[Political] Have we reached the "tipping point"?

AxeMental · Post by **AxeMental** » Thu Feb 05, 2009 3:30 pm

Q: "Eating babies and driving to LA"?

Ahhhh....yeah.

Q: "What's "profit" to a pharmaceutical company is COST to the public."

- "what's "profit" to a baker is COST to the public" your point? D, you sound like a communist (or at least anti-free market), are you?

"Big salaries and pensions for desk warmers don't get things done. What gets things done is getting things done. To build a house is a physical activity."

Dude, the Federal State and local governments are run by NOTHING BUT bench warmers with lofty salaries!#!#!#! At least CEOs run companies that actually make things people want.

You have huge trust in your goverment (despite is miserable track record, show me one govt. institution that doesn't waste huge amounts of money) and seemingly none in the free market system. Like I said earlier, before you trash the system, identify the cost problems by asking doctors, hospitals, and drug companies what are those things making medicine expensive. Then fashion laws to remove those costs...period...end of story (I suspect you could reduce the cost of medicine in half). That would be a great project for congress, you could watch the hearings on CNN.

Also, the insurance industry needs to be held to the same reductions (and probably more) true competition needs to be assured in this industry.

Dwayanu · Post by **Dwayanu** » Thu Feb 05, 2009 4:14 pm

Is there no limit to how far you'll go to avoid the real point?

You've got things simultaneously ass-backward and completely off to one side. I don't give a damn about your precious ideology, certainly not to the extent of feeling obliged to adopt another brand of silliness because that's how you choose to divide the world! The notion is childish.

Yes, profit to the baker is also "cost" to the public in the naive sense of a loss of money. However, that "cost" is not starving Americans, because we get plenty of real wealth (i.e., food) in exchange for the money.

On the other hand, Americans do find the cost of health care onerous. People prefer life to death and health to sickness, and don't see someone else getting rich off their suffering as a profit to them. That's the hierarchy of values being expressed.

The practical question is not one of being a "capitalist" or a "socialist." Those are abstract concepts with no bearing at all on flesh and blood and bone.

The practical problem, whether of killing or of healing, is a matter of chemistry and physics. Failure is failure, regardless of whose political theory produced it. Ditto success: Calling an AK-47 "Commie" won't make you bullet-proof!

However much they may appeal to one's metaphysics, such schemes as homeopathy, chiropractic and acupuncture (beyond a very limited scope), aura manipulation, and so on ... simply don't work.

What I'm advocating is that we should FIRST concern ourselves with what works and what does not as a matter of empirical fact. If political philosophers want to derive postulates afterward, then they can knock themselves out. Let them go off to their faculty lounges and smoke their pipes and throw quotations from German books at each other.

The proof is in the DOING. Who is in fact feeding the hungry, housing the homeless, curing the sick? He or she is the one from whom we can learn.

AxeMental · Post by **AxeMental** » Thu Feb 05, 2009 5:09 pm

D: "Is there no limit to how far you'll go to avoid the real point?"

D please tell me in a single sentance (10 words or less) what the "real point" is your referring to. And put it in simple english. Thanks.

badger2305 · Post by **badger2305** » Thu Feb 05, 2009 7:40 pm

AxeMental wrote:D: "Is there no limit to how far you'll go to avoid the real point?"

D please tell me in a single sentance (10 words or less) what the "real point" is your referring to. And put it in simple english. Thanks.

I know! I know! The "real point" is that this is a board for the discussion of GAMING (and not real world politics).

AxeMental · Post by **AxeMental** » Thu Feb 05, 2009 8:15 pm

Stormcrow · Post by **Stormcrow** » Thu Feb 05, 2009 9:18 pm

Friend Computer! I've just discovered a forum full of commie mutant traitors! ZAPZAPZAP!

yesmar · Post by **yesmar** » Thu Feb 05, 2009 9:26 pm

Attention all commie mutant traitors. Please report to political disintegration chamber 0xDEADBEEF for vacation assignments.

Wheggi · Post by **Wheggi** » Thu Feb 05, 2009 9:36 pm

While I used to fret about the political debate bullshit that takes place on K&KA, I have since learned to accept it as part of the landscape. For some odd reason K&KA has always had a history of political discussion, but for the most part it has remained civil and therefore not TOO much of a diversion from the real important stuff: old school gaming and old school gaming culture. Be you a right wing Avalon Hill strategist or a left wing stoner RPGer, the common ground we share rises us above our different views and allows us to focus on the real enemy: those that would try to keep the game we know and love away from us that prefer it to the cheesy crap that is being produced nowadays.

- Wheggi

Edgewaters · Post by **Edgewaters** » Thu Feb 05, 2009 11:27 pm

Ach, the world is getting very weird when advocates of the free market start to sound like Marxist theorists, bandying about abstract words and concepts about how systems are supposed to work in theory etc, and refusing to engage the concrete.

AxeMental · Post by **AxeMental** » Fri Feb 06, 2009 8:56 am

."

“they came…and they came…we drained four of our phasers and they still came…we killed thousands of them and they still came!”

No hard feelings Dy, as Wheggie said, politics is small potatoes around here and has zero bearing on friendship, we've just known each other so long its water off a ducks back.

Hey, Mit R. had a nice qoute this morning, from CNN: "In the final analysis, we know that only the private sector -- entrepreneurs and businesses large and small -- can create the millions of jobs our country needs. The invisible hand of the market always moves faster and better than the heavy hand of government

How true.

Werral · Post by **Werral** » Fri Feb 06, 2009 9:14 am

I think the range of political opinion is a good thing as it shows these games appeal to a wide range of people who might otherwise have nothing in common.

Basically I agree with Dy. Choose what works and what has been shown to work. Public medicine has been shown in ALL OF THE DEVELOPED WORLD except the US. It costs less. It works. It's more humane.

If that makes me a commie then fry me.

What I'm advocating is that we should FIRST concern ourselves with what works and what does not as a matter of empirical fact. If political philosophers want to derive postulates afterward, then they can knock themselves out. Let them go off to their faculty lounges and smoke their pipes and throw quotations from German books at each other.

The proof is in the DOING. Who is in fact feeding the hungry, housing the homeless, curing the sick? He or she is the one from whom we can learn.

You my friend will never make in politics.

AxeMental · Post by **AxeMental** » Fri Feb 06, 2009 9:22 am

Werral: "If that makes me a commie then fry me."

OK consider yourself fried!

Stormcrow · Post by **Stormcrow** » Fri Feb 06, 2009 9:54 am

AxeMental wrote:Hey, Mit R. had a nice qoute this morning, from CNN: "In the final analysis, we know that only the private sector -- entrepreneurs and businesses large and small -- can create the millions of jobs our country needs. The invisible hand of the market always moves faster and better than the heavy hand of government

Then how'd we get into this mess? Metaphors and aphorisms do not make arguments.

AxeMental · Post by **AxeMental** » Fri Feb 06, 2009 10:34 am

Recession is part of the normal business cycle. This one is a duzzy because the housing/realestate market was used as the stock market. In 30 years real estate crawled at a regular % rate. Then in 1-2 years it goes up 50%-100-200% (no bells going off#@#) and the people buying and selling are investors rather then home owners (thus no longterm stake). Why did the banks stupidly lend to them (surely they could see this was bucking the trend and not a long term thing, everyone in the real estate industry could)? Well, ultimately the real estate appraisers (the final line of defense) failed by not notifying the lender that investor to investor does not reflect long term value and should have never signed off on these incremental increases (what the banks were counting on with a 15 or 30 year mortgage). This was done hiding behind their legal guidelines (in my states case USPAP).

Plus, there was alot of lending to people without background checks. I believe that was forced onto the lending system by the government claiming descrimination or some such crap.

Anyway, a free market, operating under the rule of law, should self adjust, even in this mess (historically 6-8 months, but there's no telling). Lower taxes, reduce govt. regulations, and get the fuck out of its way. If you want to spend, spend on actual projects that have to do with improving the infastructure to increase business activity (roads, bridges, telecommunication lines, public park walk ways (bringing in vistors from abroad) etc.) not on building giant government office complexes!

Its amazing how few people even understand the basic principles of the Free market system (I know you do SC, but I'm talking about just the average guy on the street)...stuff like supply and demand...yet they are masters in it when they go to the flea market on the weekend. Go figure.

JDJarvis · Post by **JDJarvis** » Fri Feb 06, 2009 11:41 am

Tipping point as defiend by contributors versus non-contributors is still a good way off.

In the U.S. there are about 142 million employed people.
of those employed people 45.6 million had no federal tax liability

102 million businesses and individuals pay federal taxes.
In 2007 the IRS collected $2.4 trillion after refunds.
individual taxpayers were responsible for $248.6 billion

so individual tax payers with liability coughed up $2,590.00 each
businesses paid $358,500.000 each (on the average).

I hear plenty of reports and read newspaper articles that say 45% of Americans do't pay taxes and they are simply wrong because they see the 45.6 million fillers not paying number and the about 100 million payers number and can't do math worth a damn.