Neither extreme is particularly useful. If the progressives had their way we would still be operating under the hyper-regulation of the 70s when interest rates and inflation hovered somewhere in the double digits. If progressives had their way we would still have a 90% income tax bracket.
Would we have been better off "letting the market decide" and riding this collapse down into the belly of another Great Depression?
Great Depression II may still be on the horizon. Why don't we meet in 10-15 years and have a discussion about whether or not massive government intervention in the economy proved to be a sound decision?
Taking away my free choice to decide whether or not I want to enrich the pockets of an insurance company and breaking his "no tax increases on people making <$250,000" promise isn't enough to inspire some hatred?
I really don't understand people sometimes. Bush had his car egged during his first inauguration and I don't recall hearing much outrage at the time. Obama has actually been in office long enough to do things that have pissed off large segments of the country and you can't understand why people hate him?
A republican controlled congress introduced the legislation and passed it with a veto-proof majority.
Which would still imply that the Democrats share some of the blame, because at no point in recent memory have the Republicans had veto-proof majorities in both Houses of Congress on their own.
of which the republican repeal of Glass-Steagall (with the "bipartisan" help of conservative blue-dog democrats-only-in-name
I've never heard Chuck Schumer described as a blue dog before. Here's the roll call vote for it. I see a lot of Democrats in the "yea" column that are considered "progressive". Why don't you just own up to the fact that the Democrat's hands are just as dirty as those of the GOP?
To quote a US Senator from my home state, "Everybody is entitled to his own opinion, but not to his own facts."
What "extremes"? I made one example of extenuating circumstances that would excuse an action that would otherwise be a crime. There are others that I could have made. Are you seriously going to tell me that if you were watching someone bleed to death and lacked the supplies to halt that bleeding you wouldn't take steps to procure them? I'm all for property rights but I'm also for exercising common sense. Common sense says that a human life is worth more than a window and some supplies. After the the incident is over one would have to reimburse the store owner for the cost of the window and whatever supplies were taken -- but in the here and now the human life trumps the store owners property rights.
Let me make a real world example for you. A few weeks ago there was an accidental shooting in Gander Mountain. Some idiot employee was playing around with an "unloaded" gun and shot himself. Another employee obtained a first aid kit off the store shelf and used it to tend to his wounds until the EMTs arrived. Would you really condemn that man because he didn't take the first aid kit up to the register and pay for it before tending to his co-workers wounds?
And neither art nor sports require knowledge or mental discipline to be successful.
Really? You think you could learn to make one of these without knowledge and mental discipline? You think you could learn to hit a 100mph fastball without mental discipline?
Worst case scenario, I'd pay for the bandages AND a new window, because otherwise I'm just another worthless thief.
Did I say that I wouldn't do this? All I said was that if a human life is on the line you would be justified in breaking into a drug store to obtain needed supplies to keep that person alive until help could arrive.
The ends do justify the means sometimes. Your view seemed excessively black and white to me. Would you also argue in favor of writing speeding tickets to the man driving his wife to the hospital as she goes into labor? If I'm lost in the wilderness and close to freezing to death should I be charged with breaking and entering if I come across a locked cabin and seek shelter inside of it? What if I kill some animal outside of hunting season in that same scenario to feed myself?
What's wrong with sports? Sports teach leadership and teamwork, which are arguably just as important as being able to spell "necessary" without a spell checker. Some parents might need to find a better balance with regards to sports vs. the rest of the curriculum but that doesn't mean that sports don't have their place.
There's also the fact that 1/3 of this country is obese to argue in favor of expanded sports/PE instruction.....
Wow, you are a heartless SOB. Does your black and white view of the world really not allow for extenuating circumstances? You are seriously going to claim that a glass window and some first aid supplies are worth more than a human life?
I would break into a store to save a human life without hesitation and stand before a jury of my peers to justify my conduct. Were I the store owner I wouldn't even press charges in this scenario.
Why shouldn't a person have the right to screw his or her life up any way they want?
look how our rights have been eroded in the last 200 years, and the erosion is hastening. I'm not nearly as free as I was 30 years ago.
I love seeing you make comments like this and then turn around and support the health care reform legislation and it's individual mandate in a different discussion......
You do realize that propping up those industries likely prevented a 1930s style collapse?
It's too early to draw that conclusion. A lot of smart economists think that we've just delayed the inevitable and made the eventual crash that much worse. Time will tell of course -- but capitalism without creative destruction is no longer capitalism. All of the resources being used to prop up those failing companies are resources that can't be used by smaller and more nimble enterprises.
And that the safeguards which were removed (and safeguards which were not put into place) occurred during the 14 years that the Republicans controlled both houses of congress?
What are you, some sort of Democratic partisan? The repeal of Glass-Steagall was signed into law by Bill Clinton. Bill Clinton deregulated the telecom and communications industries. Democrats in Congress in Bush's 2nd term blocked needed reforms of Fannie and Freddie. Both parties are to blame for this mess.
And that it was President Bush who bought out the banking industry?
How did then Senator Obama vote on those bailouts?
There is if you are a civil libertarian. Our "Constitutional Law Professor" has proven himself no better than his predecessors in this department.
In my opinion, most people who hate Obama just can't stand the idea of people getting something for nothing (and in their minds, the people getting something for nothing are almost always a shade of brown).
Yes, that must be it. Most people who hate Obama are racists.
Yes, the problem is that the Government isn't taking enough of our money. That must be it. Why don't we just sign our entire paychecks over to it? Surely it can do a better job of spending our money than we can.
That is not true. At least from a legal standpoint.
There might not be a law saying that you can do this but I think you'd have a hard time finding a jury willing to convict somebody for breaking into a drug store to obtain supplies to save a dying man. Would you vote for conviction if you were on that jury?
And even though the USA is almost totally made their once respected police officers into para-military goons
Blame the War on Drugs for this. Two generations ago the local police were rarely armed with anything heavier than a revolver and the occasional shotgun. Now they have armored vehicles, fully automatic weapons, flashbangs, etc. Mind you, that's because the criminals got more firepower too, but that's also attributable to the War on Drugs. The last time we tried prohibition it started an arms race between the criminals and the police. Too bad we didn't learn any lessons from that experience.
Lennie Briscoe. Jean-Luc Picard. Jack Bauer. Red (from Shawshank Redemption). Londo Mollari. It's not that hard to name fictional characters with more depth than Homer Simpson.
We've had our share of disagreements but I've never regarded you as a fool until now. You claim that our justice system is wholly subservient to "business interests" but ignore the numerous cases of the justice system being wielded in a manner that's hostile to those same interests.
Slashdot Mirror
so is selling crap on the street with no license
The nerve of someone to want to engage in commerce without first obtaining permission from the government.....
<Fat and lazy American>What about the pizza box? I'm hungry.</Fat and Lazy American>
Neither extreme is particularly useful. If the progressives had their way we would still be operating under the hyper-regulation of the 70s when interest rates and inflation hovered somewhere in the double digits. If progressives had their way we would still have a 90% income tax bracket.
Would we have been better off "letting the market decide" and riding this collapse down into the belly of another Great Depression?
Great Depression II may still be on the horizon. Why don't we meet in 10-15 years and have a discussion about whether or not massive government intervention in the economy proved to be a sound decision?
And? I hated English and foreign languages when I was in school. Still had to take them though.
Taking away my free choice to decide whether or not I want to enrich the pockets of an insurance company and breaking his "no tax increases on people making <$250,000" promise isn't enough to inspire some hatred?
I really don't understand people sometimes. Bush had his car egged during his first inauguration and I don't recall hearing much outrage at the time. Obama has actually been in office long enough to do things that have pissed off large segments of the country and you can't understand why people hate him?
A republican controlled congress introduced the legislation and passed it with a veto-proof majority.
Which would still imply that the Democrats share some of the blame, because at no point in recent memory have the Republicans had veto-proof majorities in both Houses of Congress on their own.
of which the republican repeal of Glass-Steagall (with the "bipartisan" help of conservative blue-dog democrats-only-in-name
I've never heard Chuck Schumer described as a blue dog before. Here's the roll call vote for it. I see a lot of Democrats in the "yea" column that are considered "progressive". Why don't you just own up to the fact that the Democrat's hands are just as dirty as those of the GOP?
To quote a US Senator from my home state, "Everybody is entitled to his own opinion, but not to his own facts."
What "extremes"? I made one example of extenuating circumstances that would excuse an action that would otherwise be a crime. There are others that I could have made. Are you seriously going to tell me that if you were watching someone bleed to death and lacked the supplies to halt that bleeding you wouldn't take steps to procure them? I'm all for property rights but I'm also for exercising common sense. Common sense says that a human life is worth more than a window and some supplies. After the the incident is over one would have to reimburse the store owner for the cost of the window and whatever supplies were taken -- but in the here and now the human life trumps the store owners property rights.
Let me make a real world example for you. A few weeks ago there was an accidental shooting in Gander Mountain. Some idiot employee was playing around with an "unloaded" gun and shot himself. Another employee obtained a first aid kit off the store shelf and used it to tend to his wounds until the EMTs arrived. Would you really condemn that man because he didn't take the first aid kit up to the register and pay for it before tending to his co-workers wounds?
And neither art nor sports require knowledge or mental discipline to be successful.
Really? You think you could learn to make one of these without knowledge and mental discipline? You think you could learn to hit a 100mph fastball without mental discipline?
Worst case scenario, I'd pay for the bandages AND a new window, because otherwise I'm just another worthless thief.
Did I say that I wouldn't do this? All I said was that if a human life is on the line you would be justified in breaking into a drug store to obtain needed supplies to keep that person alive until help could arrive.
The ends do justify the means sometimes. Your view seemed excessively black and white to me. Would you also argue in favor of writing speeding tickets to the man driving his wife to the hospital as she goes into labor? If I'm lost in the wilderness and close to freezing to death should I be charged with breaking and entering if I come across a locked cabin and seek shelter inside of it? What if I kill some animal outside of hunting season in that same scenario to feed myself?
What's wrong with sports? Sports teach leadership and teamwork, which are arguably just as important as being able to spell "necessary" without a spell checker. Some parents might need to find a better balance with regards to sports vs. the rest of the curriculum but that doesn't mean that sports don't have their place.
There's also the fact that 1/3 of this country is obese to argue in favor of expanded sports/PE instruction.....
I'm not sure if you are being sarcastic or not. Could you please add some <sarcasm> tags to clarify? ;)
Wow, you are a heartless SOB. Does your black and white view of the world really not allow for extenuating circumstances? You are seriously going to claim that a glass window and some first aid supplies are worth more than a human life?
I would break into a store to save a human life without hesitation and stand before a jury of my peers to justify my conduct. Were I the store owner I wouldn't even press charges in this scenario.
Why shouldn't a person have the right to screw his or her life up any way they want?
look how our rights have been eroded in the last 200 years, and the erosion is hastening. I'm not nearly as free as I was 30 years ago.
I love seeing you make comments like this and then turn around and support the health care reform legislation and it's individual mandate in a different discussion......
You do realize that propping up those industries likely prevented a 1930s style collapse?
It's too early to draw that conclusion. A lot of smart economists think that we've just delayed the inevitable and made the eventual crash that much worse. Time will tell of course -- but capitalism without creative destruction is no longer capitalism. All of the resources being used to prop up those failing companies are resources that can't be used by smaller and more nimble enterprises.
And that the safeguards which were removed (and safeguards which were not put into place) occurred during the 14 years that the Republicans controlled both houses of congress?
What are you, some sort of Democratic partisan? The repeal of Glass-Steagall was signed into law by Bill Clinton. Bill Clinton deregulated the telecom and communications industries. Democrats in Congress in Bush's 2nd term blocked needed reforms of Fannie and Freddie. Both parties are to blame for this mess.
And that it was President Bush who bought out the banking industry?
How did then Senator Obama vote on those bailouts?
There is no reason to hate the man.
There is if you are a civil libertarian. Our "Constitutional Law Professor" has proven himself no better than his predecessors in this department.
In my opinion, most people who hate Obama just can't stand the idea of people getting something for nothing (and in their minds, the people getting something for nothing are almost always a shade of brown).
Yes, that must be it. Most people who hate Obama are racists.
Yes, the problem is that the Government isn't taking enough of our money. That must be it. Why don't we just sign our entire paychecks over to it? Surely it can do a better job of spending our money than we can.
That is not true. At least from a legal standpoint.
There might not be a law saying that you can do this but I think you'd have a hard time finding a jury willing to convict somebody for breaking into a drug store to obtain supplies to save a dying man. Would you vote for conviction if you were on that jury?
And even though the USA is almost totally made their once respected police officers into para-military goons
Blame the War on Drugs for this. Two generations ago the local police were rarely armed with anything heavier than a revolver and the occasional shotgun. Now they have armored vehicles, fully automatic weapons, flashbangs, etc. Mind you, that's because the criminals got more firepower too, but that's also attributable to the War on Drugs. The last time we tried prohibition it started an arms race between the criminals and the police. Too bad we didn't learn any lessons from that experience.
It would require a presidential declaration to start this in motion.
Because the Executive doesn't already have enough power, we need to give it more?
I conclude that business does not have a monopoly on perverting the justice system, as falsely claimed by Hatta.
Next time learn to read before opening your mouth.
Splitting hairs, particularly given the fact that there's a few differences between the book and TV versions of the character.
Lennie Briscoe. Jean-Luc Picard. Jack Bauer. Red (from Shawshank Redemption). Londo Mollari. It's not that hard to name fictional characters with more depth than Homer Simpson.
"Greatest character created for television or film"
Geez, it's bad enough that people can't RTFA, but that was in the summary for heavens sake.....
We've had our share of disagreements but I've never regarded you as a fool until now. You claim that our justice system is wholly subservient to "business interests" but ignore the numerous cases of the justice system being wielded in a manner that's hostile to those same interests.
There's just no getting through to you, is there?