Prioritizing government spending.

[Crazed Rabbit]

I like how Crazed Rabbit wants to unravel democratic freedoms, you can tell where his loyalties lie.

Where, exactly?

And I'm not unraveling anything with the Senators; that would merely return things to the original writing of the constitution.

Not allowing some people to vote already happens; we don't let children vote. Why should we let people who don't contribute vote?

Our current system gives a perverse incentive for politicians to highly tax the very successful so they can pay out money to the unsuccessful, but more numerous, people.

CR

[Beskar]

Our current system gives a perverse incentive for politicians to highly tax the very successful so they can pay out money to the unsuccessful, but more numerous, people.

I guess this is the point where you say you have no humanity or soul. It is in the best interest of the state to look after the poor, not for them to be exploited by the rich and powerful which you are proposing. Since being honest, the "very successful" can lose the money in the first place, I doubt owning another limited edition ferrari is going to severely impact their standard of living. The reason they are so rich in the first place is because of a broken wealth distribution system. Even then, the vast majority of the "very successful" are simply 'luckly' due to the riches of their own parents, very rare from anyone from a working background to get into the category.

Who says the original consitution was right in the first-place? It is like a fundamentalist taking the bible literially from over a thousand years ago. There are reasons for changes and there is always very valid reasons for progress.

The conquences of your actions would basically bring about a dystopia with a system far more sinister and corrupt in its place where the poor are merely cattle for the rich to exploit, and what is to stop the rich from exploiting now? You successfully disarmed everyone via removing their right to vote.

Your argument about "not let children vote" is as a reason is laughable, because you completely ignored the reasons why they have to reach a certain age to vote in the first place. Would you advocate banning gun ownership and driving cars because children cannot do them either? According to your logic, this fact means we should ban them tomorrow.

Edit: Before you ask, yes, if I was the "very successful" I wouldn't care about the loss of that money, infact, I would probably support it and promote it more.

[Crazed Rabbit]

Good grief.

Could you actually state where I propose that people be exploited, or is that just more nonsensical psuedo extrapolation? I.e. a strawman of terrifying proportions. Since I don't want to derail the thread and grow weary of debunking socialist claptrap, I shall merely direct you to read Greg Mankiw's blog.

And we do let children (18 and under) own guns and drive in some circumstances. In fact, we ban certain adults from owning guns (criminals) and driving (reckless and/or DUI morons), which fits in nicely with banning those who subsist on government handouts from voting.

In many western nations, government spending is unsustainable. It continues because politicians, voted in by those who pay nothing, keep voting for more programs and no cuts. It seems to make perfect sense that those who can't live on their own earnings should not be able to dictate (indirectly) how other people's money is spent.

CR

[Beskar]

Could you actually state where I propose that people be exploited, or is that just more nonsensical psuedo extrapolation? I.e. a strawman of terrifying proportions. Since I don't want to derail the thread and grow weary of debunking socialist claptrap, I shall merely direct you to read Greg Mankiw's blog.

It is the consequences of your proposels. Doesn't take much to realise that, or is it are you just blinded by your own elitist claptrap? But I must be wrong, there is no harm in stripping the right for people to vote, so the power becomes more centralised untill an oligarchy of your "very successful" who is obviously not use this to their advantage to exploit people and come even more "successful". People say the corperations and 'Wall Street' have too much power already, but with your proposals, they will be the only powers.

We can undo hundreds of years of suffrage, simply because [Some Elitist] is paranoid that some hobo is getting a free meal from the soup-kitchen and wants to stop it and prefer them to lay-facedown in the gutter suffering, as he drives past in his 2010BMW mocking them and taking snaps with his iphone, uploading a picture on the forum with the caption "Go and get a job you bums!", unaware that he removed the ability for them to try to pick themselves up last week with his vote.

But I trust that you won't go that far, and realise the lunacy before then.

[Crazed Rabbit]

It is the consequences of your proposels.

So human nature will change and those who earn enough to be taxed will suddenly start hating the poor?

You do know that woman's suffrage came about even while only men could vote? And that before that, universal suffrage for white men came about even when only property owning men could vote?

My point is that people won't suddenly stop caring about others. Nor will Wall Street and big corporations suddenly become all powerful. If politicians cut down on handouts and entitlement spending, that just means more people will be able to vote.

You know, it's the Democratic party that favors big corporations at the cost of small businesses with all the regulations they write. Large corporations with teams of lawyers find it easier to comply with all those regulations.

Heck, your whole 'argument' is nothing but strawmen and wild accusations with evidence or facts to back it up.

CR

PS I'm amused you think I own a car. Or a cellphone that can take pictures. Or that the government controls whether people are successful or not.

[Beskar]

So human nature will change and those who earn enough to be taxed will suddenly start hating the poor?

No no no! My poor CR, the "very successful" will not suddenly hate the poor, they already do. You are just removing power from the poor, which acts as a counterbalance to their self-interest. The elitists have looked down upon the poor and classes underneath them long before Jesus and the Eypgtians. After-all, why do 'we' at the top have to bother with the vermin below? Human nature won't be changing at all. Which is one of the reasons why in itself, socialism can be seen as viable. The greed of the many overrides greed of the individual.

[Crazed Rabbit]

Ah, that explains why the rich, 'successful' people gave the poor people the vote in the first place.

And ignores the fact that the majority of the citizens would still be able to vote. So what you're saying is based on something that says socialism is viable, ignores historic facts, and assumes that people making 50k a year or more are all part of some giant evil conspiracy to oppress the poor, whom they hate.

CR

[a completely inoffensive name]

You do know that woman's suffrage came about even while only men could vote?

They mobilized as a special interest group to get the bill through Congress (like most special interest groups do) and many individual states had long granted women the right to vote on the state level allowing them to get through the state legislature portion more easily. They were not as dependent on men as you seem to put it.

Just saying.

[Furunculus]

In many western nations, government spending is unsustainable.
CR

this is a very good point, the Bank of International Settlements recently produced a report that Britain was currently heading towards a national debt of 400% of GDP by 2040, and that even if all the efficiences and spending cuts currently proposed by the three parties worked perfectly as advertised we would still have a national debt of 350% of GDP.

i.e. by 2040 half of annual Gov't spending would be used to service debt interest.

if you are a cold and callous right-wing nazi like me this is quite simply immoral.
but even if you are a happy clapping big social-responsibility kind of guy this ought to worry you, because how are we going to afford all those disability benefits and gender-awareness officers if we are giving half of government spending straight back to financiers?!?!?

we need drastic reform.

[al Roumi]

this is a very good point, the Bank of International Settlements recently produced a report that Britain was currently heading towards a national debt of 400% of GDP by 2040, and that even if all the efficiences and spending cuts currently proposed by the three parties worked perfectly as advertised we would still have a national debt of 350% of GDP.

i.e. by 2040 half of annual Gov't spending would be used to service debt interest.

if you are a cold and callous right-wing nazi like me this is quite simply immoral.
but even if you are a happy clapping big social-responsibility kind of guy this ought to worry you, because how are we going to afford all those disability benefits and gender-awareness officers if we are giving half of government spending straight back to financiers?!?!?

we need drastic reform.

I think the key point here is that whichever UK party wins the election will have to get to grips with the deficit. Untill the debates begin to discuss it more directly, no one is going to bring it up or declare how much they are really prepared to cleave off.

I would suggest that concern over a deficit of this level transcends big/small govenment views, the manner and targetting of the cull will differ between parties however.

[Scienter]

APTG's post was TLDR right before I have to leave for work but I need to go back and read it. Financially, I'm pretty conservative, and I wish I could vote with my wallet. But, I'm so far left when it comes to social issues that I just can't bring myself to vote for the Republican candidates that run for office in my state. It's a choice I didn't wish I had to make, but both parties think that running to the extreme end of their ideologies is a better idea than coming towards the center. One thing I definitely think we should stop hemorrhaging money into is the war on drugs.

[Furunculus]

I would suggest that concern over a deficit of this level transcends big/small govenment views, the manner and targetting of the cull will differ between parties however.

i disagree, this IS a big/small government question:
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/ne...e-out-at-last/

[al Roumi]

i disagree, this IS a big/small government question:
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/ne...e-out-at-last/

It certainly is when it comes down to (as i tried to express in the 2nd half of the sentence) deciding how to manage the deficit. The scale of the deficit however is such that a high spending government cannot afford to continue its "big government" aspirations, even if it wants to (without completely buggering the country -more than you might say they had already).

The balance of cuts and tax as a means to make up the deficit is indeed an ideological (big/small govt) battle ground.

[jabarto]

Our current system gives a perverse incentive for politicians to highly tax the very successful so they can pay out money to the unsuccessful, but more numerous, people.

First of all, that's not 'perversion', that's called "not living under a caste system". Second, that's not how it works. Taxes on the rich are the lowest they've been in 50 years and our income inequality has soared over the last 30.

You know, CR, I've been meaning to ask you for a while now. What exactly is your background in economics?

[Beskar]

He "has a very low opion" of poor people.

He is probably one of those types who excludes many factors such as the "very successful" don't actually need money, while others are starving to death, unable to get work and live in destitute and poverty. Instead of seeing the inequality and going "Why can't these people get food?", his peers are the type that kicks them down and go "Worthless scum! You deserve it all!". Then laughs at them as he gets in his limited edition BMW 2010, off to a big hotel party, costing well over the hundred thousand for him and his select rich clienté.

He later goes to his bank account and goes "More taxes, huh, they are robbing me stupid. I pay more than those poor people, where at my 'entitlements'" then rants about it on the forum. Far removed from facts like he wouldn't even need them or would take them, even if he had them, with the riches he has got.

There is the more accurate version of events though, if he is indeed doing economics, he is probably looking at the figures and sees the spending as "waste", and he hates this waste, which of course, translates into the poor. He looks at the information from a removed setting, devoid of humanity, he doesn't associate "the waste" with poor people who are in need, they assoicaites the "waste" with scum/vermin who don't work hard enough. He doesn't factor in the socialeconomics of the situations either.

[jabarto]

He hates poor people.

Evicently. But I should probably soften my post a bit. Don't want to get another infraction.

[drone]

He "has a very low opion" of poor people.

He is probably one of those types who excludes many factors such as the "very successful" don't actually need money, while others are starving to death, unable to get work and live in destitute and poverty. Instead of seeing the inequality and going "Why can't these people get food?", his peers are the type that kicks them down and go "Worthless scum! You deserve it all!". Then laughs at them as he gets in his limited edition BMW 2010, off to a big hotel party, costing well over the hundred thousand for him and his select rich clienté.

He later goes to his bank account and goes "More taxes, huh, they are robbing me stupid. I pay more than those poor people, where at my 'entitlements'" then rants about it on the forum. Far removed from facts like he wouldn't even need them or would take them, even if he had them, with the riches he has got.

There is the more accurate version of events though, if he is indeed doing economics, he is probably looking at the figures and sees the spending as "waste", and he hates this waste, which of course, translates into the poor. He looks at the information from a removed setting, devoid of humanity, he doesn't associate "the waste" with poor people who are in need, they assoicaites the "waste" with scum/vermin who don't work hard enough. He doesn't factor in the socialeconomics of the situations either.