Tag: Politics

Richest 1% of Americans

There is a lot of talk about how we need to increase taxes for the richest Americans. People spout lines about how the rich need to pay “their fair share.” What these people never do is actually look into how much the richest Americans pay in taxes. Solely because I like to rain on peoples’ parades I looked into the matter.

I’ve discovered that the richest 1% of Americans pay 40% of the federal income tax. That means of all the money stolen by the government via income tax 1% of Americans pay 40% of it. In dollars that means the top 1% pay more than the lowest 95%.

Here’s the raw data on the percentage of income taxes per income bracket. I’d say the top 1% are already paying their “fair share” and then some. Maybe instead of looking to gouge these people which gives them cause to consider moving somewhere else (and remember these rich people generally own companies that employ a lot of people) our government should look at reducing the amount of money they spent. I’ll help them out here.

First and foremost bring our overseas troops back home. Our spending on national offense defense is a huge majority of our spending. Cancel all government approved bailouts, if a company is facing bankruptcy they did something wrong and their assets could be sold off to small start up companies who actually have good ideas. Eliminate welfare and social security, we can plan for our retirements better than the government. Disband some of the hundreds of federal agencies because frankly we don’t need an agency that exists only to ensure taxes and regulations on alcohol, tobacco, and firearms are followed. Hell if the government follows my ideas we won’t even need a federal income tax to make ends meet.

My Problem with Socialism

I often voice my concerns about my country’s spiral towards socialism. Things such as welfare, social security, mandatory purchasing of health insurance, etc. are all aspects of a socialist state. When I speak out against these things others often say things such as, “If that’s socialism I want it!” Then they ask me what I could possibly have against socialism.

Here’s my problem, people can not be free in a socialist system. Upon bringing this up my more liberal friends will say they still have the freedom of speech in socialist countries. When I’m referring to freedom in this case I’m not talking about having rights. Socialist programs such as social security are mandatory, you can’t opt out of them.

If I went to the government and said I wanted to keep my money that would be paid into social security and in exchange will opt out and receive no benefits when I come of age they would just laugh at me. Social security requires everybody who is working to pay in on it because the people who are currently on social security are not paying in on it. The only way the system can even attempt to continue running is if everybody who is of working age pays for those who are beyond that point in their life.

When something is forcefully taken from you it’s called theft. Unemployment is the same way. Government steals money from my pay check and says I can have some if it back if I should lose my job. Here’s the thing though, I could take that same money and invest it to create more meaning if I lost my job I’d have more money to life off of.

In a socialist country the government has a gun to your head and demands you comply with their rules. That’s ultimately my problem with socialism, you are not a free person when the government steals your property using the force of a gun.

The Anti-Educational Effects of Public Schools

I came across a brief (under 20 minutes) lecture on the Ludwig von Misese Institute website. This lecture involves the public education system and I think everybody should give it a listen. I attended a public school and now that I reflect upon my time there I can raise may problems with how such institutions are run. One of my biggest criticisms of the public education system is the indoctrination of discipline insofar as to punish children for doing anything that isn’t specifically approved by the administration staff (in other words a strong attempt at removing individualism).

The lecture covers this and other topics and is a very interesting listen.

Well That’s Retarded

With ongoing conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, our economy in the toilet, our money losing value faster than Obama is losing voter approval, and hundreds of out major issues our representatives are wasting their time on political correctness:

The measure, passed by the House by voice vote Wednesday night, changes the phrase “mentally retarded” to “an individual with an intellectual disability” in existing health, education and labor law.

I think I finally understand something. Political correctness is directly proportional to the number of words used to describe something. Being “retarded” is one word it’s very politically incorrect but “an individuals with an intellectual disability” is six words so it’s six times more politically correct.

The only thing the politically correct crowd has accomplished here is turning the word disabled into a future insult. Insults such as idiot, moron, retard, etc. all derived from their legitimate medical usage:

At the May 18, 1910 annual meeting of the American Association for the Study of the Feeble-Minded, Goddard proposed definitions for a system for classifying individuals with mental retardation based on intelligence quotient (IQ). Goddard used the terms moron for those with an IQ of 51-70, imbecile for those with an IQ of 26-50, and idiot for those with an IQ of 0-25 for categories of increasing impairment. This nomenclature was the standard of the field for decades. A moron, by his definition, was any person with mental age between eight and twelve. Morons, according to Goddard, were unfit for society and should be removed from society either through institutionalization, sterilization, or both. What Goddard failed to see was that his bias against morons would greatly influence his data later.

So what is my point here? Simple people used the words moron, imbecile, and idiot as insults due to their medical meaning. A person who is being a dumb ass is often called an idiot because they’re acting with the mental age of an infant. Retard is used as an insult because it means somebody who is mentally slow. Changing the term from retard to individual with a disability is just going to make people start using the term mentally disabled as an insult in 10 years. At that point it will be politically incorrect to use the term mentally disabled and we’ll have to come up with a more flowery and politically correct term which will probably end up being at least 10 words in length.

Why the Hell am I paying my taxes for our representatives’ payroll? Oh that’s right because the government has a gun to my head.

Where Can I Buy One

Apparently Mayor Daley is trying to get his police for a new type of firearm. I’ve not heard of this but thanks to Every Day, No Days Off I know about the amazing new semi-fully-automatic weapon:

“Many times [the police are] outgunned, to be very frank,” Daley said at an event in the Englewood neighborhood. “When they come to a scene, someone has a semi-fully-automatic weapon, and you have a little pistol, uh, good luck.”

What these new semi-fully-automatic weapons are I haven’t a clue. I can’t even begin to wrap my head around this advanced technology. I’ll post up more details on this amazing new weapon system when I have them.

The Republicans’ “Pledge” to America

So the Republicans released their “Pledge” to America [Warning: It’s a PDF]:

With this document, we pledge to dedicate ourselves to the task of reconnecting our highest aspirations to the permanent truths of our founding by keeping faith with the values our nation was founded on, the principles we stand for, and the priorities of our people. This is our Pledge to America.

Sweet they’re making Ron Paul the head of the Republican Party and allowing him to make policy? HELL YEAH… wait what? That’s not what’s happening? What the heck are they doing then? What do you mean read the entire document? Shit.

Cut Government Spending to Pre- Stimulus, Pre-Bailout Levels

But we were still in a deficit before the stimulus packages were approved. That won’t fix the financial problem in this country at all.

Cut Congress’ Budget

Yeah, I’ll believe that when I see it.

We will ensure that bills are debated and discussed in the public square by publishing the text online for at least three days before coming up for a vote in the House of Representatives. No more hiding legislative language from the minority party, opponents, and the public. Legislation should be understood by all interested parties before it is voted on.

So now you’re stealing Obama’s lies (remember he said all bills would be posted online 72 hours before he signed them, still waiting on that Obama)? What you should do is fight to ensure all bills will be read aloud in both houses. That will ensure everybody knows everything in the bill and most importantly cut the length of these bills down because nobody wants to read a 2,000 page document out loud. An added benefit would be any 2,000 pages bill would take so long to read a new house and Senate would probably be in and have to start the reading from the top again ensure it never gets voted on.

We will require each bill moving through Congress to include a clause citing the specific constitutional authority upon which the bill is justified.

I actually like this. Of course it’ll be a cold day in Hell before this requirement is actually made of bills.

We will prevent the government from importing terrorists onto American soil. We will hold President Obama and his administration responsible for any Guantanamo Bay detainees they release who return to fight against our troops or who have become involved in any terrorist plots or activities.

You’ll prevent our government from “importing” terrorists? Really? Please explain in detail how you will accomplish that. Also I love how the Republicans say they are going to adhere to the Constitution but keeping people held in a secret prison in Cuba without trail is somehow OK.

There is real concern that while the threat from Iranian intercontinental ballistic missiles could materialize as early as 2015, the government’s missile defense policy is not projected to cover the U.S. homeland until 2020. We will work to ensure critical funding is restored to protect the U.S. homeland and our allies from missile threats from rogue states such as Iran and North Korea.

Wait were’ going to fund a missile defense program because the Iranians may have intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM) someday? I guess the fact Russia has enough ICBMs to wipe out all life on Earth several times over wasn’t motivation enough huh? Maybe we should also realize we still have enough nukes to do the same and that threat prevented Russian and America from launching so I’m betting the same threat will work just fine on little old Iran. There I just saved you a boat load of money on chasing a program that has been in the works since the Cold War and never came to fruition. You’re welcome.

So let me sum up their “pledge.” The Republican Party will continue doing what they have been doing while stating they’re going to do something else instead. How are they different from the Democrats again? Oh that’s right they’re not.

This is why I’m a libertarian.

Down the Memory Hole

So our Department of Defense (DoD) decided to do a book burning at the taxpayers’ expense because some content irked them off. The publisher apparently didn’t see the possibility for infinite revenue though. Instead of publishing more copies of the book for the DoD to purchase Bruce Schneier informs us that the publisher has reached an agreement with the DoD. The agreement involves removing all the “offending” material from the book. What a poor business decision.

Canadian Will Keep Wasting Millions of Dollars

Every Day, No Days Off informs us that our friends up north have decided to keep wasting millions of dollars on a point long-gun registry. This is both a blow to the civil rights of Canadian as well as a boon from criminals whom ignore the registry anyways and know any slight inconvenience for citizens self-defense is a convenience for crime.

An Old Fashion Book Burning

In a bastion of free speech an expression no such thing as a book burning can take place:

The Defense Department is attempting to buy the entire first printing – 10,000 copies – of a memoir by a controversial former Defense Intelligence Agency officer so that the book can be destroyed, according to military and other sources.

So much for America being a bastion of free speech and expression. I’d say at least it’s going to cost them a lot of money to censor this book but it’s our taxpayer money so it’s actually costing us a lot of money to censor ourselves.

A Slight Bias

The Supreme Court is going to be hearing a case in November dealing with California’s ban of “violent” video games to minors. A story making the rounds today is that 72% of adults approve of such laws. Anybody who has been in the gun rights scene long enough recognizes a bias survey when they see it.

In this case an advocacy group called Common Sense Media (their name of course being doublespeak as they lack common sense) were the ones who commissioned the study. Taking a look at their web site I think their mission page says a lot:

We believe in media sanity, not censorship.

Please tell me the difference between sanity and censorship. Censorship is censorship regardless of how you look at it. Trying to rephrase it as “media sanity” is a lot like rephrasing war as a policing action.

We believe parents should have a choice and a voice about the media our kids consume and create. Every family is different but all need information.

They believe parents should have a choice but also believe California’s law banning the sale of “violent” video games to minors is hunky dory. What if a parent is OK with their children playing “violent” video games (my parents for instance had no problem with me playing Doom or Duke Nukem 3D and I didn’t turn into a blood thirsty killing machine).

We believe that the price for free and open media is a bit of extra homework for families. Parents need to know about the media their kids use and need to teach responsible, ethical behavior as well as manage overall media use.

The price of freedom is always personal responsibility. This statement is one of the few I can say is correct. Parents need to know what their kids are doing and determine if they feel it is appropriate. If my memory serves me I believe that’s actually a parents job. Providing a mechanism for parents to learn about different types of media is good. On the other hand:

We believe appropriate regulations about right time, right place, and right manner exist. They need to be upheld by our elected and appointed leaders.

Doublethink alert! How can an organization be for the right of parents to make informed decision and also in favor of government telling parents what is right? Making informed decisions is the exact opposite of something in authority telling you what you will do. This right here is the ultimate problem they want parents to make specific decisions, not informed ones. You no longer have choice once a law is enacted besides obey or break said law.

If there is a law banning children from playing “violent” video games (as there are laws against children smoking cigarettes) for instance a parent no long as the choice to determine whether or not their child can play “violent” video games.

This organization is biased. Cases are different on a child by child basis and parents have to know what their children are doing and if they find it appropriate. For instance Common Sense Media state:

Media violence is especially damaging to children under 8 because they cannot easily tell the difference between real life and fantasy, according to the American Academy of Ophthalmology

I never had any such problem as a child. I knew that shooting Dr. Wily’s robots in MegaMan 2 was fantasy violence. When I watched Transformers I understood Optimus Prime sending a laser blast through Decepticon scum was fantasy. Other children may not be able to determine such things though and in that case the parents need to make a decision on whether to allow their kids to play or watch such things. Making a law just fucks everybody over and gives the government more power to determine how you will live you life.