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Author | Topic: Occupy Wall Street | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
xongsmith Member Posts: 2620 From: massachusetts US Joined:
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Taq writes:
IMHO, everything needs to start with campaign finance reform. Nothing in US politics can change unless this is changed. Politicians do not want to lose their office, and corporations offer them millions of dollars that they can then use to keep their office. While there may not be an overt quid pro quo, I think we can all agree that there is an unspoken "this for that". This is where the internet stuff going viral can help us. People should see where the money is coming from and in what quantity and vote for those whose money best represents what they want. Big Pharma? Don't vote for them. Or - if you like Big Pharma, vote for them. See who they owe, see who is pulling the strings. Given how close the 2000 election was, I bet if Al Gore had publicly ripped up the donation checks he got from big oil and big pharma, on national TV during, say, one of his debates, it would have made all the difference. Florida would have been nothing. That he didn't speaks volumes. Vote for the least monied candidates! What's really sad is that that horrid despicable concept of robo-calling potential voters actually works. USA voters really need a big slap upside the head. In general, the more you see it advertised, the more utter shit it is. Buy against the advertising!!! And that goes quintuple for politicians.- xongsmith, 5.7d
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xongsmith Member Posts: 2620 From: massachusetts US Joined: |
Hooah writes:
I don't think it's getting the desired effect though. There are videos circulating of the Wall St. employees sitting on the balconies, sipping champagne and laughing at the protestors. Cocktail hour now, is it? Well, a few well-placed molotof cocktails should ruin those Marie Antoinette poses..... Hell, as Bruce Cockburn sings, "...I wish I had a rocket launcher..."- xongsmith, 5.7d
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xongsmith Member Posts: 2620 From: massachusetts US Joined:
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Crashfrog writes:
It's not completely their fault; we still don't make Election day a holiday so some people have to work instead of voting. That's usually not a problem for seniors. I would advocate moving Election Day to Veteran's Day Holiday. No extra holiday for business owners to whine about. Build it up as part of your Patriotic support of the Veterans. Vote & see a parade.- xongsmith, 5.7d
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xongsmith Member Posts: 2620 From: massachusetts US Joined:
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The only use of a computer that I would condone is one that facilitates filling out the ballot. Maybe a touchscreen, with justifiably lots of Windozian Are You Sure? buttons, to print out perfectly filled-in black ovals on the ballot and give you a receipt of how you voted so if there is an issue later, you can bring in your receipt and help verify what happened. Nothing gets destroyed.
But it is already too late. The rich fuckers in power have already put in place lying machinery to make sure the "right" guys get elected. Kill Diebold!!!- xongsmith, 5.7d
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xongsmith Member Posts: 2620 From: massachusetts US Joined:
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Taq writes:
My advice to them is to at least register and show up at the polls even if they don't vote. If politicians start seeing a big discrepancy between voter roll calls and number of votes submitted then perhaps some politicians will start to change their agenda to include younger americans. I've often held the view the every office on the Ballot should have an option to select "None Of The Above". And if None Of The Above wins, then everyone that was on the Ballot for that office is booted off the ballot and a new slate of candidates is drawn up and the voting is tried again. My Democrat father was on a vote-counting team with a Republican woman and, as they worked through the stack to corroborate the selections with each other, they were perplexed at the sheer number of completely blank ballots - it was as if these voters took the ballot, went behind the curtain, counted up to 50, came out and sent the ballot into the box blank, and left, thinking "There - I've voted. I've done my duty."- xongsmith, 5.7d
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xongsmith Member Posts: 2620 From: massachusetts US Joined: |
The Doctor writes, in part:
...not taking away their guns is part of a "massive Obama conspiracy" to take away their guns Best laugh of the day!!!LOL!!! - xongsmith, 5.7d
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xongsmith Member Posts: 2620 From: massachusetts US Joined:
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Omnivorous raises his hand:
jar writes: I don't think there even is a left in the US these days. Here I is! Me too!!!- xongsmith, 5.7d
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xongsmith Member Posts: 2620 From: massachusetts US Joined:
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Buz writes:
Well, Jonsey, pray tell, if America is not the greatest for Hispanics and blacks from Mexico, Haiti and Cuba, the nations which I mentioned, what nation on the planet is greater for them in the proximity where they would be able to go to? So we should be welcoming them with open arms...... But no - instead so many idiots in this country of ours blatantly HATE them on arrival.- xongsmith, 5.7d
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xongsmith Member Posts: 2620 From: massachusetts US Joined: |
Why doesn't Onifre have a rating yet? In my book he is a 10.0.
- xongsmith, 5.7d
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xongsmith Member Posts: 2620 From: massachusetts US Joined: |
Thanks, Panda.
Not enough Onifre posts have been cheered/jeered in the past 6 months - or some such technicality. Part of me says "I WANT TO KNOW HOW THE RATINGS ARE MADE" - just for the concept of transparency. And part of me just wants to know the mathematics. And part of of me doesn't want this ever to come to light because of the misuse that would ensue. Edited by xongsmith, : No reason given.- xongsmith, 5.7d
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xongsmith Member Posts: 2620 From: massachusetts US Joined:
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The best way to Occupy Wall Street is to buy from your local independent merchants and local family farmers, put your money in small local credit unions or town banks and avoid purchasing anything made by the top profiteering corporations of the world. Take your money out of the stock market - it's condoned gambling run by the best loan sharking cheaters on the planet. You are all their rubes.
If you see it advertised on major TV, boycott it. If it's advertised in magazines, boycott it. Advertising in fact is the best way of telling you when NOT to buy something - a great reverse barometer. Trust only your friends and their word of mouth and your own experiences. There was a time when lawyers and doctors and teachers were respected here in the USA. May stock brokers and big bankers sink even lower to the lowest of the low in respectability. They are slime. As long as we all keep feeding Wall Street, they will continue to devour our bodies and our minds with impunity by imposing their politicians upon us. This should be capitalism in action, folks.- xongsmith, 5.7d
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xongsmith Member Posts: 2620 From: massachusetts US Joined: |
Dronester opines:
It would be better if we could somehow boycott the US military I did boycott the military. They didn't get my ass. - nate- xongsmith, 5.7d
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xongsmith Member Posts: 2620 From: massachusetts US Joined: |
The one and only BUZSAW wonders:
If Wall Street were blown to bits tomorrow, can you imagine the panic you and all of those nincompoops out their yelling their fool heads off about ?? would be caught up in along with the whole nation? The impact on the economy and welfare of Americans would dwarf 9/11. God, I hope so.....- xongsmith, 5.7d
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xongsmith Member Posts: 2620 From: massachusetts US Joined: |
rueh writes:
Well in my opinion the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 was a huge mismanagement of funding by the government. While parts of the bill included provisions that helped America begin to recover from a growing recession. Other parts were laden with non vital spending. Some examples include $650 million for digital TV coupons, $25 million for new ATV trails, $83 billion for the earned income credit for non-taxpayers, $54 billion for the Economic Development Administration, $1 billion to subsidize Amtrak. ...to get it to pass in congress.....
This is just a small list of items considered non essential. Other than you, who is considering them non-essential? The congressperson installing that item on the ARRA certainly thinks it's essential. Let's look at the 2 big enchiladas in your laundry list: Earned Income Credit and - what's this? - the Economic Development Administration! The EIC puts more money in hands of the poor to spend on goods & services & this helps to get the economy moving. And when you are trying to fix the economy what department in our government should be given the job of finding answers - the Economic Development Administration seems like a very logical place. What other part of government should be bolstered in this recession?
As a personal example I have seen the DOD spend millions building guard shacks, and baseball fields when they knew ahead of time that they were planned to be demolished directly after construction in order to be rebuilt elsewhere. Some just a few feet away from where they were originally built. Now here I have no disagreement - but you know why they do this, right? If they don't spend the money awarded in this fiscal year, then the amount they get in the next fiscal year is reduced by what they didn't spend. It's stupid that it works this way - I agree.
Well then I would point you to the post office versus companies such as fed-ex or ups. It would seem that the government is awful in its inefficiencies Well, let's get junkmail out of the US Post Office. Your 44 cent stamp (soon 45 cent) is subsidizing junk mailers - think of it! You are paying junk mailers to send junk mail to your house! Junk mail is done by private companies who wangled a sweet deal out congress years ago ("Hey, I know - we'll get the average citizen to pay for it. Let me make a bribe to my congressman running for re-election...") Also, the US Post Office has to deliver to every mailbox, whether it's at the bottom of the Grand Canyon or half way up Mount McKinley. Fed-Ex & UPS would go out of business trying to do what the Post Office does.
Richie Rich, realizing that 350 million dollars isn't nearly enough upon which to survive, decides to "pass the cost of these taxes to the consumer" so he raises the prices on his bread.
You forgot to include that Richie Rich's competitor is also rich himself and therefore effected by the same tax hike as Richie Rich, so therefore passes this tax hike into the cost of goods and services just as Richie Rich did. So the consumer is left with both companies charging more for the same service. If you have such a problem with Richie Rich I would advocate that you use a local market, which is what I do. Paulie Poor doesn't want to pay more for the same bread, so he goes and buys the bread the competitor makes. Yes! USE THE LOCAL MARKET ANYWAY! (remember the OP)... What we have here is a beautiful way to correct for the inequity of the economy if scale. Richie Rich can produce a loaf of bread on the shelf at a lower cost than your Mom & Pop bakery because of the economy of scale. Economy of scale makes the rich get richer by passing civilization costs out of their responsibility and onto the citizenry at large. Richie Rich's company drives 1000's of semi trucks carrying all these loaves of bread over the highways we pay for at the pump. Richie Rich doesn't pay as much for the wear and tear to the roads & bridges because of deals he & his buddies before him got out of congress to write off on his business expense sheet at tax time. Those trucks cause more wear & tear than your sedan. Furthermore, diesel fuel stinks around the whole country but he doesn't have to smell it. We do. Our quality of life is degraded because of him. Now this could be bad for Paulie Poor, because the price went up, perhaps up enough to make him shop from his local Mom & Pop bakery. But he's already on food stamps & they will give him the difference & life goes on. He's ok - he would never get a chance to meet Richie Rich face to face, but now he's making friends with neighbors like Mom & Pop. This is an accountability step up of a better kind! What about Mikey Middle? Maybe for him the reduced potholes & diesel stink is worth the Mom & Pop price. Maybe the IRS will increase the Standard Deduction again to compensate. And again he gets the advantages of meeting Mom & Pop personally with the perks of new friendships.
I don't think that we should be taxing [the rich] more just because you have a problem with others having more than you. That is a problem when 90% of the rest of us are suffering. I also have a problem with them using & abusing more of the same world I have to live in. You might want say "well, nobody said life was fair" - and it certainly isn't. But I'd like to think that, as an intelligent species who finds strength in having a good moral character, we should try to make it as fair as feasible. Buy local!- xongsmith, 5.7d
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xongsmith Member Posts: 2620 From: massachusetts US Joined: |
I sense that we are dog piling on poor rueh.- xongsmith, 5.7d
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