Political discussion thread

Yes. That's an unfortunate flaw in human nature left over from our evolutionary history. I don't take that to mean it's the proper way to approach truth finding. 

I just think it's ridiculous that the top 20%, including my family, monopolizes so much of the wealth in this country.

So it's alright to accuse people of saying racist things they didn't say because they're racist anyway so they might as well have said it? Am I right in thinking that's what you are saying?

dtguitarfan wrote: thellama73 wrote: So it's alright to accuse people of saying racist things they didn't say because they're racist anyway so they might as well have said it? Am I right in thinking that's what you are saying? Whom did I accuse of saying racist things that weren't said?  Are you even listening, or just holding fast to your sacred Conservative beliefs?  FACT: There are more Republicans who believe (incorrectly) that the majority of people on welfare are minorities (it's not true - the percentage of minorities on welfare isn't even proportional to the percentage of them in our society).  FACT: Republicans sell fear and rage to these people by telling stories of the mythical Welfare Queen.

I'm not talking about welfare. I'm talking about the vicious lie you told about Sarah Palin supporters that you refuse to respond to, but only keep trying to change the subject.

Epignosis wrote: I am not dealing with hypotheticals.  I am dealing with data, which rarely anyone here likes to do.  The wealthiest 25% earned 66% of the nation's AGI and paid 87% of federal income taxes in 2009.  The lowest 50% of income earners earned 13.5% of the nation's AGI and paid 2.3% of the federal income taxes in 2009. So then: Who is undertaxed?

Don't get me wrong. I'm not claiming that the wealthy aren't taxed enough. They are. I merely pointed out that without the additional data you provided now, the 86% figure is meaningless.

Epignosis wrote: HarbouringTheSoul wrote: Of course taxing the rich is not nearly enough to dissolve the deficit, but it does improve the situation at least a tiny little bit. Reducing the deficit is a matter of lots of little spending cuts and revenue increases, and I don't see why increasing the tax rates on high incomes shouldn't be part of that. Not because of the "fair share" argument; I'm well aware that the rich pay their fair share for the most part. There are cases where they don't (we all remember Romney's ultra-low tax rates), but that is due to the way they earn their money, not due to the amount. No, the reason why higher tax rates on high incomes are a good idea is because the additional revenue has to come from somebody, and the rich can afford higher tax rates more easily than anybody else. Of course you could try reducing the deficit without raising any additional revenue, but that seems utterly foolish considering the sheer size of the deficit. They can also afford to move their businesses elsewhere (as they often do).

Weren't we talking about personal taxes? Business taxes are already really high in the US, so I'm all for keeping them where they are.

I should've added - if you know that a leader is racist, it's fairly safe to assume that other racists will flock to them.  There are eye witnesses who say that the hatred at Palin's rallies rose to frenzied levels, but rather than addressing it, the conservative entertainment complex says "you have no proof!  This tape doesn't prove anything - you can't really tell what that guy is saying!  Ha!"  Because in their world, all Conservatives are good guys and all Liberals are bad guys.

"When you live in a fantasy, you cannot permit any flaws to mar the perfect surface of your beautiful, frightening little world. Because if you should find a crack, if you should start to question, if you should indulge those tiny nagging doubts - it could shatter all to pieces, and you could find yourself on the floor surrounded by shards of broken glass and fake plastic snowflakes in a cold, confusing world with no good guys or bad guys or happily-ever-afters."
From Blowing Smoke, by Michael Wolraich

The above passage comes after he cites quotes from Glenn Beck saying that the John Birch Society makes a lot of sense to him now, and Ann Coulter saying that what those dirty liberals did to McCarthy was so awful and a big fat lie.

"and this is what they always do - they muddy the waters with broad, general statements that they have nothing to back up with. But they know that as long as they do this, you won't pay attention to the real problem that is right in front of you."

He's doing exactly what he's accusing "them" of doing. Please, what was the racist comment Palin did? (Not that I love her by the way). "Jon Stewart made a funny face" doesn't really qualify as evidence of anything you know.

dtguitarfan wrote: thellama73 wrote: So it's alright to accuse people of saying racist things they didn't say because they're racist anyway so they might as well have said it? Am I right in thinking that's what you are saying? Whom did I accuse of saying racist things that weren't said?  Are you even listening, or just holding fast to your sacred Conservative beliefs?  FACT: There are more Republicans who believe (incorrectly) that the majority of people on welfare are minorities (it's not true - the percentage of minorities on welfare isn't even proportional to the percentage of them in our society).  FACT: Republicans sell fear and rage to these people by telling stories of the mythical Welfare Queen.

I really don't care what Republicans think, nor do I care what race dominates welfare payments. However, where are you getting this information? The official numbers on welfare breakdowns by race usually aren't released. The only thing I could find with a quick search is this paper which tracks up until 1999.

You can see the graph on page 7. It clearly shows that between 1985 and 1999 that minorities do account for the majority of welfare cases.

The T wrote: "and this is what they always do - they muddy the waters with broad, general statements that they have nothing to back up with. But they know that as long as they do this, you won't pay attention to the real problem that is right in front of you." He's doing exactly what he's accusing "them" of doing. Please, what was the racist comment Palin did? (Not that I love her by the way). "Jon Stewart made a funny face" doesn't really qualify as evidence of anything you know.

Look, here's the thing about propaganda - it's hard to disprove it. It takes time and effort. But it's SO easy to spread it! For example, in one of the Presidential debates, according to one article Romney told 27 myths in 38 minutes. Now I'm sure putting together that article took much more time than 38 minutes. Now, you are getting very angry because I am claiming that Palin is racist. I could spend hours and hours finding quotes and building a case. But this is not my job. I have built an opinion of her based on many things I've heard her say, and actually I didn't consider it racism at first, I just thought she was a b****. But after reading some things about the history and psychology of propaganda and prejudice, I came to the conclusion that it was more than that. You want to know why I think she's a racist, I've told you to go read a book called Blowing Smoke by Michael Wolraich. I have done this because I believe it would be purposeless for me to reinvent the wheel and spend a great deal of time putting together a case against her that I feel has already been put together in a much more thorough, elegent, professional way than I could ever hope to accomplish in this book. However, I will point you to an article I saw just today that I feel illustrates quite beautifully the propaganda methods of persecution politics:
http://www.salon.com/2012/12/17/would_the_u_s_government_profile_white_men
I'll sum it up for you:
- Guy says "because most of the mass shootings in America come at the hands of white men, there would likely be political opposition to initiatives that propose to use those facts to profile the demographic group to which these killers belong."
- The conservative entertainment complex goes "BOOGA BOOGA BOOGA! Look at this Libtard saying divisive racial things!"
- But actually, the point he was making was not to racially profile - actually, he was saying that racial profiling doesn't help, and in fact is targeted at the wrong groups. And this is interesting because:
- The group doing all the profiling of all the other groups is constantly accusing all who oppose them of racial divisiveness.

Now, I'll give you a personal example of how powerful propaganda is. I got involved in a discussion about political things on Facebook with my brother in law. Note: I was very, very, VERY extremely careful in this discussion because, well, this was family. But I didn't want to run away from the discussion either, because I think that's one of the problems we are facing today: no one wants to talk about this stuff, but would rather just feel safe with the conclusions they've already made. Anyways, Benghazi came up, and he wanted to know my opinions on the subject. Basically, to sum them up, my opinion is that the attacks have focused on the wrong people. If there were lies, we have not been attacking the liers: we've been attacking people who received bad information (IF, in fact, they did) and repeated that information to others. At one point, I sent my brother in law this article (actually, I'm not sure this was the exact one, but I know it was from mediamatters.org and I know it made similar points):
http://mediamatters.org/research/2012/11/28/media-promote-gops-witch-hunt-against-susan-ric/191558
His immediate reply: "oh, you can't trust that site - it has a liberal bias." But the funny thing is -that site was started by a man named David Brock, who used to work for Fox News! He came to a turning point in his life where he realized he had been part of a movement of propaganda, and he started mediamatters after that - so you'd THINK his opinion would count for something. Similarly, in other discussions with my brother in law, I cited something that David Frum, a conservative for many years who has, among other things, written speaches for George W. Bush. But my brother in law's reaction to my quote of Frum was similar: "oh, he's not a real conservative." In the conservative world, any opinion that is contrary to your own is immediately discredited as being "liberally biased" and therefore, evil.

Palin says TV's talking heads really have nothing meaningful to offer.