Re: OT: Rating the President
 

Here, I have a solution.
Elect me supreme ruler of Earth. Everything will be fixed in about 3 months! <-- My campaign promise

Re: OT: Rating the President
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Well, the best form of government is a benevolent dictatorship, providing I am that dictator.

Askan,
Apologising to Plato.

Re: OT: Rating the President
 

There is no such thing as benevolent dictatorship.

Re: OT: Rating the President
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">And why is that?

Re: OT: Rating the President
 

"You implied the deficit was a problem, during the depression it wasn't, it didn't become a problem until it ballooned in the 80's."

Um, I think we're mixing up deficit and debt. A deficit is just the annual bottom line. If you spend more than you took in, you ran a deficit. That's acceptable for short periods of time when you have extra money and have a specific short-term goal which will increase your income. Debt (borrowing) is only acceptable when cash (or rapidly liquifiable assets) are insufficient to cover the cost for a transaction, or when doing so would disrupt normal fiscal operation. In either case, debt must be paid off as quickly as possible, both out of moral obligation and fiscal prudence.

Congress perpetually runs deficits with no short-term goals; they borrow to cover their deficit spending; and they have no production to pay for their spending. Reagan gets slammed for "his" deficit spending. It couldn't be, of course, that the Democrat-run Congress passed the tax cuts they promised him, but didn't cut spending (like they also promised him), and then took advantage of the booming deficits to attack him. Too bad the American people saw through it and re-elected him.

Re: OT: Rating the President
 

If the rich really were running the country, why isn't their tax rate lower? Maybe a flat tax? It is precisely because we are a democracy, and their vote equals the same as a poor man's that we have such a disparity in the tax rates. The poor continue to want services that they can't pay for (prescription drug benefit), and the rich are then the ones that end up paying for it.

As for the rich owning everything, I don't know if that is true. Can you provide any evidence that it is? We have a large middle class in America that owns stock, and as a whole might own more than the richest 5%.

Re: OT: Rating the President
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Um . . . well actually when you factor in the Social Security tax which is just thrown into the general fund (and not in a "lock box" remember Gore "lost") the top 5% make 35% of the income but only pay 21% of the REVENUE. (Pretty good if you ask me and something conservatives seem to conveniently always forget).

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Well they don't own everything, but 70% of the wealth is owned by 10% of the population. Pretty good if you ask me.

http://www.therationalradical.com/ds...stribution.htm

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">REVISIONIST HISTORY (please don't make things up!!)- the Republicans controlled the senate when Reagan passed his tax cut from (1981 -1987)- link below.

http://www.swishweb.com/Politics/USA...itics01con.htm

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">The "debt" tripled in the eighties with a Senate controlled by the Republicans and Reagan in the white house because the "deficit" was ballooned. Reagan gave everything to everybody without worrying about the future. The deficit causes the debt so yes the deficit is a problem.

[ February 06, 2003, 18:16: Message edited by: rextorres ]

Re: OT: Rating the President
 

If you get your information from extremely biased web sites, it can't be relied upon, period.

Re: OT: Rating the President
 

Yes, information from the web may or may not be valid, just as personal experience is a very poor source as well. Appeals to authority or testimonials are just as flawed.
Statistics can go either way, depends on what test you are using (Ive done some of the more insane ones -- augh) and the confidence values and ugh I dont want to talk about it.
Nevertheless, the national debt did increase significantly during Reagan's two terms.

Re: OT: Rating the President
 

"Um . . . well actually when you factor in the Social Security tax which is just thrown into the general fund (and not in a "lock box" remember Gore "lost") the top 5% make 35% of the income but only pay 21% of the REVENUE. (Pretty good if you ask me and something conservatives seem to conveniently always forget)."

Once again only a small portion of SS is spent on things other than Social Security. Social Security is supposed to be a self-sufficient benefit to all citizens, so it is perfectly reasonable for the poor to pay this benefit as well as the rich. As we have discussed before, reducing the SS tax would be a bad thing, because all projections seem to indicate that we will run out of money when all the Baby Boomers retire, forcing us to raise taxes anyway.

"the top 5% make 35% of the income but only pay 21% of the REVENUE"
Not quite sure how the top 5% pays most of the income tax, their portion of Social Security, and they end up paying less than the rest? Would you explain your numbers in more detail? I believe you said somewhere else that there is a cap on SS deductions? I suppose we could change that, and instead of the rich getting a cap on how large their Social Security check, they could actually get the amount that they contributed. The thing is, I don't believe anyone would want that.

And here is another fundamental issue. Should the rich be obligated to pay for the poor? Is it the obligation of a rich person to pay for a woman on welfare with 3 kids? And if they want to reduce how much they give, do they then become evil and greedy in your view? Should the rich not instead deserve our praise for all the help that they provide for the needy? I think that jealousy is a big factor here. The poor man doesn't like it that he doesn't have a lot of money and the rich man does. He never considers the sacrifices and hard work that the rich man had to make to get that wealth. He doesn't respect the ingenuity of the rich man to succeed in a competitive market. The poor man believes that he should have as much as the rich without having to work for it. That in my opinion is envy and jealousy, and not something that I want to reward.