How will Rush Limbaugh handle Ted Kennedy's death [whenever it happens]?

Great Debates
101

[QUOTE=Happy Wanderer]
And Social Security is particularly onerous. A regressive tax linked to a regressive benefit. Poor pay proportionally more than rich, yet rich receive benefits greater than the poor. Blacks lose out particularly because of their shorter lifespan. Why are liberals for this?
[/QUOTE]

Because it’s better than nothing. Half a loaf, you know. I daresay it could be improved, with the payroll tax made progressive like the income tax and the benefits means-tested, but I doubt that would make it any more acceptable to you.

W’s proposal to privatize the system was never more than a transparent (and desperate) scheme to give a booster shot to Wall Street at public expense. See here and here. It would not have affected the projected shortfall of SS tax receipts or had any net effect on the overall solvency of the system. Furthermore, the system as it stands is not financially unsound:

102

[QUOTE=Happy Wanderer]
Social Security? AFDC? Medicare? Public Education? WIC? Ag Subsidies? Corporate welfare? It’s all redistribution, and in my view, Socialism.
[/QUOTE]
So why single out Obama for the socialist epithet? I don’t think there has been a Republican or a Democrat candidate in the last 50 years that did not support those things.

103

[QUOTE=Happy Wanderer]
Social Security? AFDC? Medicare? Public Education? WIC? Ag Subsidies? Corporate welfare? It’s all redistribution, and in my view, Socialism.
[/quote]

:rolleyes: Of course, my dear.

[QUOTE=Happy Wanderer]
All of it should go on the ash heap at the federal level, all of it is extraconstitutional, and the founders are rolling in their graves at such a rate that their rotational velocity is reaching relativistic speeds such that they threaten to create some kind of black hole or quasar that will swallow us all.
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Extraconstitutional != unconstitutional.

I recall seeing an apparently Libertarian message-button at an SF convention: “The United States Constitution has its faults, but it’s a hell of a lot better than what we’ve got now.” Which is funny, and a lie. In the matters about which you are complaining, at least, the United States Constitution as originally conceived is demonstrably worse than what we’ve got now. Every modern industrialized democracy has found it necessary to institute national industrial and commercial regulations and some sort of welfare state. The Framers never envisioned such a role for the federal government – no more than they envisioned, nor could have envisioned, any of the social and economic conditions brought on by the Industrial Revolution.

At any rate, all of the above has been ruled constitutional by the SCOTUS, as you know.

[QUOTE=Happy Wanderer]
Either that or the multi trillion dollar federal budget will do the job. It really doesn’t matter as the outcome is the same.
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That deficit, in this year, owes more to military than to social or regulatory spending, as you know. Not that I’m sanguine Obama will do much to slash our cancerously bloated military budget. (I know neither McCain nor Clinton will.)

[QUOTE=Happy Wanderer]
How about Obama’s statement that he didn’t care if raising taxes would lower revenue . . .
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Cite?

[QUOTE=Happy Wanderer]
. . .as history has shown.
[/QUOTE]

CITE? (You are aware, are you not, that the Laffer Curve is bullshit?)

104

[QUOTE=Fear Itself]
So why single out Obama for the socialist epithet? I don’t think there has been a Republican or a Democrat candidate in the last 50 years that did not support those things.
[/QUOTE]

Actually, it was Ted Kennedy (Remember Kennedy? The thread’s about Kennedy!) to whom Happy Wanderer first applied the “socialist” label in this thread. But your comment is otherwise apposite.

105

[QUOTE=BrainGlutton]
:rolleyes: Of course, my dear.

Extraconstitutional != unconstitutional.

I recall seeing an apparently Libertarian message-button at an SF convention: “The United States Constitution has its faults, but it’s a hell of a lot better than what we’ve got now.” Which is funny, and a lie. In the matters about which you are complaining, at least, the United States Constitution as originally conceived is demonstrably worse than what we’ve got now. Every modern industrialized democracy has found it necessary to institute national industrial and commercial regulations and some sort of welfare state. The Framers never envisioned such a role for the federal government – no more than they envisioned, nor could have envisioned, any of the social and economic conditions brought on by the Industrial Revolution.

At any rate, all of the above has been ruled constitutional by the SCOTUS, as you know.

That deficit, in this year, owes more to military than to social or regulatory spending, as you know. Not that I’m sanguine Obama will do much to slash our cancerously bloated military budget. (I know neither McCain nor Clinton will.)

Cite?

CITE? (You are aware, are you not, that the Laffer Curve is bullshit?)
[/QUOTE]
Obama’s statement was in response to Charlie Gibson’s question and made quite a splash. I am surprised that a knowledge glutton such as yourself was unaware. In that question, good ol’ Charlie Gibson outlined the citations I mentioned. He was referring to the capital gains tax, but the same thing applies to income tax. Reagan reduced rates and revenues bloomed!

A rudimentary knowledge of history is helpful in these discussions.

As far as the SCOTUS goes, they can suck my wiener. Why does everyone worship them as gods? Do we really want octogenarians like Ruth Darth Vader Ginsburg who’s closest contact with a computer is when she touches the “frozen dinner” button on her microwave, ruling on what we can do or say or link or CITE on the internet?

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again, Democracy doesn’t work! [/Kent Brockman]

106

[QUOTE=Fear Itself]
So why single out Obama for the socialist epithet? I don’t think there has been a Republican or a Democrat candidate in the last 50 years that did not support those things.
[/QUOTE]
I was giving an example. As far as I am concerned, they are all full of what makes the grass grow green, and are in our pockets.

My Grandfather (an unrepentant Libertarian) who died just in time to see Reagan take office, which did provide him a glimmer of hope in his final year, was very pessimistic about our future. Being a callow youth, I didn’t believe him at the time.

Since then, a lot of the things he spoke of have come to pass, the rest are coming soon and they have already done worse! People whipped into a war frenzy, the deterioration of our privacy and liberty, increasing socialism…

See, this is what I hate. The socialist never give back an inch and are always wanting more. The problem is never that too much money is being wasted or put towards evil, it is always that we just need a little more, and then things will be peachy keen!

But it never is. More war, more poverty, crappier shcools, destitute seniors, and it is always because the government is not taking enough of our money. More money is always the answer.

This is why me and mine are going off the grid, growing our own food, and arming ourselves. I am done with the societal contract, which was always a sham in the first place. Good luck to the rest of you!

107

[QUOTE=Happy Wanderer]
Obama’s statement was in response to Charlie Gibson’s question and made quite a splash. I am surprised that a knowledge glutton such as yourself was unaware. In that question, good ol’ Charlie Gibson outlined the citations I mentioned. He was referring to the capital gains tax, but the same thing applies to income tax. Reagan reduced rates and revenues bloomed!
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Ain’t that simple.

[QUOTE=Happy Wanderer]
As far as the SCOTUS goes, they can suck my wiener. Why does everyone worship them as gods?
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Because they’re the SCOTUS. Somebody has to interpret the Constitution, and what other options are there? State nullification? That way lies . . . nothing good.

It’s like the Catholic doctrine of papal infallibility. Catholics don’t actually believe the pope never stumbles when he walks or cuts himself shaving, only that there should be one official who can definitively and authoritatively pronounce on what is or is not Church doctrine. Tends to prevent schisms. (Well, usually.)

[QUOTE=Happy Wanderer]
I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again, Democracy doesn’t work! [/Kent Brockman]
[/QUOTE]

Democracy is one thing, and constitutional government’s another. (Democracy is what happens when the state does whatever the people want it to do.)

108

[QUOTE=Happy Wanderer]
This is why me and mine are going off the grid, growing our own food, and arming ourselves.
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You might want to check out this thread.

N.B.: “Off the grid” or not, you still have to pay your taxes. Just like the Amish do.

You have no constitutional right to be invisible to the state.

109

[QUOTE=BrainGlutton]
You might want to check out this thread.

N.B.: “Off the grid” or not, you still have to pay your taxes. Just like the Amish do.

You have no constitutional right to be invisible to the state.
[/QUOTE]
True, but I can minimize what they consider taxable. Do you realize they are harassing folks who are burning french fry oil in their diesel cars for not paying a fuel tax? Doesn’t that burn you up? :wink:

When I get my solar array going, I plan on getting an old VW Scirocco (coolness factor plus proven conversion tech) and converting it to electric power. What are they going to do to me then? Assess me a Sun tax? Christ, if Al Gore has his way, they will tax the oxygen we breath and the farts we emit! After all, it is all contributing to “Global Warming” (oh, sorry, now that it is getting colder the last few years we must now call it “Climate Change”).

You do realize that you are listening to liars, lunatics and fools?

110

[QUOTE=Happy Wanderer]
You do realize that you are listening to liars, lunatics and fools?
[/QUOTE]
And who are you listening to?

111

[QUOTE=Happy Wanderer]
You do realize that you are listening to liars, lunatics and fools?
[/QUOTE]

[shrug] Most pols are liars if they’ve gotten far enough to matter, and you’ll find a much higher proportion of lunatics and fools in the Libertarian Party than either major party.

Small government doesn’t work. Not under modern conditions. A plain and obvious fact that Libs just don’t seem to understand. Look around the world at all the places where things are more or less tolerable, all the industrialized democracies. One thing you won’t find in any of them is small, limited government. If you’re gonna fight for that in this day and age, you’re fighting for a cause much more revolutionary than Communism, and with much poorer chances of working out well wherever it wins.

112

[QUOTE=BrainGlutton]
[shrug] Most pols are liars if they’ve gotten far enough to matter, and you’ll find a much higher proportion of lunatics and fools in the Libertarian Party than either major party.

Small government doesn’t work. Not under modern conditions. A plain and obvious fact that Libs just don’t seem to understand. Look around the world at all the places where things are more or less tolerable, all the industrialized democracies. One thing you won’t find in any of them is small, limited government. If you’re gonna fight for that in this day and age, you’re fighting for a cause much more revolutionary than Communism, and with much poorer chances of working out well wherever it wins.
[/QUOTE]

I get it now-the Federal Dept. of Education does nothing-for $80 billion/year! Waht about the entite US Congress-what product does it produce? Yeah, big government is SO efficient-let’s make it bigger!! :smack:

113

[QUOTE=ralph124c]
So Big Government Works??
[/QUOTE]

Depends on the circumstances. Sometimes it works badly, sometimes it works well. But the Libertarian vision of a night-watchman state clearly does not work.

114

“So”, he said, spraining his back as he heaved the thread back on course, “tell me again why she didn’t get out of the car when he did, or shortly thereafter?”

And the argument might be made by the more generous-minded that the beneficial work he’s done was an attempt to make up for the young lady’s death, a sort of career-spanning apology? Or am I deeply naive?

115

[QUOTE=Love Rhombus]
And the argument might be made by the more generous-minded that the beneficial work he’s done was an attempt to make up for the young lady’s death, a sort of career-spanning apology? Or am I deeply naive?
[/QUOTE]

I don’t see how Kennedy’s politics changed any in content or commitment after Chappaquiddick. Likely he would have spent his life the same way.

116

[QUOTE=BrainGlutton]
Depends on the circumstances. Sometimes it works badly, sometimes it works well. But the Libertarian vision of a night-watchman state clearly does not work.
[/QUOTE]
Yeah, but it’s never been tried!

And actually, in fact, libertarianism has never been tried. As opposed to every season’s salt of socialism which has not only been tried but also proven a failure.

The Russians are getting it right, Viet Nam is getting it right, China has had it right for a decade or so. They are cleaning our clocks. Why is it the old commies seem to know something we don’t? Perhaps they have suffered the end result of policies that Teddy loves to endorse and now reject them?

117

[QUOTE=Happy Wanderer]
The Russians are getting it right, Viet Nam is getting it right, China has had it right for a decade or so.
[/QUOTE]

What are you referring to–what are they getting right?

118

[QUOTE=Happy Wanderer]
Yeah, but it’s never been tried!
[/QUOTE]

Oh, yes, it has.

119

True. But as you’ve demonstrated, it’s not a prerequisite.

120

[QUOTE=Happy Wanderer]
The Russians are getting it right, Viet Nam is getting it right, China has had it right for a decade or so. They are cleaning our clocks. Why is it the old commies seem to know something we don’t? Perhaps they have suffered the end result of policies that Teddy loves to endorse and now reject them?
[/QUOTE]

One reason, perhaps, is that they have something called “industrial policy” and we don’t. See also “dirigisme.”

You didn’t seriously think those countries’ economic policies were more libertarian than ours, did you? The U.S. is the most economic-libertarian country in the industrialized world. And we’re getting our clocks cleaned.