Socialized healthcare is a good thing, corporations are by their very nature prone to evil behaviour, de-regulation is a bad thing when taken to such extremes as GWB, GWB was a bad president.

Reasonable taxes and social services are good for a society.

The radical must be the part where implementing these policies wholesale would basically kill the USA.

(The joke is wookie can't respond, don't ruin it :()

But wookie is the joke.

Ronald Reagan was a terrible human-being.

The distinction between a "revenue problem" and a "spending problem" is just about meaningless.

[h=2]Fox News successfully creates climate confusion, but only among conservatives.[/h]

Note that this implies a strong inverse correlation between voting Republican and having a high school diploma.

Sometimes a tax increase can be massively beneficial to society.

People have the right to a means of existence.

Wookie sends his regards.

You don't actually need to know about politics and economics to have a healthy conversation about topic such as these

Healthy conversation is one thing. Informative discussion is another thing. For instance, I'm never going to listen to anyone regarding trade issues unless they know a little about economics and trade. And it's not so that they could verbally spar with me. It's just that being knowledgeable in the field usually exposes you to the "other". If consume a little X, you must by necessity be consuming a little less of Y. Just knowing simple concepts like opportunity cost, comparative advantage, and risk make the discussion a lot more informative and probably beneficial to both parties.

It's what separates claims like "We should have a minimum wage of $10.00" from claims like "MINIMUM WAGE OF 25.00!!", or "we need slight tarrifs/protectionist policies in industry X because we think we really can gain economies of scale" to "we should put tariffs on all imported goods so we can save american jobs!". You DO need to know a little economics to have a healthy discussion. Just was reading a story today about how many Econ 101 teachers would fail the current candidates based on economic claims they've made.

You really think it's healthy to have a discussion about 2 dollar gas? To balance the budget with lower taxes? The Republican candidates are PERFECT examples right now of what happens when you DONT know about economics. And it extends to Democrats too, it's just this year we have one candidate, and Obama actually knows enough economics to keep quiet about it, or else he might appear to conservative.

No, no. We're trying to piss Wookie off, not say things he agrees with.

according to the American Bird Conservancy “Federal government estimates indicate that 22,000 wind turbines in operation in 2009 were killing 440,000 birds per year. We are very concerned that with Federal plans to produce 20 percent of the nation’s electricity from wind by 2030, those numbers will mushroom. To meet the 2030 goal, the nation will need to produce about 12 times more wind energy than in 2009.”

As a left wing animal rights activist i CANNOT let these atrocities go unchallenged!

We as a country obviously need to redirect our efforts AWAY from wind turbines or "aviary guillotines" as my fellow bird rights activists refer to them and TOWARD burning our own dead to generate power! This will not only reduce the number of brutal bird deaths, it will also greatly cut down on the habitat taken from our winged friends for the purpose of burying the deceased!

Has anybody else noticed how all of these "green" power sources use an awful lot of oil?

Anyone catch that Bill Clinton interview on The Daily Show?

http://www.thedailyshow.com/full-episodes/tue-november-8-2011-bill-clinton

I was rather amazed to find I actually agree with him on at least one thing. Do away with most of the deductions coporations can claim then lower the overall corporate tax rate and you will likely end up with higher revenues than you do now.

These all sound like liberal ideas, not radical ones...

A radical Left position would be either nationalizing the means of production or putting them directly in control of the working class.

Regulation and opposition to the Republican Party are things that Democrats are for, thus not very radical. (Although Democrats over the past 30 years or so have been less in favor of regulation of course)

Agreed. Many conservatives are so far right that their "followers" see moderates as left. Even Bernie Sanders, the so-called socialist is even rather moderate in comparison to the left in other countries.

32/33 "developed" nations have universal healthcare. Most of those countries aren't "ruled" by communists or socialists. They typically have systems that support both public & private healthcare.

Only an American would think "What? Healthcare provided as a public good? What is this radical leftist communist *****try??"

You are the insane person standing in a room, looking around, asking why everybody else is acting so weird.

Socialized healthcare is a good thing that is unachievable. Making fun of the USA for lacking it is basically beating a dead horse at this point. It's not going to change without some serious changes elsewhere in government first (particularly with taxes and spending), so it's not even worth theorizing.

That's the only thing that bothers me about foreigners discussing US healthcare. They all just ask "well why don't you get socialized healthcare already!". If it were that easy, it'd be done by now. But even if politicians weren't stuck up their ass, it'd still require so much reform in other areas, just to make it possible.

People are already angry enough over spending, and no one wants to double their taxes because they see that as a massive cut to their pay (despite they'd likely pay less than they do for insurance+copays). Finally, the transition period for moving from insurance to socialized healthcare is something I would equate to the ipv4 to ipv6 transition. No matter how it's done, it is going to suck ass.

Yeah see, we practically had socialized health care, through mutual aid societies. And we'd probably have it now, if the government hadn't gotten involved.

We can do it now without raising taxes on the people who would actually benefit from it. All the countries that do have it also have a graduated income tax that taxes the **** out of the rich.

I could hardly believe it when I first found out Americans don't have healthcare, it blew my mind to hear people were opposed to getting it in.

Somehow I think if we tax the rich too much, they won't be here to tax anymore.

Yeah all of the rich and powerful people are totally going to go Galt on us, nobody else would ever be willing to take their place.

[video of rich dude talking to people in OWS telling them that if he had to pay 30% income tax he'd stop working]

bye!

lolwut? I know if my taxes jumped an obscene amount, I'd haul my billion dollars off to Monaco and retire. In addition, there's no reason to think there'd be a place to take.

You don't get to the top 1% by wanting to retire. You get there by wanting more money no matter what.

no you get there by being ****ing insane about your money, how its made where its spent how its taxed how you can avoid those taxes, where you can go to avoid them and maximize your profits, figuring out how to produce a cheap product for low costs and charging ridiculous amounts for it.

that really sound like the type of guy that goes... gee... i guess i should stick around here and pay my fair share...

and i was not even commenting on america not having "public" run health care. good god! you all are like a bunch or rabid gophers sitting around just beneath the surface just PRAYING that some thing will be unfortunate enough to accidentally step into your hole so you can gnaw its god damn ankles off! i swear! and then you would all rush out of the hole in the ground with sharpened little sticks and poke at it whilst chanting "OHHO!!! it sucks to be you now! DOESNT IT!!!??? you uncivilised trollop! how DARE you step into our hole!" CHRIST ALMIGHTY!!!

anyways. i was just saying that those two statements seemed to contradict each other a little.

I suspect that people that think like this rarely become billionaires in the first place (unless they inherited their wealth & were never involved in starting a successful business). If taxes are such a huge concern for billionaires, then why do the 2 top American billionaires want their taxes to be raised? Remember, these are actual billionaires, not someone that's so far removed from this lifestyle that they can't even begin to comprehend it.

Yeah, and that's why you're not rich.

If a CEO is forced to work for 200 times the income of an average American, instead of 400 times, do you know what they're going to do? They're going to work, because 200 times the income of an average American is still more money than nothing.

Nobody ever got rich by turning their nose up on potential profits.

We used to tax the **** out of them. What happened when we did? The ****ing fifties happened. You know, that period of time when a middle class man made 30k and could support a family of six comfortably.

Now we don't tax the **** out of them. And that middle class man still makes 30k. And so does his wife. And they live in a dilapidated money pit. And can't afford the one kid they have.