Text 3310, 282 rader
Skriven 2006-07-05 11:21:00 av Robert E Starr JR (3783.babylon5)
Ärende: Re: Atheists: America's m
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* * * This message was from Dennis \(Icarus\) to rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.m * *
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         * * * and has been forwarded to you by Lord Time * * *         
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@MSGID: <81cfd$44aaf11d$18d64cf6$22896@KNOLOGY.NET>
@REPLY: <cemfa2pl698vnkdpfkl6hsjrm4qedts632@4ax.com>
"Josh Hill" <usereplyto@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:vlfla2tm3c2nivsnugeb04avrtsga5jjul@4ax.com...
> On Mon, 3 Jul 2006 21:32:29 -0500, "Dennis \(Icarus\)"
> <ala_dir_diver@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> >
> >"Josh Hill" <usereplyto@gmail.com> wrote in message
> >news:f98ja2t3699vr26orce9u5tuvk16bpajt7@4ax.com...
>
> >> On Sun, 2 Jul 2006 22:15:27 -0500, "Dennis \(Icarus\)"
> >> <ala_dir_diver@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> >> >So it wasnt one of your families fortunes that was wiped out.
> >>
> >> Well, let's see: we gave away $1.1 million, about 3/4 of what we had,
> >> and then paid taxes on the remainder. I'd say we did our duty, and I
> >> see no cause to feel sympathy for those -- many with much more -- who
> >> had to pay inheritance taxes.
> >
> >Duty, or choice? Your grandfather CHOSE to sell it to the charitable
> >organization, because he didnt want to see it developed.
>
> Is there necessarily a difference? One can feel that one has a duty to
> one's fellow man and base your actions on that assumption without
> being forced to.

There can be.

Well, these days, eminent domain couldve benne used to snatch the land
because the developed land would increase in value, raising property tax
revenue.

>
> >> >> >> I disagree. Wealth consists of ownership. Own a business, and you
> >get
> >> >> >> a slice of the labor that people put into that business, a slice
of
> >> >> >
> >> >> >Uhmmm...thats because the employer pays for their labor.
> >> >>
> >> >> Nope. It's because the owners own a piece of paper, and that piece
of
> >> >> paper gives them a slice of the company's profits.
> >> >
> >> >And the owner pays the employee for the labor via the paycheck.
> >>
> >> Which means nothing: we're talking about profits.
> >
> >It does mean something - without the business, the person wouldn't have a
> >job.
>
> >Without the employee....well...unless its a highly specific job, there'd
be
> >another who could do the job.
>
> But for the most part, the business and employees will still be there,
> whether an heir inherits control or not. Or their equivalent in the
> economic system. It's not as if the money, and slice of our economic
> pie it represents, disappears if the government taxes it.

Ok, but we were talking about employers & employees and profits in that bit.

>
> That being said, if anyone cares to send me a check for $100,000,000,
> I'll gladly create jobs with it. :-)

Come up with a business plan, then start talking to venture capitalists.
:-)

>
> >> Because what matter is what those pieces of paper represent -- the
> >> right to draw upon the resources of others.
> >
> >They pay for those resources with those pieces of paper.
>
> But then, so does a bank robber. That doesn't mean anything.

A key difference being, I thiunk, that bank robbery is not really considered
legal economic activity.

>
> >> I'm not arguing against incentive, but rather against it's opposite,
> >> long-term welfare dependency.
> >
> >Oh? Thought you were arguing against inheritance.
>
> I did say "long-term welfare dependency," didn't I? What does
> inheritance have to do with incentive, except for the fact that it
> diminishes it?

Well, I've a friend who, after she inherited money from her father's estate,
opened a book/anime store.
Its what she always wanted to, and finally she had the opportunity to do it.

It depends on the person, Josh.

And Welfare is a government program, right?

>
> >> >> Our forefathers had the good sense to wise up, albeit in lieu of
> >> >> decapitation they sent the lordlings to freeze their butts off in
> >> >> Canada.
> >> >
> >> >Or joined ROTC then, when finding they had a high lottery number,
chose
> >to
> >> >reneg on the committment.
> >>
> >> Or avoided Vietnam by having Daddy get them into a rich boy's unit of
> >> the National Guard, use his influence to get a coveted pilot's slot
> >
> >http://www.aerospaceweb.org/question/history/q0185.shtml
>
> Right. Any guy on the planet would give his eyeteeth to fly one of
> those things.

You did see the bit where Air National Guard units were ebing deployed to
Viet Nam, right?

>
> >> despite having scored poorly on the qualifying exam, took time off to
> >> work on a political campaign, didn't even bother to show up at his new
> >> posting, then lied about it and had the military destroy both the
> >> original records /and/ the microfilmed backups.
> >
> >Got proof he had the military destory the records? :-)
> >Or just a guess?
>
> At least one former officer claims to have witnessed it. Given that
> the originals disappeared and the backup microfilms er were destroyed,
> I'd say there's a pretty good chance he was right:

Oh? I'd like to see the story.

>
> "Military records that could help establish President Bush's
> whereabouts during his disputed service in the Texas Air National
> Guard more than 30 years ago have been inadvertently destroyed,
> according to the Pentagon. It said the payroll records of "numerous
> service members," including former First Lt. Bush, had been ruined in
> 1996 and 1997 by the Defense Finance and Accounting Service during a
> project to salvage deteriorating microfilm. No back-up paper copies
> could be found, it added in notices dated June 25."
>
> Calling Rosemary Woods . . . calling Rosemary Woods . . .

So no proof that "Bush had the records destroyed".
Check. Microfiche can deteriorate - incuding some that were made in the
1960-early 1970s.
http://www.naa.gov.au/recordkeeping/rkpubs/advices/advice8.html#deterioration

>
> >I could likely ague what e;lse was said, but doubt it'd do any good.
>
> Not really: no one who served on the guard base at the time remembers
> Bush as having been there.

Bill Calhoun does, though there are some questions as to whether he's
telling the truth about those meetings.

>
> >> Oh, and smeared at least two genuine war heroes, John McCain and John
> >> Kerry.
> >
> >Don't recall Bush "smearing" either one.
>
> You haven't read about Bush's smears of McCain in South Carolina,
> which included a phony push poll designed to convince the voters that
> he had fathered an illegitimate black child? Read up on it, and on
> what McCain himself said about it. You don't remember the Swift
> Boating of John Kerry, the illegal White House connection, and the
> hurried resignation? Dude, what planet you /been/ on lately?

Bush was calling these folks in South Carolina?
No, don't think so.
And the Swift Boats were not run by Bush.
:-)

>
> >Has Kerry ever released his medical records?
>
> Whether he has or not, why would I care? With that level of
> "evidence," one can prove anyone guilty of anything. Why has Bush
> consistently refused to discuss his drug use?

Alleged drug use.

>
> >> >> There's no choice, unless you can buy all your goods at a non-profit
> >> >> organization.
> >> >
> >> >Ahh...so its just capitalism you seem to have a problem with.
> >> >Ok.
> >>
> >> That has much the same relationship to a sequitur as a fender has to a
> >> duck.
> >
> >Lets see.....given what you've said, it does seem to me that you have a
> >problem with capitalism.
> >Ok, maybe someone can be successful, profitable, as long as they don't
get
> >too far ahead.
> >Am I wrong?
>
> I'm not a socialist because I believe in rewarding success, because I
> believe that centralized government control stifles innovation,
> because I believe that capitalism is more efficient in many areas, and
> because I believe that, whatever its flaws, welfare state capitalism
> does a better job for the little guy.
>
> And, really, because I don't want to live in a country that's run like
> the Post Office.

Good deal.

>
> My argument here is actually a /pro-capitalist/ one, in that I think
> personal initiative is economically preferable to hereditary
> aristocracy. This may surprise you, but overall, I've found that I'm
> more market-oriented than most conservatives and Republicans.
>
> Actually, it isn't even anti-family or completely anti-aristocracy.
> That's because I recognize the value of the genes and memes that are
> specific to familial and cultural groups, and because I don't believe
> in reducing the world to mediocrity, but rather, elevating it to
> excellence. My goal has never been to deprive people of advantages and
> opportunity, but rather to insure that everybody has advantages and
> opportunity. Which is to say that I believe strongly in the liberal
> Democratic ideal which, after World War II, was instrumental in
> elevating the working man into the middle class for the first time in
> human history.

Ah well with your fondess for having "wiping out fortunes" I got the
impression you did want to deprive folks of advantages and opportunity.

<snip>
> >
> >If I choose to give you a particular valuable art object, that wouldn't
(or
> >shouldn't at least to my understanding) be counted as income. I'd think
the
> >basis would be transferred though, so that if it cost me $400.00, and had
> >appreciated to $50,000.00 then you'd pay the capital gains when its sold.
> >Thats when it becomes income.
> >The $400.00 used originally to buy the item, had been taxed previously.
>
> Is that true? I would have thought it would be counted as income. Why
> don't you give me a valuable artwork so we can check it out? :-)

We evidently do have some tax professionals on here. I'll defer to their
judgement presuming they're still reading this.

> >> As it is for Joe the Welfare Recipient. Again, the difference? Other
> >> than the fact that Joseph the Heir of a Great Family Fortune gets a
> >> much larger welfare check, thereby emptying our pockets far more
> >> effectively than Joe the Welfare Recipient could ever hope to do?
> >>
> >
> >Its not welfare - welfare comes from the government.
> >Your pockets are not emptied, and indeed, you culd actually gain, from
the
> >investments managed as part of the trust, stocks, bonds, etc.
>
> Nah. From an economic perspective, it's the equivalent of a tax.

Inheriting momney is the equivalent of a tax?

Dennis


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