A wonderful chance for all those who favor redistribution. Wonder how many takers there will be? Not many, I imagine...

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120787129943306485.html?mod=opinion_main_review_ and_outlooks

darn Republicans always trying to put the democrats into dirt. *hugs Clinton family*

The wallstreet journal was bought by Rupert Murdoch, so I dismiss it as nothing more than another arm of foxes propaganda machine. Nice try.

People are greedy liberal or not.

The tax policies favored by the Wall Street Journal have been much favored in Washington these past couple of decades.

With quite visible consequences.

The wallstreet journal was bought by Rupert Murdoch, so I dismiss it as nothing more than another arm of foxes propaganda machine. Nice try.

The paper was reporting on something introduced by a Congressmen. It quoted the Congressman, so I fail to see how your charges of bias are applicable.

People are greedy liberal or not.

This is true, but as the article alludes to, there is consistently one group of people who want higher taxes. Are they willing to pay such taxes themselves? I doubt it...

Not if they have a choice I would guess.

although I'm sure there are some who would.

if i was rich considering the current way washington is spending money i wouldn't want to give more so it could be used to help those who don't need it if the government was was doing more for those in need i would give more to the government

The problem is that "voluntary" taxes create a huge fre rider problem. I have no problem with Washington increasing my tax rate, but I know that my paltry personal donation, by itself, ill have no discernible effect on the state of the government or the provision of its services.

If I could be convinced that 100 of my wealthiest friends were going to donate extra funds on the condition that I do it also, then I'd willingly agree to that (assuming I trusted them to actually make the donation).

Increasing the tax rate provides me an assurance that my fellow wealthy citizens will follow through on such a promise.

In the end, if you support America, you should be willing and happy to pay taxes. If you only support America with words and rhetoric, then you do not really support America. Wars on terror are expensive.

John Campbell is an idiot. Of course people want as much money as possible. Contributions to the treasury are not charity.

If the government allowed voluntary taxes to be directed toward specific programs according to the taxpayer's will, that might be an idea. Meantime, why should a liberal volunteer to pay more taxes—intending to support poverty relief or education—and end up paying for Bush's war and a bunch of bloodthirsty conservatives who think of people as a means to a greedy end?

Idiotic two-bit plans like this aren't intended as solutions. Rather, they're senseless, bratty outbursts by depraved elitists who think people in general are as mortally stupid as their political supporters.

"Put your money where your mouth is and increase the wealth of snobby, rich hatemongers." What kind of third-tier intellect actually falls for that sort of brainless crap? Rep. Campbell, the WSJ editorial board, and other supporters of such stupidity are a detriment to humanity.

If I could be convinced that 100 of my wealthiest friends were going to donate extra funds on the condition that I do it also, then I'd willingly agree to that (assuming I trusted them to actually make the donation).

I'm not sure why it matters what other people are doing. If you're for more taxes, and there is a mechanism by which you can pay more taxes, not doing so seems to stand in direct contrast to said belief.

If the government allowed voluntary taxes to be directed toward specific programs according to the taxpayer's will, that might be an idea. Meantime, why should a liberal volunteer to pay more taxes—intending to support poverty relief or education—and end up paying for Bush's war and a bunch of bloodthirsty conservatives who think of people as a means to a greedy end?

Presumably, Clinton and the other people who have talked about additional taxes are smart enough to realize that some of said taxes will go for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, as those conflicts are ongoing and not likely to end soon, so your point seems pointless.

Idiotic two-bit plans like this aren't intended as solutions. Rather, they're senseless, bratty outbursts by depraved elitists who think people in general are as mortally stupid as their political supporters.

I don't think the plan was put forward as serious legislation, either. My take is that it is a tounge-in-cheek effort meant to attract attention to and expose a few obvious hypocrits for what they are.

"Put your money where your mouth is and increase the wealth of snobby, rich hatemongers." What kind of third-tier intellect actually falls for that sort of brainless crap? Rep. Campbell, the WSJ editorial board, and other supporters of such stupidity are a detriment to humanity.

It's nice to know your pen is never far from the shallow and easy to reach pot of yellow hyperbole. I mean, you wouldn't want people to start thinking you aren't a self-impressed, radical, right?

I don't think the plan was put forward as serious legislation, either. My take is that it is a tounge-in-cheek effort meant to attract attention to and expose a few obvious hypocrits for what they are.

That's a malignant tumor, not your tongue.

Given that tax-baiting like this distracts from any discussion of spending policy, your tongue-in-cheek effort lends to a result that is stupid at best. While, presumably, some of those taxes would, indeed, reach the war effort and the rich con artists fleecing the taxpayers, both the war and the welfare for the rich take place even when Republicans are cutting taxes. Since conservatives aren't going to suddenly start being honest, we might as well try to do some good with public funds as well.

It's nice to know your pen is never far from the shallow and easy to reach pot of yellow hyperbole. I mean, you wouldn't want people to start thinking you aren't a self-impressed, radical, right?

Ah yes. More of your mean spirit and disingenuous appeal.

Aren't you the one who laments that you can't ignore me? Who the hell stapled your eyeballs to the screen, Counte? Or is it just that you wouldn't want people to start thinking you weren't a second-rate shill for the GOP?

Look, one of the problems with tongue-in-cheek is that it often depends on exaggeration and distortion, which undermines, in the end, any legitimate point one might be trying to make. Even with fourth-frame commentary, if the audience isn't smart enough to understand the difference, the best you can hope for is that they agree with you anyway.

When you learn to be honest enough to measure hypocrisy according to the actual standards in question, and not your own fantasy, you'll accomplish better results.

My take is that it is a tounge-in-cheek effort meant to attract attention to and expose a few obvious hypocrits for what they are. There's no hypocrisy in advocating taxes one is willing to pay.

I'm not sure why it matters what other people are doing. If you're for more taxes, and there is a mechanism by which you can pay more taxes, not doing so seems to stand in direct contrast to said belief.



Because I know that my donation, by itself, is a drop in the bucket and will make no appreciable difference given the vastness of government expenditures. Let's say I tithe on my gross income. That's an additional $40K-$100K per year. That would have no discernible impact on even small government programs, if contributed directly to them.

I have no problem paying taxes, but I want to feel as though my taxes are making a difference, not merely falling into a hole, never to be seen again. The greater the amount, the less likely I am to imagine "the hole."

Redistribution?

People are rewarded for the work they do; the pay is redistribution, giving people back their money's worth of labor.





Besides, why should I pay for something I don't use? If you want it, pay for it YOURSELF

...How selfish of you =p

Given that tax-baiting like this distracts from any discussion of spending policy, your tongue-in-cheek effort lends to a result that is stupid at best.

Well, it's not MY effort. I merely pass it along as something to chuckle about. But you're free to take it as serious as cancer if you like...

Since conservatives aren't going to suddenly start being honest, we might as well try to do some good with public funds as well.

Right. I get it. Republicans, who aren't terribly conservative these days, in case you hadn't noticed, are dishonest. Democrats are honest. OK. Sure. Whatever. I don't suppose anyone will ever hang a sign around your neck that says "unbiased."

Ah yes. More of your mean spirit and disingenuous appeal.

Well, I'm sorry, but if you keep saying cock-eyed things, expect to be treated like the verbal leper you are. Some half-wit politician puts forward a piece of empty legislation, which happens, I don't know, every day, and he's "a detriment to humanity." I'm sorry, but such ridiculous prose can't be taken seriously. Murderers and rapists are the sort I'd tag with that kind of langauge, but for you, it's EVERYBODY you don't agree with, EVERYBODY who isn't an avowed Leftist. Is that healthy? Fair? I mean, if someone of your disposition ever became something more than a pissant on a web site, that is, if you ever occupied a position of real power, I'd fear for my liberty. People like you open Gulags.

Aren't you the one who laments that you can't ignore me?

Part of the time, but typically I'm more concerned with your consistent displays of assholia. And now and again, it's fun to stuff baking soda into your gob, find the relevant catalyst and watch you froth...

Or is it just that you wouldn't want people to start thinking you weren't a second-rate shill for the GOP?

That's me. Mr. GOP. Too bad I've never voted for a Republican in my life, so down in ruby-red flames goes another of your pathetic attempts to label people you don't like or who don't agree with your fanatical Marxism.

How many labels have you licked and tried to paste to me now? 10? 12? I've lost count ... and, of course, it's perfectly OK for you to do this...

Look, one of the problems with tongue-in-cheek is that it often depends on exaggeration and distortion, which undermines, in the end, any legitimate point one might be trying to make. Even with fourth-frame commentary, if the audience isn't smart enough to understand the difference, the best you can hope for is that they agree with you anyway.

Here, I'm forced to admit you make a very powerful and very important point. Actions like this, which are little more than boorish symbolism, do tend to distract from the substance of real political debate that is focussed on tangible goals with the good of the country in mind. Point taken...

When you learn to be honest enough to measure hypocrisy according to the actual standards in question, and not your own fantasy, you'll accomplish better results.

This is particular amusing coming from someone whose prism seems to either be a natural phenomena or stitched in place over both their myopic eyes...

...How selfish of you =p

Yes, I am so selfish because I want to be rewarded for the work I do and not pay for lazy people who want me to pay for something THEY want......:rolleyes:

I buy gifts for my family and friends, NOT for strangers who neither know me nor care. I don't understand why I have to pay for THEM. You want a new park? Pay for it your self.

...Sigh

There's no hypocrisy in advocating taxes one is willing to pay.

No, but these people, most of whom do everything they can to sheild their money from the tax man, could just as easily pay more now.

It's called a society. The less spent on social spending, the more you will end up spending on police, prisons, emergency medical care, etc. The idea that a significant percentage of our Federal Budget is spent on lazy people is a Republican lie. Much, MUCH more is spent on lazy military contractors, no bid contracts, private mercinary armies, and "Star Wars" weapons systems that don't work.

...Sigh

Ah, so you enjoy paying taxes for lazy ass people who don't want to work themselves?

It's called a society. The less spent on social spending, the more you will end up spending on police, prisons, emergency medical care, etc. The idea that a significant percentage of our Federal Budget is spent on lazy people is a Republican lie. Much, MUCH more is spent on lazy military contractors, no bid contracts, private mercinary armies, and "Star Wars" weapons systems that don't work.

America isn't much of a society in most places, neither is a nation like the Netherlands (esp. the Netherlands).

Yes, I would gladly pay to support my nation's armed forces, but NOT to support some other random strangers for their little thing that benefits me in no way.

Ah, so you enjoy paying taxes for lazy ass people who don't want to work themselves?

Why do you assume that because someone cant afford something they are lazy?:rolleyes:

No, but these people, most of whom do everything they can to sheild their money from the tax man, could just as easily pay more now.

Close the loopholes then.

Why do you assume that because someone cant afford something they are lazy?:rolleyes:

Then if they can't afford it I have to pay for them?


As John Smith once said, a wonderful quote, "He who does not work, shall not eat!"; we need to start ENFORCING this!

Of course, with respect to those who are UNABLE to work (the disabled, for instance)

America isn't much of a society in most places, neither is a nation like the Netherlands (esp. the Netherlands).

Yes, I would gladly pay to support my nation's armed forces, but NOT to support some other random strangers for their little thing that benefits me in no way.

If you live here, it does benefit you. It's not wasteful spending, it's investment in society. Why isn't the US such a coherent society? It's mostly because of the attitude that it's everyone for themselves. When you want to get something done (like an army, for instance), it's not everyone for themselves, you are only as good as your weakest link. It's the same with society.

Then if they can't afford it I have to pay for them?


As John Smith once said, a wonderful quote, "He who does not work, shall not eat!"; we need to start ENFORCING this!

Of course, with respect to those who are UNABLE to work (the disabled, for instance)

You only will ever pay an affordable percentage of your income, so don't complain.

Then if they can't afford it I have to pay for them?


As John Smith once said, a wonderful quote, "He who does not work, shall not eat!"; we need to start ENFORCING this!

Of course, with respect to those who are UNABLE to work (the disabled, for instance)

Sure if you want a society free of compassion and doomed to failure ...go for it.

If you live here, it does benefit you. It's not wasteful spending, it's investment in society. Why isn't the US such a coherent society? It's mostly because of the attitude that it's everyone for themselves. When you want to get something done (like an army, for instance), it's not everyone for themselves, you are only as good as your weakest link. It's the same with society.

Yes it is, because people are spending their money on other people in ways that does not benefit them.

Besides, I've already stated, in most cases the US is not a society, same with most nations. Not by what I define to be a society (which is a logical definition.

You only will ever pay an affordable percentage of your income, so don't complain.

I'm still PAYING for NOTHING!

Sure if you want a society free of compassion lolwut, since when were we compassionate for the lazy and selfish?

and doomed to failure ...go for it.

If everyone works and puts in the effort, I would hardly predict doom.

So if you get your way, you will get to keep another dollar, while retired disabled old ladies have to eat dog food. The idea that social security or welfare is for the lazy is a Republican myth. The percentage of people that could work but don't is tiny, they cost less than maybe an hour's spending in Iraq.

So if you get your way, you will get to keep another dollar, while retired disabled old ladies have to eat dog food. The idea that social security or welfare is for the lazy is a Republican myth. The percentage of people that could work but don't is tiny, they cost less than maybe an hour's spending in Iraq.

Those are disabled people. As I said, I will pay for their benefit to an extent, but not to "build a new park" or build some random useless shit.

What's wrong with parks? Should we fill up our cities with ugly buildings so everyone is depressed and suicidal?

I just think its nice when people give a shit about people ther than themselves....maybe thats crazy..

What's wrong with parks? Should we fill up our cities with ugly buildings so everyone is depressed and suicidal?

No, we should fill up our cities with what is beneficial BUT those who want something should pay for it themselves.





Also @ Schi, again, me being taxed for something which benefits me in no way is not very "nice" to me is it?

In fact, even now my money is being used on petty criminal scum and drug addicts, that is not very pleasing.

No, we should fill up our cities with what is beneficial BUT those who want something should pay for it themselves.





Also @ Schi, again, me being taxed for something which benefits me in no way is not very "nice" to me is it?

In fact, even now my money is being used on petty criminal scum and drug addicts, that is not very pleasing.

But you dont know that do you? Oh, and if your super rich i would venture a guess that life has been pretty "nice" to you, so why not spread it around to those less fortunate. Oh wait because they are all lazy drug addicts and morons...:rolleyes:

But you dont know that do you? Oh, and if your super rich i would venture a guess that life has been pretty "nice" to you, so why not spread it around to those less fortunate. Oh wait because they are all lazy drug addicts and morons...:rolleyes:

I know some tax money is used for those purposes, which is unacceptable. It could be used for education and healthcare (if we have it), and besides criminals are criminals, get rid of them and be over with it, no need to spend money on them.



No, unfortunately I'm not bill gates:(
BUT I would give money to those less fortunate who DO work hard

But again, they still need to help themselves

How do you suppose we deal with criminals then? Throw the large amounts of non money that we arent spending on them to unspend them into oblivion? Bars cost money, courts cost money, bullets cost money.

How do you suppose we deal with criminals then? Throw the large amounts of non money that we arent spending on them to unspend them into oblivion? Bars cost money, courts cost money, bullets cost money.

No need for bars. We can just execute them, bullets are cheap enough, and we might be able to re-use them for resources


Now, of course, the GOOD deserve a respectful burial and death and funeral, NOT criminals. They deserve shit, they should get shit, and ultimately they can serve us in their death as resources.


Hey, it's a thought.

No need for bars. We can just execute them, bullets are cheap enough, and we might be able to re-use them for resources


Now, of course, the GOOD deserve a respectful burial and death and funeral, NOT criminals. They deserve shit, they should get shit, and ultimately they can serve us in their death as resources.


Hey, it's a thought.

Yes, an informed and rational one at that :rolleyes:

Death penalty cases cost the taxpayer more. I know you probably don't believe in justice, Norsefire, being a fascist and all. If you don't want to pay for things other people use, don't be a citizen of a nation.

Yes, an informed and rational one at that :rolleyes:

Well, first we just have to figure out how to convert bodies into raw resources:)

Death penalty cases cost the taxpayer more. I know you probably don't believe in justice, Norsefire, being a fascist and all. If you don't want to pay for things other people use, don't be a citizen of a nation.

They cost more because of all the policies and procedures in place, the actual execution would be cheap enough.



Don't believe in justice? I'm the one saying criminals should be punished MORE


Also a nation is established on society, it depends on what TYPE of society you happen to live in.

ahhhh I see.

They cost more because of all the policies and procedures in place, the actual execution would be cheap enough.



Don't believe in justice? I'm the one saying criminals should be punished MORE


Also a nation is established on society, it depends on what TYPE of society you happen to live in.

Justice is the process by which we determine if someone is a criminal or not.

Justice is the process by which we determine if someone is a criminal or not.

And then, ensuring that the criminal, if he is the criminal, is punished.

We should invest more to STOP crime, but if there is a criminal and that criminal is proven, beyond any doubt, to be guilty of a crime, why waste resources on him?

The actual death penalty doesn't cost very much. It's the process of justice that is costly, mostly to pay lawyers.

You say we should invest more to stop crime, well, that's exactly what social programs do. When implemented correctly, they help a person with basic needs so they can get educated and don't become drug addicts or criminals. There is no other method that works, other than a totalitarian police state. I would rather live in a civil society.

How can you talk about tradition and the benefits of religion, if you don't want to follow it's principles? Social spending is just the codification of principles outlined in most major religions.

Well, it's not MY effort. I merely pass it along as something to chuckle about. But you're free to take it as serious as cancer if you like.

Fair enough on the count about effort. Although you did speculate that it was about exposing a "few obvious hypocrits [sic] for what they are". And there's a problem with your standard of hypocrisy:

"A wonderful chance for all those who favor redistribution."

No, not really. See my remarks about directing voluntary taxes toward specific programs at the taxpayer's will (http://www.sciforums.com/showpost.php?p=1824280&postcount=10). As things are, the voluntary taxes would only redistribute upward toward the rich.

Right. I get it. Republicans, who aren't terribly conservative these days, in case you hadn't noticed, are dishonest. Democrats are honest. OK. Sure. Whatever.

Well, neoconservatives are even worse than conservatives. But I was talking about conservatives, not Republicans. A proper comparison to conservatives would be, oh, say, liberals, and not Democrats.

I don't suppose anyone will ever hang a sign around your neck that says "unbiased."

Many people think criminals should go to jail. Some think murderers should be killed. How many of those would you call biased? My point, in case you need it distilled, is simply that you can accuse me of bias until your ego turns purple, Counte, but I'm not going to trust such fundamental liars. There are certain distortions or even lies we might see in politics that really are a matter of how you or I or the next person views a certain issue, and then there are outright bullshit lies.

And you can keep demanding that I give outright bullshit lies some sort of "fair chance", but it ain't going to happen. I understand this is much to the chagrin of some people, and that apparently includes you. But you choose to throw your lot in with the liars, so I'm sorry.

Of course I have a bias, Counte. I don't pretend to be a journalist or anything, so why should anyone be surprised that I have a bias? My bias is toward the many instead of the few, truth instead of lies, peace instead of strife, social progress instead of decay, knowledge instead of superstition, and justice instead of avarice and malice.

Well, I'm sorry, but if you keep saying cock-eyed things, expect to be treated like the verbal leper you are. Some half-wit politician puts forward a piece of empty legislation, which happens, I don't know, every day, and he's "a detriment to humanity."

Coming from someone like you, that doesn't exactly sting, you know. I mean, if you had even a speck of integrity or a modicum of decency, well, at least that would be something. But it's like the time you whined and wailed about Sen. John Edwards having a book deal with a Murdoch company while complaining about politicians taking donations from Murdoch, attempting to assail Edwards' credibility because Murdoch is corrupt, while basing your entire argument on a bombastic piece of fake journalism from a Murdoch-owned tabloid with a reputation for sensationalist trash.

Come on, Counte. Really. This is you we're talking about here. Such ridiculous hypocrisy and vacuous self-caricaturization can't be taken seriously.

Murderers and rapists are the sort I'd tag with that kind of langauge, but for you, it's EVERYBODY you don't agree with, EVERYBODY who isn't an avowed Leftist.

There are plenty of avowed Leftists who are detriments to the species. It would seem, then, that you're incapable of identifying the difference.

So, first, people can be an avowed anything. There are plenty of avowed Catholics, for instance—and let's be specific here, Catholics who took sacred vows—who ended up having sex with children. So avowed Leftists don't impress me simply for being avowed.

Secondly, your argument—such as it is—seems to presume some sort of rarity about people who are detriments to the species.

Is that healthy? Fair?

Your malice, while your own, is certainly not healthy, Counte.

I mean, if someone of your disposition ever became something more than a pissant on a web site, that is, if you ever occupied a position of real power, I'd fear for my liberty. People like you open Gulags.

Nor is your ignorance healthy, either.

Part of the time, but typically I'm more concerned with your consistent displays of assholia.

So you're a man with a butt fetish. Doesn't bother me any.

And now and again, it's fun to stuff baking soda into your gob, find the relevant catalyst and watch you froth.

Sounds rather Freudian. Provoking and looking for assholia, hoping to stuff things into people?

That's me. Mr. GOP. Too bad I've never voted for a Republican in my life, so down in ruby-red flames goes another of your pathetic attempts to label people you don't like or who don't agree with your fanatical Marxism.

On the one hand, we could take your word at face value. That, obviously, is unwise. To the other, we could take your word with a grain of salt; e.g., perhaps you've never voted for anything or anyone. Or, in order to eliminate any need to speculate, we could just make note of your consistent and shameless advocacy of conservative causes.

Here, I'm forced to admit you make a very powerful and very important point. Actions like this, which are little more than boorish symbolism, do tend to distract from the substance of real political debate that is focussed on tangible goals with the good of the country in mind. Point taken.

The one bit of good faith I would ask you to attempt in this, then, would be to consider the notion of exposing obvious hypocrites. Because what you've constructed with that point is that liberals who favor redistribution are hypocrites because they do not want to voluntarily redistribute their money up to the wealthy.

Just ... think about it, please. Because your argument brings certain words and phrases to mind. "Cock-eyed" (Freudian and in itself when written that way), "pissant", "assholia", "shallow", "myopic", and, in light of other claims you've made about yourself in the past, "hypocrite".

Because I really do wonder how it is that you come to post empty-headed political distortions yet take such grave offense to being called out on them.

This is particular amusing coming from someone whose prism seems to either be a natural phenomena or stitched in place over both their myopic eyes.

You're the one who thinks liberals are hypocrites for not wanting to give even more money to the rich. And we've been over the bit with Murdoch. You're also the one who, when shown an example of your own elitism, decides to pretend that you didn't actually write the words in question.

I don't expect you to like me. I long ago recognized that you have no respect for people who don't accept your lies and hypocrisy without question. You can't help it; this is just how God or nature or whatever made you. Nature is not extraneous. You have some purpose in existing, and even if that purpose is to serve as an example of what's wrong with humanity, well, we ought to be grateful to have you here to mark so clearly one of the myriad paths of human degradation.

Life goes on. Thank you for being you.

As things are, the voluntary taxes would only redistribute upward toward the rich.

And how does that neat little trick work?

Well, neoconservatives are even worse than conservatives. But I was talking about conservatives, not Republicans. A proper comparison to conservatives would be, oh, say, liberals, and not Democrats.

You were talking about both. Or at least you were talking about Republicans in one breath and conservatives in the other. Regardless, your obvious bias and polar view of right and wrong, and my assessment of them, holds true whichever group or moniker you take up. Anything Right is bad, or evil or worse and should be expunged from the Earth. So please, don't parse...

Many people think criminals should go to jail. Some think murderers should be killed. How many of those would you call biased?

Now you're comparing those you don't like to criminals? OK... That's totally ... irrational.

My point, in case you need it distilled, is simply that you can accuse me of bias until your ego turns purple, Counte, but I'm not going to trust such fundamental liars. There are certain distortions or even lies we might see in politics that really are a matter of how you or I or the next person views a certain issue, and then there are outright bullshit lies.

The only ego elbowing people aside in this thread is yours. You've totally derailed the entire thread and lashed out at me all because I don't agree with you, and once again, had the temerity to challenge your self-perceived greatness. What are those words you are so fond of? "Get over yourself."

And you can keep demanding that I give outright bullshit lies some sort of "fair chance", but it ain't going to happen. I understand this is much to the chagrin of some people, and that apparently includes you.

Yes. Your lie detector is 100 percent accurate and free of bias. Sure. Whatever. What flavor of Kool-Aid do I need in order to believe something as sick and twisted as that?

But you choose to throw your lot in with the liars, so I'm sorry.

When, exactly, did I do this?

Of course I have a bias, Counte. I don't pretend to be a journalist or anything, so why should anyone be surprised that I have a bias? My bias is toward the many instead of the few, truth instead of lies, peace instead of strife, social progress instead of decay, knowledge instead of superstition, and justice instead of avarice and malice.

There it is! Threes posts in! The old jab at my profession! You really are a predictable cunt, aren't you?

Coming from someone like you, that doesn't exactly sting, you know. I mean, if you had even a speck of integrity or a modicum of decency, well, at least that would be something. But it's like the time you whined and wailed about Sen. John Edwards having a book deal with a Murdoch company while complaining about politicians taking donations from Murdoch, attempting to assail Edwards' credibility because Murdoch is corrupt, while basing your entire argument on a bombastic piece of fake journalism from a Murdoch-owned tabloid with a reputation for sensationalist trash.

...and the New York Times, but really? Are you still sore about your charlatan, bung-boy Edwards losing? I mean, you keep bringing this ancient dispute up. It must have really wounded you...

There are plenty of avowed Leftists who are detriments to the species. It would seem, then, that you're incapable of identifying the difference.

No, I get it. There are plenty of avowed Leftists that you don't agree with who are detriments. The key here is they MUST agree with you because you are infallible and brilliant and honest and ... swell ... in just about every way, right?

Sounds rather Freudian. Provoking and looking for assholia, hoping to stuff things into people?

That's right, Tiassa. Keep up the clever-cunt routine. That is, tip-toe right up to the line of insulting them where you can say something sly and insulting but still claim it wasn't a personal attack. Oh, you're so brilliant! I mean, if I wanted to employ your tactics against you, I could seize on your obvious intent here and ask what's wrong with said fetish? Said Freudia? Are you (gasp) a homophobe? I mean, you like to call other people that name, so why conjure up such imagery, based on my remarks?

Or, in order to eliminate any need to speculate, we could just make note of your consistent and shameless advocacy of conservative causes.

What causes would that be? The fact I'm pro-choice? An atheist? Think Bush's foreign policy stinks? Seriously, if you ever paid attention to what I wrote and didn't just wait to leap and attack you might realize that I'm not so easily pigeonholed as you think. Not that you care. I disagree with you on enough issues that you have to behave like an insufferable cunt and try to destroy me. Just like every other "detriment" that doesn't make muster with your rosy, Marxist appreciation of the world.

You're the one who thinks liberals are hypocrites for not wanting to give even more money to the rich. And we've been over the bit with Murdoch. You're also the one who, when shown an example of your own elitism, decides to pretend that you didn't actually write the words in question.

I think people who talk about the wonderfulness of higher taxes while they pay good money to other people to shelter them from taxes are hypocrites. I also think you've failed to comprehend that what this Congressman is calling for is a voluntary program to surrender more wealth to the government.

Now, in order for your claim to be true, the government would have to take that money and funnel it to rich people. Is this what you claim is happening? No, don't answer. You're a Marxist. I know the answer already...

I don't expect you to like me.

It's not about like or dislike. It's about respect. There are people on this site who I disagree with constantly, but I respect them, because they typically don't resort to the shallow sort of hyperbole you constantly employ, the rank demonization you engage in and the insults (subtle and otherwise) you hurl at people with impunity. All of which you reach for as early in a conversation as possible, so as to better silence, destroy and embarrass your self-perceived opposition. People who don't agree with you are "a detriment to humanity." These are your words. Not mine. These are also the words of a petty, intellectual thug who condones nothing but their own opinions. Again, people like you set up Gulags.

I long ago recognized that you have no respect for people who don't accept your lies and hypocrisy without question. You can't help it; this is just how God or nature or whatever made you. Nature is not extraneous. You have some purpose in existing, and even if that purpose is to serve as an example of what's wrong with humanity, well, we ought to be grateful to have you here to mark so clearly one of the myriad paths of human degradation.

Tiassa, your definition of lying is not agreeing with your or refusing to accept your Marxist rants as dogma. If that's what I am being accused of, then I stand convicted, because I think you are so full of shit I cannot summon the words to craft a metaphor that captures the level of stink. And you can bath all you like in faux intellectualism, but it doesn't wash off your foul stench, it doesn't make your deluded solipsism any more real and it doesn't disguise your blatant intellectual thuggery.

Life goes on. Thank you for being you.

Anytime.

Now, honestly.

Did that rant make you feel better?

Was it cathartic for you?

I hope so. I'd hate to have you angry all day...

The tax policies favored by the Wall Street Journal have been much favored in Washington these past couple of decades.

With quite visible consequences.
Stop being a hypocrite and put your money where your mouth is. Our taxes are too low? Is that what your saying. Well, what rate should we be paying? Figure out the difference between that and what you're actually paying and send in the difference.

Or does the higher tax rate start just above what you make?


No, not really. See my remarks about directing voluntary taxes toward specific programs at the taxpayer's will (http://www.sciforums.com/showpost.php?p=1824280&postcount=10). As things are, the voluntary taxes would only redistribute upward toward the rich.[/QUOTEThat, Tiassa, is a complete crock. What you're saying, in essence, is that you don't want to pay higher taxes because you don't like the way the government would spend the money. You, apparently, feel that you're a better judge of how to spend money than the federal government!

Well, if that's the case, you ought to favor low taxes for everyone. Once you pay your taxes, you lose all control over how the money is spent. That's how taxes work.

I support low taxes because I, like you, don't trust the government to spend the money I give it wisely. I know that the more money the government gets, the more it will waste.

If you support higher tax rates, if you claim you aren't paying enough, you're a hypocrite unless you send the difference in. Even without this proposed law being passed you can already donate money to the US treasury that will be used solely to pay down the debt.

Stop being a hypocrite and put your money where your mouth is. Another word gone.

For the record, as my mouth favors higher taxes on those who have benefited from this credit-pumped economy in order to pay off that debt, I have contributed my money to the acquisition of the necessary power by those who in my opinion are most likely to accomplish that basic act of prudence.

If I have any left over, a basic literacy program on TV - possibly in ads during Fox News - to attempt to teach rightwing America the meanings of a few English words (hypocrite the one at issue here) might be a worthy charity.
Or does the higher tax rate start just above what you make? It would start at the lowest level of income that has seen an increase in net income per hour worked, corrected for inflation in necessities, over the past thirty years.

And it would tax all sources of income equivalently- nice and flat, just like the righties claim to want.

y.
It would start at the lowest level of income that has seen an increase in net income per hour worked, corrected for inflation in necessities, over the past thirty years.

Why not just tax all people who have seen an increase in net income per hour worked, corrected for inflation in necessities, over the past thirty years? That way we could remove all incentive to better oneself!

That, Tiassa, is a complete crock. What you're saying, in essence, is that you don't want to pay higher taxes because you don't like the way the government would spend the money. You, apparently, feel that you're a better judge of how to spend money than the federal government!

Actually, sir, the crock is all yours. Think of it this way: liberals who tread into the realm of wealth redistribution intend to redistribute downward. In other words, we want to take from the rich and give to the poor.

The proposition at hand, to "put the money where the mouth is", suggests that liberals alone should volunteer to pay more taxes than anyone else, in order to redistribute wealth upward. If they are unwilling to do this, says the proposition, they are hypocrites.

In other words: Liberals want to give money to poor people. They ought to put their money where their mouths are and give to the rich, or else they're hypocrites.

I don't object to the idea of mandatory taxation. Spending priorities are part of the political fight in general. However, if one is to challenge a group of people to volunteer to pay greater taxes in order to fulfill their consciences, why should those people volunteer to pay greater taxes when the doing so will not fulfill their consciences? Why should they encourage the antithesis of their consciences?

If you support higher tax rates, if you claim you aren't paying enough, you're a hypocrite unless you send the difference in. Even without this proposed law being passed you can already donate money to the US treasury that will be used solely to pay down the debt.

If we drew debt according to my priorities, that would be well and fine. But as it is, paying off the debt we're creating with Bush's wars is simply redistributing wealth upward.

I absolutely adore, however, this imbecilic notion that liberals are hypocrites unless they give money to the rich. It's the kind of idiocy that shows just how depraved conservatives are.

Remember this: in the 1990s, Democrats balanced the budget. Some proposed to put the surplus toward paying off debt. Republicans, however, threw a fit.

And also remember this: neoconservatives concede the necessity of deficit spending and some social programs. This does would represent a triumph of liberalism except that the neocons—former liberals who were "mugged by reality" (disgruntled Trotskyists (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/13/books/review/Noah-t.html) who sold out their liberal values in order to side with paranoid conservatives against Stalin)—would use these things to prop up their imperialist designs.

One of the reasons conservatives are so willing to concede that humans are inherently greedy is that they think they are then somehow justified in their own greed. Apparently, greed is exempt from evolution and natural selection. Which, of course, is why the species has selected toward socialization: we're stronger together than we are on our own. And we all know what that means, right? It is natural that humans should only look out for number one.

They might push the species to follow the dinosaurs, but at least they get to play King of the Hill until it finally happens.

And how does that neat little trick work?

No matter how much conservatives want to blame social programs and liberal causes for defecits, they will continue to spend ridiculous amounts of money on defense—thus directing a steady flow of funds to their rich cronies—while cutting taxes in the name of fiscal responsibility. It's too much to ask, apparently, that people be educated and healthy in society. But it's never too much to ask to waste money finding new ways to kill people.

Anything Right is bad, or evil or worse and should be expunged from the Earth

See, this is where your ignorance shows. No matter how evil the right wing is, it cannot be "expunged from the Earth". Rather, the species must evolve beyond such petty and dangerous manifestations. Every step we further remove ourselves from our primal condition, the less relevant the conservatives become. Look at history:

• Liberal: republic. Conservative: monarchy.
• Liberal: abolition. Conservative: slavery.
• Liberal: Civil Rights. Conservative: Jim Crow.
• Liberal: woman suffrage. Conservative: no way.
• Liberal: peace. Conservative: war.
• Liberal: cooperative society. Conservative: intrasocietal competition.

Jesus Christ, if he existed, was a liberal. Hell, it took until Karl Marx before Jesus' legacy found voice outside of religion:

Now the company of those who believed were of one heart and soul, and no one said that any of the things which he possessed was his own, but they had everything in common. And with great power the apostles gave their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all. There was not a needy person among them, for as many as were possessors of lands or houses sold them, and brought the proceeds of what was sold and laid it at the apostles' feet; and distribution was made to each as any had need.

(Acts 4.32-35)

Gnostics—who saw the pursuit of God as a means to improving the human condition—were liberals. The orthodox—who saw the pursuit of God as a means to dominating other human beings—were conservative. So liberals have Jesus and Mary Magdalene and Thomas. Conservatives have Irenaeus of Lyon and Tertullian. Liberals have Muhammad, conservatives have the history of extremism. Liberals have the Magna Charta, conservatives have Urban II at Clermont and Anselm's Proslogion. Liberals have Lorenzo the Magnificent, Brunelleschi, Michelangelo, and Leonardo da Vinci. Conservatives have Savonarola, Torquemada, Kramer and Sprenger. Liberals have Newton, Wollstonecraft, Beethoven, both Shelleys, Byron, and Beethoven. Liberals have the Luddites—

Some folks for certain have thought it was shocking,
When Famine appeals, and when Poverty groans,
That life should be valued at less than a stocking,
And breaking of frames lead to breaking of bones.
If it should prove so, I trust, by this token,
(And who will refuse to partake in the hope?)
That the frames of the fools may be first to be broken,
Who, when asked for a remedy, sent down a rope.

(Byron, "Ode to the Framers", 1812)

—while conservatives have the Tory Riot Bill. Liberals have Harriet Tubman and Abraham Lincoln, conservatives have Bully Brooks. Liberals have Sylvia Pankhurst, conservatives have C.W. Radcliffe Cooke°. Liberals have Karl Marx and Sigmund Freud, while conservatives have over a century's worth of mortal fear about either. Liberals have Martin Luther King, conservatives Jesse Helms.

Now, this isn't to say that conservatives are devoid of admirable personages. But Russell Kirk, for instance, could write a hell of a story (e.g., "There's A Long Long Trail A-Windin'"). The thing is that conservatives, when they do something cool, are usually doing something separate from politics. Like Ted Nugent, for instance. A lot of people think he's a great rock and roll musician. Doesn't change the fact that he's a complete asshole, does it? But come on, even I don't turn off "Cat Scratch Fever".

Nor does it mean that liberals and liberalism don't screw up badly. Byron left a daughter to die in a convent. Marx had a child by the maid, and his wife had to borrow money from a French refugee to pay for one of their children's burial.

And sometimes we flip a coin. John Brown? Not real happy about the militancy, and he had like twenty children; Harriet Tubman only missed dying at Harper's Ferry because she overslept. Red Emma tried to murder a corrupt mining boss. Lincoln only freed the slaves as a war strategy. Jefferson wouldn't free his own slaves until after he died.

On the great cosmic scoreboard, Counte, there are reasons I'm a liberal.

Now you're comparing those you don't like to criminals? OK... That's totally ... irrational.

You missed the point, Counte. But I'm not surprised.

The only ego elbowing people aside in this thread is yours. You've totally derailed the entire thread and lashed out at me all because I don't agree with you, and once again, had the temerity to challenge your self-perceived greatness. What are those words you are so fond of? "Get over yourself."

You're the one who took it personally:

I don't think the plan was put forward as serious legislation, either. My take is that it is a tounge-in-cheek effort meant to attract attention to and expose a few obvious hypocrits for what they are.
• • •

It's nice to know your pen is never far from the shallow and easy to reach pot of yellow hyperbole. I mean, you wouldn't want people to start thinking you aren't a self-impressed, radical, right?

Think about it for a minute, Counte: you make a point of saying you didn't buy into the proposition, but then get personally offended by my opinion of people who do?

Yes. Your lie detector is 100 percent accurate and free of bias. Sure. Whatever. What flavor of Kool-Aid do I need in order to believe something as sick and twisted as that?

Whatever flavor you want. I'll let you know when I make the claim. In the meantime, try dealing with the issues at hand instead of raising windmills to tilt.

When, exactly, did I do this?

Well, there was the time you threw your lot in with a simplistic argument about war funding (http://www.sciforums.com/showthread.php?t=67051&page=2). Conveniently, you got to denounce Democrats. There was your attempt to recycle conservative talking points (http://www.sciforums.com/showthread.php?t=70015) against John Edwards. Or the time you decided to defend—gasp!—a conservative who described Kentuckians as corrupt liars (http://www.sciforums.com/showthread.php?t=73590). Ye gads, Counte. Talk about taking (http://www.sciforums.com/showpost.php?p=1623714&postcount=14) things (http://www.sciforums.com/showpost.php?p=1623760&postcount=15) personally (http://www.sciforums.com/showpost.php?p=1623878&postcount=16). And then there was the time you justified FOX News by calling its audience stupid (http://www.sciforums.com/showpost.php?p=1517766&postcount=82), and also the occasion you tried to deny what you said (http://www.sciforums.com/showpost.php?p=1661724&postcount=68).

There it is! Threes posts in! The old jab at my profession! You really are a predictable cunt, aren't you?

There it is! You're dodging the point by pretending to be aggrieved! You really are a predictable cunt, aren't you?

So instead screaming and crying because I used the word "journalist", why don't you tell me what my obligation is to be free of bias to whatever degree satisfies you? In other words, what obligation have I to be so free of bias that I would always side with conservatives while blasting liberalism and Democrats?

and the New York Times, but really?

I don't see the [url=http://www.sciforums.com/showthread.php?t=70015]New York Times in the topic post. You did note the NYT in post #15, but the controversial assertion is entirely yours.

Are you still sore about your charlatan, bung-boy Edwards losing? I mean, you keep bringing this ancient dispute up. It must have really wounded you.

Well, you keep pretending you're a smart, decent, honest fellow being viciously persecuted. Truth of the matter is that if you're a smart, decent, honest fellow you should try showing it around here sometime. I mean, if you look up a few paragraphs in this post, you'll see I mentioned it yet again. But you did ask, so ....

No, I get it. There are plenty of avowed Leftists that you don't agree with who are detriments. The key here is they MUST agree with you because you are infallible and brilliant and honest and ... swell ... in just about every way, right?

Actually, it seems you don't get it. There seems something counterintuitive about saying, "The facts seem misrepresented and the conclusion therefore wrong, but I think it's a good idea nonetheless, and we should go forward with it."

It has nothing to do with infallibility, Counte. If you weren't so personally obsessed with bungs and cunts, you might start to understand that. Apparently, the idea of a moral outlook that attempts to seek the best possible outcomes for the human species is foreign to you. And, hell, if you were actually paying attention to what I post around here instead of wasting your effort on being a drama queen, you would be aware that the I assert that there is a rational foundation for morality, and that foundation is perpetuity of the human endeavor—e.g., the benefit of the species. Thus, it is only natural that people who set the species aside for greedy reasons seem, to me, immoral. And since that immorality challenges the best interests of the species as I understand it, I find it detrimental to humanity.

Whether or not you agree with such an assertion of objective morality is its own question, and actually beside the point for the moment. Rather, the reality of the situation is that it's not so hard to figure these points out if you pay attention. And if you're not paying attention, then maybe you shouldn't be complaining so much about what you're not paying attention to.

Easy enough? One would think. But then again, it's you, so I realize that the idea that one should pay attention to what one complains about is an unjust and irrational demand to burden you with.

That's right, Tiassa. Keep up the clever-cunt routine. That is, tip-toe right up to the line of insulting them where you can say something sly and insulting but still claim it wasn't a personal attack. Oh, you're so brilliant! I mean, if I wanted to employ your tactics against you, I could seize on your obvious intent here and ask what's wrong with said fetish? Said Freudia? Are you (gasp) a homophobe? I mean, you like to call other people that name, so why conjure up such imagery, based on my remarks?

Keep practicing, Counte, and maybe you'll get good at it someday. A nickel's worth of free advice: There's nothing wrong with being a butt man. But the implied violence, the malice of your obsession—"it's fun to stuff baking soda into your gob, find the relevant catalyst and watch you froth"—is just a bit unhealthy at least, Counte.

What causes would that be? The fact I'm pro-choice? An atheist? Think Bush's foreign policy stinks? Seriously, if you ever paid attention to what I wrote and didn't just wait to leap and attack you might realize that I'm not so easily pigeonholed as you think.

Ooh, a pro-choice, atheist GOP apologist who thinks Bush's foreign policy stinks. You're not exactly unique there, Counte. You're willing to make excuses for conservative propagandists (e.g. FOX News) despite claiming you don't know about the issues. Your measure of hypocrisy demands that liberals violate their consciences, else they're hypocrites. You insisted on recycling GOP talking points about John Edwards. (Yet again! But, hey, you asked.) And GOP talking points about the Democrats funding the war last spring.

Not that you care. I disagree with you on enough issues that you have to behave like an insufferable cunt and try to destroy me.

Destroy you?

Okay, let's get this question out of the way: What the fuck is your problem, Counte?

Destroy you? Dude, I just don't like you. Welcome to Sciforums. How the hell can I possibly destroy you?

Yeah. I think you're a paranoid, lying sack of shit. We've had many of your kind here over the years, and we'll have many more. If I am capable, with Sciforums as my instrument, of destroying you, I have seriously underestimated the power and importance of this website and what goes on here. Now, I do realize that we all invest varying amounts of our identities in our participation here. But if I can destroy you ...?

Just like every other "detriment" that doesn't make muster with your rosy, Marxist appreciation of the world.

It's your dishonesty, more than anything, that makes you a detriment to humanity, Counte. Who knows? Perhaps in life you're not a two-bit, dishonest, mean-sprited, clueless hack with absolutely no sense of context and a troubling deficiency about your reading comprehension. And that's fine. All I can work with is what you show me. I'm not psychic. I can't think for you.

I think people who talk about the wonderfulness of higher taxes while they pay good money to other people to shelter them from taxes are hypocrites. I also think you've failed to comprehend that what this Congressman is calling for is a voluntary program to surrender more wealth to the government.

"Surrender more wealth to the government". Now that is a telling phrase. Apparently, people are at war with their government? It's about as political as saying, that Congressman Campbell was inviting people to invest greater resources in the American endeavor.

I don't have a problem with the idea of taxes. I have a problem with the conduct of politicians and the priorities of the people who elect them.

Now, in order for your claim to be true, the government would have to take that money and funnel it to rich people. Is this what you claim is happening? No, don't answer. You're a Marxist. I know the answer already.

Too late. I already answered when you asked earlier.

It's not about like or dislike. It's about respect. There are people on this site who I disagree with constantly, but I respect them, because they typically don't resort to the shallow sort of hyperbole you constantly employ, the rank demonization you engage in and the insults (subtle and otherwise) you hurl at people with impunity.

And there are people at this site I disagree with, and respect, because they don't lie.

When you lie, and someone calls you a liar, you call it demonization and insults. Tell you what, Counte: if you don't like being called dishonest, conduct yourself better.

All of which you reach for as early in a conversation as possible, so as to better silence, destroy and embarrass your self-perceived opposition.

The problem with your theory is that people don't seem to be embarrassed, destroyed, or silenced, do they?

People who don't agree with you are "a detriment to humanity." These are your words. Not mine. These are also the words of a petty, intellectual thug who condones nothing but their own opinions.

And those are the words of a two-bit moron who for whom rational consideration is an unfair burden.

Again, people like you set up Gulags.

Right. People who object to the prison state and tend to seek psychological reconciliation instead of punishment are the people who set up gulags.

I would say something about a petty intellectual thuggery, but I wouldn't want to misrepresent you. Instead, something about petty thuggery goes here.

Tiassa, your definition of lying is not agreeing with your or refusing to accept your Marxist rants as dogma.

No, my definition of lying is the intentional communication of known falsehood or deliberate withholding of information in an attempt to affect perceptions and decisions.

If that's what I am being accused of, then I stand convicted

You're a self-made martyr, Counte.

because I think you are so full of shit I cannot summon the words to craft a metaphor that captures the level of stink

Yeah, it's not like words and communication are your livelihood, right?

Here, I'll give you one for free: You are ineffably full of shit. Your argument is nothing more than sewage wrapped in feces wrapped in shit wrapped in a dead squirrel.

And you can bath all you like in faux intellectualism, but it doesn't wash off your foul stench, it doesn't make your deluded solipsism any more real and it doesn't disguise your blatant intellectual thuggery.

A victim no more. Right, Counte? Is that how you see yourself? Courageously defending yourself and others against horrible injustice? Fighting for your very life as the evil Marxist supervillain tries to destroy you?

Anytime.

Now, honestly.

Did that rant make you feel better?

Was it cathartic for you?

I hope so. I'd hate to have you angry all day.

At the very least, Counte, you deserve a response.

As to the rest? I have to admit, by this point it's getting sort of entertaining.

You know, one of the strangest things I ever saw was when I was about eleven, a neighbor boy somehow managed to accidentally lodge a fish hook in a duck's ass. No, it wasn't pretty at all. I cringed for the duck, ached as sympathetically as my young conscience could muster. But it was fucking funnier than hell. See, there was this moment, a snapshot moment, when the line snapped tight and the neighbor braced against the shock, and on the other end a duck plummeting back down to the water.

And as we grow up, those sorts of things aren't supposed to be funny anymore. And in real life, they're not. Doesn't mean the bit with the Doberman snatching the small dog in A Fish Called Wanda isn't hilarious, or the dog on methamphetamine or whatever in There's Something About Mary. But in real life, it's not supposed to be so funny.

In real life, we tend to feel sorry for such creatures.

And if you were before my very eyes, carrying on with such paranoia—

"I disagree with you on enough issues that you have to behave like an insufferable cunt and try to destroy me."

—and hatred—

"You really are a predictable cunt, aren't you? .... Keep up the clever-cunt routine .... you have to behave like an insufferable cunt ...."

—and childish frustration—

"I think you are so full of shit I cannot summon the words to craft a metaphor that captures the level of stink."

—that I would probably feel very badly about your human condition.

But cast up on the board here at Sciforums in all its calculated vainglory, it's just strange and kind of funny.

Not as funny, of course, as a surprised duck with a fish hook snagging its ass. And, to be honest, I don't think anyone at Sciforums could match that, so don't take it personally. But it is strange. It's damn near surreal.

At any rate, to get back to the topic, you never did answer a question about Campbell's tax proposal:

What kind of third-tier intellect actually falls for that sort of brainless crap?
____________________

Notes:

° C.W. Radcliffe Cooke — A nineteenth-century British Member of Parliament (Hereford) who once said, "I will oppose the right of women to vote until women are bigger than men!"

No matter how much conservatives want to blame social programs and liberal causes for defecits, they will continue to spend ridiculous amounts of money on defense—thus directing a steady flow of funds to their rich cronies—while cutting taxes in the name of fiscal responsibility. It's too much to ask, apparently, that people be educated and healthy in society. But it's never too much to ask to waste money finding new ways to kill people.

The primary and essential responsibility of any state is security — all else comes later. You can sieze on military spending — and in doing so, make the absolutely ridiculous claim that it somehow benefits conservative "cronies" — as your cause de jour, but it really doesn't equate to what the initial post and the half-wit Congressman were discussing. Sorry.

And for the record, neither parties record on spending your money and my money is all that good. The current crop of so-called conservatives has indeed created tremendous debts, but again, I don't think this is what the Congressman was on about. I know it's hard to focus, Tiassa, what with acting like a complete jerk and all. Plus, there are so many things you want to talk about, right? So many whines. So many gripes. So many ways that society could be perfect if people only listened to kooky Marxists like you. But please, try staying on topic. The issue here is — or was, until you decided to make this distinctly persona — higher taxes, and the willingness of those who advocate paying them to actually do so.

Look at history:

• Liberal: republic. Conservative: monarchy.
• Liberal: abolition. Conservative: slavery.
• Liberal: Civil Rights. Conservative: Jim Crow.
• Liberal: woman suffrage. Conservative: no way.
• Liberal: peace. Conservative: war.
• Liberal: cooperative society. Conservative: intrasocietal competition.


This would have to be one of the basest, most gerrymandered appreciations of history I've seen, but then, you really do see the world in such polar terms, don't you? Frankly, it's just scary. And rather than offer a few examples of how tremendous stupid your claim is, I think I'll just move along, safe and sure that anything I write wouldn't shake you from your dogmatic appreciation.

Jesus Christ, if he existed, was a liberal. Hell, it took until Karl Marx before Jesus' legacy found voice outside of religion:

Those are two incredible claims.

Gnostics—who saw the pursuit of God as a means to improving the human condition—were liberals. The orthodox—who saw the pursuit of God as a means to dominating other human beings—were conservative. So liberals have Jesus and Mary Magdalene and Thomas. Conservatives have Irenaeus of Lyon and Tertullian. Liberals have Muhammad, conservatives have the history of extremism. Liberals have the Magna Charta, conservatives have Urban II at Clermont and Anselm's Proslogion. Liberals have Lorenzo the Magnificent, Brunelleschi, Michelangelo, and Leonardo da Vinci. Conservatives have Savonarola, Torquemada, Kramer and Sprenger. Liberals have Newton, Wollstonecraft, Beethoven, both Shelleys, Byron, and Beethoven. Liberals have the Luddites—



Are you done babbling yet? Oh, wait. Apparently, you're not...

—while conservatives have the Tory Riot Bill. Liberals have Harriet Tubman and Abraham Lincoln, conservatives have Bully Brooks. Liberals have Sylvia Pankhurst, conservatives have C.W. Radcliffe Cooke°. Liberals have Karl Marx and Sigmund Freud, while conservatives have over a century's worth of mortal fear about either. Liberals have Martin Luther King, conservatives Jesse Helms.

Now, this isn't to say that conservatives are devoid of admirable personages. But Russell Kirk, for instance, could write a hell of a story (e.g., "There's A Long Long Trail A-Windin'"). The thing is that conservatives, when they do something cool, are usually doing something separate from politics. Like Ted Nugent, for instance. A lot of people think he's a great rock and roll musician. Doesn't change the fact that he's a complete asshole, does it? But come on, even I don't turn off "Cat Scratch Fever".

Nor does it mean that liberals and liberalism don't screw up badly. Byron left a daughter to die in a convent. Marx had a child by the maid, and his wife had to borrow money from a French refugee to pay for one of their children's burial.

And sometimes we flip a coin. John Brown? Not real happy about the militancy, and he had like twenty children; Harriet Tubman only missed dying at Harper's Ferry because she overslept. Red Emma tried to murder a corrupt mining boss. Lincoln only freed the slaves as a war strategy. Jefferson wouldn't free his own slaves until after he died.

On the great cosmic scoreboard, Counte, there are reasons I'm a liberal.



Well, thanks for explaining that. The few lines I read of it were interesting, if for nothing else, than for the portrait they painted of self-induced dementia. I thought this thread was about taxes? I mean, if I really wanted your take of history and your defense of an ideology I care nothing about and attack of an idealogy I care nothing about, I would have asked. But, as is always the case, you're such a giver that you share more than is required, meandering into fields not even in view when the conversation began. Many on this site appreciate you for this, think you're brilliant and witty and all those other warm and fuzzies. Me? I just think you're crazy. But what do you care what I think?

You missed the point, Counte. But I'm not surprised.

Well, perhaps I'm confused. Weren't we talking about taxes?

You're the one who took it personally:

I took it personally, because you intended I take it personally and went out of your way, relying on your tried and tested methods, to ensure that it was personal. Any rationale being who reads this thread could come to no other conclusion.

Think about it for a minute, Counte: you make a point of saying you didn't buy into the proposition, but then get personally offended by my opinion of people who do?

I didn't buy the proposition, but I thought it was funny. And I thought that posting it would provoke an interesting conversation. Little did I know you'd push this to its current state.

I was never offended by your opinion, either. Here, again, you're projecting, in that you think it ruffles my feathers when you rage against Republicans or conservatives — or whatever draws your ire. Wrong. I simply thought your language was ridiculous and said so. It was goofy, bombastic, ludicrous, hyperbolic, full of zealotry and a bunch of other "detriments" that tend to irk me. I mean, you really believe this shit. It really is black and white to you. Fair enough, but as I've said before, don't expect other people to take your hell fire and brimstone seriously: It's the product of a corrupt and dangerous mind.

Whatever flavor you want. I'll let you know when I make the claim. In the meantime, try dealing with the issues at hand instead of raising windmills to tilt.

How about taxes? Can we deal with that? Or would you rather lecture us about gnostics again?

Well, there was the time you threw your lot in with a simplistic argument about war funding (http://www.sciforums.com/showthread.php?t=67051&page=2). Conveniently, you got to denounce Democrats.

And conveniently, several Democrats agreed with me...

There was your attempt to recycle conservative talking points (http://www.sciforums.com/showthread.php?t=70015) against John Edwards.

The man was a charlatan. He offended me. This makes me a conservative? I could say — and have said — much the same about Rudy or Mitt...

Or the time you decided to defend—gasp!—a conservative who described Kentuckians as corrupt liars (http://www.sciforums.com/showthread.php?t=73590). Ye gads, Counte. Talk about taking (http://www.sciforums.com/showpost.php?p=1623714&postcount=14) things (http://www.sciforums.com/showpost.php?p=1623760&postcount=15) personally (http://www.sciforums.com/showpost.php?p=1623878&postcount=16).

Talk about presenting things out of context. I wasn't defending anyone in that thread. I was fed up with your obvious demonization. That is, your attempt to find minutia and try to make it indicative of some greater whole. In other words, it was about logic and fairness. If you will recall, at the time, you spent all of your days here posting about Republican sex scandals, and using those as a springboard to launch into hate-filled, esoteric rants about the people you hate most.

And then there was the time you justified FOX News by calling its audience stupid (http://www.sciforums.com/showpost.php?p=1517766&postcount=82), and also the occasion you tried to deny what you said (http://www.sciforums.com/showpost.php?p=1661724&postcount=68).

I didn't justify anything. In fact, I said it was irrelevant, like just about 90 percent of what you post in any given thread (taxes is/was the topic here, remember?). Read your link. Your anger came from the fact that I refused to agree with you and condemn a network I had no practical knowledge of. Justify it? Christ, I hate it, just as I hate all TV news.

So instead screaming and crying because I used the word "journalist", why don't you tell me what my obligation is to be free of bias to whatever degree satisfies you? In other words, what obligation have I to be so free of bias that I would always side with conservatives while blasting liberalism and Democrats?

I "cry" about the mention of my profession because it has no place in any conversation you and I have. Ever. Period. I've said this several times, but you continue to mention it — and, in fact, use it as a weapon to try to insult me — with flagarant disregard. In mentioning it, as you do in EVERY thread where we argue, you also question the fact's veracity in order to question my overall veracity — and then some. Consider that later in the rant you posted, you asked the following:

"Yeah, it's not like words and communication are your livelihood, right?"

Which can be interpretted as nothing other than a personal attack/insult, and as such, is suppposed to be inappropriate and out-of-bounds. But hey, you get to say whatever you want, right? And your character, based on these limitless choices, speaks for itself. You're an asshole. And you seem to revel it.

As for whether you have any obligation to be unbiased, you don't. You can be as biased as you like. We all are. But people, I think, put a premium on fellows who try to judge something rationally and with as little bias as possible. That is, they tend to give more credit to a person who assess things outside their ideology and is willing to see the good and the bad of all sides of the shape. This is something that is patently beyond you. Everything is approached through your bent prism of Marxism. Everything. And your zeal in this arena prevents you from accurately assessing the world. Only you will never know this because you think you are never wrong.

If you weren't so personally obsessed with bungs and cunts, you might start to understand that.

I had no idea the use of common curses implied "fascination" with the actitivities they refer to, but I will make note of that Dr. Freud.

Apparently, the idea of a moral outlook that attempts to seek the best possible outcomes for the human species is foreign to you.

Not at all. You and I just differ on the outlook, something you seem incapable of recognizing.

Keep practicing, Counte, and maybe you'll get good at it someday.

And then will everyone at sciforums worship me in similar fashion as they do you? Gosh, I can only hope...

Ooh, a pro-choice, atheist GOP apologist who thinks Bush's foreign policy stinks. You're not exactly unique there, Counte.

Never said I was. But I still dispute the GOP party claim. I don't support them. Never have. And that's largely because of a host of differences with them on a host of social issues. However, the issue in this thread is taxation, and on that subject, I would lean closer those on the Right than I would those on the left.

You're willing to make excuses for conservative propagandists (e.g. FOX News) despite claiming you don't know about the issues.

Again, I never made an excuse for FOX. I said I don't care about it. I still don't...

You insisted on recycling GOP talking points about John Edwards. (Yet again! But, hey, you asked.) And GOP talking points about the Democrats funding the war last spring.

And you insist that because my views on two issues appears to match up with some GOP talking points, that makes me a GOP apologist? Sorry, but that's just too ridiculous to coment about.

Okay, let's get this question out of the way: What the fuck is your problem, Counte?

You. Your attitude. Your personal attacks. Your unwillingness to stay on topic. Your inability to acknowledge alternative viewpoints. Your general thuggery. Your attempts to label people. Your attempts to see everyone who doesn't agree with you as "liars" or "detriments" to humanity.

Destroy you? Dude, I just don't like you. Welcome to Sciforums. How the hell can I possibly destroy you?

You can't. But your modus operandi is to attack and ridicule people so that you destroy their will to disagree with you, and in doing so, destroy alternative viewpoints and opinions on this site. This is warfare to you. It's obvious.

Yeah. I think you're a paranoid, lying sack of shit.

Another insult, but then the rules don't apply to you, do they?

"Surrender more wealth to the government". Now that is a telling phrase. Apparently, people are at war with their government?

No, they aren't. But people are "surrendering" their income when they pay taxes nonetheless. Taxes aren't optional. They are collected with the threat of legal and physical force.

I don't have a problem with the idea of taxes. I have a problem with the conduct of politicians and the priorities of the people who elect them.

No, you have a problem with certain politicians and certain people.

And there are people at this site I disagree with, and respect, because they don't lie.

Really? When do this happen? Every argument I've seen you get you behave pretty much the same way. You've had, what? Four or five threads started about your attitude in the Open Government section?

When you lie, and someone calls you a liar, you call it demonization and insults. Tell you what, Counte: if you don't like being called dishonest, conduct yourself better.

And I've discussed what you consider "lying," and it in no way, shape or fashion approaches the actual definition of the word.

The problem with your theory is that people don't seem to be embarrassed, destroyed, or silenced, do they?

On the contrary, I think one of my strongest points is the absolute lack of diversity in the political section — a lack of diversity I put down to tactics by you and your chums. The forums was much more diverse a year, two years ago when I first showed up. Then, one by one, people of a certain ilk just left. And who can blame them? I've been called ever sort of phobe or ist by you in the book. Why stay here, when the Mods do nothing, and deal with that kind of shit? It's not like the conversations here are interesting...

No, my definition of lying is the intentional communication of known falsehood or deliberate withholding of information in an attempt to affect perceptions and decisions.

And in application, this definition means people who reach different conclusions than you, because there is NO legitimate way that could ever happen. Yeah, we get it, Tiassa.

A victim no more. Right, Counte? Is that how you see yourself? Courageously defending yourself and others against horrible injustice? Fighting for your very life as the evil Marxist supervillain tries to destroy you?

No, I see myself as not taking shit of an intellectual thug who tries to bully people on a web site, probably because he's compensating for some real world "lack thereof."

That and it's fun to watch you waste your time writing things that nobody reads...

Have a nice day.

As wes would say,

"meh."

The proposition at hand, to "put the money where the mouth is", suggests that liberals alone should volunteer to pay more taxes than anyone else, in order to redistribute wealth upward. If they are unwilling to do this, says the proposition, they are hypocrites.The proposal is to pay the tax rate that you think is fair. How the money is spent has nothing to do with it, the same as any other taxes.
Remember this: in the 1990s, Democrats balanced the budget. Some proposed to put the surplus toward paying off debt. Republicans, however, threw a fit.I seem to recall that we had divided government at that time, that is, a democrat president and a republican congress. Congress controls the purse, so I'm pretty sure the Republicans had something to do with the balanced budget.

And also remember this: neoconservatives concede the necessity of deficit spending and some social programs. This does would represent a triumph of liberalism except that the neocons—former liberals who were "mugged by reality" Ok, then you can't call me a neo-con.
One of the reasons conservatives are so willing to concede that humans are inherently greedy is that they think they are then somehow justified in their own greed. Apparently, greed is exempt from evolution and natural selection. Which, of course, is why the species has selected toward socialization: we're stronger together than we are on our own. And we all know what that means, right? It is natural that humans should only look out for number one.

They might push the species to follow the dinosaurs, but at least they get to play King of the Hill until it finally happens.
Oh, so you think humans are naturally altruistic? That's why communism worked so well. The USSR was an economic dynamo just chuck full of innovations, wasn't it?

Humans are naturally out for themselves, and their families. They work hard and innovate when they see some advantage in doing so. Any system that ignores this fact will push the human species into stagnation, barbarism, and extinction.

I seem to recall that we had divided government at that time, that is, a democrat president and a republican congress. Congress controls the purse, so I'm pretty sure the Republicans had something to do with the balanced budget.

Yea, some dems seem to forget the republicans control of Congress in the 1990s, and their Contract with America.

Tiassa doesn't forget.

Tiassa doesn't care.

Nothing conservatives or Republicans do can be trumpeted. And if by some wild hair they do actually do something worthy, Tiassa will say it was an accident or for ulterior motives. For example, "Lincoln only freed the slaves as a war strategy."

The primary and essential responsibility of any state is security — all else comes later. The security of its citizenry, that is.

Too big an army is a direct threat to the citizenry of any free, democratic country.

So is a large public debt.

So is the coercive power of corporations.

So is poor management of industrial waste, the established currency and banking, agricultural and environmental resources, public health, and anything else involving Hardin's Tragedy of the Commons - and the Commons are, by definition, under governmental oversight.

The security of the state itself is not primary. It's secondary - a means to an end.

Yea, some dems seem to forget the republicans control of Congress in the 1990s, and their Contract with America. Clinton gets credit for submitting, for Congressional approval and modification and official enactment, a (dubiously) "balanced" budget. Congress gets credit for all the cooperation it displayed in this effort - I recall two shutdowns of the government altogether, and much nonsense. I don't think Tiassa will object to giving the Republican Congress all of the "credit" it so richly deserves for its accomplishments regarding the Contract with America.

This from a man who, when pressed, could not credit a Republican president during the past 50 years with any outright positives.

The security of its citizenry, that is.

I couldn't disagree more whole heartily. The primary concern of a nation state is to ensure the state continues to exist. Everything else is secondary. A state must ensure it maintains its integrity or it ceases to be a state. This seems obvious.

The primary and essential responsibility of any state is security — all else comes later.

All else? Including wisdom, integrity, and decency? Extending a war in order to test weapons of mass destruction against a failing enemy? Overthrowing an elected Prime Minister in order to secure power for a tyrant? Sending our troops to Asia because a bunch of French colonialists screwed up? Nuclear brinkmanship? Lying to the world in order to invade Iraq? Sick and wrong, inadvisably greedy, morally and strategically questionable, fanatically irresponsible and incredibly lucky, downright wrong and excessive.

I can certainly accept the theory that security is an essential—and even the primary—obligation of any state, but theory and practice are different things entirely.

You can sieze on military spending — and in doing so, make the absolutely ridiculous claim that it somehow benefits conservative "cronies" — as your cause de jour, but it really doesn't equate to what the initial post and the half-wit Congressman were discussing. Sorry.

Equate? What, exactly do you mean by that? The point is that it's not hypocrisy if one fails to sponsor the antithesis of their intentions.

Right now there's too much money going to those who profit from war, ignorance, and fear. Voluntary contributions by liberals would not accomplish what liberals intend. Yet you seem to think Campbell's suggestion "a few obvious hypocrits for what they are".

And that is incorrect, for reasons I've already explained.

Now, our friend Madanthonywayne has suggested that there is already a voluntary option to pay off the national debt, but the conscience problem with this is that even when social programs are slashed in the name of fiscal responsibility, conservatives still want to spend public money on innovating new weapons of war, and are willing—as Reagan showed—to rack up federal debt in order to do so.

And for the record, neither parties record on spending your money and my money is all that good.

Preaching to the choir on that one, Counte.

The current crop of so-called conservatives has indeed created tremendous debts, but again, I don't think this is what the Congressman was on about.

Help me understand your point, then. Are you saying that since conservatives creating debt was not part of the reason the Congressman submitted this bill, that it is irrelevant to the point that you think the bill was "a tongue-in-cheek effort meant to attract attention to ... expose a few obvious hypocrits for what they are"? I suggest the point pertains to the dimensions of hypocrisy.

I know it's hard to focus, Tiassa, what with acting like a complete jerk and all.

As your previous point about what the Congressman was on about suggests, you seem to be speaking from experience. I mean, you made a valid point, but for a different discussion. You would appear to have lost your focus in pursuit of a second-rate zinger.

Plus, there are so many things you want to talk about, right? So many whines. So many gripes. So many ways that society could be perfect if people only listened to kooky Marxists like you. But please, try staying on topic. The issue here is — or was, until you decided to make this distinctly persona — higher taxes, and the willingness of those who advocate paying them to actually do so.

You see? One sentence to establish a point (what the Congressman was on about) that depends for its validity on distorted presuppositions), a zinger, and then five sentences dedicated to your personal obsession with being rude, and then an attempt to return to a more original point, the faults of which have already been addressed.

To simplify the issue as you have—"higher taxes, and the willingness of those who advocate paying them to actually do so"—ignores the intention of what those higher taxes would do. The result, then, is that you're advocating the notion that someone is a hypocrite for not going out of their way to volunteer to aid and abet the antithesis of their intentions.

This would have to be one of the basest, most gerrymandered appreciations of history I've seen, but then, you really do see the world in such polar terms, don't you? Frankly, it's just scary. And rather than offer a few examples of how tremendous stupid your claim is, I think I'll just move along, safe and sure that anything I write wouldn't shake you from your dogmatic appreciation.

Ah, yes. It's wrong. It's scary. But you're not going to try to make the argument. Instead, you're just going to pretend to insult me and try to move along.

I would say something here about intellectual thuggery, but there's nothing intellectual about your argument at this point.

Those are two incredible claims.

Which should be fairly easy to refute, then? All you have to do is show how Jesus was a conservative according to the values and mores of his people and time, and then show who beat Marx to the socioeconomic expression of Acts 4.32-35.

Quite simple, in theory. Perhaps what makes it too much of a challenge for you to actually do so is your lack of confidence that it can actually be done?

Are you done babbling yet? Oh, wait. Apparently, you're not.

If you could actually provide a counter-argument, you wouldn't sound so desperate and snotty.

Well, thanks for explaining that. The few lines I read of it were interesting, if for nothing else, than for the portrait they painted of self-induced dementia.

Surely you realize that you damage your own credibility when you criticize what you claim to have not read?

Again, something about intellectual thuggery would go here, except there's nothing intellectual about your approach.

I thought this thread was about taxes?

Then why did you raise the issue? Oh, right. Something about a lack of focus when acting like an asshole. Oh, wait, I don't want to be construed as putting words in your mouth. You said "complete jerk".

Either way—

"Anything Right is bad, or evil or worse and should be expunged from the Earth."

—you rushed to digression in order to "stuff baking soda into my gob" or, as common parlance has it, put words in my mouth.

I mean, if I really wanted your take of history and your defense of an ideology I care nothing about and attack of an idealogy I care nothing about, I would have asked.

Ah, so we're only talking about what you want to talk about? Correcting your mischaracterizations is unacceptable, off-topic, and irrelevant? Do I have that correctly?

But, as is always the case, you're such a giver that you share more than is required, meandering into fields not even in view when the conversation began. Many on this site appreciate you for this, think you're brilliant and witty and all those other warm and fuzzies. Me? I just think you're crazy. But what do you care what I think?

Enough to respond, Counte. Focus, sir. I mean, I know it's hard for you and all, but a little bit of focus would probably help you a great deal here. Shall I continue to treat you as if you're as stupid as your arguments, or should we just admit that you're not actually that stupid, but instead sinister in your bad faith attempts to digress with deliberate and hateful mischaracterizations and then pretending self-righteous offense when that idiocy is addressed?

Realize, Counte, you're not exactly unique in this behavior.

Well, perhaps I'm confused. Weren't we talking about taxes?

I suppose there's a chance that you're legitimately confused. It is entirely possible that you're not smart enough to distinguish between the point at hand and the overarching themes of the topic. The topical themes have to do with taxes. The point at hand had to do with notions of bias, a point you raised in order to avoid a relevant discussion about the terms of hypocrisy.

Focus, Counte. You've already postulated a formula concerning lack of focus. And yet here you continue to lack focus. Something about priorities goes here. Oh, hey, that one hasn't slipped my mind: Reconsider your priorities. Seriously, violent sublimated homoerotica in lieu of an argument can certainly cloud your focus. Misogynistic obsession with cunts can certainly cloud your focus. Your obsession with me as a person instead of the arguments I'm putting forward or the issues I'm suggesting can certainly cloud your focus. Would you like me to put my hair in pigtails, Counte, so you can dip them in inkwells?

Focus, Counte.

I took it personally, because you intended I take it personally and went out of your way, relying on your tried and tested methods, to ensure that it was personal.

Actually, if you read my initial post in this topic (http://www.sciforums.com/showpost.php?p=1824280&postcount=10), you'll see that I went out of my way to leave you, personally, out of it.

What is interesting, however, is that while you claim (#11 (http://www.sciforums.com/showpost.php?p=1824298&postcount=11)) to not buying into the proposition, you took my response to the topic personally, as if ... oh, wait. Right. We've already covered that. Your lie ... oh, wait, excuse me. Your misstatement .... Let me try that again. Your argument that does not reflect the facts on record—choosing instead to speculate in such a manner that, coincidentally, purports to justify your poor attitude and intellect-free attacks—is an attempt to deflect that prior coverage.

I didn't buy the proposition, but I thought it was funny. And I thought that posting it would provoke an interesting conversation. Little did I know you'd push this to its current state.

And this would appear to be a continuation of your anemic attempt to justify yourself.

I was never offended by your opinion, either.

Yellow hyperbole?

"It's nice to know your pen is never far from the shallow and easy to reach pot of yellow hyperbole. I mean, you wouldn't want people to start thinking you aren't a self-impressed, radical, right?"

Here, again, you're projecting, in that you think it ruffles my feathers when you rage against Republicans or conservatives — or whatever draws your ire. Wrong. I simply thought your language was ridiculous and said so.

Whatever you say, Counte.

• "Right. I get it. (http://www.sciforums.com/showpost.php?p=1824423&postcount=17) Republicans, who aren't terribly conservative these days, in case you hadn't noticed, are dishonest. Democrats are honest. OK. Sure. Whatever. I don't suppose anyone will ever hang a sign around your neck that says 'unbiased.'"

• "Regardless, your obvious bias and polar view of right and wrong, and my assessment of them, holds true whichever group or moniker you take up. Anything Right (http://www.sciforums.com/showpost.php?p=1825084&postcount=50) is bad, or evil or worse and should be expunged from the Earth. So please, don't parse."

Whatever you say.

It was goofy, bombastic, ludicrous, hyperbolic, full of zealotry and a bunch of other "detriments" that tend to irk me.

And yet all you can do is engage in bombastic, hyperbolic, ludicrous zealotry of your own instead of undertake what should be a fairly simple task? I mean, if my arguments are so awful, it shouldn't be too great an effort to dismantle them. But you don't. In fact, when I expose the jugular on the basis of my argument, you pretty much avoid the point. We'll get to that in a minute. All in due time. In its right order. Whatever.

How about taxes? Can we deal with that? Or would you rather lecture us about gnostics again?

Are you suggesting that your digressions, distractions, and mischaracterizations should be exempted from any response? Why would you need such protection?

And conveniently, several Democrats agreed with me.

Democrats are entitled to be diverse. And, given that you show so little respect for them, I'm not sure that the idea that several Democrats playing a dubious political maneuver helps your argument.

Indeed, given your history of misrepresentation, "several Democrats agreed with me" is a strange and unreliable response. I mean, if you want to take comfort in the fact that several politicians were willing to agree with a spineless and simplistic political assertion designed to avoid harder considerations, be my guest.

The man was a charlatan. He offended me. This makes me a conservative? I could say — and have said — much the same about Rudy or Mitt.

If he offended you, perhaps you should have tried to express yourself a little bit better than reciting partisan talking points. Indeed, pretending ignorance about journalism was a dubious ploy on your part, as well. And, hey, objecting to Rudy or Mitt? Perhaps you didn't notice, but conservatives objected to Rudy and Mitt.

Talk about presenting things out of context. I wasn't defending anyone in that thread. I was fed up with your obvious demonization. That is, your attempt to find minutia and try to make it indicative of some greater whole. In other words, it was about logic and fairness.

I referred to an appearance of hypocrisy. Consider your phrase, "attempt to find minutia [sic] and try to make it indicative of some greater whole"? Well, that's the whole device behind conservatives decrying liberal elitist entertainers who make statements akin to Boone's description of typical Kentuckians.

And, apparently, your senses of logic and fairness assert that conservatives should be allowed to do the very things conservatives complain about liberals doing.

If you will recall, at the time, you spent all of your days here posting about Republican sex scandals, and using those as a springboard to launch into hate-filled, esoteric rants about the people you hate most.

Something about ludicrous hyperbole goes here. And thuggery. But not intellect.

Oh, wait. I think I'm supposed to say, "I thought we were talking about taxes". After all, you asked. I responded. And now you're insisting. And, hey, I don't actually object. This is how discussions at boards like this go.

But since you object, I should at least remind you of your repeated appeal about discussing taxes.

Meantime, let me know if you want to digress into a comparison of people doing wrong, and people who capitalize on a certain notion doing wrong by that exact notion. In other words, there's a difference between the wrongness of people violating their marital vows and puritanical fearmongers who pander to superstition and ignorance getting caught with their pants down. I mean, on the one hand, adultery is adultery. But a politically homophobic preacher doing meth and banging a gay prostitute? A State Department abstinence advocate getting hookers? A conservative crusader against sex crimes trying to sell himself to a male police officer? And then making it into a racist issue? You don't see the difference between these and common adultery?

Would you, say, see the difference between common adultery and a president who lies about it under oath?

I didn't justify anything. In fact, I said it was irrelevant, like just about 90 percent of what you post in any given thread (taxes is/was the topic here, remember?). Read your link. Your anger came from the fact that I refused to agree with you and condemn a network I had no practical knowledge of.

Actually, you did try to justify FOX. As PJdude reminded, "the implication is ok because it was about primary new station watched". So let's consider the question for a moment. Is the problem, then, that FOX News has inaccurate content, or that people who watch FOX News are stupid?

Perhaps it's a little bit of each, but how elitist would "FOX viewers are stupid" be coming from a liberal?

Justify it? Christ, I hate it, just as I hate all TV news.

Wait, wait. I thought you just said you had no practical knowledge of FOX News. Yet you hate it? Just as you hate all TV news?

Or have you dramatically increased your awareness and understanding of FOX News in the last four months?

I "cry" about the mention of my profession because it has no place in any conversation you and I have.

Well, see, this is the thing: Once upon a time, I was being sarcastic. Apparently, though, you weren't familiar with the concept. My bad. Life goes on.

But then you started pretending ignorance about the industry of journalism, and then you rejected the idea of journalistic integrity. And you've conducted yourself as a partisan hack so often that the idea of you as a journalist is kind of funny. And there was the time that your buddy tried to puff your credibility as a journalist, asking for your insights, and you didn't feel up to it. Or the time you couldn't make any good comment because you were busy with budget hearings or something. I don't know what 98% of my neighbors at Sciforums do for a living. I found out recently that one of them was teaching, and that another worked in law. I've engaged these people for years and its never come up in any significant context. Yet you and your pal both have made a point of your being a journalist, and the one thing you never have time for is to show us any of that knowledge and form. Instead, you sound like a bitter mailroom clerk at McClatchy trying to pass along the tidbits you overhear from the real journalists.

Ever. Period.

Except for the fact that you've made the point before, which was the reason for my sarcastic jab once upon a time. Like I said, though, my bad. I hadn't realized you didn't understand the concept.

I've said this several times, but you continue to mention it — and, in fact, use it as a weapon to try to insult me — with flagarant disregard. In mentioning it, as you do in EVERY thread where we argue, you also question the fact's veracity in order to question my overall veracity — and then some.

Question your overall veracity? I can't question what you don't have.

Consider that later in the rant you posted, you asked the following:

"Yeah, it's not like words and communication are your livelihood, right?"

Which can be interpretted as nothing other than a personal attack/insult, and as such, is suppposed to be inappropriate and out-of-bounds.

You, who have been shepherded and protected by a moderator with whom you have a relationship predating your time at Sciforums, are complaining about something being out of bounds? You, who are obsessed with assholes and cunts, are complaining about something being out of bounds? See my prior note about your overall veracity, Counte.

And, besides, when someone who has noted his professional journalism and lectures to college students, and whose pal notes his presidential interviews and such like that can't figure out fairly simple words, what, really, do you expect?

I don't think it's that you don't know words like "ineffable", but, rather, that your poisonous obsession with throwing tantrums and attacking people outstrips any interest you have in actually communicating. Your bad faith is all your own. Quit bawling because I'm willing to meet you on your chosen terms.

But hey, you get to say whatever you want, right? And your character, based on these limitless choices, speaks for itself. You're an asshole. And you seem to revel it.

I ... uh ... thought we were talking about taxes.

(chortle!)

At least we know what's important to you, Counte.

As for whether you have any obligation to be unbiased, you don't. You can be as biased as you like. We all are.

So why should I worry if anyone would hang a sign around my neck that says "unbiased"?

But people, I think, put a premium on fellows who try to judge something rationally and with as little bias as possible.

Well, here's the thing, though, Counte. When person (A) lies, and person (B) calls the lie a lie, (B) is not necessarily showing bias. In many cases, your complaints of bias suggest that it is somehow biased to call something what it is.

Furthermore, you don't seem to worry about the premium people put on fellows who judge something rationally and with as little bias as possible unless it's something you want to fling at other people. You, who show a consistent bias toward conservative politics, who is willing to deliberately distort and misrepresent issues in order to pretend justification for mudslinging and hatred, are complaining about bias. You pretend to lecture me on bias.

Well and fine, Counte. You're entitled to your opinion, but you long ago undermined its credibility. That doesn't mean you shouldn't speak your mind, but since you refuse to operate in good faith, it's not a matter of bias or irrationality or injustice that other people don't repeatedly and foolishly presume your good faith.

Everything is approached through your bent prism of Marxism. Everything. And your zeal in this arena prevents you from accurately assessing the world.

You know, I realize it's too much to ask for you to have practical knowledge of the things you pretend to discuss, but you really do need to pay attention to a couple of points. First, Marx himself wasn't a Marxist. Really. It's true. And there are practical reasons for this. And if you actually paid attention to my philosophy—I mean, since you see fit to criticize it so vociferously—you would be aware that I accept those practical reasons. Thus, a Marxist outcome is not at this time practical. Additionally, if you were paying attention you would recognize that I have a certain devotion to a period of Anarchism that includes one Emma Goldman. Hell, I named my daughter after two anarchists, Counte. But if you were paying attention, you would also know what faults I attribute to anarchism and classic anarchists.

And if you were aware of those notions, then you would understand how perversely mistaken is your repeated reference to prisms of Marxism. In other words, if your perspective and argument went any deeper than the superficial, you wouldn't make such mistakes. Well, unless, of course, you wanted to in order to pretend to justify your disingenuous, mean-spirited bombast.

Only you will never know this because you think you are never wrong.

I'm quite frequently wrong. Apparently you missed the bit about the penguins.

Tell you what, Counte: if you want to abuse me, then go ahead. But at least have the decency to abuse me, and not some libelous, delirious myth intended to pander to your martyr complex.

I had no idea the use of common curses implied "fascination" with the actitivities they refer to, but I will make note of that Dr. Freud.

Well, I happen to think cunts are good things. Fun things. Useful things. I don't understand why people use them as insults. And, hey, if you were paying attention, I wouldn't have to remind you of my prior address of this point:

There's nothing wrong with being a butt man. But the implied violence, the malice of your obsession—"it's fun to stuff baking soda into your gob, find the relevant catalyst and watch you froth"—is just a bit unhealthy at least, Counte.

In this case, it's not so much the fascination with the words but the context you assign them. The malice of your obsession is the key here.

Not at all. You and I just differ on the outlook, something you seem incapable of recognizing.

So here we return to a certain point as promised. I expose the jugular on one of my philosophies that you find goofy, bombastic, ludicrous, hyperbolic, full of zealotry, and irksome, and that is what you come up with?

Okay, fine. Should I presume this is one of those parts you didn't read?

What's sad about your response is that if you actually paid attention to what I attempted to explain to you, you might understand a few things about other notions that upset you so.

But I understand. This is another one of those focus things, Counte. I was, after all, responding to another of your mischaracterizations, and your response seems to suggest that you have forgotten that fact, or have other reasons for failing or refusing to regard that part of the discussion in its proper context.

And then will everyone at sciforums worship me in similar fashion as they do you?

It's been years since I heard about the Church of Tiassa.

Seriously, people worship me?

Are these worshipers the minions I will send to destroy you, Counte?

Really, man, I'm not sure what to tell you.

Never said I was.

And? There are plenty of GOP apologists who can claim to be pro-choice, atheistic, and opposed to Bush's foreign policy.

You're not doing much with such claims to dispel the notion that you're a party shill.

But I still dispute the GOP party claim. I don't support them. Never have.

I could actually believe that, since some Republicans actually believe in bipartisan compromise.

Look, lots of people like to pretend they're libertarians, but they're just self-loathing conservatives. We have a few of them around here, and if you watch closely—or, in some cases, just watch—their "libertarian" aspects pertain entirely to themselves.

You tend to be an anti-identification, Counte. That you are a journalist is one of the few affirmative identifications you'll offer about yourself, and you're very sensitive on that point.

And that's largely because of a host of differences with them on a host of social issues.

How many of those differences are derived from your own identity cues?

However, the issue in this thread is taxation, and on that subject, I would lean closer those on the Right than I would those on the left.

And good for you. What does that have to do with the context of taxation in this thread?

Again, I don't object to having that discussion. But since you've repeatedly made the point of wha