No it's not. Jefferson coined the term, in one of his letters. Big difference between letter, and Constitution.

Hey, someone that knows their history. Well I'll be....

Word up, Nubs

If you want to know what the Constitution says about religion, go look at some Supreme Court cases (specifically Everson and the Lemon trials. Lemon test is still used today to judge religion/constitutionality of something).

I'm staying out of this argument for the betterment of my mental health...

I think he meant the implication as opposed to literal wording.

I always find it amusing how some people seem to think that subjects like the separation of church and state and abortion are so clearly addressed in the constitution but they just can't seem to see the right to keep and bear arms.

I was just about to point out the irony of people who seem to be for strict constitutionality, but are alright with IMPLYING or assuming separation of church and state :rolleyes:.

DAMNIT I SAID I WOULDN'T JOIN! I swear that's it

I personally don't care if the constitution specifically states it or not: Religion does not belong in government. Your Jesus would agree.

How would you know what a dead man speaks?

Which is pretty stupid, if they aren't specifically designed with the idea raising kids in mind/ having a mother stay home to raise the kids. Either way, you've just admitted that it's cashing in on inapplicable kickbacks rather than rights. What do tax breaks have to do with love?




I don't understand how revenue increases if we decrease taxes.

Simple answer: less taxes = more money in the consumer's pocket to spend on stuff.

But everything costs that must more, so you've really gotten nowhere. If you have 40% more money, but everything costs 40% more, who cares?

Well, I don't know about where you live, but in Kansas it had mostly to do with divorces, and here in AL there's a lot of loopholes you can use in your state taxes, which considering the amount of small business owners there are here, are extremely useful.


There was a big debate somewhere about that a while back. Apparently, it meant the right to keep and bear arms as an ORGANIZED militia, not as just individuals, if I remember correctly.


Um...so they don't deserve equal tax rights why? What does love have to do with anything--this is about fair treatment.

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof"

It's a pretty strong implication. Nevertheless, government and religion should never come close, period.

Wow, who thinks abortion is in the constitution?

Anyways I'm for the right to bear arms for the record.

Marriage, as far as the government is concerned, is a business agreement. When you live with someone, share expenses, and support eachother in your business arrangements, you are given a break on your taxes in order to assist the jointed arrangement.

And if you have a problem with the above, let's get rid of it. If you still like your cushion of cash for your business arrangement, let's start giving it to everyone who starts one of these agreements.

Oh man that's hilarious!

Are we really doing the "tax cuts increase government revenue" thing here? I just got finished with this on another board.

Government revenue has increased since the Bush tax cuts were passed. That much is true, but it's misleading if that's the only number you look at. The thing about government revenue is that it increases continuously as a consequence of economic growth and population growth. Revenue was rising before the tax cuts; as a matter of fact, it was rising at a faster rate. It's just silly to credit the tax cuts with a rise in government revenues that 1) would have happened regardless of policy and 2) actually slowed down after the cuts were introduced.

I'm all for lower taxes, but let's not kid ourselves into thinking they'll pay for themselves. Our government has to rein in spending as well.

What are the tax breaks for? If anything we should strip the tax breaks from married couples and give them only to families with kids, which is their only real use. The current system was created with the idea that women would stay at home and be house wives. It's obsolete for heterosexual couples and totally ridiculous for homosexuals.

Besides, if a husband and wife make about the same amount of money, they'll end up paying more taxes than if they file separately. It's only helpful in the stay at home mom situation.



Well, it also provides kids a bit of protection against the selfishness of one or more parents.

The more money that is in circulation the more it is taxed. But more specifically and more recently you can look at how the "evil" Bush tax cuts have resulted in record high revenues to the government. If it wasn't for class warfare, all the libs would love him on taxes.

1) You don't even know what tax breaks I'm talking about. Most of them ARE if you have kids. Having a kid, depending on your revenue, can draw up to 5-10 grand in tax refunds. That's a lot of ****ing money, but when you have a kid it doesn't come near supporting them for a year, almost always. Obsolete for heterosexuals? Why? I know a LOT of stay at home moms...they haven't gone away, they've just become less prominent.

2) Homosexuals can adopt, or be artificially inseminated in the case of women. I think you judge way too quickly here on that fact...it's not impossible for homosexuals to have kids, at all, in any way shape or form. I thought this needed its own point.

3) Explain to me how they would pay more jointly. I know a lot of married couples, and every one of them claims that they wouldn't be able to get by without the breaks.

Yeah, but if you increase the amount of money in circulation it's worth less.

Also, it turns out that if the taxes are high enough, decreasing taxes will increase revenue, but we aren't anywhere near there yet. It turns out that taxes would have to be enormously high for people to start working a lot more when they get tax cuts.

What are you getting at? I was talking only about the tax breaks that do not involve kids, and a reaffirmed their importance for a family.




So could a team of non-romantically involved partners. The point is though, that kids are not a natural result of any of the previously stated unions, so they can sure as hell take a good hard look at their finances before they adopt. This isn't the case for married couples. If you want to make the case that people should have tax incentive to take care of orphans, that's one thing, but it's a totally different issue.




Meh. I'm no lawyer. Take it with a grain of salt.

Um, obi, you can talk specifics all you want, but why does a heterosexual couple get tax breaks and a homosexual one doesn't (IE, one is called marriage, the other is called civil union?) That's the real issue, here. There's an inequality that has little to no grounds to stand on.

So you're saying homosexual people should have to pay more taxes when they adopt than a heterosexual couple who has a kid? Correct me if I'm wrong.

If so, think about that for a second or two.


That link says more people get a bonus from getting married than pay more after getting married.

Yeah, that's exactly what I'm saying. I think all gays should burn in hell, and it's the governments job to put them there. And keep them there.

Seriously though, you're going into straw man fallacies. I have established a good reason that natural families should have tax breaks. Children are naturally born heterosexual couples regardless of income. Adoptions are a totally different situation. Like I said before, weather people should be offered tax incentives to adopt children is another subject entirely.

You've forgotten the argument. I'm saying that the whole issue is a pissing contest, because it doesn't change anything relevant for either party no matter which way it goes. Your argument that not recognizing gay marriage is discriminatory, has basically degraded to the point where your only complaint against a ban on gay marriage is that they don't get taxes breaks they deserve because, "they might adopt kids." This is ridiculous. It has nothing to do with marriage, and could just as easily be made for a group of people who isn't romantically involved.

I don't know what your trying to accomplish here. You seem to be obsessed with proving that I'm a bigot or something. If that's what you really want, I'll think homosexuality is wrong, though it's really superficial to the condition we are born in before God. (Don't go there, argument for another thread.) I don't take a stand on this particular issue because I'm a fan of John Locke, and I think trying to impose values on someone with the law is an exercise in futility. My whole point is that this is exactly what both sides of this argument are doing.



I never said they didn't. I hope you noticed that more = 51%.

(Man, I had the strangest heads rushes while writing this post. Very, very odd. It felt like two crossed wires in my head.)

I almost agree with that. Except allowing homosexual "civil unions" does not harm anyone. It does not take away anybody's rights. Nothing is imposed or forced on anyone. But not allowing them a legal union is clearly unfair.

Whoa, what? That was my entire point against the ban to begin with, and I think it's a very valid point. We live in America--our entire LIFE is about money. How much do you make, when do you get a raise, do you have benefits, when are you moving up, etc etc etc. Tax breaks can be a HUGE deal.

I'm not trying to prove you're a bigot, I'm just saying tax breaks are a very valid argument against the ban, and that was my point from beginning to end. There was no degradation, and if you think there was go back and check.

You're right we shouldn't have marriage laws

lol

This is exactly the kind of sophistry I debunked in my last post. Rising revenues are not enough. Government revenue is not keeping pace with government spending, and the tax cuts have only reduced the growth rate of government revenue.

Here's a chart for those of you who like pretty pictures:

How come no one has said what it is about marriage that is inherently religious.

Um. As long as the government has this bizarre idea that they can print all the money they want and be fine, then I have doubt tax levels will make much a difference.

Marriage isn't just a Bible thing. And for the record, the Bible DOES discuss marriage on several accounts.

But different religions have their own views on marriage (usually as a sacred bond involving the religion's respective god(s), which is why we shouldn't have it defined by a Christian government.

Well, that's a bit beyond what I'm talking about. I'm just trying to explain the simple and intuitive fact that if a government taxes less, it will have less money than it otherwise would. There are secondary effects that make the reduction in revenue less than proportional to the reduction in taxes, but it's absurd to imagine that the tax cuts pay for themselves.

At the end of that post I agreed that spending should be slashed. Not sure where the sophistry is since you don't seem to be debunking the fact that revenue is up or my opinion that spending should be reduced because, as you point out, the revenue does not keep pace with the spending. Let alone the fact that the federal government is spending money on all sorts of things that it shouldn't.



I believe that people should be able to enter into domestic partnerships of some sort. For example, gay couples or siblings who are trying to pool their resources. The only tax break available for married couples is when only one works they claim the higher standard deduction when they file jointly. I'm not sure why Yoshi brought up kids and what his point about the tax breaks not being enough to support them. First, single people can claim dependent children. Second, your income is meant to support your children, not whatever amount you don't have to pay in taxes because you have them.

I would also like to add that it seems odd to make the case for gay marriage based on tax breaks (which don't really exist at the federal level anyway). If people are only getting married for "tax breaks" that just seems sad to me.

It's absurd to think that tax cuts need to be paid for. How do you explain the fact that the Bush tax cuts have increased revenue? Or are you simply saying that tax cuts don't always mean higher revenue? If you mean the latter than I certainly agree.

Why do you say that?

Because by all accounts Jesus wasn't a nutjob.

Again: Raw government revenue is not the number that matters because it continually increases regardless of policy (with the exception of hypothetical truly enormous tax cuts, or a hypothetical tax increase so large that it tanks the economy). The growth rate of government revenue is what's relevant here, and it's fallen since the tax cuts were passed. (Refer to the chart.) The implication is that yes, the government has more money than it did before, but it has less than it would have today if the cuts hadn't been made.

I don't think Jesus would object to some religious influence in government (such as the usual "how you treat others" sort of thing) but he might object to forcing Christianity on others (such as banning gay marriage). I mean come on....forcing people to follow your beliefs is how you get them to accept and adopt those beliefs? Not exactly my choice of method for picking up followers.