OT: US President (US Dom Players only)

[HoneyBadger]

I would say-in my economic innocence-that the best way to attack poverty (it seems to me) would be to, yes, more heavily tax the very rich, but while attacking inflation, itself. That would cause everyone's money to be worth more, while reducing the gap between the very rich and the very poor. It *should*, I would think, also cause prices to drop, since the money itself would have more value.

[chrispedersen]

Honey, it is widely held that that *deflation* is a much greater risk right now.

There are lots of reasons, however if you deflate your money, you make it more difficult to service existing debt. This lends to market defaults -- such as the problem we are having now with the collapse of the housing market. Too many properties entering the market crushing the housing market.

Whereas if you *inflate* your money, you make it easier to pay off existing obligations.

[Agema]

Sorry, part of that is wrong. Increase the minimum wage and whilst the mean income goes up, the median will not, so more people will not be put across the poverty line. Besides, I think I also slightly misinterpreted NTJedi's point, I think you were actually saying that people already above the new minimum wage become poorer because costs go up and their salary doesn't alter, although I don't agree that's the case for reasons stated above. Sorry about the double post, didn't have an edit entry option the previous.

[Agema]

Erm... are you sure the Great Depression will make the Democrats look bad?

It started during a Republican presidency (Herbert Hoover) following a previous Republican incumbent, and the drop in US GDP is almost entirely in his stewardship. The US recovered under FDR (Democrat).

[thejeff]

Read the original speech. Not the wingnut's take on it. He's talking about expanding AmeriCorps, the Peace Corps, programs like that. Not some new secret police force.
There's one line, that Broun quotes, that if you take it out of context and squint just the right way can hint at some security force. In context, he's talking about relying on diplomacy not just the military.

Sure watch the government, be informed, but at the same time don't latch on to the first paranoid conspiracy theory you find.

Aside: If you think Broun's credible, my favorite pet project of his is his personal crusade to make our fighting men and women safer by removing porn from military bases.

[JimMorrison]

Originally Posted by thejeff

Aside: If you think Broun's credible, my favorite pet project of his is his personal crusade to make our fighting men and women safer by removing porn from military bases.

Oh come on. Do you know how many studies have shown that chronic masturbation directly impedes a soldier's crisis response? No..... Well, none really, but you can imagine it if you already dislike porn, and the concept is presented to you!

[Tichy]

It's a circular argument form of a very rare type. It actually requires two arguers.

It goes approximately like this:

Arguer A: Your guy's a fascist!
Arguer B: No! Your guy's a fascist!
Repeat.

It is closely related to two other well known argumentative fallacies, the Argument from Say the Same thing Louder, and the Argument from I say X therefore X.

[JimMorrison]

Well apparently after GW Bush had the audacity and ill-sense to speak of Nazi appeasement while speaking to Isreal, Nazi/Hitler references are in vogue again.

[Tifone]

Originally Posted by Tichy

It's a circular argument form of a very rare type. It actually requires two arguers.

It goes approximately like this:

Arguer A: Your guy's a fascist!
Arguer B: No! Your guy's a fascist!
Repeat.

Actually, IMHO, it goes more this way:

A: My guy wants to help the poor and lower taxes! And he loves animals so much he became vegetarian!
B: Hey, you know who else lowered taxes? Hitler! And he was also vegetarian! Your guy's exactly like Hitler so! He's gonna put on a Nazist regime, kill the innocents etc. etc.

Totally illogical of course, but of great effect on the weak minds (Star Wars FTW) as every logical fallacy.

This one is often used currently against Atheists. I met and heard people saying that Nazism did what he did because Hitler was atheist
Of course "forgetting" the motto -Gott mit uns- and Hitler's famous speech "Hence today I believe that I am acting in accordance with the will of the Almighty Creator: by defending myself against the Jew, I am fighting for the work of the Lord."; the "German Reich Christian Church" he established in 1933 etc...

Not of course that one would say that he did his utterly evil actions because he was Christian or whatever, it would be crazy c'mon But many today like to go anti-atheism going for "Stalin and Hitler were mass-murder tyrants because they didn't believe in God" I'm not even atheist but you know, some things should really p*ss off any rational being.

Long OT, sorry ^^

[thejeff]

Nobody is "granting terrorists the rights of us citizens."

Simply saying that the US government does not have the right to detain whoever it feels like for as long as it wants without even having to make a case to the judicial branch.