Bar Stool Economics: A Simple Guide to the American System of Taxation and Distribution

by | Jul 25, 2012 | Headline News | 278 comments

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    Suppose that every day, ten men go out for a beer and the bill for all ten comes to $100.

    If they paid their bill the way we pay our taxes, it would go something like this:

    The first four men (the poorest) would pay nothing.

    The fifth would pay $1.00

    The sixth would pay $3.00

    The seventh would pay $7.00

    The eighth would pay $12.00

    The ninth would pay $18.00

    The tenth man (the richest) would pay $59.00

    So that’s what they decided to do. The men drank in the bar every day and seemed quite happy with arraignment, until one day, the owner threw them a curve.

    “Since you are all such good customers, he said, I’m going to reduce the cost of your daily beer by $20.00.

    “Drinks for the ten men now cost just $80.00

    The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes so the first four men were unaffected. They would still drink for free. But what about the other six men – the paying customers? How could they divide the $ 20 windfall so that everyone would get there “fair share?” They realized that $ 20.00 divided by six is $3.33. But if they subtracted that from everybody’s share, then the fifth man and the sixth man would each end up being paid to drink his beer. So, the bar owner suggested that it would be fair to reduce each man’s bill by roughly the same amount, and he proceeded to work out the amounts each should pay!

    And so:

    The fifth man like the first four, now paid nothing ( 100% savings).

    The sixth now paid $2 instead of $3 (33% savings).

    The seventh now pay $5 instead of $7 (28% savings).

    The eighth now paid $9 instead of 12 (25% savings).

    The ninth now paid 14 instead of 18 (22% savings).

    The tenth now paid $49 instead of $59 (16% savings).

    Each of the six was better off than before! And the first four continued to drink for free. But once outside the restaurant, the men began to compare their savings.

    “I only got a dollar out of the $20“ declared the sixth man. He pointed to the tenth man, “but he got $10!”

    “Yeah, that’s right, shouted the seventh man. “why should he get $10 back when I got only two? The wealthy get all the breaks!”

    “Wait a minute,” yelled the first four men in union. “ We didn’t I get anything at all. The system exploits the poor!”

    The nine men surrounded the tenth and beat him up.

    The next night the tenth man didn’t show up for drinks, so the nine sat down and had beers without him. But when it came time to pay the bill, they discovered something important. They didn’t have enough money between all of them for even half of the bill!

    And that, boys and girls, journalist and college professors, is how our tax system works. The people who pay the highest taxes get the most benefit from a tax reduction. Tax them too much, attack them for being wealthy, and they just may not show up anymore. In fact, they might start drinking overseas where the atmosphere is somewhat friendlier.

    For those who understand, no explanation is needed.

    For those who do not understand, no explanation is possible.

    Hat tip Brother Slavo via David R. Kamerschen, Ph.D. The original author of this simple guide is unknown.

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      278 Comments

      1. Excellent analogy! 70% of America would never get it.

        • Mr.B; since you’re such a good and repeat participant here, I’m going to give you a 10% discount. Now it is only 60% that don’t get it. We both can enjoy the simplicity of the narrative and it is quite true.
          Good one Mac. The taxation is really theft masked as tax.

          • It is a slow day in this small Midwestern town and streets are deserted.
            Times are tough, everybody is in debt and living on credit.

            A tourist visiting the area drives through town, stops at the motel, and lays a $100 bill on the desk saying he wants to inspect the rooms upstairs to pick one for the night.

            As soon as he walks upstairs, the motel owner grabs the bill and runs next door to pay his debt to the butcher.

            The butcher takes the $100 and runs down the street to retire his debt to the pig farmer.

            The pig farmer takes the $100 and heads off to pay his bill to his supplier, the Co-op.

            The guy at the Co-op takes the $100 and runs to pay his debt to the local prostitute, who has also been facing hard times and has had to offer her “services” on credit.

            The hooker rushes to the hotel and pays off her room bill with the hotel owner.

            The hotel proprietor then places the $100 back on the counter so the traveler will not suspect anything.

            At that moment the traveler comes down the stairs, states that the rooms are not satisfactory, picks up the $100 bill and leaves.

            No one produced anything.

            No one earned anything…

            However, the whole town is now out of debt and looks to the future with a lot more optimism.

            And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how a “stimulus package” works.

            • TINA, very well stated. Thanks for the bit of humor and wit.

            • Well, between Tina and Mac, we are covered on our understanding of the economy…=) Thanks guys!!!

            • I’ve seen that before many times and it is just a true now as it ever was.

            • Ah Tina if it were only that easy. The problem with a stimulus package is that we all have to pay for it while the one who gets stimulated gets the bang for their buck.

            • Awesome.

            • @ Tina AWSOME!! have to read this one to my hubby he will laugh soo hard

            • Uh, not quite. The hotel owner has just given out $100 worth of hotel rooms to the prostitute for free.

              • Incorrect. The hotel paid the pig farmer and now owes nothing.

                • sorry butcher not pig farmer…

            • Totally awesome Tina, thank you.

            • @
              Tina
              I like the story,however; that doesn’t really portray how the O-drama stimulus has played out. A whole lot of pockets got lined along the way and the American taxpayer got shafted. Well, you could say the Chinese gov. got shafted. They basically own most of our debt and they too will get “shafted” in the end. One way or another.

            • motel and hotel owner the same person?

            • You forgot the part where the stimulus waters down their currency to the point that their economy crashes and they’re forced to eat each other to get through the winter.

            • But the chain is wrong near the end. The prostitute does not pay off the hotel bill. She gives the $100 to her pimp (Uncle Sam), who spreads it around among his drug dealer buddies (Congress), his hooker supplier (the Executive Branch), and his posse (the lobbyists and public leeches). The $100 never comes back to the hotel patron (the taxpayer). THAT is the reality of the stimulus.

            • Good example but when the government pays the stimulas, the money is never returned.

            • Your story assumes that everyone pays off debt. They don’t. In a perfect world, the one in this story, a stimulus package could have worked out in some twisted sort of way.. but when the man at the hotel asks for his $100 back because he has decided not to stay there after all, and the guy at the co-op decides to buy beer instead of pay off his debt, the fault falls on the owner of the hotel for using money that was never really his to begin with. The guy never checked in, which means the hotel owner stole from him.

              This is basically what a “stimulus package” is. Stolen money from the people who actually pay taxes, to spread around those who feel they deserve it. If they were paying off their debts, they wouldn’t be in the situation they are in.

            • so if it was really like a stimulus package, the hotel customer would need to find a cheaper room because they charged him to use his money…

            • The $100 bill story is, at first glance, amusing and seems to have a point but unfortunately it is not a good analogy of the debt problem as it is far too simplistic. It assumes that everyone owes exactly the same amount, $100, which is unlikely. Also, there is a nice closed loop but the motel owner will also owe money to the baker, the laundry and the electricity company so debts are linked in a complex web not a neat closed loop.

            • That’s the way Germany paid for the debts of Greece…..everybody happy
              (the Greeks still struggling)

          • As another analogy, the bar is the corp. The owner has promised those drinking for free that it is their right to do so, never telling them that someone else was paying for it.

            How long will it be before those free drinking alcoholics at the bottom revolt and trash the bar when the free beer dries up?

            And whose fault is it? The drunks or the idiot bartender who pretended to give them free drinks for so long.

            The drunks will trash the bar, and the bartender is very afraid of them. The people will trash the corp, and it’s owners are very afraid of them.

            • Bravo Gods Creation, I am giving you a standing ovation.

            • Can you define this “corp” with specificity? I sincerely doubt the “corp,” as I think you mean it, is at all afraid of the people. The monied interests running the show are not at any risk whatsoever, even if the S does HTF. It is, as usual, the middle that will be put in the position of fighting for its life as the bottom attempts to use violence to steal the wealth it previously had been given by those who stole it through the law.

            • The corp consists of all corporations formed under the private law of the United States, including State of Corps and their municipalities, and all private corporations operating under limited liability under those private laws.

              The corps owner/creditor is the stockholders of the Federal Reserve, a list of families now known.

              They will attempt to pit the people against each other. That is their escape plan.

              Secrecy is a requirement to carry out their crimes, and that secrecy has been lost. Yes, those banksters fear for their lives.

              You give them too much credit and buy into the “were omnipotent” meme. They have run a good fraud, but that they are flesh and blood will be proven once the people have nothing left to lose.

              There power comes from control of the money. Once the money they control is worthless, so will be they.

          • It won’t matter because number 1 man through number 10 man are ALL going to be in a nice FEMA line getting their daily rations after being implanted when everything implodes from the whacked out math of taxes and ohantom money. In fact number 1 man through number 99 man are going to be in that FEMA line because they took all of this as a big joke and that nothing was ever going to happen. Man number 100 is going to remain free behind the lines because he prepared.

            Taxation is a big fat joke. The fact is that taxes are not really the main problem right now, the U.S. could survive with all the bad tax laws, that reek, IF there was more people working good quality jobs that were sent over to the enemy (China). So the Chinese can use that good U.S. money to build a completely modern high tech army, navy, air force, and a massive rocket force mobile ICBM’s to flattened the U.S. one day. I am getting on my soapbox about how free trade has killed the U.S., but the true is so there for everyone to behold. Tax laws suck and are unfair, but losing jobs to the enemy is beyond despicable and the true core of the problem.

            • BI, I see that yellowstone has had 3 earthquakes in the past few days. Has there ever been, like in the last 100years, A 6.0 there? Saw your post yesterday, NZ is on fire, even with an active volcano…. Very interesting and mainly wondering about Yellowstone. Thanks in advance!

            • @ Youdontneedtoknow. Only one of those was in the caldera and the nice thing about Yellowstone is that it is not directly on an active plate boundary. It is going to take a large earthquake to split it open and as the National Geographic special said, unzip it. What could do it is an earthquake in the vicinity of 7.0+ and why they were so worried back in 1959 when just such an earthquake struck the area. Yellowstone could have moved over a thicker plug of rock strata that could keep it bottled up for the next 1/2 million years.

              I am personally much more concerned over Mt. Taupo down in New Zealand that is also a supervolcano, 5th. largest explosion on record, because of what is goin on right now between the Australian plate and the Pacific plate. This supervolcano IS on a major plate boundary. There is a chain of sequences that are very important that occurred in this region.

              First you had a 8.1 several months before the Indonesian mega quake that killed 200,000+ on the southern section of the Australian plate. This movement triggered that 9.1 mega quake on Christmas after day 7 years ago. The Australian plate is moving north and collided with the Pacific plate moving northwest. This in turn triggered another 8.7 months later. The you had the New Zealand and Japanese earthquakes that were both the result on that Australian plate losing out to the bigger Pacific plate. Then again, that Australian plate triggered the largest strike slip, horizontal earthquake ever recorded at either 8.6 or 8.7 that sent many other plates around the world into spasms because it was almost totally horizontal movement that pushed most of the other plates and caused much more stress build up all over the planet.

              That Australian plate is the real problem with what could cause a supervolcano to go off in areas that are famous for other supervolcanoes like the one in Indonesia called Toba that almost ended human beings 74,000 years ago when it went off as big as Yellowstone ever exploded. Toba and Taupo are the two most worrisome supervolcanoes that everyone should be most concerned over because of the battle of stress going on between the Australian plate and Pacific plate.

              The largest explosion ever of a volcano was the La Garita Caldera that went off 27 million years ago that was twice as much as Yellowstone and where Colorado is now. It was about 1/400 the amount of energy of the 6 mile wide asteroid that hit the planet 65 million years ago. Another area that I thought was dangerous is the Long Valley Caldera that is capable of almost a supervolcano level and went off close to when Yellowstone went off in geologic terms about 760,000 years ago, where Yellowstone went off 640,000 years ago.

              Any earthquake that is 7.5 or larger within 200 miles of a supervolcano has the potential to start an eruption of it. A 9.0+ that is within 300 miles of a supervolcano the same results. Doesn’t mean it will cause an eruption but the closer an earthquake is to the caldera of the supervolcano, the more likely it is to cause it to blow up. Watch for future earthquakes that are close to one of the many supervolcanoes around the world as the triggering force. Volcanoes can blow on their own, but usually there is something that causes that stress or an opening that releases the pressure and the magma from before.

            • Well, considering all the activity in that area, I foresee something happening in the near future… What would a super volcano eruption down there do? Global killer? Throw us into a long winter? Very facinated with this, especially seeing what’s going on. And Japan had a 5.0 earthquake, wonder about what it would take for those nuke plants? Thanks BI!!!!!

            • @ Youdontneedtoknow. I am watching very closely the Kuril Islands for Fukushima, another tsunami would come from this region that is only 400 miles away and would finish off Fukushima if it was probably larger than 10 feet high. I would say it would take probably a 6.5 to cause total collapse within about 5 miles of the hypocenter which is where the earthquake waves hit the surface. For every 8 miles the energy of a quake is reduced by 1/10 away from the hypocenter. Epicenter is where the earthquake starts underground and only 90 degree earthquakes have the same hypocenter and epicenter on the surface. It would take about a 7.5 within 25-30 miles away, and a 8.0 about within 40-45 miles.

              I have personally been in earthquakes and it usually takes the 25% or higher the force of gravity to knock down such a structure such as Fukushima. So perhaps a thrust fault of 5.9 directly below it could do it, but more than likely a 6.5 or higher pretty close. A 5.0 has about 3-12% the peak acceleration of the force of gravity. The highest force I have ever been in is 22% and that was big enough for me. I have felt a 7.3 at a distance with about 15% the force of gravity. The USGS site has maps that will show the force of gravity after an earthquake. Just click on the earthquake you want to look at, then click on maps to show the gravity maps that expand outward to lesser and lesser. Example click on the recent LA earthquake, then click on maps, then click Shake Map. Interesting above 100% objects are actually thrown upward as they lose gravity in a sense.

              A supervolcano going off ANYWHERE in the world would affect the entire planet in that it would drop the temperatures about 20 degrees because the ash would get far up into the atmosphere. Much like the difference between an A-bomb going off and a hydrogen bomb going off, it matters how far the pulverized ground gets up into the atmosphere. With smaller volcanoes it doesn’t get high enough up to spread globally. With a supervolcano VEI 8 it gets higher up than the largest H-bomb. In fact when Taupo blew before it was like 240,000 one megaton hydrogen bombs going off.

            • Well, it’s going to be interesting watching what happens… 3 6+ earthquakes in a matter of days and an active volcano is foretelling something. It scares me that that line goes nicely through Japan. But my masks are ready…=(

              Thanks again very much for the info, I’ve learned alot from what you’ve said and than watching it on the website. What I don’t know and what I’m trying to learn is the prediction of earthquakes, like you just did.

            • BI & YDNTK,

              Here is a site for Eartquake prediction:

              ww.syzygyjob.com

            • @ JustMe. I actually talked to the gentleman that runs that site many years ago. He goes by the moon cycles as the way to predict earthquakes. Syzygy has to do with when the moon has the most pull on the planet, normally during the spring tides, hence the name he choose. The moon does play in earthquakes as the Foundation for the Study of Cycles has documented. When the moon is at the apogee, between 390,000-407,000 km away earthquakes increase, as you would thin it would decrease being further away. The distance from the ecliptic also plays in as when the moon is 4-5.25% north of south of this middle point earthquakes increase. The shear factor must play in. The moon is closer than the sun that has only 40% the tidal forces on the planet that the monn has.

              I have found though this with the moon is too vague and tried to predict earthquakes based on where the earthquakes of present and past are focusing their energy towards. This is what I call a quiver theory that says that EVERY earthquake releases stress before it breaks somewhere along the axis of where the fault migrates outward towards. On the NSA article I posted a prediction about 3/4 of the way down on the comment section at 12:08 AM July 22. I said that an earthquake of a 6.8 or more along the western Pacific plate was going to occur within a week. So far 2 have of smaller magnitudes of 6.5 and 6.4 in Indonesia and the Soloman islands along the westrn Pacific plate like I said. Still have till Sunday to get the 6.8 size right, but there were bigger earthquakes where was predicated.

              I have posted other predictions that have also come true on this site as proof that earthquake can be predicted. I always say watch for earthquakes close to magnetic north and south, south of 60 degrees south, and north of 70 degres north. This 90% of the time means that the planet is warming up the bullpen for a good shaker. By the way there was a 6.7 in Mauritius region today and shows the Australian plate is really getting active evn on its western most edges.

              Here’s the thing that anyone can do that is really interesting and others can begin to predict earthquakes also. Get a globe, no flat 2 dimensional maps, and every earthquake over 4.5 put a little sticker on the globe where it happened. I cut out stickers about 1/8 of an inch square size, and 1/4 size for anything over 6.5. After a week or two you will see patterns developing where the stress points seem to be pointing to. Much like fire investigators know that fires have a knack of pointing towards where they started. You will see something much different than looking at a flat map by looking at the planet the way it is, in three dimesions.

              After a month of so you will have many stickers on the globe and see where the plate boundaries are and how the plates are moving against each other at many different angles, not just one straight horizontal plain like a map fools our eyes into believing. Just like when a peeble hits a car’s windshield and it cracks a certain way, so does the planet and you will see this a lot more so on a globe. Try it on a globe and you and others will be amazed how your viewpoint changes on what the planet is really going though under everybody’s feet. 😉

            • Good little article that explains a little bit about the San Andreas: http://blogs.laweekly.com/informer/2012/07/massive_earthquake_san_andreas_86_possible_caltech.php

              For a 8.6 to happen you would have to have more fault break, at least 375 miles of it. This would take a break past Parkfield and almost into the zone of creep that is suppose to be the buffer zone from the entire San Andreas breaking, if it started in the Salton Sea area. If it started south into Mexico then you could have that 375 miles of break to Parkfield.

              Now IF the entire San Andreas did break from the Mexican border to where it heads more westernly south of Eureka then you have a collosal problem. I am right now looking at a little guide book of the San Andreas that says it is more than 800 miles long, USGS give a total of 650-700 miles. 800 miles of break will shake for about 400 seconds, that is a little more than 6 and 1/2 minutes. 800 miles of break is more like a 8.9-9.3. Yes I said 9.3. This would like set off the Cascadia fault to the north which is a mega thrust capable of a 9.1 like in Indonesia the day after Christmas.

              Okay what that would do. Watch the 2012 movie, “without” the sinking of the land mass into the ocean and you will get an idea of what LA and San Francisco will look like after 6 and 1/2 minutes of shaking from a 8.9-9.3 mega earthquake. It would like like the Chinese had launched a full scale nuclear attack on the west coast using megaton warheads.

              Could it happen? Yes. Will it happen? Maybe. I say this because it all depends on just how much of the runaway motion that starts in the south will continue northward. It will go past the 1857 break because much stress has bulit up here after 155 years. Can it continue beyond the creep zone where stress is released each year? Yes, if there is enough inertia it can. There should be enough energy built up in the 106 years since San Francisco got it to continue beyond here north beyond here. It will take getting past that creep zone south of San Francisco though.

              Will california sink in the ocean? Small parts of it could where massive liquidification have occurred from the separation of soil particles from each other because of the intense shaking. During the New Madrid earthquakes of 1811-1812 this happen along the Mississippi river, sand geysers were everywhere. Happened in 1755 in Portugal where people actually were buried alive and sank in the “quicksand” type of pool that were created from that earthquake that some say hit 8.8.

              Those living where the earthquake waves will hit them full force WHEN the San Andreas breaks have no idea the horrifying events that will come from them. It is not just along the fault where the energy will be the strongest, it is also where the fault bends in a different direction that earthquake waves will break off from going parallel to the fault. Between San Bernadino and Palm Springs the fault heads more west than northwest, from this point a lot of energy is going right towards the LA region. A very large globe you can really see this well rather than a flat map.

              IF the San Andreas breaks before the economy or a war has started, or other major SHTF event, this will be the event that destroys the U.S. economy and likely will at least result in regional martial law. It is that serious because so much money is still locked in the state of california. The U.S. cannot take a TRUE disaster like this.

            • Creation–You give them too little. The true monied interests, those with genuine wealth and means, will be hurt in no way by you, me, or anyone else. They OWN the means to do as they please. They can live on 100,000 acres with a dozen underground bunkers and 1000 security guards around them in the middle of Patagonia, and you will never even know who they are. Seriously, this notion that we can threaten them in any way is ludicrous. Can you and I, in some trivial way, impact the minions of the “corp”? Sure, you can decide to whack a plant manager at the local subsidiary plant of Global Corp A, but all you are doing then is hurting what is probably someone not at all unlike you. No, the reality is that the true power is not seen, not heard, and not within reach.

          • Actually, it would be 63% who do not get it. (10% 0f 70 = 7 ) ((70 – 7 = 63 ))

            • I don’t get it. To start everyone’s net worth was $0 and in the end it was $0. How is that stimulative?

            • Capn,

              It is stimulative because the debt was extinguished.

              Think of how much better things would be if someone gave congress a 20 Trillion dollar FRN, in reality worth the same as the travellers 100 FRN regardless of the number on it.

              The corp could pay the Fed banksters, and they could pay restitution to the People, who could use the money to extinguish the fraudulent debt they created against the people.

              Everybody can be debt free simply because the debt is no more real than the “money” it is denominated in.

            • Wouldn’t AlGore love a 20 degree temperature redction?

          • Some things to consider as well

            ww.huffingtonpost.com/anthony-gregory/obama-business_b_1687374.html

          • Tina has oversimplified, and also wrong.

          • I thought it was a waste of my time and five minutes lost that I can never get back.

            It is no secret that war has been declared against us and that video is nothing but a propaganda piece to convince the sheep they are in danger that, ironically, is put out by the source of the danger while pointing at others as the threat.

            People that have better things to do than watch cnn videos, save your time with this one.

          • I saw something like this on my local channel yesterday (?) and the anchor said “lone terrorists who practice survivaling”. I tried to find the link to that broadcast, but couldn’t locate the report on the channel’s website.

            It’s scary because they seem bound and determined to link terrorism with prepping…or ‘survivaling’.

        • While I favor a $100/year head tax and no more tax than that, I feel no sympathy for “the tenth man.” The tenth man is usually a bankster or another swindler or pig at the public trough for corporations.

          • Yup, let the tenth man fade away and let the void be picked up by the other 9.

            I would rather have 20,000 small businesses making millions a year and making a good living than 1 large corporation making Billions and hording the cash. We created too big to fail (#10) by following the latter of the two.

            • Before anyone goes jumping down my throat over the last post.

              Imagine there is 1 trillion dollars and #10 has 600 Billion of it. Then the others spend their money on things increasing #10 tens bankroll until the pot runs dry. #10 will never spend his money at the same rate to replenish the cycle. Things break down at this point or more money is created so the other 9 can live. Now there is 2 trillion in the system (or whatever number) and the cycle continues.

            • Reread the article above. You misses the point or immediately forgot it.

            • I understood it to mean that without #10 that they would take their riches and ditch.

              “Tax them too much, attack them for being wealthy, and they just may not show up anymore. In fact, they might start drinking overseas where the atmosphere is somewhat friendlier.”

              If the rich man is that important to the company let him/her do the jobs of everyone there since their pay scale shows them to be the value of 100 people or more.

              It does not matter how it will happen since people will feel the same way as we do today in the future. Again it will be a separation of rich and poor and in about 100 years there will be another article just like this one and people will claim its the rich that make the world spin.

              I am not rich nor poor but I do see trouble when the income gap has a huge spread. If someone makes so little that it does not make it worthwhile to work, why bother?

              Lets say you make X dollars and you need Y to live and X does not cover Y so you look for another job to add to X. Now you work two jobs while your kid stays home alone and become delinquents that somebody will say “Its like those kids don’t have parents”. So as a parent you say ‘Screw it’ I am getting Z (welfare) to pay for everything since the jobs do not pay squat.

              Then Richy rich takes his jobs to China where wages are more competitive and tries selling his crap to a country where he just pink slipped the very people he wants to purchase his trash. So now all he has is other #10’s to sell his trash too. But how much volume can one sell to such a small demographic?

              You see it is a cycle and if there is no middle class the whole thing dies. Wait for it.

          • The 10th man actually employees all of the first nine and the beer is their wages plus some money. Now some of the first nine have to give back some cash they get working in the form of beer tax and the other 4-5 don’t pay tax and are concidered below poverty. Even though they are below the poverty line they still get there beer. i.e. IPods cars free housing and food. You could call those 4-5 the un-employed. Buy getting the goverment reduction (bartender $20 off deal) the employer or man #10 gets a nice tax break from the bartender i.e. (gobberment or resulut of sending jobs over seas).

        • Mr. Blutarsky … You’re being at least 20% gratuitous!!!

        • Well I don’t get it!!!! I must be in the 70% crowd, because I drink rum and coke!!! Hahahaha

        • Clearly the author is a vague boring twat.
          What is left out of this fux news propaganda like fable is men 6-10 hired lobbists to manipulate and buy congressmen and senators and recieved 1B$ for some shoddy wigets that are paid for by the rest of the working poor thru payrol taxes. Paying the extra $ for the beers is little more than a minor inconvenience.
          Wake the F@#k up you tea party trolls, your 15 minutes are up.

          • There is a large element of truth to your post anonymous. If you look at the fortune 500 companies you will see a large amount of lobbying. Whether they like it or not when the little people feel screwed over then whole thing goes to crap regardless how the 1% think we got there.

          • Exactly the problem with the “free” market! Big business buys off the government and both oppress decent working people.

            End usury. Pay just wages and charge just prices.

        • This is such a stupid analogy.

          First off, stop equating the “income tax” to all taxes. People who say that 40% (or whatever percentage it is today) don’t pay taxes just isn’t true. Poor people still pay sales taxes, car registration, etc. etc. etc. etc.

          “Poor” people should NOT pay income tax and neither should “rich” people. NOBODY should pay an income tax! Stop being duped by this game. This is just more divide and conquer with class warfare being played both ways. The 16th amendment is total bs, ratified or not. It is completely against natural law to have the gov. take someone’s money when they work. This is slavery and theft and nothing more.

          Not one single American “citizen” should pay an income tax. Rich or Poor. NOBODY!!!! 1913 was such a good year for the banking elites. They got their income tax passed and then they got the Federal Reserve Act passed to be fed by the income tax. And now they have the sheeple arguing about who should pay their fair share. I guess it’s a fun game if you’re the one reaping the spoils of the theft.

          • YEPPERS , if we will remain divided , we will remain conquered .
            @double tap

          • Why insist on missing the larger point here? Sure, we ALL pay taxes of some kind–income, real estate, excise, Social Security–any money the government takes from us, one way or another, and by whatever name (e.g., a $100 parking ticket) is a tax. It is THEFT by government except in the very narrow case of taxes necessary for the fed govt to carry out its extraordinarly limited ENUMERATED POWERS. But the point of the story is to show that all of the propaganda, lies, and class warfare of the Statist Left are what they are. Your argument is exactly the reaction of the Statist Left to any argument about the gross inequities of the current income tax structure. I doubt anyone would disagree with you about your views on income taxes as stated, but your response supports only the Statist Left because it parrots their line.

            • And the “Statist RIght” loves a “free” market that isn’t free at all for families sweating and BLEEDING to pay for corporate welfare swindlers, warmongers, and banksters who are “too [greedy] to fail.”

              Let them stand trial at Nuremberg.

          • You forgot direct election of senators. 1913 was a very bad year for USA as a whole.

        • I think that this describes America perfectly, magnificent post. Well Said Governor, Well said!!

        • The US “open bar policy” is well known. Many can’t wait to come here and get their “share.”

          VIDEO: Top Immigration Officials Describe Border Chaos Resulting From Obama Policy…

          (www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xb2_3R6oHSQ)

          Direct link on Drudge Report

        • 5 out of 4 people don’t understand fractions.
          Obama, Change we can be leavin.

        • The analogy makes a great point, but the data percentages and rates of payment shown aren’t quite correct in the USA.
          According to the Congressional Budget Office, and using 2009 data (the most recent I could find), #10 (the top 10% of households ranked by annual income) actually pay 51.8% of all federal taxes. (And yes, that includes payroll, sales, and corporate taxes too.) However, #10 only has 36% of all the 2009 annual income before taxes. (Income includes all types, including government transfer payments such as Social Security and welfare.)
          Drinkers #1-4 combined had 14.9% of the 2009 income, but paid only 4.1% of all federal taxes.
          There’s a lot of interesting data in the CBO report at this link:
          http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/attachments/43373-06-11-HouseholdIncomeandFedTaxes.pdf

      2. A lot of folks here beat up on the rich; better take a look at Greece and see how the rich are doing! They aren’t hurting the people are, and they aren’t hurting because they’ve left.

        • I’d rather drink with a few rich fellers than one welfare scumbum. At least in the well to do places around here you can still leave your money on the bar while you step out, try that in the getto or around government employes it would be stolen or taken for tax purposes immediately. Im sick of demonizing the rich they are not the problem!

        • Not all rich were created equal. If you create or run a business that makes products or provides services that are legal and in great demand by society you should become rich. If you are a criminal Bankster, or other crony capitalist and you create nothing of value to society you will get richer.

          • I’ve always heard..when’s the last time you got a job from a poor person??

      3. DOES ANY OF THAT SOUND FAMILIAR TO YOU? IF NOT, GET OFF YOUR COUCH AND LOOK AROUND.

        • And that’s not what I posted, Mac.

          I posted a clear rebuttal to this garbage.

          and hell no I’m no lib, but I did waste 30 years being a republican until I learned economics.

      4. I wish they wouldnt show up anymore, I don’t mind the well off at all most have worked to get where they are. Im so sick of “drinking” with the first four! This has become such an entitlement society it makes me sick. I stay out of the bar untill I have enough to pay my way that’s how it should be. Hand outs have ruined our country. FYI I live in the biggest handout state there is (ny) and I’m Irish so you can find me at the bar when I’m done working for my living, so I know what I’m talking about!!

        • I’m sick of paying for the first 4-5 as well….. Now see how easy that was for the gobberment to create class warfare.

        • I must tell this story I learned at the SICU waiting room at Nashville VA hospital.
          The man from Kansas had congestive heart failure, quite young; couldn’t get disability because he ‘looked’ too good.
          He then had kidney failure; still couldn’t get disability.He looked too good.
          His wife worked 5 jobs while he stayed home with the unexpected baby. He was 45 and she must have been about 40 when she gave birth.
          He was in for a kidney transplant, after 3 years on dialisis and she received word after his operation he had been approved for full disability. She sat and cried.
          This is how the system works; wife said if he was 10 miles across the line in Missouri, he’d have been on disability 5 years prior.
          Go figure!!!

      5. I’ll drink to that!!

      6. Three men walk int a bar…..the fourth one ducked! (collective groan)

        Seriously though, great analogy! But who’s bar tending? That may be the more important question. Clay

        • America the open bar.. we never close! So far!!

      7. Good story, but here is how it really works: The first five pay their bill with an EBT card. The EBT is distributed because No# 6,7,8 and 9 pay taxes. No.#10, (Timothy Geithner) pays no taxes at all. He cannot join the boys at the bar, because he was appointed Secretary Of the Treasury. And, now you know “the rest of the story”. Huh?

        • Like the 21 Trillion sitting in off shore accounts. Yeah the elite are an honest bunch. Perhaps if we all got to tax evade without jail time we all could be rich.

          BTW I do not consider anyone with less than 5 million to be rich. I make nowhere near that but it really does not do much nowadays.

          • I probably make less than you do, but consider myself rich. Spending time here each day has benefited me too. Money isn’t everything.

      8. But what when the rich dodge taxes threw legal loop holes…

        • Then your CPA needs to use those legal loop holes for you. I have saved alot of money just by having my taxes done by a pro. Nothing illegal. Use the riches rules to your benefit. ALOT of people don’t do this.

        • Even after the tax “loopholes”, as you call them, are figured in, the rich still pay a disproportionate share of their income in taxes. In 2009, the Top 1% of households in the US ranked by household income, had 13.4% of all income, but paid 26.7% of all the federal taxes. Those percentages include all types of income (including government payments) and all types of federal taxes. That figure is from the Congressional Budget Office report that you can find at this link:
          The analogy makes a great point, but the data percentages and rates of payment shown aren’t quite correct in the USA.
          According to the Congressional Budget Office, and using 2009 data (the most recent I could find), #10 (the top 10% of households ranked by annual income) actually pay 51.8% of all federal taxes. (And yes, that includes payroll, sales, and corporate taxes too.) However, #10 only has 36% of all the 2009 annual income before taxes. (Income includes all types, including government transfer payments such as Social Security and welfare.)
          Drinkers #1-4 combined had 14.9% of the 2009 income, but paid only 4.1% of all federal taxes.
          There’s a lot of interesting data in the CBO report at this link:
          http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/attachments/43373-06-11-HouseholdIncomeandFedTaxes.pdf

      9. The tenth guy said f— it,climbed into his private jet and high tailed it to the Caymans where he could spend his billions on blow and brown skinned hookers in peace.

      10. uh i hate to hit everyone with a bit of reality but unless you’re making well over 100,000 dollars a year (and i mean well over it) then you aren’t considered a tax payer in this example. this tax argument if you really take a look at it is a mess. not because of the tax rates but because of the deductions that are built in. but back to the point. the part where he talks about a tax return in this example should have everyone here thinking about how both parties are just alike. sad but true. don’t hate the messenger.

        • You make no sense. Just what deductions are left for the average person? Almost none. Business gets deductions based on what they spend to get and keep the business running. Try mortaging your home if you even have one to make payroll and keep the doors open. All you know nothings think that all businesses just make money hand over fist. That must be why eighty percent of them go broke. So easy being an employee where when things go bad you can just walk away.

          • @John W- are yu a MORON? 8 out of ten businesses near me don’t go out. Maybe you don’t know how to run a business.

            • John W. is incorrect in his statement of 80% failure of businesses. 75% of all new businesses fail within the first year. Of the remaining businesses 75% of them fail within the next 5 years. He far understated the problem of failing businesses.

              Your statements however are clearly of someone who has never run a business. An individual, or group, that creates a business providing needed products and services ethically deserve to get rich.

              Are the mega rich creating legitimate products and services ethically or are they getting rich by gaming the system at the expense of the majority. The needed discussion is being deflected through the usual divide and conquer technique.

              As many others are saying: Wake Up!

              Study the root causes, not the symptoms.

              Critical mass is approaching, what will happen I do not know. I only know it will not be “pleasant” and a favourable outcome is far from being the likely result. Continue prepping. Hope for the best, prepare for the worst.

              Rant off. Let the games begin. What with the summer Olympics pun intended.

        • My wife and I both work, make less than 40K a year (combined) , have 4 children (and only 2 count as deductions, how that works even H&R Block can’t figure out), we still pay almost 10% of what we make in regular taxes, another 7% in state taxes, add on another 15% for medicare, medicaid, and SSI. Then put on the sales taxes, taxes for fuel, electricity, phones, property taxes or other assorted taxes.
          Since we both work we cannot get government assistance (even if we wanted it), BUT if she or I quit our job we could get more in federal welfare, EBT, heating/cooling assistance, ETC that would add up to more than what we both make combined now!!!!
          After all taxes are figured in and “fees” my wife and I are trying to raise 4 children, another adult family member (job loss/house forclosure/property seisure) and just keep a roof over our head we have about 25$ a month for preps, fishing/hunting permit, park permits, or what ever.
          I’m not on the govt take, I have pride, I will NOT be a usefull idiot. I will be ready when the system crashes and the welfare queens and coke head idiots wonder what happened to their free lunch…

          • You need a better Tax advisor

          • MM I hear you. I have a family of four myself making about what you make, well not always easy I have never felt poor in my life. I can build, fix, produce most all of what we need. I’m pretty concerned with the fact that mote than once in a while the faithful government employees try to give me a hand out, if I needed whatever I would have to work more or harder I suppose! Alot are not like us I think that they are lacking one thing we have and that is personal pride and self respect! I will gladly go without before taking a government handout. Stay the course brother even 10$ thrown at preps a month will have us leaps and bounds ahead of many of our richer neighbors. Be safe.

            • I think it is called MERIT, building what we have and doing it on our own. I hope all is well with you and yours and in the end we will be richer than the rest that have never known the joys, sorrows, trials and tribulations of being parents and the everlasting pride of knowing that you helped make a difference in the life of a child. A child that will eventurally grow and be a parent themself and teach to a new generation what you have instilled in them.
              Ignore the guy below (disector284), he will never know the love between a parent and child. The spontaneous hugs and kisses or the “i love you daddy” as you tuck your kid into bed.
              Good luck and God Bless you and your family.
              I’m off to bed (working night shift sometimes blows)

          • Quit having kids.

            I’m not saying your not both hard working good parents, but you are considered person #5 or #6 on the scale above. You pay less in taxes. I pay 27% in fed taxes and have no kids. In reality I am helping you support your kids through reduced taxes and paying for schools and programs alike. I know if we didn’t have schools we would have more crime……WAIT a minute. If parents did their job RAISING THEIR children ( not saying you don’t) I wouldn’t be typing at this late hour. Just wonder what everyone thinks about a flat tax? Or better yet. The more kids you have the more you pay into the schools and other social programs. Kind of a pay as you go. You have a family of 6 it costs more to take them to the movies ect. I call it living inside my means.

            • Yea I’m self employed and my kids go to private schools, so in all actuality I pay way more than 27% of what i make to taxes and various regulations, I also have time to be a CFR. I also pay taxes on my home and my rental for scumbag peope to send there children to shitty schools. I plan on having a bunch more kids to carry on the family bussiness. I choose to live like this, I could make a shiton more money with one of the useless degrees I’ve managed to pick up, but the simple life and being my own boss suits me fine! Your welcome America and if you see Obama go ahead and tell him I built this!

            • Dan, you are truly a yeoman in the medieval English sense of the term…one of the staunch and sturdy freeholders who were the backbone of the English system, and who became the middle class. They were the class of people celebrated by Jefferson. This is exactly the class being trashed by our current overlords and sterile fools like Disector. If you want a prosperous land, you cultivate and encourage the intelligent, prudent, thrifty, independent yeomen…including encouraging their children, so you provide for the prosperity and good management in the next generation.

              I grew up in a family just like yours…although my parents were both college educated, my dad could make more money driving a truck. And we would have qualified for a lot of the gubmint goodies, but, well, we had a sense of pride and hard work and family.

            • It ia clear there are about half welfare libtards on this site. Just wait until your free milk money is taken away in the form of inflation. 5 out of 11 think we should pay more because they want more kids. Retards!

          • I heard that due to “entitlements” (how are others “entitled” to my money?), a single parent with two dependants making $15K had more disposable income than a married couple with two dependants making $60K.

          • MM2Nuke..same here..24,000 a year and only one income;I don’t work.
            I have prepped for 3 years.
            No children is the only difference and that allowed money for preps.
            Word for you?? From Aretha; r-e-s-p-e-c-t!!!

            • Thanks fellow prepper. My kids help in making ends meet; from helping with the fishing (as if you really have to try to get kids to go fishing), deer hunting (11 year old daughter got her first deer last year), making sausage, salami, canning vegetables, soups, stews and helping with the other things around the house. My oldest boy helps make sinkers and jigs, ties trout flies for bluegills/crappie/bass, or casting bullets for blackpowder and regular rifle/pistol for hunting. I may not have a mansion or a farm(YET) but we get by and have a lot of fun in the process.
              Last camp out my daughters and wife watched a doe and 2 fawns walk right though camp and not even seem scared. My great danes (2) slept right through it, they had a rough night of chasing the racoons away from the coolers. My father in law who lives with us, my boys and I were out catching catfish for breakfast at the time the deer walked through and saw a covey of quail with about 12 chicks chasing bugs while the sun was rising over the horizon. Better than any lifestyles of the “rich and shameless” people could ever have.
              We have each other, we have food, security, a roof over our heads, can pay the bills if only barely, and we have love of each other. What more do we need?

            • MM, I love this post. I can just see that campsite, with the deer and the two exhausted dogs!

      11. Eliminate the IRS and the thousands of pages of tax code.Implement a consumption tax at say 15%.Cut the corp gov by 50%.Everyone will have skin in the game and we can all drink top shelf instead of beer.

        • “Nothing will help you.” -IRS officer to Aaron Russo, in the documentary “Freedom to Fascism”

        • Yea right. Eliminating the IRS or Federal Reserve is like eliminating the stench at a sewer plant. It ain’t happening in this life.

          • Would take a major reset of USA.

        • I like your way of thinking JRS!!!!!

        • Diddling with the symptoms will cure nothing.

          • I’m all in favor of eliminating our debt based monetary system and bringing the perps to justice.Much like cancer,the cure is done in steps. Other than all out revolution, I can see no immediate cure. You have to learn to walk before you can run.

            • The cancer is not cured, it is treated. The money is in the treatment, not the cure, thus it has not been made available if it exists so the treaters can make their money putting toxic substances made by pharmaceutical corps in the body.

              All out revolution is not required. What is needed is enough people to stand up and say no to the debt paper and the corp numbers that control it.

              While that would be revolutionary, it does not require an “armed revolt”. It requires that the people understand who they are, what the corp is, and a desire to live under Gods law in pursuit of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

              You have to run away from the influences of the corp before you can walk in freedom.

            • I would like to say no to the debt paper, but my state will not accept “real money” for property “rent”. Their paper is all they will accept. While I could probably survive without participation in every other way, I have not been able to find a way to get allodial title to my property. I will be forced to participate or lose my shelter. I do not wish to live in a box under a bridge.

      12. Simply Brilliant!

      13. Heard that before, love it.

        Along the same lines, after President Obama’s ‘you didn’t do anything without government” speech; I was furious; came up with this and sent it to my family.

        Explaining public and private business in 6 easy steps.

        How private business works.

        As an example, say you want to open a sandwich shop:
        1. You reach into your wallet and grab money to buy or rent the location.
        2. You reach into your wallet to buy equipment and food to make sandwiches and sell them.
        3. You pay taxes, licenses and fees to the government to operate and keep your shop open.

        How government works, using the same sandwich shop:
        4. You want a stop sign at the corner of your shop. You reach into your wallet and grab $100 to pay the government for the sign and $100 for the government employee to put it up.
        5. Your shop is on fire. You need to reach into your wallet and grab $1,000 and have 5 other people reach into their wallets and grab $1,000 to pay for the fire trucks to come and put the fire out.
        6. You want to open another sandwich shop in a new part of town. You reach into your wallet and grab another $1,000 and have hundreds of othe people reach into their wallets and grab $1,000 to build the roads, stoplights and city services like water and electrical lines.

        The moral of the story is, it doesnt matter if it’s a stop sign or a fire station making your neighborhood safer or sending a space shuttle to outer space. In every case of government,

        GOVERNMENT MAKES IT HAPPEN BECAUSE THEY REACHED INTO YOUR WALLET TO DO IT !

        • Maybe Obama should mention all the towns that were built and only exist because of a business going in. There were and are quite a few of those. They pay alot of taxes and wages which also generate taxes which is why most areas want large employers and small to move in. Cars were not built because there were paved roads. Roads went in because of cars.

        • Lee says

          GOVERNMENT MAKES IT HAPPEN BECAUSE THEY REACHED INTO YOUR WALLET TO DO IT !

          No, government makes it happen because it has convinced you that evidence of it’s debt issued in the name of a private corporation is really money when in fact it is nothing more than a promise to deliver your future labor to the creditor named on it, the Federal Reserve.

          The moral of the story is, so long as we allow government corp debt, fraudulent or otherwise, to be money the people will be enslaved by the owners of that debt.

      14. I bet the rich guy does the best on ladies night!

        • No, it’s probably the first one, a good looking manly red neck likely to beat her up and treat her like shhiit.

          With women, all you have to do is find out what they say they want and it’s a fair bet they go for the opposite.

        • In USA, the definition of “rich” has been changed to “anyone with a dollar more than me”.

          • Good point. Many liberals like to point fingers at the “greedy” rich, but of the 7 deadly sins, envy is clearly the most evident in our society.

      15. So, you want to keep the income tax? The 16th Amendment was not legally ratified. The high priests of the british accredited registry, who insist that the 16th is true are actually stripped of Citizenship in the Republic by the original 13th Amendment. The BAR members will be exported as illegal aliens.

        16th not legally ratified
        (givemeliberty.org/features/taxes/notratified.htm)
        13th original Amendment
        (usavsus.info/usA–Original13thAmend.htm)

        The Lord is Righteous.
        Standing by in Texas.

        • You are reading a lot of theory and disinformation that gets a lot of folks in trouble and leads to serious misunderstanding of the Law and the enemy.

          You were born into Natural Law as a Free Man. Acceptance of any document from any group, including the US Constitution, subjects you to the bastardization that claims to exist under it.

          The exception is the acceptance of the Oath and Bond of an officer, opening them up to Claims under Natural Law enforceable through the corp as a contract.

          These corp criminals are not stripped of their citizenship, they merely drag you into the jurisdiction they are citizens of and the people are dumb enough to go there without a proper challenge.

          You are far away from a true understanding of self and Law. Don’t try to defend yourself in a corp action using any of what you think you know.

          • @GC

            Authority.

            I, [NAME], DO SOLEMNLY SWEAR (OR AFFIRM) THAT I WILL SUPPORT AND DEFEND THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES AGAINST ALL ENEMIES, FOREIGN AND DOMESTIC; THAT I WILL BEAR TRUE FAITH AND ALLEGIANCE TO THE SAME; AND THAT I WILL OBEY THE ORDERS OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES AND THE ORDERS OF THE OFFICERS APPOINTED OVER ME, ACCORDING TO THE REGULATIONS AND THE UNIFORM CODE OF MILITARY JUSTICE. SO HELP ME GOD.

            I don’t believe the Constitution is theory. I believe all lawful authority here exists to support and defend it. That the true “POWERS THAT BE” according to Oath of Offices is the Constitution, which acknowledges the People, who is given Power by the Declaration, which acknowledges the Creator as source. Texas also acknowledges the Supremecy of the Constitution of the United States (Article 1 Bill of Rights, Sec. 1).

            Any law, preposed or propped, against the Constitution is unlawful. Any other supposed authority that tries to establish supremecy against it is an enemy. The purpose here is to identify the lawful from the unlawful authority here in the DOMESTIC. If those in positions of authority are disobedient to their Oath or having oaths of loyalty against the POWERS THAT BE to overthrow it, well, in that case, I intend to see the Declaration invoked.

            Concerning the original 13th and problems with the 16th, they will not be the crux or edge against the usurpers. The Authority, that I see, being brought to bare against the usurpers will be in Romans 13 and the Constitution (1st,2nd,4th,5th,6th,8th,9th,10th). I’m seeing toward their Notice and it is forthcoming I expect. If there is no Constitution, we are left with natural law as in the Declaration. Which explains the usurpers martial law plans. Force.

            So, as far as natural law goes, it is the Declaration. Perhaps we both see on this level? If they repent, I will be very happy to call them kinsmen, countrymen. If they continue unlawful progressions, their very Oaths will sentence.

            I suppose many have plans for BOL in such a circumstance. I’m not against it. Perhaps it is your lot. So, I consult with the Highest Authority on such an important and overwelming problem. This is what I believe is my lot. I am subject to the Higher Powers, so defined. God, Country, Corps. Faith.

            The Lord is Righteous in Judgement and Grace.
            Standing by in Texas.

            • While I appreciate your belief in the Constitution, it can not be enforced against the corp because it is not a Lawful entity operating under it. It poses as such until it gets you in its grasp, then it tosses it in file 13 and has it’s way with you.

              There is only one enforcer of the Constitution. the victim of crimes against Natural Law perpetrated by the corp officers. The problem is you have no force or existence within the corp as a subject of Natural Law.

              You are severely mislead if you believe you are SUBJECT to any country, corp, or faith. If you choose allegiance to any of these, you must first surrender your allegiance to the Almighty God and His Law.

              I do not believe that to be your intention, but that is the result of your beliefs.

              Allegiance is for God and Family. Nothing else deserves or requires your allegiance and any given is a voluntary act against those.

            • @GC

              While I appreciate your belief in the natural law (Declaration?), it can not be enforced against the corp either? What? Since it is an unlawful entity which the true POWERS THAT BE have ceded their authority to? What? Anyone who chooses to resist tyranny by whatever means is enforcing against the usurpers.

              Saying that corp officers are the only enforcers of the Constitution and that Oath Keepers have no force is definitely discouraging and defeatist. Those that have given Oath needs remembering that Oath. This is necessary to bring the usurpers to account.

              As far as me being SUBJECT to higher powers is to God (Our Heavenly Father and Lord Jesus Christ), Country (The Constitutional Republic), Corps (United States Marine Corps) is what I have come to be. FAITH in HIS AUTHORITY and powers he has delegated to that I should bare true faith and allegiance is to resist tyranny until HIS return to this HIS foot stool.

              The Lord is Righteous.
              Standing by in Texas.

            • JCSG

              Natural Law is the Law from God. The Ten Commandments directly from the finger of God. The Declaration is derived from Natural Law by free Men, but not part of it.

              Neither the Declaration of Independence nor the Powers That Be have ever had any authority or power to cede, except that which you have given it by acknowledging it as a source of power. YOU are the source of ALL Power over YOU (God has given you Free Will), if you can accept the responsibility that goes along with the power you wield. If you can not, you take an oath to something else and/or cede your power to it.

              “””Saying that corp officers are the only enforcers of the Constitution and that Oath Keepers have no force is definitely discouraging and defeatist. “”

              Who said that? I said YOU were the only enforcer of The Constitution AGAINST the corps officers when they violate Natural Law against you. That must be done in the corporate courts through Contract Law, not Constitutional Law. The corp does not have any enforcement power IN Law. The corp does not exist under it and it’s officers violate it routinely as a matter of statutory requirement.

              Do Oath Keepers have force? If so, why are they not removing the treasonous offenders from the power centers? Every Order you receive is in violation of the Constitution. The stopping point is apparently when you get asked to kill or disarm Americans only.

              The Bible warns against taking any oath because they subject you to rulers other than God and create a false allegiance to Man. The act of taking an oath is a violation of Biblical Law and the compact with God.

              The Constitutional Republic consists of Sovereigns, not subjects. It is not possible for you to be a subject in the Republic because the Law reserves all power to YOU in your sovereign capacity. You only become a subject to those you voluntarily cede that power to.

              The US Marines are paid corp soldiers fighting to perpetuate an illegal, Unlawful, and unholy legal fiction through the protection of it’s monetary monopoly it wishes to make worldwide. The military is asked to kill and destroy on behalf of this fiction and its anti-God agenda to control all Men. Participating in evil against God and His People is not made right because someone believes they are doing good.

              You can fight for God. You can fight for the Constitution or other Man Made law. You can fight for the US Marines.

              But you can only do ONE, and you are subject to the lowest authority if you choose more than one.

              Understand I am not trying to beat you up. Your heart is in the right place, but as the Bible warned you have been deceived.

              The aim of my comments is not to belittle your beliefs, but to help you understand there is ONLY ONE AUTHORITY. that of God. I think you understand that, but are not sure how to apply it because you have given authority over yourself to others besides God.

              I was in your place many years ago. You have made it into the fog from out of the darkness. I am attempting to lead you out of the fog where the only visible authority is the Almighty God.

              You seem to think that you are fighting tyranny by being a Marine, when the reality is that you are a part of the tyranny being imposed by force if you are a uniformed soldier murdering on it’s behalf.

              The only way to fight tyranny is to deny it’s existence, or it’s right to exist, and seek the protection of God for the consequences of honoring Him in doing that when someone or something else claims authority it does not have.

              You don’t have to believe what I say, but I hope you will strongly consider it. God is in your heart and I can see it. But I also see it cluttered up with other pretenders that you believe also have authority over you.

              In the end, I hope you will realize that there is only room for God and Family (derived from God). Kick out the rest. God has given you the Free Will to do that at the time of your choosing.

              When you do, you will know Peace and Freedom, and God will know you because there is nothing else in your heart competing against Him.

              I believe you to be a good Man who wants to honor his Creator and help his fellow Man. You just have too many other distractions that keep you from doing so at this time.

              We come from the same place, I have just gone farther down the road. I have read all the materials that you imply as fact in the original post. ALL of it is crap intended to help those who believe in the authority of the State to beat the State at it’s own game. Only God and His Law will defeat them, and only if YOU force the criminals to honor it. That can be done, but not by trickery like using it’s laws.

              So long as you consider the State a legitimate power, it will rule over God in your life. It doesn’t have to be that way, but only you can change that by refusing to acknowledge what does not exist in the eyes of God.

              Somehow, I know eventually you will “get it”. When you do, you will fully understand my postings and where I am coming from.

              The fastest way home is to measure everything against Gods Law. The Bible says no man or thing is add to or take away from that Law.

              I accept Gods law, and ONLY Gods law. I don’t care what the Constitution says because it is subordinate to Natural Law, God’s law. I don’t care what the statutes say because they are subordinate to the Constitution.

              You can choose any law you want to. That Free Will thing, you know. I think your problem is that you accept laws from many other sources and they all contradict the Law from God.

            • GC

              Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master. George Washington

              The United States Constitution is containment. A necessary limitation on governments, to preserve liberty. Government, like fire, will consume everything without clear boundaries to keep it in its’ place. The Constitution is not set up to limit peoples liberties but to preserve liberties from governments encroachment. It is a tool to keep this government at bay.

              If as you say ‘Natural Law is the Law of God’ then it should suffice for the God Fearing in governments to keep with the Commandments of God. Governments would stay limited and contained to preserve liberty. But the God Fearing do not exist alone but are outnumbered by atheists, communists, secularist, luciferian, and all manner of godless lawless in this country. The people in government do not have Oaths to Gods Commandments or Natural Law, so what is their limit? Without Constitutional containment how far will they go? Remember what George Washington said?

              Concerning the Marine Corps. I am aware of the corporation. You should be aware that the Oath is not to the corporation, it is to preserve the Constitution, IE limited lawful government.

              You ask. Do Oath Keepers have force? If so, why are they not removing the treasonous offenders from the power centers? That’s what I have been posting here to get it done. Except that comments like “I don’t care what the Constitution says because it is subordinate to Natural Law, God’s law.” and “Acceptance of any document from any group, including the US Constitution, subjects you to the bastardization that claims to exist under it.” are counter productive to rally Oath Keepers. Why would anyone rally to a bastardization? Why would anyone diminish the one document in our government that limits that government? Remember not everyone is Christian to rally to Gods Law.

              When this Constitutional Government is replaced, what do you see replacing it, GC? UN Tyranny/Mark of the Beast?

              I know it’s almost gone already. They are working the last major keystone “Fast and Furious”ly.

              The “SUBJECTS” disconnect is best answered in Romans 13, which applies to Christians.

              The Lord is Righteous.
              Standing by in Texas.

      16. Thanks Mac! Great analogy. And bars are somehting I have a certain familiarity with. (from my younger days, of course. I’m now a bible thumping t-totaler)
        But here’s how it usually goes in my neighborhood…

        10 guys go into the bar. The bartender recognizes two of them who haven’t paid their tab and tosses them out. Now there’s 8.
        One orders a fruity drink with a little umbrella. The bartender gives him a stern look. “This ain’t San Francisco.” And throws him out. Now there’s 7.
        Two guys get into a dispute over whos turn it is to buy. The argument gets so heated, they take it outisde to settle it. Now there’s 5.
        The phone rings and a female voice on the other end is heard yelling ‘Tell ole I aint here he’d better get on home’. Realzing it’s not that old country song on the jukebox, one guy gets nervous and scurries out. now there’s 4.
        One guy looks at his iPad, shouts “Oh, crap! Appointment at the realtors office in 15 minutes! I almost forgot!” He rushes out. Now there’s 3.
        Two of those remaining are sitting at the bar, side by side. One says, in a sort of musing philosophical way, “You know, I guess that Obama fellow ain’t so bad after all. We just need to give his policies time to work.” His drinking companion spews his beer across the bar. Then, without a word, he and the bartender pick the man up, carry him to the door, and throw him into the street. Now there’s 2.
        An old rerun of America’s Most Wanted comes on the tv. One guy looks at it, ducks his head and leaves quickly. Now there’s 1.
        The last customer sits there, making idle conversation with the bartender, “So, how’s business?”
        ‘It’s been a little slow lately. Maybe I need to change the decor in here or something….’

        • Excellent!

      17. Aaaahhhhhh… for some reason I had an urge for a cold beer. Fortunately, I prepped everything I need to make my own. Screw the other 9 guys that failed to plan, had to leave their home and go to a neighborhood to drink where almost 50% of the people can’t even afford a beer. The moral of the story is be ready for anything, or end up drinking with some poor bastard with nothing. The end.

        • You DID make enough beer for everybody here…did’nt you?

      18. We should copy and email this to our respective Senators and Congressional Rep. Unfortunately, the last line of the article is probably most applicable to them.

        • We need to send them ALL PINK SLIPS!!!!

      19. What’s beer?

        • Something Al Gore invented.

          • Sacrilege!

            • “Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.”- Benjamin Franklin

          • Didn’t he invent a……….fishing net? I think I heard that somewhere.

      20. mac, tina swift, lee; you’re all right on target. the entitlement mentality has really screwed up this country. when tshtf, the “where’s my check” crowd will go bananas when they realize their goodies have been cut off. it’s going to be hellish for all of us’ but one of the best things to come out of it will be the demise of socialism. it’ll be a real blessing to have people work and be self-sufficient instead of sponging off other people’s revenue.

        • It boggles me how some people have no problem asking things of others. If I have to ask someone for something I feel ashamed. I am able bodied, have good intelligence, and know how to balance a check book. Now all you have to do is go to work and earn a living. It really is that simple. You go into the hills and you see guys in beat up trucks driving into the city to do odd jobs, scrap metal, tires, wash the windows at the gas station you name it….but they are making a living on their own

          • …in the immortal words of Charley Daniels “I aint askin nobody fer nuthin,if I cant git it on my own,you dont like the way Im livin ya jest leave this longhaired country boy alone…”

      21. ummm folks
        you’ve heard the saying “NOTHING in life is free” ?

        there is a reason the rich guy has been buying us all drinks

        http://www.forbes.com/sites/charleskadlec/2012/07/24/the-governing-elite-are-the-greatest-threat-to-americas-middle-class/

        he wants to keep us drunk for a reason

        remember all those manufacturing jobs,years ago, that someone could get right out of high school?
        they paid good wages and had benefits ?
        yeah those jobs

        well they were all sent to China
        so now when you get out of high school
        it’s the 7-11 or Walmart for you
        at minimum wage and crappy benefits if any

        the “good” news is
        some of the manufacturing jobs are coming back
        yeah
        we got some of those right here in my town
        trouble is they pay a big whopping $8.50 an hour
        and the company brags about this
        WTF ?????

        welcome to a life of wage slavery

        thats why he’s buying the beers
        and even now that is coming to a stop isn’t it ????

        • Very good.

          However, let’s look at the larger picture.

          Is the problem that the corp has provided an atmosphere where the best one can do is that?

          Or is it that the people themselves believe they can do no better on their own?

          Being a wage slave is a choice. He can buy all the drinks he wants, but nothing is stopping you from leaving either before or after he has stopped.

          How many are there now just taking them up on their free drinks because it makes up for the difference of what is stolen through taxation, but are really prepared to start buying their own as soon as he stops?

          You are 100% correct. Working for the corp is selling yourself into wage slavery, and the “wages” are taxable to boot.

          The only one that can sell you into slavery is YOURSELF. The corp just makes it easy and convenient for people to do.

        • Look, if you don’t like the $8.50/hr the company is offering, then don’t apply for the job. Get off your ass and find something else to support yourself. YOU are responsible for your life, your income, and your happiness – no one else. Do you know why the manufacturing jobs went to China? It’s because they’ll take the $8.50/hr (or less) and be very happy with it. Bitching about the companies that are offering jobs when jobs are scarce is counter-productive and won’t bring the manufacturing back. If they are only offering $8.50/hr it’s because the job can be done by any schmuck with 15 minutes training, and as long as there’s someone applying to fill the position they aren’t going to raise the pay, and should have to.

          • typo noticed…. I meant “shouldn’t” have to.

      22. I’ve never had a poor man offer me employment! Higher taxes levied upon the rich are generally paid at the expense of the working man’s job.

        • Thank you!

          • Now don’t get me wrong. I ain’t no rich man by any stretch of the means. I do own a small business and after the o’bomb-bomb I’m down to me and my son, who just finished college and works with me cause he cannot find a job in his field of study. Be as that may, I continue to be able to pay the bills and am thankful.

            • Hey PO’d, same here. Three years ago, 14 employees, now 5 and two of those are me and my wife.

            • ~~~Be as that may, I continue to be able to pay the bills and am thankful.~~~

              That right there is the problem–thankful??
              You should be thriving–but with the incompetence running this country, fees and regulations abounding, bankers stealing our money, we’re thankful???

      23. I think people on this blog could benefit from watching Zeitgeist Addendum. I think this second movie has a stronger impact then the other two so i recommend watching this movie first, you can find the full length movie on Youtube. Although the movement and some ideas may have flaws it may inspire personal research and provoke thought.

        • Zeitgeist was entertaining, lots of truths and noble dialog, but it avoided some of the hardest truths about why we’re all in this jam, and who’s behind it…

          • Applause to you for discerning reality…sorry I can give only one thumbs up!

      24. You forgot that 2 of the bar guys were illegal aliens and get theirs free anyway.

      25. In the case of the US “bartender” the $100 worth of beer actually costs the barkeep $135.

        • that’s what kills me about everything in the US nowadays is subsidized so we actually pay twice for everything but no one knows cause we have no idea what our taxes pay for. This is my one argument for property taxes..they have to ask for them every couple years and the money has to be used for that exact purpose :/ The wealthy also get to incomes…the one from their company and the check from uncle in the form of a “subsidy”

      26. Just something to add. It cost the bar $140 for those $100 in beers. He put the extra $40 on a credit card. How long will this bartender stay in business at this rate?

      27. The use of the word arraignment ….is this misspelling [ arrangement ] or much more subtle? Regards Crafty

      28. Very clever, I love it!

        This is “Atlas Shrugged” in a tiny nutshell. The only people who won’t get it are the ones who don’t want to.

        • Who is John Galt?

          • a character from the book Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand

            • Haha I didn’t pay attention to the post above yours JustMe your question was rhetorical lol

            • Yes…he knows….

          • Me almost 8 years ago. I read Atlas Shrugged and decided it was a good idea to become John Galt. No one really appreciated my work when I was on hourly salary. When I decide to work now, I get a lot more money anyway. I did a few jobs free to demonstrate my skills, and now people in the area know I can do anything even remotely associated with a computer. Anything comes up that needs to be done, and they say “Archivist can do it!”

          • @ JustMe. The only John Galt I ever knew used to be on the shortwave on the Steve Quayle show that I use to listen to. He forecasted much of the disaster of the economic crash 4 years ago on this shortwave program with some pretty good accuracy. John Galt has a web site that is geared somewhat like this one, towards preparedness and getting the truth out about what is happening. I have many times tried to find his progam on shortwave but been able to for some time now. He has SHTFplan actually linked on his web site, which is cool. You can check it out here: http://johngaltfla.com/wordpress/

            • Be informed

              We have a plethora of forecasters who have been correct.

              My question..

              Given a systemic collapse..just what exactly is ahead for us?

              We have right now..
              severe droughts
              collapsing financial system
              100 million poor
              50% of the nation dependent
              22% real unemployment
              Military assuming domestic police powers
              potential UN gun ban looming

              and that’s just the surface..

              mideast potential conflicts
              possible false flags olympics and elsewhere

              you mention potential earthquake scenarios as well.

              just add water and stir..a mess indeed..

              possee

        • Geraldine—I just read the analogy to dh and said the same thing…who is john galt??

          • OOps..we all got it!!

      29. I make a lot of money.
        (If I told you the amount you would not believe me so I won’t)
        I go to work about 5:30 – 6:00 AM most days.
        I spend 3-4 days a week out on the road selling and try to be home no later than 6:30 – 7:00 pm, unless I have to present to a board or a conference, then I may be home by 10:00 -11:00pm.
        My wife has spent the better part of our 24+ year marriage managing the home front, raising our 3 children, as I sacrificed time with them to build my client base for OUR future. Then she worked nights (At one time, 3 different part time jobs) to cover the bills I couldn’t.
        I am straight commissioned and there have been months I owed the company money (deducted from my next check) because I didn’t sell enough to cover the insurance coverage deduction for the month.
        I am not evil.
        I don’t take advantage of the less fortunate.
        I donate to charities; I volunteer to help with youth activities, help at the food pantry, go to church, and “pick up the check” a lot!!
        29 years ago I was earning peanuts.
        Hey Obama and Biden.
        Why is it fair for me to now pay more? I don’t owe anyone anything.
        If I choose to give, that is on me.
        I should not and do not feel guilty for my success.
        Back in the day, people looked at success and tried to emulate it, now they are jealous and want to destroy achievers and take that they have under the umbrella of “fairness”.
        Teach your kids to work hard, and dream big!
        Instead we have a president and an entire race that feels entitled to what we have, and they plan on taking it.
        By using class warfare, the left has effectively demonized the well to do, and now we are an open target.
        I look at all the Black on White crime (Ol’ Remus ‘ Woodpile Report) and wonder. Will there be a full out “Race War”?
        I am locked and Loaded!!!!!

        • “communism” destroys the desire to achieve and in it’s place shows up apathy and envy. The owner of the company I work for is from WWII Hungary and whenever a Russian comes in to put in an application he throws it away. He says commies don’t work very hard lol.

          • “They pretend to pay us, so we pretend to work.” -Soviet Worker’s saying

        • LivinTheDream: Love your truth. I am not rich and bearly middle class, but even bearly middle class puts me in the “Hit Zone”.

          With almost 50% of American Citizens considered Poor, They will gladly look at me as one of the rich and that will justify their hate, anger and theft towards me.

          Class warefare, race wars and taxageddon are going to bring violent revolution to our country.

          God bless and keep on prepping.

        • It’s coming. Good luck.

        • Livin the Dream, good rant. Take care.

        • LivinTheDream,

          Excellent post! Well Said!

          KY Mom

      30. What a phony load of manure idea….If we are not nice to the rich and lick their backsides they will take their toys and go home…Booo Hooo…Don’t let the doors hit em in the backside as they leave…They will quickly discover that capitol controls will eat their savings (stealings) and a lot of countries will only welcome them until they can figure out a way to take the wealth from those stupid rich americans… If a guy can make a mi daon a year, but the bad old government even takes 90%, the poor rich guy would only have $100K a year to live on…poor baby…I know about 90% of the population who would gladly eat human wastes every day to have such an option of making $100K a year…Oh wait, they do already eat human waste every day since there is this thing called economic repression.. Wonder why the unemployment rate is so high…so the wealthy have an excuse and the leverage NOT to give salary increases even though inflation is eating people alive..especially the working poor who don’t get handouts or government baleouts for sitting on their sofas doing nothing.
        We need jobs that pay livable wages (you figure out how to live on $8 an hour..its not possible) then make jobs avalible for anybody who wants one…(we really do have crumbling roads and bridges and anybody can use a shovel)..and next cut off the parasite class who do nothing and contribute nothing…offer em a classic American option..”If you want to eat you have to work” then watch the fun…As for the wealthy…Who the hell needs a billion dollars? Come on folks, If I am a billionare, I can spend of 10K a day every day and get richer and richer off of that money sitting in a savings account…(at 0.1% annual interest) and do nothing But
        how much is enough and how much is too much? When the pigs eat the whole pie, nobody else even gets the crumbs.
        How about a new law…you can leave behind a million bucks to anybody else you want to, and beyond that, your mountain of money goes back to the government and the people (your employees) ect who you took it from
        Even Scrooge got generous when he saw what a crappy life his employees had because of his greed…

        • @Mickey – Are you serious? If a rich person has your money, it’s because you gave it to them, probably for useless junk that you don’t really need.

          My father once said that you could take all the money and resources in the world and divide it equally among the entire population of the world. Inside of a year, the same people would be rich or poor as before, because the rich know how to make money and the poor don’t know how to keep it. Most poor people do not know how to handle money. They see pretty things in the store, or want to party and blow their money on the here and now. Most rich people save money and put off buying things until they can really afford them. My father was never rich. He never made more than $6 per hour. But he always paid cash for everything, including cars. The local car dealer would bring cars to the house for my father to look at. He only bought one house on credit, and he paid double payments until it was paid off. He said that paying cash saved you money in a number of ways. First, you get interest on your money while you are saving up. Second, you don’t have to pay interest by getting something on credit. Third, you can wait for a sale. Fourth, if it’s a big item, you can talk the price down sometimes.

          When I started out at minimum wage, I rented a house for $50 a month, ate bologna sandwiches and chicken hot dogs three meals a day, and rode a bicycle to work. I bought my first car for $400. Six years later I bought an old house trailer for $4,000. Three years later that was paid for, and I was ready to buy some property to put the trailer on so I wouldn’t have to pay for a lot in a trailer park. My situation changed so I didn’t continue that course, but my next step after paying off the property would have been to build a small house. I couldn’t have had a house when I first started working and only made $250 a month. I’m not rich, but I don’t have to work for anyone unless I want to.

          So don’t think most rich people didn’t work for what they have. They worked and made intelligent decisions. They didn’t always live in the here and now like most poor people do. They planned and saved for the future. Maybe you should talk to some rich people and find out how they got rich. You might learn something.

          • A good example is the number of lotto winners who go bankrupt. They were making bad decisions with money before they won the lotto.

        • “””How about a new law…you can leave behind a million bucks to anybody else you want to, and beyond that, your mountain of money goes back to the government and the people (your employees) ect who you took it from”””

          Nothing should ever g to the corp. Have the executor of the estate enter local people in a free lottery for a million dollars each, tax free.

          A billionaire could create a thousand new millionaires. Bill Gates could create 50,000 new millionaires despite his evil and utter worthlessness.

        • I know theres alot of evil out there but wealth and corruption do not nessesarily have to be companions,I know well to do people who got it honestly and would /do give alot to help others and I know poor people who I wouldnt trust with my dog,its not having money or not having money that matters its whether or not you have decentcy and character,if a man makes a billion dollars by honest enterprise why should anyone have any say in how much he needs or has use for?…that kind of nonsense is why the kenyan is in the white house,its evil!I run this farmstead to stay alive and cash is somthing I havent ever had much of,my Lady works a 9$ an hr sweatshop jop for some cash in this place…I qualify for all the govt bennies and wont take a cent,we will stand or fall on our own two feet and Gods grace,God forbid I ever look with jaundiced eye at another mans honest earnings,stolen is another issue we should deal with as a nation but greed and envy are nasty in a person …be he rich or poor.

        • Slow day at the “occupy wall st” groupie house, mickey?

          Get a life, chump!

        • Good I got you guys thinking and talking… One problem we do have is that the proportionate tax burden is not equal. If someone earns $100 a week and pays $50 in taxes, that leaves only enough money for a small bag of groceries or a tank of gas…If someone makes $3000 a week and pays $50 in taxes it is nothing..Or even if they have to pay $500 (50%) just like the poor guy) they still have $1500 a week and can live comfortably. Social equity is about doing what is morally correct.
          those to whom much is given, much is expected…meaning, if you were blessed, were lucky, were born with a silver spoon..whatever, your obligation and responsibility to society and taking care of those less fortunate really is larger.. Now don’t get me wrong…people who can work need to be cut off and be handed a shovel..no exceptions… We also need to fix our tax code to make incentives to create enough jobs, we need to make incentives for investment in infrastructure, factories, and building up this country instead of what we have now. Romney and Baine Kapitol were given hugh incentives to become to successful US companies (like KB Toys) the equivilant of serial rapist/murders of companies for a profit.
          In the case of KB Toys one of many companies Romney and his buddies murdered.. (remember that nice toy store in the mall), Baine Kidnapped the company, beat it up, made it use its own ATM card and Credit cards to pay for the Baine guys to have a wild party, then when the Baine boys had their pockets filled, and had raped, beaten, humiliated and robbed this company and its employees, it tossed this broken bleeding company in the nearest river with a giant stone of debts tied to its feet to drown..For them it was a thrill kill… they bought KB for say..5…they made KB borrow 30…the Baine boys kept 15 for all their hard work beating and holding down their kidnapped toy company while they took turns on it..(such a hard job)…then they forced their little toy company to give them their childrens allowance too (the company pension money) so I guess you could say they raped all the employees too…anyway…after this, they looked around and saw that time was short since their poor little toy company was bleeding and getting weaker by the minute, so before the bitch died, they forced her to sign a paper that the toy company agreed to pay these guys 15 more (all the money the company had left that it had borrowed and it had to also sign over the property, car and furnature)…then the Baine boys knowing that time was short, died their little toy company up, and dumped her in a river (of debt) to drown so there would be no witnesses… These Baine Boys did this over and over and over destroying many companies and hundreds of thousands of American jobs… all of these were thrill kills… (guys that do this sort of thing to people normally have some problems getting it up normally and have to use violence humiliation ect for this) (of course I remember a story of Romney as a teenager being the leader of a gang holding a new kid in school down to humiliate and degrade him too)..you guys really want this pervert in the white house?
          Our system rewarded them for this.. it was a faster way to make a buck…destroying a healthy company and destroying the jobs of thousands of employees than it was to manage this company properly and do the right thing. Is what they did legal…yes….moral or ethical…is rape thieft and murder moral or ethical?
          Sure some people earn it and I can respect that…
          In my own life, I have been so poor that those on food stamps looked down on me…I have also enjoyed a few limos and world travel… I never had to hurt anybody to get what I got…AND I never forgot what its like to be at the bottem where the system or rules, laws, taxes and discrimination/repression make it a hundred times harder to break those chains of poverty than it should be… My fight is against the chains our society makes that hold people down and hold them back..Its a lot harder now than it was when I had to swim uphill to escape from poverty. I frankly doubt its possible now…

        • You are a sick, envious, moron who doesn’t deserve even an $8/hr job. I hope you starve.

      31. In your story the rich always paid the bill. But when comes to Tax they pay less percent when they have good taxman. They rather make huge sum to get their people in power. They do not scream about roads or Dam and Bridges that need replacing but they give million for ads on TV.
        Which I’m sick of seeing.

        So compare this story to tax is silly. Also this statement about 50% pay no taxes is for the birds. Income tax maybe but I see poor pay property taxes, they paid Federal and state taxes in phone bills. water bills and fuel bills. They pay state and city taxes when buying anything. Take the help away and that tax money will also stop. And everyone will be living on street.
        And those luck like me will be living in dark. Take three years of no property tax before they throw you out and take it. But that the world some want to see where promise made are broken. Look to Greece.

      32. Apologies Mac, love your site…

        Why barstool econ is a crock of $#!+

        First, no one buys four losers drinks at the bar everyday.
        Anyone who drinks at a bar knows you only buy ladies drinks everytime you go to the bar.

        Second, what @$$hole goes to the bar with a dollar in his pocket? This ain’t the fifties.

        Third, the guy with 3 bucks drinks his one beer and goes home to his wife.

        Forth, guys 7 through 9 buy their own drinks, hang out together and hit on the ladies.

        Fifth, guy 10 OWNS the bar and doesn’t pay for drinks. He also drinks at a more exclusive bar that doesn’t let guys 1-9 in the front door.

        MOST IMPORTANTLY! You forgot to tip the bartender, so you’re all pricks!

        CHEERS! All posted in jest.

      33. Here’s a novel idea…let us go to a usage tax so those that have nothing or little to spend pay little to no taxes and those that buy yachts, super cars, own $10mil homes pay a chit ton, if you want your taxes to be less you just spend less. You really can’t make it more proportionate than that. Those on fixed incomes that spend little will actually still have money, and those that spend billions will pay a lot more but it will be the same percentage for everyone. it would be like a 15% sales/usage tax replacing all taxes. These taxes go to your towns local gov’t and they pay the state taxes from those and the federal gov’t gets theirs from them, what little they actually need since the IRS would be defunct

        • oh and the same taxing is used for businesses as well so the greedy owners can’t buy things with company money and use them themselves and pass the expense to the company.

          • you’ve never met my boss apparently.

        • The plan is NOT to replace the current tax structure, but to expand upon it.

        • Aaron: That is not a novel idea and it is not a good one since the poor cannot buy anything anyway, and those with money to spend would have a disincentive to spend it on buildings and equipment.

          Without consumption there is no demand and without demand there are no products and services; or jobs for wage earners. That is a deflationary spiral that the world wants to avoid.

          What WE want and need is a fair and balanced economy that provides reasonable incentives for both work and investment; fair opportunity for those who aspire to better themselves, and who are willing to apply themselves for it.

          WE do not need an economy and a society that allows phony crony capitalism, political favors, and legalized bribery that passes a political system. Or for that matter, a tax code and/or health care system that subsidizes the Uber Rich and Corporations at the expense of 80% of the citizens of the nation.

          Engage these bastards or be serfs for them.

          • If you’re implying the current tax code subsidizes the rich, you’re dead wrong, as the facts prove the opposite is true. The Top 1% had 13.4% of the income in 2009 but paid 26.7% of the taxes. The top 20% of households paid 94.1% of the income taxes, and 67.8% of all federal taxes while they had only 50.8% of the income.

      34. One of the reasons The Left vilifies wealth is because they are jealous. Not jealous of the wealth of successful people, but rather because The Leftists want ALL success and production to be doled out by their “god” The State.

        Those who are self-sufficient and self-reliant are anathema to *everything* The Left stands for.

      35. We pay a lot in taxes, way more then my parents, grandparents, or sister. My husband made $71,000. Last year, we are having a hard time because the people renting my house pay rent late or not at all. I don’t mind paying taxes, but the lady renting our house get disability for her husband both get SSI, food stamps and an adult son living there who pays $600 a month. Why can’t she pay rent? It’s $750. Any one getting welfare or whatever needs to take a class on managing money.
        I hate to say this but people collecting SSI are going to get way more out then then they put in. So you work. 45 years, and get it for 15-20 years. There is no way anyonehas put in that much money.

        • It gets even better…there are entire classes of people who are not even from the US, who come here, and get SSI, in addition to welfare, Medicaid, Medicare, etc…

        • The Arab Spring revolts were instigated…

      36. The poor people that do work get all the money plus more back on their income taxes. That to me is the first thing that should change. You should never get back more than you paid in. I don’t know what the answer is but I sure as heck know what we are doing ain’t working! Look how many IRS jobs we could do away with if we had a fair tax law.
        Thanks for what you do to keep us informed Mac!

        • You don’t even have to be poor to get more back than you put in. In 2009, my 77-year old father made nearly $50,000 in Social Security, directors fees, and investment income and got back $800 more than he paid in. I know because I did his income tax returns (legally). According to the Congressional budget office, the bottom 40% of households by income were net gainers on income tax, i.e. they received more in transfer payments from the federal government in 2009 than they paid in income taxes.

      37. 2 Thessalonians 3

        10 …if any would not work, neither should he eat [or drink].

      38. Ron Paul’s ‘Audit the Fed’ bill passes the House

        • Dog and pony show.

      39. The problem with this bar today is the beer, liquor, wine, glasses, bar stools, TV, radio, mirrors along with everything else is made overseas. The patrons work in jobs (those that have a job) that also create nothing except another service.

        Even the old drunk (not an alcoholic because he refuses to attend meetings) can see (well kinda see) that this can’t be sustained (although by now he badly slurs sustained).

      40. The sixteenth amendment was not only not ratified correctly, it also gave the government NO NEW TAXATION power. They didn’t have it before the sixteenth amendment and they only TOOK it after the sixteenth amendment. By force. It was supposively voluntary compliance. They make it manditory by intimidation and pure bully tactics, smiled on by the Federal”Reserve” Government.
        There is no law that requires you to pay tax on your labor. Your labor is exchanged for wages. Income is derived from corporate activity. Corporate income tax is legal.
        Income tax is not an apportioned tax.
        Income tax is not constitutional; decided by the U.S.Suppreme Court more than once. Lower courts will not allow that decision in their courtrooms. (WTF?)
        Ruled by Law Of the Shotgun Terrorists.

      41. Taking it from the rich and giving it to the richer!

      42. Mac

        Excellent post. This reminds me to bring rich friends everytime I drink.

      43. the United States now has one of the biggest disparities in wealth
        between the rich and the poor

        wanna know what it’s gonna soon be like

        try reading Sinclair’s THE JUNGLE
        or Jack London’s THE IRON HEEL

        those who forget history are doomed to repeat it

        and it’s not gonna be pretty for most of us

        • @ Satori. This is exactly what the elitists want, a total population in which almost everyone is a slave to those at the very top that continue to have a total disproportional amount to everyone else. Just like you said, history repeats itself, like the past kings and queens and the peasants worked themselves to death. This time around though the elitists have the technology to keep everyone in line. Anyone say George Orwell and several others that warned about this.

          • No, the elites want a much smaller and controllable population because they can not defend themselves from 100 million pissed off gun owners.

            They know that enough of the “peasants” will resist, and with such firepower in their hands they can not do what they want.

            Thus, the first stage will be the corp against it’s poorest citizens, attacking by “failing” and being unable to pay the promised benefits. The benefits will drop and those populations where the recipients are dense, like inner cities, will kill each other off in a rapid fashion.

            It doesn’t matter that the money is worthless anyway and the whole mess could be wiped clean with a keystroke, they will say there is no money.

            Then those willing will take the corp food and it will take their guns for the privilege.

            That will remove half of the guns, maybe more, and many will die of starvation further reducing the population and gaining total direct control over the majority of the rest.

            That leaves the few free minded who have been able to steer clear to deal with. They will know that those remaining are 100% armed and quite pissed off.

            These criminals are very patient. But no matter how patient they are, I believe there to be enough people who WILL NOT surrender their guns for government food. Many will use the guns to kill their own food instead.

            Those who surrender their guns would have been of little use to freedom anyway.

            • Guns have changed the game since their invention. When peasants were able to aquire guns, mounted knights were less than invincible. The King/Queen crowd know this well, hence their obcession with finding a way to disarm us peasants. They have the same attraction to mass transit, because it makes it hard for you to run away from them.

              Hillary, Barak, et al lose sleep over your AR 15.

            • There’s a popular saying among us Libertarians: “They can take my gun when they pry it from my cold, dead fingers.”

      44. I have a little analogy also about taxes. Let’s say you have 100 people, in which you have 95 of them working for $10,000 a year. Someone earning $80,000 right now would be earning the same in 1962 dollars, about. You have a tax rate of 15% for everyone. This means that you get $142,500 each year in tax revenue. Now lets say that someone gets the “brilliant” idea that you can get much cheaper goods by outsourcing with free trade to the enemy and makes people’s lives easier to buy what they need. 20 people lose their good paying jobs and must find other jobs to pay their bills.

        Out of those 20 people, 10 find minimum wage paying jobs that give them $2000 a year, the 10 remain unemployed. Out of the other 75 their wages also drop slightly by an average of 10% because the outsourcing has lead to much competetion in the markets with the cheap, lousy, goods and the comapnies have had to drop their employee wages to compete.

        Now you have 75 people earning $9000 a year.
        10 people only earning $2000 a year.
        And now 15 people instead of 5 now earning nothing.

        Before you had 95 people earning $950,000, now you have 85 people earning $695,000. With a tax revenue of only $104,250. To raise the tax revenue back to $142,500 everybody that is working must now pay 20.5% in taxes instead of 15%.

        No tax hikes, so they have to start paying the bills with borrowed money that is now $38,250 in the hole. Using the rule of 70 that debt grows each year by how much the interest is. Let’s say the interest is 10%, 70/10=7. In 7 years even if the debt is not added to will double. In 7 years though each year it is added to. So within 7 years you owe 38250×7= $267,750 plus interest that actually more than doubles because the principle is being added to each year. It comes out to close to $500,000. That is now approaching your entire base of what you take in each year that you owe.

        Just to maintain the debt from not raising at this point you need the original $38,250 + the interest you now owe which is 500,000x 10% or $50,000. To stop the bleeding and hold it stable 85 people must now pay extra $88,250 or a tax hike of over 10%. If this is not stopped the debt becomes unmanageable even if everyone pays 100% of their income.

        Bringing back the jobs and the income is the answer to at very least stopping the lack of income coming in. At least if you have debt, restoring the income base will keep you from adding to the debt. Through a few cut backs in expense when you restore the base income you can begin to pay off the principle. This cannot be done if the tax revenue is lower because people are not paying into because they are out of work and because there is less income that those are working are earning.

        Cheap products does not mean that people are going to purchase what is going to create jobs in your country, they are just going to purchase more of what is coming from another country. Free trade kills jobs unless free trade is with a partner of equal to or that is better off than your country. Every job loss means less money for your country, and an exploding debt that will take down your country eventually. Let the poor countries free trade with each other. Well to do countries become thrid world level when they allow their good job base be filled with out of the country slave labor.

        • While the system was designed to work pretty much like you say, you make the same false assumption that everyone else makes. That money is being used, something that has a value on it’s own.

          If we had to pay China REAL money for the cheap crap they send us, we would never get to import any of it. It is only valuable to us if we can buy it with paper we can print. Instead, they have invested a lot of resources into a fraud for profit and jobs for its people.

          They know it is a fraud, and are heading for the exit. They no longer want our “debt” to pay for real items. Cash for Clunkers was merely a way for the corp to obtain scrap metal resources for paying some of the debt off. They are selling their treasuries as fast as they can, and spending them as well on resources all over the world.

          Our manufacturing base was purposely destroyed by the corp creditors. They have no intention of rebuilding it. We are far more useful to them, and more compliant, when we are poor.

          Your right, but the solution will not be possible until the current system self destructs and it is rebuilt by free men in a free market that uses real money.

          • @ Gods Creation. I should have thrown in that the money used was backed up by something. Fiat currency is certainly the problem. When Nixon destroyed the last of the silver coins and the silver certificates, the U.S. dollar began to die. This was coincidencely at about the time when peak oil hit for the U.S. around 1970. REAL money has not been in this country since Woodstock.

            I guess my point with this was that when the United States had a strong manufacturing base backed by hard currency, times were wonderful. The common family had to only have one breadwinner, and the money that they did earn had value. If you look at what could be bought 50 years ago to now, there is a huge difference using 2012 dollar values. When the U.S. shipped jobs overseas, the U.S. became a welfare provider for India, and many other poverty ridden countries. There is an old saying, think about your own home before thinking about others.

            With the term about elitists, I wrote something that has exactly that statement that you said that the elistists want as few as possible because there are not enough of them to control. The more people below you the more people you must have on the top to control them.

            I will be prefectly honest with you. Everytime I see a made in China tag on something it is like seeing a nazi swastika on the product. China is as much or even more so an enemy of the U.S. as Germany was in WW2. Or it is as bad as seeing the hammer and sickle of the USSR stuck on the bottom of a product when I see that made in China on it. Trading with China, that has hundreds of mobile ICBM’s aimed at the U.S. right now and a massive armed forces, is in my view treason. It is terrible what has happened to the notion of national security in this country.

        • @beinformed
          Your analogy bears some resemblance to economic reality but is wrong in many ways. You ignore jobs created to transport goods from the new manufacturing locations to faroff areas of consumption. You ignore entrepreneurship created by necessity in those areas that lost manufacturing jobs. You ignore rampant government redistribution that disincentivizes that entrepreneurship, exacerbating the unemployment problem, accelerating the growth of government and the debt. You ignore the primary cause of jobs moving out of the country, which is not the difference in labor costs, but the irrational, overburdensome regulations and high tax rates here in America.
          No one is denying that productive jobs are the engine for economic growth and wealth creation. It’s just that the Keynesians don’t have the key to start the engine (pun intended). Government growth & redistribution, high taxation, and over-regulation is the reason we have fewer jobs. Government is the problem, not the solution.

      45. its just like musical chairs….will you have a seat when the music stops?

        • NOW this-

          within an hour of the bill passing word spread from the office of the Harry Reid. The Senate Majority Leader and Nevada Democrat has vowed the Federal Transparency Act will not be put to a vote in the Senate.

          • Harry Reid is a hypocrite and a liar. So is Obama.

      46. I’m sorry but that whole article was really stupid. Our tax system is such that it punishes high income earners and takes the most money away from those who are most capable of making it grow.

        from:

        http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/2011/0415/Taxes-and-the-rich-How-much-do-they-pay-now

        “the top 1 percent of earners account for 20.3 percent of total personal income in the United States and pay 21.5 percent of all federal and state taxes.”

        The other travesty is that the bottom half of wage earners pay no federal income taxes.

        from:

        http://dmarron.com/2011/07/27/why-do-half-of-americans-pay-no-federal-income-tax/

        “You may have heard the claim that about half of Americans pay no federal income tax. That’s a true fact. My Tax Policy Center colleagues estimate, for example, that 46% of households either will pay no federal income tax in 2011 or will receive more from the IRS than they pay in.”

        • Barn Cat: You stated that:

          “Our tax system is such that it punishes high income earners and takes the most money away from those who are most capable of making it grow”.

          Punishes high income earners? You are out of your FUCKING mind!!!

          High income earners never had it so good! If your statement was true, income and wealth would not be aggregating at the top while the middle class has been stripped of their wealth, jobs, and businesses while paying 80% of the freight for the poor and picking up trillion dollar tabs for the GB’s.

          “the top 1 percent of earners account for 20.3 percent of total personal income in the United States and pay 21.5 percent of all federal and state taxes.”

          This statement is typical LSM PROPAGANDA to manipulate the numbers to suggest that the Uber Rich are, or have been paying their fair share, when they have not.

          This is like comparing the trade deficit WE have with China ($300B) to OUR GDP ($15T)when that trade deficit should be compared to OUR total annual trade deficit.($1.2T)

          If 1% of the population accounts for 20.3% of all personal income, it means that a very small number of people (three million) are receiving more than 20% of American GDP ($15 trillion), while 250 million Americans are dividing less than 80% of American GDP and paying almost 80% of all taxes to boot. (50 million poor have been deducted).

          The table is clearly tilted toward the Uber Rich. Lets at least know the difference between apples and oranges, ok?

          Under a flat tax system, the Uber Rich would pay the same rate as everyone else (say 15% or 20%) which is FAIR, but as a group they would pay a larger percentage of the gross aggregate taxes, because as a group, their income is disproportionately higher.

          As it stands, under the current “progressive system” (another lie) the middle class bears a much larger burden on a dollar for dollar basis. And this is exactly the intent of the Uber Rich and their managers. Read GB’s.

          Engage these liars, cheats, thieves, and scumbags or be impoverished by them.

          • DK, off topic…. what’s your take on Peter Schiff, what’s his angle (or dog in this fight)?

            • POP: I do not know what Schiff’s position is on taxes. As part of the 1% Uber Rich he benefits under the current system, so I doubt that he would like a flat tax. Do you have link?

              Schiff is a bright guy and I like him but he has an entrenched self interest in metals, thus his position on metals backing money.

              Without changes to the current global economic system, and a level playing field all around the world, money backed by metals would be a DISASTER for the USA and would only hasten the demise of America’s true wealth. (Our Gold Reserves.

              This is the reason Libertarians like Paul and Rockwell, among others, are wrong on metals behind money.

            • durango kidd

              Why would going back on a gold standard be a bad idea? You fix the rate to say $1600 per oz and stabilize the USD. Obviously everyones feet are held to the fire so significant cuts must occur both public and private because if you continue to spend you loose your gold reserves. It’s painful like a junky coming off dope but like the choices of kick the habit or die the alternative is worse. This would require a dramatic change in geo-politics requiring the US to not “control the world”. Not too bad of a thought considering the lives lost in global conquest.

              Granted if fiscal responsibility had been taking place standard or not we would not be in this position.

            • K2: Yes Kevin it would strengthen the dollar so that Americans could continue to use their SNAP cards to buy food at Wall mart.

              It doesn’t matter if you fix the dollar at $1600 gold or $6,000 gold, as long as the global economic system remains in place (NAFTA, GATT, WTO, & TPP) American gold reserves would be drained sooner or later; much like when France wanted to exchange US gold back dollars that were being spent in France for bullion.

              That would occur whether spending was cut in the US for a time or not.

              Even if spending were cut, it would not likely last as the system is established to drain dollars out of America and send them offshore to provide (a subsidized) profit for the investment class elite who have used American depositor funds to build factories in China and elsewhere to maximize profit margins by exploiting incredibly cheap labor.

              The table is tilted for the NWO Globalists. right now these crooks are getting fiat. with a gold standard they would get the one item that has been the touchstone for wealth for many thousands of years; and will be again.

              The current status of gold as (not) money is a blip in history.

          • DK

            Thanks.

            Point well taken. We’re back to the root cause of the trade agreements. Regardless where I start at all paths lead there.

          • Bush 41 said “‘ When government aims for the rich, they always hit the middle class”. True words, but he was one of the scum doing the aiming.

        • Oh, like that earned income credit for children and the b**ches don’t earn income because they don’t have a job??
          THAT’S redistribution of wealth..and the fraud didn’t introduce it to this nation–it’s been happening a long time.
          And because a woman has a wreck, hurts her back, why does the SSI check get tripled when she has a child??
          Shouldn’t she use that check to support that child??
          It was her choice to have it–not mine!!!

          • Soft tissue injuries are used because they are hard to disprove. I have said for a long time that USA is doomed if we keep giving tax credits to people who pay no taxes.

            .gov was truthful in the 90s when they said they ended welfare as we know it. Problem is that they moved most of the leech class to SSID. The giveaway dollar figure never dropped.

        • @barncat
          “the top 1 percent of earners account for 20.3 percent of total personal income in the United States and pay 21.5 percent of all federal and state taxes.”

          The above statement is erroneous, according to the Congressional Budget office. In 2009, the top 1% had 13.4% of the income and paid 26.7% of all federal tax liabilities.
          There’s a lot of interesting data in the CBO report at this link:
          http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/attachments/43373-06-11-HouseholdIncomeandFedTaxes.pdf

      47. Well, it’s time for the tenth to satart drinking overseas!

      48. What is money?
        What is its ‘value’?
        Where does it come from?
        Where does it go?

        Why did America, grow, then level off, and now is dying?
        Is morality linked with money?

        Money is nothing but a ‘chip’ in the Game of Life…
        Its value is YOU, since you, are, the Game.

        We are Babylon, the Rule of Gold.
        It can only be brought down by The Golden Rule.

        Babylon invented banks, government and religion, as One.
        We must come full circle for the People to see.

        The Grail shows all things as cycles,
        there is no new thing under the Sun.

        The only way out?
        A Constitution of a Confederation of the Kingdom of God.
        Stewardship economics.
        All money comes from your value, not rich men.
        No more profits, no more costs.
        No more destruction of Earth to pile up little green pieces of paper.
        Think what you will, but the concept of ownership is the key to all things.

        But, you keep listening to those preachers of MYSTERY, in all things religious, economic and government…
        For your own self interest, screw everybody else,
        you love your governments, and their taxes, and their rules, and their wars, and you love to complain about it all… and wisdom flees from you as our people are destroyed through a lack of knowledge (Hosea)

        The meaning of Life, is Joy, not riches.
        Become as the lillies in the field, your brother and your Mother Earth’s keeper, she’s all you have. For now.

        ************************
        Mammon

        Money is a tool, of the evil man,
        thru pump and dump, is Mammons band.

        For worship of money, is Mammons hand,
        and you are left, without your land.

        they’re of the world, and full of sin,
        those in the world, are not their kin.

        but those who see, the schemes and such,
        support and follow, into the clutch.

        those who wonder, and cry in vain,
        at the hands of the smart, inflicting pain.

        your money is paper, stains of sin,
        not of the people, at the origin.

        The source is wicked, flow is naught,
        for it drys up, and you are bought.

        wages go down, and profits go up,
        well whadda ya know, the money sucks.

        you sit the fence, between two forces,
        lukewarm in nature, split with horses.

        onesies, twosies, it all goes around,
        leaving the people, bereft in frown.

        God’s work they do, with haughty grin,
        not knowing light, from all the sin.

        listen up children, and you will hear,
        the sound of darkness, and it will sear.

        When money dies, those on the fence,
        do all fall down, the evil is hence.

        for money spread, is life, becomes,
        centralize, and death is sung.

        Humpty dumpty sat on a wall,
        humpty dumpty had a great fall.

        But Humpty’s men, did not go away,
        and here he comes, again to say.

        For Mammons lies, are thick as butter,
        leaving most, as sick as nutters.

        For rich mans rules, have killed the law,
        we all suffer now, on beastly claws.

        A Harlot rides, a Beast does roar,
        for they both know, their time is short.

        The Founders knew, and did proclaim,
        rich man’s rules, go down in flames.

        Piper Michael

        • Obama’s Anthem

          O say can you see, what this land’s come to be,
          where so blindly we failed to stop Congress from scheming,
          Whose tight rules and bad laws, took away all our rights.
          For elections we botched, and deserved all our reaming.
          Millions on fed welfare, half the folks pay no share,
          Was cause through the years that our debt will be there.
          O say, does that entitle-mentality always pave
          the way for communists, and the government slave?

      49. Let me ask this. If our country was to only spend money it had we would have to be rid of the military for sure. If our economy completely collapses we would have to get rid of our military for sure. So which is safer and more pallatable for everyone? If the gov’t ceased to exist today we would probably be better off in most regards other than infrastructure but there has to be a way to achieve that without the federal gov’t. Our country is at a serious crossroads. Now that we are at 100% debt to GDP we either continue riding a train to destitution or turn it around go through the painful austerity that’s required to right the ship. I for one vote for the auserity to right the ship the pain will be much shorter than the alternative. A few years of suffering will be good for the entitlement junkies here in America and will be better than a life sentence of third world like conditions for most everyone.

        • Tinkering around the edges…

          The Grail says you MAY NOT have infinite growth,
          on a finite planet…

          But you will not listen to anything but the Siren song,
          of wealth, and The Game makes it flee, from you to them.

          Do you not understand? When your collapse comes,
          the Beast of the 10 Shofar’s, will be the only thing left standing?

          And you will beg them, for your daily bread…
          and it will cost you, your soul…

        • So, does austerity also include null and void benefits for 535 congresspersons?? Is that why they keep this charade going??
          They don’t want to risk losing their gravy trains??

          • Well of course, with the change in taxes we’d also limit gov’t service to 2 terms for any elected officials. Then we don’t have to pay for their retirements either. See we have to think as cold and hard as they do. If they only work 32 hours a week they don’t qualify for benefits lol. The point of serving is to create the kind of country you would want to live in then go live in it, not turn it into a career.

            • The term “public servant” drives me nuts, especially when applied to elected office holders. They serve only themselves.

        • Military spending, as inflated as it is, pales in comparison to “entitlements”.

        • We are actually entering a real-time paradigm that makes the dissolving of hierarchies such as government and central banking very realistic. The major issue is a matter of structure. Structure is the governor of how power flows and since our whole modern existence has been driven from the top-down (supply driven), we evolved with hierarchical institutions for the sake of logistics , organization and distribution. We’ve been supply driven since the “apple was shoved in our faces”. The rest is history. The internet changes all of this so that the apex of classical power can be weaned out as we create a “rounder world”. ALL applications that relate to our problems are contained within structure…. so they are not really problems in so much as they are symptoms. Real-time changes a great deal, including the very liquid capabilities of distributing debt-free currency such what we see in bullion based payment processors. You cannot pour new wine into old wineskins.

        • No, we can’t and shouldn’t do completely without the military. Providing for the common defense is one of the primary responsibilities and enumerated powers of our Constitutional government. We can certainly cut our military down to size though, along with everything else government does. Redistributing the wealth of its citizens, on the other hand, is not at all within the enumerated powers of our government, so let’s stop them from doing it.

      50. I guess there was a shooting up in canada.

        From ABC-

        “Politicians in Ontario are urging the federal government to take action in the wake of a shooting at an east-end Toronto street party that left two dead and 23 others wounded”

        They elected a bunch of “conservitives” up there also.

        Canada has modified its controversial position on a United Nations arms control treaty.
        In a new position paper submitted to the UN, the federal government has dropped its proposal to exclude all sporting and hunting firearms from the international Arms Trade Treaty, an agreement that seeks to regulate the import, export and transfer of all conventional weapons.”

        Hmmmmm.

        All this sounds familiar dont it?

        • this continent is about the only one left with the citizens right to own firearms of course they have a crazy shooter probably with a closed file on his court case as well.

      51. You cant make this shit up people, and you cant fix or legislate stupididty…someone needs to tell this to our podium stooge

        Buckyballs banned for severe safety concerns

        .By Tecca | Today in Tech – 5 hrs ago.. .

        (their story goes..)

        The fun educational toy is apparently more dangerous than the government would prefer

        Purveyors and purchasers of small, tiny, spherical magnets take note: You’re dealing in forbidden goods. The Consumer Product Safety Commission has issued a ban on the sale of Buckyballs, an “educational toy” consisting of a handful of small, tiny magnets.

        The ban is the agency’s first in the last 11 years, and apparently there’s a solid reason behind it. If swallowed individually, Buckyballs could possibly reattach somewhere in your intestines, damaging tissue to the point where surgery would be required. According to an American Academy of Pediatrics report, there were 60 magnet ingestion cases over the last two years which resulted in 26 surgeries. At least 22 of these cases were connected with Buckyballs.

        A number of retailers from Amazon.com to Urban Outfitters have agreed to stop selling the balls, but the creators of the product are digging their heels into the ground and turning the issue into an election year missive on the president. Buckyball creator Craig Zucker says he will “vigorously fight this action taken by President Obama’s handpicked agency.”

        “As a small business owner I’m left wondering what to tell my employees and their families. How can this happen in America,” grandstanded Zucker.

        If you’ve purchased the balls in the past, the creators of Buckyballs have been directed by the government to provide refunds. Alternatively, you could just choose to keep and enjoy your Buckyballs while resisting the tempting urge to eat them — for America.

        Really?

        • another small buisness out sourced, and outlawed by the podium sniffer

          more added to the unemployment line, and those who have had TSHTF because of no fault of their own.

          signs are everywhere of his intentions , deaf dumb and blind people can even grasp it

          • Well, most deaf, dumb, and blind people probably get it, most of the people I know sure do not…

            • I hear ya, sad isnt it?

            • Been sitting on this bar stool talkin’ like a damn fool,
              got the twelve o’clock news blues,
              and I’ve given up hope for the afternoon soaps and a bottle of cold brew,
              isn’t any wonder I’m not crazy
              isn’t any wonder I’m sane at all
              isn’t any wonder I got too much time on my hands, and it’s tickin’ away, tickin’ away for me.

              Styx

            • really? You HAD to quote Styx? Good lord!

            • Ma Bear, I guess you could say that ” I can’t fight this feelin anymore”

            • BTW, REO Speedwagon

      52. Well I Think everyone should buy their own beer…but one doesn’t need beer….unlike food for poor children….a roof over their head….access to school…medical care…and a chance at the dream…anyway….the wealthy guy can keep all his beer money….
        and if he takes his factory over seas….all good and well…but make dam sure he can’t sell his slave labor goods here with out tariffs out the ass….I don’t believe the chronically lazy should have their way paid for by anyone(this includes beer)….but poor women and children…or anyone going through hard times…through no fault of their own…shouldn’t have to starve in this country… but I must give credit for the beer analogy…I’m very sure it made a strong point to trailer park republican types…and no..I’m not a Democrap either….just a person trying to have a heart…

        • Then fight for a structure that contains heart. It isn’t hierarchical. Structure is what governs power. Ours needs to have the apex (greed factor) weaned out by way of more participation in the capitalistic supply chains that now allow for integration by the individual …. or do you believe that corporations should dominate all supply chains ? The new capitalism integrates the individual and moves toward balance, only made possible by the information age.

        • I’m a Libertarian who agrees with you. People with means should have a heart and take care of the poor, and those who cannot fend for themselves. But it’s none of government’s damn business to legislate charity or morality. The care of the weak is a personal responsibility, and one that most well-to-do people take seriously. Those that don’t will have their Creator to answer to, so government should scrap all their redistribution schemes. If the able-bodied don’t work, they will then suffer for their laziness. If people don’t save something for a time when they can’t work, they will suffer for their foolishness. It is not for government to provide for the lazy and foolish, but for the charity of the hard-working and wise, if they so choose.

      53. Bar stool economics- 1001
        The best way to get the economy going again….Stimulus!!! Not the bailouts of the “Rich & Not So Famous”, like we have witnessed over the past four years. A true stimulus that will work.
        With just a portion of the pissed away $$$$ by the gov. idiots over the past five or six years, that’s been added to the deficit; we could have given it to the people. Yea that’s right, the people. Anyone not making in excess of 50 K per year for the past three years, would get a non-taxable stimulus check for twenty thousand dollars. Requirements are these: Must be at least 18 years old by the end of that calendar year. Must be a legal citizen of the USA. Must not be receiving welfare checks like SSI or similar. SS Disability doesn’t matter since that is from worker $$ paid into their retirement fund. The economy would flourish and most would have “hope” again.

        Yea, there are some dumbasses that would party the funds away, but that would keep them from stealing for a while.

        • I have to think this is a better idea than the Fed giving it to the TBTF banks. They just use it to clean up their balance sheets and park it back in “excess reserves” to skim the interest. It never makes it to main street. To really help the economy and fuck the bankers why not give it to everyone? Require that it must be used to pay down debt. The bankers will hate that.It will destroy their assets.If you are prudent and don’t have debt you would not be penalized. You would be allowed to spend it or save it. The bad thing about this would be inflation would jump. Well, maybe that wouldn’t be bad. Bernanke would then be forced to raise interest rates and that would benefit savers.

        • instead of spending the money like they did with T.A.R.P. they should have taken it and given one million dollars to each worker over 55 years old to retire right away and give up their social security benefits, that would have opened up a lot of jobs good jobs cause generally the better jobs are filled by that age group. Then all the unemployed get to move a rung up the ladder and we have way way lower unemployment. This would stimulate the economy way more than bailing out the banks and car companies. The car companies could have declared bankruptcy and made out fine. This plan would have cost cost what about 50 million and TARP cost what 700 billion. To me it would have created much more bang for the buck. And to those that want to complain about why those people get one million and they don’t shut your pie hole you have a job now.

          • The recipients of that 1 million could have also saved it, which indirectly helps investments, or invested in small businesses, my choice being the latter.
            Both those should have helped the economy.

            • With that kind of money pushed into the economy, car companies may have been saved and not declared bankruptcy.
              Boomers buying cars for themselves, and their grandkids??

          • I can’t understand how Taxpayer/National Debt dollars can be freely given to foreign banks without some kind of uproar. A German bank received half a billion and not one reason was given as to why. People are too “occupied” with trying to keep tabs on their next door neighbors EBT accounts, I guess.

          • Your idea is interesting but your math sucks. According to the 2010 census, there are 36,482,729 citizens between the ages of 55-65. Presumably, at least 80% of them are working. (The government says the unemployement rate is 8%, but you and I know it’s much higher.) That means about 29 million people would be eligible for $1 million each under your plan, which comes to $29 trillion, not $50 million. Where is that money going to come from? More government borrowing?

      54. Goolgle- “run,hide,fight.

        SICKENING VIDEO FRO DHS.

        Whats missing?

        THE FIGHT PART!!!!!

        “call 911” yeah, that will save you.

        The people on power are living in a dream world.

      55. Things that make you say Hmmmmmmmmm.

        About Aurora Co police chief-

        Before heading to Aurora in 2005, Oates was the police chief in Ann Arbor. According to his bio on LIU Riverhead’s Homeland Security Management Institute website, “In his first four years in office, Chief Oates has overseen a 30-percent reduction in major index crime in Aurora and introduced new initiatives to apprehend dangerous fugitives and increase investigative support for victims of sexual assault and gun violence.” Today, Oates and his police officers are continuing to investigate the tragic shootings and are ATTEMPTING to defuse apparent explosives in the suspect’s apartment.

        Side note, the cops over there are “attempting” to defuse bombs???

        WTF????????????????

        Wasnt there 100’s of feds there, and after all this time they are STILL “attempting” to defuse the bombs??????

        Looks like bull$hit, and smells like bull$hit= BULL$HIT

      56. OOPS- pasted wrong paragraph.

        This guy was the head of the ny police “inteligence”.

        Oates, who graduated from New York Law School and is licensed to practice law in NY, NJ and Colorado, had a storied career: The Daily News reports, that he “finished his 21-year career with the NYPD in 2001 as the commanding officer of the department’s Intelligence Division” and had “previously served as the second-in-command of Patrol Borough Brooklyn South and commanding officer of the NYPD’s legal bureau.”

      57. The corp. The corp. I have this image of that group of humanoid types on some version of Star Trek. One was named “7of9” or some other such thing. The constant refrain of “the corp” also conjures up images of the pods from Invasion of the Body Snatchers. “The corp.”

        I am beginning to think your obsession with “the corp” is bordering on the unhealthy, GC. I wish you luck and blessings, but you are going to have to get past this obsession to even function in the world. The way you describe it, nothing we do, from breathing the air to eating our food, is not all part of “the corp’s” conspiracy to enslave us. Perhaps you take the notion a little far?

      58. http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/jul/22/americas-corn-farmers-dry-harvest

        My Research: geo-forming…. Chemtrail spraying to block the sun for global warming…This lowered the global evaporation rate. Hence..no clouds…no rain. Think about it..like trying to dry a wet towel on a cloudy day…vs hot sunny day. I feel this is by design…to decrease the food supply and modify human behavior. Africa will be in trouble…no big shipments I bet.

        Good luck
        ps. This will go on next year as the barium and aluminum will stay in the skies for over a year.

      59. The $100 bill story is, at first glance, amusing and seems to have a point but unfortunately it is not a good analogy of the debt problem as it is far too simplistic. It assumes that everyone owes exactly the same amount, $100, which is unlikely. Also, there is a nice closed loop but the motel owner will also owe money to the baker, the laundry and the electricity company so debts are linked in a complex web not a neat closed loop.

      60. the solution is simple: end the fed; recall all of our gold that has been shipped around the world; cut all unConsitutional alphabet agencies; redefine welfare standards and institute mandatory drug testing and consequences; repeal all 2nd amendment infringements and the UNhealthcare edict; end life-time political careers by placing 2yr limits an overy elected position at every level of governance from local to federal.

        • @PP, your right, the solution(s) are simple. But at this point in the game, too many toes get stepped on.

          But I have a belief, that just as water seeks it’s level, nature always looks to balance. We all know, things can’t continue like this. Wealth, in all forms, represents human labor. This labor is either past, present or future. We, they, are spending the future. It cannot continue. It is a gigantic ponzi sceme, that makes Bernie Madoff look like a rank ametuer. And compared to these(we) theives, that is what he is.

          If you don’t produce, or do something worthwhile (other than vote! ha ha), it makes you a parasite. All of us are guilty, to some extant. Some are more guilty than others. The whole USA is very guilty, owing to the reserve status of the dollar. We really have lived large off the rest of the world. ( Many won’t understand this, but it has to do with the US “abusing” it’s priviledge of controlling the reserve currency of the world). We really have had it good, but the party is winding down.

          I believe history will show that the US from WW2 thru, say, 2020?, as a whole, lived easier and larger than any population ever to exist. Be gratefull.
          And now; Charton Heston, last scene of Planet of the Apes.

          • Rick; I agree with your perception. We didn’t live so well here in the west because we were better and smarter people (or so God blessed while the rest of the world is God cursed); we were the benefactors of the Bretton Woods System of monetary management – the USD would become the reserve currency. And then the secured installation of the greatest WMD, the petrodollar, guaranteeing USD hegemony indefinitely (or so thought). Of course, the required concession is to suppress the US GDP, but that’s ok, we’ll be able to keep US people busy on government subsidized, meaningless, non-sense for a slice of the pie. Can this form of capitalism exist without socialism/communism imposed elsewhere? There are so many abroad who can do the simple math and know the score; know that the playing field isn’t level; the deck is stacked; however you want to say it…I don’t expect it to wind down easily.

          • Rick, you get it. Problem is there are too many eligible voters who don’t. Their votes can be bought so cheaply with dollars that have no backing. And no one has done that more effectively than Obama and the Dems. Don’t get me wrong, the Republicans do it too. They’re just less dishonest about it. The $hit is perilously close to the fan, and it will take a miracle at this point to prevent the blades from sending it flying all over the globe.

      61. All this tax crap is a nice tool for divide & conquer. Don’t lose site that the real problem that leads to this symptom of taxation is debt and debt’s underlying issues start with debt currency where credit and currency are created from thin air. We need gold to circulate, gold which works very well now that its value floats in real-time and actually has the ability to extinguish dollar based fiat currency debt thanks to the information age and free floating values that reflect real fundamentals. Gold has never been a liquidity problem when acting as a currency. The problem was always the fixed values placed upon it, not the bullion in of itself. This is why the FIXED peg had to be removed. Monetize precious metals ! That’s not a call to the elite, it’s not their job. It’s a call to the market, bottom-up. This beast must rise.

        • At one time, there was enough volume of gold in the world to cover the volume of all currency in distribution. That was at a time when the world population was 3.7 billion. Now the population is 7 billion. The volume of currency in so many hands far exceeds what can be covered by gold (even though more gold has been mined – not enough of it has). Currencies are backed by a much more complicated array of national assets (material and labor) – that are credited and traded in SDRs. The USD may collapse, but whatever replaces it will not be pegged to gold – I don’t think you’ll ever see a currency pegged to a single asset, like gold, ever again. If gold cannot be monetized to cover all currencies, then what about land? It’s not a consumable like oil. I find it interesting that when you look on the tax rolls of rural communities across the United States, that you see so much deed ownership by mega-institutions, like insurance companies.

          • Actually you’re wrong about currencies being “backed by a much more complicated array of national assets (material and labor) – that are credited and traded in SDRs.” For the most part, currencies around the world are “fiat”. They’re backed by nothing but the promise of the issuers. The holders have no legal claim on the assets of the issuers, only the belief that those claims on materials and labor that you refer to will be honored. So, what happens when those claims aren’t honored i.e. Greece, Zimbabwe, others? The “fiat” becomes worthless. Like the banks, we holders and users of the currency must demand some real collateral. Gold is the best choice as it has the characteristics that make it useful as money. The small amount of gold available globally to back all the currency is actually a strength, not a weakness, because rarity comes from the difficulty of obtaining it, which means it cannot be counterfeited, nor the supply easily increased. This stabilizes it’s value over long periods of time, which is a good thing. Inflation slows to a crawl and a dollar’s worth of labor today will still buy a dollar’s worth of goods ten years hence. Gold’s price will rise exponentially when it backs a widely accepted currency, but that rise will be a one-time adjustment followed by price stability over long periods of time.

        • Right on!

      62. The analogy states that 50% of the population pays 99% of the taxes. That’s impossible. This analogy is false. According to the IRS, those at the median and less pay 8% of taxes, not 1%.
        Also, middle income workers pay the highest tax rate. Upper income earners pay the 2nd lowest. There is $16 trillion in debt. There is no surplus to discount.

      63. Well, this analogy asserts that 40% are welfare, 50% are graded middle class, and 10% are wealthy. Welfare accounts for ~10%, with graded middle class at 89%, leaving 1% as being the far out-distancing wealthy – a much skewed distribution. Do serfs need feudalism? What separates the serf from the feudal lord?

        • The analogy asserts that 40% collect more in government transfer payments (beer) than they pay in taxes (the bar bill), which is dead solid truth.

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