Moron.

They invented universal Velcro?

Right. Material crap. That's what wealth is all about. The allure of wealth is NOT the money, but all the material crap it can buy.

Home ownership is higher than it was 40 years ago.

Car ownership is higher than it was 40 years ago.

Neither do I. But most people I know spend several hours a day in front of one. I assume they find it adds value to their lives.

Again, several people I know spend their spare time on one. If it's not contributing to their lives then they're crazy/stupid to be wasting their lives on it. But it's there, for those of us who find that it does add value to their existence.

So you finally recognized something of great wealth? You wouldn't have that, certainly not as inexpensively, except that the wealthy provided capital investment for innovation with the vision in mind to market it to the masses. In the exchange, they have grown more wealthy as you bought a product that they produced, and you have grown more wealthy for having such a product. A free trade, and all free (and honest) trade is to the benefit of all the parties involved. And that is the gist of my rant against the above post, which suggested that economic activity can benefit the wealthy alone. Except through means of deceit, a free economy cannot benefit the wealthy alone.

Improvements to windows and insulation to keep homes warmer in winter and cooler in summer. And it's not all in your home. Cheaper food from advancements in farming. GPS. I'm sure there's many more.

Why? Did the work week get longer in the last 40 years? Or do you think you should earn the same working 20 hours as you would if you worked 40 hours? If you want to work only 20 hours, there are a few part-time jobs out there.

Efficiency is important, because someone will find out a way to do something cheaper, and you have to compete with that. Cheaper does mean more profits, and more dough to line the pockets of shareholders, but it also means that customers have more spare money in the end.

And why are you miserable? Are you going hungry? Do you not have decent clothing? Aren't all of your needs met? You're miserable because of greed, and you blame it on the wealthy for their greed, but it's your greed that's making you miserable. I've been working 60 hour weeks for a few months, without overtime pay, and I'm still happy when I go home.

Ahh, you forgot about how the cell phone and the computer have made your life better. They didn't just magically appear. Someone with wealth and a vision brought these highly valuable resources to you, at a price much better than you could ever afford to make one on your own.

But the struggle for survival is easier than it's ever been. You don't have to tend a garden, can vegetables and keep your shelves stocked so you can survive winter. And you don't have to cut lumber for firewood to keep warm. But if you did those things, maybe you could make it on a 10-20 hour work week.

And when was the last time an otherwise healthy person in the US involuntarily starved to death? And by "rich get richer without doing any work" you must mean labor, or you're too ignorant or stubborn to realize that THEY DO WORK. Although most of their hardest work may be behind them, they worked their asses off to make money to work for them.

Right. My point was that we've been brought up and told all of our lives that the authority of the government is from the consent of the governed. And it may have followed that very closely, for a few years after the war of independence. Slowly, that principle has been whittled away. Even though it's still praised in tongue, it has been displaced with violence by some of the very same people who give it praise.

I just want to make sure that the people who advocate the government usurping authority understand that this is merely authority through violence, and it may at any time be used against them. Either from their own government or from invading armies. If it's justified within the nation, it is justified without.

Any superior violence is a superior authority.

Taxation is the assertion that my body, my labor and the product of it, are not my own. It is slavery.

So you justify using the government army to take from me to protect me from another army, and if I resist, the government will rough me up and take what I have? Sounds an awful lot like a protection racket. Why can't I afford to protect my own wealth in my own way?

Do you mean an invasion? Ever read the second amendment? That's what is vital to the security of the free state.

Once again, your metric is wrong. You're measuring in money, which is not the source of wealth. Production is. Doesn't the middle class have more products for living a good life than they did 10 years ago?

Several years ago, my family and I (3 of us) spent about a year living on food budget that was about the equivalent of a single cell phone plan or extended cable service. And we weren't too bad off. Your modern middle-class meal is like the banquet of a king would be centuries ago. It's not necessary, and neither is the cell phone or the cable service, which even many of your POOR families enjoy at least one of these. We are a long way from subsistence living in the US.

I wouldn't hesitate to give to a good charity that addressed these issues, if they were real.

Because most of you spend dozens of hours a week in front of the boob tube, playing video games, social networking and doing other unproductive things with your free time rather than educating yourself or finding more ways to enrich your lives.

Capitalism is an economic model which is defined by private ownership and investment. A capital venture would be investment money finding a promising new product or idea to develop. It's in the interest of the capitalist to find projects to develop. About the only time it would inhibit development would be if you have competing products. If an idea has it's own merit and the entrepreneur is determined, it will find enough capital investment to overcome competition trying to put it down. It cannot be stopped, except by lacking marketability or government regulations and control. And through capital success, you are given innovation. The best ideas that can be bought are at your fingertips, because there's personal gain in bringing that product to you. Take away that private ownership and you'll not see anything like the product growth we've seen in the last 100 years.

From the horse and cart to space tourism in such a short period of history, brought to you by none else but capitalism.

Why did you bring banks into the conversation? I thought it was about the wealthy. Are the wealthy all banks?

Banks are only empowered through government usurping authority. Government is complicit in this symbiotic relationship. Proposing a greater tax on the rich is a distraction from the real problems, such as fiat money and fractional reserve banking. You know that banks are out to own the world, so why is your answer to demand that the rich give you a better life? You have been fooled into class warfare when you should be finding out what inequality perpetuates this growing divide. You are treating a symptom, calling wealth inequality, when the real inequality is a fundamental part of the system and not the product of it. Fractional-reserve banking.

Compound interest is not a ponzi scheme. You are not promised any return for paying interest. It's just the hip word of the week you decided to misapply. And it is sustainable, provided bankruptcy. But then you mention inflation as part of this equation, and I have to wonder why you think that does anything but lesson the burden of that debt. A "modest" inflation rate of 2-4%, which itself is compounded, will effectively drop your 6% home loan to a real rate of 2-4%.

The part that's not sustainable is growth. Which social security is entirely dependent on. So yes, SS is a ponzi scheme.

You must have missed the part where you own a house and/or a car, a cell phone, a big screen TV, a state-of-the-art game system, a PC or laptop, and so on. You don't count yourself as having a richer life than people did 40 years ago? Wealth is not money. Capitalism is responsible for these developments.

I never said that the rich aren't getting a larger portion of the pie. I said that the pie is (has been) growing and everyone's portion is larger.

I'm saying you're using the wrong metric. You measure in dollars, I measure in richness of life.

At it's core, capitalism is that you own your own labor and your own product (if you produce something). Screwing other people over is what happens when the government gets involved, as in a free market you would exchange your money for goods and services that you find the greatest benefit in obtaining. If you're screwed over in free capitalism then you've screwed yourself over.

Stop wasting your time with television and video games and make something out of yourself. Did the wealthy obtain their wealth while they played video games and watched the boob tube a combined 20 hours a week? I gave up television and video games years ago and I'm working hard to make my own wealth, and I'll be damned if I let some lazy bastard with an entitlement complex demands I share because I have taken an unfair advantage.

Do you know what it means if you think you can all authorize government to tax me for my wealth? It means you are asserting that violence is the foundation of authority.

What's that supposed to mean?

What kind of world do you live in where the rich are not a subset of the people?

It wouldn't be possible unless the people are bound to the purchase of products and services against their own interests. You know, government mandates and government spending.

Is there such a thing as economic growth where only the rich benefit? What do they do, collaborate to give services to and manufacture products only for each other? How then could they collectively increase their wealth? Only if wealth is not exclusively measured in money.

This is an illusion based on the notion that money is wealth. The people have less money and the rich have more, therefore, the rich are wealthier and the people are poorer. Never mind that every single cent that the people spend, some of which goes to the rich, is deemed by themselves to be in their own interests, causing them to benefit from the exchange of money for products and services. Never mind that the value of money is intangible and unrealized, and it enriches no one's life until it is exchanged for goods and services, which are the real things that enrich lives.

Huh. Maybe it isn't Bush's fault after all.

I disagree.

An unlawful order should not be obeyed. We are citizens, not subjects. The police and even the military are subject to civilians. They are empowered by civilians and charged with performing their duties. They are given authority as a means to an end, but balanced with the burden of responsibility. Having no greater claim to authority than their duty allows, which is the function of law enforcement. They do not have the authority to detain or arrest someone they do not have reason to believe has committed any crime, or issue any order except that instructs a person in abiding by law.

In other words, the only lawful orders are orders which instruct you to comply with law. Disobeying a lawful order would basically be breaking a law AND having been warned about it by an officer.

And if you see an officer obviously using excessive force, you should warn them that they are exceeding the authority you have entrusted to them, and that you have the legal authority to forceably restrain him, by whatever means necessary, from continuing the assault. The law is not on their side when they exceed their authority, and you need to let them know that.

The more you act like a subject, the more you'll become like one, and the more they will become like lords.

If officers do not keep themselves and each other in line, it's up to us. If they watch out for each other, we need to watch out for each other.

You mean like http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antisocial_personality_disorder#Millon.27s_subtypes ?
* covetous antisocial - variant of the pure pattern where individuals feel that life has not given them their due.

In trade, both parties are enriched, as they both find a greater value in what they got than what they gave. Trade, in itself, automatically benefits society.

Background services? I would voluntarily trade, and pay for such services as I require or see fit. I do so on a daily basis. The fact that the government runs some of these, and so claiming that I would not pay for them because I object to taxation, is a strawman. The government doesn't need to run things. Roads can be privatized (and some are) and I would pay for my use of these roads. Same deal, value for value. And I keep the rest.

A sociopath, or anti-social person, is one who would demand that others contribute to one's benefit through the use of violence. And make no mistake, government force is not eloquence, it is not reason, it is force. It is violence. If I choose non-compliance, the government will use force, increasing it's violence up to and including deadly force, asserting their dominion over me. You advocate slavery.

I don't know what roman was referring to, but if you think "keeping what I earned through my own labor, innovation and investments" = "shitting on my fellow man from a high perch," then I'd love to shit on you all day, every day.

Do the judges get 1 save to use to override a vote and save their favorite candidate?

Well, they can either (A) take turns holding the majority, or (B) they are fundamentally the same, or (C) both.

I believe the correct answer is C.