Leader

Well, that's true.

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Confed999

We get everything you allready mentioned, plus an ever increasing tax on an ever expanding range of products.

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No man is free until all men are free - John Hossack
I agree completely with this Administration’s goal of a regime change in Iraq-John Kerry
even if that enforcement is mostly at the hands of the United States, a right we retain even if the Security Council fails to act-John Kerry
He may even miscalculate and slide these weapons off to terrorist groups to invite them to be a surrogate to use them against the United States. It’s the miscalculation that poses the greatest threat-John Kerry

barrowaj

Yeah, well hopefully something like what I was saying could be implemented without expanding people's tax basis by much. I wouldn't think that such a system would amount to more than $50 a year or something for anybody. In turn, credits should be given for healthy choices like excercise and healhty foods. Plus the system would be a flat tax, so Republicans couldn't complain about that. Or actually they might be happier to know that its acutally regressive, because poor people buy more processed foods. That way it could help make up for the "progressive" American tax system. I put "progressive" in quotes because the last sentence is laced with sarcasm. Its true though that healthy food is more expensive, but eating it is cheaper in the long run for America. Of course the lobby of the processed foods industry would be strong against such legislation.

So its true that something like this is happening in Florida? I've never heard of it, I thought I just came up with the idea?

Bluesman

How do you expect to modify anyone's behavior by levying a tax that amounts to less than $1/week? And if you've ever seen government in action and paid the least little bit of attention, you'd understand that the $50/year WILL NOT STAY AT THAT LEVEL.

HOW high in saturated and trans fat would a certain food have to be before your tax kicks in? How big would the portion have to be before you make a consumer's choice for him - for his own good, of course - and pick his pocket?

Okay, so I could possibly reduce my tax bill by eating Bulgar wheat and drinking carrot juice EXCLUSIVELY. I'd die after leading a very unhealthy life, which I presume would be counter to your entire proposition, but that is what happens when we violate the Law of Unintended Consequences, right?

Alternatively, we could assign a bazillion government workers to each and every one of us to monitor our diet to MAKE CERTAIN that we're entitled to our 'health food' tax credit, but inviting a couple of government employees to each and every meal seems to, oh, I don't know, reduce my freaking freedom to live as I please.

But the exercise idea...let's move on to THAT gem. Do you suppose that the leisured classes, the Ladies Who Lunch and the Trust Fund Babies and the Idle Rich Playboys would get those tax credits somewhat more readily than the 55+-hours-a-week salesman or the all-day-in-the-sun roofer is likely to want to work up a sweat at the Bunz-O'-Steel Temple of Narcissism Gym and Racquet Club after their workday, or do you suppose that picking up the kids from daycare, and getting that crappy Mac'N'Cheese dinner (with Li'l Smokies extra-fat chunks stirred right in!) in front of their little mouths before bath time and homework MAY be the priority for 'em, 364 days out of every single dam' year?

Frankly, your elitest proposal is a bit shocking from an egalitarian friend of the proles like ya'se'f, comrade.

You Utopian-builders just never seem to run out of the Big Ideas, do you? Never once stop to think that MAYBE the rest of us can get along just fine without a busybody know-it-all buttinski telling us how we all should live to their satisfaction.

Go back to kindergarten, Mr. Med Student, and try to learn this one lesson FOR GOOD, this time: keep your hands to yourself.

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"The quickest way of ending a war is to lose it, and if one finds the prospect of a long war intolerable, it is natural to disbelieve in the possibility of victory."
- George Orwell

Parihaka

Stop beating around the bush man, say what you really mean.

Bulgaroctonus

Remember, Bulgar wheat is watching this post and plotting his return.

I'll now officially ally with Barrowaj against a lot of people that are unfairly defaming him. Let the tyranny of good ideas and government reform reign for a thousand centuries!

Seriously, this debate is getting far too centered on character attacks. We need to move this back to actual debate about taxes and the role of government is controlling people's habits. It does no good to slander people.

For example, Bluesman, I know you have emphatic ideas about this whole thing, but is it necessary for people to start trading invective like "You Elitist bastard, or Utopian Pig"?This goes for people like Sniper too, who I think originally turned the debate into a character assassination.

I'm disappointed in the course of this debate, and anyone who's getting too heated about this needs to remember that civility and respect should be the hallmarks of the World Affairs Board, especially since there are many senior members here. Let everyone set a better example.

So there it is.

Shek

A sniper is an assassin! He was just doing his job, one bullet (or word) at a time

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"So little pains do the vulgar take in the investigation of truth, accepting readily the first story that comes to hand." Thucydides 1.20.3

Anon

When the opposition is spouting verbal stupidity i feel it my duty to verbally assassinate said opposition.

The FACT is that socialists ARE the enemy of freedom loving people everywhere, and the TRUTH is that all the proposals put forth by Barrow are FLAT OUT socialist.

I'd cut his throat before i saw any of his ideas implemeneted, but then....i'm not a nice person.

What i am however, is a (relatively) free person.

I'd like to keep it that way thanx.

We Americans have the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

Barrows proposals violate all three...

Finally, it is no character assassination to call a socialist a socialist. It is only a prescient observation.

You may call me a freedom loving conservative, and you'd be right, and i would hardly be ashamed to be called such.

WHY is it that the left is ashamed to be called what they really are?

Most on the left are socialists. It's time to face the facts kids.

Bulgaroctonus

[quote=M21Sniper] When the opposition is spouting verbal stupidity i feel it my duty to verbally assassinate said opposition.

The FACT is that socialists ARE the enemy of freedom loving people everywhere, and the TRUTH is that all the proposals put forth by Barrow are FLAT OUT socialist.

Would you? Remember, this is an academic online discussion. If you two actually met or talked, I bet you would not be as hostile. Does this kind of hatred benefit the WAB?

More importantly, does it actually advance debate? I don't think so.

Look at it this way, Barrowaj's proposal could be argued without bringing in his political alignment. You could talk about the economic, civil, and constitutional impacts of his plan. It could be approached in a disciplined and scholarly way. If Barrowaj's ideas are so wrong, why not point out eloquently why they are wrong?

In fact, that is something that generally annoys me about the World Affairs Board - people are so quick to apply blanket political statements to each other.

For instance, in many ways I'm a liberal person. However, I'm not starting posts like "The Republicans Suck" or "Conservatives can't do anything right." First of all, those are stupid titles, and a bunch of people have started things like that here. Those threads might actually be good if there were some intelligent comments on those threads, but there never are.

I've been guilty of this slightly, I did call Confed999 a libertarian. What I should have done is outlined exactly why his ideas didn't work. The reason why I sometimes don't answer posts as well as I can is because I run out of time or get lazy. However, I don't just call someone a 'conservative bastard' and leave.

The thing is, we all limit ourselves by conforming to these silly ideas of conservatism or liberalism. What we really should do, nationwide, is assess what policies are most effective, and explain why.

I am sick of people on this board touting their political ideology at every turn of the debate. It sounds like a bunch of toddlers arguing in a sandbox. It makes people sound less intelligent than they really are.

So there it is.

Thats a big 'relatively.' While we enjoy a very nice standard of living here, and we all have it pretty good, the U.S. government affects every part of your life.

Good for you.



We should turn a scholarly eye towards Barrowaj's ideas. First, Barrowaj should outline them all in detail, this hould be done in one really long post. Then we can all take a look at constitutional law and political theory to see if his ideas really are that bad.

Its prescient to call a socialist a socialist? Well, I must be telepathic if I call a tree a tree or a car a car. Its no mean feat to call something what it is. My point is that we are so quick to jump to someone's political views, especially when we hardly know the person.

I don't give a damn what your political alignment is, I'm through with those terms of conservatism and liberalism.

Because no one wants their complex ideas watered down to one word.

I could easily spout off slogans and slurs about conservatives, but that is not the point. I say we all holster our political sidearms and have as orderly and disciplined a debate as possible. Enough of the political fluff.

The World Affairs Board would be a lot better if everyone would just relax with the political hate campaigns. I say the debate quality will increase tenfold.

dalem

Word of advice, Bulgy:

Don't shave too fine a point on someone's comments just to try make an extra paragraph - you often end up cutting yourself that way.

Snipe already acknowledged the lack of complete freedom by his use of the modifier "relatively". Jumping on and modifiying his modifier (can one even have relative relativity?) is just gas-bagging and misses his point. The bottom line is that America enjoys more freedoms than any other civilzation arguably ever has. I'd say that's pretty free even though I'm not allowed to pogo stick naked through the Mall of America.

Language is more than an exercise - it's a tool for the communication of ideas.

-dale

TopHatter

Two excellent bits of advice IMHO:

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If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.
~John Quincy Adams

Anon

I stand by all my comments in this thread, just as i always do with all my comments in all threads.

I'll put my political pistol back in it's holster when my political enemies stop trying to ram their idiocy down my throat.

I am not the type to sit back and chuckle as others work hard to erode my rights. To the contrary, i am the letter writing, name calling, in your face sort of political participant.

You want to pass laws that force me to pay taxes on foods that taste good(because obviously i can't be trusted), but on top of that you want me to be a good sport about it too?

Here's some civilized commentary for you(and all socialists everywhere):

Go fucck yourself.

Bulgaroctonus

I'm still intact, Daley.

Well, this is a very minor point so I'm not going to follow it up.

That might not be because its against the law. What kind of shape are you in? I bet Bruce Lee could pogo stick naked through the Mall of America.

Yes, I realized his modifier. That is why I acknowledged that we have it good in the U.S.

Yes, but here its often a blunt object for conveying ideas, more of a ramming device.

Bulgaroctonus

I guess that's the British parliamentarian approach, just shout at people. Also, as a comical aside, how is 'letter writing' an especially confrontational approach?

This is why I want Barrowaj to outline his position in depth, so that we can see how unconstitutional it is.

Well, I'm glad to see we understand each other so much.

barrowaj

I've got no qualms about calling myself a socialist. The problem is that you only think you understand what socialism means and stands for. The difference is that I understand what conservatism stands for, so when I call you a conservative, I'm doing so justly. In fact, the very precepts that social democracy does stand for are "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." On the other hand, a completely libertarian economic environment is absolutely counter to those ideals. And conservatives want to tell people how they can live their lives at least as much as liberals do. That's another subject though.

I ask you though, if you are so keen on freedom then why do you threaten the lives of others? And additionally, why does a liberal get banned simply for pissing people off, while I've seen others talk about killing their fellow citizens many times, with no action taken? Furthermore, its ironic that while you clearly view me as a Stalinist of some sort, you would clearly advocate putting liberals in some sort of gulag ala Guantanamo.

Back to the point of my message. With an understanding of Biology and Behavioral Science, we learn that human behavior is not a singularity of rational thought that libertarians make it out to be. People make irrational decisions all the time, and even those irrational decisions are only a small component of market failure. For example, rats put in a cage with cocaine, food, and water, will eventually learn to self administer cocaine in place of food and water. Eventually the rat will die from starvation. The reward center, specifically the nucleus accumbens and the dopaminergic mesolimbic pathways that innervate it are turned on by the drug, while receptors on neurons that normally give a pleasureable response to food are downregulated. Essentially the drug shortcuts the normal pathways for reward. While not all humans would follow the same path if given an unlimited supply of cocaine or heroin, they will do drugs innstead of other aspects of life that they would normally attend to. In addition, drugs such as cocaine and heroin are addictive (especially heroin), and the drug is needed just to maintain a normal equilibrium of well being.

Now, if we examine fatty and high calorie foods, it can be shown that they also affect the brain in a similar manner, although to a lesser effect. Humans evolved in the wild as hunter gatherers over the course of hundreds of thousands of years. In the wild, there was no steady food supply, and people ate mostly berries, fruits, nuts, and whatever edible foliage they could get their hands on. Small game was a rare delicacy. Salt intake was low. The human body in turn evolved to cope with that life and developed mechanisms that led to craving for high calorie, salty, fatty, and high in protein food. These mechanims rewarded such food intake because said food was extremely scarce. Nobody ever got heart disease or diabetes because there simply wasn't enough supply of the foods that cause those diseases. On the other hand, the human body doesn't crave fiber, because we got more than enough of that. Fast forward 50,000+ years. Now humans have mastered their environment, and we can control food production to meet our desires (or at least the desires of 15% of the world). Since we now have an unlimited abundance of high calorie food, and we still have the same hunter-gatherer reward mechanisms, we overconsume said food, and are faced with the health consequences. Evolution never crafted our bodies to compensate for such a diet. Now from understanding the basis for the consumption of said foods, we know that it is not entirely volitional. Therefore, to compensate for the irrational behavior, we should discourage consumption of unhealthy foods, and encourage healthy behavior like exercise. In the context of law, this idea is completely consistant with the status quo. For example, we regulate our baby formula for contaminants, we regulate our vaccines for both purity and effectiveness, we regulate that bread contains folate, which increases its cost. All of those actions cost money, but the money saved by implementing them is far greater than the cost of such regulations. The truth of the previous statement in light of the fact that the free market could not organize those reforms independently demonstrates an example of the concept of market failure. And in the vein of ensuring people "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness," we have an obligation to correct such a failure.