I agreed with Michelle Bachmann!

Nevertheless... We have what we have!

I don't know what the true numbers are, it doesn't matter. A majority of people don't want Pot legalized, and they have a right to that opinion, just as you have a right to yours!

I have argued against legalization on the grounds that smoke ingestion into your lungs is damaging to the lung tissues, and subsequently, your respiratory health. Why would you make a legal product out of something you KNOW is harmful to your health? It makes no sense whatsoever... People are already addicted to tobacco, it has been a legal product since before we "knew" it to be harmful to your health, and we are somewhat stuck with that now... what sense does it make to repeat the error of the past, KNOWING it will cause health problems? KNOWING people will abuse it? KNOWING it will result in people becoming dysfunctional and unproductive potheads? It's about the stupidest idea ever, if we legalized it and started taxing it like tobacco. That's my opinion, and I am an occasional pot smoker!

I realize you idiots like the weed, and wish it were legal so you could smoke the shit out of it without risking criminal arrest... and I can sympathize with that! I FEEL YOUR PAIN! ....But the answer is "Decriminalization" not legalizing it. Relax the laws on possession, and stop filling the jails up with people who are guilty of possessing a WEED!

Then we should ban alcohol (again), tobacco, fast food, high-sodium products, high-sugar products, high-fat products, high-calorie products, most drugs with side-effects, and we should set limits on resturant portions, and so forth. Can't have people getting sick on us...

Personally, I consume a lot of beer, and am generally an unhealthy eater, but I don't plan on ever using marijuana, narcotics, or hallucinigents, assuming that any or all are made legal. I even postponed drinking until I was 21. What I want from drugs, is not a healthy society, but one that I don't have to "defend" with my tax dollars, but one in which morons pay for my services through the taxes they pay on drugs. There would also be a smaller power-base for liberals due to less political participation via tuning out and overdosing.
 
I have NOT imposed my will on you in any way! I can't impose my will on you, it is inherently impossible for that to happen! Unless you are claiming SOCIETY has imposed its will on you, and I am part of that by extension. You seem to want to blame ME for the law, and I had nothing to do with the law! I merely pointed out what the law was, and why it was that way... don't shoot me, I am only the messenger!

You do have a "world view" because everyone does. Perhaps you don't comprehend what that means? In short, it's how you view the world, and how you think the world should be. Seems to me, you have a very firm opinion on that, by your posts.

And finally, you have the right to your property, but you don't have the right to possess an illegal narcotic, just as you don't have the right to own a slave, or any number of other things you can't own... nuclear bombs... harems... national parks... There is no "socialist authority" dictating this to you, it is LAWS established by The People... you know, those other individuals out there who don't happen to agree with YOUR world view!

I wish I had the time to drill this point, but I have to go to bed. I'll try to pick this up tomorrow. I have to get up for work in about five hours.

I will say one thing though, "I don't think your dependent on a welfare check". At least you don't seem to be.
 
Then we should ban alcohol (again), tobacco, fast food, high-sodium products, high-sugar products, high-fat products, high-calorie products, most drugs with side-effects, and we should set limits on resturant portions, and so forth. Can't have people getting sick on us...

Personally, I consume a lot of beer, and am generally an unhealthy eater, but I don't plan on ever using marijuana, narcotics, or hallucinigents, assuming that any or all are made legal. I even postponed drinking until I was 21. What I want from drugs, is not a healthy society, but one that I don't have to "defend" with my tax dollars, but one in which morons pay for my services through the taxes they pay on drugs. There would also be a smaller power-base for liberals due to less political participation via tuning out and overdosing.

Actually, with the implementation of Nationalized Health Care, look for exactly that sort of thing to start happening, as the costs skyrocket and we realize the government can't afford health care for everyone. The First Lady is already on a crusade to take away your Big Macs, haven't you heard?

The rest of your argument is devoid of ethics and morals, as is to be expected from a piece of dog shit like you. I don't really give a flying fuck what you want, this is (like I said) not about what you want or what I want, it's about what the reality is, and what the majority of American people want. When someone dies and makes you or I the King of America, let me know... we can probably come to an agreement on legalizing pot.... but I don't believe that is likely to happen anytime soon. I think we have to accept the will of the society we live in, and realize that other people might not agree with what we want.
 
Actually, with the implementation of Nationalized Health Care, look for exactly that sort of thing to start happening, as the costs skyrocket and we realize the government can't afford health care for everyone. The First Lady is already on a crusade to take away your Big Macs, haven't you heard?
These things usually end up crashing and burning in the end.

The rest of your argument is devoid of ethics and morals.

Don't give a shit, and also, if true, it means it should definitely pass before long, and must also have a hell of a lot more public support than you give it credit for.
 
Just to answer your misinformed understanding about the Fair Tax being "regressive:"

Under the FairTax Plan, poor people pay no net FairTax at all up to the poverty level! Every household receives a rebate that is equal to the FairTax paid on essential goods and services, and wage earners are no longer subject to the most regressive and burdensome tax of all, the payroll tax. Those spending at twice the poverty level pay a tax of only 11.5 percent -- a rate much lower than the income and payroll tax burden they bear today.

Under the federal income tax, slow economic growth and recessions have a disproportionately adverse impact on lower-income families. Breadwinners in these families are more likely to lose their jobs, are less likely to have the resources to weather bad economic times, and are more in need of the initial employment opportunities that a dynamic, growing economy provides. Retaining the present tax system makes economic progress needlessly slow, thus harming low-income people the most.

In contrast, the FairTax dramatically improves economic growth and wage rates for all, but especially for lower-income families and individuals. In addition to receiving the monthly FairTax prebate, these taxpayers are freed from regressive payroll taxes, the federal income tax, and the compliance burdens associated with each. They pay no more business taxes hidden in the price of goods and services, and used goods are tax free.

Under the 'fair' tax, the wealthy in this country would pay far less as a percent of income/wealth than would the middle class. THAT is regressive. While the poor may not pay on 'essential' goods... they would pay on anything the idiots in DC deemed 'non-essential'.

WHO decides what is essential Dixie? The lobbyists... that is who. Whomever bribes the right number of politicians gets their product/service marked as 'essential'.

In your example... does EVERYONE pay 11.5% on non-essential items? If so... REGRESSIVE.

If not, then how do you keep track of who pays what percentage?

The so called fair tax is a horrid idea. It creates a bureaucratic nightmare, enables a more corrupt system and is overall ... REGRESSIVE.

While it MIGHT be better than our current system.... a flat tax with standard deduction is far simpler, eliminates the majority of bribes (lobbying), is actually FAIR and it is PROGRESSIVE.
 
Under the 'fair' tax, the wealthy in this country would pay far less as a percent of income/wealth than would the middle class. THAT is regressive. While the poor may not pay on 'essential' goods... they would pay on anything the idiots in DC deemed 'non-essential'.

WHO decides what is essential Dixie? The lobbyists... that is who. Whomever bribes the right number of politicians gets their product/service marked as 'essential'.

In your example... does EVERYONE pay 11.5% on non-essential items? If so... REGRESSIVE.

If not, then how do you keep track of who pays what percentage?

The so called fair tax is a horrid idea. It creates a bureaucratic nightmare, enables a more corrupt system and is overall ... REGRESSIVE.

While it MIGHT be better than our current system.... a flat tax with standard deduction is far simpler, eliminates the majority of bribes (lobbying), is actually FAIR and it is PROGRESSIVE.


Regressivity is a feature of the Fair Tax, not a bug.
 
...
I don't know what the answer is, because I think the right is bananas, and don't trust them with our gov't. ...
So why not minimize the government down to just its Constitutionally mandated form? That would reduce the amount of shenanigans by both parties along with giving you "the answer", which is to cut spending, thereby reducing taxation.
 
Nope, it's not "regressive" at all, it is just as the name implies... FAIR! There would be no lobbying, nothing to lobby for, unless you're going to lobby for more consumption!

I think you haven't really studied up on this, and don't have a clue of what you're talking about here.

Here, go educate yourself, and come back when you can articulate what part you don't think will work:

http://www.fairtax.org/site/PageServer?pagename=about_faq
It is nothing more than a national sales tax. Proponents of a national sales tax RENAMED it because they know sale taxes are anything but fair.

To wit: a family making $50K/yr spends it all. So a 10% sales tax would make them pay 10%.

A family making 100K/yr spends it all, and thus spend 10% on taxes.

A family making 1 million/yr probably saves/invests more than half, but let's say their hedonists that spend 500K a year. They pay 10% on what they spend, and nothing on what they do not spend. So they are effectively paying 5%.

Top level CEOs making 9 figures would be paying less than 1/2 of one percent.

Now, if we were to excclude necessities, then the breaking points change, but the high income levels STILL pay way smaller percentage of their income than lower income people. And that is where lobbying comes in. Is lobster a luxury or necessity? How about a personal computer? A televisions? What determines which items are exempt so we don't tax the poor at full rate? Who INFLUENCES those who make that determination?

The end result: a tax system functionally even more regressive than the current system, just as convoluted, and just as prone to lobbying and corruption for special consideration for exempt status.

OTOH, a flat tax which taxes all personal income, coupled with a base standard deduction (I would promote such being adjustable according to family size, such as 15K per adult individual, 30K per married couple, plus an additional 10K per child or legal dependent such as aged parent, etc.) and we end up with a FAIR system mildly progressive, but simple with nothing to lobby about except where the standard deduction is set.

One other point to consider, though, is to possibly tax only personal income. Since corporate taxation is passed on through consumer pricing calculations anyway, let the people pay those taxes directly by setting the tax rate instead of indirectly through companies adding 15 cents to every can of soup to pay their taxes.
 
BTW: on "prebates"

So the people get something "back (in advance" calculated on what they are SUPPOSEDLY spending on sales tax on poverty-level necessities.

First, if they're making less than 100K+, they'll spend that "prebate" some of which will go to taxes, some of which will be on necessities. So an individual gets $2491 in prebates, which supposedly offsets the $2491 in sales taxes they spend on their $10830 poverty-level necessity pruchases, right? But the vast majority are going to spend that $2491 - and $622 of that will go to the national sales taxes - thus effectively making them pay $622 (6.25%) on their "exempt" base income. So let's say this individual only makes $10830. Theoretically they should pay zero taxes, right? But they paid $2491 in sales taxes, which is prebated, and then they spend the $2491 prebate, and in doing so spend another $622 in taxes. So someone making POVERTY LEVEL WAGES pays 6.25% of their income in national taxes.

So much for THAT idea of "fairness"
 
Had to share. She was on with Anderson Cooper; I just caught the end. I saw that she was on, and my instant thought was "oh boy; here's a nutter. I wonder what kind of nutter thing she is going to say." And that wasn't just a knee-jerk, because she is a nutter, and she generally says nutter things.

But she was talking about taxes, and darned if she wasn't right. We really are taxed way too much; and this isn't Obama's fault, or any current politician's. We just always have been. What some don't realize is that it takes awhile, for most people, and a lot of work, to get to a point where they are earning what could be called a "decent" or "comfortable" living.

But when they get to that point, the paycheck they get - that first week, when they have passed the imaginary threshold that they always held in their mind - is a shocker. When you get to a certain point, your net is half your gross, basically. It's ridiculous.

So, she was right. We're taxed way too much. It's a bummer, because most Democrats don't talk about lowering taxes, and most Republicans ONLY talk about taxes, so they miss out on the other issues. And they basically give it lip service, because even with Bush's "big" tax cuts, most over $50K in income were still paying way too much.

I don't know what the answer is, because I think the right is bananas, and don't trust them with our gov't. I was very encouraged when Clinton talked about a smaller, smarter gov't, and Gore did the whole "reinventing gov't" project. I had political ideals I agreed with, that seemed to "get it" as far as the tax question was concerned; or at least, it was headed in the right direction.

That was lost very quickly; now, no one seems to get the whole picture. It's reduced to the extremes.

OK, Oncie, give me the list of tax raises for the poor and massive budget cuts you'd take to ensure that you reach your magical arbitrary number of 1/3. Would you eliminate the department of the defense and the public education system? I'm still not sure you'd be there. Would you pointlessly shove money around in the economy and really accomplish squat for the average American by abolishing social security? There were a lot of states, I'll remind you, that privatized their public workers social security and pretended they'd make it up through investments. The investments didn't turn up. There was practically no savings in the program besides that gained by the people who left the state and so were robbed of those years of social security credits. You really have no plan. You're just a bag full sound and fury, signifying nothing.

Liberals who expect everything to work by magic are even worse that conservatives that expect everything to work by magic.
 
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