The only thing that is terrible about Obama is that he is stuck with a bunch of obstructionist pricks. I hope the entire congress flips so we can get some shit done. That wont happen with the jackasses who wont even go with Obama's ideas when they themselves came up with it first.

Obama hasn't been strong enough, but I am not going to side with the Antoinette party.

Of course the answer to poverty is creating incentives to be poor and stay poor. Such a wonderful long term solution.

the "large amounts of money" are a big part of the problem.  a senator or congressman should make a typical civil servant's salary and that's it--and i think typical civil servant's salaries are way too high to begin with.  the idea that a congressman--who needn't have any kind of advanced education--can make as much as or more than an MD is ludicrous.

In a rational world... both of you would have valid ideas-a-plenty.

Double post.

Do you ever get tired of making a strawman out of me. Debate the facts. We've had a war on poverty for almost 50 years. Same poverty rate, just massive debt and dependency. A continuation of the behaviors that cause poverty passed from one generation to the next.

Yes there is always the poor. It's how we do population size control. So your answer is get out the credit card and charge more until the whole country is bankrupt. Sorry if I don't want to follow that script.

I tired of your phony compassion attitude. One of Ghandi's seven deadly sins is Religion without Sacrifice. You have infinite compassion for the poor as long it's not your sacrifice. If you care so much, do it yourself.

So this means that someone else is willing to do your job for less money. So what do you want, you get paid more while the other guy goes without? What makes you better than the guy willing to take your job?

When have I ever "blamed" the poor? I blame people with your irrational political ideas like rewarding failure and punishing success.

Supply and demand problem. Too many unskilled workers.

1. Only pay schools for producing students with job skills. Force students to study science/technical/medical and not whatever they feel like.

2. No permanent welfare. Force them into job training.

3. Stop job killing taxes like this 'Medical Device Tax' shit.

4. Mandatory birth control for those that can not support any more children.

No. It's run by entitlement:

1. Students are entitled to study whatever they feel like and then blame society when their unemployed.

2. Teachers are entitled to not produce skilled workers and then keep their unions jobs and pensions.

3. Poor people are entitled to live in homes they can not afford.

4. Politicians are entitled to keep taxing me without any benefit to myself.

5. People are entitled to have as many kids at they please and pass the cost onto others.

6. Employers are entitled to hire illegal aliens without punishment.

7. Leftist are entitled to believe they are compassionate just because they want to tax the rich more.

Government has become a tool for armed robbery by other means on a massive scale.

To sum up your argument.

Money equals power and fuck you and everyone else who doesn't have it. Every man for themselves. Do you masturbate over Ayn Rand's picture?

Damned fucking right we should tax the rich more. I feel so sorry for GE and Mitt Romney, they are eating cat food, I forgot.

Lets take up a collection for the rich, I'm passing the plate around right now.

You can deal with us "lefties" now, or later, but what wont happen is more of the same. We've had enough of your bullshit and poor me Richy Rich victim crap.

Warren Buffet AND Suze Orman are hardly poor and if they can see the abuse at the top, YOU need to get your fucking head out of your ass.

Actually the complete opposite. I have whole list of things unrelated to money that the government should force people do besides just pay taxes.

Whereas you on the other hand are totally obsessed with getting you hands on the others people's money. If money is so damned evil, why are you totally obsessed with getting as much as you can? You tell us money taken by force from anyone that has any, is the solution to all of society's problems. And then tell us how greedy the rich are??? WTF.

You accuse the rich of stealing all the time, so your answer is to do the same. You are so obsessed with money you have basically become an armed robber, except you have the IRS do you dirty work for you.

Face it, you are exactly what you hate. Obsessed with money, believing money is the answer to everything and willing to do anything to get it.

Well, people can say anything even explicitly. In fairness to Brian37 I don't think you were here for some of the more colorful commentary from these two. It ranges from praise of Ayn Rand and unregulated free markets to characterizing altruism as an evil or even non-existent, to forcing people who receive government assistance to raise and slaughter pigs in their tenement house studio apartments.

It's possible they care about the poor in some way. They say when a dog is drowning everyone offers him water. People often appear pitiless to others who meet with misfortune.

The Frenchman makes a salient point... mostly because I agree with it.

*oink, oink*

[/mrpotatoheadsmiley]

edit; I really suck at html

Actually, I wouldn't say that I "care" about the poor. I believe that altruism and "caring" as it is commonly understood is not possible for anyone. It's an illusion just like free will is an illusion. I don't believe anyone is capable of a truly unselfish act. If you read the post on oxytocin and other evidence for what motivates behaviors, I don't think a rational person can come to any other conclustion except that we always act in our own interests of feeling good. Compassion is way to gain social currency.

I don't enjoy seeing people suffer, it makes me feel uncomfortable. So any motivation I would have to help the less fortunate is simple motivated by what feels good to me or some other selfish interest. I can't really feel anyone else's pain, so why pretend like all the phony compassion folks that I can. But I don't believe being self interested rules out the possibility of cooperation.

If people that claim they care for the poor actually wanted to end poverty, they would be in favor of other methods of eliminating the problem. Obviously welfare and charity don't work or it would have been eliminated the problem by now. They would be in favor of mandatory birth control and forcing schools to teach job skills not just forced charity by the government.

The real motivation behind their 'caring' is that it 'feels' good. There is nothing harmful with that per se. This feeling of compassion enables cooperation. It should motivate them to sacrifice to help people. But their compassion is only for other people to sacrifice. So they can 'feel' they are compassionate without spending their own money. It's like getting a free drug. But don't expect me to think they are using rationality or science to solve any problems. They're junkies looking for a free high.

Despite the strawman characture that Gauche and Brian37 would like to make of me, I think for myself. I don't model myself after anyone.

You say that, but then you side with Marie Antoinette. I don't think even my most ardent detractors on this issue truly want to see the end result of that mentality, but that is where we are headed. I simply think people like you and Beyond have swallowed the economic party line because you have swallowed the mantra of robbery and laziness falsely sold to you by your side.

1. A THREE CLASS SYSTEM is needed. EVERY ONE IS NEEDED, to have a healthy market.

2. No one in an open market should begrudge someone for "making it".

3. PAY GAP! COST OF LIVING. Nothing more. Address that, and do so through self introspection and self investment. But "every man for themselves" under our rigged market, will not work.

When have I ever advocated this? You're have to make shit up about you opponent to try an make any points. Yes, many of the poor are lazy. But that is because the welfare state has incentivized this behavior. So I blame people like you with your irration approach to poverty.

OK the pay gap is due to supply and demand. An oversupply of unskilled labor. So mandatory birth control, only paying for schools that produce people with job skills, eliminate illegal immigration. That would "stop making things worse". What you suggest more welfare and higher minimum wage is not a sollution that address the oversupply problem with the pay gap.

I don't blame it on them. I blame it people like you with your irration approach to poverty and for voting for politicians that pander to it. It's obvious it's diven by anger and jealousy.

Of course, they pay the taxes. You expect government to kil their goose that lays golden eggs?

 And market forces have nothing to do with that? Inflation is caused by the Fed 'printing money.'

I hardly agree with Fuxs News, they would probably call me a communist.

Huh, that sounds pretty interesting, I'll have to check it out.

However, you can feel your mind's approximation of what their pain is like.

For example?

So not giving somebody something is punitive? You didn't buy me a Christmas present this year. Why are you punishing me? Why aren't you my personal slave? All this punishment for poor me.

I have offered a number of solutions I don't consider punitive. When Brian bitched about the pay gap, I suggested he look into getting a job in North Dakota near the oil fields where pay is high. When Vastet bitched about not having enough money to invest in a business I made a recommendation of where to go, when and how to try to raise funds.

I routinely offer suggestions of what one might do to improve their personal economic situations. If they decide not to heed my advice I am fine with that. I support them having the liberty to do nothing and remain in their current situation even if I believe they would be better off doing something else. Liberty means having the freedom to govern your own affairs, it does no come with a guarantee you will govern them well. How is that punitive?

You want to create incentive to create jobs? Then let me keep my money and stay out of the way. The incentive is already there, it is called profit and even though profit is unfashionable right now, people still seek it. Greedy assholes like me already want to create jobs. Hiring other people is what allows me to sit here lazily drinking my coffee and posting on forums. What could the government do that would give you incentive to create a job?

I have no problem helping people out in hard times. I just don't believe that using government to force it is desirable. 

Well in my ideal world there wouldn't be any welfare checks. If you are having money handed to you I don't think you are in a position to complain about any requirements the giver decides to puts on the money. If I personally am giving someone money as charity I don't care if they use drugs, but it isn't my role to tell anyone they can't request such requirements before they give it out. So in the case of welfare, I think I as a tax payer should have control of my money. If I decide to give $100 to some homeless drunk and I don't care if he/she buys more booze fine. If some church decides they will only give away the money if the person enters rehab, fine. My money, their money. That's what economic liberty is, you spend your money however you want, and I'll spend mine however I want. When you take liberty away from the individual and put the government in charge of that money you can't be surprised when they tie a series of strings on that money. The government is far more likely to try to control people than I am. 

You don't profit from hoarding any more than a UFC fighter wins by covering up. Right now investors are covering up and trying to protect themselves. Get the government out of the way. You can ask any person who is in a position to invest why they are not investing right now, the answer you will get will be an uncertainty of profitability due to the massive government regulations. Which government regulation will depend on the particular industry.

I suspect that by far the largest reason investors are hoarding is Bamacare. Any business with over 50 employees is going to have large costs and the exact costs can't be calculated until all the rule making is done. For example, every company with over 50 employees has to build a lactation room- even if you don't have any female employees. Rooms don't build themselves and they aren't free so every company with over 50 employees has to set aside $X to build a lactation room, that is money that can't be used to hire a new employee. Most companies are probably waiting to see if Bamacare is going to be struck down by SCOTUS before committing to the expense because most employers probably don't believe they need a lactation room. If Bamacare is upheld, going into the lactation room building business would probably be profitable as many employers will be scrambling to get them built on time.

When those costs are known or investors believe they have enough to cover whatever that cost may be they will start investing again. Until then, practicality dictates that you save your money. My top priority is to protect the business I already have and I'm not going to branch out if I think doing so will jeopardize my current business, doing so would not only be risky for myself but would be irresponsible towards my current business partners and employees. Right now, I believe it would and many other investors have apparently come to the same conclusion I have. 

So I repeat, what could the government do that would cause YOU to create a job? Why is it someone else's responsibility to do it for you?

The loss of money. Investors invest when they believe there will be profit. Right now there are a variety of reasons why a rational person would conclude that starting a new venture would be less than profitable. I listed a specific example in my post and have listed many examples in a variety of posts in this forum explaining why I personally am not expanding and why other business owners I know are not expanding. Get government influence out of the way and investors will find places they believe will be profitable and invest. When you make running a company more expensive you can expect less companies to be started, it is a very simple concept, and virtually every law passed the last several years by GW and Bama have made it more expensive to operate a company unless you have political connections that most of us don't have. Bamacare alone dramatically increases the costs of payroll, which for most companies is by far the largest expenditure. The bailouts, corporate welfare, social welfare, quantitative easing and monetizing the debt costs businesses money both through direct means such as taxes and fees, but just as importantly through indirect means such as inflation and falling consumer demand (or worse by creating false demand).

I'm not asking anyone to do anything other than leave me alone to run my business. You're the one complaining about there not being enough jobs. If you want more jobs, you make them. I'll make jobs as I need them. It makes no difference to me if you become a tycoon and employ thousands or if you spend your life smoking crack in an alley. As far as I'm concerned you are free to contribute a lot to society or contribute nothing. For the most part, those who produce a lot of what is in demand will make a lot of money, those who contribute nothing won't.

Government intervention is at record highs. Why do I hire people? Because I believe that hiring a person will make me more money than I was making before hiring the person. If I don't believe it will make me more money, I won't hire them. 

So is the government forcing you to purchase more expensive health insurance going to make you more or less likely to hire more people?

Is the government charging you more for unemployment insurance for each person you hire going to make you more or less likely to hire more people?

If the government gives one of your competitors massive grants is that going to make you more or less likely to expand?

When you see inflation happening on your core expenditures, does that make your more or less likely to expand?

When you see companies like Boeing get crucified for attempting to build a factory in a right to work state, does that make your more or less likely to expand?

When the government is writing regulations left and right that costs billions for businesses to be in compliance with, does that make your more or less likely to expand?

When there is a decent sized political movement that basically demands to seize the money of the top 1%, and they find friendly support from political leaders, does that make you more or less likely to expand?

When the US government seems to be headed for default, which will trash the value of the dollar, are you more or less likely to expand in the US if you have the ability to expand overseas?

These are all factors that investors consider. Which play larger roles in influencing the decision depends on the individual investor and their particular industry. I am sure there are dozens of other reasons, but they all boil down to a growing federal government that makes starting/operating a business more expensive and more risky. The higher the perceived risk and the lower the perceived reward, the fewer people will be willing to take it.