“Give all that you have to the poor.” Not ambiguous at all, but I sure haven’t heard that taken seriously by the Gospel Of Success crowd. All it took for the Pope to be regarded as an irrelevant annoyance by the Republicans was a return to biblical values, instead of the US approach of the last 50 years, where Jesus is taken as a cheerleader for self-reliance and free enterprise.
The issue is not that there should be income equality – that is but a red herring. The issue is that income disparity in the U.S. is the highest it has ever been and growing. Extreme income disparity is harmful to the nation because it reduces overall demand, creates pockets of extreme poverty, produces social unrest and eventual riots, and deprives the nation of its real potential.
“……That provides some insight to the hard-hearted people who want to make sure average Americans have little left to help anyone when they’re through with ’em….~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Good point.
“…All liberals seem to know how to viciously bash those they cannot abide (or disagree with)… ……dismissive language that suggests they have no rational defense for the liberal positions, so they just sling hate…..Their comments are trivialized by the petty, personalized and’ hatefully irrational content…~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~PLEASE look up the definition of ‘liberal’
My, quite vicious here today. A few facts:1. Conservatives do not give more to charity than liberals. They give to different charities. (http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2012/10/21/study-conservatives-and-liberals-are-equally-charitable-but-they-give-to-different-charities/)2. Income inequality is a phenomenon long studied by economists. Research shows that for a culture or country to have a lot of economic mobility — that is, a lot of opportunity for its people — it helps to have less income inequality, because desperately poor people can’t move very far and super rich people have undue control over economics to make sure they stay super rich, even at the expense of others. A strong middle class seems to be related to better economic growth and more potential. The US has moved from a place where all economic growth was shared to a place where the rich gain the vast majority of benefit of economic growth, and gaps are increasing. (http://www.cbpp.org/cms/?fa=view&id=3629)I’m with the Pope on this one.
News flash, donating to a mega church that looks like a cross between a shopping mall and basketball arena so that another mega church can be built is hardly what any reasonable person would call charity. Yet that is the majority what makes up the donations you keep harping on.
…please put down your socialist Kool-Aid that barry served you, figure out something that you can do and go do it. You’re bothering the rest of us."Way to show him how to make a thoughtful, informative post. /sarcasm
“Everyone of Bush 43’s ‘Stimulus Spending’ failed to inject capital, it increase the national debt, Same with Obama’s Stimulus Spending, zero gain and deeper in Federal debt we go.”Bush’s tax cut stimulus & loose credit policies did pump up the economy for a while, but it wasn’t sustainable. Reagan, Bush & even Obama to a degree, have pushed policies that favor putting an ever bigger piece of the economic pie into the hands of a very small number of people. While Romney was complaining about the 47% of people who don’t pay income taxes, I was suggesting that maybe the problem could be fixed by paying them enough to qualify for taxes. Wages have been in decline for over 30 years & it’s not a coincidence, IMO. A few very wealthy folks have outsized political influence & they are using it to tilt the table.During the 50s & 60s, we had a much flatter income distribution, & the nation thrived.
Tigger: we agree on Fox, but watching it occasionally is the only way to see where some of the extremist right views of “events” comes from.
No, not all Liberals are “Christian, Jew, or Muslim”, but Buddhism, as one example of alternative “faiths”, is NOT “atheism”.
Which it’s interesting that Mike works off the statements of a man, which many, if not all “faiths” recognized as sound support of humanity, leads to such vehement, and vile, attacks from the “conservatives” he portrays in the ’toon, proving his point.
“Wealth” per se, is not “evil”, however, the placement of wealth above human caring, or decency, IS what the Pope was addressing, and he called it right.
“NOW they want to separate their spirituality from their politics, or so they say.”
Or at least, YOUR spirituality from politics.
Spirituality only counts if it’s their brand of spirituality. What ‘spirit’ would support their brand of same is a little frightening to contemplate. All the time they are beating their chests and shrieking ‘Christianity!!!’, they are worshiping Moloch and Mammon.
Maybe their literacy has failed them. Maybe they’ve mixed up their spiritual references …
“Conservatives give MUCH MORE to charities of all kinds than you selfish, thuggish liberals. Take that to your commune.”
What makes you think any of those donations are going to anyone who might actually need them? The charities all the politicians donate to are organizations which hand the money round and round to each other. It’s rare for the poor to see as much as 10% of it.
What they are doing is handing it round and round to each other. ALL of them, both sides of the aisle.
Apart from the public records from the government, check around those ‘charities’. The poor isn’t seeing enough of it to make a difference.
If the RC church finally began to actually disburse any of it’s ‘charitable funds’ to the poor, we might see some improvement for at least some of the poor.
The Vatican is one of the few entities with resources to challenge the insurers. That would tell you something, wouldn’t it? But if nothing bad happens to Pope Francis, he may be able to effect some long overdue reforms.
It might reduce some of the contempt I feel for institutionalized religion. Perhaps.
“It all boils down to reality, what works and what doesn’t Austerity created by hoarding capital is bad, failing to maintain real supply and demand growth slows capital flow increases debt reduces revenues.”
Thank you. Wish I’d said that – succinct, terse, accurate.
“…All liberals seem to know how to viciously bash those they cannot abide (or disagree with)… "
I don’t know how ‘liberal’ the posters you are complaining about are, most of them actually sound pretty conservative to me – in the classic sense.
I get a pretty strong sense that the people you are determined to see as ‘liberals’ find the concept of genocide offensive, and would like to reverse the tide.
The policies you and your friends support are genocidal, but very much worse than Hitler’s little foray into that field … more like Stalin’s, really.
Fair enough, at ground level, at the peak of the offense, there isn’t much the people can do. They let it go too far to be easily retrieved.
It may be that the Russians really had no recourse at all, their government being frankly and openly totalitarian, but that’s not the case here. This country has a Constitution, which offers some civil rights guarantees and stipulates at least some restrictions on government’s behaviour.
NEITHER party has supported the Constitution in any way since the early 70s, if then. Your boys are no better than the libs, and to pretend otherwise is suicidal in civic terms.
" We have been throwing money at the poor since 1964, and they have not spent it on tangible goods."
Ya think ..?
Would that be because the money we are ‘throwing at them’ doesn’t actually cover their overhead and food costs, leaving NO ‘discretionary income’ for them to spend?
Where are the jobs again?
Oh, yeah, the Industrialists moved them all offshore, to unregulated countries where they can pay their slave wages and be counted heroes.
It might be pretty interesting to see what ultimately becomes of propping up those third world countries at the expense of our own. I mean, is it wise to prop China up this way ..?
One thing a lot of “Pro-Business” conservatives fail to see is that a more affluent middle class is good for business. The 1% can’t possibly buy enough houses, cars and other expensive durable goods to support businesses. There’s only a million or so of those households. Even if each one bought 2 cars per year, the US auto industry would be 13 million short. Only the middle class could fill a gap that large.*It’s been in the news recently that many Wal-Mart employees don’t even earn enough to buy enough food at Wal-Mart. Henry Ford figured this out a century ago, and paid his employees enough for them to buy his cars. Wal-Mart would benefit if they did the same. It’s certainly working for Costco.
^^Hawthorne: just trying to dispel a little of the “right wing talking point” that “liberals are atheists”. But, when it comes to the Constitution: I fully support Article VI and the Second Amendment and the clear intent of the founding fathers to separate church from state.
I never really cared about money much, but rather raising my kids right, and living well enough to care about others. We’ve done okay, good kids, years of volunteerism to serve the community, and “accomplishments” I’m proud of in that regard, as well as serving the nation in my professional life. Now retired, and “comfortable”, but in large part because my spousal unit DID monitor the finances all those years, and planned well.
A friend of the family who DID go from near bankruptcy to being a millionaire passed on to me a bit of “wisdom”: “There are people who have a lot of talent and a lot of money who could actually care less about wealth. Then there are those who have money, but little talent themselves, and who NEVER have enough to satisfy them.” Such defines in the latter, way too many of the “Reaganomics” and TEA party fraternity. “Never enough” sums up way too many on today’s “right”, and yes, some on the “left”.
Given that I am at least citing facts, and you are merely insulting me, your response is hardly very compelling. it took me a grand total of about ten minutes to look up the facts, read several sites to see which had better detail (rather than merely a summary), and post them. Not exactly hard work finding real evidence of things.Indeed, I could have gone much farther. Your comment simply suggests you lack a response, and therefore are hoping an insult will replace more facts.
Kip W over 10 years ago
“Give all that you have to the poor.” Not ambiguous at all, but I sure haven’t heard that taken seriously by the Gospel Of Success crowd. All it took for the Pope to be regarded as an irrelevant annoyance by the Republicans was a return to biblical values, instead of the US approach of the last 50 years, where Jesus is taken as a cheerleader for self-reliance and free enterprise.
Gypsy8 over 10 years ago
The issue is not that there should be income equality – that is but a red herring. The issue is that income disparity in the U.S. is the highest it has ever been and growing. Extreme income disparity is harmful to the nation because it reduces overall demand, creates pockets of extreme poverty, produces social unrest and eventual riots, and deprives the nation of its real potential.
goweeder over 10 years ago
“….. Conservatives give MUCH MORE to charities of all kinds than you selfish, thuggish liberals.”~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~ And isn’t it lucky that those contributions are TAX EXEMPT"One more thing —-PLEASE look up the definition of ‘liberal.’
Marty Z over 10 years ago
DaSharkie said, “I worked hard to get where I am, from government cheese on up. You know who did it? I did.”
Do you see the hypocrisy in that statement? It is very revealing.
goweeder over 10 years ago
“……That provides some insight to the hard-hearted people who want to make sure average Americans have little left to help anyone when they’re through with ’em….~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Good point.
goweeder over 10 years ago
“…All liberals seem to know how to viciously bash those they cannot abide (or disagree with)… ……dismissive language that suggests they have no rational defense for the liberal positions, so they just sling hate…..Their comments are trivialized by the petty, personalized and’ hatefully irrational content…~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~PLEASE look up the definition of ‘liberal’
Motivemagus over 10 years ago
My, quite vicious here today. A few facts:1. Conservatives do not give more to charity than liberals. They give to different charities. (http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2012/10/21/study-conservatives-and-liberals-are-equally-charitable-but-they-give-to-different-charities/)2. Income inequality is a phenomenon long studied by economists. Research shows that for a culture or country to have a lot of economic mobility — that is, a lot of opportunity for its people — it helps to have less income inequality, because desperately poor people can’t move very far and super rich people have undue control over economics to make sure they stay super rich, even at the expense of others. A strong middle class seems to be related to better economic growth and more potential. The US has moved from a place where all economic growth was shared to a place where the rich gain the vast majority of benefit of economic growth, and gaps are increasing. (http://www.cbpp.org/cms/?fa=view&id=3629)I’m with the Pope on this one.
AlnicoV over 10 years ago
News flash, donating to a mega church that looks like a cross between a shopping mall and basketball arena so that another mega church can be built is hardly what any reasonable person would call charity. Yet that is the majority what makes up the donations you keep harping on.
Uncle Joe Premium Member over 10 years ago
“Boy, the FAUX Noise Kool-Aid is flowing here today!”Wouldn’t it have been easier & more productive to refute Debt Free’s silly claim?
Uncle Joe Premium Member over 10 years ago
…please put down your socialist Kool-Aid that barry served you, figure out something that you can do and go do it. You’re bothering the rest of us."Way to show him how to make a thoughtful, informative post. /sarcasm
Uncle Joe Premium Member over 10 years ago
“Everyone of Bush 43’s ‘Stimulus Spending’ failed to inject capital, it increase the national debt, Same with Obama’s Stimulus Spending, zero gain and deeper in Federal debt we go.”Bush’s tax cut stimulus & loose credit policies did pump up the economy for a while, but it wasn’t sustainable. Reagan, Bush & even Obama to a degree, have pushed policies that favor putting an ever bigger piece of the economic pie into the hands of a very small number of people. While Romney was complaining about the 47% of people who don’t pay income taxes, I was suggesting that maybe the problem could be fixed by paying them enough to qualify for taxes. Wages have been in decline for over 30 years & it’s not a coincidence, IMO. A few very wealthy folks have outsized political influence & they are using it to tilt the table.During the 50s & 60s, we had a much flatter income distribution, & the nation thrived.
Dtroutma over 10 years ago
Tigger: we agree on Fox, but watching it occasionally is the only way to see where some of the extremist right views of “events” comes from.
No, not all Liberals are “Christian, Jew, or Muslim”, but Buddhism, as one example of alternative “faiths”, is NOT “atheism”.
Which it’s interesting that Mike works off the statements of a man, which many, if not all “faiths” recognized as sound support of humanity, leads to such vehement, and vile, attacks from the “conservatives” he portrays in the ’toon, proving his point.
“Wealth” per se, is not “evil”, however, the placement of wealth above human caring, or decency, IS what the Pope was addressing, and he called it right.
Hawthorne over 10 years ago
’Income inequality has been around since the dawn of time."
So has homicide. Extortion. Battery. Rape. Blackmail.
Are you suggesting that because these things are more or less universal, we should embrace them?
Let’s not.
Hawthorne over 10 years ago
“NOW they want to separate their spirituality from their politics, or so they say.”
Or at least, YOUR spirituality from politics.
Spirituality only counts if it’s their brand of spirituality. What ‘spirit’ would support their brand of same is a little frightening to contemplate. All the time they are beating their chests and shrieking ‘Christianity!!!’, they are worshiping Moloch and Mammon.
Maybe their literacy has failed them. Maybe they’ve mixed up their spiritual references …
Hawthorne over 10 years ago
“Conservatives give MUCH MORE to charities of all kinds than you selfish, thuggish liberals. Take that to your commune.”
What makes you think any of those donations are going to anyone who might actually need them? The charities all the politicians donate to are organizations which hand the money round and round to each other. It’s rare for the poor to see as much as 10% of it.
What they are doing is handing it round and round to each other. ALL of them, both sides of the aisle.
Apart from the public records from the government, check around those ‘charities’. The poor isn’t seeing enough of it to make a difference.
If the RC church finally began to actually disburse any of it’s ‘charitable funds’ to the poor, we might see some improvement for at least some of the poor.
The Vatican is one of the few entities with resources to challenge the insurers. That would tell you something, wouldn’t it? But if nothing bad happens to Pope Francis, he may be able to effect some long overdue reforms.
It might reduce some of the contempt I feel for institutionalized religion. Perhaps.
Hawthorne over 10 years ago
“It all boils down to reality, what works and what doesn’t Austerity created by hoarding capital is bad, failing to maintain real supply and demand growth slows capital flow increases debt reduces revenues.”
Thank you. Wish I’d said that – succinct, terse, accurate.
Hawthorne over 10 years ago
“…All liberals seem to know how to viciously bash those they cannot abide (or disagree with)… "
I don’t know how ‘liberal’ the posters you are complaining about are, most of them actually sound pretty conservative to me – in the classic sense.
I get a pretty strong sense that the people you are determined to see as ‘liberals’ find the concept of genocide offensive, and would like to reverse the tide.
The policies you and your friends support are genocidal, but very much worse than Hitler’s little foray into that field … more like Stalin’s, really.
Fair enough, at ground level, at the peak of the offense, there isn’t much the people can do. They let it go too far to be easily retrieved.
It may be that the Russians really had no recourse at all, their government being frankly and openly totalitarian, but that’s not the case here. This country has a Constitution, which offers some civil rights guarantees and stipulates at least some restrictions on government’s behaviour.
NEITHER party has supported the Constitution in any way since the early 70s, if then. Your boys are no better than the libs, and to pretend otherwise is suicidal in civic terms.
Hawthorne over 10 years ago
“Poverty is a sin, or should be.”
Actually, poverty is a crime in the US.
It’s the only ‘crime’ which is swiftly and reliably (and brutally) punished in this country.
Hawthorne over 10 years ago
" We have been throwing money at the poor since 1964, and they have not spent it on tangible goods."
Ya think ..?
Would that be because the money we are ‘throwing at them’ doesn’t actually cover their overhead and food costs, leaving NO ‘discretionary income’ for them to spend?
Where are the jobs again?
Oh, yeah, the Industrialists moved them all offshore, to unregulated countries where they can pay their slave wages and be counted heroes.
It might be pretty interesting to see what ultimately becomes of propping up those third world countries at the expense of our own. I mean, is it wise to prop China up this way ..?
Marty Z over 10 years ago
One thing a lot of “Pro-Business” conservatives fail to see is that a more affluent middle class is good for business. The 1% can’t possibly buy enough houses, cars and other expensive durable goods to support businesses. There’s only a million or so of those households. Even if each one bought 2 cars per year, the US auto industry would be 13 million short. Only the middle class could fill a gap that large.*It’s been in the news recently that many Wal-Mart employees don’t even earn enough to buy enough food at Wal-Mart. Henry Ford figured this out a century ago, and paid his employees enough for them to buy his cars. Wal-Mart would benefit if they did the same. It’s certainly working for Costco.
Dtroutma over 10 years ago
^^Hawthorne: just trying to dispel a little of the “right wing talking point” that “liberals are atheists”. But, when it comes to the Constitution: I fully support Article VI and the Second Amendment and the clear intent of the founding fathers to separate church from state.
I never really cared about money much, but rather raising my kids right, and living well enough to care about others. We’ve done okay, good kids, years of volunteerism to serve the community, and “accomplishments” I’m proud of in that regard, as well as serving the nation in my professional life. Now retired, and “comfortable”, but in large part because my spousal unit DID monitor the finances all those years, and planned well.
A friend of the family who DID go from near bankruptcy to being a millionaire passed on to me a bit of “wisdom”: “There are people who have a lot of talent and a lot of money who could actually care less about wealth. Then there are those who have money, but little talent themselves, and who NEVER have enough to satisfy them.” Such defines in the latter, way too many of the “Reaganomics” and TEA party fraternity. “Never enough” sums up way too many on today’s “right”, and yes, some on the “left”.
Diane Lee Premium Member over 10 years ago
In a just society “Working Poor” would be an oxymoron.
Motivemagus over 10 years ago
Given that I am at least citing facts, and you are merely insulting me, your response is hardly very compelling. it took me a grand total of about ten minutes to look up the facts, read several sites to see which had better detail (rather than merely a summary), and post them. Not exactly hard work finding real evidence of things.Indeed, I could have gone much farther. Your comment simply suggests you lack a response, and therefore are hoping an insult will replace more facts.