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This is why OT is bad. I used to like captain collius when he was only talking about things related to warhammer.
Then I found out he regards the USA as "socialist leaning".
Oh dear.

captain collius wrote:
Dogma: look it up a free economy free of taxes preforms better. So yes EXCESSIVE taxes are corruption, where in money is taken from those who have earned and is spread to those who have not see unemployed.

I won't lie, I'm going into this having seen "Thomas Sowell" at the end of your post, which caused a good chuckle, so be warned.

I'm still not clear on what you mean by "excessive" it seems like you mean "redistributive" (read: all taxation), but that may not be the case.

Assuming that it is, however, I think you'll find that essentially all states with notable GDP growth over the past two decades have featured redistributive policies. Here's a nice graph:

captain collius wrote:
I can honestly say i was unemployed for most of a year i worked temp jobs did laborers work whatever it took to pay the bills but i never ever accepted unemployment or free healthcare so don't try to put me down i know i'm right i work a hard job everyday to get less than half the average median income in the area I live.

Whether or not you accepted unemployment has no bearing on economic performance given the presence of unemployment.

My income has doubled in the last 4 years, does that mean the economy is healthy?

captain collius wrote:
By the way i can't post all my argument here as explanations would take to long please go read these books.
Basic economics by Thomas Sowell, freakonomics by Steven D. Lovett

Read both. Thomas Sowell is an idiot (or at least, his public persona is that of an idiot, his academic work isn't bad), and Freakonomics has very little to do with economics.

Also, his name is "Levitt".

Joey wrote:This is why OT is bad. I used to like captain collius when he was only talking about things related to warhammer.
Then I found out he regards the USA as "socialist leaning".
Oh dear.

no only our laws that currently on the books and persoannly i believe in many things that are social liberal. But anything that is the government trying to tell me what to do thats right out.

@joey if you don't like my politics i'm sorry man but i'm not gonna change em.

if you only wanna talk to me about Warhammer and 40k go right ahead i love these games (even though it drains my bank account)

but back on topic if you look in a vaccum and remove any prejudices you'll see the western world is much more to the socialist end of the spectrum. We want to take our of the poor and unfortunate. We want to improve our societies. The only problem i have is forcing people to do it achieves nothing.

if you see your mate lost his job what do you do you take him get him beer for the night and then the next day you can you try and get him a job. (this achieves the same ends as socialism through different means.

That what i want freedom

captain collius wrote:
but back on topic if you look in a vaccum and remove any prejudices you'll see the western world is much more to the socialist end of the spectrum. We want to take our of the poor and unfortunate. We want to improve our societies. The only problem i have is forcing people to do it achieves nothing.

It seems to have achieved quite a bit, as I sit here telecommuting on my 4 monitor system while watching Burn Notice on my 42" TV, and posting on Dakka while waiting for my data simulation to finish processing.

Oh, and drinking a beer.

dogma wrote:your reply

sry didn't want to upset the mods by quoting everything

okay i noticed how your list stops before the economy tanked

2nd. saying is an idiot proves you are only looking from one side of the issue. you have to look at it from all around and not disparage any idea if you want to achieve a reasonable idea.

3rd. China experciened GDP growth in that area what has China been doing thats right deregulation. Hong Kong arguably the finance Capital of the Asian Market has the lowest taxes for new buisnesses in exsistence.

4. Redistribution is wrong when it is not a persoanl choice. meaning people buy goods this suppots a chain of jobs, people give money to non-profits this provides money to the needy.

the ideal government does 3 things defends the people (soldier are payed to be ready to fight) Regulates commerce (this is road matinence and laws keeping states within the country from taxing each other.) Provides for the Public Protection (police to maintain law and order)

where do i need anything else



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dogma wrote:

captain collius wrote:
but back on topic if you look in a vaccum and remove any prejudices you'll see the western world is much more to the socialist end of the spectrum. We want to take our of the poor and unfortunate. We want to improve our societies. The only problem i have is forcing people to do it achieves nothing.

It seems to have achieved quite a bit, as I sit here telecommuting on my 4 monitor system while watching Burn Notice on my 42" TV, and posting on Dakka while waiting for my data simulation to finish processing.

Oh, and drinking a beer.

WAY WAY OT what do you do for a job?

captain collius wrote:
okay i noticed how your list stops before the economy tanked

It gets worse after the economy tanked. I'm not going to list off a bunch of examples but Sweden, as one, had about 4.4% growth last year compared to 1.5% in the US. No one anywhere, ever, will argue that Sweden is less redistributive than the US.

This doesn't mean that redistribution is intrinsically good for an economy, it just means its not intrinsically bad; the trick is getting the balance right.

captain collius wrote:
2nd. saying is an idiot proves you are only looking from one side of the issue. you have to look at it from all around and not disparage any idea if you want to achieve a reasonable idea.

I disparage Sowell for his lay work. His academic work, as I said, is pretty good. The problem isn't that I disagree with him, its that I consider the translation of his more esoteric points into opinion pieces to be very sloppy.

Pretty much anyone that isn't biccat will probably tell you that I'm naturally disposed to want more information, rather than less.

captain collius wrote:
3rd. China experciened GDP growth in that area what has China been doing thats right deregulation. Hong Kong arguably the finance Capital of the Asian Market has the lowest taxes for new buisnesses in exsistence.

The absence of taxes doesn't mean the absence of regulation, just as the presence of taxes doesn't entail corruption. Hong Kong is a special case because it is backed by the PRC (and an inroad to their economy), in essence SARs don't count when it comes to blanket, national policy; for the most part.

Regarding the deregulation of China: you're talking about coming away from absolute state ownership, not having fewer controls on a stock market. Degree is important.

captain collius wrote:
4. Redistribution is wrong when it is not a persoanl choice. meaning people buy goods this suppots a chain of jobs, people give money to non-profits this provides money to the needy.

I disagree, but then I don't care about individuals unless I like them as people, so this is just going to be a wash.

I would happily take something from a random person, without their consent, if I needed it.

captain collius wrote:
WAY WAY OT what do you do for a job?

Political analyst, and some weird, indefinite consulting job at a friend's NPO.

dogma wrote:
Assuming that it is, however, I think you'll find that essentially all states with notable GDP growth over the past two decades have featured redistributive policies. Here's a nice graph:

They have also featured extreme poverty. They grew lots because they had a tiny base to grow from.
I favour "redistributive policies" in general but to imply that the West has anything to learn from the developing world economically is ludicrous.

dogma wrote:Assuming that it is, however, I think you'll find that essentially all states with notable GDP growth over the past two decades have featured redistributive policies.

The Economist posted an argument that any time you had notable income disparities between rich and poor in a democratic country, you usually also had a growing-in-strength push for re-distributive efforts.

I'll have to look for it later. Currrently just woke up...

This thread went dullsville... :(

quick let a dachsund loose in the room.

Started out lame, talked about football, got lame again,spiraled down from there.

AlmightyWalrus wrote:
Let me tell you, I agree wholeheartedly. Your obvious lack of sources supporting you, your complaint about anything disagreeing with you being biased and your rant against those dastardly socialists doesn't matter, because you obviously speak the truth! Woe to all who disagree, for the LORD hath spoken, and his name is Captain Collius. Look upon his words, ye socialist rabble, and despair!

I believe I have found my new sig.

Melissia wrote:I'm not convinced this is the case.

You can be as 'not convinced' as you want. This is hardly the first report to note the US has governance problems that are significantly greater than other developed countries.


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AlmightyWalrus wrote:Let me tell you, I agree wholeheartedly. Your obvious lack of sources supporting you, your complaint about anything disagreeing with you being biased and your rant against those dastardly socialists doesn't matter, because you obviously speak the truth! Woe to all who disagree, for the LORD hath spoken, and his name is Captain Collius. Look upon his words, he socialist rabble, and despair!

TL;DR: Wut? Get real!

I think if people keep saying "I don't like that information, it's biased socialism" enough times, it gets to be a reflex, like when a doctor hits your knee with a hammer and your foot goes up.


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captain collius wrote:Fact all contries with a socialist leaning laws are FAILING (greece, spain, netherlands, USA, Italy, Great Britain, Ireland, Denmark, Finland) (I have not heard about sweden directly)

Okay, look, I'm just going to say this a bluntly as possible - what you've written above is just plain silly.

First of all, 'failing' is a term that really, really needs a meaning. It would commonly be something like 'the nation's government is losing authority, it cannot undertake free and fair elections, and it is in reasonable peril of not remaining a democratic government in the short to medium term'. That would maybe apply to Greece if we wanted to speculate enough, applying it to any of the rest is goofy.

Second of all, socialism is a complicated term with multiple meanings. In one sense, any nation which accepts any need at all to interfere with market processes is socialist, and while that definition is the one that includes the USA among the list of socialist countries, it also includes every country ever put on Earth.

Fact Germany and Norway do not suffer these problems Germany is not heavily socialist and norway is not part of the EU. ohh wait they have a much more controlled form of socialism in Norway yeah and they maintain themselves.

Norway has a first world skilled workforce and it has oil. Everything else sorts itself out. Much the same as us living here in Australia (though its mineral resources rather than oil).

Claiming Germany is to the right of the US in its economic policies is just plain bonkers. Germany is the place where workers unions get automatic membership on corporate boards.

Dogma: look it up a free economy free of taxes preforms better.

That's just plain goofy. How do you even have a society devoid of taxes?

Perhaps you mean a society with minimal taxes (where 'minimal' is a vague kind of thing anyway). In which case you're plainly and simply completely wrong anyway. The simple fact is that government plays a key role in economic development, and has done as long as there have been things called nations. Whether it's providing the infrastructure for businesses in terms of roads, rail lines and telecommunications, producing a skilled workforce through education, or encouraging technological development through subsidy of universities, government plays a major role in expanding and growing the economy.

By the way i can't post all my argument here as explanations would take to long please go read these books.
Basic economics by Thomas Sowell, freakonomics by Steven D. Lovett

Ummm, Freakonomics is a fun read in places, but the academic qualities behind it are quite frankly woeful. It's also plainly and simply not a text on general economic theory, but rather a collection of interesting ways to apply economic concepts in new ways, with wildly varying levels of success.

Basic Economics by Sowell is a good book, but it's really only intended to give people the basic understanding needed to begin to engage in greater debate on economics. It can't even really be taken as a replacement for a highschool level understanding of economics, let alone any more than that.

dogma wrote:

Frazzled wrote:Rugby, the thinking man's hockey.

Is it strange that, in the US, both sports are basically limited to the upper middle class? Throw in lax, and you get the impression that wealthy people like hitting each other.

We have two types of rugby in the UK; Union and League.

Union is the upper middle class one. It was all amateur until a few years ago. Rugby League is (was) the professional version.

captain collius wrote:

Fact all contries with a socialist leaning laws are FAILING (greece, spain, netherlands, USA, Italy, Great Britain, Ireland, Denmark, Finland) (I have not heard about sweden directly)

Somehow I missed this bloody gem.
I notice you left out Israel, perhaps the most successful socialist nation of them all. They even bounced out of the 80's skyrocketing inflation of the Shekel and recovered. You know, because of socialist policies. Just because you are, I assume, a conservative of some stripe doesn't mean socialism is EVIL. You may not like it, I certainly don't, but socialism does work and has worked for some people; notably Jews since Judaism is the root of socialism. That's why it integrates so well into the Jewish state without bringing it to the brink of collapse.

okay i do not know everything.
I do not know about Israel's economics.
as i have no information i have nothing to do.

I am not a conservative, i believe in the right of gay couples to do what they want, i want marijuana legalized and as far as I'm concerned as long as you are not violating my rights or property i don't care.

i just don't want the government to be taxing me heavily tell me what i can and cannot do. I will own guns and knives and they can't tell me no.

AustonT wrote:
Fact all contries with a socialist leaning laws are FAILING (greece, spain, netherlands, USA, Italy, Great Britain, Ireland, Denmark, Finland) (I have not heard about sweden directly)

captain collius wrote:okay i do not know everything.
I do not know about Israel's economics.
as i have no information i have nothing to do.

I am not a conservative, i believe in the right of gay couples to do what they want, i want marijuana legalized and as far as I'm concerned as long as you are not violating my rights or property i don't care.

i just don't want the government to be taxing me heavily tell me what i can and cannot do. I will own guns and knives and they can't tell me no.

If you don't have all the facts perhaps you should avoid making sweeping statements. I've made them large in the post I responded to (big text for the big text God). As I said before: Socialism works for SOME people, however in the US we've always had the freedom and right to starve to death or freeze in our unheated shanties rather than give in to socialism. American individualism doesn't leave a lot of room for communal ideas like socialism, which is why it tends to be unpopular here. That doesn't mean that all socialism is destined to fail. I encourage you to remember how much you hate socialism when you go to a public library for instance, or if you ever get a Union job that actually pays well enough to provide for your family, or hell if you get a minimum wage job that pays what $7 dollars an hour now? Barely enough to keep your head above water if you are single and live in a studio apartment eating rice and ramen. If you search hard enough through my posts you'll find I would be perfectly happy if the government slashed taxes and social programs; that doesn't mean that they are evil and don't make the lives of millions of Americans better.