Michael Moore: You Money Isn't Yours - Its The Peoples

[OCGuy]

Actually Michael Moore made a good point that conservatives don't seem to understand. The super rich get tax cut after tax cut from the Republicans under the premise that those super rich will use that money to create new jobs. However, they aren't creating new jobs. They're getting taxed at increasingly lower and lower rates and aren't in any way reinvesting that into society. So his point is that perhaps we should return to taxing them at a regular rate and make them contribute to society as the rest of the 90& of Americans do. Currently 10% of the American population controls 75% of the wealth. That's insane!

Please, before commenting, at least have some idea what you are talking about.

How much federal income tax does the bottom 1/3 of society pay? How much does the top 1/3 pay?

 

[Zebo]

Oh, I see.

Well bud, I don't know about you, but I've done great. I retired at 54 after working since I was 12. Now those first years were paper routes and the like but as soon as I could hold a real job - I did. I moved to jobs with better opportunities and higher pay until I reached as high as I could, which on the grand scheme of things wasn't very high.

I haven't inherited a nickel.

As I moved through life, I spent frugally and saved (and invested) all that I could. I've got a comfortable retirement going and now after a few years of retirement I'm getting a little bored and should have a business up and running this summer.

I thought about laying around and pissing and moaning about what everybody else had, but I decided that wasn't going to get me anywhere. So I rolled up my sleeves and grabbed for everything I could. I was rewarded by the virtue of my attitude and work ethic.

Either make it happen or whine, piss and moan. I think I know which course you've taken.

Good man. Let's work so that opportunity is there always instead of some South American shit hole were 12 families own everything and everyone else is in misery and destitution.

BTW you're one up on me I stated at 13. But I had my biz no papers. Dad loaned me $1000 @33% interest (said if you don't like it go to bank his way of teaching me importance of credit i.e. credit is king) Bought two lawnboys and trimmer and went to town. Paid off loan in two months. Graduated HS with $17,000 and got a little lazy and went to college.

 

[sandorski]

Please, before commenting, at least have some idea what you are talking about.

How much federal income tax does the bottom 1/3 of society pay? How much does the top 1/3 pay?

Your cherry picked question is moot.

 

[Craig234]

Your argument is that large amounts of wealth harm society, and you intend to solve this.

No, that's not what I said at all, and so there's no point in reading after that based on the false statement.

But you can have another of Theodore Roosevelt's comments, and try again based on what I actually said.

The vast individual and corporate fortunes, the vast combinations of capital which have marked the development of our industrial system, create new conditions, and necessitate a change from the old attitude of state and the nation toward property.

And here's one directly correcting your misstatement.

Our aim is not to do away with corporations; on the contrary, these big aggregations are an inevitable development of modern industrialism, and the effort to destroy them would be futile unless accomplished in ways that would work the utmost mischief to the entire body politic. We can do nothing of good in the way of regulating and supervising these corporations until we fix clearly in our minds that we are not attacking the corporations, but endeavoring to do away with any evil in them. We are not hostile to them; we are merely determined that they shall be so handled as to subserve the public good. We draw the line against misconduct, not against wealth.

That's a basic error of the right, confusing correcting wrong with opposing corporations.

But of course, phrases like 'public good' may as well be encrypted Hieroglyphics to the modern right-wing ideologue who has no idea what the phrase means.

So to them, 'limiting to the public good' and 'destroying all corporations' are the same.

That's why they defend big Wall Street banks manipulating the economy for unproductive selfish profit as if it were defending mom and pop stores selling you candy.

Faced with something big they don't have any idea about - Wall Street - they just surrender as citizens and take out their hate and fear on the government.

 

[OCGuy]

Your cherry picked question is moot.

Your nationality makes any opinion you have on this subject moot

 

[werepossum]

Good man. Let's work so that opportunity is there always instead of some South American shit hole were 12 families own everything and everyone else is in misery and destitution.

BTW you're one up on me I stated at 13. But I had my biz no papers. Dad loaned me $1000 @33% interest (said if you don't like it go to bank his way of teaching me importance of credit i.e. credit is king) Bought two lawnboys and trimmer and went to town. Paid off loan in two months. Graduated HS with $17,000 and got a little lazy and went to college.

Good life story. I'm all for working to make sure opportunity is present for everyone, including protectionism. I don't want a level playing field for the world nearly as much as I want my own country to prosper.

However the left's desired income redistribution does nothing to facilitate opportunity. Instead they simply assume that income disparity is evidence of unequal opportunity and therefore wealth redistribution by government is needed - which by the way is protecting the wealthy, who make most of their money as capital gains, not wage income, from competition from wage earners - and discourages innovation and hard work. This should be obvious. In a purely communist country, there is no incentive to take any risks with your wealth or to work harder than is absolutely necessary because the state will reap the rewards. In a purely capitalist country, there is every incentive to take risks with your wealth or to work harder than is absolutely necessary because the individual will reap all the rewards of success.

There is a certain amount of socialism that is necessary for civilization at a particular level, and beyond that a certain amount of socialism that most people will find worth the cost. But what the left ignores, and what none of us should ever forget, is that the greater the level of socialism, the more wealth seized, the less the incentive to risk capital and work hard. This is doubled down, because not only are the potential rewards decreased, but the guaranteed rewards for NOT risking wealth and NOT working harder than is absolutely necessary are increased.

 

[Zebo]

I'm with you. Who ever devised the pernicious social welfare for no input should have been shot. Not even FDR went that far. At the same time wealth needs to be reigned in. You can't have Guys on Wall Street getting near zero % interest FED loans to build Chinese factories and displace American Labor.

 

[sandorski]

Your nationality makes any opinion you have on this subject moot

Negative. These are issues that all Nations must grapple with.

 

[RabidMongoose]

Your nationality makes any opinion you have on this subject moot

Good point. We're talking aobut a nation of people that willingly subject themselves to a Hag Queen as their God-Monarch. These people cannot be rational thinkers.

 

[BoberFett]

I'm with you. Who ever devised the pernicious social welfare for no input should have been shot. Not even FDR went that far. At the same time wealth needs to be reigned in. You can't have Guys on Wall Street getting near zero % interest FED loans to build Chinese factories and displace American Labor.

You see concentrated wealth as the problem, I see over-reaching government creating that concentrated wealth as the problem. No matter what the organization, those with the right connections will always receive a disproportionate piece. With a smaller more manageable government, that piece wouldn't be so disgustingly large. When a budget is trillions of dollars, it's easy to hide billions. The federal government is simply too large.

 

[sandorski]

You see concentrated wealth as the problem, I see over-reaching government creating that concentrated wealth as the problem. No matter what the organization, those with the right connections will always receive a disproportionate piece. With a smaller more manageable government, that piece wouldn't be so disgustingly large. When a budget is trillions of dollars, it's easy to hide billions. The federal government is simply too large.

You can't be serious?

 

[JS80]

Your nationality makes any opinion you have on this subject moot

it actually just makes him an idiot

 

[Jaskalas]

Lolwut???

Obama (D-IL), Yea
Clinton (D-NY), Yea
Kerry (D-MA), Yea

Yes, your Heroes serve you well. I mean, if you want your money going to Wall Street.

 

[Jaskalas]

Please, before commenting, at least have some idea what you are talking about.

How much federal income tax does the bottom 1/3 of society pay? How much does the top 1/3 pay?

It does not matter to them that it is already progressive. The pit in their hungry stomach requires more. As if they could ever be sated. Still, they will not rest until everything is devoured. Come little morsels, your time is up. GET IN MAH BELLY!

Your right to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness is their right to take you to the cleaners.

 

[BoberFett]

You can't be serious?

And I say you can't possibly be as stupid as you try to appear here in P&N, but facts are what they are.

 

[boomerang]

From here:

http://iowntheworld.com/blog/?p=63796

I quote in its entirety, a post by Grandpa.

I think fear is at the core of liberalism, and love/trust is at the core of conservatism. Liberalism is about control. Conservatism is about self-empowerment.

This is an important distinction.

Control is a reaction to fear. I think in terms or politics and society – the fear behind liberalism is the fear that someone might withhold things (opportunities, money, whatever) from me, fear that if you live your life in a way I dislike that it might affect my life, fear that if you get that job, there will be nothing left for me. Fear that if you make tons of money, it’s means there’s less money out there for me. So these people seek control as a means of trying to create guarantees and safeguards against those circumstances they fear (re-distributive wealth policies).

Liberals try to control the world and people to enable their comfort and happiness. Which, as we know, is an endless quest. (*Think about fear created with Global Warming alarmists). Trying to control others does nothing in the way of making oneself happy. By extension, voting in this mindset so that government can try to control others will also – shockingly – not lead to a happier, more comfortable life.

The conservative (and moderate, independent, but for the sake of expediency, the conservative), on the other hand, relies on himself to meet his own needs. And the trade off of being free to live his life as he wishes is also understanding that he has to make peace with how you live yours. By extension, aware that he wants to be able to hold onto this liberty and freedom forever, the conservative votes accordingly, so that everyone can remain free and in charge of his or her own life.

But here’s the crucial difference, I think, particularly in where misery on the left stems: The conservative does not worry, so to speak, about you. The conservative knows that you were born with the same access to self-love, self-empowerment, self-determination and self-reliance that we all were, no matter the circumstances into which you were born. (*Think about the millions of people this country has allowed to crawl up from poverty into prosperity – the conservative KNOWS this is possible.)

The conservative believes that if you want prosperity, or a good job, or a good education, you can make it happen – but you have to work hard. The conservative hopes and intends that the free markets bring you all of the affordable and positive opportunities and resources that you need. The conservative also knows that on the other side of that hard work is great reward – material and, more importantly, emotional, spiritual and mental.

The conservative understands that not only is it a waste of time to try to control you, it’s actually impossible. Humans were born to be free, and if we put a roadblock in front of you, you’ll find another way around it. So we see attempts at control as a waste of resources, energy and time at best, and at worst, creating detrimental results that serve to hinder people’s upward mobility or teach dependence. We see much more efficiency, as well as endless opportunity, in leaving you to your own devices. We want the same in return, but Obama and his progressive policies are specifically counter to this belief. Hence, at an undefinable emotional level, conservative Americans are responding with outrage to these policies.

I don't know who Grandpa is of course. I hope he doesn't mind that I quoted him. Grandpa's got a dinner on me coming if our paths ever cross.

 

[Jaskalas]

That's a basic error of the right, confusing correcting wrong with opposing corporations.

What we do not confuse is the power to take from an easy prey. We understand that it cannot, with the test of time, find itself limited to the highest earners.

So long as inequality exists this mechanism used against 'wealth' will strike at us all, against our right to private property.

This is not even about whether they are right or you are wrong. Forget the end for it is the means to your end that we cannot have. Our fight is to get you to find another way. Centralized power is our opposition. You are not allowed to wield it, least of all against us.

 

[DCal430]

Surely I can't be the only one to figure out that DCal430 is a returning banned member. The tone of his posts have been very slowly ratcheting up. Every one is a troll post but he's got them toned down for right now.

I don't think he's going to last long and his exit won't amount to much more than a fart in the wind. For a troll, his entertainment value is nil. Too transparent.

Not really sure what you are talking about, but ok.

 

[DCal430]

How do the rich get their money. They get it through cheating other people out of money. Most the people who are being cheated are the poor and lower class.

 

[jhu]

Obama (D-IL), Yea
Clinton (D-NY), Yea
Kerry (D-MA), Yea

Yes, your Heroes serve you well. I mean, if you want your money going to Wall Street.

First off, you have given the names of just 3 Democrats. What about the moderates? Second, I haven't outlined my positions here, so I don't know how you came to the conclusion that these people are my heroes.

Third:

We do not forget the bailouts of the rich on Wall Street, that Democrats and Moderates forced on us.

From this list on the TARP vote, can you please tell me who the moderates are that you are referring to? Are you referring to all the Republicans who voted for it? Because I can assure you, they're not all moderate (and neither are all the Democrats liberal). Are you referring to the Democrats who voted against it? Who? And finally, please tell me was it a Democrat who signed the final bill?

 

[SparkyJJO]

How do the rich get their money. They get it through cheating other people out of money. Most the people who are being cheated are the poor and lower class.

Generalizations suck. SOME may get rich that way (and it will come back to bite them at some point), others get rich from good old hard work.

Oh, and from reading your comments in this thread, go take your communist self back to the hole you came from. MY property is not YOUR property or anyone else's. I paid for it, not you, not anyone else, using money that I worked for. So therefore, it is mine. Got that?

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

I'll pay attention to moore when he's had to surrender his money. Michael, please send me your money. You owe me.

 

[BoberFett]

First off, you have given the names of just 3 Democrats. What about the moderates?

Who cares about Democrats moderates? Those three are people that the Democrat party wanted to be president, so they're obviously what Democrats believe exemplify their party positions.

 

[Craig234]

What we do not confuse is the power to take from an easy prey. We understand that it cannot, with the test of time, find itself limited to the highest earners.

So long as inequality exists this mechanism used against 'wealth' will strike at us all, against our right to private property.

This is not even about whether they are right or you are wrong. Forget the end for it is the means to your end that we cannot have. Our fight is to get you to find another way. Centralized power is our opposition. You are not allowed to wield it, least of all against us.

You're talking paranoid nonsense. You're not discussing an issue, you're saying 'forget the issue, let's base the policy on the issue on the imaginar things I'm scared of'.

I'm not saying that you can'targue that if you can back it up, but you can't; the healthy demcracy that has some fairness to control the rich and powerful isn't headed to the poor.

Look at the facts on the distribution of wealth the last 30 years - it's facts that show the opposite of your paranoia.

You're arguing the equivalent of 'we can't have police who fight crime, because if we do, they'll start arresting law abiding citizens soon after and we can't have that'.

 

[Darwin333]

How do the rich get their money. They get it through cheating other people out of money. Most the people who are being cheated are the poor and lower class.

So the uber wealthy got that way by cheating people with little or no money..... out of their money?