Santorum Drops Out

[Goku]

Originally Posted by Shanesan

More along the lines of totalitarian policies, in my opinion.

Obama backed off on closing Guantanamo.
Obama backed off of his promise to keep lobbyists out of his administration.
Obama protected the Bush administration from prosecution for torture.
Obama authorized the assassination of U.S. citizens abroad.
Obama rescinded on his promise to not prosecute marijuana users in states where it is legal, and pushed for a 5 year prison term for a California-legal medical marijuana dispensary operaton.
Obama prosecuted child-soldier Omar Khadr using evidence gained through torture.
Obama granted 27 waivers to oil companies drilling in the weeks following the Deepwater Horizon disaster.
Obama fought for, and won, the right to deny habeas corpus to detainees.
He blocked UN human rights investigations at Guantanamo.
He dropped charges against the CIA for destroying videotapes documenting torture of detainees.
He continued rendition of alleged terrorists to countries where they could be tortured.
He continued indefinitely detaining alleged terrorists, WITHOUT TRIAL.
He extended the PATRIOT Act, with no reforms.
He dramatically increased government secrecy, denying more Freedom of Information Act requests in 2009 than Bush did in 2008.
He cut a secret deal to kill the public option, while still campaigning on its behalf...
He defended Don't Ask Don't Tell from legal challenges and then "celebrated" its repeal.
He reaffirmed his opposition to same-sex marriage though he campaigns as if he supports it.
He granted waivers to 30 companies, including McDonalds, exempting them from health care reform.
He announced the single largest arms deal in history, of $60bil worth of arms, to Saudi Arabian dictatorship.
He gave permits to BP and other oil companies, exempting them from environmental protection laws.
He appointed Monsanto executive Michael Taylor to the FDA.
He appointed a former Monsanto lobbyist as Chief Agriculture Negotiator.
He appointed Timothy Geithner as Secretary of the Treasury.
He increased the use of combat drones in Pakistan.
He passed a massive Wall Street bailout at the expense of the taxpayers.
He played down the importance of the WikiLeaks documents.
He pushed for mandatory DNA testing for those arrested for crimes, even if they have not been convicted.
He undercuts whistleblowers.
He promised $30bil in military aid to Israel over the next decade.
He gives $250,000 to Chevrolet every time they make a Volt.

I have links for all those.

While I don't agree with what you think in terms of these actions being totalitarian, I can see why you think so. I'm not going to argue with you on the far majority of those points either. I'm going to agree to disagree .

[Warborn]

Half of those are simply continuations of Dubya-era US policies. It isn't "Obama is totalitarian" so much as "the US is moving toward becoming a police state post-911 and Obama hasn't changed that".

[Goku]

Originally Posted by Warborn

Half of those are simply continuations of Dubya-era US policies. It isn't "Obama is totalitarian" so much as "the US is moving toward becoming a police state post-911 and Obama hasn't changed that".

Hence Obama was just Bush's third term as some people call it.

[Firefly]

[Shanesan]

Originally Posted by Goku

Hence Obama was just Bush's third term as some people call it.

I will agree with that. There's a lot of things he could have fought against, or fought harder against, and didn't choose to.

My big issue is that he was a "change" candidate, and the biggest offenses to citizen's civil liberties in a long time as well as the abhorrant POW camp Guantanamo were not solved. They stayed the same.

I don't like watching this slippery slope with our rights continue. That's why I try to make sure people realize, at least, what's happening so I don't have to say "I told you so" before they eventually strip that right too. People say that couldn't ever happen, but they are working their way up the chain of amendments they can ignore, for our safety, of course.

[Malorn]

Meh.

[Chrispin]

Income tax should be outright replaced with increased sales tax. If you want a fair tax, there it is just as long as there are no loopholes. The only negative side-effect I can think of is it scaring away tourism. For those worried about the jobless, welfare could be improved by giving those on it more of a sales tax break and less of a money handout. Investors would be equally affected by the increased cost of buying/selling stocks. Exported goods aren't affected, import sales are taxed just like everything else.

Of course this is all just the ideal situation. Online merchant companies like Amazon will probably need to stop being exempt from sales tax. There may also be increased black market activity, but the thing is that the black market isn't properly paying its income tax anyway.

[Vash02]

Originally Posted by Chrispin

Income tax should be outright replaced with increased sales tax. If you want a fair tax, there it is just as long as there are no loopholes. The only negative side-effect I can think of is it scaring away tourism. For those worried about the jobless, welfare could be improved by giving those on it more of a sales tax break and less of a money handout. Investors would be equally affected by the increased cost of buying/selling stocks. Exported goods aren't affected, import sales are taxed just like everything else.

Of course this is all just the ideal situation. Online merchant companies like Amazon will probably need to stop being exempt from sales tax. There may also be increased black market activity, but the thing is that the black market isn't properly paying its income tax anyway.

Way to think of a way to stomp on the poor even more so than now.

[Figment]

Originally Posted by Vash02

Way to think of a way to stomp on the poor even more so than now.

I don't think they want to realise that what is "fair" to them has nothing to do with good for the economy.

If you tax an equal percentage of all people, then you might take an equal share, but that's not really the effect on purchasing power.

Say you earn $15.000 each year, and 15% is taken away, then you are left with around $12.750 to spend on everything you need the entire year, or 365 days. Let's say that each person needs to spend money for housing, food, energy, food, fuel, maintenance, before being able to look at other commodities. Basically, the actual purchasing power of the consumer, would be reduced to a few hundred bucks a week including food, if that.

On large sums of money, say $80 million, taking away 12 million in taxes leaves $68 million to spend throughout the rest of the year. Or you can put it on the bank for a nice interest. Often the argument is they can invest more and create more jobs, but there is no guarantee they will and once it's invested in huge Beverly Hills villas it's not like that's actually going to be true at all. So that's a rather moot point.


Either way, if you're rich, you're not even going to notice there's a tax, because you don't have to split dimes to get through the day.

So the 15% tax rate I mentioned earlier for people who make money with money, is ridiculously low and it's absolutely not fair that people that often work equaly hard or harder (physically/mentally), just with a different job that makes less money, get taxed the same way or even more and are left with not just less, not even a bit less, but so little they have to wonder about their family's wellbeing. If one works and especially if one works hard, one should be rewarded, correct?

And what if you can't work due to disabilities? It's easy to say "equal rate is fair", but that's oversimplifying things. Though that's not uncommon.


Note that I'm not at all in favour of extravagant handing out of money for unemployed people like some socialist parties want. However, I don't think it's a bad thing that you get some time to move on to the next job without immediately being financially rock bottom. Especially in the US where you can be fired instantly without notice (here, it's two months ahead unless contract breach occured and after you get around 70-80% of your past salary for a short period of time, so you don't immediately have to sell of your house, make an extra loss, etc, while looking for a new job). If you don't have a job after that period, then your state provided income is reduced much further, below minimal wages. This means you can still survive, but it's more attractive to get a job. Even at minimal wages.

And Malorn, haven't heard you respond to Warren Buffett's article yet.

[Malorn]

Meh.

[Figment]

It would only be fair if you spend equal %s on food, clothing etc.

So if you earn $8000 and you buy a loaf of bread, you pay $1. If you earn 8 million, you pay 1/8000th too and pay $1000.

Then you can say it's flat rate. Flat rate is not "fair", it benefits the rich much, much more than the poor. I don't vote labour, but even I see the consequences of taxing the mass-consumer who stimulate the economy, over those people that hardly spend more on the economy. The whole point of being rich is that you have money stockpiled. Keeping that money going around in the economy is much better for it. You can still stockpile money if you're taxed more, so much that you don't have to work a lot anymore, but a smaller amount is taken out of the economy than would otherwise be the case with a flat rate.

[Malorn]

Meh.

[Baneblade]

Originally Posted by Malorn

Must be some quality education in the Netherlands.

A flat tax is fair because rich people spend more than poor people, thus they contribute more in the tax. I also said things like FOOD are essential to life and therefore should not be taxed so as not to add unnecessary risk to those less fortunate.

If I spend two million dollars and I have a flat consumption tax I'm contributing a hell of a lot more money to the government than someone who spends only 10k.

And taxation itself should be limited. It shouldn't be a burden to anyone, rich or poor. Big government needs big money. They can't take it from the poor so they must take it from the rich. That in turn causes the rich to be more conservative, take business elsewhere or simply hire fewer employees.

Big government has little accountability - they aren't spending their own hard earned money, they're spending someone else's money so they are naturally more wasteful. They have no personal benefit in being efficient or even wise in spending. And that's why we have stupid shit like this. That's just the stuff we find out about, smaller waste and incompetence is far more common.

Government also spends money it doesn't have - a practice that citizens and businesses don't take lightly, and having an unbalanced budget is a great way to end up in the "safety net". We do it and we suffer. They do it and it's perfectly OK. The irresponsibility is stunning.

This is why tax rates should be low to begin with. Government should be limited to bare essentials not be a business all itself.

Free market and capitalism is salvation.

A national sales tax is the way to go, but it needs to be capped (as in Amendment) so the greedy elected 'elite' cant grab more and more of it.

[Vash02]

Originally Posted by Sobekeus

A national sales tax is the way to go, but it needs to be capped (as in Amendment) so the greedy elected 'elite' cant grab more and more of it.

"STATE RIGHTS HURRRRRRRRRRRRR DURRRRRRRR"

[Malorn]

Meh.