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Sorry but this is a massive generalisation.
Its no more true to say this than it is to say the left are stifling free speach or that Muslims are using Islamaphobia as a screen to avoid critism of Islam. Sure, you can find examples of all of these things but it's not true that all of the relevant group are doing this.
I've somewhat foolishly waded in on Israel a bit recently and have said things like "Zionism is a rediculous idea" and haven't been called an anti semite. In fact, I've been called a Zionist!
I'll say it again here, this particular policy is absurd and stands in opposition to values we should aspire to. Israel is far from the only nation state performing these actions though.
Is anyone actually willing to call me an anti semite for the above?
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There's a vocal minority that abuses that term to gain power (and happen to usually be supporters of the leading Israeli party in power in Israel right now). And *fuck them*.
It's an insult to rationality and debate, and even worse to actual victims because it renders the term meaningless (see comments here echoing this) while there are actual antisemites running around, and how are you supposed to differentiate them if you have retards calling everyone and their families antisemites?
How are victims supposed to get help if they aren't taken seriously because 'ha yes antisemitism of course, like everyone haha shut up and stop playing victim'.
This is damaging the entire worldwide Jewish community and Israel in general so their views (which are themselves usually pretty bad) can get imposed on others inside Israel. So once more, fuck them.
Anyway, my rant here is to bring this point. Please don't let yourself grow jaded to the term. Notice who says it, check if the call is sincere, dubious or utterly trash, then remember the idiots next time and ignore them and them only.
A failure to do so can only bring tragedy to Jewish people worldwide and indirectly to Palestinians too because of the reinforcement it causes to the vicious circle of fortress mentality which is already too strong in Israel.
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> What I cannot understand is why whenever Israel does something that can only be described as barbaric and xenophobic, those who criticise the state are immediately labelled as anti-semites.
Where do you see this? Literally the top 90% of comments here are saying the same thing with zero outcry.
Also whether or not you like it, there is a large amount of antisemitism still around and visible on platforms such as Reddit.
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> Also whether or not you like it, there is a large amount of antisemitism still around and visible on platforms such as Reddit.
No it isn't. There is a large amount of anti-Israeli government policies on reddit and the internet. Most of us love jewish people and israeli jews and arab people in particular. The only places you get anti-semitism are some really extreme communist circles and most alt-right circles like T_D, certain drama subs, and certain random islamic subs.
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> No it isn't.
Yes, there is.
> There is a large amount of anti-Israeli government policies on reddit and the internet.
Yep.
> Most of us love jewish people and israeli jews and arab people in particular.
Most as in above 50%? Sure.
> The only places you get anti-semitism are some really extreme communist circles and most alt-right circles like T_D, certain drama subs, and certain random islamic subs.
No. I'm guessing you haven't looked through many Israel/Palestine /r/news articles that don't reach the front page.
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>like any overused accusation it simply has no meaning anymore
Most people still use the term appropriately and don't abuse it as a catch-all deflection for criticisms of Israel, I would say its generally used appropriately outside discussions of Israel. But even on the topic of Israel: Lets not ignore that there still is antisemitism in a subset of criticisms of Israel and that its appropriate to point that out.
Yes, accusations of antisemitism are an over- and abused rhetorical tool to deflect criticism of Israel but that doesn't mean it the term can't and isn't being used to describe actual antisemitism, generally or as part of criticisms of Israel.
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I'm deeply opposed to this law, but... "barbaric"? Seriously?
> Barko highlighted that the bill above would emphasise the principle of reciprocity. Therefore, anyone who would raise the flag of a country which is already banning the flag of Israel will be punished too.
The proposal is literally banning flags of countries that ban the Israeli one. Are you denouncing these states for being "barbaric", "apartheid" states too?
And as for being "those who criticise the state are immediately labelled as anti-semites"? I see every other comment crying about it, including an actual, highly upvoted, alt-righter, who talks about "globalist media" and how there were no Nazis in Charlottesville. And yet, I hardly see it happening. It reminds me of Fox's and The_Donald's paranoia of "reverse racism" and how being wrongly called a racist is worse than racism itself, more than anything.
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The British didn't start a mandate to "save" jews. they used them, as a foot hold in ME. after WWII the torch got passed to the US, who side lined for a short period, saw what the British had seen (world oil resource control) and opted in for the same reasoning.
The world isn't terrified to do anything, it's western leadership refuses too, while oil and war profits soar and the rich profit anyway.
They care less about our outrage then most Israeli's do I'd imagine.
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Yes Israel is so western and progressive with its liberal occupation. And I love that you try to make this a religious thing. So because there are Muslim countries that means the Jews of Israel have a right to ethnically cleanse the Palestinians who happen to be majority Muslim? Because they have the "option" to live in a land of people who share the same faith but not culture, traditions, land etc. ?
Get out of here.
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And the Israeli flag is the symbol of the Israeli people - or at least the Israeli Jews. Why is it okay to ban their flag, but it's "barbaric ethnic cleansing" when they retaliate and ban your flag back?
And I'm not sure how the fact Palestine aren't a country (although they certainly claim otherwise) has anything to do with it. Since when do you need to be a country to be barbaric or commit ethnic cleansing?
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Same happened to mine. Know what we did? Migrated, acquired education, built a better life in Israel with better quality of life, and got a nice house by the beach. We became middle class instead of lower class or below poverty line, and could afford a good living.
You know how we did that? We got over it, and started working for a future, not a past.
The Palestinians are only defined by their past, which in itself is disgusting to me. A man defined by his past alone is not a man anymore.
Time for you to man up.
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They can return to their homes in the WB, Gaza, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, or Iraq. That is, they can force elections in WB and Gaza that would result in a government that would sign a peace treaty that would better their condition, and in the Arab states they could actually ask their respective states to provide them with citizenship, like Israel did with its own Palestinian population.
And no, I am not defined by my past. I define myself as an electronics engineer, which is my own doing.
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A few possiblities from the top of the head.
A) Someone that dislikes me in particular (I tend to give pro-Israel comments but often bash on extremists both sides, and some people remember that) did it.
B) A rabid Likudnik that can't have anyone suggesting that abuse of the term antisemitism exists.
C) A zealot pro-Palestinian that hates anything calling Israel anything less than a genocidal and/or apartheid state.
D) Someone that hates rational debate and prefers people flaming each other.
E) A mix of the previous.
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>You can't compare Israli policy to Nazi Germany's without being called an anti-Semite
Yeah there's a reason for that. It's called Jew-baiting.
There's no important rhetorical point to be made about Israel that requires a comparison to Nazi Germany. Why not compare it to other brutal regimes, which are far more analogous than Nazi Germany? There is no accurate comparison between Gaza and the ghettos under Nazism. One major point being that when the Jews in the ghettos tried to fight back, the Nazis promptly exterminated the entire ghetto. How long has Gaza been shooting rockets again?
You don't need to agree with it, you can absolutely criticise it, but there is no reason to compare it at all to Nazi Germany. At best it's intellectually lazy, at worst it's actively antisemitic Jew-baiting.
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Oh I think maybe you aren’t from the US or don’t follow domestic news but many in the Trump administration have been arrested and charged with and plead guilty to crimes and found to be corrupt. Also, Trump and many in the administration have been caught in countless lies in an attempt to hide meetings with Russians. It just so happens that the Russians were found to have intervened to assist his campaign in 2016 (as confirmed by all US and most of our allied intelligence agencies).
And can you give me a source that many in precious administrations have been arrested and charges with crimes? I can’t recall many high level administration and campaign officials in Obama, Bush or Clinton’s administrations.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_American_federal_politicians_convicted_of_crimes
I know wikipedia isn't an academic source but if half of these are good then we know this is a fairly consistent thing ever since nixon.
I do follow international and american news and I'm from Canada. Trump has been the target of the media ever since he announced his bid for president. They are over-reporting anything that has his name attached to it and involved crimes/scandals/russians/corruption. There was even an undercover video of someone talking with one of the directors of some news network's journalists. He caught the director saying they have no reason to believe that Russia and Trump colluded but the public was eating up the story and it was great for ratings. He was fired when the video was released.
As for the intelligence agencies of the world, they aren't necessarily known for their integrity. I mean, look at the Bush administration and their intel on WMDs. Besides, there's no secret that the US intelligence community has a bias against non-career politicians. And the only other intelligence source I know of that you could be talking about is that guy from MI6 who wrote a piece on Trump. Except that he's got a number of bias's against Trump and was hired to write the piece by democrats and is retired having no current connections to the intelligence world.
There simply isn't the kind of concrete evidence that everyone keeps talking about. By contrast, there IS concrete evidence that Hillary has been directly involved in a number of exceedingly shady deals and scandals that seem to not get reported on at all.
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You want me to go and find every official in previous governments directly tied to presidents who were convicted/investigated for criminal/corrupt activity? What am I? Inspector gadget? We know that most recently Hillary, secretary of state and close ally of Barrack Obama was found to be using a private server and deleted over 30,000 emails before investigators could see them. James Comey conveniently decided that that was ok and not at all suspicious.
There's literally dozens and most of them (just like the ones being investigated/arrested now) are small fish. They did something prior to the election or during the election which usually benefited themselves personally and they got caught. The difference right now is that the media is taking anybody getting arrested now and slapping Trump's name all over it like he's their legal guardian and should be held responsible for all their actions.
Let me know when you find dirt on the guy you're actually targeting.
And as for deflection, I like how you literally read the title of the wikipedia page and nothing else. You clearly have no interest in either open discussion or debate. Have a nice day.
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Obama; IRS targeting scandal, Benghazi weapon smuggling.
Bush; CIA leak scandal, Dismissed 8 attorneys in december 2006
Clinton; most well known for the whitemouth controversy and impeachment vote. But there are literally entire websites dedicated to the scandals surrounding the Clintons.
The fact of the matter is that 90% of politicians and businessmen are guilty of some kind of crime (fraud, tax evasion, etc). Most manage to sneak by. Now, that said, the odds of a number of people who work for someone being guilty of these kinds of crimes is actually very high. The thing is, never has the media ever focused so much on trying to find everything possible wrong with someone and their circle of friends and staff.
And lets just be clear, most of the crimes that have been confessed/convicted for have been concerning non-political issues prior to the campaign. There are concerns of some campaign funds issues, but they haven't been able to tie that to Trump directly, just his campaign staff who have a personal interest in his victory. Besides, campaign funds scandals are fairly common. The kind of collusion that is being implied against Trump actually happened with Clinton and China in 1996 and lots of questionable campaign funding was going on coming from out of country. Obama failed to report the sources of over 1.9 million dollars in donations from 1300 sources. They got hit with a fine for that... a 375,000 dollar fine.
This is all nothing new. The media is blowing everything out of the water and blaming Trump for all of it despite no real connection between him and the crimes committed.
Let me know when they find something on TRUMP himself.
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Cool so you still don’t have examples of criminals. That’s what I thought.
You’re repeating talking points from Fox News.
I’m talking about indictments and guilty please by many in the Trump administration and campaign. If we want to extend the discussion to scandals? Then the Trump administration absolutely takes the cake.
It’s telling that all you have is Trump himself. Especially since his lawyer has testified under oath that Trump directed him to pay the two porn stars to change the election.
And can we trust Trump? The guy who said he had no knowledge of paying the porn stars even though we now know that he did and was lying the whole time?
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First of all, IRS targeting, the Benghazi weapon smuggling, the CIA leak, and Clinton's history are all examples of illegal activity by previous presidents themselves. If you want to talk about their administration then yeah, you can draw a funny kind of line around certain people and say that Trump has more people in his administration that have plead guilty than any recent president. But if you expand that line a bit to include all people directly associated with/allied with the president then you again get huge lists for all presidents going back at least to Nixon. So yeah, I guess if you want to define things in such a particular way then Trump is an anomaly. It's still telling that with all these guilty pleas and investigations nobody has found proper evidence that Trump himself is guilty of anything. I believe in judging people by what they do, not what their friends do.
His lawyer is breaking the law by abandoning client privilege if he's really telling the truth. And are you seriously saying that two porn stars changed the election? How the hell do two porn stars affect a national election? Did they get his face tattooed on their breasts or something?
Every president going back to Roosevelt has been caught lying to some degree or another. That's part of politics. You have to lie to make yourself look as good as possible because the alternative is that you are proven guilty and the media crucifies you. Look back at the Clinton presidency "I did not have sexual relations with that woman". You can find plenty of examples for both Bush and Obama.
Trump isn't a great president. I'm not even sure he's a good one. But my god, get a grip. He's not the nazi-saluting, white supremacy endorsing, racist, moronic, criminal that the media is making him out to be. He's a businessman who has entered the world of politics. Neither businessmen nor politicians are known for their integrity or squeaky clean records. Trump is not so strange in his level of supposed "corruption" even if the worst rumours about him are true. He's only abnormal in the levels of reporting and media attention everything he does is getting.
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True. But I don't think they did all of that just to get them to watch some ads. Have you ever had a teacher decide to show a youtube video only for a movie trailer to pop up forcing everyone to sit through a minute of explosions before watching some documentary?
The children could just go do something else while the ads play like they do when the watch TV on their spare time. The assignment was on the program itself, not the ad
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> First, it wasn't on school time, it was at home.
Have you heard of home assignments?
> was that the parents had to post a picture of their child(ren) watching online
The program, not the ads? They were free to skip that.
Having the students send photos seem like a more chill way to make sure people complete the assignment compared to having a rehearsal on the contents next morning
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“In 2014, Russia illegally annexed Crimea from Ukraine and began to support separatists in the eastern part of the country through information warfare, direct shipments of weapons, and the deployment of Russian fighters posing as Ukrainian separatists.
Experts branded the campaign, for which Russia denied responsibility, as a new form of conflict called hybrid warfare.”
Haven’t the U.S. been using these tactics in South America for the last 50 years? I don’t see how this is a new tactic.
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Not Ukraine, the authors of the article. Or the experts they cite.
It’s interesting how they make a point of that it’s worthy of a new term, when in fact it’s a practice that’s been used for many years. Again, I’m not trying to diminish how deplorable it is, just taking notice of how they wrote the article. The language they use makes me want to believe that it’s much worse than any previous incarnation of this tactic.
I’m reading Manufacturing Consent by Edward Herman and Noam Chomsky at the moment. They do a great job of highlighting the use of language and the way it can manipulate opinions. It’s quite amazing how easy it is to spot these things when you look out for them. I’d highly recommend it if you haven’t read it already, it’s really eye-opening.
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I am familiar with their work, and of how the media tailors their articles. I also take anything I read with a grain of salt, knowing there is almost always an agenda of some kind. It is important as a critical thinker to do so. But it is also important that while there may be an agenda, there may also be truth.
I am curious about Mr. Hollande's timing, but I do not feel he is lying. I understand they are merely reporting this information because they feel it is of interest and want people to click on it, but they also have liability if they report false information (even if it is credibility and not outright legality). And truthfully, it is not unlikely Mr. Putin is indeed doing the things he has been accused if.
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Everything west of the Louisiana purchase, Puerto Rico, and Hawaii. Remember that popularly elected socialist leader of Guatemala? No you don't because we called him a communist and facilitated a coup to oust him from power so Dole would retain ownership of it's vast banana plantations.
That's just on this continent. The Ayatollah are in charge in Iran right now because they overthrew the Shah, who we put in power. That guy straight up had his own secret police and we not only let it happen but gave him safe harbor after he fled the country. A huge factor in our shitty relationship with Iran is the fact that we shielded him from having to answer for the numerous atrocities he committed. Oh and we installed a satellite dictatorship in the Philippines because we beat spain in a war we started over an accident they had no involvement in.
This is just a small list. We've pulled a metric fuckton of totally unacceptable bullshit over the years, all with unbelievably flimsy excuses like fighting savages or communism or terrorism or whatever. That doesn't change the fact that what Russia is doing is equally unacceptable, but that sentiment doesn't come from a place of ethical objection, it comes from experience.
And make no mistake, if Russia is ever made to account for it you better believe that they'll throw all of that back in our face.
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No, it's a bullshit buzzword media marketing term to sell interventions, clamp-downs on freedom of speech and blossoming arms budgets. Wars were always fought with all available means, even the Mongols used propaganda and psychological warfare, and even the Americans were constricted in their campaigns in Vietnam. War is a branch on the tree of policy, it is always attached to all other considerations. It's never a hybrid, it's always a complex. In this, nothing has changed.
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Of course, because I'd put good money on him *not* being East Ukrainian and having sympathies for the far-right coup government. Try getting to know some people from the East and finding out why they wanted to secede in the first place - political repression from the far-right coup government, *not* the big bad Putin under the bed conspiracy theory. Putin clearly *supported* them, he certainly didn't *cause* it to happen.
The fact he/you refer to them as "Russian-Ukrainians" betrays a very heavy bias - they're not Russians, they're a Ukrainian minority who speak Russian, and this idea that they are "Russians" comes straight from the "fifth-column"/infiltrators/not-real-Ukrainians rhetoric of the far-right coup government.
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My bias is in favour of all people to self-determination - whether that's Chechnya wanting to secede from Russia, Tibet wanting to secede from China, or here, Donbass and Luhansk wanting to cecede from Ukraine. Being pro- or anti-Russian shouldn't be a factor in whether or not people get to assert their legitimate rights.
If you're referring to bias in favour of Ukraine or Russia, I don't have one. The Russian government has acted disgustingly. So has the Ukrainian coup government. So have the West in supporting the coup government.
Ultimately the whole situation was caused by the Ukrainian far-right violently overthrowing a democratically elected government and politically repressing the Eastern regions.
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I'm from the UK, and both sides (West and Russia) intervene and meddle in foreign elections. However, vague references to interference don't justify violent state-sponsored far-right coups.
I wouldn't like to see, say, Saudi Arabia sponsoring a violent takeover of the White House on the grounds of the election process being "unfair".
In the same sense I'm not going to look at a violent Western-sponsored coup by fascists and say "well, it probably wasn't that democratic anyway, so I guess the fascists are okay". That makes no sense.
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Did producing umbrellas cause it to rain more? Pick a better analogy, that makes no sense.
If the pipeline can carry 3 times as much product a day, that would be the equivalent of 1300ish train cars a day. You think they have that capacity already? There would be no end to that train convoy, and that's daily. They will extract more oil because they will have more capacity. It is essentially their duty as a company to produce more profits for their shareholders.
And remember, the pipeline will be able to do 900,000 barrels a day, but they will not just stop trains and trucks, so we are now looking at the the increased capacity plus the current system.
Nothing with oil or transport of it is good in the slightest when it comes to the environment, so don't try and polish the pipeline turd to make it shine. The author may be using exaggerated language when it comes to its effects, but make no mistake the environment loses regardless of rail or pipeline because that extraction is so harmful.
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Give me an electric car and you got a deal. But in all seriousness, not doing the pipeline puts us in a situation we are currently in, and i don't see doom and gloom right now, yet people are crying over it like the economy hinges on its creation.
And even "environmental snowflakes" know we aren't getting rid of oil in a day, because that's idiotic and the tech and infrastructure isn't there to replace it yet. But we also live in a world that is by all accounts dying, so doubling down on something that produces the most emissions in this country feels like we are basically embracing climate change as inevitable (and only because...more monies)
Also, 600,000 barrels a day (the amount the new pipeline expansion generates) simply can't be stored in that quantity. In one year that would be the equivalent of almost 250 billion barrels they are storing. Oil production will increase with a pipeline, you can't convince me otherwise.
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And we're the extreme ones for thinking we shouldn't be murdering billions of animals that can live 20+ years at age 2 that have been force fed weight-gaining food to be consumed by consumers that are twelve steps removed from the slaughterhouse. All because we think being morally consistent is important.
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I try to pick my battles, I really do, but it's extremely infuriating that people will use me IRL to excuse their behaviour (for example, I've had a friend tell me she has started to only eat meat twice a week instead of every day because she cares about animals... like great but you don't care about animals at all if you still consider eating their flesh a-ok after being educated on the horrific conditions that these animals are kept in).
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I can already predict we're gonna get comments like ''muh uncle's farm tho'' where 0 abuse ever happens, yet they get take out three times a week from God knows where where they source their meat from a factory farm like 99% of the Western world.
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Biodiversity is it’s own end in that humans are not advanced enough to be able to predict the consequences of a species, let alone a large intercontinental mammal, becoming extinct.
So in that way, as an individual, I potentially l suffer from a reduction in biodiversity. Although I only frame it that way as a response.
I agree that what some humans are doing to the planet is probably the highest crime we see, but I think articles like these are important to inform those who really care and inspire action.
Ask not for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee kind of a situation.
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Going extinct isn't bad dude. If you eat meat, you're already supporting the massive land clearance that happens when corporations need more land to feed their livestock... which makes bugs, small animals like foxes, rabbits and so on lose their natural habitat (forested cover). You're already supporting extinction to support your lifestyle, what's one more?
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So what if cattle, pigs and so on go extinct? They're living miserable, horrific short lives where they are abused, forced into extreme weight gain and perform mentally and physical strenuous activities (laying hens live a fraction of what their lifespan would be because they were bred to push dozens of eggs a month that makes them suffer).
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If you consume any animal product, this is what you and the billions of other humans like you are causing to this planet's fauna: [time-based calculator of how many animals are killed per second.](http://thevegancalculator.com/animal-slaughter/)
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You can change this today. Your next meal can be 100% plant-based, with little to no animal cruelty involved. You are the master of your own life. If you try and proclaim some kind of ethical standing where you care and respect animals, you cannot be consuming animal products at all. It's hypocrisy, and while harsh, it's reality bro.
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So let's say I'm not willing to stop consuming animal products, because I am not. I have a strong culinary background, am partial partner in a restaurant and catering business, and come from a family of chefs. Most of my travels are focused on trying cuisine from different cultures. Food is one of my biggest passions and the truth is the best food isn't 100% plant based, choosing to live that way just isn't an option for me. I do my best to make sure that my products are locally sourced and raised as humanely as possible. So what do? Compromise with me hypothetically, I'm legitimately curious about your advice.
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Do you care about animals at all? If so, what is your reasoning for separating animals into animals you consider worthy of not being abused and exploited for personal satisfaction and gratification and others who are worthy of the opposite?
I used to be a foodie. I realized that my personal hobbies and/or things I like are not superior to the current reality that animals are being slaughtered for their unnecessary consumption.
No animal has ever given consent to be exploited and murdered after 1/5 of their lifespan to the farmers, no matter “local” or industrialized, that have taken it in their hands to brutalize these animals.
The only advice I have to give you is that you decide what kind of person you want to be in life. If you’re fine supporting abuse and literal torture, that’s on you. I don’t believe in sugar coating shit just like MLK didn’t ask white supremacists and apathetic white people to “pls act nicely and stop lynching us”. Niceness doesn’t get you anywhere in activism. The vegan position is that any exploitation of animals is wrong. And that one should try as far as it is possible to limit their personal contribution to what is happening on a global scale to animals.
There is no compromise to be had in this debate. It is literally all or nothing. There is no humane way of killing someone or an animal that did not consent to it. By continuing to eat and consume animal products, you are sponsoring abuse by contributing to the overall demand of meat and other animal products.
It’s hard to put yourself in a situation where you aren’t the main beneficiary of something, but animals literally do not have a voice in this. Someone has to stand up for them.
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Ya, but we haven't made elephants stupid meat bags. Anyone who thinks a cow is the same as a buffalo has never met a buffalo. They've probably never met a cow. By all accounts, the aurochs was as big an asshole as the buffalo.
Modern cattle are classified as their own sub-species. Their wild predecessor is extinct. We should probably release buffalo into Europe, much like we should release elephants into the US.
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Cows are bred specifically for use in human needs while elephants are wild animals and elephants are more neurological and socially complex than cows for two examples. Also cows have been a staple of meat and dairy for thousands of years, a critical part of society.
However this is meaningless as it’s fine to be varying degrees of levels against both. Killing elephants is bad for biodiversity reasons, and the over exploitation of cows in the modern age is bad for lots of reasons.
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Why does it matter what cows are bred for if the consequences are similar?
Why are neurological and social complexity relevant to the morality of killing?
> Also cows have been a staple of meat and dairy for thousands of years, a critical part of society.
Does history define morality? They may have been a critical part of society in the past, but how is that morally relevant to individuals for whom it is not a necessity today?
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What’s the difference between iron and gold? It’s just some electrons. Why would you be mad if I stole your gold watch more than your cast iron pan? People value things differently for many reasons, one of them being scarcity.
History doesn’t define morality but it provides context for the present. If someone gets shot in the head at 20, that’s more shocking than someone dying of cancer at 80. We’ll what’s the difference? In both scenarios one person died, so why wouldn’t people react the same?
I have to ask, what are you driving towards? I don’t get your ultimate point.
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> People value things differently for many reasons, one of them being scarcity.
And as explained both killing cows and killing elephants affects scarcity. You still haven't answered the other questions.
Unless you're saying that they are values you assume to be true and have no further justification? Go deep enough and eventually that will be the foundation of many people's morality, but I hardly think 'cows are bred specifically for use in human needs' is an assumed value of yours.
> If someone gets shot in the head at 20, that’s more shocking than someone dying of cancer at 80. We’ll what’s the difference? In both scenarios one person died, so why wouldn’t people react the same?
We are talking about morality. Morality is concerned with actions, not people's reactions. The action of shooting someone in the head is certainly more immoral than standing by helplessly as a person dies of cancer.
> I have to ask, what are you driving towards? I don’t get your ultimate point.
My ultimate point is that it is hypocritical to admonish those who killed the elephants while eating meat.
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Cows are not scarce, we know exactly how to make more, elephants are not bred in captivity and if their numbers deplete we don't know how to change that.
>My ultimate point is that it is hypocritical to admonish those who killed the elephants while eating meat.
That's certainly an expression of your values, but those are not universal values. I value an elephant's life more than a cows. I have varying degrees of value of all life with humans at the top and single cell organisms at the bottom. Since we can't make more elephants but we can make more cows and since elephants are more advanced creatures, I value them more. I also don't not value cows. I actively support lab grown meat/meat alternatives and the reduction of meat eating in general.
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> Yea but that means there's a belief structure that can admonish the killing of elephants, use animal products in a way that is ethical to my values, and still want to reduce use/dependency on animal products.
You claim to believe in such a belief structure, I'm highly suspicious, hence the questions.
> Listen we clearly disagree and that's fine, but you really go a long way to prove a point that is meaningless and ultimately not helpful to a cause we both seem to agree on.
You don't think questioning one's actions or ideas is useful? It's one of the best tools to reliably come to a conclusion.
Anyways, this doesn't seem to be going anywhere. So let's end here.
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We do pay for our own wars, US aid to Israel cover a small part of Israel's defense budget.
And as for lobbying, why wouldn't he? This is realpolitik kid, not a game of baseball. Israel gets all the help it can get, just like the Arab states used to get all the help they could get from Soviet union back in the day.
strange questions really, That's like asking why don't you put a handicap on yourself and fight with 1 hand behind your back.
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A small part? FACT: ISRAEL DOES NOT pay for its own wars. Israel only keeps requesting more aid. The data isn’t on your side friend.
https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/interactive/2018/03/understanding-military-aid-israel-180305092533077.html
Going deeper, if 3.7billion is coming from the US and Israel had a declared 18.6 billion defense budget, that’s *20%* of your defense cover3d by the US. Please send back that small percentage.
Also that’s great that you’re getting all the help you can get, so now why are you restricting the movement of Palestinians, preventing them from building an operational port, getting supplies intended for them and illegally expanding settlements. Is that under the “getting all the help we can get” by handicapping them?
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[IDF annual budget is ~18b](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel_Defense_Forces#cite_note-IISS-2), not sure if it includes the aid or in addition to, but either way, US aid doesn't pay for everything, not even half.
> so now why are you restricting the movement of Palestinians
Because they have a tendency to suicide bomb busses, pizza parlors and restaurants. do drive by shootings and stab random civilians.
> preventing them from building an operational port, getting supplies intended for them.
Because they have a tendency to smuggle rockets and other weapons. Are these serious questions?
> illegally expanding settlements
Same reason the US and every other country expand cities. population growth.
> Is that under the “getting all the help we can get” by handicapping them?
Yes, it is. In a conflict you make it harder for the enemy to fight you, not easier. Same way the [Arab states tried to do](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arab_League_boycott_of_Israel).
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You said the US only pays a small percentage so return the 3.7 billion and stop asking for our money altogether. If 20% is so small return it all.
Everything else you said is why Israel has no intentions of peace. The difference is your government is two faced about it and the Palestinian people smell the dishonesty a mile away.
So far you provided no facts about anything. You are wrong about Israel paying for its own wars, you admitted that Israel is illegally expanding and restricting the Palestinians and you showed you have no intentions of peace contrary to what your government says every time they are begging for more money.
All using your own words too, lol
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I said small part and it is. You said we don't pay for our wars at all but we do.
> so return the 3.7 billion and stop asking for our money altogether.
Not going to happen pal, this aid is part of the camp david accords and both Israel and your government has an interest in continuing it. Don't like it? tough shit.
> Everything else you said is why Israel has no intentions of peace
Can't say I'm surprised, you obviously hold very little regard for Israeli lives. If defending yourself from Palestinian terrorism is not wanting peace then so be it.
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> There will be a president at some point that slashes aid to Israel, I expect no bitching about it.
Maybe, maybe not. I expect at some point for the aid to end, hopefully by that time Israel will no longer need it.
> I expect no bitching about it
You mean like how the Palestinians bitched and moan when you just cut off their aid? saying its an attack on them?
lol imagine giving donation to a soup kitchen and when you stop they attack you for it.
> Also, covering 1/5 of your defense isn’t a small part
Depends on your definition of small I guess, either way it still not half and definitely not all.
> at least be fucking grateful instead of acting like an entitled prick.
Oh make no mistake I am very grateful for the US aid to Israel and I thank the American people for their help.
But you? you act like a prick and consider us a stain of shit, why should I be grateful to you? I take great pleasure knowing someone like you who hate us so much is also paying for the aid.
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You know who isn't trapped in modern society by the prisoner's dilemma? Billionaires that have partly divested from the source of their billions. SV billionaires. Bitcoin. Finance. Etc. Etc. Isn't it in their best interests to try to prevent the oncoming collapse by putting more money into, say, fusion research than vaccinations in the 3rd world? Especially such public figures that will be the target of much of the world's ire when collapse comes. You know why they don't do it? Delusion. Techno-optimism. The world is better now than it's ever been. The benevolence of the market gods. They'll come up with a solution when things get bad enough. Confirmation bias. I'm up here for a reason. Via capitalism, humanity has elected its leaders, the elite, who are not only ignoring the issue but installing into "public" power those that deny the issue. More insidious is that some, beyond techno delusion, may be betting on some form of paradigm change that sees the global conflict and mass famine ensnaring billions in lives of cruelty that end in violence. So I guess that's human nature, too. Hubris of those market confirmed rulers to take us to the brink of human extinction.
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No; despite the concentration of wealth they create, they are too useful and efficient to do away with - the losses would far outstrip the benefits.
That said, we can and should mitigate the extent to which they concentrate wealth. If capitol gains tax was much higher, those with significant resources would still invest in the market; it's not as if lower returns makes mattresses more attractive - the market is still the only option.
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Not at all. I despise socialism and I think capitalism is the best economic system we ever came up with. People who take risks and contribute more to the economy deserve to be rewarded. I want to accumulate wealth myself and I'm working on it, but at the same time, when so many people (in the United States) live paycheck to paycheck, go bankrupt under the weight of health care bills, can't save for retirement (the large number of people with poor fiscal discipline notwithstanding), there is too much inequality in this country and something should be done about it.
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I remember Bill Gates getting so much hate for having a lot of money. I heard like 20 years ago this comment: "If Bill Gates was walking down the street and saw $500 in cash on the ground, it would not be worth his time to stop and pick it up." The amount just seems intangible. Not that being financially successful (and then some) is a bad thing but "How many yachts can you water-ski behind?"
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Despise socialism?
”when so many people (in the United States) live paycheck to paycheck, go bankrupt under the weight of health care bills, can't save for retirement”
”there is too much inequality in this country and something should be done about it.”
It’s called socialism. But i agree, i don’t think socialsm would work in the United states without som real changes in the way your politicians spend your money. I wouldn’t trust them with my tax money either.
Question:
Whats’s the point of living in a wealthy country if only some take all the wealth?
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Large companies use stock as a source of funding. For instance, Amazon pays their employees with stock rather than cash, so they're paid by investors rather than revenue. It's good for companies.
The stock market is a cheap and efficient way for anyone to make these investments. Closing the markets closes most investment opportunity for average people.
Bezos' money is capital. He's not some Saudi prince spending it on mansions and Ferraris. It's more like he's in charge of the money, which is fine, because he's proven that he's really good with it.
If you disperse his capital to the people, it will decrease production, increase consumption, and decrease overall wealth.
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>Nope, the incentive to become rich via innovative ideas or high education has to be there.
I've always wondered about that though. I went for a PhD so I could help drive innovations, make people's lives better, that sort of thing. I also enjoy discovering new things, sharing what I know, etc.
It pays really well, don't get me wrong. But even if money wasn't part of the equation, if all my basic needs could be met no matter what I did with my life, I can't imagine doing anything different than what I'm doing right now.
I think I speak for a lot of my fellow researchers when I say that.
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>Seeing as its the only way for Joe Six Pack like you and me to retire millionaires
Wow you're the epitome of what Roger Wright warned about.
"Socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires."
We shouldn't keep a system which lends itself to the exploitation of thousands/millions because there's a tiny fraction of a chance that you might become obscenely wealthy.
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> People who take risks and contribute more to the economy deserve to be rewarded
>isn't it profoundly unfair that people like Jeff Bezos can increase their net worths by billions of dollars in a day when the average worker can expect to make barely 2-3 million in a lifetime
Hmm.
>there is too much inequality in this country and something should be done about it
Economic inequality (the accumulation of capital) is a feature of capitalism, not a bug. There's no immediate profit motive for them being "concerned about the basic needs of their citizens and fighting inequality".
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Save the invent vs harnessing of fire argument for the semantics dome.
So that's how you measure the quality of a life, with the aquisition of Material objects? They may live a miserable existence to achieve an iPhone and a car, but boy do they have them! What about those who live in poverty around the world, billions of people, because of terrible imperalistic policies exploiting the natural resources of nations that aren't ours? We've destroyed half the world and plundered its resources at an unsustainable rate, all for what? So most people now have iPhones and cars. Is that really worth it? Is that really the best you think mankind can do?
Or is that what capitalists have lead us to believe over years of indoctrination? Why would the rich capitalists tell you differently? It certainly made complacent slaves out of a lot of us.
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We need to go back to the top tax bracket going up to 98% as it did in the 70's. Ever since it was removed we have had this horrible problem of stagnant wages, and ridiculous wealth concentration. Make a law where the highest earner cannot make more than 5 times the lowest earner in a company, cap capital gains income with a 98% tax bracket, and the country will become a MUCH better place over night.
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It's not a fraction of a chance. It's a mathematical fact if you're in the American middle class and not a complete moron. Save a portion of your money and put it in a mutual fund. Save when times are good and save when times are bad. It's really that simple. Just because Roger Wright harped on the dipshits living in trailers who had no clear path to that end doesn't make his meme quote right about the people who actually use the system.
The thousands/millions exploit themselves by being terrified chimps like yourself who would rather screech in terror about wealth inequality than understand the system they live in and use it to benefit themselves.
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> It's not a fraction of a chance
There are only about 10.8 million millionaires in America and the vast majority of them came from wealth, not "playing the Stock Market smart."
>The thousands/millions exploit themselves by being terrified chimps like yourself who would rather screech in terror about wealth inequality than understand the system they live in and use it to benefit themselves.
I actually do really well for myself, but a lot of that is the fact that I had a lot of opportunities growing up. The fact that you think that the system is just waiting to be gamed says a lot.
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\>There are only about 10.8 million millionaires in America and the vast majority of them came from wealth
Got a source for that? All the studies I've ever seen indicate a large portion of millionaires (80-90%) did not come from wealth. No doubt the number isn't entirely accurate due to self selection but I have never seen anything to indicate that the majority of American millionaires are born into it.
I never said anything about "gaming" the system. Stop strawmanning. I am talking about using the system how it is meant to be used. Suffer the short term, benefit in the long term.
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> All the studies I've ever seen indicate a large portion of millionaires (80-90%) did not come from wealth.
The studies you're referencing define "not coming from wealth" as meaning "not already millionaires." If your family growing up was worth $800,000 then they would consider you self-made.
>I am talking about using the system how it is meant to be used. Suffer the short term, benefit in the long term.
A huge portion of Americans don't have the luxury to "suffer in the short term." Do you not realize that?
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No, there's nothing wrong with stock markets. Some types of speculation are shady and maybe shouldn't be allowed but stock markets are pretty straightforward.
He basically just owns a portion of Amazon and it's a 1 trillion dollar company. If Amazon wasn't public and Jeff Bezos privately owned it he'd be worth the full 1 trillion dollars. So it's really not the stock market that makes him so much wealthier than all of us. It's the company he started being worth many times a lot of country's GDPs.
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This. Abolishing the stock market will do the exact opposite of what that guy thinks it will. Get rid of the stock market and guess who the only people allowed to invest in companies is now? Oh wait it’s the super rich because they’re the only ones that have enough capital to. You can buy shares of Fortune 500 companies for less than $100 get rid of the stock market and now your extra money is sitting in a bank account losing real value year over year. Abolishing the stock market would only increase wealth inequality. the market is how people can leave the lower and middle class and enter higher social classes by sharing in the ownership of these companies.
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Oh, which studies am I referring to? And btw, you have still failed to provide any of your own.
And they absolutely can. The issue is that most people, yourself included, have confused luxuries with necessities. Cable is a luxury. Eating out every week is a luxury. Expensive new iPhones are luxury. Expensive brand name clothes are a luxury. New cars are a luxury. Televisions are a luxury. I don't think there is a single person in this country, myself included, who couldn't trim a significant margin off their budget if they were really committed to it.
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> It's better to eliminate the corporate income tax
Why?
> lower the marginal rate of the highest tax brackets
Mathematically, nobody is paying marginal tax due to progressive taxation.
> and tax dividends and capital gains as personal income
This would cripple investments. I think capital gains should also have progressive taxation to encourage investments but heavily tax those who make a killing. Keep the same low-tax tiers but after a certain profit amount, add progressive taxation based on overall income from all sources.
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Jeff Bezos sold 2 million stocks in 2016 for ~$1.4 billion total, post-tax that's around $1 billion. That's his liquid cash. He's sitting on $163 billion in stocks that are there to help the company. He's stupid rich on paper, but in reality he's not close to the top in terms of absolute fuck you money (Meaning the people who buy Bugattis and leave them at a Saudi airport because it's not worth their time to get it stored or shipped somewhere, so they just cut their loss).
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It's more to do with tax policy than anything that causes the wealth gap. Bezos reached a point where all of the loopholes were accessible to him. When you have more power than the government, they will form policy according to your rules.
The only thing that will close the wealth gap is an overhaul of the tax system. I really think if it was setup so the bank collected and remitted 10% of every deposit, you could run a society with a flat tax rate that is completely fair and doesn't have lower classes paying the majority of the costs of running a government.
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What do you think billionaires like that do with most of their money? It is in stock in their company which goes towards funding the company doing what it needs.
No employer is going to be like “I already made as much money as i can for the year, so let’s take huge financial risks with my own money so that if things go well I can give more money to my employees! No! Limit income and producers will just scale back production to hit their limit while minimizing their risk. Or open another division of their company in another country.
98% tax rate would not be, nor has it ever been, effective.
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The middle class seriously needs to run for every elected role and push a middle-out economy. If the middle class gets the tax breaks, free healthcare, and support, they become the upper class. And with more upperclass paying a larger portion of the taxes than now, this will help more people move from lower to middle class.
Everyone who is looking to move up gets some, regardless of the angle then are coming from.
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I think Stock Markets should be abolished because of the type of business practices they create. When a company goes public, suddenly everything wholesome about it goes out the window in favor of getting those stock prices up. Labor gets outsourced, people get paid slave wages, benefits drop, product quality goes down, the environmental cost increases, mergers happen and more good companies get absorbed.. its a mess. All to get stock to rise to keep the shareholders happy.
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I'd rather it benefit to more people instead of just a select few that will accelerate their capital hoarding and leave more and more people behind.
You drank some seriously strong koolaid. That article doesn't even confirm your claim about american owning savings/401k...
It just says 65% of them think they are saving enough and that, worryingly, 39% of them think 5 to 15% is the sweet spot while it really is more than 15%....
so yeah, stock market don't benefit to everyone. Just the already rich.
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Yeah sure it might turn into a million but I also might lose all my money like HMNY investors or anyone who bought Bear Sterns. Also it's not like a magic money machine. My money is being used to grow companies which makes more people employed and hopefully gets people better wages.
We live in a fucked society and healthcare and college should definitely be made drastically cheaper since they're such corrupt institutions profiting off of them. But stock trading has been regulated quite a bit over the years and the taxes function pretty well on it.
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You are only taxed on the additional income. Example - Invest $100, that $100 increases in value to $150, you are only taxed on the $50 increase, not the entire $150. If you incur a loss, you can carry forward that loss and deduct gains in future years. It's a pretty sweet deal for investors.
So no, you are not taxed twice. It is the same situation as selling a house. Buy house for $100k after 30 years that house is now worth $1,000,000. You are taxed only on the difference ($900k). Additionally, since it is a capital asset, it is taxed at the lower capital gains rate of 20% (if this was regular income it would be the top bracket of 37%). The government provides even more advantages for this capital asset and provides a deduction up to $250k for single filers and $500k for married filers. So that $900k income is treated as only a $400k income at 20% (80k total tax).
Compare this to making $900k as regular income and you get taxed in excess of $300k+
That's 3x more taxes.
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The dudes spending a billion dollars a year funding Blue Origin, and thats pretty much just a hobby project which has barely even started so far. They're not expecting to turn a profit (company-wide. Individual programs like BE-4 sales and New Glenn flights should be profitable in the short term) for at least 20-30 years because of all the R&D needed, in all probability he'll be dead by then. And even with that massive expenditure (paid for by selling Amazon shares) the value of his remaining shares are still increasing.
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I can provide an anecdote. I lived in Colombia as an upper middle class person, and my quality of life was worse than living in Compton.
I say upper middle class because we owned a house in Cartagena, paid in cash, and two farms in the Amazon basin, as well as having our own store.
No hot water, no access to medical care (the closest provider was a guy in a house who claimed to be a doctor and had a small office in his house with a steel bed and some equipment) , no potable water, often no electricity, often no water period, deaths in front of the street from accidents, deaths from very easily treatable cancers, deaths from dealers getting revenge on retired cops. (I mentioning the deaths because, I find that the amount of money your people have affects when/how your people will die. )
Malnutrition was just a thing. All of the women didn't start their period until they were 17 or so.
Gangs of starving children would raid your house if you weren't careful (good ol' Olaya!)
I would rather be the poorest of the poor in the USA than be upper middle class in Colombia pre-2015
Because it doesn't even compare.
At the very least, when water gets lead in Flint, people notice.
In Colombia, it's just the way it is.
At the very least, the drinking water you buy isn't reused sewagee water that's been lightly filtered. (Big scam in Colombia)
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>seriously combat inequality and make the 99% better off
What makes the 99% better off is heavy investment in free healthcare, education and security, but most of the 99% are more interested in taxing the rich directly than making these structural changes that actually benefit them.
Which is why things like Bezos being rich offends them even though it comes on the back of creating half a million jobs and creating significant efficiencies in the economy, but their lack of free healthcare and education doesn't seem to inspire the same kind of anger as this guy's being successful does.
The super rich don't consume that much compared to their net worth, wealth being invested is more useful to everyone than it not being invested. I've met my fair share of 1%ers by income that really don't consume any more than anyone who makes 20% as much as them.
Do people realize Jeff Bezos's net worth is basically paper money until he decides to sell right? And the day he tries to sell it all, Amazon's stock is going to crash by 90%.
Taxing capital gains is fine, but by making capital gains taxed at the same rate as income you promote speculative trading instead of passive investment which could create chaos in the markets and actually damage the economy overall, and you need to also be OK with the capital/residency flight that might entail since many other countries also have low long-term-capital gains to encourage investors.
Wanting to tax UNREALIZED gains (like Bezos's) right now, is absolute madness, and there's no reason why his unrealized gains should evoke such passion.
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This is totally incorrect. There is no regulatory body or something tweaking the capital gains rate to maximize revenue year to year - watch how it stays the same for multiple tax periods. The closest thing to that is Congress and the President, for whom it is laughable to attribute any amount of technocratic leanings.
Lowering taxes on rich people has been tried before and 40 years later look where we are.
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> The super rich don't consume that much compared to their net worth, wealth being invested is more useful to everyone than it not being invested. I've met my fair share of 1%ers by income that really don't consume any more than anyone who makes 20% as much as them.
So why did you claim in your prior comment that raising their taxes would encourage consumption over investment? Already they pay a higher tax on investments than consumption, and already as you said they mostly put money into investment over consumption. In other words the taxes would have to be pretty significant to actually turn them away from investment and into consumption, and regardless that can be counteracted with a progressive consumption tax very easily.
> capital/residency flight that might entail.
Again, if the US got serious about it, this kind of shit would not happen. Tax havens only continue to operate because the people in power are wealthy and benefit from their continued existence. The US is by far influential and powerful enough to prevent capital flight, policymakers just... choose not to. For good reason (at least for their own political fortunes). Imagine if they put the effort into shutting down loopholes and tax havens that they put into cracking down on the pennies lost to welfare fraud.
> Taxing UNREALIZED gains
I don't think a lot of people are arguing that. It's more the concern that a single individual or company can even reach this size without being broken up.
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> So why did you claim in your prior comment that raising their taxes would encourage consumption over investment?
Realistically they'll just restructure their investments to be in/from vehicles in different geographies.
> Tax havens only continue to operate because the people in power are wealthy and benefit from their continued existence.
No, tax havens continue operate because there's no such thing as a world tax law and you don't get to invade other countries to establish one. You will have to literally ban trade with other country, there is no other way - because banning trade with say, Ireland, won't stop your problem since you can trade with Germany and Germany can trade with Ireland. You can tax consumption, but that's a regressive tax since the rich consume less.
If you have such a prescription to prevent tax havens and shell corporations I'd love to hear it, given that no country has been able to stop it completely. I'm sure more can be done, but I really doubt that it's as straightforward as you make it sound.
Again not a single goddamn word on health and education, but 3 paragraphs on capital flight.
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That's like just your opinion man! I wholeheartedly disagree. My career and hobbies are a product of my interests, I pursue them because they give me personal satisfaction, not wealth. I believe humans would still work, invent, and try and make the world better without money as an incentive (and in fact, I'm sure you could find thousands of examples where profit motive has had the exact opposite effect). But you know, that's a whole other philosophical debate.
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>Lowering taxes on rich people has been tried before and 40 years later look where we are.
You don't understand history. Taxes are typically lowered after existential wars. And at the height of the US marginal rate, no one was paying that rate, because there were tax shelters.
>There is no regulatory body or something tweaking the capital gains rate to maximize revenue year to year - watch how it stays the same for multiple tax periods.
You don't understand contemporary policy. Legislators are advised by armies of economists on revenue vs growth vs tax rate.
>Lowering taxes on rich people has been tried before and 40 years later look where we are.
You don't understand English, because I never suggested lowering the taxes on the rich.
Do you understand anything at all, or is just a stream of *non sequiturs* and angst?
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There *is* an optimum point. The evidence that we're close is that historical and well studied proposed changes in tax rate make little change to revenue, so were near a rate of change of 0.
The big problem is that the revenue will drop sharply at high tax rates, because there are discrete effects with respect to the tax rates of other markets. So we're near the peak, and searching for it with higher taxes courts economic recession.
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Unfortunately for those who weren't, if you were raised with education, good nutrition and in a place with access to the tools required, you are literally going to provide another person with more value than those who weren't.
Aside from punishing those who were, and want to invent, trade, improve the globes wealth, which will only slow our progress, we cannot do anything about that.
The world has far fewer starving people because the scraps from the west today are so much better than what one could muster in Uganda in the 50's.
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The reason healthcare and education and other public works can’t get through IS the inequality. Solving the inequality is gonna be a prerequisite for lasting change. There is a reason that labor has been pushing for big changes like that for a century and little has gotten done. Inequality is a social ill on its own - other problems must be solved too, but this discussion is about inequality.
And tax havens aren’t doing the big economies of the world any favors. Sanctioning the Bahamas or Switzerland or what have you is very do-able. It’s never even been tried though. The US can effectively regulate the vast majority of multinational corporations because of its indispensable place at the center of global trade, but it chooses not to. If the governments of the world actually went to bat for the 99%, tax havens would be shut down by the weekend. Your argument implies that no sanctions work, but they needn’t be universal to be impactful enough to effect change. And imagine the optics of being the Chancellor of Germany or what have you and continuing to treat the Caymans as a normal country while the US tries to stop international tax evasion through meaningful sanctions - it’s not a good look.
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I would prefer all items being inflation adjusted after X amount of years. This way Congress doesn't have to continually go back and re-write the laws (adding in more bologna as they do it).
Went to Law school and got a concentration in Tax Law, and I still don't know shit. There is a strong incentive to prevent double taxation (for example the Foreign Tax Credit which gives you a credit for any taxes you paid to foreign countries on your year abroad in Germany so you don't pay taxes to two different countries).
However, the tax codes are longer than any other sub-section of laws and are a product of those in power carving out advantages from themselves and advertising them as benefits to all (such as the mortgage interest deduction).
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You're right, I'm not sure I understand your objection.
I don't rank people on some kind of hierarchy where one person's labor is intrinsically more valuable than another's. Every person has equal dignity and equal worth. Moreover, there are plenty of people out there who could do my job better than me (and would want to), but who are stuck struggling to make it each day, doing something they hate because we live under a system that grossly misallocates human potential. There's nothing particularly special about me as a person.
In any case, there's no instrinsic reason why anyone (in the devleoped world, at least) should have to suffer from poverty regardless. These are structural issues, man-made problems.
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> You don't understand history. Taxes are typically lowered after existential wars. And at the height of the US marginal rate, no one was paying that rate, because there were tax shelters.
So do something about the shelters? There is no good reason that the IRS has to play along with Apple's game that supposedly their Palo Alto headquarters are just a subsidiary of an Irish company. Also, I'm referring to trickle down economics in the 80s, not the Kennedy tax cuts or whatever you're trying to vaguely reference.
> You don't understand contemporary policy. Legislators are advised by armies of economists on revenue vs growth vs tax rate.
You have a faith in the US legislative system that even the legislators themselves don't have. Imagine thinking that legislation is simply the end result of a bunch of economists and policy wonks coming together to craft policies optimal for the median citizen and then telling someone else that they "don't understand contemporary policy." Jesus Christ that is naive. For your information, the latest overhaul of the tax code was completely devoid of support by independent economists, and tax revenue immediately dropped after it went into effect.
> I never suggested lowering the taxes on the rich.
Let me quote you directly:
> lower the marginal rate of the highest tax brackets
> Do you understand anything at all, or is just a stream of non sequiturs and angst?
Considering I have a degree in economics, I'd say I "understand" the tax discussion as much as anyone else in these comments. Clearly more than yourself, person who unironically chose the username "L2Logic." Jeez.
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I have no clue... But I assume the connections that China has been building out their way? They're reconnecting the old silk road basically with modern ports and shit.
That or something completely different... But who knows too lazy to google just as you are pffff
Edit: yep got less lazy, it's the belt road initiative. Basically a modern silk road that gonna make China into a even bigger superpower/economy if someone doesn't think up something better.
Vox has a (admittedly biased, as all vox videos are) video on the BRI of you care to learn more.
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The rich staying rich is a different statement than "the vast majority of millionaires are from wealth". Do you have a chart breaking down the number of millionaires by how wealthy their parents were?
I think you're overestimating how difficult it is to become a millionaire in 2018. With a lifetime of working, saving, owning a house, and putting money into a 401(k), it is common for middle class people to retire as a millionaire. Not as exciting or accessible as being a liquid millionaire in your 20s, but still a millionaire.
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Oh yeah gotta love how much refinancing helped people on '08. The amount of scum and crookery in the stock market is insane but they focus the attention on Bezos (who needs to increase his workers wages and cut hours or take on more shifts. Do something so people don't have to shit in bags) the dark pools of the stock market and the fucking mortgage and student loan bond market still needs to be fixed. The amount of money people make from growing a company like Amazon is pennies compared to the money made from screwing people over through debt.
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No single person on earth truly produces anything worth billions of dollars.
They just place themselves in a position to exploit the shit out of people who produce and actually create tangible goods. On that same note, you as CEO are not worth 10,000x the lowest of your employees. That’s the whole god damn issue.
And this “white mans burden” explanation of how nothing can change is outright short sighted. Not all inventors are rich, not all of them were for purely monetary gain. This is a relatively new phenomenon fed into by America’s creed of “Fuck you, I got mine”. Is leaving nearly the entire earths population in poverty save for the group of billionaires behind truly progress? Sounds more like me a centralization of wealth into a noble class all over again.
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It’s the Belt and Road Initiative. It is the plan by the Chinese government to make western dominated shipping from the Chinese coast less important. Right now the Chinese are dependent on western shipping companies to take goods from China to their destinations everywhere in the world. China is building several large highways that Willens make it possible to drive from basically anywhere in Africa, the Middle East, and Europe to China or vice versa. There is also a big railroad that’s getting built too and some ports in various countries.
It is as important as the silk road once was. Think of how dominant the idea of the Silk Road was in your history classes was, how dominant the transpacific railroad to the US was, the Panama Canal. This is bigger.
It will mean that China controls the global supply chain for more than 3/4 of the world. The only thing they won’t control is goods produced in North and South America that go by sea to Europe or Africa. It’s also why China wants to control the South China Sea, because it’s where all the major shipping lanes go for that region.
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I disagree. Unfair, would be taking all of the risk, and doing all of the work, and making all of the personal sacrifice, only to be forced into giving your earned gains away.
It is sad, and hugely unfortunate, that there are poor people, and people with untreated mental health issues, and people who just can’t seem to catch a break. These are tragic conditions, to be sure.
I do not begrudge anyone who takes all the chance, and assumes all the risk, and comes out ahead for it. That being said, folks with ridiculous amounts of wealth should feel morally obligated to help those less fortunate. Whether those folks choose to help or not, is their decision. They should not be forced to part with their earnings because there are others less fortunate.
There will always be poor, infirmed, down-on-their-luck people in this world. Taking from the rich and giving to the poor does nothing to solve the problem.
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Did you even read the article you linked? First of all, as the other guy pointed out, the article says 65% of people think they’re saving up enough, not 65% are saving up enough. The whole point of the article was to say that most people are not saving up enough. Second, this article says nothing about how many people have 401ks, it only says 65% of people think they’re saving enough. It tells us nothing about the figure you were trying to back up. Third, unrelated to the article and as another person pointed out, changes in stock price affect richer people much more. The effects on the average person can sometimes be negligible. If you have $200,000 invested (which is close to what the article said people will save total over their whole career) and the market goes up by 5%, you’ll get an extra $10,000. That may seem significant, but over 20 years (assuming you retire at 65 and die at 85, which is pretty average), that’s only $500 extra a year or $42 a month, which is almost nothing. However, if you’re rich and have $20 million invested and stocks go up 5%, then you get $1 million ($4,200 a month), which very much is significant. So, stock market increases barely affect average people at all, and mostly just make rich people richer.
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Did he say that? I'll answer for you: he did not say people didn't die before we had the obscenely rich, he said the two are linked. I'll break it down a little for you.
The way Bezos is able to reach the level of extreme wealth he has today is, obviously, by maximizing his company's profitability, which, inevitably means taking advantage of and under paying workers, which is very well documented with Amazon. So that's one part. The other, is that in the era where Jeff Bezos lives (hint, it's the current one), there is much more poverty then there needs to be because wealth is extremely concentrated in a few hands, instead of helping out those who could benefit a lot from just a little. We grow enough food in America to fully feed every citizen. We have more empty housing stock then homeless people. Obviously solving these problems is complex, but the point is that there is a finite amount of wealth in the economy, and every million dollars more that goes to Bezos is a million dollars not able to help anyone survive. (not even Jeff himself, since $1,000,000 will sit unnoticed tied up in stock somewhere not bringing him anything except even a little bit more money).
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Forbes has a ranking scale for their top 400 richest people based on how wealthy they were growing up. A 10 means they grew up poor, and a 1 means they inherited everything. Only 9s and 10s would be considered working class. 98 of the people on that list (~24%) fall into this category. This is despite being a majority of the country. Only 8.5% actually grew up poor. However even if you make the cutoff for "grew up wealthy" to be people like Donald Trump (who is a 5 on their scale, was the son a major real estate tycoon, and got a small loan of a million dollars) then those people account for over 30% of the list despite very much being in the top 1%.
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