What you say should be paid attention too. But the problem is that most Americans no longer know their history or the reasons is happened. We constantly find people claiming the constitution is a 200 year old document that has no relevance to modern time (this usually comes out when talking gun control).

The founding of the country, the whys and whatnot simply aren't being taught in any significant ways in schools now. When they are, they are brushed over with political slants mostly leading to conclusions used to shape the next generation of voters for a political party.

People claim the federalist papers are meaningless but they go a long way in explaining a lot of the hows and whys the constitution of the government was in such a way. After all, it was a public discussion that expressed the concerns of people as well as explaining the intent and reasons of some parts of the constitution. Yet, I'm not aware of any high school that has it as part of the curriculum and people who bring it up are often dismissed as kooks.

I guess my question is how long will this continue before something is done and if and when something is done, will anyone like the results. A lot of political power is spent making the state we are in today and a lot of power will be spent on keeping it that way.

Congratulations on finding your little safe corner of the world. I have never felt unsafe in the US and while I do own firearms and encourage everyone possible to carry, I actually do not carry a weapon myself.

I've been to Compton, NYC, Chicago, Miami, as well as many Midwest areas and never once felt unsafe. There was one time in Compton CA where a gang gunfight broke out near me, but I ducked behind a car with 2 or 3 others and waited for the shooting to stop. They weren't shooting at me, I didn't feel unsafe. It wasn't like I was in a war or anything.

I'm not sure why people get scared because guns happen to be around or they go off. But I have learned that people are different all across this country and some are completely scared of the idea of guns while others like me could care less.

I think you miss his point. Homosexuality is ancillary to the problem it was just an example, it's that something- anything- could be discovered and used against the politician or anyone else for that matter. Replace homosexuality with a stay in a mental hospital, a car accident that killed people, a juvenile crime of some sort (property damage or perhaps assaulting someone in high school), an affair with a biographer or anything that the politician thinks will make him unelectable. That is what the point was about, having some sort of dirt over the person that was discovered through this cache of information that was thought to be personal and private.

lol.. Hoffa was the leader of the teamsters union that allowed the mob to be part of it. It helped in their so called fight against the big corporations to have a little mob backup. The mob would in turn use the retirement funds to launder money.

Anyways, the senate started investigating the mob connections and the unions and Hoffa disappeared without a trace. No one has found a body, he is presumed to be dead. Several mobsters have claimed they killed him and lead investigators on wild trips looking for the body but it has never been found to date. There is a lot more involved and is actually a somewhat interesting story if you find yourself bored one of these days. Hoffa was one of the original anti 1%ers so to say, but he did most of his work attempting to unionize America in the 70's which more or less lead to all the downsizing in the 80's and outsourcing in the 90's. Most of what the unions demanded back then has been codified into laws now making them more or less a bullying arm for wages and benefits.

I hate to bring this up but the idea that government provides adequate food, shelter, and education for the majority of the population is really one reason why a government fails to do so.

Seriously, in the US, before the government handed things out or got involved in education, people received enough education from the local communities to function in society. Before government got involved in providing housing and food, the vast majority of people were able to find it and live- even if they were working just for subsistence. Now enter education- kids graduate from high school knowing less about more things then a high school graduate in 1860. I spoke with someone just today who told me that going off welfare and working has actually cost him an average of $40 a week in income because he now has to pay for his transportation to work and childcare. Of course he expects this to be made up within 6 months when he gets his evaluation and raises.

We have gotten away from a large agrarian society and a lot of the gold old past simply isn't practicable or applicable any more. But expecting government to provide something is really harsh on someone trying to provide for themselves. That is how a country becomes wealthy- when the population provides for themselves and the government only keeps the social economic environment that makes it possible to do so.

Really? What, pray tell, were Bush's Fast and Furious, Bhengazi, James Rosen, IRS targeting and now this hacking attempt equivalents. I'll note that Iraq is nowhere in this discussion as Obama is rapidly gearing up for his own Iraq in Syria.

I guess Irony means a description of a Ferric object right?

You have no idea what you are saying, you are just ranting about rich people you don't think are paying enough in taxes. Of course if it is illegal to remove income as taxable income it is a crime. That's BY DEFINITION. Do you have any evidence that those awful rich people are doing this, or is it just conjecture on your part? If you have evidence, report it to the IRS. I think they have a bounty for such things, but even if they don't, it is your responsibility as a citizen to report it. Don't just whine about it.

I showed you the facts. The link I provided showed you were wrong. Where's your data?

You have a problem sticking with the terms you use. You said it was "potential income", not "potentially taxed income." Which is it?

That is complete and utter nonsense. There is no "potential income" line on the tax form. There is "total income", "adjusted gross income", and "income subject to tax". The tax rates are based on "income subject to tax". That's not a "potential income", it's based on actual income. The total income has nothing to do with your tax rates, which is what I think you are trying to refer to as "potential income", but there is no "potential" about it. Either it is or it isn't. If a rich person, no, if ANY person isn't writing down all the income on his tax form, it is a crime. If you have proof someone is doing that, report it. Just assuming it happens is a waste of everyone's time.

You're guessing at how much a rich person puts in this "tax account". There is no "common sense" to tell you that, you'd have to ask the rich people.

I'm not spending anything when I put money in an account. I still have it, it's there for me to withdraw when I want to. If I'm putting it into a "tax account" as an escrow for future taxes, well, that doesn't change how much tax I'll owe, only that I'll be sure to make some interest on it while I'm holding it.

If, by some odd chance, you are referring to an IRA of some kind by "tax account", then you're still wrong. Then the rich person truly is using $100,000 to get no benefit. His deductions for this money go away as his income goes up and if he has a qualified retirement plan. I am hardly in the top 5% even, but I am high enough up the scale that my allowed contribution is exactly $0. An IRA truly is a poor-person's benefit -- another example of you complaining about a deduction that the rich can't take but the poor can, just like the "per person" dependent deduction and child tax credit.

I pointed you to the link that showed you they were. Since you didn't bother to look, let's review, shall we? You said, and I quoted this in my response: "Wealthy people pay 8-10% tax on average while you and I pay 35-40%." I provided a link to here, which you apparently did not bother to look at. In that data for 2009, it shows the following facts:

• The average tax rate for the top 1% was 24.01%
• The average tax rate for the 25% to 50% level was 5.58%
• The average tax rate for 10% to 25% was 8.23%
• The average rates for lower income brackets were smaller.

Now, I don't know what tax rate you fall into, but the data clearly shows that while you claim that "wealthy" pay only 8-10%, they really pay 24.01%. And the "you and I" pay anywhere from 6-11% (and that covers from $32k through $154k AGI). So, your numbers are upside down. Wrong.

I can't say what you individually paid in taxes for 2009 (or this year, for which data is not available yet), but the average rate was well below your %35-40%. Mine was about 14%, and I was not aggressive in finding deductions. If your's was significantly higher, I suggest you hire a tax accountant to find the deductions that you aren't taking because you think only the rich can take them.

That's funny. I pointed you to the facts that back up my statements. So far, all you've done is pull numbers out of your rectum and claim I'm fudging things. Do you have a cite for anything you've claimed? Do you have facts or just a pathetic hatred for people who are more successful than you?

It is simple data traceable to the IRS. You can get it yourself and see, if you care about the truth. If you just want to keep up a diatribe against those awful law-breaking tax-cheating rich people, well, have at it. I've shown you the numbers, you can choose to understand them or not.

It's legal because the law makes it so. It is the same law for poor people and rich people. It appears you've grabbed on to something you've been told and are reluctant to look at the real numbers. You've are believing everything you are told, except the truth that has citations to back it up.

Your profanity serves no purpose other than make you look childish. Warren Buffet has some motive for making the false statements he makes, but I don't know what they are. I proposed two different possibilities, one of which I believe and one I don't. It was simple math. You could get the data and calculate it yourself to see. And, as always, you could ask Warren Buffet if he thinks the tax code is so unfair why he isn't paying his secretary's taxes for her and then sending in an extra contribution for himself to make things fair on his own. The fact he doesn't tells me he doesn't really think it is unfair.

If I am an owner, how can anyone withdraw my right to access something? And who enforces this withdrawal? Do you imagine that I'll simply leave the house I'm staying in if you come around and say "please leave, you've not cleaned your share of toilets today"? You'll make me leave? You and whose army? Oh, there's the organized violence.

How about a couple of months eating out of your refrigerator and sleeping in your bed? I'm not going to live under a bridge just because you ask me to. You think I should sleep in the cold? Nice try. Ain't gonna happen. The stuff in your house is just as much mine as it is yours. That's what your socialism rules tell me. You made the rules, now live with them.

And that, Weedlekin, is the reason pure socialism can never work -- it is being run by and applied to human beings.

No, it wouldn't. It would result in the same kind of power struggles and partisanship that occurs today, only worse because scientists aren't elected.

Anyone who has been alive for more than a decade has already seen the back-and-forth that science brings us regarding simple things. Red wine is good for you. Let's pass laws making it legal for anyone to drink red wine. Red wine is bad for you, let's make it illegal for anyone to drink red wine. Red wine is good for you in small amounts, let's make it legal to buy a glass at a time.... This study shows ... that study shows ... the other study shows something else. Which do we follow? What law do we enact? That's just one example.

Then you need to reconcile the concept of human rights and freedom against stark realities of physical law. It's dangerous to skydive. We're banning skydiving. It's dangerous to fly small airplanes. Let's ban small airplanes. It's dangerous to be distracted while driving. Let's ban all distractions. I mean ALL distractions. It's dangerous to drive anywhere, let's ban cars.

Who elects the technocrats? Does anyone with a scientific degree get to create new laws, or only some of them?

The main problem is that science deals with one part of reality and society deals with a different thing. Science doesn't consider the human side of things (no, I don't mean physiology, I mean social and emotional things), but the law has to. Science doesn't care if I like the taste of red wine, it deals with how it hurts or helps my health. "You must drink red wine because it is good for you" is a bad law from so many standpoints, but it would be "science" in a technocrat society.

Let's end it with this: if I do a cost/benefit analysis of the death penalty issue, I would probably wind up with the answer that it costs society much less to execute a convicted murderer than it does to keep him in prison for any significant amount of time. (That applies to pretty much any convicted criminal sent to prison. A dollar or two of drugs vs. hundreds or thousands of dollars in incarceration costs. Benefits to society: lower population, lower costs for supporting that population, less carbon footprint as relatives and friend don't have to drive to the jail to visit. Wow, a win for the planet!) I would also probably come up with the science to support that once a person has committed a murder he's more likely to murder again. (Yes, the "one off" crimes of passion exist, but there are a lot of people who are complete psycho and sociopaths who will murder more than once, and they bring up the odds.) I could probably manage a scientific study that shows the costs of multiple, unending appeals are the main reason that the death penalty has any added expense, and that the majority of those fail.

Ergo, science tells us that someone who is convicted of murder no longer gets appeals and is executed at the earliest opportunity. It's a simple cost/benefit study. Science has ruled. But wait, people make mistakes. There are incalculable and often unrepeatable social costs (and thus outside any scientific realm) to the death penalty and we shouldn't do it. Sorry. Science rules.

And as a final nail in this coffin: the science of eugenics. Technocratic government is nice?

Fear of exactly what I said. They agreed not to talk about certain things as a condition of getting paid to do what they do and getting access to the information they got access to. They were afraid that while talking about unclassified things they would let classified information that they agreed not to talk about slip out.

This "government knocking" isn't because they talked to the press, it would be because they talked about things they voluntarily agreed not to talk about.

Yes, you can. It's easy. Go to work for a government contractor that deals with classified information and see if you aren't expected to waive your first amendment rights, at least with respect to the classified information you have access to. Or, join the military. There's lots of things you can't say under the UCMJ that someone not subject to those regulations can say freely.

Nonsense. If you want to keep your first amendment rights, don't waive them. Very simple.

If you sign such a contract, then you have, indeed, waived your rights. Since such contracts are figments of the imagination, then your argument is similarly a figment. The problem with your figment is that it involves information solely created by the speaker, which has not been subject to NDA or other agreements. Should someone go to a free speech zone (whatever that is) and start spouting nuclear secrets, he would not be prosecuted for doing so in a free speech zone against some fictional appropriate usage agreement, he's be prosecuted for breaking the agreement that got him access to those secrets in the first place. If an active-duty military person used a "free speech zone" to make statements that violate the UCMJ, he'd be prosecuted under the UCMJ -- which contains no mention of "free speech zones." The "free speech zone" is irrelevant.

I'm sorry, but when I saw this in meta-moderation I had to come comment. Open Source is one of the least equal environments I have ever seen. Linus, the perl pumpkin, etc, are not equals.

In an open source project, if a majority of people want something, one of three things happens.

1. The open source project leader agrees and it happens.
2. The open source leader disagrees, but enough people who know how to program and are familiar with the project create a fork and the user community splits into fragments that may or may not be sufficient to support the long term existence of either or both versions.
3. The group who wants the thing don't know how to program and it just doesn't happen.

In a true world of equals, the first action would always happen.

That's the point. Who is going to work when they get paid the same no matter what? Who is going to maintain the nice houses so that the string of visitors can use them when they show up? Who is going to fly the planes to take people there? Who is going to drive the cabs? Who is going to fix the toilets when they break? Who fixes the broken water pipes? I won't -- I'm not living in that house and you're paying me whether I work or not. Tough to be you.

I want a private island. I don't want to be "an easy stroll away" from what I want. I'm sorry, I'm working on what?

Built and maintained and run by who? Interesting topography to who? Designed by who? You think a pile of dirt heaped up by a grader can equal a mountain vista or oceanside view? You haven't seen a mountain vista or been to the ocean, have you?

I know I can have a discussion without automatically resorting to name calling.

If you have evidence that someone isn't reporting all their income, report them to the IRS. That's a crime.

The tax codes define what is income for those with any amount of income, even none at all. They define what is income for me, for you, and for the person next door.

Now you're using the term "potential income". I don't know what that is, or why someone should be taxed on income that is only potentially theirs.

Now, if you mean that there are deductions from income granted for certain things, well, yes, of course there are. But first you have to report the income to deduct it legally. I can't just change the amounts on my W2s when I want to deduct mortgage interest or charities. Neither can those awful rich people.

Of course. But that's different than not claiming the income in the first place, and deductions aren't limited to certain people. Of course if you can't afford to give $10,000 to charity you can't claim a $10,000 deduction on your tax form. You didn't give $10,000 to charity, the charity didn't get the benefit of $10,000, so why would you expect to be able to deduct a charitable contribution of that size that you didn't make? You also still have whatever money you didn't donate, and the rich person does not. He can't spend the $10,000 he gave to charity, the charity did get the benefit of $10,000, and so he should get the benefit of the deduction.

Yes. They are on our tax forms, too. If we could qualify, we could take those deductions. But that's STILL different than not claiming the income.

The personal exemption was $3900 for someone who made less than $250,000 AGI, but was zero for anyone over $397,500. (Source: here..) This same amount applies to dependents. That's the only "per person" number I know.

So, you should note that the awful rich people you hate so much don't get that deduction, at least not most of it. The latest number I have is for 2009 and the bottom end of the 1% was $343,927. I suspect that 2013 was higher, and it wouldn't take but $50k added to the bottom of that bracket to put that deduction out of reach entirely. And they don't get the child tax credit of $1000, which does nothing to reduce AGI but is a straight subtraction from the tax you owe. If you owed $1000 in taxes and had a child, and made less than $75,000 AGI, you would owe ZERO in taxes. If you managed to get your tax bill down to zero for the year and had an AGI of less than the stated amount, you'd get a check for $1000 from the other taxpayers.

It seems rather silly to complain about a deduction that rich people can't use when you're complaining about all the deductions the rich people have that you don't. Given that the latter is "none", it seems even sillier.

Huh? I fail to see any significance to your guesses here. I don't know how much a rich person puts in a "tax account", and I don't really care. They're already paying a rate higher than I am, they're already paying more than their proportional amount, so I say, if they can save on their taxes by using deductions more power to them. If they can get their tax liability down to zero by donating a lot of money to charity, I say "great!" They have a lot less money to spend, and the charities have a lot more to help other people. That's the intent of the charitable deduction, by the way. Promote charity. They're obeying the law and paying what they owe. If you have evidence of them not claiming income in violation of the law, report them. If all you have is assumptions about "those awful rich people must not be reporting it all", well... the term for that is "class envy" or "class hatred", and it's not a productive emotion.

So what? The money they pay a tax lawyer isn't in their pocket anymore, and the deduction for paying a tax lawyer isn't limited to rich people. That same deduction appears on my tax form, too, and I expect it appears on yours. (The money they pay the tax lawyer is now income for him, and taxes get paid on that.) There are lots of things I can't afford or just don't want to do, so I can't claim them as a deduction. The answer is still "so what?"

I cited a reference that showed your numbers were upside down. You cited nothing other than your own opinion, and made unsupported claims of tax fraud. Who is ignoring facts?

Good question. Yes.