f13.net

I just saw some of the pictures of the burned and lynched americans in Iraq... Made me sick to my stomach. From what our media reports most of thoose images aren't being aired in the US and you should consider yourself thankfull for it.

It made me wonder just how much media needs to show, I know I for one would rather not see charred and bloody corpses when I turn on the television in the early evening, this is one of the few times I've thought "What if there are children watching this?".

Whoa.. yeah good thing no kids saw that  on TV.. oh wait what about the kids in Iraq that see people of their country dying.  You wonder why they can hate so well, they see the raw violence and we see the PG-13 version.

Yeah keep the reality of war away from us Americans, keep it all nice and clean if we pump enough money into the problem it will go away right?  One of the biggest problems of war is no one knows what war  is really like anymore.. with the exception of the  people dying.


Maybe if they dragged a corpse though Main Street USA we'd think a bit more before we jumped into fighting, we would hold our leaders more accountable for their decisions, and we would better take care of  our people when they came back from service.


So many troops are coming back with their lives in ruins.. but hey atleast they are not dead right?

http://www.progressive.org/april04/zinn0404.html

If children are watching this, they'll just learn an important lesson:

Brown people are bad.

Or the people who have actually been in one.

Very trite, Bstaz.

I'm sure you also think the horrors that Hussein's regime inflicted on his own people were just and right.

While it may very well be quixotic for the US to go off righting international wrongs, and you may have issues with the prioritization, it is hard to deny that a post-Hussein Iraq will be better off.

I'm not sure a warlord-run anarchy is an improvement over well-ordered tyranny, really...

Your implied definition of "well-ordered" is rather suspect.

Do you honestly believe that order through abject terror is acceptable and preferable to what is in place now? I'm not whether to call that myopic, or just sadistic.

I'm sure we believed that Afghanistan was better off after the Soviets got kicked out.  Myopic indeed.

The question isn't whether the Iraqis are better off with Saddam gone, it's "Will they be better off with what we leave them?"

Well, I mean, let's face it - most Iraqis weren't gassed or tortured. Yes, some were, but most? No.

Now? Places that used to have water and electricity reliably no longer do.

I mean, yeah, I have a hard time saying the day-to-day lives of most Iraqis was improved. It may be that we didn't make it any worse, but, really, with the amount of money we threw into the Iraq war, I think one can fairly expect better than "No change."

If every mother fucker who thought that this war was ok was strapped down clockwork orange style when they were children and forced to watch the deaths of every person, civilian and military, who died in this war I can't believe this war would have occurred.  Yes romantic violence like that found in movies should not be shown to children, but to extend that to forcing the media to hide reality is idiocy in the extreme.  Every child should know what war means.  Action should only be taken with a full understanding of the outcome, and when action is taken the media has a responsibility to show us everything that we've done. If you hide our history from our children then they will be doomed to repeat it.

Interesting, so you think forcing kids to watch real violence and death would equal them been so turned off by the ick factor they would never want to go instigate war again?  What happens is war was initiated against them instead by a less enlightened populace?  Besides, isn't there a large body of thought that exposing kids to continued images and stories of violence will actually end up desensitizing them to it thereby making it more like they would be ok with said violence?

Yeah, its off topic, but what the hell. :)

Xilren

Iraq has never attacked the United States.
But I take your meaning, and yes I know war will always exist, but we don't need to initiate it.  If we are attacked we should defend ourselves.  And sometimes life must be taken in order to preserve life.  The problem is a life must be valuable or else it's not worth the price.  Every day I hear of another death with no meaning, usualy without even a name.  And the death of 600 means the same as one.  That's the problem.
We need to know the people involved (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/world/iraq/casualties/facesofthefallen.htm).  We need more truth and less fear.



Yes, I agree, fake violence like that in film and TV does desensitize.  When I watch a piece of fiction that includes the death of 20 or so extras it means nothing to me because I know they will stand up and wipe the fake blood off after the cameras cut.  I understood that from childhood.  People need to know death better. They don't need to fear death, they don't need to hate death, they need to understand death and all its implications.

To be perfectly honest, I think this is about as good as it's going to get in terms of political stability in Iraq. I find it difficult to believe that ethnic and religious strife won't tear the country to pieces as soon as American forces are withdrawn, which means they most likely never will be as long as the current administration or its political heirs are in office: it would be political suicide. While our administration of order at gunpoint will certainly be far more humane than Saddam's, I doubt it will be very long before the majority of the country gets sick of bleeding away a soldier or two per day on Iraq's behalf for well into the forseeable future.

On an unrelated note, the American contractors who were murdered were mercenaries working for Blackwater (http://www.blackwaterusa.com/). You have to wonder how thinly stretched our manpower is over there right now if the government is paying a premium to hire outside guns.

First off, the country's borders are pretty damn artificial anyways, just some arbitrary lines the British and French drew up after the Ottomon empire disintegrated. It's probably better in the long run to carve out some more natural boundries for the major competiting groups now, for the Kurds too, fuck Turkey, they're just a pain in the ass anyways who've never done anything useful in 1000 years.

And they should damn well put this stuff on TV also, there'd be a lot less retards defending murderers and torturers like Saddam Hussein and Castro as great guys who know how to run (into the ground) a country if they saw more graphically what them and their followers did. These people are savages.

The USA is giving them the greatest gift any country could ask for. Being relieved of a crappy despot who cares only about satiating his sick lust for power, and being rebuilt as a liberal democracy that has a chance to really be prosperous in 10-20 years.

yea but what are the odds of Iraq turning into a working liberal democracy?

Good if the USA/UN sticks around. They're a pretty well educated country, and will have tons of $$ once the oil starts pumping. And with the USA/UN in control, it won't be squandered like Saudi Arabia does with their oil money.

Edit: Also I hope vain Americans don't try and replicate their own political system in Iraq... With its conflicting populace, they'd be much better off with a british parliament style govt with propertional representation and also a canadian style federal system where the provinces have a lot of power, to the point where they are semi-autonomous.

The Kurds would get rid of that 'semi' so fast your head would spin.  Unless someone want's to chanel the ghost of Tito, I don't think anything will work.

yea but the US is pulling out in June and handing over to the governing Council.

I think it would be a miracle if it works, you have all these different power centers: 3 major racial/religious groupings (shiites, sunnis and kurds) plus some others, tons of tribal chieftans who pretty much rule their own areas and then you have religious leaders who are probably the most powerful of them all.  Plus you have Al Qaeda trying to stir up as much shit as they can.

All of these groups are armed to the teeth.  Even if somehow they can come to an agreement, which seems unlikely to me, whats the bet that the losing sides in an election are going to decide they dont like democracy anymore and start a civil war?

Not really (http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,606092,00.html).  Whoever the US hands power over to on that date - and it's still unclear who that will actually be - the US will still hold de facto control over Iraq and will be keeping at least 100,000 troops in place for the forseeable future.  The more subtle and more interesting question is how much the US is going to let the UN participate in deciding on how to attempt to build democracy in Iraq.



Slim at best.  As has been repeatedly pointed out, Iraq has no tradition of democracy or open society, it has ethnic and religious divisions with a history of violent clashes, it has several political factions competing for power, each with its own heavily armed militia, it is surrounded by foreign governments with their own vested interests in interfering with its future political development, it's in a region where the overall public sentiment is decidedly anti-western, and to top it off this democratic reform is being imposed by an occupying army.  It was George Soros, who has donated five billion dollars of his own money to promote democratic reform around the world, who wrote that Iraq was such a poor candidate for transformation into democracy, that George Bush was "giving nation-building a bad name".

If you so chose, the improvement could be measured in the number of children not killed by the old gang.

Lynchings are bad, mmkay.

But let's not pretend that similar things didn't happen in the formative years of some/any/all other democracies.

Also, for what it's worth, my understanding was that the pictures in question were of iraqis who had been working in CPA facilities being lynched?

Not that this makes it ok, but it does explain why you don't know the names of the people involved; and why dozens of people who never met them, but happen to live in their hometown, aren't on TV every hour lauding the dead as heroes.



Nor did America in any significant way before the revolution.

Apparently some people died during that one too.



So did America.



ditto



You make a fair point in relative terms (espeicially compared to certain african nations), but the art of the possible applies to getting approval from national legislatures, just as much as to providing the actual military, political, and economic muscle; to do something about criminals who claim to be a running a country's "government" without any obvious mandate from or respect for it's populace.

Iraq was worth doing when it became possible. It became possible because enough people (for whatever reason) wanted it done. This doesn't mean there aren't other criminal gangs running countries that don't need dealing with, it's about saying that it's about time someone started somewhere.

The footage I was shown was of the burned corpses of american civilians being dragged to the streets, once they reached a bridge they hanged said corpses ( blood dripping, arms and and feet hacked off ) from the bridge on display while they were chanting "*Iraqi town name* will be the grave of americans".

My point was that this footage was aired only to shock and quite frankly I am disturbed by our media's choice to move towards becomming the best produced splatter movie around.

As I understand it, Blackwater Security generally provides small arms and small-team combat training to SWAT and other law enforcement special operations units in the US. I have read that they also provide the same service for the Navy's SEAL teams. (Rhetorical question: How good do you have to be to train the SEALs?) I think it unlikely that the US has hired Blackwater as mercenaries, but rather as trainers for the Iraqi police forces. Quite a different thing, really.

America and the major European countries were slowly evolving towards what we now think of as "democracy", the French and American revolutions being culminations of a long, self-driven process.  (this book looks interesting, I'm going to ask my local library to get it (http://www.upenn.edu/pennpress/book/14007.html)).  Contemporary Iraq is being told to transform overnight at gunpoint.  Comparing the two is kind of silly.

Don't misunderstand me about Iraq.  I think that its chances are not good, but I certainly believe that every western country should be doing everything in their power to try and help at this point and in the immediate future.  Unfortunately, I don't have a lot of confidence in the Bush administration's will to really go the distance for Iraq, just as they already seem to have forgotten about rebuilding Afghanistan.

This is BS.  It is not FAKE violence that desensitizes.  It is any violence real or fake.  Violence in the home, and images of violence on television.  If you think fake violence is the only one that desensitizes you should see a theatrical showing of faces of death once and see how many people in 'civilized' countries cheer and laugh in the theatre as people are dying for real on the screen.  I went to one showing of this and was frankly more disturbed by the audience than the images, as disturbing as those were...

Just look at the people in Iraq.  There was a fucking 10 year old boy who collapsed the skull of one of the corpses by standing on it's head while his father watched.  Do you think that boy was desensitized to this by watching scooby doo and the terminator or REAL death and violence.  When you see enough death you LOSE sensitivity, not gain it.

Careful with those absolutes.  By your definition then we unjustly attacked Germany, and should have let them roll over England because they never attacked the U.S.  Also I have to assume you'd have advocated standing by as 800,000 Tutsis were killed in Rwanda.  There clearly are actions short of direct attacks that deserve military intervention (like genocide), but in your opinion Iraq's actions did not warrant this.  How would you have handled Iraq were you in charge?  Afghanistan?

If you're talking WWII didn't we declare war on Japan, and then Germany and Italy declared war on us?  Or were you talking about the lend lease actions?

And please don't bring any of the many genocides that we have stood by and watch happen into the discussion.  I would have sent troops into Rwanda and the Yugoslavia fiasco.  I also want to send forces into Sudan.  The problem is that no country in the world seems to give a shit unless its interests are directly threatened.  Nobody considers piles of corpses to be something worth doing anything about.

Bah, a bit of a rant, but it just burns me up whenever I see some diplofuck standing on a mass grave making tsk tsk noises.  Everyone knows about it, and no one cares to do anything about it.

Let's look at the Iraqi situation in the filter of the American Revolution.

The way Iraq is moving towards democracy would be similar to the American Revolution except that instead of the Americans revolting from within against British rule, the French attacked the Americans because of the French and Indian War. Apparently these damn Americans came into French Canada and took some land, so the French are now striking back. At the end of it all, the French decide to institute democracy based on electorates they appoint, with proportional representation as decided and drawn up by the French.

Not quite the same thing, but close.

Now, as for Iraq, how in the fuck does anyone think they are going to have representative democracy without US forces overseeing it? How well democracy is fostered in Iraq is going to be directly proportional to how long our troops stay there to oversee it. Think about it.

You already have fuckers like Al-Sistani, AN IRANIAN CLERIC, telling members of the Governing Council when to jump and how high to do it. How can he do this? Easy, he has a virtual army of people who will jump at the snap of his fingers, all of whom are armed, and all of whom will do so because they think he speaks with the word of God. They think he has the power of the salvation of their soul in his words. And he isn't the only one.

Saddam ruled through fear, and bilked the populace of billions of dollars. BUT, and this is the important part, "the trains were on time." For the average Iraqi before the first Gulf War, Iraq was a center of learning, a lawful place with a good economy, and a huge amount of religious tolerance. There was none of the stoning of women for not wearing a Hijab shit that you see in Saudi Arabia or Egypt. But, behind all that, he was pulling people off the streets, torturing and killing them simply for looking the wrong way.

It is, IMO, our duty to return that country to a state where the streets are safe, most minorities feel moderately well-represented, and religious whackjobs aren't getting women killed simply because they aren't wearing the right shawl. Why? Because we blew shit up there.

Now, as soon as we can get our own country reasonably like the situation I've described, maybe we can start working on that Iraqi thing.

No offense here Haemish, but I think our country is as close to these ideals as we can truly get. Streets in America could be safer, but I think that most people feel safe enough in the daytime to go walking through the majority of the city they live in. Having that compared to places where you don't go outside to get in the way of gunfire, we are doing pretty well.

As far as people killing people over religion, despite our intolerances individually, we do have a wealth of freedom and communication that others don't have. And, we've made it a point to severely punish those who commit crimes purely on hatred for another group of people.

Finally, the minority thing. I have a sticking point with this one especially. Minorities are well-represented in America, and in many cases, perhaps too much so. They seem to forget that they are the minority sometimes and try and throw weight around regardless. In Atlanta, the majority of the city is minority, and they control the majority of the city politics. But they still bitch, they still blame whitey, and they still are not satisfied with the rights and priviledges they have. Often I wonder if they would only be happy when white people are the ones in chains. If you think I'm talking out of my ass here, I could only wish I was.

Everything becomes a racial issue if a black person is involved. Fire a black superintendent, its because he was black. Fire a black sheriff, it was racially motivated. Redistrict lines, well that was to keep the black vote from counting. Nevermind that the superintendent was on the take, the sheriff was promoted over four better qualified white guys to get the job, and that the county in question is majority white anyway. These are all stories from the Atlanta news within the last 6 months. It's a kneejerk reaction, and its the first bullet out of the gun. I tend to think that as far as minorities are concerned, they will never be happy, but we are doing a damn good job for them now.

Would this help?

<sarcasm>Now, as soon as we can get our own country reasonably like the situation I've described, maybe we can start working on that Iraqi thing.</sarcasm>



My point was, our house is not in order, yet we have no problem telling others how to get their own house in order.

And my point was, our house is in order, and compared to the countries we are in right now, we are a shining beacon of light on a hill.

Joke or not you got my point.

Show it, I say.  Lets not sanitize war through omission.  War sucks, and people need to understand that.

Compared to those countries almost everything is a beaon of light on the hill. Way to tone down your expectations.

By all means start naming countries that provide for Haemish's list better, although I must point out that before you start rattling off European nations, remember to name a few that have a large racial diversity and economic seperation tied to race so we can compare apples to apples.

Sorry, don't believe in "large country is better for the people", don't believe in "Racial diversity at all costs (even when you have to rape some of the tribes and put them under control of their direct enemies)", and surely I dont think economic seperation tied to race is something good. Its more akin to what I associate with racism.

If you mean that in the USA racial diversity works better than in other countries where that racial diversity leads to constant fighting, then I agree with you. But the reason for that is that almost none of those people were native to the USA with a tradition of warfare and abuse of control against each other.

I think what  Paelos is saying name countries that have a large multi-ethnic, multi-ligual society where one group controls most of the wealth that are better places to live than America.  It is easy to find countries with reletavely small populations made up off one ethnicity and religon that are "good" places to live.  However when you start mixing relegions, ethnicities, nationalities, and all the other baggage that humans have together you invariably get conflict.  That conflict in America is largely regulated to verbal debate although debate is elevating the screaming that goes on to a higher level than it should be.  Now there are instances when people are victimized because of their ethnicity by those outside of it but most those cases are prosecuted and the perpetrators sent to jail.  In most other places in the world that have even a small percentage of the above combinations it is usually ends up with one group actively killing the other just because.

I can count on one hand places that I would live if I had to leave the US.  The UK and the  Philippines are the only ones of those that have some sort of real racial/ethnic diversity.  Both of which are much narrower than diversity in America.  Singapore is very small and the diversity there is limited to Channel Chinese, Malay, Indian, and a small Muslim population so doesn't count.  Japan has almost no diversity especially outside of the major cities.  Ireland is along those same lines last time I was there although that might have changed in the ten years since.

Edit for spelling>

Britain, Australia, New Zealand, France, Spain would be other countries that are as multicultural as the US.

The conflict in America IMO is related in a large part to social and economic policies.  No health care, little social security etc, more regressive tax system, very 'tough on crime' etc

This has economic benefits and its nice for the rich people but it has social consequences.   Whereas the European model redistributes wealth to the poor and provides them with services such as free health care and tertiary education, social security etc

Anyway you cant blame America's social problems on race.

Debatable.

Contrary to popular belief, most european models really aren't all that redistributive at all.

Mostly they follow the Frank Ramsey priciple of simply putting the most tax on the things that are least price sensitive.

So,

European, and espeicially Scandanavian fiscal regimes tend to have low taxes on capital and high taxes on labour (since capital is deterred from being invested more easily than workers are deterred from working). Similarly, they typically have high taxes on habit forming or addictive products (alcohol, tobacco, petrol) and low taxes on luxuries, which puts more of the burden on the working poor rather than the rich.

In most European countries, the effective marginal tax rate (the amount of extra tax you would end up paying if you earnt one dollar/pound/euro more) is actually higher for the working poor than any other group.

It's true to say that European economies simply choose to spend more money through monopoly state provision, and it's true to say europeans redistribute more heavily in favour of those who do not work at all, but the general redistribution thing is a myth. The group who get reamed in a european fiscal environment are the working poor.



The thing is, I find it hard to see how this is different from saying....

"Only when my family is absolutely perfect would I be willing to help out the battered wife who lives down the road".

Sure, I can understand a viewpoint that says 'unfortunately we don't have enough resources/military/money/political-will to solve this problem now because we are dealing with this other thing on our own shores first'. And I can understand why people would or wouldn't choose to invade on that basis.

But thats a whole world away from saying that it was actually the right thing to do to let a bunch of criminals continue to claim sovreignty over people with the misfortune to be born in iraq, and so it was somehow wrong or immoral to go in.



Only if you happened to be part of the Sunni middle classes.

Which naturally is what most of the pre-war western media output was covering (because going to iraq was dangerous enough, and so visiting the dodgy parts with no dramatic statues of saddam would just be insane!), and hence is what the current arrangements are being judged against.

On this hapless earth
There's small sincerity of mirth,
And laughter oft is but an art
To drown the outcry of the heart.
-Hartley Coleridge

Be more afraid of those who don't react.



1. That kid would do whatever he thought his dad wanted.
2. The boy and his dad were part of the mob and as much as we don't want to absolve them of guilt we have to.

We see, then, that the disappearance of the conscious personality, the predominance of the unconscious personality, the turning by means of suggestion and contagion of feelings and ideas in an identical direction, the tendency to immediately transform the suggested ideas into acts; these, we see, are the principal characteristics of the individual forming part of a crowd. He is no longer himself, but has become an automaton who has ceased to be guided by his will.
Gustave Le Bon, the Crowd. (http://www.gutenberg.net/etext96/tcrwd10.txt)


Actually they were sinking our civilian ships left and right for almost 2 years prior to our declaration of war.

I should clarify.  If the world is harmed, as such an act does, we should defend ourselves.  That is we the people of a civilized world.  Yes, I think that the war on terror, however botched, is a noble war. And if I had my way there would have been more done to help the people who have been oppressed.  But that's not what Bush is doing.  He is engaged in a war for oil.  (And sadly he's doing just as bad a job at liberating the oil as he is in liberating the people)  He has paid no attention to the civil rights violations in Africa, the Philippines, south America, or China, there simply isn't enough Incentive (read: MONEY) for him. If you have doubts that motives matter in such a case notice what happened when Bush "won"; massive contracts intended to "get the oil flowing again"; People who used to have running water and electricity now don't; brainwashed civilians are still brainwashed, only now half of them have been brainwashed by our propaganda.

Seriously.

If someone was after oil. There are FAR easier and simpler ways to get oil.

Iraq is about two things.

1) Finishing his father's business.

2) The conservative theory that if you could get one successful democratic arab country the others would fall like dominoes, which would in turn earn someone a place in history by solving the israel/palestine issue (not to mention saving assloads of tax dollars).

The first might be ignoble, and the second is probably overreaching, but either way, it puts Bush in the position of having goals aligned with the interest of the people of Iraq and the rest of the region.

This is as good as you are likely to get.

First of all point 1 is a result of point 2 and second of all point 2 is a result of oil. You must understand THEY DON'T GIVE A SHIT ABOUT THE PEOPLE OF THE MIDDLE EAST!  All they want is a guaranteed supply of oil and they think the best way to do that is through a "friendly government" that's why they don't say boo when the Saudis do the same shit we yell at the other countries for.  They went to war thinking, "oil controls our economy and we need to control oil", and as valid as you may think that point is, it's like saying I want money so it's ok to steal.  The truth is the conservative doctrine is not aligned with the people of the Middle East, it's just that we plan to kill any people that aren't.

Oil is a motive, yes. Let's take a bit of a realist view on this area please. If the oil stops flowing, we (the civilized and prosperous liberal democracies of the west and asia) are seriously fucked. Oil is hugely important to our economies, and even just cutting it off to the USA would seriously depress the whole world.

It's not a good idea to have this kind of power in the hands of some pea brained despots, they could really hose us bad. That's why rescuing Iraq and turning it into a prosperous democratic state is important, because it's estimated to be sitting on reserves that are as big as the Saudi's.

Maybe that's not very politically correct or humane, but it's necessary to solve the dilemma of us being extremely vulnerable to a 1970s style oil crisis.

We haven't turned Iraq into a democracy, nor are the odds good that we will.  In all likelihood, all we've done is caused a huge problem that we'll be back to solve in about 10 years or so, after the factions have finished genociding each other, and we are forced to go back in and pick up the pieces.

We don't have an oil problem, we have an energy problem.  Oil is but one way to get energy, there do exist other ways.  We're focusing on oil simply because there are oilmen in the white house, and a good deal of support for the political parties comes from oil companies.

Any sensible person would look at the situation and try to figure a different solution.  A pity we aren't being given any real choice this time around.  Or are likely to ever have a real choice again.  Ah well, apathy wins for them in the end!

BWAHAHAHA!
Ok, there might be a few luxury items that aren't taxed as hard - but most of them are taxed for what they're worth.

And the model is redistributive, but not in the sense you think. Money is getting redistributed all over the place - just not between social layers ;)

I would certainly accept that the model redistributes wealth from the working poor to the idle poor and the idle rich.

I'm not sure that's a recipe for social harmony for ever after though.

No, it isn't. It's a system that works "ok". It works well with some issues, and horribly with others - just like every other system there is.

It has worked pretty well this far, but that's because most people have been too (stupidly) honest to take advantage of the system. That's no longer the case. Once people start abusing it, the system breaks down.

What happens then is that too many people are taking money out of the system, this in return results in increased taxes, which in turn result in either a) more poor people, b) higher wages, or c) both. Not a very nice cycle.

(Un)fortunately, we have no foreign debt, and a reasonably large cash reserve, so the politicians can just push the problem in front of them until another issue will make this situation intolerable. When 1/5 (or what it is) of our total workforce retire (as in: are not replaced by new workers) over a 10-year period about 20 years from now. I can only imagine what will happen - and I plan to be long gone by then.

Just to point out how insanely expensive everything here is:
When I was in the US we drove through a neighborhood (I can't remember what it was called), and I was told that it was one of the most expensive places in Florida to buy a house. So I asked what a house there would cost - around $ 200k I think it was. I started laughing - where I lived then that would've gotten me a medium sized apartment.


And just in a halfhearted attempt not to hijack:

There are enough people on this board who have claimed to prefer anarchy-like government systems. This is what happens in an anarchy-state if a sizable number of people don't like you.
While it is macabre and inhuman - it's neither shocking nor surprising. At least they killed them first...

Back in the day we didn't do that, we tied them to a stake, lit a bonfire, and shook hands while we watched them burn - knowing we had done the world a favor and that we were one step closer to be admitted to heaven.

Some things change, some stay the same. Human nature has not changed overly much.

It's not like we can just flick a switch and no longer be dependant on oil. First off, it would cost a hell of a lot to suddenly replace every vehicle's current engines with electric ones. Second, electrical engine and battery technology is way behind gas combustion engine technology which means initially a huge loss in efficiency. Now, a society that has gone from kitty hawk to mach 7 scramjets in 100 years could probably get them up to par relatively quickly, but since we're a capitalist society ruled by the invisible hand, why would anyone do this until the oil business became unprofitable?

I'm not defending it, I'm just saying switching to alternative energy sources is just incredibly unrealistic until the cost of producing oil goes way up. We still should be researching them though, cuz we know the day will come, but then you run into the brickwall of politics when a president is presented with the choice of putting x billions into energy research or education/healthcare (I wonder which buys more votes?).

How about we divert 'oil procurement' funds. You know some of the 399.1 Billion spent on our military.

generally the redstributive effect is from the rich to the poor.  Its not just a question of handouts in the form of unemployment benefits, family welfare benefits, pensions, superannuation etc  Its also things like free health care, free education, legal aid and any number of services provided by the government.

There are always people who abuse the system, there are always dishonest people and it doesnt expect people to be honest to work.

What it does do is lead to a more stable society, less poverty, less crime etc.  Has its downsides too but it does do what it aims to do.

No, the effort is from the rich to the poor - the effect is from the "regular joe" to the poor. The rich can always get off; we're a small country so it's very visible here. Once people make a certain amount of money they start jumping the hoops to reduce their tax (basically the equivalent of setting up a dummy company, doing this the right way they slash their income tax in half - the tax reduction from this is supposed to be removed this year though). The extremely rich just move their assets elsewhere and pay no tax at all. But this is the same all over the world. Just take Hollywood - not one movie with profit in what, 30 years now? Maybe one of the largest organized (non-criminalized) tax evasion stunts in history.

Don't get me wrong, it's not that bad really - atm (hell, when looking around it seems like one of the best systems to me). The free health care, education, legal aid, and whatever else other people have to pay for directly that I just take for granted, and never have to worry about - I think that's worth a lot.

But the system is far from perfect, no point in pretending otherwise. And when we get the same influx of pensioners that everybody else are getting a few years from now - the system, as it is today, is probably not going to be able to handle it. The worker/non-worker ratio is going to be too low, not enough money from income tax compared to what is needed for the benefits the pensioners have earned through a long life of paying tax. There is currently no solution to this problem.

Note: I'm pooling a few other payments in with tax here, as the difference is only technical (the money is gone when you get your paycheck, and it's not differentiated on in any budgets - only difference is the name).

Yes, rich folks are usually assholes. If they weren't most of them wouldn't be rich to begin with.

I for one would revoke the citizenship of everyone that moves to one of those tax paradises like Monaco. Don't pay here, you are not one of us. Easy as that.

But that would mean alot less gold medals in sports!

You know how many gold medals I could press from all those taxes? I'd actually DROWN in them.

Saving the battered wife down the street does not result in thousands killed, homes bombed to shit and back, families without basic running water and electricity for weeks at a time, etc. The effects of said altruistic individual action are not nearly so wide-reaching as "altruistic" government action.

The war was not about oil. Oil is a side venture, just something that happens to be there, and happens to make Iraq strategically viable. Iraq would never ever have been an issue in modern times if there had never been oil there.

The war was, as someone else said, 1) finishing Daddy's business, and 2) the neocon view that just 1 stable democracy in the region will have a sort of reverse domino effect.

Of course, the "reverse Domino effect" makes about as much fucking sense as the ridiculous "Domino effect" theory on Communism that got us into some of these fucking messes in the first place. The idea that one country in a region that fell to a Communist revolution would cause other countries in the region to follow suit was stupid in the extreme, and got us involved overtly in Vietnam, and covertly in places like Iraq, Afghanistan, etc. I think neocons are under the misapprehension that the "oppressed majorities" of countries like Saudi Arabia and other Arab Islamic countries with oil will see a stable, free democracy in Iraq and suddenly rise up against their oppressors. It totally ignores the fact that most of the oppressed minority are oppressed not just by restrictive governments, but their religion as well. Most of the Arabic countries use Islam as a fulcrum for the justification of their government's existence. You can't overcome that just by having one free democracy.

And people who make broad generalizations are usually idiots.

Our prosperity was built by people ("rich assholes") who's entrepreneurial investments were encouraged by low taxes. Tampering with that by looting and discouraging the most productive citizens with socialist policies that redistribute wealth to deadbeats will lead to our downfall. Governments should be focusing on ensuring equality of oppurtunity for everyone to compete in the free market. That means providing good & cheap education to all, eliminating glass ceilings, and preventing "market failures" from spoiling competiton (aka monopolies/cartels). Too many democratic goverments are forgetting this, and adding more and more social programs to buy votes at the expense of our future quality of life.

Well, the rich assholes was tongue-in-check. But if you really want to discuss this topic Snowspinner, evidence and human nature are your enemy. You usually don't become rich by being nice, non-confrontational, and always playing by the rules. Because if those are your character traits, you get screwed by the competition, by your own employees, by your manager, whoever in your vicinty has the ruthlessness you lack.

Sure there are exceptions, but those are not exceptions that break the rule.
But let me rephrase for you: " Yes, rich people usually evade a good part of their taxes by using loopholes or by paying people to use loopholes for them. These people are assholes"

And Speedy Cerviche, you have a very simplicistic view of economy. Just one point. How exactly do you propose to provide good and cheap education to all if not by paying for that education with tax income?

By that logic, poor people are just assholes who are too stupid to get ahead.

Where do the poor people come from all of a sudden?

Did I talk about poor people anywhere? I was talking about taxes mainly and management of existing money secondary. Poor people usually pay less to none of the first and don't have an abundance of the second.

You're making an argument from human nature - because rich people do X, they are assholes.

The problem is that 90% of the population would do X if they knew how. 90% of the population would be cut-throat, avoid paying taxes, etc. I mean, shit, you think rich people are the only people who fudge their taxes?

Exactly, rich people have more abilities to do so. And, of course, more reason. to because the stakes are higher.

Therefore a tax system must take that into account, it should go specifically after loopholes primarily used by rich people. Thats where the money for the government is in.

So, when I say rich people usually are assholes I am called an idiot for generalization, and then you yourself call being an asshole basic human nature. Still know where your point in this discussion is? If you find it, please let me know.

The "Poor people are assholes who are too stupid to succeed" claim was one of those things where I try to show that your position has completely unacceptable consequences.

You've somewhat foiled this debate tactic by walking right into this unacceptable position without blinking, but that was pretty much my point.

Next time try to debate points and not tactics and you might fare better, Snowspinner.

Expecting something else than general contempt for people from a MMORPG player is a wee bit optimistic, even for you!

Truth be told, I think I faired just fine.

I mean, how are you defining rich anyway? Millionaires? Multi-millionaires? Shit, plenty of millionaires are just people who grew up in the Depression and never actually spent anything.

Plenty of them pay their taxes. And even with all of these alleged tax breaks, the rich take up a whole lot of tax burden. The top 20% pays over 65% of the tax burden. The top 5% pay more than the bottom 80% combined. The top 1% pay more than the bottom 60% combined.

They're doing their fair share. They're just an easy scapegoat, because they have something you want. But they're not evil bastards. Your generalization was idiotic.

It's not that complicated Tebonas, just cut back on more useless programs.

Trying to construct a personal agenda that I carry out? Trying to paint me as jealous of rich people? Wow, are we getting desperate already?

They have nothing I want. If I wanted to earn more money I would just have to suck up to some superiors and kick some coworkers in the crotch to proof my "leadership ability". But then I am rather a slacker reading message boards. It beats actually working in my job.

And Its more fun that way.

If you actually want to discuss those perchentages, please provide me with a link that does not only show the absolute perchentages, but the relative perchentages as well. I'm not really motivated enough to look up US taxes, but from the taxes and practices around here I would take your numbers with a grain of salt. You know, company houses and company cars as part of your payment which are taxed better than getting paid in money alone. Part of your wages hidden by some neat little tricks, and, last but not least, an actual top tax rate that makes wages over a certain amount practically tax-free.

The statistics took me ten minutes to find. In five minutes, I found another set of numbers for a different year that were pretty close to what I found the first time.

If you're invested in this issue, you can find the numbers with no trouble. Consider it a sniff test to tell if you're actually interested in the issue on any level beyond grandstanding.

You ARE a bit dense, aren't you? Those numbers are pretty worthless without context. Five minutes to get them were five minutes too many. You want to use these numbers, bring the context.

I'm not here to prove your points for you. If you can bring me perchentages that take income into consideration as well as taxes, whereas nonmonetary income is treated as if the benefits were bought with money after taxes, then I accept your numbers. Until then they are not relevant to the discussion at hand.

I think that taxes hit the middle class the most. If you want to challenge that view, then do so. But not by showing that the top 20% pay 65% of the tax burden. Because if their income is 70% of the total income they actually pay less than they should. Whereas if their income is 50% of the total income they are poor sods.

See - context!

So basically you have an idea how to refute me, but want me to go do the research on it?

Basically, I could provide you with some Austrian numbers, though. By virtue of that being my native language and being more google-friendly to me. Please excuse that I don't learn economic english just for the pleasure of refuting an attack on me.