Aristotle on Politics (Kebir Blue)

I agree that if you do not vote you really cant complain about any particular politician. On the other hand, if you do vote for them, are you not to 'some' degree responsible for what they do? Good or bad?

1. I'm not saying that fraud would start being legal. Nobody has the right to lie. When I say that there needs to be no regulation and the government needs to exist to provide a system of justice. I understand that the two ideas will sometimes conflict, but I'm also saying that seeking the least regulation conceivably possible is the best idea.
2. I'll admit that perhaps the time for the elimination of public schools may not be here yet. I'm not a radical that wants immediate change. I'm an incrementalist that will postpone certain changes until such time as they become feasible. I imagine this would be one of the last government programs to be eliminated, but inevitably, it can and should be eliminated.
4. I'm saying that the number of people dependent on government backed flood insurance doesn't make it right... I couldn't figure out the words the first time for some reason. As far as Katrina, failure to abide by co

Capitalism Serves Corporations. Socialism Serves People. This is Why You've Been Told Socialism is a Bad Thing All Your Life

Scarlet--My church over the past few years has done work in underdeveloped countries. One of those countries is Kenya. We fly thousands of miles at great expense, travel roads that are impassable parts of the year to work in a children's AID's hospital, a private school and in the farming community around the area. The locals may have to walk a day to the clinic, children die not only from AIDs but also malaria that could be prevented by simply using a mosquito net at night. Children are lucky if they get a third grade education. In the past three years the community has suffered a drought that has created an epidemic of disease and malnutrition. The school can only accommodate a few students (those who are able to travel) and the water wells have gone dry. Last year we took it upon ourselves to feed the village for a year. But it's only a drop in the bucket. The Church in the hundreds of years that it has been in Africa has do

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Capitalism Serves Corporations. Socialism Serves People. This is Why You've Been Told Socialism is a Bad Thing All Your Life<!-/Quote-!>

I beg to differ with you PH. I would say that Capitalism serves people, and Socialism serves government leaders and the elite.

After humans stopped living in caves and became farmers, people have lived under oppressive government rule for most of human history. Kings owned the land and had control of all the wealth, and most people had no rights and just enough resources to survive. This system was maintained until several hundred years ago, when the idea that ordinary people should have rights including the right to property and the right to life. These ideas started to be recognized by governments in such documents as Magna Carta and our own Declaration of Independence. These freedoms enabled people to voluntarily exchange good a

Nick--your argument would lead us to believe that big gov't and big corporations collude with one another. Don't forget to add big labor in the mix. The question then is how do you dismantle the mess. One result of gov't intervention in the early 20th century was anti-trust legislation. Many of the provisions of anti-trust have been eliminated. In this last melt down, we've seen big business, through mergers and acquisition, gobble up other companies. The first thing they do is lay off workers. In some cases as much as 15% of the work force. Then, as in the case of Mark Hurd with HP, he raised his salary about 100million and then went over to Oracle. This happens over and over again, with big business contributing 100s of millions of dollars to political campaigns. Big labor, including gov't employee unions aren't much better. And who suffers? The little guy who may own his own shop/business and can't pay his employ

You would beg to differ while we see a fractional amount of examples of Capitalism working for Government leaders and 'elites' while the masses suffer the failures of the system?

Do you wear glasses? Very few people benefit from capitalism. The world economic crash was a result the core value of Capitalism. Profit driven by greed. Many hard working people who believed in capitalism and would give your speech and ear a few years ago have been severely hurt by the greed of a few small players who scalped the markets, watched it all crumble, then walked away with almost no harm done to them. The greed of a few men, who completed millions of mortgage transactions to people they knew would eventually default, in their infinite greed led the world into the largest economic disaster of our times.

Meanwhile here are some fun facts for you Mr. Capitalist.

Here is Capitalism at work.

The global financial crisis, brewing f

PH- You make some good points. However, i'm not ready to throw out the baby with the bath water. SC is a socialistic system in action. it supposedly is for the good of the players but it results in a very lethargic and uninteresting system, which is still controlled by the gm.

i realize this isn't completely analygous but in a capitalistic society creativity and vibrancy tend to be more evident. And whether it's capitalism or socialism, etc. they're still systems created by humans. Not all corporations are evil and not all gov't actions are either. Doing away with one or the other won't necessarily make things better. We have gotten ourselves into the fix we're in now, mainly because of our greed and desire to have it all now, even though what we get only may cover the necessities. And that goes for both corps and gov't.

Most corporations are responsible. But we have to ask oursleves, what is thei

I know Parsifal, I just figured I'd throw a silly rant after what Nick got on.

I truly feel that Capitalism, applied in accordance with profit, but NOT greed is what most Capitalists think they are defending.

Profit, and the ability for anyone to go out, start a company and make money is not bad at all.

It is in fact good. But how many of Americans actually have a real opportunity to do that? Not many, and certainly not enough. I've listened to my husband tell his friends over and over, if you cannot find a job, you need to make your own, and become self employed in some way shape or form. This is what is good about Capitalism. What is bad is that there are some big money people that are really out to suck the markets dry and that will come at whatever cost, because GREED outweighs all consequence, especially when it doesn't affect those instigators.

Socialism, in the most extreme and cynical definition i

We do absolutly nothing. Sheep to the slaughter.

We let Jesus whack 'em. Wine press of God's wrath baby! Nations destroyed in such a fasion that: "and they will know that I am the Lord".
good stuff -gotta love the REAL 'gamemaster'.

They're openly creating chimeras for crying out loud and that's mainstream news. That's splicing animal to animal, human to animal and animal to human DNA. Creating abominations.

They're getting whacked this time.

OH yeah and FEMA couldn't handle Katrina because FEMA didn't DO Katrina. That's how they respond when it's real, chaos, can't make decisions.

Swine Flu propaganda

Swine Flu truth. Take the time to watch these, they're good

Vaccine results

PH the problems that we have had during the past 10 years are a result of too much worldwide government debt, and excess government intervention in the markets. However, progressives always blame capitalism even though we have had a mixed economy ever since the 30's. I do agree that the European riots are coming here, and Obama will use them as an excuse to grab more power. He can't let a crisis go to waste.

Danny, how did you draw that conclusion?

The current Global Economic Crisis a result of the Housing Bubble caused in the United States that threw us, the leader of the world economy, into a recession and economic downturn. The snowball effects of this crisis led to a Global Credit Crunch. There has always been too much Global Government Debt, our world economic system is built upon debt, without debt, and lots of it, the World Central Banks and the IMF would have no reason or capacity to function. Global Debt didn't cause what is happening now. The ensuing Credit crunch resulting from the RE bubble in the US has now made refinancing and or carrying Outstanding Debt near impossible.

You need to read up some more. And please leave the progressives\capitalist type accusations out of the conversation.

We need to move forward. You all seem only interested in pointing a finger where the blame is already clearly obvious. So we don

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Forgive me, but I don't need a lesson on Cavemen, the Ice Age, or anything else. I only need to look at the last decade to see there is more than something inherently flawed about the way our world is operating.<!-/Quote-!>

Haha, that's funny stuff there PH. Your obviously an intelligent person who writes well, but some of your positions are not well thought out.

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The greed of a few men, who completed millions of mortgage transactions to people they knew would eventually default, in their infinite greed led the world into the largest economic disaster of our times.<!-/Quote-!>

So, it was just a few greedy wall street bankers who created this problem, right? Is that what you really believe? Isn't the Federal Reserve supposed to tighten monetary policy when they see a speculative

They didn't 'fail' anything, the whole farce was planned.

Nick, please wake up. Take the veil off and look at what is staring you in the face. If you are in denial, it is obvious we can't get anywhere arguing who is at fault.


My positions are well thought out. I don't repeat what the media pours into our heads everyday. I think independently, so of course my view is not well thought out.

It would appear your response is not well thought out. The conversation is moving(or at least should be by now) past the mumbo jumbo arguments. You feel how you feel, and so do I. Nothing will move us from our positions. Now can we get to what you think would help fix what is already done?

In order to prescribe solutions, one must examine what factors created the problem in the first place. That is key to fixing any issue. If you don't address the right things, then you want make any real progress.

The 1st item would be to restore confidence in the economy, which would require a quick resolution to the wreckage of the real estate bubble. People who aren't currently paying their mortgages need to be removed from their homes, but helped by the government to find other places to live. Then, once the homes are resold to people who can pay the monthly payments, the real estate market can recover. Every post ww2 recovery has been led by real estate, and that's part of the reason this one is so anemic. The whole real estate financing system needs to be overhauled, and it needs more rigorous over-site and regulation.

Second, Obamacare and the financial regulation bill need repeal ( especially the bailout provisi

This history has peat and repeated more than once Nick, please wake up.

If you don't think this wasn't a planned fleecing of the worlds wealth I can offer you some educational materials that might give you some insight.

Right on Hon!
Wait... history is in a peat bog?

(the love of money REALLY IS the root of all evil)

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Third, once the economy is stabilized, we need tax reform, budgetary reform and entitlement reform.<!-/Quote-!>

You aint gettin' it.

They don't work for you.

I agree Danny. Obamacare should be repealed and we should replace it with a single payer system like that of Canada and the UK. This would simplify the entire process and move the debate towards making this healthcare model sustainable like it is in our the two mentioned nations.

Taxes. Interesting. Again, simplification is needed. The mere debate is wasteful in itself. Raise taxes, lower taxes, yada yada. Install the "Fair Tax" proposal we all win and see a lot more money on our paychecks. A change to the "Fair Tax" is better for individuals of all wage classes and is probably the quickest and easiest route to a budget surplus, and easy financing of a single - payer healthcare system as well.

Day in and day out I watch CNBC and Bloomberg. The schemes we see played out in the financial world and the lack of anyone in either party to combat corruption, restoring confidence in the Markets is going to be near impossible. Movi

We have to listen to what they say.

Wisdom dictates that whenever someone delivers a false accusation that they themselves are guilty of what they are accusing. Actually the word of God says that and I've found it's 100%, it always works. Try it out for yourself.

Lets look at what our friends in Washington falsely accuse others of thereby exposing their own guilt.

1. They hate you for your freedoms.

2. They will stop at nothing to harm America.

3. They possess WMD and the will to use them.

4. They never stop thinking of new ways to harm America.

5. (just a second, let me pull ANY 'war drum' bush speech. How about the State of the Union where he's all coked up... brb)

good short and to the point

PH--well, we all have to rant occasionally.lol
I like your husbands response to unemployment. Start your own business. My family has had its own business for 88 years. My sons, when they got out of school worked for others for a while but decided after a couple of years they didn't like that, so they started their own business and later came into the family business. they were fortunate that the business was there and much of my life has been devoted to teaching them how to look at like differently in terms of "jobs". Most Americans, when they think about work, think only about working for someone. And most have to do that. But more people ought to conside the alternative.

I also agree that we may be faced with similar social upheavals as Europe is experiencing now. But our form of socialism is not as entrenched/severe as theirs.

After Katrina many survivors came to Houston and a group that i'm a part, were a

You wanna learn more about FEMA watch jesse ventura conspiracy theory tonight at 10pm on the east coast Thats on truTV. No joke u must accept the truth no matter how horrible it is. Call me crazy after you see it with your own eyes. I leave you with this clip and a quote.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=etv8YEqaWgA

"The indiviual is handicapped by coming face to face with a conspiracy so monstrous he cannot believe it exists" - J. Edgar Hoover

A couple of books that you might be interested in are:
Crisis Economics: A crash course in the future of finance by, Nouriel Roubini and The Big Shrot by, Michael Lewis. They deal with the jmelt down and where we're going from here. I couldn't put them down.

Also, i have a blog entitled www.ethicalhouston.com that among other things, deals with business ethics. I haven't posted in a couple of months but you might be interested.

Kewl, I'm, looking you up.