Right below “unregulated free market”
Do you believe that the US is an unregulated free market?
Regards,
Shodan
PS - there are three words in the part in your quote marks, not two.
I can’t find it, but a couple/few years ago there was a conservative person claiming that fossil fuels are infinite. I can’t remember if he said that it was continuously being made (at a rate higher than we’re extracting it), or if God makes it. But there was at least that one.
Did I say I did?
octopus was saying socialism doesn’t work.
One of the goals of the GOP is eliminating government regulations on the basis they stifle businesses. And they tend to be big on the free market fixing everything.
Huge holes in that logic. You assume that “EPA” = “clean air”. You also assume that there is no other way to obtain clean air other than the EPA. In reality, of course, we all make trade-offs between the air we think is “clean enough” and the cost it would take to make the air “as clean as humanly possible”.
Let’s suppose you could find one Republican who said that. What would that prove, other than one Republican thinks it?
Do you really want to play the game that whatever one Republican or Democrat says means the whole party believes it?
In reality, of course, the EPA regulations did clean up the air. Sure, private industry can clean up their own act. But air pollution didn’t magically appear in the '60s so that Nixon could form the EPA in the '70s. It was a known problem that people wanted to fix for decades before that. So your implied argument that private industry can voluntarily reduce the pollutants they emit has been shown to be false. In the present day, businesses balk at taking measures mandated (or proposed) by the EPA to clean up emissions. Do you think they will voluntarily undertake these measures if only they were not mandated? I think it’s unlikely.
And this shows that Republicans believe that fossil fuels are infinite?
You will, of course, accept the same standard of evidence for Democrats. Right?
Regards,
Shodan
Hey I’m not afraid to admit that the GOP has issues. Here’s an issue that I feel strongly about and had me tempted to vote Dem this presidential cycle as a symbolic gesture of thanks for being on the side I feel is right. http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/07/your-money/new-rules-for-retirement-accounts-financial-advisers.html?_r=0
I’m not a huge fan of the religious zealots on the right as a whole. I never claimed the Republican Party was perfect or in all ways superior to the left. But for me the biggest issue is concentration of power.
I’m not a Republican at all, but this is poor logic. It assumes both that the only outcome of having the EPA is clean air and water, and that the only way to have clean air and water is through the EPA. Neither of those assumptions are true. Real life doesn’t really work like an Aristotelian syllogism.
No, but not for lack of trying, and it will eventually get there if we are not vigilant. Thirty years ago, free market economics was not even taught in universities other than in passing as a curious but unworkable theory, but through huge donations, the curriculum is now available, and in some cases required by the donors, on hundreds of campuses. The defunding of regulatory agencies has been the first step in doing away with oversight, and tax cuts like those by Reagan and Bush (and shamefully allowed to continue by Obama) are netting astounding profits for large corporations, while the gap between the haves and have-nots gets ever larger. An unregulated market means a return to the bad old days of the Gilded Age, despite how it’s being spun by the New Right.
Capitalism is what provides the wealth for the redistributers to dole out for a vote.
What’s your suggestion for regulating pollution?
I experienced smog(L.A. Basin) so thick the CHP was running traffic breaks due to poor visibility.
Superfund sites
Love Canal
The recent mess in Flint, Michigan
I wasn’t aware that social safety nets were paid from private funds.
:smack:
You do understand that taxing the private funds is what provides the social safety nets?
Not the way you phrased it.
You’ve said you favor a basic income. Where is that money going to come from and how is it different than the current system?
First, remember the topic of this thread: **Why are Republicans often seen as the “bad guys”?
In Post 11 running coach listed ‘Republican positions’. He did not say whether those were actual positions or perceived positions. Nevertheless, the list answers the question in the thread title.
John Mace said, ‘OK, let’s start with the first one and work our way down. Cite?’
In Post 18 quicksilver provided a cite.
In addition, Republicans are calling the EPA ‘has become a fascist threat to all Americans.’ I hope we can agree that fascism is evil. The Oath Keepers FB page says ‘The EPA is every bit as evil, and anti-liberty as the BLM.’ The Tea Party says ‘EPA - AN EVIL ROGUE AGENCY’. To Michelle Bachman, ‘the EPA is the evil heavy handed regulatory agenda of the Obama Administration.’ There is plenty of evidence that Republicans think the EPA is evil.
Now to your post. Can you please quote me where I said ‘that the only outcome of having the EPA is clean air and water, and that the only way to have clean air and water is through the EPA.’? I can’t seem to find it. In any case, the United States was much more polluted before the EPA came about, and EPA regulations did cause people, businesses, and corporations reduce their pollution outputs. I can think of a way that this can be done without EPA regulations: Polluters can say, ‘You know? We’re going to put scrubbers on our smokestacks and stop dumping waste into our rivers and contain nitrogen and phosphorus so that it doesn’t destroy other people’s livelihoods and do all sorts of other things to clean up our country.’ So you see? EPA regulations are not the only way to reduce pollution.
Basic income would come from taxation. Ok let’s divide the populace into 3 groups for sake of argument.
Population A: those who make more than minimum wage.
Population B: those who make minimum wage.
Population C: those who do or would make less than minimum wage.
Now lets deal with productivity or wealth generation whatever you want to call it.
The sum of the output of A, B, C is total productivity P.
Without a minimum wage the portion generated by C increases. Why? Because that population which is under or unemployed due to the wage floor is now working for market value and generating wealth. This is a net gain for society as a first order effect.
Now what about a second order effect. The time that population C can spend doing destructive or counterproductive activities decreases in some proportion. Furthermore by being part of the official taxpaying employed population employable skills such as punctuality, following instructions, etc. are internalized. Another bonus is that those in population C have skin in the game and are actually part of the wealth generating machine.
If P2 is greater than P1 society in the aggregate is benefiting from the larger amounts of wealth and services.
That by itself ought to be sufficient to advocate need based aid or a basic income with no minimum wage policy. But wait there’s more. We have excess productive potential in the United States. We could produce vast amounts more. Why don’t we? I believe in large part due to a deficit in demand which is a function of insufficient money velocity. Tax the upper class more and institute a basic income and the net result is not only does productivity increase but the lower classes have a higher standard of living and the money flows right back to the capitalist class.
In my opinion, it’s in the best interest of society (even the wealthy) to tax a bit more, redistribute a bit more, and remove price floors and caps. Honestly, I don’t see why more liberals and conservatives don’t come together to implement such a scheme.
What’s the point of having idle factories and idle cities when those means of production can generate wealth if there wasn’t a shortage of demand?
Oh… I thought that was just their accent.
I was not aware that it was in dispute that Republicans tend to be very pro-fossil fuels and anti-renewable energy. I know it tends to be due to their connections to the oil, gas and coal industries, rather than what they may or may not actually believe. But their policies clearly treat fossil fuels as if they will not run out ever.
And don’t even get me started on the environment.
a) I don’t think socialism sounds good on paper. Why shouldn’t people who work smarter, harder and more successfully than those who don’t or can’t?
b) You still need to figure out what to do with all those people who don’t or can’t succeed in a capitalist environment. They don’t just disappear because they can’t get into business school and become Goldman Sachs investment bankers.
c) Do you understand the difference between “socialism” and creating shared services and social safety nets?
d) Are you aware that there are various forms of “socialism” and “capitalism” that are more or less effective than others?