Politics
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- TheBlueOne0
I'm going with "it could also be some massive scheme, right out in the open, to steal our money."
And I hate conspiracy theories. Hate.
- Don't they have more subtle ways to do this shit?ukit
- They are being subtle.TheBlueOne
- TheBlueOne0
Oh, House just passed a bill taxing the bonuses:
- kinda silly, imo. 'YAY way to go congress. Good job repairing your original fuckup.' Political grand standing at its finest.tommyo
- ukit0
I say we take a "can't beat em, join em" attitude and demand bonuses for ourselves.
- ********0
^^ Unlawful. Un-American. Shameful!!!
- ********0
FIRE:
The vote to tax back most of the bonuses was 328-93. Voting "yes" were 243 Democrats and 85 Republicans.VOTE BACK IN:
It was opposed by six Democrats and 87 Republicans.
- ********0
^ Whoever voted for taxing the bonuses is a CROOK and should be BANNED FROM GOVERNMENT, that's what.
- TheBlueOne0
Wow. You REALLY do get your talking points from Rush Limbaugh, eh?
- TheBlueOne0
I don't get you, you have no logic. If we follow what you claim in prior postings, in your opinion the government should not be involved, and financial institutions/banks should be let alone to fail. If that's the case AIG should have fallen months ago. OK, fine.
Now that the government HAS propped them up, refusing to give these bonuses, taxpayer money to people at the root of the problem, that IF they followed your advice would be OUT OF A JOB right now anyway, who wouldn't be getting them ANYWAY, that's violating your weird-ass view of "free market rah rah capitalism"?
Moronic. It's not logic. It's not an argument. All you have is rhetoric that you change to self justify your position. The Ancient greeks had a word for that. Sophists.
- Dude, he admittedly never graduated from high school.DrBombay
- Ah, dobs, I won't necessarily hold that against him...TheBlueOne
- That and the complete reactionary he is, sure.DrBombay
- TheBlueOne0
CONCEPT A) No government money. Let the market take care of itself. In which case AIG fails. No bonuses are paid because the market punished these traders for their shitty job.
"Capitalism, yeah!"
CONCEPT B) AIG is propped up. Government own 80% of AIG, decides through process to deny bonuses to same traders based on the fact that these guys did a shitty job.
GetRefresh obvious response: "The government is a crook!"
So following your logic, then...let's see...government denying bonuses based on performance = crook, then...capitalism denying bonuses based on performance = not crook
Sense, this makes none.
- ********0
TBO, with respect, why must you and DrB continually put forth so much effort to attempt to discredit me? Your actions themselves are quite suspect.
If you want to focus your energy on something positive, acknowledge that you are being RAPED by your government. And now, you cheerlead the fact that the government is NOW in the business of altering contracts? Contracts that were formed months, and months ago?
How about spending your time railing against the fact the the Obama Admin is inept, and incapable, and that most of Congress and plenty of Senators are Fing corrupt?
- no one cheerleaded anything about it. You are deluded.DrBombay
- DrBombay0
The governemnt forced the UAW to renegotiate their contracts with the Big 3 automakers. Where was your outrage then, you fucking numbskull?
- Negotiating is fine. Changing the rules of the game mid-stream is disgraceful.********
- call it what you want, the autoworkers didnt want pay cuts neither.DrBombay
- Negotiating is fine. Changing the rules of the game mid-stream is disgraceful.
- TheBIueOne0
I seem to remember Reagen breaking contracts with the air controllers union. America survived.
And stop with your entire bullsit argument. Contracts are broken every single day in America. It's why we have courts, lawyers and a legal system. We have an entire bankruptcy system solely designed to process broken financial contracts.
In my job, if a subcontractor doesn't deliver or do as promised I don't pay. They sue, we go to court and justice prevails. These AIG tools fucked up and they don't get bonuses. If they don't like it, they can sue.
So shut the fuck up with the SAME EXACT FUCKING ARGUMENT THAT RUSH LIMBAUGH has been making for two days now about "Can't violate contracts"How about this, you make a contract with some guys to roof your house, and they do a shitty job, and it continues to leak and you don't pay them..do they say "Well, A contract IS A contract" and then oh goly gee wilikers simpleminded boy Oh shhucks you just gotta pay the shitty contractor..is that how it works in your world...fuck please hire me to so whatever lame ass shit you do.
You can't even fucking defend your line of thinking when I called you on it but just called me "obama's buttboy" or whatever, because THAT'S ALL YOU HAVE. Your truly infantile. You're kind of rhetoricjust gets me sick. You ignore facts. You are the truly moronic american. Moron.
- Your wrong. No thanks. I don't listen to Rush. I annoy you because I am right, you are wrong.********
- ... also see tommyo below / +1********
- Your wrong. No thanks. I don't listen to Rush. I annoy you because I am right, you are wrong.
- tommyo0
There are a few things I find really screwed up about the gov taxing these bonuses. First I need to preface this with, 'I think the people who gave, and the people who received these bonuses should be scrutinized heavily.'
With that said. These bonuses were contracts between AIG and their employees, now the government is going to come in and circumvent contract law by creating a special tax? I'm afraid these are the sorts of situations we're going to see more and more often as our government starts running companies with our money. Imagine if Company A purchases Company B, then Company B gives lavish bonuses to their employees. Company A virtually has no recourse but to fire those at the top approving the bonuses no? Thus fixing the problem for the future. Now that the Gov IS Company A, they're going to use the countries legislative powers to force employees to give back the bonuses. Could a civilian Company A force employees from Company B to give back some of the money they were given? Unchartered waters we're entering here. Our government now has special abilities in the competitive marketplace that other companies aren't allowed to use? Curious.
Like I've been saying since this all started, our government has no idea how to run a company. None. Why are some people still okay with letting politicians run industry? Just read this recent admission and statement from Dodd about his part in this whole mess, and then tell me that you feel comfortable with these guys running businesses who are 'too big to fail.' http://www.courant.com/news/poli…
Which brings me to yet another point. In Feb we passed a stimulus bill that none of the politicians, except those penning it were able to read. It was pushed through without the due scrutiny and discourse it deserved. I'm still pretty mad about this. Congress fucked up. They had a great idea in this bill to keep companies, who are using our money to stay afloat, from handing out the lavish bonuses that make all of us feel like suckers, and them like wolves. Instead, Dodd (who received large sums of campaign money from AIG) says first that he didn't know that the language had changed, now he admits that he was involved in adding a loophole (this is that language he didn't know was changed a week ago) at the request of the Treasury Dept. Geithner admits to this now as well ... guess what Congress, maybe before passing very large, potentially economically disabling legislation you should give it due process and re-fucking-read what you're signing, talk about it amongst yourselves, you know, do what you're fucking hired to do. These bonuses should have served as reminders that our Congress didn't do their job, and that a company who has been wasteful and reckless continues to do so because our Government continues to prop them up.
Now Congress will try and act like the hero. Very publicly and illegally (imo) reversing bonuses the corporations have handed out. It's silly and shameful on both their houses. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.
- the reason why the gov is running these companies is because they were acting irresponsibly. because of lack of oversight and regulation.DrBombay
- oversight and regulation fostered by the previous administration.DrBombay
- Again, you really don't get the issue here. You see the surface of the water and can't seem to grasp the depths of it. I get whytommyo
- gov is running these companies, it's not due to their lack of responsibility though. It's because their failure threatenstommyo
- our country. The POINT is that gov is no better at running these companies then the thieves are. Worse in my opinion.tommyo
- tommyo0
"And stop with your entire bullsit argument. Contracts are broken every single day in America. It's why we have courts, lawyers and a legal system. We have an entire bankruptcy system solely designed to process broken financial contracts."
You're forgetting something TBO. It's the government acting as the judicial branch in deciding the outcome now. That doesn't raise the hair on your neck? In your rebuttal you mentioned 'court' how many times. There is no court in this matter. It's wrong. It was wrong for AIG to do this, and it's wrong the way it's being rectified.
- the people getting the bonuses can take it to court if they wish.DrBombay
- You don't get the point of this, I'm afraid it flew right over your head.tommyo
- if they can take it to court, how is the gov acting as the judiciary?DrBombay
- The execs have the money. They have possession. If gov want's it back, they (should) have to do it judiciously. Not thetommyo
- other way around where the gov takes possession and then the execs have to judiciously take it back.tommyo
- Not to mention that these bonuses, while completely distasteful, aren't illegal. They could have been. But your Demtommyo
- friends in congress and your demmy Treasury Secretary wanted to feed their corporate masters. :)tommyo
- God damn I really like the term 'Demmy' Can I trademark something like that?tommyo
- designbot0
"But great as our tax burden is, it has not kept pace with public spending. For decades we have piled deficit upon deficit, mortgaging our future and our children's future for the temporary convenience of the present. To continue this long trend is to guarantee tremendous social, cultural, political, and economic upheavals.
You and I, as individuals, can, by borrowing, live beyond our means, but for only a limited period of time. Why, then, should we think that collectively, as a nation, we're not bound by that same limitation? We must act today in order to preserve tomorrow. And let there be no misunderstanding: We are going to begin to act, beginning today.
The economic ills we suffer have come upon us over several decades. They will not go away in days, weeks, or months, but they will go away. They will go away because we as Americans have the capacity now, as we've had in the past, to do whatever needs to be done to preserve this last and greatest bastion of freedom.
In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem; GOVERNMENT IS THE PROBLEM."
-Ronald Reagan, 1981
- reagan spent like crazy.DrBombay
- And as far as Rick is concerned that nullifies anything he ever said. Period!!! La La La I Can't Hear You La La La I Can't Heartommyo
- look at the chart below. Following the post to the left, that chart should be inverted.DrBombay
- and cue the crickets...DrBombay
- or go suck ronald reagan's dead dick :DDrBombay
- ukit0
That's why it's so funny when Republicans talk about returning to the Reagan era and then use fiscal responsibility and small government in the same sentence.
Reagan was the president who invented massive deficit spending. Carter left office with a $74 billion deficit, same as when he came into office. Reagan opened the floodgates and there's been no turning back since.
- I wasn't insinuating that at all. Just that the above quote rings true now more than ever.designbot
- tommyo0
Deficit Deception
Ed Carson | May 1997 Print Edition
It's an article of faith among Democrats that President Reagan was responsible for the doubling of the national debt during the 1980s. Not so, say Stephen Moore, director of fiscal policy studies at the Cato Institute, and investment analyst Michael A. Byrd in a new Institute for Policy Innovation report, "Whose Free Lunch?: The Truth About the 'Reagan Deficits.'" Like so many others before them, Moore and Byrd rebut claims that tax cuts drained the federal Treasury. They point out that tax revenues increased 24.1 percent between 1982 and 1989, virtually identical to the 24.4 percent rise from 1974 to 1981, and higher than the 19.3 percent growth projected for 1990-1997, after the Bush and Clinton tax hikes.
But former Senate Majority Leader Robert C. Byrd maintains that if Congress had approved Reagan's appropriations requests, the deficit would have been even higher. True and false, say the report's authors. Reagan did request about $90 billion more for defense appropriations. But Byrd's claim leaves out entitlement programs, which make up over half the federal budget. If all of Reagan's requests had been approved, spending would have been $209 billion lower.
And when Democrats controlled both houses in 1987-1988, congressional spending exceeded the president's requests by an average of $51 billion, far above the $20 billion average when Republicans controlled the Senate from 1981 to 1986.
Moore and Byrd don't absolve Reagan for the deficits during the 1980s, noting that he exercised his veto power sparingly and never submitted a balanced budget. They simply state that Congress, particularly Democrat members, deserves more of the responsibility.
http://www.reason.com/news/show/…
He doesn't deserve all of the blame. You Demmys get some too. :)
- so you are a republican, tommy...DrBombay
- or are you still false flagging that independent shit?DrBombay
- I'm a libertarian. I just like watching you two party cocksuckers argue about how each others parties are worse.tommyo
- It's fun to watch from this position. I just toss logs on the fire and sit back all devils advocate like. Bowl of popcorn,tommyo
- stroking my beard and adhering to whomevers ideology I agree with most whenever it suits me. It's not for everyone, but I dig it.tommyo
- You should try to actually elect some people instead maybe be a better use of your time.DrBombay
- funny thing is all you ever do is bag on democrats.DrBombay
- the way I see it, fence sitters call themselves libertarians.DrBombay
- because they never actually elect any "libertarians" they just bitch like archie bunker.DrBombay
- It's just that your people have convinced the sheep that 'voting 3rd party is a waste of a vote.' So we get to throw stones.tommyo
- the repubs run as though they are libertarians, that is the problem.DrBombay
- So you need to associate yourself with an electable party to have an opinion? Seems phoney.tommyo
- you never see any libertarians voting democrat, maybe presidential elections if the republican candidates is a mccain.DrBombay
- I don't believe in god or the two party system. May I fast track myself to hell please.tommyo
- I dont agree with everything, but to do it your way nothing ever would get done.DrBombay
- Well Dobbers, Libertarians would never really vote Dem. You guys unabashedly love big gov...see the issue?tommyo
- To do it my way nothing would ever get done? Ohhh I forgot, your delusion that we're actually penning policy here eh? Right. :Ptommyo
- dont you know how untrue it is that repubs shrink the gov though?DrBombay
- you missed the point.DrBombay
- You ate the point fatass.tommyo
- hahahahaha :Dtommyo
- Of course I know Reps are only vocally in favor of large gov. Look at what Bush did. But you guys, you guys aren't afraid totommyo
- yell from the tallest mountain how gov should fix this and fix that and take care of everyone. Makes me sick to my stomach.tommyo
- Rick have I ever told you how much I cherish our long winded, obviously private comment conversations?tommyo
- dude I aint that fat, just a beer gut, like yer girlfriend.DrBombay
- I like it too. we're totally gay for each other.DrBombay
- I don't have a girlfriend. I have five. But I think I know which one you're talking about. She could stand to lose a few.tommyo
- I think we'd probably end up sweaty and naked if we ever just innocently and honestly intended to 'grab a drink.'tommyo
- stop being so gay and stuff.DrBombay
