BTW, how do you claim that Enron is so rare when you had Enron, WorldCom, that pharmaceutical company (I think it was bristol myer) within a 2 yr period. that's what 3 of the Fortune 500 companies? i could hardly call that rare.
LeeTJ (just to quit quoting stuff), they feel the burden of the bad seeds in their field as well. Malpractice insurance is sky high, to the point of putting many good people out of business (especially doctors). That's just an example. but it seems like we're all coming to the same place, the system's broke, so we need to fix it.
i agree.
i guess my point is, many conservatives like to pretend that the welfare program is the biggest of our problems and it isn't. it's relatively minor compared to all the others. Look at medical malpractice, can you honestly tell me that that problem is less than the welfare problem??
Yes, the system is broke. Yes it needs a lot of work, let's prioritize based on where we can recover the most amount of money quickly.
I can see you disagree, and have still refused to answer the question I asked. Poli-peak at it's finest.
in the grand scheme of things, it is rare. 3 in 2 years, practically nothing before that. We'll have to see how many pop up in the future.
BTW, I'm pro-flat tax because a) there are too many people who can afford to pay who avoid it and b) the tax brackets are way too high. If you pay legitimately, and just break into some of the upper brackets, the amount of money you lose on that income is absurd. No tax bracket should have ever broken 25% IMO, but then again the tax code also shouldn't have this many exemptions or be this complicated IMO.
even if it is rare, you neglected to mention the absolute cost to our society. to all those workers that lost pensions. to all those workers who lost jobs. guess what they ended up costing our welfare even MORE. yes?
This is easily one of the dumbest remarks of the year on this board.
Their pensions are still lost.....due to corporate corruption.
Originally posted by: Ferocious
This is easily one of the dumbest remarks of the year on this board.
Their pensions are still lost.....due to corporate corruption.
3 times in 217 years isn't rare?
and yes, lost pensions were a lot. But the partners lost even more (if you know the basics of a partnership, each partner contributes a certain amount into a fund. That's hundreds of thousands of dollars each, even if you had only been a partner for months before the collapse, all gone to pay for Enron pensions. and, of course, the enron execs have lost no money of their own.)
Originally posted by: Dark54555
Originally posted by: Ferocious
This is easily one of the dumbest remarks of the year on this board.
Their pensions are still lost.....due to corporate corruption.
3 times in 217 years isn't rare?
and yes, lost pensions were a lot. But the partners lost even more (if you know the basics of a partnership, each partner contributes a certain amount into a fund. That's hundreds of thousands of dollars each, even if you had only been a partner for months before the collapse, all gone to pay for Enron pensions. and, of course, the enron execs have lost no money of their own.)
again, all this just goes to show that it was a significant cost to our economy and indirectly to each of us.
I never denied the existence of the free rider problem the fact that there are welfare bums but there are people on welfare legitimately as well. would you deny them also??
the fact that bad apples exist doesn't mean that you should do away with the tree.
the parable implied that mary the party animal got 2.0 gpa and the father said that welfare is like she and mary getting the same grade despite the fact that all mary did was party and that she actually earned her 4.0.
i'm saying not everyone on welfare is mary AND that the ones that are, you're not giving them the same GPA as this girl but something passable so that they can recover.
I'm puzzled, if you'd read my post you would have seen i said all this before. is it because i never directed those answers just to you?
no, i described people who choose to mile the system as free riders. i've also written that i believe this to be a problem with the current system that must be dealt with.
I have however further added that it isn't nearly as big a problem as it's sometimes made out to be, especially considering some of the curruption we see in other systems, defense contractors for eg. i don't want to repost everything again.
yes
there should be a system in place that tries to weed out those that are just taking advantage of the system. being that no system is perfect if your going to err, i'd rather err on the part of mercy than of judgment here.
I'd rather let in a few undeserving than cut out a few deserving.
Unfortunately we are not talking about a few. If a man doesn't support his children and we have to, that's the same thing. They work about 20 hours a week, making some spending money, and we pay for their kids. I know these people. These are not fictional like Mary. And then they laugh about not coming to work!
i met a guy in the army once. he was a sargent and we took MCSE courses together. he said that the ENTIRE IT department there was completely useless. he said most of the IT managers got their positions using the old old punch card machines. he said they knew NOTHING about current technology and that whenever there was a problem HE was the one that was called to resolve it. the IT staff was civilians working for the base there. that they had seniority and that they couldn't be replaced even tho they had ABSOLUTELY not kept up with technology. hmmm seems like free riders to me.
one of my favorite pet peeves are Toll Booth collectors, talk about a self feeding system purely for the purpose of polititcal votes. Everytime i pay a toll collector i want to say to him, your nothing but a beggar in my books. my money goes to him mainly to pay his salaries. whenever the roads need to be fixed they have the taxpayers pay it and then claim they will pay it back. tolls are highway robbery LITERALLY.
i could go on and on.
What about these scenarios?? do you think we are getting our moneys worth here?? how is this not welfare, even tho it isn't officially called welfare.
As long as the Gov't doesn't have to make a profit, people not doing anything for a paycheck will be rampant. On that we agree. Now on the toll collectors, that's not really their fault, they are doing their job.
As a sidebar, in Louisiana we built a bridge over the Miss. River that had no roads leading to it. then we built the roads to it, and then put up toll boths.
As a sidebar, in Louisiana we built a bridge over the Miss. River that had no roads leading to it. then we built the roads to it, and then put up toll boths.
Actually you misconstrue the point. It simplifies a pretty simple issue - that many Democrats in their 'social welfare advocacy' seem to make no distinction between those who reap precisely what they sow and those who are victims of circumstances beyond their control.
I agree its a generalization, and all generalizations are both true and false, but again, the moral of the story is only that Mary is getting precisely the GPA SHE HAS EARNED. It does not speak of, nor suggest, nor imply, that Mary is pulling a GPA due to any other circumstance. It does not imply all social welfare programs and their recipients are undeserving, only that there is often on the part of social welfare advocates (typically Democrats) an overzealous concern for the welfare of those whom have nobody to blame for their own situation but themselves because their situation is wholly the result of foolish or stupid choices made by them and nobody else.
It didn't cost me a nickel, except for the subsequent investigations and prosecutions. The last I checked, your tax contribution is not voluntary. Nor do you get to chose directly where each of your tax dollars are spent.
Investing my money in Enron or Worldcom is 100% voluntary. If anyone lost a penny to Arthur Andersen, they took a risk when they voluntarily invested in the companies with whom Andersen contracted. Like it or not, fraud and malfeasance IS part of the known risks any investor takes. If you had your life savings in one stock, well then you've taken the greatest investment risk known, and you reap the consequences of your high-risk investment decision.
But this is all an aside, a deflection of the issue at hand. I won't say it was deliberate, but it is definitely a distraction from the issue. What CPAs or Doctors or Lawyers or Nurses or Pharmacists or Police Officers or 7-Eleven clerks - anyone - does is irrelevant to this issue. You're distracting or deflecting attention away from THIS discussion by pointing to other 'bad' things. Carrot=>stick.
For example: I create a thread criticizing some flawed logic of Tom Daschle on a particular issue, and as your response, you don't agree or disagree, you don't articulate a point that has to do with Tom Daschle's logic, defend it or otherwise. Instead, you offer as some 'antidote' the flawed logic of a Republican to 'counter' my criticism of Tom Daschle.
Oh yeah? Well my dad can bench press more than your dad!
Oh yeah? Well my mom can bake better cookies than your mom!
Sorry, I'm not interested in your pissing match.
*gosh* I sure hope my conservative retired military father doesn't have this conversation with me, his liberal still-in-school Quaker son :Q
if this were real, and her beliefs were so easily swayed on a non-issue, I wouldn?t be too keen on having her on my side of the fence.
if this were real, and her beliefs were so easily swayed on a non-issue, I wouldn?t be too keen on having her on my side of the fence.
Ever notice how giving money to the rich stimulates the economy, but giving money to the poor is a drain on society?
Seems odd.
Seems odd.
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