BF2S Forums What's your Manifesto for Saving America?

dayarath wrote:

ah yeah I was thinking about another chart, anyhow that makes sense. Yet at the same time you'd think that there should be countries who have a surplus to provide the loans of those in debt. Yet going by this map;

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/c … ld_map.PNG

Where does it all come from? With pretty much all of the western world being in debt isn't this a problem of some sort. I highly doubt that russia, china and australia could provide for everyone.

IMHO the problem with the socialist programs isn't the concept of it but it being mismanaged. Granted I'd say that "nearly free healthcare" (probably the most expensive of all) and such require a somewhat over-controlling system to work. I set foot in hospitals a couple times and watched quite a few operations. What you notice is that 95% of the people on the operation table are firstly obese and overweight, secondly massive smokers and/or heavy drinkers.

And they mostly seem to be inbetween the age of 45 and 70, I guess that's the time when living an unhealthy life really starts to show results.

If you'd force people to jog and work out, even eat healthy regularily you'd drop healthcare costs by atleast 50-60%. You'd almost say it's arrogance to consider healthcare a common good if more than 3/4th of the people using/abusing that system aren't doing anything to improve their own health to begin with. Causing research in the field and the quality of work to decrease and stall because the cost of keeping these people alive is just so damn huge.

And yeah, elder care is the other HUGE tax-eating machine. I don't really know what sort of opinion I should have on it though.

Most debt is sold to individuals. Most of Japans debt is owned by the citizens themselves. The US borrows money by issuing Treasury Bonds etc.

Turquoise wrote:

dayarath wrote:

Turquoise wrote:

Wow... Sweden seems to be in good shape when it comes to debt.

you'd think the country should be in the gutter, they give away free money to people for no reason.

Well, they have pretty restrictive immigration policies and very little wealth disparity.

Damn socialists... 

JohnG@lt wrote:

Turquoise wrote:

dayarath wrote:

you'd think the country should be in the gutter, they give away free money to people for no reason.

Well, they have pretty restrictive immigration policies and very little wealth disparity.

Damn socialists... 

And the highest suicide rate on the planet.

JohnG@lt wrote:

Dilbert_X wrote:

JohnG@lt wrote:

Really? Because Germany has lost much of its manufacturing to the Czech Republic over the past decade. Pesky union labor.

They still have a colossal trade surplus, funny that.

Anyway, like most blowhards you haven't come up with any solutions, just criticised everyone elses.
Are you sure you're not a liberal?

Australia has a balance of payments that is more than 7% of GDP negative, and has had persistently large current account deficits for more than 50 years.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia#Economy

dayarath wrote:

Just a side question here, is the huge debt % of the EU countries still a leftover from post WW2 rebuilding?

JohnG@lt wrote:

Turquoise wrote:

JohnG@lt wrote:

And the highest suicide rate on the planet.

True...  that probably has a little bit to do with the weather...  lol

Being hopelessly mediocre would make me suicidal.

JohnG@lt wrote:

jord wrote:

JohnG@lt wrote:

Being hopelessly mediocre would make me suicidal.

I'm gonna try to ask this in the nicest way I can, and I don't mean it as an insult. How exactly are you not mediocre?

Not that everyone in sweden is mediocre

The whole point of socialism is equalizing outcomes. Equal outcomes is precisely mediocrity.

jord wrote:

JohnG@lt wrote:

jord wrote:

I'm gonna try to ask this in the nicest way I can, and I don't mean it as an insult. How exactly are you not mediocre?

Not that everyone in sweden is mediocre

The whole point of socialism is equalizing outcomes. Equal outcomes is precisely mediocrity.

The majority in america are mediocre, what does socialism have to do with anything?

On the flipside there are I'm sure many people in sweden that aren't mediocre.

jord wrote:

JohnG@lt wrote:

jord wrote:

The majority in america are mediocre, what does socialism have to do with anything?

On the flipside there are I'm sure many people in sweden that aren't mediocre.

Point is is that things like ultra-graduated tax systems are designed to pull people back down to the middle. The result is people stop trying to better themselves since there is no point. End result is mediocrity. May not matter to you since you'd be a prime beneficiary in a system like that. You've got no motivation, no skills, and you're perfectly content to sit on government assistance. I'm not like that. At all.

Well firstly I asked you in the least offensive possible way why you think you yourself aren't mediocre. Still unanswered... Secondly I'm not on government assistance so don't speculate when you don't know anything about me, especially as I didn't speculate about you but merely asked an open question. So to further this exchange please go ahead and state what makes you above mediocre.

Doctor Strangelove wrote:

Turquoise wrote:

JohnG@lt wrote:

Being hopelessly mediocre would make me suicidal.

Well, I looked up the stats...  They have the 29th highest rate, actually.  Belarus has the highest rate.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_co … icide_rate

But good god...  South Korea is #2.

Russia is #6.

France is 18.

We're #41 (out of 106).

Ironically, a lot of the Islamic World has very low rates of suicide.

I think that has allot to due with the strong religion in those countries.

Macbeth wrote:

jord wrote:

JohnG@lt wrote:

Point is is that things like ultra-graduated tax systems are designed to pull people back down to the middle. The result is people stop trying to better themselves since there is no point. End result is mediocrity. May not matter to you since you'd be a prime beneficiary in a system like that. You've got no motivation, no skills, and you're perfectly content to sit on government assistance. I'm not like that. At all.

Well firstly I asked you in the least offensive possible way why you think you yourself aren't mediocre. Still unanswered... Secondly I'm not on government assistance so don't speculate when you don't know anything about me, especially as I didn't speculate about you but merely asked an open question. So to further this exchange please go ahead and state what makes you above mediocre.

I have read two entire Friedrich Nietzsche books and have have over a thousand karma. I am special.