Sterling silver toothpicks for the rich? Seriously, and they complain about taxes?

[Erand7899]

Yup, most business owners think they're part of the 1%, or try and copy that mindset and cap it all off by thinking they're a Republican. Old news. Seen that coming easily.

I don't own a bank, but I am opposed to bank robberies. I don't think they are good for a stable economy. Does that make me a Republican, or just a common sense citizen? Greed and envy are not virtues. Why is it so hard for some of you to understand that?

Stealing IS wrong. I wish our politicians would learn that - or we'd truly stand up to them.

Our federal government is being stolen blind, and no one in the government seems to be overly concerned with stopping the theivery. They could do one hell of a lot more good to the deficit by stopping the financial bleeding, than they will ever get out of rich people.

Billions of dollars cannot even be accounted for, and billions more are going out to fraud, waste and abuse. Yet, their concern seems to be about the education of our four year olds, and how many rounds we have in our guns. Why in the hell can't they just do the job they signed up for?

 

[MikeK]

Individual Wealth should be outlawed and all currently held Private Wealth should be confiscated. America would be better overnight.

Let's say all personal assets in excess of twenty million dollars should be confiscated. There is nothing wrong with wealth. The problem rests with excessive wealth.

And excessive wealth is what Bucs is talking about -- silver toothpicks being symbolically representative of precisely that -- along with gold-plated toilet fixtures and 30 room mansions.

True to form, it always follows that the toadies of the super-rich, most of whom haven't a pot to piss in, seem obliged to defend excess and the vulgar symbols of greed.

Define excessive.

I don't know how much you are worth, but give some thought to how you could live with a personal fortune of twenty million dollars. If that much money couldn't satisfy your needs, then your needs are perverse and you would categorically be regarded by reasonable standards as greedy and gluttonous.

With twenty million dollars I could buy a beautiful home and furnish it well. I could buy just about any type of car, and second car, I want. I could send all three of my granddaughters to any campus university they choose and buy them each a car. I could afford he best health insurance -- and still have ten milion left over to invest and live in comfortable leisure off the dividends for the rest of my life.

Considering the vast majority of my fellow citizens, mainly including those who work hard but are barely able to pay their mortgage or rent and afford health insurance, how could I justify wanting more than twenty million dollars?

I believe the sum of twenty million dollars is the point at which the concept of personal wealth ends and economic aristocracy begins. And it might be you are not old enough to remember a time in America, and it wasn't that long ago, when the concept of aristocracy was offensive to what then was regarded as the American dream. Today the American dream is reflected in the Gordon Gekko mentality which has infected so many of those whose comments we are reading in this thread.

 

[Soggy in NOLA]

Do you obsess over everything that has nothing to do with you?

 

[bendog]

I don't think it's really about class. I actually agree with Erand to a degree, though I suspect his estimates of how much we're being stolen from are larger than mine.

All taxes are unfair. It's our money and it's taken without really our considering how it's spent, since govt is ruled by spec interests. But there are also issues that affect us all ... like full faith and credit and aggregate demand ... and those should not be ruled by partisanship or class.

 

[Crackerjaxon]

People are poor because some people have silver toothpicks.

How stupid can you be?

Do silver miners get paid? Do silversmiths get paid? How does having a silver toothpick make anyone poor?

 

[MikeK]

What you fail to grasp is that it is NOT the nation's wealth.
My nearly obscene fortune does not harm your pocketbook one iota, as a matter of fact, if you work in a ship yard, you have a job because I am buying a yacht. If you are a carpenter, you are building my house. If you work for GM, you are assembling my Escalade.

What you fail to grasp is all wealth produced and possessed in America is indeed this Nation's wealth. It was created by utilizing this Nation's material, administrative, natural, and human resources. And in the examples of exceptional wealth it is highly unlikely the same could be achieved elsewhere. The problems with our economy, both now and in the past, have to do with distribution, not production.

You obviously are unaware of such contemporary economic phenomena as the exceptional growth in incomes of the one-percent occurring simultaneous with reduction in the incomes of the ninety-nine percent. What this damaging tilt means is the one percent is not spending so much as they are hoarding their inordinate share of this Nation's wealth, which many (if not all) of them have managed to acquire by means which if not illegal, should be. The bottom line is hoarded wealth is not circulating, and circulation of wealth is to a national economy what circulating blood is to the living organism. Which is why I am recommending confiscation and redistribution of this Nation's wealth resource.

In short, you have money in your pocket because someone else spends it, not because the government prints it.
Liberals act as if there is a finite supply of money and we're all grubbing in the dirt for the same dollars.
Money represents wealth. Wealth is no more than accumulated tangible assets. My house was an empty lot, a forest and rocks.
The forest was an asset. it was sold to a lumber mill who made studs and beams and flooring out of it. Those products are assets. The more lumber the mill has, the more wealthy he is. Some of the mill's lumber was sold to a builder who made a house out of it. The more houses he builds, the more wealthy he is.
I bought one of his houses. I paid a fair price for one of his assets and combined with the rest of my tangible assets, I am wealthy. Funny thing is, all government did in all this is they printed the money.
How is my home, my boat, my tractor, my motorcycle, my truck or my silver toothpick, the "nation's wealth"?

Do yourself a favor and visit the Inside Job website noted in my signature line. Watch the free video a few times and educate yourself to just one of the nefarious means by which our national economy has been egregiously tampered with by people whose greed knows no boundary.

 

[KnobbyWalsh]

I don't own a bank, but I am opposed to bank robberies. I don't think they are good for a stable economy. Does that make me a Republican, or just a common sense citizen? Greed and envy are not virtues. Why is it so hard for some of you to understand that?

Stealing IS wrong. I wish our politicians would learn that - or we'd truly stand up to them.

Our federal government is being stolen blind, and no one in the government seems to be overly concerned with stopping the theivery. They could do one hell of a lot more good to the deficit by stopping the financial bleeding, than they will ever get out of rich people.

Billions of dollars cannot even be accounted for, and billions more are going out to fraud, waste and abuse. Yet, their concern seems to be about the education of our four year olds, and how many rounds we have in our guns. Why in the hell can't they just do the job they signed up for?

Because they are moral cowards. Doing their jobs would mean they'd lose the next election, and NO WAY are they going to give up THAT gravy train.

 

[MikeK]

I'm sorry, you don't need an HDTV. We're confiscating that for the People.

You don't need that fancy phone, either. Here, take this rotary phone. We're taking your iPhone for the good of the People.

You don't need those chips and soda and beer. Put those back and hand over the cash. There are people starving in India who need it more than you.

Where did you ever get the stupid idea this is YOUR stuff?

The stupid idea is the one that presumes anyone is suggesting confiscating anything which is obtainable within the boundaries of acceptable wealth. The question being what is an acceptable level of wealth.

Would you say that having the sum of one-hundred-million dollars, created by exploiting the resources of this Nation, stashed in some offshore accounts is an acceptable level of wealth by the "American Dream" standard of our society? How about five-hundred-million? Or a billion? Ten billion? Such fortunes do indeed exist -- and they are the reason why our economy has lost its balance. Hoarded money is not circulated as it would be if distributed equitably to the middle class in the form of fairly proportioned wages and the absence of exploitative banking practices, etc.

Again, there is nothing wrong with wealth. The problem rests in excessive wealth. Hoarding.

 

[Crackerjaxon]

What you fail to grasp is that it is NOT the nation's wealth.
My nearly obscene fortune does not harm your pocketbook one iota, as a matter of fact, if you work in a ship yard, you have a job because I am buying a yacht. If you are a carpenter, you are building my house. If you work for GM, you are assembling my Escalade.

What you fail to grasp is all wealth produced and possessed in America is indeed this Nation's wealth. It was created by utilizing this Nation's material, administrative, natural, and human resources. And in the examples of exceptional wealth it is highly unlikely the same could be achieved elsewhere. The problems with our economy, both now and in the past, have to do with distribution, not production.

You obviously are unaware of such contemporary economic phenomena as the exceptional growth in incomes of the one-percent occurring simultaneous with reduction in the incomes of the ninety-nine percent. What this damaging tilt means is the one percent is not spending so much as they are hoarding their inordinate share of this Nation's wealth, which many (if not all) of them have managed to acquire by means which if not illegal, should be. The bottom line is hoarded wealth is not circulating, and circulation of wealth is to a national economy what circulating blood is to the living organism. Which is why I am recommending confiscation and redistribution of this Nation's wealth resource.

In short, you have money in your pocket because someone else spends it, not because the government prints it.
Liberals act as if there is a finite supply of money and we're all grubbing in the dirt for the same dollars.
Money represents wealth. Wealth is no more than accumulated tangible assets. My house was an empty lot, a forest and rocks.
The forest was an asset. it was sold to a lumber mill who made studs and beams and flooring out of it. Those products are assets. The more lumber the mill has, the more wealthy he is. Some of the mill's lumber was sold to a builder who made a house out of it. The more houses he builds, the more wealthy he is.
I bought one of his houses. I paid a fair price for one of his assets and combined with the rest of my tangible assets, I am wealthy. Funny thing is, all government did in all this is they printed the money.
How is my home, my boat, my tractor, my motorcycle, my truck or my silver toothpick, the "nation's wealth"?

Do yourself a favor and visit the Inside Job website noted in my signature line. Watch the free video a few times and educate yourself to just one of the nefarious means by which our national economy has been egregiously tampered with by people whose greed knows no boundary.

What can you do with an idiot like this? He actually believes that the government owns us and all the resources in the country.

People that stupid should not be allowed to vote.

 

[g5000]

I'm sorry, you don't need an HDTV. We're confiscating that for the People.

You don't need that fancy phone, either. Here, take this rotary phone. We're taking your iPhone for the good of the People.

You don't need those chips and soda and beer. Put those back and hand over the cash. There are people starving in India who need it more than you.

Where did you ever get the stupid idea this is YOUR stuff?

The stupid idea is the one that presumes anyone is suggesting confiscating anything which is obtainable within the boundaries of acceptable wealth. The question being what is an acceptable level of wealth.

Would you say that having the sum of one-hundred-million dollars, created by exploiting the resources of this Nation, stashed in some offshore accounts is an acceptable level of wealth by the "American Dream" standard of our society? How about five-hundred-million? Or a billion? Ten billion? Such fortunes do indeed exist -- and they are the reason why our economy has lost its balance. Hoarded money is not circulated as it would be if distributed equitably to the middle class in the form of fairly proportioned wages and the absence of exploitative banking practices, etc.

Again, there is nothing wrong with wealth. The problem rests in excessive wealth. Hoarding.

What is clearly sailing miles above your head is that the whole concept of "excess wealth" is bogus. Neither you nor anyone else has been appointed the judge of what is or is not an appropriate amount of wealth for any individual but yourself.

And read my sig. You are the living embodiment of the ignorant idiot Reagan was talking about who blames one person's poverty on another person being rich.


And I call BULLSHIT that you are not talking about confiscation. That is EXACTLY what you are doing.

 

[g5000]

What you fail to grasp is all wealth produced and possessed in America is indeed this Nation's wealth. It was created by utilizing this Nation's material, administrative, natural, and human resources. And in the examples of exceptional wealth it is highly unlikely the same could be achieved elsewhere. The problems with our economy, both now and in the past, have to do with distribution, not production.

What you fail to grasp is that we ALL have access to the same material, administrative, natural, and human resources.

If you chose to sat on your fat lazy ass while someone else used those resources to take risks and to create things and to grow wealthy, that is not their fault. It's yours.

 

[g5000]

When we are teenagers, we are going to drop out of high school. And for the rest of our lives, you should be forced to pay for our healthcare, and give us food stamps, free housing, and a free cell phone, you fucking silver toothpick chewing motherfuckers! Nyuk! Nyuk! Nyuk! Liberals are our friends!

 

[MikeK]

So the middle and lower class will not spend unless there is more taken from the rich?? Idiotic

No. The middle and lower classes will not spend when they have nothing to spend. And they have nothing to spend because of something which has happened in the decades beginning with the Reagan presidency. Specifically, middle class wages have been stagnant or reduced while accumulation of wealth by the upper class has increased proportionally. And the lower class has substantially increased, as has the impoverished (welfare and homeless) class, as the result of exportation of jobs, wage diminution via elimination of unions, and permissive tolerance of illegal alien labor.

And the 90% tax myth again.. LOL... predictable... now, granted it is WRONG To tax anyone that much and IMHO WRONG to tax people on different rated for some arbitrary 'fairness' agenda... but perhaps you should look at what was deemed income, what was deductible etc during that 90% time and realize that it was not being paid like that

I think you should look at what is deemed income by today's major corporations who pay no tax at all because deductions which didn't exist in during our golden era. Study: Many corporations pay no income taxes - Nov. 3, 2011

You are the champion of equal treatment when it benefits you, and unequal treatment of others when it benefits you... how proud you must feel...

If you're saying I would not be concerned with existing economic inequities if I were among the super-rich, all I can say is the same orientation which accounts for my concern also accounts for why I've never been motivated to become rich. I have achieved what was the American Dream of my contemporary era and I am profoundly offended by the reasons why my grandchildren's generation is being denied the same opportunity.

I wonder if you can understand that.

 

[g5000]

If a thief is coming into your house, the solution is not to steal from your wealthier neighbor. Then you are no better than the thief. You ARE a thief. And instead of one thief, we now have two thieves. And you are one of them.

The solution is to stop the thieves.

Ban tax expenditures. Repeal the CFMA and the FSMA.

And stop rewarding irresponsibility. One third of the involuntarily uninsured are high school dropouts. Carrying people who exercise bad judgment is not the answer. It just encourages even more of that shit.

For starters.


If you bigoted class warfare assholes insist on negatively stereotyping a group of people to justify your desire to exploit and abuse them, I can play that game every day and night for as long as you wish. I bet I have way more ammunition than you.

 

[MikeK]

The only thing hurting the middle class is left wing meddling in the economy. Get the hell out of their way, and the middle class will take care of itself.

The left wing of American politics was shoved out of the way by Ronald Reagan, Bush-1 and his criminal son, whose collective efforts brought us to the doorstep of another depression.

Equity means that you have a legitimate financial interest in that wealth, and you don't. You didn't earn it, you didn't contribute to it, and you therefore don't have any right to any of it. So don't mention equity in your attempt to rob someone of their wealth.

The only thing you are entitled to is what you earn with your brains, your brawn, your own capital investmensts, or what is endowed to you by a benefactor.

It occurs to me your idea of earning is about as perverse as Tony Soprano's.

Tell us how you think someone goes about "earning" fifty million dollars or more? What exactly do you consider as "earning?" Visit the Inside Job website noted in my signature line, watch the video, then tell us if you believe the sonsabitches who wrecked our economy went about it by "earning" the fortunes they stole from us.

All greedy, envious left wingers amaze me with their dumbass rationales for having someone else support their lazy asses.

I suggest you learn how to think for yourself and stop parroting the thoughts deposited in your brain by such corporatist propagandists as Limbaugh, Hannity, Levin, Beck, and O'Reilly.

 

[KnobbyWalsh]

The only thing hurting the middle class is left wing meddling in the economy. Get the hell out of their way, and the middle class will take care of itself.

The left wing of American politics was shoved out of the way by Ronald Reagan, Bush-1 and his criminal son, whose collective efforts brought us to the doorstep of another depression.

Equity means that you have a legitimate financial interest in that wealth, and you don't. You didn't earn it, you didn't contribute to it, and you therefore don't have any right to any of it. So don't mention equity in your attempt to rob someone of their wealth.

The only thing you are entitled to is what you earn with your brains, your brawn, your own capital investmensts, or what is endowed to you by a benefactor.

It occurs to me your idea of earning is about as perverse as Tony Soprano's.

Tell us how you think someone goes about "earning" fifty million dollars or more? What exactly do you consider as "earning?" Visit the Inside Job website noted in my signature line, watch the video, then tell us if you believe the sonsabitches who wrecked our economy went about it by "earning" the fortunes they stole from us.

All greedy, envious left wingers amaze me with their dumbass rationales for having someone else support their lazy asses.

I suggest you learn how to think for yourself and stop parroting the thoughts deposited in your brain by such corporatist propagandists as Limbaugh, Hannity, Levin, Beck, and O'Reilly.

You know what pisses me off about these goddamned right wing zealots? They assume EVERYONE who isn't on board with their Republican worshiping, right wing media talking heads just HAS to be an Obama loving left wing commie. As if there are only two choices? Fuck both of them I say - I'm for AMERICA first and foremost. Anyone remember that country, America? Or are your fucking playbook recited talking points more important?

 

[MikeK]

What you fail to grasp is that it is NOT the nation's wealth.
My nearly obscene fortune does not harm your pocketbook one iota, as a matter of fact, if you work in a ship yard, you have a job because I am buying a yacht. If you are a carpenter, you are building my house. If you work for GM, you are assembling my Escalade.

What you fail to grasp is all wealth produced and possessed in America is indeed this Nation's wealth. It was created by utilizing this Nation's material, administrative, natural, and human resources. And in the examples of exceptional wealth it is highly unlikely the same could be achieved elsewhere. The problems with our economy, both now and in the past, have to do with distribution, not production.

You obviously are unaware of such contemporary economic phenomena as the exceptional growth in incomes of the one-percent occurring simultaneous with reduction in the incomes of the ninety-nine percent. What this damaging tilt means is the one percent is not spending so much as they are hoarding their inordinate share of this Nation's wealth, which many (if not all) of them have managed to acquire by means which if not illegal, should be. The bottom line is hoarded wealth is not circulating, and circulation of wealth is to a national economy what circulating blood is to the living organism. Which is why I am recommending confiscation and redistribution of this Nation's wealth resource.

In short, you have money in your pocket because someone else spends it, not because the government prints it.
Liberals act as if there is a finite supply of money and we're all grubbing in the dirt for the same dollars.
Money represents wealth. Wealth is no more than accumulated tangible assets. My house was an empty lot, a forest and rocks.
The forest was an asset. it was sold to a lumber mill who made studs and beams and flooring out of it. Those products are assets. The more lumber the mill has, the more wealthy he is. Some of the mill's lumber was sold to a builder who made a house out of it. The more houses he builds, the more wealthy he is.
I bought one of his houses. I paid a fair price for one of his assets and combined with the rest of my tangible assets, I am wealthy. Funny thing is, all government did in all this is they printed the money.
How is my home, my boat, my tractor, my motorcycle, my truck or my silver toothpick, the "nation's wealth"?

Do yourself a favor and visit the Inside Job website noted in my signature line. Watch the free video a few times and educate yourself to just one of the nefarious means by which our national economy has been egregiously tampered with by people whose greed knows no boundary.

What can you do with an idiot like this? He actually believes that the government owns us and all the resources in the country.

People that stupid should not be allowed to vote.

Keepers at NYC's Bronx Zoo have installed plexiglas barriers beyond the bars of some cages in the primate exhibit because the monkeys there are known to defecate into their hands and throw it when something upsets them. The monkeys do this when they are frustrated because all that a monkey in a cage can do when he doesn't like something is throw shit.

Ignorance and stupidity are metaphorical cages. Personal insults and empty ad hominem comments are analogous to handfuls of shit to be tossed out in place of intelligent, reasoned, logical arguments.

So if your comment is the best you have to contribute to an adult discussion, off you go to my Ignore list with the rest of the shit-slinging monkeys.

 

[DiamondDave]

So the middle and lower class will not spend unless there is more taken from the rich?? Idiotic

No. The middle and lower classes will not spend when they have nothing to spend. And they have nothing to spend because of something which has happened in the decades beginning with the Reagan presidency. Specifically, middle class wages have been stagnant or reduced while accumulation of wealth by the upper class has increased proportionally. And the lower class has substantially increased, as has the impoverished (welfare and homeless) class, as the result of exportation of jobs, wage diminution via elimination of unions, and permissive tolerance of illegal alien labor.

And the 90% tax myth again.. LOL... predictable... now, granted it is WRONG To tax anyone that much and IMHO WRONG to tax people on different rated for some arbitrary 'fairness' agenda... but perhaps you should look at what was deemed income, what was deductible etc during that 90% time and realize that it was not being paid like that

I think you should look at what is deemed income by today's major corporations who pay no tax at all because deductions which didn't exist in during our golden era. Study: Many corporations pay no income taxes - Nov. 3, 2011

You are the champion of equal treatment when it benefits you, and unequal treatment of others when it benefits you... how proud you must feel...

If you're saying I would not be concerned with existing economic inequities if I were among the super-rich, all I can say is the same orientation which accounts for my concern also accounts for why I've never been motivated to become rich. I have achieved what was the American Dream of my contemporary era and I am profoundly offended by the reasons why my grandchildren's generation is being denied the same opportunity.

I wonder if you can understand that.

So the middle class and lower class spend nothing??

What someone earns as a wage is not the responsibility of society, anyone else, nor government.. we have tons of people who have not changed with the times, and tons more who are nothing more than unskilled labor.. they, you, or anyone else wants more.. do what it takes to put yourself in demand to earn more...

I support a flat tax for corporations just as I do for individuals... eliminating ceilings, floors, deductions, loopholes, exemptions, and exceptions.. you support someone else paying more because you think it is fair... very telling

I am not saying that you would be anything of the sort. I am saying that I support equality in treatment and all the positives and negatives that come with it.. you support only selective equal treatment when it benefits you, and unequal treatment of others when it benefits you.. also very telling

 

[Quantum Windbag]

Top 1/10th of 1% make 60% of all Capital Gains Earnings

Forbes opinion columnist notes:

Make no mistake; the battle that is to be fought over the coming attempt to reverse this reduction in capital gains will be bloody and intense. The facts are clear according to the Congressional Budget Office. More than 80% of the increase in income inequality was the result of an increase in the share of household income from capital gains. In fact, you can go so far as to claim that Capital Gains income is the most unevenly distributed—and volatile—source of household income, according to Laura D’Andrea Tyson, UC Berkeley business professor and former chair of Clinton’s Council of Economic Advisers under President Clinton.

As a poor person, all I have to say is, so?

 

[MikeK]

When we are teenagers, we are going to drop out of high school. And for the rest of our lives, you should be forced to pay for our healthcare, and give us food stamps, free housing, and a free cell phone, you fucking silver toothpick chewing motherfuckers! Nyuk! Nyuk! Nyuk! Liberals are our friends!

I wonder if you know that, in terms of census percentage, just as many Whites receive public assistance as do Blacks.

http://articles.chicagotribune.com/...22_1_food-stamp-welfare-issue-cash-assistance

And in case you're wondering, I'm White but I've learned to rely on verifiable facts rather than folklore born of ignorance and stupidity.

That aside, those two Black kids are not your enemy. Your enemies are the greedy, scheming bastards on Wall Street, the bankers who gamble with our money, and the politicians who facilitate them -- the vast majority of whom are White.

But if you're content with assigning blame in some randomly available and vulnerable direction there is little I can say that will alter that orientation. But I can tell you that you're wasting your own time and looking in the wrong place.