A serious question for "conservatives"

[xsited1]

I have seen more than a few self described "conservatives" on this board make statements to the effect; "The government has done nothing to help me be successful", or "I made my own money with no help from the government", or "I owe my success to no one but myself". While I think I understand the underlying concept these folks are speaking of, do they/you truly believe that our government has had no hand in creating the landscape that has allowed them/you to be successful and to have the things that you have? Just asking for clarification.

The government has a MAJOR effect on whether an individual will be successful. In the absence of fair and equitable laws, America could become another Mexico. The problem is too much governmental intrusion. We can do far more with a lot less government.

 

[LadyGunSlinger]

I believe the concept of government at the time of our Founder's was uniquely beneficial. It paved the road to the greatest country in the world. The problem lies in the ideology of liberalism and having allowed that ideology to shape our courts, schools, government. I'd like to see anyone name ONE Founder who was any where near the far leftist we see today? You can't because NONE were. The extremism that leftism brings has not only destroyed our government but is on it's way to tearing down capitalism and our beloved America.

 

[Avorysuds]

i have seen more than a few self described "conservatives" on this board make statements to the effect; "the government has done nothing to help me be successful", or "i made my own money with no help from the government", or "i owe my success to no one but myself". While i think i understand the underlying concept these folks are speaking of, do they/you truly believe that our government has had no hand in creating the landscape that has allowed them/you to be successful and to have the things that you have? Just asking for clarification.

the government has done nothing more for me being successful than it has for someone else, or someone who has fallen on hard times, or someone that is just doing ok.... Government is there to set the playing field of equality and equal treatment.... Government did not make my decisions, did not hone my judgment, did not make me take my actions...

Government, however has taken from me to give to others in some misguided attempt to equalize outcome for others.... It has not only concentrated on pure equal treatment, like it is supposed to...

Our government has done as much if not more to try and hinder success or hinder those who make their success, as it has to keep the landscape within this country

qft.

 

[Avorysuds]

No I don't think that is what he is saying at all.

This technique of amplifying what people actually wrote into some extremely absurd statement they clearly did NOT say is intellectual dishonest.

What doing that really tells us is that the argument that was made cannot be debated by the person who created a straw man to mock.

Mad Scientist, try responding to the post instead of the strawman you've invented.

Not true. That technique is called "Demonstrating absurdity by being absurd".
If you don't like that, then let me ask the OP this:
VaYank, do you think that ObamaCare is part of "creating the landscape that allows me to be successful"?

IF you are already successful, then "no". Healthcare for those less fortunate than you can only make you more successful if after the implementation, healthier people bring you more business.

I take it you look like a beached whale?

A healthy person makes companies FAAAAAAR less money than unhealthy people. The simple fact is a truly healthy person consumes less than an unhealthy person. If you realized that MOST HC problems "illnesses" are caused due to poor diet and lack of exercise then you couldn't make such a ridiculous statement.

It costs us as a nation much more to "keep people alive" or "healthy" in the context that you use the word healthy. While going to space was one a goal of America, our new goal is how to keep fat people alive…

 

[VaYank5150]

I am going to extremes?? No.. I would say not... I am going in terms of freedom and a free country with a limited but powerful scope of government, as it was indeed set up to be...

And you would indeed be more successful if not taxed for over 50% of your income thru the governmental system that is extending it's tendrils continually and purposely setting up a system of unequal treatment based on subjective 'fairness' for more equalized outcome

So? I am not the one on here whining about desiring to be "more" successful. As I stated, by my own definition, I am successful. And while you will not state as much, I believe if you truly felt you could be MORE successful under a different form of government, you would have moved there already.

Why would I want a different form of government somewhere else?? Rather than save the country and government I swore to defend from those, like you, who wish to continue to bastardize it away from what it was intended to be??

I don't whine about being more successful... I complain when our government acts more like Robin Hood instead of Themis... I complain about a power hungry system of politics that has nothing to do with the true best interests of the citizenry which is helped more by freedom than by interference

Very nice broad brushed talking points. Again, if it is SO bad, how are you able to be successful at all? Wouldn't another government with less stipulations and regulations better suit your desires?

 

[Mad Scientist]

IF you are already successful, then "no". Healthcare for those less fortunate than you can only make you more successful if after the implementation, healthier people bring you more business.

The "less fortunate" label doesn't work on me either, I feel no guilt. It comes from being raised by parents that grew up poor and became successful anyway. They were "less fortunate" than others. My father for example lived in a rented chicken coop for at least a year during the depression years yet he turned out just fine.

My Mother was born in a house in Kittanning PA with no health care, and she turned out just fine.

In fact, growing up poor is a great motivator for being successful later in life. Governments giving poor people Welfare and Government housing only serves to quash that motivation and desire.

This Liberal Utopian Dream where all the people are "shinny, happy and squeaky clean healthy" is never gonna' happen. No matter how much of other peoples money you spend. You know why? Because it all comes down to "who's giving out the goodies". You Liberal dupes are under the impression that Government's gonna' do it all for you. Well bullshit! Just look at what they've done with the Federal Reserve for starters. Government is a destroyer of wealth and liberty not a giver.

I'd rather keep my money give myself my own "goodies" because I know what's good for me and my family, not some self absorbed, mindless bureaucrat hack in Washington DC who thinks he/she knows better than I do!

 

[VaYank5150]

Not true. That technique is called "Demonstrating absurdity by being absurd".
If you don't like that, then let me ask the OP this:
VaYank, do you think that ObamaCare is part of "creating the landscape that allows me to be successful"?

IF you are already successful, then "no". Healthcare for those less fortunate than you can only make you more successful if after the implementation, healthier people bring you more business.

I take it you look like a beached whale?

A healthy person makes companies FAAAAAAR less money than unhealthy people. The simple fact is a truly healthy person consumes less than an unhealthy person. If you realized that MOST HC problems "illnesses" are caused due to poor diet and lack of exercise then you couldn't make such a ridiculous statement.

It costs us as a nation much more to "keep people alive" or "healthy" in the context that you use the word healthy. While going to space was one a goal of America, our new goal is how to keep fat people alive…

Really? Where are your stats to prove the points you are trying to make? Back before there was healthcare, the mortality rate in children was much higher. People are living on average 10-15 years longer than they did 50 years ago.

 

[VaYank5150]

IF you are already successful, then "no". Healthcare for those less fortunate than you can only make you more successful if after the implementation, healthier people bring you more business.

The "less fortunate" label doesn't work on me either, I feel no guilt. It comes from being raised by parents that grew up poor and became successful anyway. They were "less fortunate" than others. My father for example lived in a rented chicken coop for at least a year during the depression years yet he turned out just fine.

My Mother was born in a house in Kittanning PA with no health care, and she turned out just fine.

In fact, growing up poor is a great motivator for being successful later in life. Governments giving poor people Welfare and Government housing only serves to quash that motivation and desire.

This Liberal Utopian Dream where all the people are "shinny, happy and squeaky clean healthy" is never gonna' happen. No matter how much of other peoples money you spend. You know why? Because it all comes down to "who's giving out the goodies". You Liberal dupes are under the impression that Government's gonna' do it all for you. Well bullshit! Just look at what they've done with the Federal Reserve for starters. Government is a destroyer of wealth and liberty not a giver.

I'd rather keep my money give myself my own "goodies" because I know what's good for me and my family, not some self absorbed, mindless bureaucrat hack in Washington DC who thinks he/she knows better than I do!

Then, knowing the way our government works, and has worked for many years, it sounds as if America is not the place for you to be "successful".

 

[Skull Pilot]

I am not referring to the roads!!! You two are taking "landscape" entirely too literally, and as I suspected, dodging my question.

Let's see you mean the landscape where i have to pay thousands of dollars a year in licensing fees, where I have to pay an increase in unemployment tax even though I laid no one off, where the fucking IRS crawls up my ass almost every year, where one state agency after another tells me I have to comply to their idiotic standards?

That landscape?

The bold. When did that change? I did my parents books, UI didn't go up without claims.

My state UI is increasing the federal has not increased.......yet.

 

[DiamondDave]

So? I am not the one on here whining about desiring to be "more" successful. As I stated, by my own definition, I am successful. And while you will not state as much, I believe if you truly felt you could be MORE successful under a different form of government, you would have moved there already.

Why would I want a different form of government somewhere else?? Rather than save the country and government I swore to defend from those, like you, who wish to continue to bastardize it away from what it was intended to be??

I don't whine about being more successful... I complain when our government acts more like Robin Hood instead of Themis... I complain about a power hungry system of politics that has nothing to do with the true best interests of the citizenry which is helped more by freedom than by interference

Very nice broad brushed talking points. Again, if it is SO bad, how are you able to be successful at all? Wouldn't another government with less stipulations and regulations better suit your desires?

So bad compared to what?? I could work in Haiti and have a lower chance for income or chances to use my skillset...

But if you don't think 50% of income going towards income and other forms of taxation is bad... and if you don't think selective equal treatment by government in some Robin Hood touchy feely scheme is bad, then I would have to say your values of a free society based on equal treatment and rights are warped beyond reality

I swore to defend this constitution... I did not swear to defend the usurpation of it

 

[VaYank5150]

Why would I want a different form of government somewhere else?? Rather than save the country and government I swore to defend from those, like you, who wish to continue to bastardize it away from what it was intended to be??

I don't whine about being more successful... I complain when our government acts more like Robin Hood instead of Themis... I complain about a power hungry system of politics that has nothing to do with the true best interests of the citizenry which is helped more by freedom than by interference

Very nice broad brushed talking points. Again, if it is SO bad, how are you able to be successful at all? Wouldn't another government with less stipulations and regulations better suit your desires?

So bad compared to what?? I could work in Haiti and have a lower chance for income or chances to use my skillset...

But if you don't think 50% of income going towards income and other forms of taxation is bad... and if you don't think selective equal treatment by government in some Robin Hood touchy feely scheme is bad, then I would have to say your values of a free society based on equal treatment and rights are warped beyond reality

I swore to defend this constitution... I did not swear to defend the usurpation of it

And you believe in your heart of hearts that you could be more successful in Haiti? If not Haiti, then where?

 

[AllieBaba]

For one those roads were built with my tax dollars, the government did not "give" them to me.

I am not referring to the roads!!! You two are taking "landscape" entirely too literally, and as I suspected, dodging my question.

Your question is a theoretical which demands that conservatives defend things they haven't said, and which doesn't specify which conservatives said what.

Any time someone says "a serious question" I call bullship. The OP is a bullshit, rhetorical question based on the OP poster's own bias. I'd like to hear who exactly said those things, and let those people defend their statements.

 

[Barb]

Let's see you mean the landscape where i have to pay thousands of dollars a year in licensing fees, where I have to pay an increase in unemployment tax even though I laid no one off, where the fucking IRS crawls up my ass almost every year, where one state agency after another tells me I have to comply to their idiotic standards?

That landscape?

The bold. When did that change? I did my parents books, UI didn't go up without claims.

My state UI is increasing the federal has not increased.......yet.

Do you contact your state legislators? Its not meant to be a snotty question. Pols are responsive. The more local, the more responsive. Show up, get others involved. I don't think your business should be taxed to lower the costs for other businesses that are less responsible.
My dad, he would do anything to avoid laying anyone off. He took a loan out every year to cover payroll during the slow times. WE ate less...cheaper. He thought that he had a responsibility to the people who put the bread on out table, the roof over our heads. You don't see that sort of reciprocity in corporations today, only in small business. Small business is the backbone of America, THEY are the ones who employ and take care about their employees. They're also the ones who get screwed, and not by the workforce, or government regs (at least to a lesser extent), but by corporate interests that try to equalize and minimize their risk by legislating that risk to smaller businesses. Reagan did SHIT for small fries like my dad. He bought into the rhetoric though, and he was SO much better than the men he admired. It still makes me mad.

 

[Avorysuds]

IF you are already successful, then "no". Healthcare for those less fortunate than you can only make you more successful if after the implementation, healthier people bring you more business.

I take it you look like a beached whale?

A healthy person makes companies FAAAAAAR less money than unhealthy people. The simple fact is a truly healthy person consumes less than an unhealthy person. If you realized that MOST HC problems "illnesses" are caused due to poor diet and lack of exercise then you couldn't make such a ridiculous statement.

It costs us as a nation much more to "keep people alive" or "healthy" in the context that you use the word healthy. While going to space was one a goal of America, our new goal is how to keep fat people alive…

Really? Where are your stats to prove the points you are trying to make? Back before there was healthcare, the mortality rate in children was much higher. People are living on average 10-15 years longer than they did 50 years ago.

I just googled quick...

FASTSTATS - Leading Causes of Death then look at http://www.suite101.com/content/the-six-major-causes-of-heart-disease-a96618

I don't give a shit that more children died 150 years ago VS today. Point is they get sicker sooner and we spend billions keeping fat people alive. Try and realize that if you took all the meds away and people kept living as they do you would have mass death all over the place... unless of course people picked to live a healthier lifestyle.

On the flipside, if we had the medicine of today 150 years ago people would vastly outlive people today with a much higher quality of life.

 

[asterism]

So? I am not the one on here whining about desiring to be "more" successful. As I stated, by my own definition, I am successful. And while you will not state as much, I believe if you truly felt you could be MORE successful under a different form of government, you would have moved there already.

Why would I want a different form of government somewhere else?? Rather than save the country and government I swore to defend from those, like you, who wish to continue to bastardize it away from what it was intended to be??

I don't whine about being more successful... I complain when our government acts more like Robin Hood instead of Themis... I complain about a power hungry system of politics that has nothing to do with the true best interests of the citizenry which is helped more by freedom than by interference

Very nice broad brushed talking points. Again, if it is SO bad, how are you able to be successful at all? Wouldn't another government with less stipulations and regulations better suit your desires?

Probably. But I like it here and would prefer to resist the expansion of government that depends on me far more than I depend on it. Without my already high tax contribution it would not have the resources it needs.

 

[asterism]

I am not referring to the roads!!! You two are taking "landscape" entirely too literally, and as I suspected, dodging my question.

Let's see you mean the landscape where i have to pay thousands of dollars a year in licensing fees, where I have to pay an increase in unemployment tax even though I laid no one off, where the fucking IRS crawls up my ass almost every year, where one state agency after another tells me I have to comply to their idiotic standards?

That landscape?

The bold. When did that change? I did my parents books, UI didn't go up without claims.

False

Florida employers face a huge jump in unemployment compensation taxes - St. Petersburg Times

 

[Barb]

Why would I want a different form of government somewhere else?? Rather than save the country and government I swore to defend from those, like you, who wish to continue to bastardize it away from what it was intended to be??

I don't whine about being more successful... I complain when our government acts more like Robin Hood instead of Themis... I complain about a power hungry system of politics that has nothing to do with the true best interests of the citizenry which is helped more by freedom than by interference

Very nice broad brushed talking points. Again, if it is SO bad, how are you able to be successful at all? Wouldn't another government with less stipulations and regulations better suit your desires?

So bad compared to what?? I could work in Haiti and have a lower chance for income or chances to use my skillset...

But if you don't think 50% of income going towards income and other forms of taxation is bad... and if you don't think selective equal treatment by government in some Robin Hood touchy feely scheme is bad, then I would have to say your values of a free society based on equal treatment and rights are warped beyond reality

I swore to defend this constitution... I did not swear to defend the usurpation of it

Were you educated in Haiti? Our education system is regulated by the federal government. Was your health looked after by Haiti? Our health system is regulated by the federal government. Was you first, second, or last bank accounts located in Haiti? Our deposits and banking (loans, credit, etc...) is insured and regulated by the federal government. Were your neighbors, the person who washed dishes, served your food or cooked it (or for your children) in Haiti? Guess what? Their health (or lack of same, or even tracking of same) is regulated and looked after, giving a direct benefit to you and yours, by (OMFG!) by the US federal government.
You wouldn't have gotten the education you needed to rise to your level of achievement in Haiti. Your and your progeny would not have been as protected health wise in Haiti. Your funds would have been more vulnerable as well, and your credit would not have been more forthcoming and / or the terms might not have been as protective of your financial OR physical health.
Why not a a pile of giraffe shit anywhere else in the world? Land anywhere. As a newborn. With or without a healthy mother (because of pesky US government rules and regs) and how do you think all that self determined skill and talent would have developed?
Jesushchristonapopsiclestick
but all of you take immense pride in letting the point sail WAY over your heads.

 

[Bass v 2.0]

I have seen more than a few self described "conservatives" on this board make statements to the effect; "The government has done nothing to help me be successful", or "I made my own money with no help from the government", or "I owe my success to no one but myself". While I think I understand the underlying concept these folks are speaking of, do they/you truly believe that our government has had no hand in creating the landscape that has allowed them/you to be successful and to have the things that you have? Just asking for clarification.

The people who make those statements are not conservatives, they're individualists who live is an idealistic world and like to credit themselves for everything. They're being intellectually dishonest.

 

[Barb]

Let's see you mean the landscape where i have to pay thousands of dollars a year in licensing fees, where I have to pay an increase in unemployment tax even though I laid no one off, where the fucking IRS crawls up my ass almost every year, where one state agency after another tells me I have to comply to their idiotic standards?

That landscape?

The bold. When did that change? I did my parents books, UI didn't go up without claims.

False

Florida employers face a huge jump in unemployment compensation taxes - St. Petersburg Times

Not false in NY, not in the 1980s. Skull was nice enough to answer based on his state without implying I was lying. Maybe you could slow down just a little.

 

[AllieBaba]

I have seen more than a few self described "conservatives" on this board make statements to the effect; "The government has done nothing to help me be successful", or "I made my own money with no help from the government", or "I owe my success to no one but myself". While I think I understand the underlying concept these folks are speaking of, do they/you truly believe that our government has had no hand in creating the landscape that has allowed them/you to be successful and to have the things that you have? Just asking for clarification.

The people who make those statements are not conservatives, they're individualists who live is an idealistic world and like to credit themselves for everything. They're being intellectually dishonest.

We don't even know who those people are or if they exist anywhere outside VY's head.