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dscuber9000

macrumors 6502a
Sep 16, 2007
665
1
Indiana, US
Good thing Obama was reelected! [/SARCASM]

All we need is to keep punishing those who took up America's legendary offer of "Freedom, and "Land of Opportunity."

"Come work are, excel at what you do, rise to the top and prosper!"

Now it's "How dare you make more money than everyone else! You need to contribute MORE!"

Makes me sick!

I think they'll live. :rolleyes:
 

ixodes

macrumors 601
Jan 11, 2012
4,429
3
Pacific Coast, USA
I expect a lot of people to do this, but they will reinvest the funds once they've locked in gains.

You're right, it's a customary practice.

Yet this new administration is out to punish high earners, successful investors & all levels of businesses. Those of us who worked hard to be successful are smart enough to adjust accordingly. Cash is king & we're going to continue to grow ours even if it is via a different strategy.

The man is a terrific speaker, a better spender, but he's easily outwitted. Promising millions a free ride... it will be interesting to watch him fund it.
 

samiwas

macrumors 68000
Aug 26, 2006
1,598
3,579
Atlanta, GA
Yet this new administration is out to punish high earners, successful investors & all levels of businesses. Those of us who worked hard to be successful are smart enough to adjust accordingly. Cash is king & we're going to continue to grow ours even if it is via a different strategy.

You've gotten the free ride for so long and you're certainly not going to give it up. Enough with the "punish" talk. Every time I hear someone say this, I imagine them sitting on the floor with their fingers in their ears and tears down their face thinking everyone is picking on them.
 

iMikeT

macrumors 68020
Jul 8, 2006
2,304
1
California
+1 for tolerance!!! :rolleyes:


Oh come on..... When conservatives get criticized, they do nothing but play victim. The logic behind conservative positions often don't hold up and when the holes are pointed out, conservatives come back to the false equivalent of the "fair and balanced" argument. You can't call an orange an apple no matter how much you try.

So +1 for facts.

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Punish? The status quo today makes Reagan look down right draconian by comparison.


Reagan looks like a liberal compared to the hard right wing crazies that have taken over the republican party. By the way, REPUBLICAN president Reagan raised taxes 11 times during his two terms! On top of that, he thought it was unfair for extremely high earners to pay a lower tax rate than lower income earners. Pluh-eeze!
 

thekev

macrumors 604
Aug 5, 2010
7,005
3,343
You're right, it's a customary practice.

Yet this new administration is out to punish high earners, successful investors & all levels of businesses. Those of us who worked hard to be successful are smart enough to adjust accordingly. Cash is king & we're going to continue to grow ours even if it is via a different strategy.

I wouldn't go as far as punish. I'd like to see a focus on intended actions more than philosophy when it comes to politicians. On the GOP end, I think they waste more time and money on backwards social policies. This doesn't mean I hate everyone that votes Republican. Both are too aggressive at a military level, even with the ties between the world economy and the middle east.

The man is a terrific speaker, a better spender, but he's easily outwitted. Promising millions a free ride... it will be interesting to watch him fund it.

I've never liked the rhetoric, but I hear it from politicians on both sides. The hope and change crap in 2008 made me want to puke. Political parties inject it in different ways. The GOP is actually quite clear on their intended actions most of the time. My concerns are more with their projected consequences most of the time. At this point I wish both sides would do more to work together.

Regarding a free ride there are some things that should be handled at a societal level, such as education. I don't like how either side has handled it, but I don't have a complete answer. District management often looks pretty terrible, even in expensive cities. Given that "Pacific Coast" likely means California (and your prior comments indicate you're old enough to have kids or friends with kids), you've most likely seen it firsthand.
 
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MacDav

macrumors 65816
Mar 24, 2004
1,031
0
To all you highly misguided people who say you want to leave California, good, leave. Qe don't need you here and the rest of us can finally move forward with progress without you in the way. Go live in podunk places like Mississippi, Kansas, Alabama or some other red state it's still the 1800's. That's where you truly belong.

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Agreed 100%. I'm registered as an independent as well and vote for those who have the most progressive agendas regardless or party.

I was highly skeptical about those studies that find people in general are getting stupider but I'm starting to believe it considering that people will freely vote against their own best interests because the crazy neo-con, right-wing, useful idiot libertarians yell to the top of their lungs and spread their hate on the TV.

Indeed, may Darwin help them all.

"Indeed, may Darwin help them all"
How amusing. I suppose this is to let us know that you are not religious and live by the code of science? I am neither conservative or progressive. In fact it is severely limiting to be hamstrung by any particular political dogma. I work around these limiting political obstacles as best I can. I am for the most part an Agnostic. Not only in matters about "God", but in most human matters. If you think that following science is the "true path" then I would say that you are a very religious person. Only those with "Faith" can believe what science has to offer is a road to human salvation. I am not religious, but at the same time I don't believe that science has much to offer in terms of "Whats it all about Alfie"? Over 90% of the Universe is "Dark Matter". Science hasn't figured out what this is. Is it real or is it just an error in some equation in some theory along the way. The 10% they know about is questionable at best. Quantum Theory is good as far as it goes. Which isn't very far. So please, be my guest and put all your faith in science and progressivism , I'm sure you will be very happy. :)
 

ixodes

macrumors 601
Jan 11, 2012
4,429
3
Pacific Coast, USA
I wouldn't go as far as punish. I'd like to see a focus on intended actions more than philosophy when it comes to politicians. On the GOP end, I think they waste more time and money on backwards social policies. This doesn't mean I hate everyone that votes Republican. Both are too aggressive at a military level, even with the ties between the world economy and the middle east.



I've never liked the rhetoric, but I hear it from politicians on both sides. The hope and change crap in 2008 made me want to puke. Political parties inject it in different ways. The GOP is actually quite clear on their intended actions most of the time. My concerns are more with their projected consequences most of the time. At this point I wish both sides would do more to work together.

Regarding a free ride there are some things that should be handled at a societal level, such as education. I don't like how either side has handled it, but I don't have a complete answer. District management often looks pretty terrible, even in expensive cities. Given that "Pacific Coast" likely means California (and your prior comments indicate you're old enough to have kids or friends with kids), you've most likely seen it firsthand.

Ah yes, an intelligent response. I have followed politics very closely since a young age, it's always held my attention. If we step back & look at the big picture, it's our two party system that's straining under the changing dynamics of our society, and ever powerful, highly influential media.

Sound bites playing a role of great significance, have taken campaigning, & changed the process forever. Influencing large segments of our society that may not have the time, or desire to keep themselves informed, so as to make their own decision, when it comes to what serves them best.

There's more than just that of course, a very daunting task at best. Far too much to summarize in a post, the bottom line is that we desperately need people on all sides to work together. That in & of itself would produce far better results than mud slinging.
 

NickZac

macrumors 68000
Dec 11, 2010
1,758
8
There is no sound logic behind conservative viewpoints.

+1 for tolerance!!! :rolleyes:



Oh come on..... When conservatives get criticized, they do nothing but play victim. The logic behind conservative positions often don't hold up and when the holes are pointed out, conservatives come back to the false equivalent of the "fair and balanced" argument. You can't call an orange an apple no matter how much you try.

So +1 for facts.

The logic behind most people's positions don't hold up, and sweeping generalizations that oversimplify huge groups of people into a single, irrational stereotype only make things worse.

"There's no logic to a Muslim thought. Most of their thought processes involve high yield explosives." ...what's wrong with this statement?
 

thekev

macrumors 604
Aug 5, 2010
7,005
3,343
If we step back & look at the big picture, it's our two party system that's straining under the changing dynamics of our society, and ever powerful, highly influential media.

Vast campaign funding and the electoral college principle really make it difficult for other parties to gain any kind of leverage at a national level. The inability to receive votes at a national level from a given state in presidential elections would make it difficult to gain real recognition.


Sound bites playing a role of great significance, have taken campaigning, & changed the process forever. Influencing large segments of our society that may not have the time, or desire to keep themselves informed, so as to make their own decision, when it comes to what serves them best.


I'm not sure what could be done about the sound bites. It might start with education. The way subjects like history are taught is pretty terrible. A lot of the details that make it interesting are cut out, especially at the K12 level.

There's more than just that of course, a very daunting task at best. Far too much to summarize in a post, the bottom line is that we desperately need people on all sides to work together. That in & of itself would produce far better results than mud slinging.

I expect this would yield far better results. I'm not sure what would fix the current tax system. It's overly complex as I mentioned, and there should be some effort to fix unintended results. Capital gains laws are supposed to encourage investment. They have the unintended consequence that a number of CEOs receive a large portion of their salaries in the form of capital gains. There are a lot of weird ways companies do their accounting to minimize tax liability, such as stripping earnings via foreign based subsidiaries, not to mention betting on foreign currencies. There are a lot of practices that irritate me, but the dependencies make it difficult to tune. You could significantly narrow deductions, but it would squeeze businesses like wholesale that rely on volume over margins (obviously anecdotal). Anyway I'm rambling so end rant...:D
 

MacDav

macrumors 65816
Mar 24, 2004
1,031
0
Apple makes money in the US because..
1) We have good public education
2) We enforce the law and have a court system
3) We spend $1T a year to gard "our" oil supplies
4) We have transportation infra structure
andso on and so on.

It the above were not true then Apple would pick up and move to (say) Mexico in a minute. They stay here because they need the government services they can't get in other places. One could argue that the rich use FAR MORE government service than the poor.

What poor guy needs to find and hire 20,000 engineers. No one finds 20,000 engineers unless they liv in a place with good education. What poor guy eeds a Coast Gard to keep pirate away from his cargo ships?

Yes, you are mostly correct. This is something that Romney argued in the debates. He said he loves government regulations, as long as they make good sense and don't get in the way. Too little is government is just as bad as too much government. I was not thrilled by either candidate, Romney pretty much lost the election because of his 47% comment and saying he wanted illegals to self deport. He was a terrible politician, but probably would have been a better choice regarding economic issues. If we could roll the best of Romney and the best of Obama into one person then maybe we would have something. ;)
 

ixodes

macrumors 601
Jan 11, 2012
4,429
3
Pacific Coast, USA
Anyway I'm rambling so end rant...:D
You've brought up some excellent points indeed.

At the end of the day it's a vast challenge, one that if addressed properly, an appropriate plan created & executed, could bring us out of the abyss that is politics circa 2012, propelling the nation forward in a positive way.

Ah yes, I always tend to lean towards optimism :)
 

Rocketman

macrumors 603
Since this thread has been moved I can now post:

As for the political discussion, we saw today the proposal by Obama's Treasury Secretary for $1600B in new taxes including substantially increased marginal rates to 46.3%, $50B in infrastructure spending, and $400B in cost savings. These are 10 year figures I believe. Tax, spend, AND borrow. Now some folks approve of that and others do not. That's politics, but from a financial solvency basis, this is the exact opposite, and WILL result in further credit rating downgrades and increased chances of a government credit cost explosion and a bond bubble pop. The housing crash resulted in about $3-4T in destroyed capital. A bond crash would be closer to $14T and impact everyone's pensions and retirements instantly.
 

Eraserhead

macrumors G4
Nov 3, 2005
10,434
12,250
UK
I'm not very familiar with the Swiss. I'm not sure what you mean when you say they "pull it off". Would you say the Swiss populace is more involved in daily government? Are they a homogeneous group or do they have many minority factions who pull in many different directions? There are always reasons why something works in one place and not another.

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Yeah, they tried to have be retroactive back to 2002 but turns out it's illegal.
(yes, I am joking)

Swiss democracy has a lot of referendums so the Swiss people are heavily involved in government. They also have 4 languages so they aren't that homogenous.

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Correct..Why is it then, that so many people still want to go as far as they can in that direction? They want to be taken care of, and not have to think for themselves too much. In other words they are children and spoiled children at that.

I think you missed my point. Most of the current communist country's have very successful economies. For example Kerela has spent half of the past 50 years with communist state government and it has the highest HDI of any Indian state and a respectable GDP per capita given its location.

Even places like Eastern Europe weren't actually doing that badly under communism. Russia's GDP per capita even in the 1980's was respectable given they were an agricultural economy at the start of the 20th century and their losses in WW1 and WW2.

Ok sure they were still poorer - and obviously they either collapsed or like China they offer far greater personal freedoms but communism really wasn't as much of a failure as some people like to make out.
 

LethalWolfe

macrumors G3
Jan 11, 2002
9,370
124
Los Angeles
Swiss democracy has a lot of referendums so the Swiss people are heavily involved in government. They also have 4 languages so they aren't that homogenous.

Switzerland also has a population of just 8 million and has existed for hundreds of years so there is an extensive common history that helps bind the country together (even if different regions have distinct cultures and there are four official languages).

CA, on the other hand, has been a part of Spain, Mexico and, now, the U.S. over the past 450 years and has a population of 38 million (which has been growing by about 5 mil a year for the past 60 years).
 

eric/

Guest
Sep 19, 2011
1,681
20
Ohio, United States
Taxes are what makes a society function properly. Look at the nations where taxes are highest, for example, Denmark, Sweden, and Netherlands. These countries have the happiest people and highest standards of living in the world. Even with high taxes, the citizens of these countries continue to live there.

This is quite a leap. What metric are you using to show that high taxes mean happy people?

And taxes aren't necessarily what make a society function properly (and who says those societies are functioning properly in the first place?, and what is a proper society?).
 

MacDav

macrumors 65816
Mar 24, 2004
1,031
0
I highly and respectfully disagree with your assessment about the decline in California.

Taxes are what makes a society function properly. Look at the nations where taxes are highest, for example, Denmark, Sweden, and Netherlands. These countries have the happiest people and highest standards of living in the world. Even with high taxes, the citizens of these countries continue to live there.

It was Republican administrations and legislatures that screwed my home state of California a few decades ago. The reason why California is in the toilet is due to these CONSERVATIVES who decided to enact a 2/3 majority to even raise taxes. Because there was no active revenue coming into the state, the state has been cash strapped and severely limited in it's ability to function properly. Because taxes have been so low to begin with, right-wing crazies typically cry fowl when even the slightest increase in tax rates are needed.

If I were you, I would turn off the noise you get from Faux Noise or any Rupert Murdock-owned network.

"These countries have the happiest people"
Really? Why is the suicide rate in these scandinavian countries higher than in the U.S? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_suicide_rate
 

MacDav

macrumors 65816
Mar 24, 2004
1,031
0
Since this thread has been moved I can now post:

As for the political discussion, we saw today the proposal by Obama's Treasury Secretary for $1600B in new taxes including substantially increased marginal rates to 46.3%, $50B in infrastructure spending, and $400B in cost savings. These are 10 year figures I believe. Tax, spend, AND borrow. Now some folks approve of that and others do not. That's politics, but from a financial solvency basis, this is the exact opposite, and WILL result in further credit rating downgrades and increased chances of a government credit cost explosion and a bond bubble pop. The housing crash resulted in about $3-4T in destroyed capital. A bond crash would be closer to $14T and impact everyone's pensions and retirements instantly.

Yes, I agree that we are treading on thin ice. What you are saying would infer that Obama and his cronies are completely incompetent or ignorant, or both. If both sides stick to their guns, then we're headed over the "fiscal cliff". Maybe this will wake up the mostly lethargic U.S populace? It will be interesting to see how this plays out. Interesting in a kind of sick way. I believe the 1.6 trillion is Obama's opening bid and they will compromise from that starting point. Possibly moving the tax hike to those making over $500,000 instead of $250,000. Hopefully they will make budget cuts to equal the tax hikes. We will see. I hope your scenario does not come to pass.
 

Eraserhead

macrumors G4
Nov 3, 2005
10,434
12,250
UK
"These countries have the happiest people"
Really? Why is the suicide rate in these scandinavian countries higher than in the U.S? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_suicide_rate

Because the lack of sunlight for half the year makes people depressed. Edit: Alaska has the highest suicide rate of any US state - even though depression is rare - http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/health/2007-11-28-depression-suicide-numbers_N.htm

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Yes, I agree that we are treading on thin ice. What you are saying would infer that Obama and his cronies are completely incompetent or ignorant, or both. If both sides stick to their guns, then we're headed over the "fiscal cliff". Maybe this will wake up the mostly lethargic U.S populace? It will be interesting to see how this plays out. Interesting in a kind of sick way. I believe the 1.6 trillion is Obama's opening bid and they will compromise from that starting point. Possibly moving the tax hike to those making over $500,000 instead of $250,000. Hopefully they will make budget cuts to equal the tax hikes. We will see. I hope your scenario does not come to pass.

Frankly I don't think the fiscal cliff will be that bad. I thought it was only supposed to drop the size of the US economy by 0.5% or so.

Given the deficit reduction it causes its probably almost worth it.
 
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