they don't deserve this money! We should take the money away. Taxes! Then we can put this money into social programs! Then it can benefit everyone."

The problem with this is, rich people may not have to spend their money to increase or decrease the wages of their workers, but a COMPANY does. So if you target the company for money, who do you think is going to have their wages cut or get laid off? The company isn't going to cut into their profit margins, that would upset the shareholders, and they're not going to take it from their highest wage earners.

Remember that scene in Shindig, where Mal pickpockets the money off of the slavers? In this case, with the company being less organized and not as rich (just one crew), we could reasonably say that taking money from a person is the same as taking money from the business. So when Mal rips them off you sit here thinking "Haha, yeah, go Mal! He's like Robin Hood. Give them what for!" ...Until you realize that picking the pocket of just one of the slavers probably isn't going to take them out of business. The end result of something that seemed well-meaning and awesome on the surface is that the slavers will purchase fewer rations for the next batch of slaves they ferry to make up for the lost profit margin. Doh.

Here, you end up cutting the wages of the mail room, the secretaries, office support, the non-management cubicle dwellers. They can't buy as much, can't afford as much food. This exacerbates the problem you have highlighted (and it IS a problem, but I just don't think this problem is the particular cause of recessions, rather it's a factor that makes a recession worse) of the disparity of wealth, dwindling money for the lower classes, and money not being circulated.

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Saturday, August 28, 2010 7:24 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:
You'll never convince me to conjoin our system of law enforcement to our system of taxation. You sure as heck will never convince me that I must assume any rich person is guilty of a crime, and must be punished without trial by a tax system on that premise.
Because you are already convinced that a system of "profit" is fair.

Tony, I have no problems with people working for a living, and making money from it. Hell, if you're not working for compensation then you're either a saint, or crazy, or already independently wealthy.

But that's not what wealthy people DO. Wealthy people sit on the carotid of society: where money flows fastest, in banks and investment firms and stock markets and hedge funds and insurances, and they skim. Yep, that's what they do: skim. The guy in AIG who brokered financial "products" based on stuff even HE says he didn't understand... do you call that "earning a living"? All he did was figure out a way to dupe people into passing money through HIS hands so he could get a portion of it.

In the biological world, it's called parasitism, plain and simple.

I'll bet that you look at pandhandlers and welfare recipients with disgust as parasites on society. What are "brokers" and "CEOs" except a waaaay more successful version? Other than a $1000 suit and a seat next to the money stream, what do they contribute more than a panhandler does?

I mentioned before that money is like blood: It is a medium of exchange. It does no good unless it's circulating. The problem comes on when money is commodified: when people start treating it as it were a thing to be hoarded and not a tool to be used. At that point, all kinds of economic distortions take place. When you can more more money on money than you can make on production, the economy and society are both in a death-spiral.

Work becomes devalued.

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Saturday, August 28, 2010 7:30 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


BYTE:
Quote:
I know. And my answer to that is "it shouldn't be like this," not, "well fuck! It's already like this so why don't we go all the way?"
Oh Byte, we're already waaaay past "all the way". Waaaay past. In the MORAL realm, what I'm thinking is that people should demand at least equity with corporations, for god's sake! Going "all the way" would be an advantage for us because in the legal realm we are already so much less. LESS. OFFICIALLY LESS.
Quote:
I know what you're thinking, you're looking at, say, the profit margin of an insurance company and thinking "oh my god, this is obscene, look at the money they've made off of taking advantage of people's illness" or maybe it's just a company in general and decrying the general exploitation of the workers or the consumer or the environment. Then the next thought is, "man, this company is bunch of thieves and vultures, they don't deserve this money! We should take the money away. Taxes! Then we can put this money into social programs! Then it can benefit everyone." The problem with this is, rich people may not have to spend their money to increase or decrease the wages of their workers, but a COMPANY does. So if you target the company for money, who do you think is going to have their wages cut or get laid off? The company isn't going to cut into their profit margins, that would upset the shareholders, and they're not going to take it from their highest wage earners.
Other countries make it work, Byte. They have a leash on their banks and boards of directors. There is NOTHING impossible about making things work for people. Why can't we?? Or would you rather just kiss ass?

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Saturday, August 28, 2010 7:35 AM

BYTEMITE


I think you have to ask yourself whether different countries have the same mentalities in the upper echelon about entitlement and profit that ours do. There are a number of things that might work in other countries but maybe won't work in ours because of those differences in sanity. Or corruption, as it may be, as it's probably less so much sanity and more so corruption and cooperation between government and industry.

I already told you other alternative solutions I can think of that are less likely to end up hurting the people we're trying to help. Your false dilemma and inappropriate accusation is noted, and unnecessary.

Maybe what we should be pushing for isn't equal rights between citizens and corporations, but a reversal of what we've given up. I consider the people in a corporation persons deserving of civil rights. I do not consider a corporation an entity with any claim to legal rights of expression or privacy, not if they're publicly traded.

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Saturday, August 28, 2010 7:41 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


So, if you look around, you'll see that England and Germany are already experiencing a strong rebound.

Why??

Because they didn't shove money at the wealthy. Because they have a plan. Because they make capital and corporations serve them, not the other way around.

You look at the solution, but it requires a bit of balls... a bit of sticking up for yourself. A bit of self-worth. And you draw back. Because you feel small and unworthy, because you feel as if you don't deserve to represent your interests. You worship at the altar of money. Anything with money is better than you. You blame yourselves for not being rich. You hate yourselves. You blame the victim. You ARE the victim. You're so frigging willing spill your blood on the altar of capitalism, you won't even demand equity, for god's sake, you would rather remain peons.

Fine, continue your peonage. And when it turns to fascism, for god's sake, don't come crying to me.

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Saturday, August 28, 2010 7:45 AM

BYTEMITE


Clearly you don't know me Sig, and you are so blinded by your agenda that you're not even talking to me anymore, but some strawman you've invented. I've offered alternatives, ways for people to stand up for themselves THAT WOULDN'T HURT THE PEOPLE YOU'RE TRYING TO HELP, and you accuse me of cow-towing to corporate interests.

I'm done with this thread. You are being irrational and you have stopped listening. Have fun.

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Saturday, August 28, 2010 7:49 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Byte, you don't know yourself.
Quote:
I've offered alternatives, ways for people to stand up for themselves THAT WOULDN'T HURT THE PEOPLE YOU'RE TRYING TO HELP
Really? What are those? "Suck it up"? Don't demand even a modicum of equity? God forbid we should (GASP!) take back money from the wealthy, after they took it from us? Maybe if we're "nice enough" they'll give us some of our money back?

Other people in other places have done FAR better. Brazil, Germany, England, Venezuela, France, Italy, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Holland, Argentina... Do you think what I'm suggesting is impossible??? Then why have other places made it work?

You THINK you're some sort of rebel, but I'm here to tell you that you're a coward, because when it comes to facing the REAL power, you just frigin' wilt. And you're just as willing as the next fellow to goose-step when someone waves money at you.

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Saturday, August 28, 2010 8:01 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:
I think you have to ask yourself whether different countries have the same mentalities in the upper echelon about entitlement and profit that ours do.
First, you have to change YOUR sense of THEIR entitlement.

And do you think this came easy for them? People DIED. They were disappeared. They went on strike. They organized. THAT takes courage, something you don't seem to have.

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Saturday, August 28, 2010 8:17 AM

BYTEMITE


I've dodged cop cars in my time in protest, I've intervened and knocked out a person involved in an attempted murder, and I've jumped out of a moving car, into traffic, to run to the side of a person who had been hit by a car. I've watched them die, in my arms, while I could do nothing.

It's easy to talk trash when you're sitting behind a computer screen. Call me a coward, and call me stupid. You DO NOT KNOW ME.

And I'll call you a well-intentioned extremist, unwilling to listen to even the slightest argument that what you're proposing might be hurtful for the people you're trying to help and lashing out at anyone who speaks up with insulting mischaracterizations. Prove me wrong. Please... Prove me wrong.

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Saturday, August 28, 2010 12:02 PM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important


"I'll bet that you look at pandhandlers and welfare recipients with disgust as parasites on society. "

Hello,

Jesus, Signy. Do I have horns and a tail, too?

--Anthony


Due to the use of Naomi 3.3.2 Beta web filtering, the following people may need to private-message me if they wish to contact me: Auraptor, Kaneman, Piratenews. I apologize for the inconvenience.

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Saturday, August 28, 2010 12:07 PM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important


"THAT takes courage, something you don't seem to have."

Hello,

Signy, there may be a good spokesperson for your suggested way of life. I recommend you find that person.

'Cause if your best method of communicating ideas is to stand at a podium, point at your audience, and say, "YOU ARE A FUCKTARD" then I suspect you'll never get far.

--Anthony



Due to the use of Naomi 3.3.2 Beta web filtering, the following people may need to private-message me if they wish to contact me: Auraptor, Kaneman, Piratenews. I apologize for the inconvenience.

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Saturday, August 28, 2010 2:31 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


YOU are a fucktard. And the reason is that your thinking can be twisted by vocabulary, by the path of the argument, propaganda, and bunch of irrelevant factors. In other words, you're completely manipulatable.

I choose not to manipulate you. I choose to talk to you as if you are a rational human being. If you want to be manipulated, go watch some TV, or listen to Glenn Beck.

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Saturday, August 28, 2010 2:36 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Oh, big fucking deal Byte. When you live as long as I have, you've done all of that at least twice. You're still not willing to challenge the real power. You're still a coward.

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Saturday, August 28, 2010 2:42 PM

KLESST


Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Here's another option: Collect up all the various Federal housing agencies, including the infamous public/private Fannie and Freddie, and nationalize them. Have the Fed step in and actually create loans at 4% instead of just buying them up ("securitizing" them).


As horrific as the idea is to me, it might actually work to minimise the losses that will soon be seen when Fannie and Freddie fail. We're looking at potential losses of a trillion dollars and it's not like the major banks aren't already socialized for all practical purposes anyway. We should have just let Freddie and Fannie fail at the height of the bubble and cut our losses, but now our options are all bad ones.

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Saturday, August 28, 2010 2:48 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


look guys, I'm fed up and disgusted. The right-wingers, they're a lost cause. May as well clean house with a machine gun.*

"When economies collapse, governments follow".

You don't seem to realize how close to fascism we are. And things are only going to get worse. Fires in Russia and Brazil, floods in Pakistan and China, killer heat on the East Coast and 97 deg water temps near Aceh, with massive coral bleaching.

And here you are, rubbing your hands in worry. "Oh dear, will it offend the corporations? Will it involve (GASP!) gubmint??" You guys... you have no idea, do you? 'Parently not!

*Oh, BTW that's a sarcastic remark, so don't get all wigged out about it.

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Saturday, August 28, 2010 2:50 PM

ANTHONYT

Freedom is Important because People are Important


Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Oh, big fucking deal Byte. When you live as long as I have, you've done all of that at least twice. You're still not willing to challenge the real power. You're still a coward.


Hello,

Enjoy the fight against the real power.

Language and attitude means more than just 'manipulating' people. These things convey information. Information about the speaker.

You've assumed a great deal about people that may not be true. You've insulted them. You come across as a foamy rabid extremist with an agenda.

Just like those television shows you recommend.

Maybe someday I'll speak with someone who shares your point of view and can convey that point of view rationally and politely, without instantly demeaning and reducing people.

Then maybe I'll understand the point of view better.

--Anthony



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Saturday, August 28, 2010 2:51 PM

BYTEMITE


You know I'm not a jack boot, and you know Anthony is one of the most levelheaded people on the board.

Bridges, you're burning them. It's not my place to ask you why, or to assume that something is wrong, or that this thread is about anything other than what you have represented. But this is non-normal behaviour.

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Saturday, August 28, 2010 2:53 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:
Language and attitude means more than just 'manipulating' people. These things convey information. Information about the speaker
Then apply that to YOURSELF. Apply that to the RIGHT WING.

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Saturday, August 28, 2010 2:56 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Quote:
You know I'm not a jack boot, and you know Anthony is one of the most levelheaded people on the board.
No, you are comfortable with your presumed rebelliousness and happy with your "reasonableness".

Can I give you fiddle?

You can play it while Rome burns.

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Saturday, August 28, 2010 3:36 PM

KLESST


Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
look guys, I'm fed up and disgusted. The right-wingers, they're a lost cause. May as well clean house with a machine gun.*

"When economies collapse, governments follow".

You don't seem to realize how close to fascism we are. And things are only going to get worse. Fires in Russia and Brazil, floods in Pakistan and China, killer heat on the East Coast and 97 deg water temps near Aceh, with massive coral bleaching.

I think I've heard something similar before.

You still don't get it, do you? they'll find you! That's what they do! It's ALL they do! You can't stop them! They'll wade through you! They'll reach down your throat and tear your fuckin' heart out! Listen, and understand. Those right wingers are out there. They can't be bargained with. They can't be reasoned with. They don't feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And they absolutely will not stop, ever, until you are dead.

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Saturday, August 28, 2010 3:42 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


Hear voices in your head much, Klesst?

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Saturday, August 28, 2010 5:46 PM

FREMDFIRMA



Siggy, there's a reason that despite sympathy for your cause I've not said word one to you about it till now, but I must.

You are indeed coming off as a foaming fanatic, burning bridges and alienating the very people who would be your most effective allies because emotion has wholly blinded you - and I suspect it's source is something other than this particular discussion, but that is your own business.

As you are well aware, I do indeed know something about effectively dealing with an opposition which completely outpowers me and mine - and you're going about this wrong.

Look, if you wanna go fight toe to toe and throw yourself against their strongest point and damn the disparity, I'll gladly sell ya the torches and pitchforks, might even do you a favor by waitin for a chance to hamstring em while you're getting massacred - cause that is, politically, or otherwise, the end result of playing THEIR game, by THEIR rules, on THEIR chosen field.

Byte was suggesting a useful turnabout, using their own rules and concepts to encourage them to lay their heads on the chopping block FOR us - do you really think she'd do so were she not ready (or damn sure someone else was ) to pull the rope when that happens ?

And yet you come out with the flamethrower rather than adapt and incorporate the idea, when I've known you long enough to know quite well you're smart enough to do it ?

Emotion has indeed overruled your reason, if not started to impinge on your sanity in a fashion extremely uncharacteristic of you, so I am pretty sure there's something else at work here, which is only tenetively if at all related to this discussion - nor is it my business other than to express an honest concern, cause our own occasional disagreements aside, I'm well aware there's a human being behind the other screen here, and I am concerned for them - which is, IMHO, a bit more important than this argument.

-Frem

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Saturday, August 28, 2010 6:43 PM

KWICKO

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." -- William Casey, Reagan's presidential campaign manager & CIA Director (from first staff meeting in 1981)


Ummm... Signy?

At this point, you're pretty much poisoning people who would likely be among your best allies.

People have a learning curve. Not everyone is where you're at in their beliefs, but several of us ARE coming along, and are on various legs of the journey, and some of us will likely get there to where you are now. But not if we've been clubbed to death by you for not marching in lock-step with you quite fast enough for your liking.

Just sayin'.

You have people here who are quite potentially on your side, if you'd stop yelling at them for a minute and listen to them.

AURaptor's Greatest Hits:

Friday, May 28, 2010 - 20:32 To AnthonyT:
Go fuck yourself.
On this matter, make no mistake. I want you to go fuck yourself long and hard, as well as anyone who agrees with you. I got no use for you.

Friday, May 28, 2010 - 18:26 To President Obama:
Mr. President, you're a god damn, mother fucking liar.
Fuck you, you cock sucking community activist piece of shit.
... go fuck yourself, Mr. President.

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Saturday, August 28, 2010 6:53 PM

KWICKO

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." -- William Casey, Reagan's presidential campaign manager & CIA Director (from first staff meeting in 1981)


Quote:
Emotion has indeed overruled your reason, if not started to impinge on your sanity in a fashion extremely uncharacteristic of you, so I am pretty sure there's something else at work here, which is only tenetively if at all related to this discussion - nor is it my business other than to express an honest concern, cause our own occasional disagreements aside, I'm well aware there's a human being behind the other screen here, and I am concerned for them - which is, IMHO, a bit more important than this argument.


Well said. And I echo the sentiment; this doesn't seem like the Signy I know, even if I only know her from this board. And this worries me.

AURaptor's Greatest Hits:

Friday, May 28, 2010 - 20:32 To AnthonyT:
Go fuck yourself.
On this matter, make no mistake. I want you to go fuck yourself long and hard, as well as anyone who agrees with you. I got no use for you.

Friday, May 28, 2010 - 18:26 To President Obama:
Mr. President, you're a god damn, mother fucking liar.
Fuck you, you cock sucking community activist piece of shit.
... go fuck yourself, Mr. President.

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In the garden, and RAIN!!! (2)
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human actions, global climate change, global human solutions
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Game Companies are Morons.
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Is Elon Musk Nuts?
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Idiot Democrat Wine Mom
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Where is the 25th ammendment when you need it?
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