Farewell to Amazon Associates…

Updated on April 15, 2011 By Ken Begg 57 Comments

Thanks, State of Illinois. You’re pigheaded (and just plain piggish) attempts to grasp at even more taxpayers dollars while you spend us into oblivion has now you income money from everyone in the state who was an Amazon Associate. Oh, and it’s personally costing me the money I was using to run the site. So…kudos.

Anyway, as of today all Illinois Amazon Associate accounts have been terminated (a move on Amazon’s part I fully support). They’ve been great to me, and I want to thank them. Moreso, I want to thank all of you who hit my Amazon links before buying stuff. I might not get the money anymore, but I truly and always will appreciate the support this symbolized.

Anyway, there are still plenty of other sites with still active accounts you can use. I always hit the Amazon links over at Badmovies. org myself when I’m buying something.  However, MY PREVIOUS STILL EXTANT LINKS ARE NO LONGER ANY GOOD. So please don’t bother to hit them.

Again, though, my very, very sincere thanks to all of your for your continued presence and support.

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  • Lawyer Ku

    It’s time to move to Texas, Ken. The republic always calls its own eventually, even if you’re born elsewhere (me: New York). And the Astros play in the NL Central, same as that team you follow. (Where’s Cutesie?)

  • Chris — In my case, it would probably be Kentucky, since I have family there. However, Texas is certainly on the map, what with all the friends I have down there.

    Of course, in a few years you guys will be seeing a gigantic wave of people fleeing there from pretty much every other state in the union. If I were you, I’d start having your state senate put in safeguards against people leaving California and Illinois and then wanting to start the same kind of tax and spend (emphasis on the spend) policies down there that they were fleeing up here. See Washington State, Oregon, etc.

  • roger h

    It’s for the children and people in nursing homes Ken and do you really think those votes will buy themselves?

    happy I used your links in the past to buy stuff, must find a new way to feed the beast.

  • roger h

    Our Leftenant Gov Gavin Newsom is in Texas to learn the secret of their success at attracting new business.

    HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!

    Seriously he doesn’t know Texas’s secret? Here is a hint Gavin: it rhymes with Balifornia Brogressive Bolicy.

    I am hoping governor Peryy tell Newsom “you know that stuff you do in Sacramento? stop doing it”

  • The real problem of course, for both the state(s) and the federal government, is that every new dollar brought in is then used to leverage new borrowing; so even assuming new taxes don’t depress the economy generally (as this tax has done to me personally) and actually reduce tax revenues, each extra new dollar actually ADDS TO THE EXISTING, ABOUT TO EXPLODE STRUCTURAL DEBT. So there’s that.

    Let government at all levels cut real, actual spending by, say, 10% (just as a start; the Federal government borrows 40% of every dollar it spends), and THEN come to us asking for more money.

  • Ericb

    Look who’s balanced their budget:

    http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/07/nyregion/07cuomo.html

  • That really sucks, Ken. I hope you can find some replacement funding, since this site is nigh-indispensable to the future of our civilization.

    As far as I am concerned, you are already a Texan. You’re going to have to get used to blistering-hot summers instead of bone-chilling winters, though.

    Guy

  • Thanks, Guy! I’m honored to be an honorary Son of Texas.

    I think I’ll just suck it up and pay for things myself, as I did in days of yore. I never liked directly soliciting money from people, even if that was how I got to know Sandy. But I was so relieved when Amazon came along, because I got money without it really coming out of anyone’s pocket. I can’t imagine going back to that.

    I really, really do appreciate your good thoughts, though.

  • Eric — Yeah, weird how unions and the press are all over Wisconsin and New Jersey and other states where Republicans are doing stuff like this. Things are a LOT quieter if you’re a Democrat, though.

  • Ericb

    Ken , well, he didn’t attempt to eliminate collective bargaining by state employees (i.e. since he didn’t have to be a foot soldier for the national party he could concentrate on balancing the budget rather than try making ideological points). It’s funny, Cuomo and Bloomberg are now engaged in an add war and the quasi-Republican Bloomberg (he’s really just a member of the Mike Bloomberg party) is the one who comes off as the “liberal”. But the reality is, if we want to get our finances in order we have to concentrate on just the numbers and leave the political posturing to the pundits otherwise nothing will get done.

  • Ericb

    I should add, I’m not trying to a make Cuomo into some kind of saint. It just that, unlike almost every other politician in the country, he sas the luxury to base his political strategies on 2016 rather then 2012 and can make himself appear above it all.

  • roger h

    If the government is wise and benevolent, why do the state/fed workers need a union to protect them?

  • Ericb

    Uh, Since you want to bring it to the philosophical realm, because any organization will try to exploit its employees. Human organizations are never ideal and it’s aways a bad idea for any one institution to have too much power. Both radical socialism and libertarianism sound great on paper but in the nuts and blots of the real world they are inperfect and it’s a good idea for very large organizations and institutions to have some check on their power. Extremes are bad for republics and democracy. Unrestricted govenment power can result in a collectivist olligarchy where the individual has little to no recourse to object to government power. A completely unregulated market with no restrictions on big business will result in a monopolist plutarchy where the individual has little to no recourse to object to economic power. The middle course it best, which where the U.S. has been from the begining with relatively small swerves of the pendulum to the “left” and “right.”

  • Gamera

    I don’t know the secret of success but I’d say the secret to failure is: if something is successful you tax it to death, if it loses money subsidize it.

    Heck, if you move to Texas Ken at least you won’t have the snow and ice problems you had last winter.

  • Eric — That’s all well and fine, but we are literally on the very edge of a financial apocalypse here. Do you know what the Federal government would have to do to return to it’s (gigantic) level of debt in 2008? Cut Federal spending 35% (35%!) and leave it there FOR THE NEXT TEN YEARS. That’s to get us back to the debt load we had THREE YEARS AGO.

    Is this really a liberal/conservative thing? I’d say literal survival of the government and more, the entire nation as we know it, would be something most people could agree on.

  • Ken , well, he didn’t attempt to eliminate collective bargaining by state employees..

    No, but he should. On their face, government unions should be illegal.

  • Ericb

    “Is this really a liberal/conservative thing? I’d say literal survival of the government and more, the entire nation as we know it, would be something most people could agree on.”

    No it’s not, abstract post was in response to Robert’s the “governement is wise and benevolent” comment.

    I basically agree with you that this shouldn’t be a liberal/conservative thing (though I do think that each state and locality should be able to decide for itself whether they have public unions or not).
    The best way to get this done is to decouple financial issues from the ideoogical posturing so prevelant from our political/entertainment culture. The NY example shows that it can be done (though Cuomo doesn’t have as smooth a ride as you might think). If we can lay off the “fascist” and “socialist” labels the extremes like to throw at each other and focus on the numbers we are more likely to get this done. We really need to stop the conceit that the “other side” is out to destroy america. Obama is a wishy-washy Democratic centrist, he’s not a “socialist” (just as Sarah Palin isn’t a “fascist”). I just wish everyone would calm down. Sure things aren’t great but we still have some time to make things better but if people we don’t tackle this with a measure of calm we won’t be able to do anything.

  • Ericb

    Oh, and I don’t think things are as dire as you believe. Part of the problem is the recession. Government revenues are down so deficits goes up. We don’t have to balance the budget immediately. It not like of we con’t have a revolution in the next two years that the government will collapse Once the economomy recovers and revenues increase we it won’t be. We do have to tighten our belts but, com on, the US hasn’t been debt free since the 1830s. The UK is still paying us off for debts they incurred during the First World War. We can get through this but the last thing we need to do is panic.

  • roger h

    (boy I hate being called Robert, it’s petty I know)

    Thanks Ericb, that was my sarcastic point. I do think the state is very much capable of exploiting their own workers.

    I just want some of those same state workers to remember that when they start calling people in the private sector “tea baggers”, “fascist”, “racists”, anarchists, etc. for wanting to reign in and check the power and uncontrolled spending of government.

  • Ericb

    To put it in a little perspective:

    http://www.iweblists.com/world/commerce/PublicDebtPctofGNP.html

    Oh, and we finished paying off World War 2 in 1997 (during which the public debt vs. GNP was larger than it is now). Yes, we need to fix things but we are not facing the immenant demise of our country.

  • Ericb

    Sorry Roger, as you can see I’m the typo king of Jabootu. Yes, I agree. I wish everyone on both sides would stop screaming.

  • Ericb — Look at the stuff Paul Ryan’s getting called, by the President, for offering up a plan that is inadequate itself but is at least a serious start. The fact is, the Democrats (and, sadly, the great majority of Republicans) have now GOT to realize that entitlement programs as they’ve been promised simply can’t work. We need people who go to Washington to radically diminish the size of government, not simply to cut up the pie in favor of their own favorite groups.

    It would be nice to get the name-calling out of it, but it should also be noted that the “socialist” tags are at least a LOT closer to the truth than the “fascist” ones. How people trying to decrease the role of government in the public sphere can ever remotely be called fascists is a new one on me. “Help, help, these fascists want to leave me alone!”

  • Eric — We ARE facing the imminent demise of our country. The world is vastly different now than it was after WWII; the world will never have a dominant manufacturing power like we were again. And the government has taken on super-crazy obligations ever since the ’60s, to which we can peg our current dilemma.

    The main point: When WWII was over, it was over. Unless you’re saying, “We should similarly stop all entitlement programs,” as we at one point stopped WWII, I don’t see the relevance of any such comparison. Entitlement programs ARE our current WWII.

  • roger h

    (s’OK ericb, old pet peeve)

    Ok, using inside voice and no labels. The president’s and congress’s policies have drawn out this recession well beyond its natural life.

    They really need to try to stop being George Constanza for awhile.

  • alex

    Speaking of the deficit, what about the Bush tax cuts who have been crippling the economy for a decade? What about those wars costing Billions of dollars? What about the fact that companies who receive corporate welfare like Boeing and General Electric do not pay taxes? What about those criminals on Wall Street who have destroyed the US economy in 2008?

    Oh never mind, it’s all the fault of teachers and those mooching seniors. Let’s throw ’em out in the street. Problem solved.

  • roger h

    check, check, check, check, and check.

  • Ericb

    “Help, help, these fascists want to leave me alone!”

    Well, there is the abstract consideration of power of government and then there is the coercive power that social movements can aquire once they can gain government power. Regardless of my belief on government finance or the role of government in our society, since I’m not included in any conservative vision of America that I’ve ever heard I can’t say that them “taking America back” can count as anything less than threatening. Am I afraid of “fascist” take over or Christian blackshirts beating me up? No, but it would be nice if they can recognize that Christian cultural hegemony is not in the Constitution (and that the Founders left out mentioning Christianity on purpose, something that people who campaigned against the Constitution recognized during the ratification debates of 1788) and that conservative Christians don’t have a “special right” to use government institutions to propagate their faith or to determine who can get legal and economic benefits in the long term relationships (frankly I’m pretty libertarian on this point. Government should get out of the marriage game completely and just give civil union benfits to whoever wants them. Leave it to private institution to determing what what relationships are or are not a scrament). The US belongs to all Americans, not just the majority (jfyi I’m not gay).

    Yes, entitlements are a big problem and need to be tackled but we are not going to fall apart in the next few years. We need to fix it but we also need to realise that just cutting them out won’t solve our problems. Eliminating entitlements will have major implications for our society so it’s something that needs to be done gradually and there need to be a solution to the underlying problem that health care jsut costs too damn much and that simple market solutions are probably not the answer since there is simply no profit to be make selling health insurance to old and sick people.

    Uh, I hate politics and I’m probably going to regret that first paragraph but I feel the need to post it anyway.

  • Eric: You realize the Tea Party has ABSOLUTELY nothing to do with Christianity, right? And that none of the issues we’re discussing right now have ANYTHING to do with Christianity, right? Really, you might as well invoke Martians.

    Alex — God, but you are stupid. I’ve tried to avoid saying it for such a long time, because as anyone who knows me knows, I never assume bad faith in those who disagree with me. However, after you outed yourself as a troll last time around, I just no patience for sparring with you and your endless array of strawmen anymore. When you actually get a thought in your head, feel free to comment again.

    This remark most certainly *not* aimed at Eric or anyone else, and is not predicated on agreeing or disagreeing with anyone. Alex, though, is a plain, vanilla, straight-out troll, who only exists to gadfly people who have better things to do with their time. Please ignore him, folks. He has proven in the past that he has nothing to add here. May God have mercy on his soul.

  • Ericb

    Ken, I wasn’t really talking about the Tea Party but just a segment of the Conservative Movement (I know there is a bundle of different ideas in that group). Sorry, I was just getting a bit emotional and losing sight of the general topic and venting some political hangups I’ve been feeling. For someomne who loves history I sure hate politics.

  • Marsden

    Yes, entitlements are now a necessary evil, over 50 million people are on the dole and if that many people lost their income the economy really would collapse. I think they never should have started but it’s too late for that.

    I like EricB’s point in his paragraph but I’d counter that just because Christians are in an orginization it shouldn’t be suppressed. I’m not saying EricB said that, just for clairification, but stating I don’t think Christians should be targeted as fair game but most other “diverse” ethnic/religous groups are beyond any reproach.

    I worry how every man woman and child in the nation is going to pay back $50,000.00 though. That should really be above politics.

  • That’s cool, Eric. I understand these are touchy subjects. I just felt we were going afield with the Christian stuff, which in this particular instance has not much to do with the topic at hand.

    To reiterate, I hope you genuinely understand my impatience with Alex below in no way, not in the very slightest degree, reflects upon you or anyone else. I’m more than glad that you decide to spend your time here, and appreciate you taking the time to express your thoughts.

  • Ericb

    Ken, oh no, I didn’t think you were refering to me in your alex post. It’s just a feeling of regret I always get whenever I get agitated when posting on politics.

  • Personally, I’ve always thought (although it might be too late even for this approach) that they government should just–and I mean just–buy everyone catastrophic heath care insurance, and that we should be responsible for our own regular healthcare. If people had to pay for their day to day healthcare out of pocket, they would stop ordering things they don’t need, and it would actually work to hold down prices. More importantly, the thing most people really worry about, getting creamed by bills if you get leukemia or whatnot, would be covered.

    The government could also work things so that clinics became more prevalent and affordable. What if nurses or the medical equivalent of paralegals could open clinics that covered the basic stuff that doesn’t really require an actual doctor, like setting bones and putting on a cast. Hell, you could have those in Wal*Marts and Sam’s Clubs, just like they have optometrists. And it would it easier for people and philanthropic organizations to open such clinics in high need areas, which would stop the poor from hitting emergency rooms every time they get the sniffles.

    Admittedly, the details would have to be fleshed out, but the best thing about this particular safety net is that it would be sustainable. That’s a feature that’s been entirely ignored over the last fifty years now.

  • Eric — I’m glad you understand. I think you’ve been around long enough to know I generally don’t respond to people like that. In fact, I think Alex is the only one I have ever called out like that. He’s also the only troll I can remember coming here.

  • Ericb

    Actually Ken, those I are pretty good ideas. With a tweek here or there I could easily get behind a plan like that.

  • SUCCESS! Thanks, Eric.

  • Ericb

    “If people had to pay for their day to day healthcare out of pocket, they would stop ordering things they don’t need, and it would actually work to hold down prices”

    I actually don’t think it people drive up the prices. The health care industry in this country had developed into a bit of a racket where you have health care providers who have become expert at milking Medicare and health insurance companies for anything they can, drug companies who grease doctors’ palms to prescribe their products which Medicare and health insurance commpanies end up paying for, health insurance companies who’ve become expert at paying as little as they can to the people they insure and lawyers who … well, who do whatever it is that lawyers do. We’ve developed this perfect storm of a system that gives us all the bad aspects of socialzed medicine and market driven health care with few of the good aspects. It’s a mess that will be hard to disentangle.

  • roger h

    In defense of myself from sounding like a cold-hearted reactionary, some people who I have known for awhile think I have changed and become more conservative. I try to explain, I care about all the same things as I always have, I just don’t believe in most of the old solution any more.

    When I say “old”, I mean “progressive” solution that date back to the 19th century (we need an exit strategy for “the war on poverty” for one thing and I say that as someone who grew up on AFDC and foodstamps).

  • Eric — I think this does have an effect, because the medical procedures most open to market forces and people paying out of pocket, which are elective surgeries like breast implants and such, have held steady in price or even fallen, in marked contrast to stuff covered by most everyone’s health care plans, where people don’t reach directly into their own pockets to pay for stuff. Maybe there are other factors accounting for this, but that’s my guess.

    People do order way more test than they need, which doctors at least partly push because they’re so frightened of being sued. Meanwhile, I think it make juries less likely to give out ridiculous medical judgements. If jurors actually thought, “Hey, if I tell this doctor / hospital to pay this guy ten million dollars, it may drive MY costs up.” That’s true anyway, but it’s currently hidden because people think “no, my insurance company is paying for it.”

  • I’d be interested in what people think about this plan, which is picking up steam with people (hence it being a ‘purple’ plan) on both sides of the aisle:

    http://www.thepurplehealthplan.org/

  • Ericb

    Ken so are you saying we should basically eliminate private health insurance?

  • Well, I still prefer to have private companies oversee the catastrophic care. And if the ceiling is, say, $5,000 a year before the government insurance kicks in, then you could have companies offer supplemental care to cover, say, anything from $1,000 to $4,000. Again, though, you would be buying that extra insurance out of pocket, and not through your employer or whatnot. Basically, I’d like to cut out as many middle men as possible. And yes, ‘poor’ people should be forced to buy insurance as well. If you can afford cable TV, you can afford a few hundred bucks a year to buy insurance. For the genuinely indigent, again, public and private clinics such as I alluded to should be able to cover a lot of things.

    Again, this is a general idea, and details would definitely have to be hammered out. I’d still think it would be wildly more sustainable than what he have now, though, and in the end, that’s the most progressive kind of social net…one that will actually exist long enough to cover everyone.

  • Ericb

    Certainly sounds interesting. It’s definitly a start. My only worry are it getting through the armies of Washington lobbyists.

  • Well, that’s it. That why I think a radical plan, a cutting of the Gordian knot, actually has a better chance of succeeding. Anything other than a massive, overwhelming change to what we all know is a failed system would die of piranha bites from lobbyists of all stripes. It would be nice if we could move more slowly and cautiously, but sometimes when you’re pinned down you just have to hack your arm off to save your life.

  • Ericb

    I see your point. And, actually, now probably is the time to do it. Both sides should have to take responsibility for it and, frankly, when one party has control of all branches of government pressing problems like this have a tendency to be put off until a tomorrow that never comes.

  • Sadly true!

  • Mr. Rational

    If you do decide to start taking donations, mark me down for a little something. It would only be fair — a small partial payment for the many hours of pleasure I’ve had at this site and its predecessor.

  • alex

    Ken I’ve been visiting your website for years. Just because I disagree with you politically doesn’t make me a troll. I’m giving my opinion.

    America is not broke, it’s the richest country in the world and the land of opportunities. Teachers and seniors do not have to pay for a bunch of crooks on Wall Streets who crashed the economy. Repeal the Bush tax cuts and tax the richest people in the country at the same level as they were during the Clinton years. That would go a long way in fixing the damage of 2008.

  • Petoht

    Just a quick point…

    While everyone’s demonizing Wisconsin et al for stripping state union workers (aside from Police and Fire) of their collective bargaining, where’s the outrage for the Federal government? No unionized federal workers have collective bargaining rights. Nor should they as they aren’t bargaining with a corporation, they’re bargaining with their fellow taxpayers. Government unions in general are a ridiculous concept (don’t get my started on the Netherlands unionizing their military), and granting them collective bargaining is nothing more than political pandering.

    Workers pay dues to the union that funnels contributions to the politicians that funnel more benefits to the workers who pay dues to the union that send contributions to the politicians that increase benefits to the unions… all while the taxpayer bleeds more and more.

  • Petoht

    I just noticed Alex’s last point and wanted to address it too.

    Repealing the Bush tax cuts on the “wealthy” is an Underpants Gnome plan. The so-called cost to government for the the tax cuts for the rich amount to about 80 billion per year (it’s 800-some over 10 years). The current deficit is trucking along at 1.5 Trillion per year. The tax cuts that everyone’s freaking out over are pennies against the spending, but everyone wants to pretend they’ll make a difference.

    Step 1: Repeal Bush Tax Cuts
    Step 2: ???
    Step 3: Balanced budget!

  • Alex — You’re right, your opinions don’t make you a troll. The way you danced around that whole communist issue last time, writing note after note while utterly refusing to take a clear stand (despite me pleading with you to) on the issues you raised and then immediately abandoned when confronted about them, does. I can understand somebody debating a stand they feel passionately about, but you were incredibly dishonest in that instance. You were, in short, acting like the very definition of a troll. This isn’t anyone else on this board who would have done that. I really don’t like being rude to people, but your really burned my ass in that instance.

    And your ‘arguments’ this time around were just sophomoric; Bush bad, etc. Here’s news for you, Bush indeed sucked mightily…but because of his huge, huge spending, not because he didn’t want the government grabbing even more of our money. And Obama sucks ten times as much, because he’s spending trillions and trillions more than Bush did. 2011’s budget is nearly 25% higher than 2009’s. To be exact, we’re talking a raise in spending of 23%, in just two frickin’ years! Meanwhile, the government on all levels is eating up more than half of the yearly GNP now. Half! And yet you think the problem is that they aren’t taxing enough.

    How can you possibly say we’re not broke? We have a true debt, if you count in all our supposed pension and entitlement ‘obligations,’ of well other a hundred trillion dollars. The federal government currently borrows FORTY CENTS out of every dollars it spends, and Obama’s spending the highest level of GNP since freakin’ WWII. We’re talking trillions and trillions and trillions of dollars here. The tax increases on “the rich” you speak of wouldn’t even scratch the surface; hell, it wouldn’t if we just confiscated every single dollar of net worth from every single millionaire and billionaire in the country. That wouldn’t cover a single year of spending under Obama, and then all that wealth would be entirely gone, exhausted out of existence.

    Have you actually researched this issue? Can you do basic math? How many “crooks on Wall Street” are there? Now compare that with how many seniors there are, what with the baby boom generation hitting the Medicare and Medicaid rolls. That’s thousands of people vs. tens of millions of people. Seriously, you cannot make anything approaching a rational argument in favor of your position. You just can’t. The facts just don’t allow it. But I’ll tell you what; if you’ll lower the level of government spending down to the levels we had during the Clinton years, I’ll go for raising the taxes up that high again…assuming you also decrease the rises in state taxes, local taxes, property taxes, etc. that have basically replaced the supposedly lower taxes Bush put through.

  • alex

    I never said repealing the Bush tax cuts would fix the deficit. What I’m saying is that before you ask working class people to make huge sacrifice you have to make sure that those who are very wealthy and can afford it pay their fair share.

    As for the deficit, America is a huge country and you will always have a deficit and huge spending. Yes it would be nice if people in Washington stopped throwing money left and right but good luck on that ever happening. America has so much wealth and ressources that it can afford to ‘live big’ so to speak.

  • alex

    Ken I’ll write to you directly regarding the whole Hollywood blacklist thing as to not bore the readers and to settle this once and for all. Your email is Ken@jabootu.com right?

  • It’s really sad that the Amazon affiliate program got pulled out from under you. I remember when you ran a tip jar to fund the site, and how uncomfortable you were doing it. I remember how cool the affiliate program was when you first found it — an opportunity to mention deals that might actually interest some of your readers, and a revenue source based on products they probably would have bought somewhere anyway. I was also always impressed with how quickly you would strike out the headlines once a great deal was over.

    It’s sad that some states are slaughtering golden geese while others are sprinkling goose food all over their golden plains. Remind me in 5 – 6 years to chart their comparative budget progress. I have to agree that Amazon did the right thing; by taking long-term but inevitable consequences and making them immediate, hopefully they will discourage other states from similarly short-sighted money grabs.

    Still, it’s a pity that your funding mechanism had to be a casualty of it all.

  • Hold on… we need to baseline the “fair share” thing when it comes to taxes.

    I propose $27,500. That’s in the neighborhood of the current federal budget divided by the number of taxpayers. Anyone paying less is paying less than their fair share, and anyone paying more is subsidizing others. You could adjust for the actual government expenses consumed or incurred by individuals, but let’s be charitable and just admit that from the beginning of human history to the end of it some people will be subsidizing others to some extent. Given that, “the commons” is probably the place where this is most justified.

    So, $27.5k. No loopholes, no deductions, no shelters. Abolish the IRS; if you’re not paid up on your taxes, you simply have your right to vote in federal elections suspended (not revoked). Anyone else can pay them up for you (especially those interested in your political views having a voice). However, no contract provision is enforceable which enjoins a person’s right to vote secretly, anonymously and for the candidates of their choosing.

    Now, take away all the gerrymandering, the money wasted on trying to navigate a labyrinthine and treacherous tax code, no more shell games of pushing it off on corporations (you can’t actually set up a sustainable wealth-transfer scheme based on corporate profits, since that ends up being paid by consumers anyway). Now instead of squandering billions and billions funding campaigns and greasing lobbyists and PACs, get the people and groups who do that cover some disenfranchised tax-debtors who they’d like to see have a voice at the polls. Take most of the people who now work in the language-twisting industry of political PR and have them ply their trade to move actual products… you know, those things that people spend money on voluntarily because they are worth more to them than the money they cost… enough more to fund (without compulsion) most of the TV programs, internet content, and print material we enjoy.

    There. Done. Man law. Now, can we quit arguing about corporations versus individuals and about class versus class, and start dealing with what policies actually grow the economy and grow opportunity faster than others?

  • P Stroud

    As yet no one has given me a convincing moral argument than justifies the theft of money from people who work in order to redistribute it to people who don’t. It’s the people who drag themselves out of bed and go to work who deserve help. The layabouts deserve nothing.

    Oh yeah, and there’s that hefty admin fee the bureaucrats charge in salaries and fat retirements to re-apportion the loot.

  • P Stroud

    BTW. It is impossible to make the “rich” pay their “fair share”. They’re rich. They just move their money to some other country. Stop wasting time with stupid ideas that can’t ever be realized. They already pay over 50% of all tax revenues.

    Money in not kept in vaults. The rich invest it in things that will make it grow. That’s where the money comes from for public works, new businesses, etc. Jeez. People think the rich bury it in the ground and hoard it.

    It really gets tiring, explaining this simple stuff.

    Though I do agree that many Wall St financiers and many govt officials would be in jail right now if the Dept of Justice wasn’t so corrupt. They don’t have the guts to arrest the Fed Chairman or the Treasury Secretary. Or Barney Frank and Chris Dodd…. the architects of the mortgage collapse.