Debate heats up: Capitalism vs. Socialism

[NickD 203]

We can look at this country in terms of exactly what freedoms we do have left, my major gripes are these 1,525 Gestapo type agencies we have, with most of them starting in the 70's.

In running a plant, we needed insurance, and do get insurance, the insurance companies would come over and check everything out, if our liability was great, either wouldn't get insurance or have to pay through the nose for premiums. So exactly what function is the EPA, OSHA, and the DNR serving? They don't pay for any liability, just fine if they find a can of spray you can buy off of any grocery store shelve. It's that ridiculous. Then the ERA comes in and tells you what percentage of workers you must have when your only interest is in finding good workers, and to keep good workers, you have to pay them decent wages. Then the IRS comes in and wants to see your inventory to make sure you are paying taxes on profit that inventory has when you never made any money off that inventory yet!

And if that IRS isn't satisfied enough coming to your plant, they also come to your home and demand the same thing, added by the tax assessor, and the building inspector plus other city ordinances that will fine you severely if you don't shovel off city owned sidewalks that nobody uses within 24 hours. And they don't give a damned if you have the flu, go out their and shovel.

What proves you own your property is a piece of paper issued by the government, so you realize your property is only yours if the government survives. If China comes over, and they are in a very good position to do so because we are building them up, they certainly won't recognize that piece of paper. And while you worked your can off to buy, pay off, and keep neat, your ownership is only as good as your ability to pay outrageous property taxes you have no say over.

You are not free to marry anyone you want to, we have the USCIS for that. Not even free to pick up a couple of extra mph going down a steep hill that will be more than compensated for when climbing the next one, always a cop at the bottom of that hill that will give you a ticket. So in times of overpriced gas, you have to waste it by braking going down those hills, this is the kind of country we live in.

Then we have giant corporations that can save a few cents by using salve labor in foreign countries, there goes our jobs. In regarding small business startups, almost impossible today with rules and regulations. And if you do have the cash to start up a business, you are far better off to live off that cash.

And you are automatically a criminal if you do something stupid like buying an airline ticket.

I really enjoyed helping my wife with her civics test, but found myself asking, what in the hell happened to this country?

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

Obama makes Oval Office call to reporters

President Obama was so concerned that he had appeared to dismiss a question from New York Times reporters about whether he was a socialist that he called the newspaper from the Oval Office to clarify his policies.

"It was hard for me to believe that you were entirely serious about that socialist question," he told reporters, who had interviewed the president aboard Air Force One on Friday.

Opening the unusual presidential call to reporters by saying that there was "just one thing I was thinking about as I was getting on the copter," he said it wasn't he who started the federal government's intervention into the nation's financial system.

"I did think it might be useful to point out that it wasn’t under me that we started buying a bunch of shares of banks. It wasn’t on my watch. And it wasn’t on my watch that we passed a massive new entitlement -– the prescription drug plan -- without a source of funding. And so I think it’s important just to note when you start hearing folks throw these words around that we’ve actually been operating in a way that has been entirely consistent with free-market principles and that some of the same folks who are throwing the word 'socialist' around can’t say the same."

The New York Times asked, "So whose watch are we talking about here?" but Obama wouldn't name names.

"Well, I just think it’s clear by the time we got here, there already had been an enormous infusion of taxpayer money into the financial system. And the thing I constantly try to emphasize to people if that coming in, the market was doing fine, nobody would be happier than me to stay out of it. I have more than enough to do without having to worry the financial system. The fact that we’ve had to take these extraordinary measures and intervene is not an indication of my ideological preference, but an indication of the degree to which lax regulation and extravagant risk taking has precipitated a crisis."

He concluded the brief call by saying, "I think that covers it."

The phone call came after the president was asked aboard his plane: "Are you a socialist as some people have suggested?"

He was clear in his first answer: "You know, let’s take a look at the budget – the answer would be no."

"Is there anything wrong with saying, 'Yes'?" a Times reporter pressed.

"Let’s just take a look at what we’ve done," Obama said, ticking off efforts his administration has made to stabilize the economy. But he acknowledged that, as he told Joe the Plumber, he plans to try to spread the wealth around.

"If you look on the revenue side what we’re proposing, what we’re looking at is essentially to go back to the tax rates that existed during the 1990s when, as I recall, rich people were doing very well. In fact everybody was doing very well. . . . We said that we’d give a tax cut to 95 percent of working Americans. That’s exactly what we have done."

http://washingtontimes.com/weblogs/joe-cur...call-reporters/