Teabag Obama!

[Inkidu]

... did he get teabagged?

No but he was probably a hater of boiled bark. Eww tea...

[Bliss]

[Trieste]

... you just took that picture for the sake of a joke, didn't you?

There's no way such a perfect picture can be found on the internet.

[Bliss]

Oh really?

[Trieste]

[Bliss]

*crowns herself Queen of the Internet*



*sips some tea*

[Trieste]

... purple!

[Oniya]

No but he was probably a hater of boiled bark. Eww tea...

"So that's it, is it?" said the Nutri-Matic when he had finished.

"Yes," said Arthur, "that is what I want."

"You want the taste of dried leaves in boiled water?"

"Er, yes. With milk."

"Squirted out of a cow?"

"Well, in a manner of speaking I suppose ..."

[consortium11]

... >.>

<.<

John Rawls is the DEBIL. *shakes fist, steals the threads serious bone, and runs off*

I don't particularly like much of his jurisprudence work, I really dislike the way he seems to attatch everything to Kant and I'm not even a fan of much of his means for getting to his end: I think the veil of ignorence has serious issues with it, but I do believe his version of liberalism is both the most morally and logically sound... and it's the best of the political philosophy positions.

Does that make me a DEBILworshiper or whatever the cool term is for us now? 

[Bliss]

Yesh. Welcome to zee club, here is zee complimentary het.

[Zeitgeist]

Funny how when Bush was in office, dissent was supposed to be 'patriotic'. Now that the shoe is on the other foot, descent is somehow unbalanced, ugly and radical.

This CNN reporter's reaction to the protester's is quite illustrative of this curious switch.

Chicago Tea Party VS CNN Reporter:"Fascist & Anti-CNN?"

Oh and never mind that strange report that came out by DHS and Napalatono about the threat of 'right wing' activism.

http://www.newsroomamerica.com/usa/story.php?id=451008

'Cmon, lets be consistent at least. If dissent is patriotic, then it remains patriotic whether or not its your guy in the office or the others.

[Trieste]

What a horrible piece of (I use this term lightly) journalism. Is that woman related to Michael Moore? Her antagonistic, in-your-face style of interviewing does nothing but make everyone - including her - look stupid. Her decision to make her point with the guy who can defend his statements of 'Obama is a fascist' with no other defense but "Because he is!" also makes her look like a bully.

However, the purpose of this thread, I believe, was to make fun of the humor, not bash people for protesting.

(Although, seriously, poor widdle rich guys who can afford accountants up the yin-yang to look for tax breaks are getting their taxes raised? Awwwwwwwww, let me get a violin.)

[Zeitgeist]

What a horrible piece of (I use this term lightly) journalism. Is that woman related to Michael Moore? Her antagonistic, in-your-face style of interviewing does nothing but make everyone - including her - look stupid. Her decision to make her point with the guy who can defend his statements of 'Obama is a fascist' with no other defense but "Because he is!" also makes her look like a bully.

However, the purpose of this thread, I believe, was to make fun of the humor, not bash people for protesting.

(Although, seriously, poor widdle rich guys who can afford accountants up the yin-yang to look for tax breaks are getting their taxes raised? Awwwwwwwww, let me get a violin.)

Well, I would argue that in part, the use of MSNBC's over the top, if admittedly funny parody of tea-bagging is an attempt to cast what is otherwise a fair gripe as just something ridiculous and irrelevant.

Oberman and Maddow as at least as dishonest and disingenuous as the left claim O'Reilly and Hannity are.

[Inkidu]

I laugh at both political parties. They're the two sides of the same coin and refuse to see it. Ignorance is not only bliss but humorous as well.

*Ish proud supporter of the Purple Party*

[goalt]

Funny how when Bush was in office, dissent was supposed to be 'patriotic'. Now that the shoe is on the other foot, descent is somehow unbalanced, ugly and radical.

What about the flip side? During the Bush years, dissent was un-American. Now it--even talk of armed rebellion is being praised up and down by the very same people!


Also, these people seem to have taken up the old "taxation without representation" cry. But, wait, what is this? What, then, are those representatives and senators?

One last point. Boston Tea Party was protesting the repeal of a tax.

[Oniya]

Beg pardon, but with in-laws in the Boston area, I get bombarded with 'local history' every time I visit.

On December 16, 1773, after officials in Boston refused to return three shiploads of taxed tea to Britain, a group of colonists boarded the ships and destroyed the tea by throwing it into Boston Harbor. The incident remains an iconic event of American history, and has often been referenced in other political protests.

The Tea Party was the culmination of a resistance movement throughout British America against the Tea Act, which had been passed by the British Parliament in 1773. Colonists objected to the Tea Act for a variety of reasons, especially because they believed that it violated their constitutional right to be taxed only by their own elected representatives. Protestors had successfully prevented the unloading of taxed tea in three other colonies, but in Boston, embattled Royal Governor Thomas Hutchinson refused to allow the tea to be returned to Britain. He apparently did not expect that the protestors would choose to destroy the tea rather than concede the authority of a legislature in which they were not directly represented.

[consortium11]

What about the flip side? During the Bush years, dissent was un-American. Now it--even talk of armed rebellion is being praised up and down by the very same people!


Also, these people seem to have taken up the old "taxation without representation" cry. But, wait, what is this? What, then, are those representatives and senators?

One last point. Boston Tea Party was protesting the repeal of a tax.

I believe the argument is that because of the vast increases in government spending and national debt those in the following generations will be burdened by a huge tax bill to cover it... and obviously, someone's who's not born yet has no representation.

What weight you want to give to that or other "think of the children!" arguments is up to you...

[goalt]

That's what I get for just trusting Some History Teacher I Know :p

But, do note that, according at least to the Wiki article, it wasn't necessarily the tax that was the issue, but rather the monopoly it would create:

Some claim that the protest movement that culminated with the Boston Tea Party was not a dispute about high taxes. The price of legally imported tea was actually reduced by the Tea Act of 1773. Protestors were instead concerned with a variety of other issues. The familiar "no taxation without representation" argument, along with the question of the extent of Parliament's authority in the colonies, remained prominent.[39] Some regarded the purpose of the tax program—to make leading officials independent of colonial influence—as a dangerous infringement of colonial rights.[40] This was especially true in Massachusetts, the only colony where the Townshend program had been fully implemented.[41]

Colonial merchants, some of them smugglers, played a significant role in the protests. Because the Tea Act made legally imported tea cheaper, it threatened to put smugglers of Dutch tea out of business.[42] Legitimate tea importers who had not been named as consignees by the East India Company were also threatened with financial ruin by the Tea Act.[43] Another major concern for merchants was that the Tea Act gave the East India Company a monopoly on the tea trade, and it was feared that this government-created monopoly might be extended in the future to include other goods.[44]

EDIT: People who are not born yet have no representation... but they don't exactly exist yet, either.

[Trieste]

See, and I was told by my history teacher that actually, the colonies ended up with lower taxes than the rest of Britain.

With about as much representation as the rest of it.

[goalt]

Well, the British concept of representation was different from what we think of now. To them, the colonies were represented--I forget what the concept was named, though.


There's also the matter of the practicality of representing, what with the ocean in between and all

[Oniya]

See, and I was told by my history teacher that actually, the colonies ended up with lower taxes than the rest of Britain.

With about as much representation as the rest of it.

This may have been true, but it was the colonial perception that they were being mistreated, just as it seems to be the perception that Obama's taxes, though apparently less than Reagan's, are unfairly high.  (And now we're back on topic )

[Zakharra]

What about the flip side? During the Bush years, dissent was un-American. Now it--even talk of armed rebellion is being praised up and down by the very same people!

During the Bush years, the Democrats were saying that dissent 'was' American. Now that they are in power, they are working to make those who do disagree with them, look small and try to  brush them off.

[Nessy]

During the Bush years, the Democrats were saying that dissent 'was' American. Now that they are in power, they are working to make those who do disagree with them, look small and try to  brush them off.

The media has a lot to gain by presenting only the most verbal and most obnoxious individuals from each party on screen. It makes small people comfortable to be confronted by primarily seeing and hearing only individuals of their like minds. It would be difficult, however, for even the media to make someone look small and brush them off if they had actual content to speak of. Instead they are likely not to be presented at all except through less mainstream sources.

Since we already know that the parties are presented in the most extreme lights and that the majority of the population falls somewhere in between them, it seems a mute point to talk about "the" Democrats and "the" Republicans as if the viewpoints that are being referred to actually full represent a majority of the American People.

Personally I think dissent isn't just "American" its part of any healthy democratic process, and I support it if its voiced with thought and meaning instead of usual grunting we hear, however wishing for our government to fail is an extremist position that serves a minority and for the sake of our troups, wishing that a war we already entered to fail was also an extremist position. Both "parties" were wrong on those fronts, but then again, neither party really represents any majority.

[purpleartemis00]

According to the bi-partisan Congressional Budget's Office's site the average American pays about 9.1 of his/her income in taxes. Do you think that's too much?

http://blogs.usatoday.com/oped/2009/04/tax-rhetoric-vs-reality.html

[Zakharra]

According to the bi-partisan Congressional Budget's Office's site the average American pays about 9.1 of his/her income in taxes. Do you think that's too much?

http://blogs.usatoday.com/oped/2009/04/tax-rhetoric-vs-reality.html

  Possibly, but that is the average over all people old enough to pay taxes. Nearly half (About 45-49%) of Americans do not pay Federal income tax. The upper 50% is taxed at a higher rate to compensate for that and they do pay more, much more the higher you go in tax brackets, in taxes. Also the % of income tax paid is far more at the upper levels.

The top 50% pay over 80, nearly 90% of all federal income taxes. Which is a huge chunk already and the government (Congress and White House) plan on tapping that even more, while 'helping' people who do not pay taxes, or pay very little at all. IE, the 'Tax the Rich' arguement because they obviously have more money.

To pay for the massive spending they plan on doing, they are going to have to tax more people, not less. The rich will only be tappable for some long before they are dried out of ready funds.