Occupy Rants, Flames, and NSFW

[Aadill]

Originally Posted by Daldolma [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

governmental-unanimity that doesn't currently exist for essentially anything

That is the problem.

[Hasbinbad]

Sorry for reposting, but this belongs here:

Originally Posted by Hasbinbad [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

For years, the city couldn't afford to feed the homeless in Oakland.

For the past two weeks, the mostly white, upper middle class people shown above have been feeding the homeless of not only Oakland but the majority of the transient population 3-4 cities out. They set up a feeding station on the lawn in front of Oakland city hall, and invited anyone to come eat nutritious, sustainable food for free. They paid for this out of their own pockets, as voted on by an assembly at large of the people gathered. They all did their own math, and figured out what they could afford to give every month without a serious cramp on their style, and that amount was more than sufficient to buy enough rice, tofu, and whatever fruity vegetables they could to give away for free. Real people (soccer moms, buisnessmen) dropped off bagloads of food to the hippies who didn't have jobs and thus were the cooks/servers.

This was set up to be maintained forever. It took about 3 hours and 200 people with jobs on their own dimes. This is a direct analogy of what the 99% movement is all about. Give to those of a lower class. Tax the rich more. You make a million dollars a year - AND THAT IS GREAT! GOOD JOB! YAY CAPITALISM! - but fuck you, you pay taxes for the privilege. If 200 or 2,000 local people can fucking figure out how to feed the fucking homeless people in their area, why can't the fucking city which is paid millions of dollars in taxes for the social welfare?

Yes I know the math. Yes I know the 1% do pay more taxes. It's not enough. The tax needs to be flatter, or have more regulation on capitalism. The disparity has led to this nationwide protest, and this is just the beginning. Even when the police put the people down the first few times and it seems like it will get better, they will keep the policies involved static, and the disparity will get worse. This will trigger the revolution.

So yeah. They were a bunch of dumbasses standing around. Look carefully. They aren't in all black or Guy Fawkes masks. They were just standing there. Listening. There was a P.A.. People were speaking based on their ability to speak ideas as voted on by their peers. There was order. It's a strange thing to watch man.

Of course Oakland doesn't like the majority of the transient populations of every city for miles camped at the door of city hall.. They shut it all down, built a fence. Tear gas was involed.

That fence is now gone.

The people are still there.

..and Oakland wants to sit down with this bunch of dumbasses.

[Daldolma]

Originally Posted by Hasbinbad [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Sorry for reposting, but this belongs here:

Serious question: at what point does it stop being the responsibility of the wealthy to provide for the less wealthy? What's the cut-off? What entitlements are "rights" and what are indulgences? Food, I think we all agree, should be provided by the government. Education, too. Shelter. Maybe even non-emergency health care.

But when do you say -- "OK, we're providing enough for the baseline citizen. Let's stop raising taxes on the rich"? Do citizens have a right to comfort? I'd argue that they don't. You have a right to survival and equality of opportunity -- not to comfort. In fact, you *should* be uncomfortable if you're unemployed. You should be uncomfortable until you're employed.

I'm not a big proponent of raising taxes on the rich. I'm not theoretically opposed to it, but in practice, the US government hasn't earned my faith. The government is inherently inefficient, and American welfare programs are largely unsuccessful. The money raised by taxes is more likely to be spent on administrative bullshit or defense than on lower classes.

I prefer less ambiguous measures. A significant raise in the minimum wage, for instance, is long overdue. It is impossible to live comfortably on current minimum wage. Reforming the tax code to eliminate loopholes is necessary. The wealthier you are, the easier it is for you to get out of paying taxes. That's backward. Taxes should be simple and unavoidable. Greatly increase regulations on financial institutions. And fixes are necessary for the health care and education systems in America, but I won't pretend to have the answers to those questions. Raising taxes is not even close to a solution to those problems.

[Recycled Children]

ITT: Commies complain want more commie things.!

[aresprophet]

Originally Posted by Daldolma [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Serious question: at what point does it stop being the responsibility of the wealthy to provide for the less wealthy? What's the cut-off? What entitlements are "rights" and what are indulgences? Food, I think we all agree, should be provided by the government. Education, too. Shelter. Maybe even non-emergency health care.

That's exactly the kind of serious question that we haven't been asking for the last two decades. Instead the national dialogue has revolved around how we can sustain our current society while asking less and less of everyone (but particularly of the well-off).

Is a 40% top tax bracket enough? 50%? 70%? Hell 90% worked just fine post-WWII, would that be appropriate now?

OWS is making people think about this kind of thing, and that's good because we've been pretending we can get along just fine while ignoring the realities of what it takes to support our society.

But when do you say -- "OK, we're providing enough for the baseline citizen. Let's stop raising taxes on the rich"? Do citizens have a right to comfort? I'd argue that they don't. You have a right to survival and equality of opportunity -- not to comfort. In fact, you *should* be uncomfortable if you're unemployed. You should be uncomfortable until you're employed.

"Uncomfortable" and "destitute" are vastly different things, but only a few thousand dollars a year apart for most people. Hell I'm gainfully employed and I'm still "uncomfortable", if you define comfort as having more than a few dollars a week in disposable income.

Making poor people suffer turns more poor people into criminals; placating them costs a relative pittance compared to the Big Five of the federal budget (which are, in no particular order, Keeping Old People Alive, Keeping Poor People Alive, Killing Brown People, Keeping Old People Alive (redux), and Keeping Other Governments From Repossessing Half Our Country).

I'm not a big proponent of raising taxes on the rich. I'm not theoretically opposed to it, but in practice, the US government hasn't earned my faith. The government is inherently inefficient, and American welfare programs are largely unsuccessful. The money raised by taxes is more likely to be spent on administrative bullshit or defense than on lower classes.

None of this is true. Not a sentence of it. The money spent on defense and welfare is largely a fixed amount (at the federal level anyway), federal government programs often outperform the private sector in terms of administrative overhead, and the "efficiency" of government is a non-issue when you consider that it is meant to fill roles that the private sector will not, cannot, and should not. It's not there to make money, it's there to perform certain essential functions regardless of efficiency.

Your distrust in government is not necessarily misplaced, but it is for the wrong reasons. Politicians who ignore their central duties in favor of their election campaigns, who argue in bad faith, who block good legislation to score points, and who are more beholden to lobbyists and donors than the electorate are the problem. It is no coincidence that the OWS protests are about precisely this, and share your concerns about government's ability to perform. They're just doing it for the right reasons.

It is also no coincidence that the political party who has been most defined by the above flaws over the last 15 years or so is the one that is preying on your fears about government to win your vote.

I prefer less ambiguous measures. A significant raise in the minimum wage, for instance, is long overdue. It is impossible to live comfortably on current minimum wage.

I thought "comfort" wasn't something we were supposed to guarantee? I'd rather live on welfare than slave for 40 hours a week on minimum wage, but that's not the reason we have high unemployment.

Reforming the tax code to eliminate loopholes is necessary. The wealthier you are, the easier it is for you to get out of paying taxes. That's backward. Taxes should be simple and unavoidable.

The capital gains tax is the most egregious example in world history of taxes being reshaped to greatly favor those who have over those who have not. "Loppholes" by and large are the byproduct of the kind of initiative you claim to support, and any attempt to eliminate them is generally an attempt to impose a heavily regressive tax that fucks over anyone who isn't super-wealthy (see national sales tax, flat tax, Fair Tax, see any GOP tax proposals since Reagen was inaugurated)

Greatly increase regulations on financial institutions. And fixes are necessary for the health care and education systems in America, but I won't pretend to have the answers to those questions. Raising taxes is not even close to a solution to those problems.

Yes, actually, it is. Because you can't throw hundreds of billions of dollars (in the case of health care trillions of dollars) at problems without those dollars coming from somewhere.

[Daldolma]

Originally Posted by aresprophet [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

None of this is true. Not a sentence of it. The money spent on defense and welfare is largely a fixed amount (at the federal level anyway), federal government programs often outperform the private sector in terms of administrative overhead, and the "efficiency" of government is a non-issue when you consider that it is meant to fill roles that the private sector will not, cannot, and should not. It's not there to make money, it's there to perform certain essential functions regardless of efficiency.

I don't know where you're getting that from, but it's demonstrably false. The money we spend on defense and welfare is *not* fixed by any reasonable definition of the term. The dollar amount, percentage of GDP, and dispersal of funding fluctuates significantly from year to year for defense spending. Moreover, as recently as a few months ago, Congress passed a bill that required ~$450 billion in defense spending cuts over the next 10 years. That's, by definition, not fixed. It changes constantly. It's a safe bet that with increased tax revenue would come more expenditure on defense, and had we already increased tax revenue, those defense cuts likely never would have been realized.

Originally Posted by aresprophet [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I thought "comfort" wasn't something we were supposed to guarantee? I'd rather live on welfare than slave for 40 hours a week on minimum wage, but that's not the reason we have high unemployment.

Comfort is not a right, but it should be attainable for the employed. A minimum wage that provides a modicum of comfort for the employed would go a long way toward eliminating the need for many welfare programs. And yes, a large reason for the number of unemployed is the fact that working minimum wage is less desirable than simply collecting welfare. You can't improve your lot on current minimum wage, so why bother? There's no shortage of jobs at Subway, McDonald's, or a million other businesses that pay minimum wage. The fact is that millions of people choose not to do that kind of work because minimum wage isn't worth the effort to them.

Originally Posted by aresprophet [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Yes, actually, it is. Because you can't throw hundreds of billions of dollars (in the case of health care trillions of dollars) at problems without those dollars coming from somewhere.

Who decided it was desirable to "throw" hundreds of billions -- or trillions -- of dollars at health care? The current health care system doesn't work, no matter how much you tax the wealthy. We already spend more per citizen on health care than any other nation in the world -- what is more money going to fix? Dumping more money into it will just delay the inevitable, which is reform. Our national health care programs are insolvent, and our private health care industry is broken. "Tax the rich" sounds nice if you're not rich, but it's not actually a solution. It's a bumper sticker. There has yet to be a comprehensive, fair, and workable healthcare solution presented -- no matter how much revenue is brought in.

[Shiftin]

Originally Posted by aresprophet [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

None of this is true. Not a sentence of it. The money spent on defense and welfare is largely a fixed amount (at the federal level anyway), federal government programs often outperform the private sector in terms of administrative overhead, and the "efficiency" of government is a non-issue when you consider that it is meant to fill roles that the private sector will not, cannot, and should not. It's not there to make money, it's there to perform certain essential functions regardless of efficiency.

Hi. Actual accountant here. This is horribly false, and will never change while governments use a method of accounting that discourages having leftover money (what we would deem profit in the real world).

NFP and government accounting is done in "funds". When you have leftover money at the end of the year in your "fund" it is moved to the government's "general fund" and used for other shortfalls, and it usually means your budget is reduced for the following year, which completely disincentivizes leaders of cost centers in government and NFP accounting from doing things efficiently. "Hey, thanks for saving us some money. We're not allowed to share profits with you because we're not allowed to have profits, but we will make sure you have to do things at least as cheaply next year! Good luck getting everything to work out this well again!"

Also, if people could quit calling things that were explicitly passed into the tax law to encourage certain behaviors "loopholes", that would be fantastic. You can't completely rewrite the tax code without a meltdown of our economy. The easiest piece to explain is the mortgage interest deduction. If you eliminate that, you eliminate the reason a lot of people who just pop over the rent/buy decision from the individual housing market. What that market shrinks, it affects virtually every facet of our economy.

[Hasbinbad]

Originally Posted by Shiftin [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

we will make sure you have to do things at least as cheaply next year!

Thems is sum powerful words son.

That is itself one of the root problems of society, and a good example of where government should (imho), and in fact does in some cases (FDA, USDA) have a role in regulation (do things as cheaply as you can, but maintain this standard).

[Hasbinbad]

Originally Posted by Daldolma [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Serious question: at what point does it stop being the responsibility of the wealthy to provide for the less wealthy? What's the cut-off? What entitlements are "rights" and what are indulgences? Food, I think we all agree, should be provided by the government. Education, too. Shelter. Maybe even non-emergency health care.

But when do you say -- "OK, we're providing enough for the baseline citizen. Let's stop raising taxes on the rich"? Do citizens have a right to comfort? I'd argue that they don't. You have a right to survival and equality of opportunity -- not to comfort. In fact, you *should* be uncomfortable if you're unemployed. You should be uncomfortable until you're employed.

I'm not a big proponent of raising taxes on the rich. I'm not theoretically opposed to it, but in practice, the US government hasn't earned my faith. The government is inherently inefficient, and American welfare programs are largely unsuccessful. The money raised by taxes is more likely to be spent on administrative bullshit or defense than on lower classes.

I prefer less ambiguous measures. A significant raise in the minimum wage, for instance, is long overdue. It is impossible to live comfortably on current minimum wage. Reforming the tax code to eliminate loopholes is necessary. The wealthier you are, the easier it is for you to get out of paying taxes. That's backward. Taxes should be simple and unavoidable. Greatly increase regulations on financial institutions. And fixes are necessary for the health care and education systems in America, but I won't pretend to have the answers to those questions. Raising taxes is not even close to a solution to those problems.

You're smart until your last sentence.

I guess everyone is going to have a different line, but since you quoted me, my line is right about here (in approximate order of importance):

Shelter. Food. Medicine (really great healthcare for all people). Defense (actual defense, not "defense" as a euphemism for being a colonial empire). Education (preschool-doctorate). Infrastructure (better roads, highways, bridges, public transit, emergency services [police, fire, ems, disaster response], better water & power systems). Public works & entertainment (monuments, spectacles [4th of July, NYE], speeches & debates).

I'm probably forgetting something, but that's the jist.

Most of these are things that #1 we already provide in some form, or at least purport to provide, and that #2 are provided in countries with higher (flatter) taxes on the rich, which are still somehow able to provide enough incentives to corporations to stay there despite the higher taxes (defeating the argument which states that the money will run if taxes are raised).

I'm not proposing to put Shaquiniquila - mother of 9 children - up at The Ritz. I agree that it should be uncomfortable to ask for assistance. I agree that the current systems in this country have failed miserably. That is no fucking excuse for letting people go hungry but for the charity of strangers. Those people shouldn't have to beg on the streets while the fat cats cruise their helipad-equipped yachts on Uncle Sam's dime.

That shit is fucking ridiculous. We hook the banks up with billions, and that's cool, but when it comes to obtaining enough money to scrape by, you bitches wanna cry foul. It's cool to throw hundreds of billions of dollars on the military so that they can go do some shit in some other country, but it's near-impossible for someone who has worked their entire life in the trades and has ended up actually disabled and poor in this country to get any assistance for being really disabled or really being poor. I know lots of stories like that, and I'm sure if you think about it you do too.

I'm not talking about trailer trash freeloaders or EBT trading crackheads. They actually have an easier time of it because there are so many private outreach programs set up for abused women etc. to supplement the shitty government program.

No private outreach programs set up for 45 year old blue collar guys without the ability to work.

Meanwhile the CEO's apply their cost/benefit analysis to whether or not to squeeze every dime out of the customer through engineered faults (WHY THE FUCK AREN'T CELL PHONES WATERPROOF???) and planned obsolescence or actually try to provide a good product that will last. They decide fuck you, put some colored lights on it, you'll buy it anyway.

..and thus the people take the streets.

[Daldolma]

Originally Posted by Hasbinbad [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

You're smart until your last sentence.

I guess everyone is going to have a different line, but since you quoted me, my line is right about here (in approximate order of importance):

Shelter. Food. Medicine (really great healthcare for all people). Defense (actual defense, not "defense" as a euphemism for being a colonial empire). Education (preschool-doctorate). Infrastructure (better roads, highways, bridges, public transit, emergency services [police, fire, ems, disaster response], better water & power systems). Public works & entertainment (monuments, spectacles [4th of July, NYE], speeches & debates).

I'm probably forgetting something, but that's the jist.

Most of these are things that #1 we already provide in some form, or at least purport to provide, and that #2 are provided in countries with higher (flatter) taxes on the rich, which are still somehow able to provide enough incentives to corporations to stay there despite the higher taxes (defeating the argument which states that the money will run if taxes are raised).

I'm not proposing to put Shaquiniquila - mother of 9 children - up at The Ritz. I agree that it should be uncomfortable to ask for assistance. I agree that the current systems in this country have failed miserably. That is no fucking excuse for letting people go hungry but for the charity of strangers. Those people shouldn't have to beg on the streets while the fat cats cruise their helipad-equipped yachts on Uncle Sam's dime.

That shit is fucking ridiculous. We hook the banks up with billions, and that's cool, but when it comes to obtaining enough money to scrape by, you bitches wanna cry foul. It's cool to throw hundreds of billions of dollars on the military so that they can go do some shit in some other country, but it's near-impossible for someone who has worked their entire life in the trades and has ended up actually disabled and poor in this country to get any assistance for being really disabled or really being poor. I know lots of stories like that, and I'm sure if you think about it you do too.

I'm not talking about trailer trash freeloaders or EBT trading crackheads. They actually have an easier time of it because there are so many private outreach programs set up for abused women etc. to supplement the shitty government program.

No private outreach programs set up for 45 year old blue collar guys without the ability to work.

Meanwhile the CEO's apply their cost/benefit analysis to whether or not to squeeze every dime out of the customer through engineered faults (WHY THE FUCK AREN'T CELL PHONES WATERPROOF???) and planned obsolescence or actually try to provide a good product that will last. They decide fuck you, put some colored lights on it, you'll buy it anyway.

..and thus the people take the streets.

I don't disagree with 99% of what you say. I'd nitpick your idea of defense, because I do believe that the US plays a dominant (and massively advantageous) role within world politics as a unipolar power with prohibitive military might, but let's not get into that.

The fact is that the government already has more than enough money to achieve everything you've stated. Read your complaints -- they're almost all government-focused. Like I just posted above, we already spend more per-citizen on health care than any other nation in the world. We could feed every homeless person in America 3 meals a day every day for less than what we spent on foreign aid to Egypt this year. It's not about the revenue. It's about the priorities. Whether you see them as representative of their constituencies or not, the leaders in government do not particularly care about infrastructure or public works. Education? Meh -- that's what the internet is for. Shelter for the impoverished? Not a huge concern. In fairness, food they do provide. If you're starving, you're not using the public funds and programs at your disposal. You may not be well-fed, but you won't starve to death. But the point is that more taxes are not going to magically fix this. Do you realize how much our government spends? We literally are so deep in debt that if you had spent $1 million every single day since Jesus was born, you wouldn't be as deep in debt as the United States. They're not strapped for cash. They just genuinely don't care all that much. There are a million things they're trying to juggle and pursue, and in the grand scheme of things, they don't care how well the bridges hold up, or whether homeless people have a place to sleep every night, or whether your kid knows that dinosaurs didn't build the pyramids.