ParanoiA

I simply don't agree that's it's my problem how much you require to buy bread and wine. I'm paying someone to do a job. Depending on the complexity of that job, the supply and demand of the labor market and costs associated with training and re-training will determine how much I'm willing to pay someone. This is business. We are a capitalist country and everything we do is a contract or agreement, supported by laws. You don't owe benefits to the guy that mows your lawn do you? That's silly. If a job is super simple and virtually anyone can do it, then it isn't worth much as a job. How is it that my friend makes 30 dollars an hour at telecommunications? How about the hundred or so people on his floor that also make that wage? How about the 14 floors of similarly slicked up folk making similar salaries, give or take a few? What about the vision, dental and health benefits they receive? The market has failed for them? You mean all of those slicksters running around downtown on their cell phones and shiny watches are poor folk that the market has failed on? Please...they get paid what they do because they are a valuable business asset. They made themselves valuable by going to school to learn things others don't know and then used that to market their labor. Also, because of Unions. Unions are not the government. They are the people organizing and using their power of alliance to levy change. Quite american, in my opinion and is a necessary force for keeping labor from being exploited unfairly. To me, Unions are as much a market institution as any other private business and should be playing the role here. Employers who take good care of their people can avoid Unions and many do, just for that reason. That's not true. Minimum wage has increased several times, just in the past 15 or so years. When I was 16 it was like 3.35 an hour, now it's around 5 or 6 something. You're really equating a reasonable hunting and gathering expectation on others with killing sprees and mayhem? I already made it clear that helping the handicapped, elderly, mentally ill, anyone who can't take care of themselves, should be expected from the people. And I'm not really against helping the impoverished. I'm for doing the job right or not doing it at all. It's a worthwhile investment to help people become productive, but handing them checks and looking the other way isn't helping. Either declare them mentally ill and zap their asses or something...

I'm not sure what's more despicable...the Sensitivity Police or the candidates that kick them while they're down...

Just to be clear though, I'm not necessarily against minimum wage. I was just taking issue with some of Mokele's and 1veedo's statements. I'm sort of on the fence really...because on the one hand MW goes against what I believe in terms of a truly free society. On the other hand, it's quite pragmatic. Businesses will screw people over and hold them down to pennies of what they're worth if they can. Just like I'd pay a dollar to have my lawn mowed if I can.

That's a huge stereotype that I lived with for about 7 years of my life. Don't lecture me on welfare, I had to support my poor wife and kids in a nasty apartment complex littered with section 8 welfare recipients. I wasn't on welfare. I had a job, a crappy job, and had to pay to live in those conditions that those people lived in for free. The taxes I paid went to these losers. Some of these people get drunk all day, deal drugs in the courtyard. I had to walk through gangs of drunks and cracker haters after work to get to my apartment. Mothers teaching their kids how to drain the system. You should hear these people talk about our government. They believe, after all of this welfare, that they are owed this and so much more. They bitch about being screwed by the government. Yes, you read that right. They actually believed their welfare was an entitlement they weren't getting a fair amount of. I have a rotten outlook on welfare because it is a thoughtless, careless institution. Like I said, it's society's way of dealing with people who won't take care of themselves - without having to do it directly. No one wants to take personal responsibility. That's why it's basically a shit hole. You don't want to bring the homeless guy into your house and feed him at the table with your family. Instead, you just earmark taxes so some program, somewhere in the bureaucratic empire will go feed him. This is welfare. Throw some tax money at it, and I don't have to look at hungry kids begging for food in front of the supermarket. Instead, they'll be pinned up in the broken down apartment complex, out of our view. I'd like to meet a welfare recipient that wants a job. Somebody who wants a job, has a job. I've never gone without work. I'm 35 and just got my degree when I was 29 and started work at my current job. So all of my work was without a high school diploma, nor any college at all. I was able to support my wife and kids as well. What you're advocating is a myth. Welfare is an attitude. So is homelessness.

Yeah, that was a stupid statement on my part. I even knew it at the time but I had all this crap in my head I was trying to get out and forgot to go back and re-word it. My apologies, because that's rather insulting to poor chinese workers.

Ok, well here's a debate I don't have much input on, but rather questions about. If this is the wrong place, please feel free to move it, as I apologize in advance. Two things occured to me listening to the radio today... One: Is it really true that Global Warming, at least as an apocolyptic event is not proven? I guess I already know the answer to this or else there wouldn't be so much opposition. But from what I heard, we have an observed phenomenon and a hypothesis - but no proven test. We have not satisfied the scientific method. If that's true, then how is "faith" in Global Warming any different than "faith" in God? Two: It is my understanding that the oceans will rise, so we'll lose dry land mass and the climate will shift, changing environments all over the earth. If that's correct, then what are the consequences of that? Are there good things to expect from GW? Are we just being old men set in our ways that refuse to welcome change? I realize flooding and mass migration and the thousands, if not millions of deaths are not good things...I just mean after the initiation. Would some climates actually become better or more desirable?

Of course many agree with you, no doubt. That's usually when I start questioning something. Once the herd starts pluralizing, it's time to look deeper. I agree that we'll just have to disagree in agreement. This is one of those fundamental things that drives subsequent logic and conclusions. I would agree with that assessment, except that this behavior modification has to do with economic stimulation in general, not a focused effort to thwart some particular market. Huge tax breaks to the wealthy is good. Wealthy people employ people. Wealthy people move alot more money than I do. Give me a tax break and I go buy an xbox. This pays the salary of some chinese kid for a day maybe. Give a wealthy person a tax break and he buys a yacht. That pays the salary for a shop full of yacht builders for a week or more? Yacht builders that pay taxes.... Wealthy people impact the economy more than I do. They impact the economy more healthy as well. Wealthy people are good at managing money - that's how they got wealthy. So, if I'm looking at stimulating the economy, trying to get folks to invest, build, buy, - then I need a smart, healthy stimulation. Giving the poor and middle class huge tax breaks just results in a surge of buying goodies and gadgets. That's cool for a few months, but then you're right back where you started. However, if you give these huge tax breaks to the wealthy, they will buy goodies and gadgets, but they'll also invest in their businesses and other capitalist ventures - which creates long lasting economic growth. Not just a one sided sweep of purchasing. Tax breaks to the rich just sounds bad. Try to think deeper than the sound bite. You're being played by those who stand to benefit by exploiting class envy. They're banking you won't think this through, but rather just take it at face value. Yes. Because paying the factory worker was a voluntary decision. It was not based on how much I've "benefitted" from the american government. Taxes are forced. I'm not saying they aren't necessary, but when they aren't fairly extracted, they are a punishment. The rich are punished for being successful. They pay a higher percentage, which I believe is wrong. Equal percentages still result in exponential amounts of taxes compared to me - which is perfectly fair. This is compensation for the proportion of benefit you eluded to in your first quote above, in my opinion.

Tax incentive for small business? There are actually people in this country that would be against such a thing? Since when has small business screwed anybody over? From what I've seen, small business is the prey the government uses as its primary food source.

If I own a business and I hire you to do work for me, then how is any of the above my problem? Where are you when I can't get my business to work out and I go under? You just get another job. I go bankrupt and possibly lose everything I own. How come you don't care about my kids? My hospital bills? My car? I actually employed someone for a given amount of time - I provided a job. But that's not good enough is it? Oh no...I have to pay for their poverty too huh? You want me to provide health insurance too. You want me to pay them out the ass so a grown adult can flip french fries and pay for their whole life with it. Why do you think minimum wage jobs deserve to be higher pay or benefits? It's perfectly reasonable to assume french fry skills should provide an adequate income? Talk about reaching low. The whole point of a job is that an employer hires me to do work for him for a given wage, benefits - whatever deal we agree on. If I don't like his offer - then screw him. If I like his offer, then I'll take it. If I make myself valuable to him, then he'll want to give me raises or whatever it takes to keep me. That's exactly what has happened in my jobs. While everyone is burning cigs at the smoke hole crying and bitching about "the man", I'm busting my ass and demanding raises. I've quit more than one job because they wouldn't pay me what I wanted. Minimum wage is unnecessary when you realize a job is not an entitlement - it's something you earn. Otherwise, go hunt and gather on public hunting land. Nothing stopping you, but you. Those are not the only options. Jobs and welfare...or death? come on... You don't have a right to live anyway. You earn your right to live. You've studied nature enough, you know this already. You don't have a right to my stuff because you suck at getting stuff. You don't have a right to my food and shelter because you can't figure out how to get food and shelter yourself. You have a right to pursue food and shelter. None of us should be obligated to provide any of it for you. Welfare is the sheeple's way of feeling good about themselves while not personally having to help others less fortunate - it's also the public's way of taking care of the offspring that irresponsible, lazy humans won't take care of. We basically feel sorry for them. No...it's not a right either. So, neither one is a right. They seem like rights when an economy works so well, when a society thrives to the point that survival has been mastered to the point that it's no longer much of an effort. It's down to preference, comfort. That's why I don't feel sorry for poor assholes that "can't get a job". I feel sorry for the handicapped. I feel sorry for single moms that got screwed over. I feel sorry for their kids. I don't feel anything for the idiot hunter gatherers than haven't figured out how to hunt and gather in the easiest place on earth to do it.

Dittos bascule. I love the press conference on hair styles - that was awesome. I refuse to accept the charge that these individuals should be punished for other people's interpretation of an event. I realize they thought it was a bomb, but it wasn't - so laugh it off and chaulk it up as a lesson learned. I just about fell out of my seat with laughter when I read the DA actually said something to the effect that they were "clearly intended to be a bomb scare hoax". That's even more stupid than detonating these supposed "bombs". Boston is making fools out of themselves and I say let them. I hope these two fellows continue making a mockery out of their stupidity and refusal to accept they made an honest mistake. What law has been violated anyway? There something in the books about distributing blinking light thingy's around town? I wonder how the neon ridden downtown infestation of lights and signs doesn't qualify as the same. Contrary to modern social norms, somebody doesn't always have to be punished when these things happen. Sometimes we just overreact, we live, we learn, we laugh about it and we move on...or maybe I just wish we did.

This is bad. Mark my words and remember this post. If this passes, terrorism will slow but not stop - just enough to keep the doubters looking stupid. Then, after the six months is up, when we pull out, it will be Vietnam all over again. There will be civil war and they will be invaded by a neighboring country - most likely Iran. How sad. We promised those people we wouldn't do this to them again. So many dead due to our cowardice the first time. This will not be forgotten if this happens.

Not to pick on you about your position, but what is "conservative" about those issues? I realize the GOP position is as you've stated, but what makes that "conservative"? I don't really see those issues as conservative or liberal. Liberals will and have attacked and waged war on other countries. And securing borders has been a non-partisan demand from the people of the country I thought. Anyway, I understand your position on them, I just don't understand labeling those positions as conservative or liberal in this case. So, Obama, to me anyway, may not represent two important views for you, but he's still a liberal. And what exactly is that action?

Ok, I'm a little confused. Before the democrats took power back, the media was telling me that I'm supposed to believe we need more troops. That was a big deal. Everytime a news camera found a democrat, they were going on about how we need an increased troop presence. The other thing, and I'm sure there's more, is armor. This armor was a huge deal. Again, everytime a news camera focused on a blue politician, they were going on about how Rumsfeld's an idiot and "where's the armor for our troops?". Then, this week they killed a resolution to get more troops and I haven't heard squat about armor since the election. What's the deal? Where did the chorus go?

True, but it's still interesting. It's not like Fox tried to represent it as such. I believe it was buried amongst a bunch of other equally irrelevant stories. I have a tendency to dig up stuff like this because I like controversial subjects and race, sex, drugs - all good subject matter for that.

I didn't say government wasn't necessary. I was trying to make the point that the government doesn't make money, it costs money. The following point to that being how ridiculous it is to thank the government and scorn the rich.

The government establishes law and order, arguably a civilized society for business and consumers to operate in. In that way, the government serves all of us - not just the rich dude that owns the business. What benefit are you speaking of that he has received from our government, that I have not received as well? I believe the laws effect all of us. You're free to put a second mortgage on your home and risk all of your assets like so many other successful rich people did before they got rich. There's nothing stopping you...but you. I don't agree with this idea of weighted benefit. Joe Blow enjoys more success than me, so he is "benefiting" from the government more than me. No, no..you're leaving a step out...Joe blow risked and did what I'm not willing to do to enjoy more success than me. He earned it. I didn't. I chose security - an 8 to 5 job, guaranteed paycheck. He didn't. He took a chance and gave up security. Yes, the tax and spend concept is a democrat idea. Taxes are a punishment. Economics is a domino effect. When you play around with hiking taxes here and there you always end up treading over the innocent. I personally find it incredibly offensive and downright weird that democrats - renowned for their support of the little guy - don't care about that. Democrats have become anti-rich, not pro-working class. There's a huge difference. Hopefully you've read tomgwyther's post by now. Nothing speaks like experience...

Well, hopefully they'll feel compelled to stand up for the rights of dicks because they fully appreciate the constitution and its timeless reverence. But I doubt it too....

I apologize, you're right. I'm really pissed at this taxation ideology perpetuated by so many. I don't mean to take it out on you, but it blows my mind how people can just talk about other people's money and how they can get it through legislation. The rich made their money in the free market. The government just takes it like a thug. The rich do things for society and the economy - they give back, even in the peak of their greed. Government is a liability. It doesn't make us any money at all - it costs us money. Government doesn't create revenue - it takes it from others who did. Yet people will scorn the rich and thank their government. That's sick, to me. Just as sick as people who think they have a "right" to a job, or are entitled to a particular lifestyle. I believe this mentallity is to blame for a tax happy public. Actually I'm not. There shouldn't be either one. That was my point. Taxes should be for bringing in revenue for the government to operate on. Taxes should only be used and decided on for those purposes. I don't agree with using taxes to manipulate the behavior of the free market. Well then how does a rich man use sooooo much more energy than me? Because he has a big ole house to heat up? So what's stopping you? The free market has responded. But you're not buying their cars. You're not buying solar panels either are you? What exactly are you doing? I'm going to assume you'll answer yes to at least one of those, but my point is, why is always up to someone else? Yes it's going to hurt, so get out there and start getting used to the pain. Instead it's all about manipulating taxes here and there, forcing the employers of the nation to risk their money, their business, your neighbor's job. I don't get that. Anyway, that's the flaws I see in a tax hike on fuels. Punishing the private sector for the lack of consumer interest in alternative fuels.

All of you make great points, but then aren't they rather easy to deduce?. So, how come this Texas town enjoys "overwhelming support" for this ordinance? I don't even agree with the "fighting" words thing either. I agree, that screaming obscenities at someone on the street would constitute harrasment (even without the obscenities), so I see no need for a law here. It just smells like white people overcompensating again trying to be liked or admired for being soooooooo not prejudice.

I think it may just be time to move. My countrymen have lost their ****ing minds. Can America get any more stupid? Don't answer that...I already know it can... http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,246279,00.html Texas Mayor Singles Out N-Word for Ban It's one of the most reviled words in the English language, but if one Texas mayor gets his way, getting caught uttering the "N-word" will hit offenders where it hurts. Mayor Ken Corley of Brazoria, Texas, has proposed a city ordinance that would make using the word in an offensive fashion a crime equal to disturbing the peace and punishable by a fine of up to $500. "I would like to, if possible, ban all racial slurs," Corley told FOXNews.com. "We chose this word because it's the most controversial issue throughout the United States today." Corley said the city would like to go after the use of other racial slurs, "but we want to take this one step at a time, depending on public opinion." Speakout! What do you think of the N-word ordinance? The 62-year-old mayor, who is a self-described "middle-class white boy," got the idea for the ordinance after watching Rev. Jesse Jackson and Rev. Al Sharpton discuss banning the N-word on TV after "Seinfeld" comedian Michael Richards used it in an act last November. "The word is not used or abused in the streets of our town; it's more, amongst the black community, as a term of endearment, OK?" Corley said. "But it is a national issue, and I would like the city of Brazoria to take a leadership role throughout the nation in banning the use of this word." Corley polled his constituents and found "overwhelming support" for the ordinance. Brazoria, with a population of around 2,800, is an industrial city nestled about 50 miles south of Houston near the Gulf of Mexico coast. About 10 percent of the population is black. Under the proposed Brazoria ordinance, users of the N-word would be fined only if a complaint were filed against them, thus protecting those who think they are using the word as a term of endearment. Bishop Ricky Jones, a black minister and the head of the Living Word Fellowship Christian Center in Brazoria, "wholeheartedly" supports the ordinance and the mayor, though he doesn't agree with the "term of endearment" loophole. "It's trying to be made a term of endearment in the black community, the way it has been used so loosely, but I for one, when I look at that word and look at the history of it, it has been used to demonize, demoralize and degrade black people as a whole." Jabari Asim, a deputy editor at the Washington Post and author of the forthcoming book "The N Word: Who Can Say It, Who Shouldn't and Why," has traced the American arrival of the word to 1619 when a Jamestown, Va., diarist, John Rolfe, noted: "We got 20 niggers today on a Dutch man-of-war." "That's the first recorded instance of African captives arriving to British North America and that was the word used to describe them," Asim said. Over the last 25 years, the hip-hop community has sprinkled the word throughout its anthems. "It's really important for people to realize that the history of the word goes so far back that recent developments in the past 20 years [of] casual use," Asim said. "There is no god higher than history and I don't think recent developments are strong enough to overcome the centuries of hatred that are attached to the word." Brazoria's proposed ordinance is the first time an American city has tried to ban the word, though groups such as Abolish the "N" Word have lobbied for its permanent retirement, Asim said. "Calling for societal change is one thing, but calling for legislation against speech is quite another," he said. "That's practically anti-American to say that we're going to allow the government and Uncle Sam determine how we speak to one another. It's counterintuitive to me. It's best to lead by example than by legislation." Judge Andrew Napolitano, a senior legal analyst for FOX News, agrees. "This is government trying to take the easy way out," he said. "When people use words that are harmful, they lack civility and they lack education, but they don't lack the right to say it." Napolitano doubts the ordinance will stand up in a court of law. "You can't just pick a word because then you're granting more protection to the victims of that word than you are to victims of other words, so you really open up a Pandora's box," Napolitano said. The ordinance is on shaky ground legally because of a 1992 U.S. Supreme Court decision, R.A.V. vs. the City of St. Paul, said David Hudson, a First Amendment scholar at the First Amendment Center in Nashville, Tenn. "Fighting words are not protected by the First Amendment, and a lot of fighting words are face to face personal insults," Hudson said. "But in 1992, in this case, the court held that selective banning of fighting words, in other words, singly out, for instance, fighting words based on race and sex, that that constituted viewpoint discrimination and violated the First Amendment. "It's a well-intentioned effort, but it's a well-intentioned unconstitutional effort," Hudson said. Corley said that while he has "some concerns" about the law's legal standing, the city attorney is confident it will pass muster. A public hearing will be held Thursday, before the five-member city council decides on whether to pursue the measure. Last year, it was the first city in Texas to pass a sex-offender ordinance.

Yes..as in tax cuts that democrats like to call subsidies. This is what I mean. You're tax happy. Cut 'em here, add 'em there - trying to control the behavior of american business. Oh...and jobs. Forget that one? Rich people are out there burning up energy for no reason? These rich people you're talking about are businesses and industry that provide jobs for the freaking country. The energy they're burning up is manufacturing things, producing things - like your computer and your car. Why do you insist on using the term 'rich people'? Rich people don't burn that kind of energy. Their businesses do. The business is part of the economy. When you say rich people do it, that's disingenuous and suggests it has nothing to do with the economy, or your paycheck, or the precious revenue ( other people's money ) you're after. Is this anything like how my employer "reimburses" my college tuition? On paper it means nothing lost, but in real life I was out several hundred dollars until the reimbursement check came in? ( a very precious several hundred dollars for some - the ones you're not thinking about ) I'm not actually attending college, but that's an example of how it may sound really cool on paper and the equations all work out all neato and stuff, yet people get screwed in real life. The logistics don't work out to mean nothing to the average consumer - they mean a whole freaking lot to average consumers - they just don't mean much to you. It's so easy to spend other people's money isn't it? Seems so logical to dream up taxes when it's not yours - or very, very little of yours.

Behavior modification through taxation....definitely a democrat idea. Great post Gcol. Couldn't possibly say it any better... I know this is Sisyphus's idea, but this is a common theme with the left I've noticed. Tunnel vision. So caught up with bringing down the great giant they don't see the innocent being smashed in the process. Isn't that the same criticism leveled against the administration and the Iraq conflict? Taking down the innocent during the prosecution? Perhaps the left minded and the current administration aren't so different after all...

Actually yes, which is why I'm particularly pissed about it now. No, I'm not claiming that. But I see it as an arguable necessity of conflict. If our bombing of Germany in WWII were to piss off other countries, I doubt we'd do it any different. I'm not saying it's necessary to piss off half the world, but I'm willing to accept that it shouldn't impact or alter our resolve.

Yes, in that he is an opportunist, just like the guy that's in charge right now. Only GWB is also bought and paid for...I can't say the same for Obama yet. With the similarities to Clinton's reign, I just think people should remember that he is a politician, instead of immediately taking to him just because he says all the right things. Every good salesman says the right things. That's how they sell shit.

I'm with Pangloss. The similarities with the Clinton era are stunning. It was quite successful, so I guess they're just doing it again. But please don't mislead yourselves so far that you actually believe Obama is not a politician. The devil's greatest trick was proving he didn't exist. The democrats are very good at this. Remember, you're talking about well educated, learned men and women that pretend to fight for the "common man", the "working man" and so forth - been duping voters for decades with that rhetoric. Half of their constituents are the poor, uneducated, working class - most of whom don't have the time or energy to think much about politics - they're too busy trying to find a little happiness in their depressing, busy lives. The other half are middle class, many of which just graduated from the ranks of poor and uneducated - they're too busy watching reality TV and listening to some music star's anti-war, let's all love one another cure for terrorism. These people are very easy to sway - just repeat what they already believe - truth is irrelevant. Obama is instant god with them. They've never heard of him and he "feels their pain". That'll work, elect him!