Political Thread 2012

[thrash]

Well, Obama is wrong that everyone should go to college. Doesn't seem to make Americans smarter. It does seem to make colleges dumber. When you have everyone chasing after a fixed supply of college admission spots, using borrowed money, the result is predictable. College gets way more expensive, and universities spend the money on dumb things to attract fickle student loan dollars. Like giant new stadiums, rec centers, etc. Not things that make kids better.

[DaveH]

Trafik Jamz;326449 wrote:
I can see your point Dave. My point is that what he said originally is based on a lie (shortened version or not) that Obama said he wants everyone to go to college. I WILL give him credit for taking back the statement once it became apparent to him (via Fox News) that he and Obama were actually on the same page and even saying gasp that he agreed with the President.

A "lie" assigns intent. I don't know if he lied or just made a mistake.

With that, I think we've beat this horse to death. lol

Ron Paul sure is getting his ass kicked in the primaries.

(that ought to stir the pot)

[DaveH]

<u>The crushing national debt:</u>

I read an interesting article this week. We always hear on the news about the debt being around $15 trillion, which is so stupidly large that it's hard to even grasp. But the article kind of put it in a new light, if you add to that number, the money that the government owes to seniors for social security and medicare, owes the Vets, and owes government worker pensions, the actual national debt is more like $120 trillion.

Insane.

[Trafik Jamz]

DaveH;326459 wrote:
<u>The crushing national debt:</u>

I read an interesting article this week. We always hear on the news about the debt being around $15 trillion, which is so stupidly large that it's hard to even grasp. But the article kind of put it in a new light, if you add to that number, the money that the government owes to seniors for social security and medicare, owes the Vets, and owes government worker pensions, the actual national debt is more like $120 trillion.

Insane.

That would be the amount of promised benefits over a number of years without any regard to revenues during that time if I'm understanding that correctly (including gov't workers who are just now entering the workforce and won't retire for 45 years). But yeah, the number is pretty staggering.

[thrash]

If you made the government do its accounting the way we require private businesses to do theirs, that stuff starts to show up.

Here is an explanation that scratches the tip of the iceberg, from the magnificent Khan Academy:

http://www.khanacademy.org/humanities---other/american-civics/v/government-s-financial-condition

Basically, we are completely fucked. Buy gold, silver, and ammunition. The dollar will collapse in our (natural) lifetimes.

[Trafik Jamz]

thrash;326464 wrote:
If you made the government do its accounting the way we require private businesses to do theirs, that stuff starts to show up.

Here is an explanation that scratches the tip of the iceberg, from the magnificent Khan Academy:

http://www.khanacademy.org/humanities---other/american-civics/v/government-s-financial-condition

Basically, we are completely fucked. Buy gold, silver, and ammunition. The dollar will collapse in our (natural) lifetimes.

Great video.

The thing I've never understood why it is worth anything is gold. Aside from being shiny, extremely malleable and a decent conductor of electricity, I fail to see why it has any real value. In theory, could another country not say "Yes, USA you have piles upon piles of gold but we've decided that gold isn't worth anything to us so you're fucked!" I'm not saying that there is a huge likelihood of this, but theoretically it could happen.

[DaveH]

The author of the article thinks that within the next 3 years the house of cards is going to collapse, leaving us in a world of hurt. Can't say I disagree.

[Trafik Jamz]

DaveH;326470 wrote:
The author of the article thinks that within the next 3 years the house of cards is going to collapse, leaving us in a world of hurt. Can't say I disagree.

Now, the question is this: What can we do to prevent it? Go back on legal contracts (I'd argue that Medicare and Social Security are both legal obligations that the citizens of this country have paid into....whether the system is right/wrong is irrelevant at this point, the point is that there were promises made that if you paid in x amount you would receive y amount of coverage)? MASSIVE cuts in spending including military, welfare and the like?

The problem is that neither the left or the right in this country are good at not increasing spending. Also, there is virtually no way that Social Security and Medicare will go away entirely. Benefits may be cut and premiums may be raised, but realistically it will be career suicide for any politician who decides to actually vote to kill these two programs. Welfare (especially long term welfare) may well be eliminated or at least dramatically changed. Disability is too easy to receive as are unemployment benefits. I really, truly believe our military could be restructured dramatically w/o affecting our ability to defend ourselves. Fewer ground forces are needed each and every time there is a war. We need special ops, infiltrating agents, technology and supreme firepower. We can't get rid of our ground people entirely, but I think we can get by with less of them.... and we can for damn sure get by with less wars.

We've trained these soldiers in a career field and offered them a GI Bill to continue their education. It's time to transition them back into civilian life.

I get frustrated when I think about what and where to cut, which is why I think we should cut everything by at least 1 to 2% every year until we balance the budget and then for a couple of years after. I'm also ok with increasing everyone's taxes by 2% across the board (one time) and making sure that even the poorest wage earners pay at least that 2% income tax.

[GarageAlchemist]

I agree on the disability. My uncle is a lifetime drug user. Been to prison multiple times for it, been through rehab for it, always goes back to it. Now his body is shot at 50. He gets 950$ a month disability because his joints are shot.

We need to be able to distinguish between disabilities from choices and disabilities that are caused by circumstances that aren't in anyone's control (accidents, etc.)

[DaveH]

Trafik Jamz;32647 wrote:
I get frustrated when I think about what and where to cut, which is why I think we should cut everything by at least 1 to 2% every year until we balance the budget and then for a couple of years after. I'm also ok with increasing everyone's taxes by 2% across the board (one time) and making sure that even the poorest wage earners pay at least that 2% income tax.

I think the cuts needs to be more like 5% a year, or more. Politically, it probably needs to be done across the board otherwise people/politicians will be screaming that they are being singled out and nothing will get done. If everyone has to take a hit, it has a lot better chance of getting done. That said, I don't think it will get done. You should probably make plans to take care of yourself and your family when things go into the shitter.

I don't know if increasing the tax rate is the solution, I think much more would be gained by getting the economy going again instead.

[thrash]

So gold doesn't have any intrinsic value. Infact, nothing has intrinsic value. A thing is valued only if a particular person wants it more than something else they have at a particular time.

It turns out that most people for most of history have chosen silver and gold for money because they are extremely suitable for that purpose.

Money develops naturally as a logical outgrowth of the barter system. Without money, the butcher has to have exactly the number of chickens that the cobbler wants in exchange for making a set of shoes. The butcher can only get shoes when the cobbler wants chickens.

This is of course an awful way to conduct the affairs of society, and is a detriment to the effectiveness and growth of human civilization.

Compared to all other things, gold and silver have a few properties that make them excellent as money

• they are highly resistant to corrosion, rot, contamination, spoiling, human touch, etc (as compared to wheat, iron, wood, leather, etc)
• they can be cut and melted and recombined and reformed over and over again with no loss whatsoever in utility or capability (as compared to say, a cow)
• the naturally available quantity of each substance is quite difficult to change rapidly (as opposed to peices of paper, flower petals, etc)
• they have unique physical and chemical properties that make it difficult for others to create convincing frauds

the monetary utility of gold and silver is significantly higher than their industrial or ornamental utility. There simply isn't something that has more desirable properties than silver as day to day money, and gold as a store of wealth. Why? Because most people have decided that's what they want to use as money, primarily for the reasons above.

It doesn't hurt that silver and gold are both very pretty, and are both medically useful chemicals, and do have industrial/technical uses. But the #1 good feature of any commodity money is that it be difficult to inflate the supply rapidly. Copper or other metals would work as well for this, but they have problems with durability, corrosion resistance, etc.

Gold and Silver aren't the only things you should have because they are only useful to you in a proto-functioning society where people are willing to trade items with direct utility value (food, clothing, protection) for things with societal/barter value (money, jewelry, luxuries). Depending on how severe the collapse is, there may be a period where your silver/gold holdings are effectively worthless because nobody wants to give you their food in exchange for your silver. They can just wait until you die and then take it from you

At some point -- perhaps on the way down, and perhaps on the way back up if we sink that low -- a barter economy will re-emerge and commodity money will re-emerge to make ti better. Historically, gold and silver have always been at the center of this.

[DaveH]