raubhimself

Heck yes!

Frink making actual posts? Say it ain't so.

Flat taxes suck for the poor. I can see why people want a flat tax for everyone, but you have to give a really low percentage to make that work for poor people. Let's look at those brackets again...

Tax Bracket Married Filing Jointly Single
10% Bracket $0 – $17,000 $0 – $8,500
15% Bracket $17,001 – $69,000 $8,501 – $34,500
25% Bracket $69,001 – $139,350 $34,501 – $83,600
28% Bracket $139,351 – $212,300 $83,601 – $174,400
33% Bracket $212,301 – $379,150 $174,401 – $379,150
35% Bracket Over $379,150 Over $379,150

Right now I sit in the 15% bracket for a single dude. I'm relying purely on the graces of unemployment right now, and money is tight. 15% of my income for a year is equivalent to about 3 months of bills and rent. So yeah, without those taxes I'd have A LOT less to worry about. Last week I had to tell my mom, who is my insurance agent, that I can't afford to pay my insurance bills that are coming up. But if you're in the 33% bracket? Even on the low end you're still making more than $100k after takes. What will that $50k or so in taxes really do for you except be used for luxury or to increase your wealth?

Regardless of how politically fair it is, I just don't feel bad about it. I don't really complain about income tax. It sucks, but it's there, and I pay it. Even when I was making $50k/year I didn't complain. But income tax for lower class people would be better used for their straight up survival. And the rich people are the ones complaining about how unfair it is? Sorry, rich people, but you can get bent if you're gonna bitch about unfair.

I do agree with tony about tax deductions and all that malarkey though.

john, would definitely be down for lunch friday. mig and i have been talking about grillfesting later this week. meats, meats, and more meats.

got to see donald at la tolteca last night and we both struggled to finish our quarts of Sol while mig pounded it down and was ready for more.

hung out with aaronburke, robin, and quezo for a bit last night and then me and mig cruised home at least one sheet to the wind.

today i walked around downtown and stopped at free trade cafe and i think i saw donald's lady there but i didn't wanna be like "I KNOW YOU FROM THE INTERNET BUT YOU PROBABLY DON'T KNOW ME EVEN THOUGH I THINK WE MET ONCE."

So the top 1% has an incredible share of the wealth, but most of their money is invested in businesses intended to generate more wealth. Maybe the reason they're so rich is because they do such a good job of it. Maybe it's a good thing they're the ones investing and controlling so much of the money, especially considering the alternative is to let the government take it.

Maybe, but I doubt it. Look at Bill Gates. Oh he's so great now, but all of his wealth is built on him being a huge dick. The first big jump of Microsoft was at the expense of IBM and OS/2 devs. There is a saying "Embrace, Extend, Extinguish" that Microsoft used in-house which describes their strategy to decimate standards so they can be the de-facto standard. They supposedly have used BSD code for their TCP/IP stack but I don't think that's ever been proven one way or another. More recently they kept throwing wrenches in the ODF spec. They didn't like not being in control of the Sun-designed ODF spec, so they pushed for their own OOXML (which the first two letters stand for Office Open, making confusing as to what spec belongs to what side since Sun had Open Office). Their strategies for gaining support for OOXML were not based on the genuine worth of their standard.

Microsoft is just one example, but there are plenty of other companies, especially in the tech sector, that make their worth not through hard work and the quality of their product, but by manipulating the market and the consumers, using monetary muscle, and exploiting legal loopholes and patents. Larry Ellison is up there too, he's like the Bill Gates wannabe. Is the Walton family really deserving?

So no, I definitely don't think most of the supremely rich are deserving. Saying that maybe the rich worked hard to get there is like saying maybe most politicians got where they are by being good, genuine politicians. Come on, we both know that's not true. Are there exceptions? Sure, but I'm not about to generalize the rich or the government as a group of deserving people.

As a Libertarian I'm sure you know how the Fed got started. Do you think the people who made out like bandits from that are deserving? I mean, obviously they were good at what they do, but what they do is manipulate and take advantage.

We're talking about having our money in control of one set of manipulative, greedy assholes, or another. Corporations or government, doesn't really matter much. Government at least symbolically means for the people though.

quite possibly interested

Getting a job, moving to PHX, sweating A LOT.

Well, here's the conundrum... what the hell are the cartels going to do if drugs were legal? The Mafia rose to power because of the prohibition of alcohol. They didn't go away because prohibition was repealed.

But what does the Mafia even do anymore? I mean yeah they exist but they must have moved on to greener pastures, but what are those pastures? I don't even know. I'd imagine other drugs is certainly a big part of that, but the Mafia has definitely withered away a great deal over the years.

Making marijuana legal will certainly have some backlash. But, I basically see the US gov't saying that the level of violence and profits made by illegal drug sales is more acceptable and manageable than the freedom of the American people. That's pretty disheartening.

25 bucks for a 48 page hardcover? Ugh! I could by half an eighth with that!

Just a little desert recon.

Departing:
PHL Philadelphia
Feb 28, 2011
11:10 AM

Arriving:
PHX Phoenix
Feb 28, 2011
04:35 PM

Godaddy. Paypal. Got it. I'll look into both of those too. Thanks~.

if you go the godaddy route and get the job and stick it out 90 days, i get a bonus for referring you (assuming you give them my name). you stick it out the 90 days and i'll half that with ya. it might still be $500 (less taxes of course). just throwin' that out there.

What's your name? I am applying for a development job right now kinda for kicks.

That went way easier than I anticipated.

Grace Perry from Landmine Marathon

when she was in obama bin sars i told a friend of mine that her screaming "anal" at the top of her lungs during "if you loved me, you'd do anal" was the hottest thing i'd ever seen. i think she said at the time that that made me a creepy old dude. that friend then became friends with her. and i was pretty sure that she would have told her what i said. so i always felt a little bit like a creepy old dude when she was around.

lol @ obama bin sars

glad i got to see them once

People of Phoenix,

Mig has been bothering me for a while about moving out there to bask in the cancerous and dehydrating sun with you all. I guess he needs a roommate or something.

Here's the thing: I love where I live; I've lived here my entire life. However, I have been unemployed for 9 months and outlook not so good for the future. All my friends are getting married and I am happy for them but I just end up going to the bar with the same 3 people (whom I love dearly) and my social life is stagnant. I am in a band and I dig it plenty but it's not 100% what I'd like to do and I'm not sure what I want to do is possible here.

I have been to PHX twice and enjoyed it both times, not just for whatever shizz shit I was there for. I was there in November of 2005(?) and February of 2010. Not sure if I can handle the heat. I got a foot of snow outside my door right now.

Five or six years ago I would have been like "AWW HELL YEAH DAWG I'M ROLLIN' TO PHOENIX WOOO" but now I am like "You know, I actually really love this town now that I'm not all teenage angsty about it and I'm not so anxious to leave like everyone else is..." Fuck my hat, as mig would say. I dunno, Phoenix. My family and friends are the only reason I have to stay, and I know moving out there would be pretty fucking awesome. But I've never lived outside of this area and quite frankly it scares me to move across the country and be away from what's here.

Gimme reasons to come west and I will think about it. I need to either say yes or stop thinking about it.

They should upgrade to pot-firing t-shirt cannons.