I would enjoy that but you are here to belittle people. Know how I can tell. I gave you compliment a few pages ago that I really felt and not a word back. Couldnt stick it my face so it was boring.

My step father was a self made man. He came to the US as a fucking immigrint from France when he was sixteen, and his first job was being a paper boy. In the end he had his own business, a motor repair shop. He started by working at General Electric in his early twenties, and after fifteen years there he had saved up his money to open up his own shop. My step father worked hard, and usually worked full days on Saturdays. But his business was made on the backs of many others. You see, he didn't do it all alone. He had employees - a dozen of them, half of which worked for my father for nearly twenty years. I had known them since I was a child; I thought they were family. My family's business was built through the hard work of dozens of people.

Minte is no different. Without the blood, sweat, and tears of his employees... Minte would nothing.

I complimented you on your weight loss once. You never replied.

Asshole.

Check the times that I posted Tony. If I missed something I apologize. I was away since 6am today on a business trip. I turned on my computer tonight and saw this thread hadn't died. I also read the things that the people I just responded to wrote about me.

And now I read from you that I am only here to belittle people. I take offense to that.
Search my posts on this board from the beginning and you will see I have not ever started a thread to belittle anyone. A solid 90% of the posts I have ever made here were in car threads. But those seem to have fallen out of favor with this new crowd here.

If someone attacks you, are you not going to respond?

if I missed it I'm sorry but he didn't miss it.

1. You know very well that I think we should bring home ALL of our troops. From the middle east, Afghanistan, German, Japan, etc.
It's a huge waste of money and it's bankrupting us.

2. We are NOT at war. We haven't been since 2002. We actually won both of those wars in a matter of days.
We are in a state of "Occupation".
Again..neither you or I want that. But the thieving federal govt. and their buddies in the corporations who make trillions off military spending DO.

3. When Dick Cheney said "deficits don't matter" he was talking to the Treasury Secretary about winning an ELECTION. He was pointing out that Reagan won with a deficit. I can see you are trying to take that statement completely out of the context it was said in and insinuate that Cheney just openly declared that as if it were a matter of policy.
But that's not true.
And also..the deficits he talked about were in the billions of dollars.
Obama is running a TRILLION and a half.

4. I've heard Bill Maher say that same thing about the wars "not being on the books"
What does that mean? Do you have knowledge of the actual federal budget that shows that? Or are we all just repeating something that a liberal media guy said?
I'm just asking about that because I"m curious.
But if that is true...then wouldn't that mean the wars "went on the books" in one of the recent years?
What about all these other years that Obama has been president?

And you still are not addressing this fact: Obama is President RIGHT NOW. And RIGHT NOW we are spending 10.6 BILLION dollars a day.
Don't you think that is ridiculous? And don't you think it's obviously unsustainable? And can you show me the math where the feds can actually tax the American people 10.6 BILLION dollars per day no matter how much they raise the tax rate?

You can't. Because we are being fucked over by the federal govt. The same ones you want to give MORE money to.

Think about that Tony. Forget Obama and Romney for a second. It doesn't matter which one of them gets in...this time next year the feds will be spending MORE per day than they are now.
It never, ever stops growing and expanding.

That is until our credit runs out. Then it's going to be riots in the streets unless we do something now.

Employees are tools. It takes a great talent to find the best and get the best out of them. Success in business definitely takes a great deal more than just "having employees". Every failed company had employees. Are the employees to blame for failed companies? Or they just get improperly credited for success?

You have no idea what I've done in the past ten years, do you?

Why shouldn't we raise the taxes over anyone making $250k a year? This the demographic of people who can afford it the most. The average family making $50,233k a year is barely getting buy...

The money is going to waste your tax dollars anyhow. (Btw, thank you - Your federal tax dollars just built a $350 million freeway bypass around my tiny little town!) And that money is going to come from somewhere, but that's okay... It's gonna come from your pocket one way or another.

I thought we were told in the 1990's when Clinton put a national sales tax on gasoline that it was going to pay for all federal highways and we weren't going to use income tax for that?

So that means that our gasoline taxes paid for that freeway correct?

Shouldn't the real question be: Why SHOULD we raise the taxes?

Is that going to pay for the 10.6 Billion dollars the feds spend EVERY DAY?

With the "tax them" theory...the American people need to pay 10.6 BILLION dollars in taxes per day in order for the Feds to break even.
Is that even mathematically possible?

Essentially what he did was go to Congress and ask for more money to fund the wars each time the money he had previously asked for ran out. This money was given as supplemental spending bills so it added to the overall national debt, but it never appeared on Bush's official budget.

It is similar to what might happen in the case of a major natural catastrophe. The president asks for a supplemental spending bill to be passes so we can pay to help the people affected and fixed the damage caused by the disaster. Apparently the president has the ability to choose not to add this money to his current budget or future budgets so while the full national debt increases, it still makes his budget look a lot less off than it really might be.

Thanks for explaining that. So it isn't the entire war that wasn't "on the books" but the portion that was needed when the original funding ran out. (however much that was)

So the debt still occurred. And WAS counted. It just didn't show up on the Bush budget and made it appear his BUDGET wasn't that big. But his DEBT still was.

So does anybody know when (and why) Obama put that on HIS budget? Which year did he do that/ And how? I thought that there hasn't been even ONE budget passed since Obama has been President?

I did not assume I knew.. I asked a question. It's still there, if you would like to scroll back and reread it.

You on the other hand drafted a fairly lengthy statement about what you think I do and do not know. Do you think that I started in business working in an office? Would it surprise you to know,that at the beginning I ran punch presses, drove trucks,learned to TIG weld..then after 4.5 years of college took a tool & die apprenticeship and built dies for over 8 years? Without all those years of real experience it's tough to say whether I would've been able to grow my companies.

Most of the war was supplemental spending under Bush. Obama put on the books from day one. Also you have remember there over 300 million people is this country. If the Gov spend only $5 on each one of them it would be 1.5 trillion.

Also bring all the troops home what do you do with them then? and all the businesses that support that army.Its not cut and dry.

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2009...ighing-the-ir/
n his address last night on the economic crisis, President Barack Obama made it official: No more budgetary sleight-of-hand at the Pentagon.

As we have noted here before, the U.S. military has largely paid for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan through emergency spending measures, in effect keeping wartime costs off the books. In addition to masking skyrocketing budget growth at the Department of Defense, this process has allowed the services to treat budget supplementals as a piggy bank for new procurement. Members of Congress may have grumbled about poor oversight, but they have largely acquiesced.

Obama’s message? Not anymore.

"That is why this budget looks ahead ten years and accounts for spending that was left out under the old rules – and for the first time, that includes the full cost of fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan," he said. "For seven years, we have been a nation at war. No longer will we hide its price."

This is the first real move toward belt-tightening at the Pentagon; we’ll see if the new Defense Department budget reflects it, and Obama’s pledge to stop "paying for Cold War-era weapons systems we don’t use."


Meanwhile, the president is weighing the options for a withdrawal from Iraq. In his speech, Obama said he would "soon announce a way forward in Iraq that leaves Iraq to its people and responsibly ends this war."

What that means is that combat troops could likely be out of Iraq by the end of next summer. The Washington Post quotes anonymous officials as saying Obama will announce a withdrawal plan later this week that would have U.S. forces out by August 2010. A substantial force may stay on, however, to train and advise the Iraq military and conduct limited counterterrorism missions. As the New York Times notes, one of Obama’s national security advisers said during the campaign that that the force could number between 30,000 to 55,000 troops.

Meanwhile, the fighting in Iraq is not over. In the volatile city of Mosul, gunmen in police uniforms opened fire on U.S. soldiers, killing a U.S. soldier and an interpreter.

Check your math.

Raising taxes on the rich/wealthy would not help anything. Anyone who thinks that it would is fucking delusional. I'm not rich/wealthy nor am I an American, but the REAL problem, just like Canada or any other country is the Government and all of their wasteful spending. Raising taxes will NOT stop that and it will not help a god damned thing.

As for "You didn't build your business" comments.. That has to be one of the most retarded things that I have ever heard. If businesses were not created all the people who would have gotten a job would be where? That's right.. JOBLESS and broke. Why expect them to pay even higher taxes? You know what will happen if they do? The company will, if they are losing $ due to it, either fire some people OR lower wages.. In either case it's a lose/lose situation.

So all this "fuck the rich" crap is idiotic in my opinion. Without all those rich people all working people would not have a job to begin with. If you think you're better then go do something on your own and make the millions you think you will make, but when you fail don't go crying to whoever about how unfair shit is or how high taxes were or whatever the fuck else.

As I said, I'm not rich/wealthy, (more like poor lol)but I don't bash on the rich just because my life is crap compared to theirs. Who's to say that just because they are rich their life is so great? They possibly have much more stress to deal with then you so just live your life as best as you can and stop bashing everyone else that makes more then you.

let me assure you fuckwit i neither have tourettes nor any other affliction


you think the fact that your manual for your obnoxious car that you knjow for a fact 99% of people cant afford is a little humor ?

were meant to relate to that and have a little laugh are we minte? at you or with you ?


you have have silverspoon shoved up the arse, dribbling so much money you have to tell everyone about it disease

nobody like a rich cunt who insists on tellin everyone how rich they fuckin are you fucking wanker

So if Obama "put it on the books"...then that was resolved after the first year of his presidency. Correct? And also...I thought he has been unable to get a single budget passed since he took office? So how did he put it "on the books"?
And if he did it right away...then HE is responsible for us spending 10.6 BILLION dollars per day NOW!

Also your math is off bro. $5 times 300 million would be $1.5 billion dollars not trillion.

As for the military coming home...It's time to change the way our country works. IF we have to rely on having troops all around the world to keep our economy afloat...then we need to CHANGE that. I'm sorry if they come home from partying in Germany or Japan and have to enter the work force like the rest of us. But it's time. WW2 has been over for 70 years.

You can't just keep justifying spending 10.6 BILLION dollars per day. You can keep trying. But eventually we will run out of credit and we can't keep printing money (and making it worthless) forever.

When that happens..then WHAT do you suggest? Magic? Wishful thinking?
Because when that day comes...EVERYBODY is going to lose ALL their entitlements. And the military won't have any money either.

The gravy train has to stop Tony.

Tell me...how can you tax the American people 10.6 BILLION dollars every day?
Answer: You can't. And you shouldn't anyway.

:1orglaugh:1orglaugh

wow man you are fucking wonderful - just ask you!

thanks for dropping in to tell us how fuckin rich you are again faggot

The war cost is still hanging around because we are still there and still spending money. Bush kept it off the books for his entire presidency, but since it is ongoing Obama has added it back on in each of the last four years and it will be there next year and every year until we are out of Afghanistan.

His budgets haven't passed, but there are parts of them that still stand. Money we have already spent or that is spent by law like Social Security etc stands, it is all the extra cuts or spending that he wants to make that don't get passed so in the end he will have a final budget, but all of it may not end up actually getting enacted. A good example of this is Bush's No Child Left Behind. The cost of it was on his budget, but most of it never got funded so the money was actually never spent.

And when there are bright, hard working, energetic, law abiding citizens of this country who become displaced by shifts in the economy, or personal tragedies from poor health, or a simple lack of aptitude... What should we do with them? We used to kill them with war or let them die from plagues. Those options are pretty much done. We will have a large and growing segment of the population comprised of 'extra people' who society does not need. Old people, disabled people, dim people, unlucky people.... And they aren't going to go away. In fact they will eventually be the majority. Automation, technology and cost will always combine to discard more people. Any dip in the overall economy and even more people get discarded.

The simple cost of caring for parents who now live twenty or thirty years beyond what they used to Is crushing for many hard working citizens. As populations grow older and ninety becomes a normal lifespan, most people are having one or two offspring at most and tech continues to reduces the number of people needed. We will have a massive population of extra people. Taking care of the less fortunate and providing a safe, sanitary somewhat comfortable life for them is the responsibility of our society. That means basic healthcare, food, education...not ferraris.

It is a strategic error to talk in terms of screwing the lazy good for nothing 47%... We ought to be talking about finding some way to put the extra people to use and actualising their full potential without denigrating the fact that their potential is less than someone else. Getting the most out of our extra people will go a long way toward fixing this country, and being respectful of them rather than disdainful will come in handy when they become the well armed majority that they almost are already.

his new mercedes has a 600 page manual you know!

Maybe if you didn't have 15k posts you might have some money, and not work at Walmart.

You worked for adult.com, quit or were fired, then worked for Lightspeed I believe, then bunny ranch, then lightspeed I think a 2nd time? now whatever you do.

Basically you are a grunt right?

Agree 100%. Stop big businesses outsourcing to the third world, 10% import tax on non essential goods like food and oil. Take more from the rich, put it into projects with jobs suitable for the poor and problem solved.

Your cost of living goes up, but you solved the problem and in time it will bring down the deficit.

And do what with the money?




A big part of Government spending is employing people, 97% of cuts will result in lost jobs.

And here you see where some of it went. Minte can you tell us where the waste is exactly. What do you produce?

Good thinking. Exempt basic goods, foods and add it to sales tax like how VAT works in Europe. Slap 10% on top of gas guzzling cars, yachts, exec jets, designer clothes. etc.

The problem with you guys is you see all the Government does as free without realising it has to be paid for. So what if a few less of you can fly down to Cancoun and spend your money or buy a Merc. And a few people lose their jobs.

I'll bet some of you still think the "Trickle Down" effects works.

http://www.lolbrary.com/content/990/...own--19990.jpg

Paul, you are supposed to be here: https://gfy.com/forumdisplay.php?f=54

If you stop the spending. You take food off peoples tables. Some of them your customers. You're thinking is short term. Do you want tax cuts that put your members out of work and stop them buying from your site?

Yes they did. The problem was Bush's level of maths stopped at how much him and his mates earn.

Only 400. Mitt will raise that number. It will mean many more having less, but he doesn't care.

Because it's not in their favour enough already. :upsidedow

Stop coming up with logic. Some idiot will point out countries around the world with Governments who over spent, now forced to cut spending and got massive unemployment. Americans never look across State Lines unless they're off invading somewhere.

And they argue it's not low enough. :1orglaugh

Don't fucking ASK them. Let them know the tax code MUST CHANGE.

http://www.fishink.us/wp-content/upl...f-tax-cuts.jpg

They're in China.

His theory falls down right at the beginning. Giving the middle class more money to spend would result in more American jobs in the 1950s. Today it will result in more jobs in China.

The world is a far smaller place than it was when I left school and got a job. UK produced loads of goods it sold to the rest of the world. America's rise was based on selling arms in two World Wars. And carried on looking inward for sales of produced goods. We rarely saw an American car in Europe, same goes for many other things. Look at the American products we do see all the time and where America leads. Boeing, Microsoft, Apple and others.

This shows you the way forward. Giving the money to middle class to buy Nike shoes made in an Indian factory or a BMW. Isn't going to boost jobs in the US. Giving the poor money to spend in Ralphs, Wal-Mart, Costco, Safeways will. Trickle up works when people spend the money in their home town far better than trickle down when they spend it in Neiman Marcus.

So you don't have to answer questions based on the truth?

Man up and face it, you don't have an answer.

Real life example of tax cuts for the middle class.

Yesterday I received a check from the UK Tax Office, it was a refund on some of the tax I over paid on my pensions. $400 so no big deal, yet if it was 5% of my taxes or $8,000 a year it would be a whopping hole in the UK tax revenue if applied to everyone on an income that brings taxes up to that level.

$400 tax, yes someone earning $32,000 a year. Would get $400 back a year with a 5% tax cut, which would mean a lot of people losing jobs or more borrowing/debt for the UK.

Now what will I do with my whopping sum of $400? I might buy a new Nokia phone or some more clothes. If every one does the same, the shops might need to employ an extra shop keeper, the ports might have to employ a few more people, but it's so automated the odds are they won't. Truth is the extra spending will be balanced by those who lost their jobs and have no money to spend.

Nokia in the Far East might take on more workers and build more factories. Unlikely because one sale gained is one sale lost.

On the off chance they buy an iPhone, again it will be made in China. Someone who lost a job will not be buying a new iPhone.

So where does this extra spending produce extra jobs or wealth?

This whole philosophy is based back in the 50s and 60s, when Chinese people were starving to death. I dream magazines will come back, you dream of these times coming back.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ZDTxPzd57I...0/12280296.jpg

The fat cats have brained washed you.

at the end of the day raising taxes in so called rich (250k a year isn't rich) even raising taxes on the ultra rich, while it would have more effect still won't solve the problem and making poor people and anyone who doesn't pay income taxes because they don't make enough pay taxes definitely won't help at all since the amount wouldn't add up to much. the idea that if taxes are raised in the higher income brackets, businesses won't hire might be true for smaller to medium businesses but for the huge powerhouses, it makes no difference as there is no need to hire any more people than is needed to create their product or do whatever they need to do.

the problem is government is broken and only works to serve those who fill their pockets via lobbyists, donations and other back room deals. unless you are super rich, you aren't even on their radar of caring. they make sure who gets what contracts and ensures the war machine continues on at huge profits for the companies who supply them. not to mention the financial sector who seems to have a government license to risk it all and when it blows up in their faces, use taxpayer money to make up their losses. until this changes, debt will continue to increase.

The product we sell to Vietnam is not exclusive to them, We have been selling the product all over the world for many years.
The product line is by-pass oil filtration systems. They are fabricated steel oil tanks that run in conjuction with a normal spin-on filter. They do a far superior job of filtering oil. On cars and trucks the oil lasts much longer. Most fleets that use them only have to add oil and change the filter element everfy 25,000 miles. In Vietnam they are used primarily on the fleets of fishing and navy boats and ships.

I am at the office now and just looked. The tank department has 23 people. The tanks are made from US steel,(jobs) We buy welding gases and wire(jobs) to make the tanks. We buy filter elements(jobs hose and fittings(jobs) cardboard packing(jobs). We send them to a local powder coat(shipping jobs) who paint them(jobs). They come back to us after paint and are assembled. From there they are packed in a shipping container(jobs) and trucked to Long Beach(jobs) where longshoreman(jobs) load them on to a ship.

How many jobs do you suspect are created from that one product? But there is more. There are administrative jobs that purchase the materials,schedule
the trucks,expedite the manufacturing,there is insurance documents and finally wire transfers.

This one product line ultimately creates jobs for hundreds of people if not thousands.

I stand corrected.

Coprolalia is involuntary swearing or the involuntary utterance of obscene words or socially inappropriate and derogatory remarks. Coprolalia comes from the Greek κόπρος (kopros) meaning "feces" and λαλιά (lalia) from lalein, "to talk".[1] The term is often used as a clinomorphism, with 'compulsive profanity' inaccurately referred to as being Tourette syndrome.

Ben, you have been in adult for a long time. If you are so impressed about a Mercedes, it might be time to consider another line of work. There are plenty of webmasters here that own nicer cars than I do.

There are much smarter people than us who have wrestled with this question for decades. And to date there is no solution.

It's going to be very tough for a lot of people. The only thing the human race has going for it is that it is resilient. I wonder how people survive in places like the Sahara or the jungles of south america. Yet they do. And for many the future probably will boil down to basic survival.

I am Canadian so feel free to skip this post right off the bat, since apparently being Canadian means I am automatically retarded around here.

I don't agree with raising taxes on the rich. I don't understand the disrespect towards the successful people that is happening in your country right now. For some reason you guys have turned the successful into blood thirsty animals raping the country when in fact most of them are the reason you or your family even have an job / income. I guess this technique makes it easier for you to place the responsibility on them to save the country. They build a business from scratch, from working their asses off, employ many people which stimulates more consumer spending in their local areas and possibly other places such as Minte's business. They pay more taxes in one year than most of us will pay in 100. You guys should be promoting small business & entrepreneurship right now more than anytime in your history. I have to agree with Minte & 12clicks (Some self ego comments about their wealth was shallow & could have been done without), I don't think raising taxes would help, the politicians would just find other ways to waste this newly taxed cash on payouts for their buddies instead of paying down your debt. Spending needs to be cut on wars & used to promote healthy business in your country. Start teaching the youth small business / entrepreneurship classes in high schools, money management, etc...

When "raising" taxes means returning to pre-Bush era tax rates when everyone prospered more and better. Well.. why should I have to continue the question. The end.

And companies like yours, THAT ARE BASED IN THE US, are the only way the US will get out of the hole it dug for itself.

Cutting Government spending will not. Because;

Cut spending = losing jobs = less spending.

Cutting taxes = more money in some people's pockets = more spending on imported items.

Cutting spending x cutting taxes = standing still or losing US jobs and increasing non US jobs. Because the odds of Robbie buying one of your filters is 1-1,000,000,000,000 And the odds on him buying a Nokia phone are evens.

But it does make the very rich richer. :Oh crap

You seem to be totally unaware that economies run in cycles regardless of who is in office. Maybe we cause another .com boom where retards run wild and where spending on online advertising alone was on pace to pass the GDP of the nation within a couple years and where investors are investing in .com startups that have no product or business plan again? Maybe we start allowing IPO's for tech companies that have no business plan, much less a product again? Any ideas on how to do that? Or you think it was just about "tax rates"?

The end.

daer idiot, you'd have a point if you wanted to get rid of ALL the Bush tax cuts and not just the ones benefitting your betters.

Sorry for the math being off. I agree but how do you do that?
You let the army go ? Where do all those people find work?
What do you do about companies that pay people close to nothing so they need gov benefits but work full time(aka walmart)? And let them get another job is not the answer in lots of places.
Where do you cut?
Also FYI riots in the streets wont be people like us.We have shit to lose. It will be the people that didnt have shit and we cut more from them.
Also raising taxes wont fix it alone. You got to cut and raise rev.
But this is the bullshit the gop do to get the base all fired up and it worked. Read the two Santa Claus theory
During Bush they had wars unfunded, a medicare drug program unfunded and that was fine. Ryan the numbers guy voted for it and any spending bush wanted.
If Romney wins and has the house and senate. Let me tell you how it will go. They will say omg its worse than we thought we have to save the economy and they will start spending at a level you have never seen. And you will support it because all of a sudden it makes sense now. They will also lower taxes on the rich and kiss the mortgage deduction goodbye. They will also cut some programs that stick it to the middle and low class.They will also blame obama all 4 yrs and you will be ok with that.

I figured this was over your idiot head to understand

People in the Sahara have to 'survive' because there is a fundamental lack of resources. We do not have that problem by any stretch of the imagination. We can produce more food than we need, more energy than we need, more shelter and clothing than we need... And we can do it with less than half our population working to accomplish those goals. Back in the days of the world fair, or when things like the electric dishwasher were invented there was a lot of talk about a future where people lived a somewhat comfortable life without having to work as hard as they did at that time. One person today can produce what 10 or 20 did a decade ago... what 100 did a century ago.

We use cell phones, email, video calling, shared software, free youtube instructional videos that answer most questions and an omnipresent database that answers almost any other. The average person has more information in their pocket today than all of civilization could access only a century ago, and it is available nearly instantaneously. However, instead of raising our standard of living and shortening our work week to three or four days, we have extended the work week of our best 10% to 6 or 7 days while gutting the pay of everyone else. The result is most households have both parents working instead of one, their kids are poorly raised by a combination of nannies and cheap daycare that warehouses them before they go to substandard public school.

The shift in our population, natural acceleration of technology which builds upon itself and surplus we create will require us to rethink the role of half our population. Are we better off paying two people half as much, or paying one enough so that the other can stay home and raise their children properly? Did unions have it right that one guy working 30 hours of overtime is worse overall than two people having a job and doing it adequately? Should we spend 50K per person per year or more to incarcerate a huge and growing part of our population, or make changes that cost less which make life easier on poor people even though they 'didn't work as hard for it'?

Income tax by itself is not the answer, we agree. Nationalism and patriotism have an important role to play. Giving the less able a leg up actually turns out to be cheaper, safer and smarter than making sure they only get what they earn. Currently we destroy food to stabilize price while people starve. Your arguments on income tax are about fairness. Fairness goes beyond a percentage revenue based understanding of our society.

We are doing it wrong. We can do better.

It's a simple fact of economics Paul, you can't go on forever spending more than you make.

Government spending has been out of control for a decade. Along with out of control spending we have out of control waste. Everything that the federal government does it wastes money on. And not small amounts of it.

As far as what to do with all that money...Have you been to the US lately. The bridges,hiways,sewers,dams, fresh water systems are all in major need of repair and replacement.

You mean the exact time frame of the internet bubble that crashed when Bush came to office? Don't get me wrong, I hate Bush. Clinton is brilliant but he had a little help.

Cutting / Raising taxes DOES NOT CREATE WEALTH. Give your kid $10 and tax him 10% or 90% a week, either way he will still waste it on candy unless he was taught to use it to create more wealth. Americans with day jobs are like kids, they will waste it on "candy" instead of using it to start a business and create more jobs. There are the rare exceptions.

#1 the middle class is just fine. look at all of the middle and lower middle class in this thread posting away during working hours on their computers.
#2 this lie of the war not being on the books is horse shit for the uneducated to swallow. On the books or off, the money was spent and it added to the deficit. obama increased the deficit well over and above anything bush did. it doesn't matter if its in the budget, or supplemental spending, it still is counted in the debt number.

holy christ, the unintelligence is astounding some days.

I don't disagree that we can do better. Only the future will tell if we WILL do better. There are a lot of events in our history that suggests we won't.

Part of our downfall will be people ignoring the big picture while quibbling over 3-5% of something affecting 5% of the population. Citizens United is a much bigger problem than either leaving taxes as they are or raising them by a few points. Wasting a fortune on emergency room care instead of providing efficient single payer care to all costs us much more than income tax revenue would bring back. Not means testing social security at this point will deplete the system for those who actually need it at a much faster rate. We are constantly distracted by trumped up bogus issues like gay marriage, a few points of income tax and the like while a handful of oligarchs are gutting our economy.

It isn't welfare queens, gay people, guys making 250K or <insert race here> who are ruining our country. It is a handful of asshats so high up the totem pole that few outside their circle ever meet them... and they couldn't care less if we all lived in manure pits so long as we keep producing so they can continue tilting the whole thing in their direction to scrape massive profits off the top. Watching you vehemently complain about a few points of income tax is no different than watching gay people focus passionately on issues like don't ask don't tell or gay marriage. Yes, they affect us.... but not as much as the massive problems we face which almost nobody even bothers to discuss. We need to look beyond our own bedrooms and balance sheets at what is really going on and work at fixing the major issues. Until they get resolved we are pissing in a fan. If your taxes get cut 5% and the dollar gets devalued 15% your income tax rate is not your biggest problem.

Citizens united, publicly funded elections, preventing media consolidation, obliterating the entire tax code to make a better one rather than poorly patching this one, ending unnecessary wars, reducing obsolete military funding.... Your passion would serve you better if it helped fixed these issues.

Nope. Seems a good chunk of this money came from stimulus money... Freeway opens up a week from today.

I just assumed you had started at the bottom and worked your way up. Just like my step father, who worked for General Electric for years and then opened up his own shop. That's the American dream.

But you didn't accomplish this on your own now did you? Someone taught you how to run the punch press, right? Somewhere along the line none of this would have been possible without a bank loan, right? How many people have worked for you since you opened up? Ten? Fifty? Two hundred? And the sweat and tears they put into YOUR business, all of the bullshit they put up with... Nah, you did it all by yourself.