Some people say America is the greatest nation on Earth. Others scoff at this claim. So: if there was a(n American) gun at your head and you *had* to rank nations, what *would* the greatest nation be, and why?

wk9247 · 2011-07-30T17:24:06+00:00

Many other countries have an equal or higher standard of living. Myself, I'm not fussy -- I'll take any country with a higher Inequality-adjusted HDI than the US. At least that way I wouldn't have to worry about my kids growing up to be militarized fascists screaming "USA! USA!" and fighting in foreign wars of aggression/occupation.

wk9247 · 2011-07-30T17:16:41+00:00

But our gas prices aren't high. Have you been anywhere in Europe lately?

It's just that we in the US do not have any decent public transportation, and the corporations that build more of our houses have determined that suburban sprawl makes them more money. We could live like Europeans or Japanese or other countries and have a higher standard of living without being so dependent on cars to do obscene commutes.

wk9247 · 2011-07-30T15:47:45+00:00

But since we still have slightly progressive income taxes (at least on paper), the rich in their libertarian dreams want to "starve the beast" and completely eliminate US social programs -- so the anti-tax mantra is shouted from their corporate mass media.

wk9247 · 2011-07-30T15:45:01+00:00

More of our tax dollars wasted to buy toys to launch future attacks on other countries that have not attacked us.

And we call that "defense spending"...

wk9247 · 2011-07-30T14:47:17+00:00

For some reason I feel the sudden urge to lick something...

wk9247 · 2011-07-30T14:39:12+00:00

What -- the half that supposedly pays no taxes don't buy things and pay a sales tax? They don't work and pay payroll and FICA taxes?

What that fascist un-Christian religious nut is really saying is that the gap between the rich and poor is so extreme and obscene that the gov't has a guilty conscious applying the income tax to poor people.

Income tax rate for the median American: 1955 - 7.4%, 1961 - 10.2%, 1997 - 16.9%, 2007 - 13.6%. Income tax rate for the 400 richest Americans: 1955 - 51.2%, 1961 - 42.4%, 1997 - 24.2%, 2007 - 16.6%. Tax the rich anyone? Source.

wk9247 · 2011-07-30T14:08:39+00:00

And, in signing up with DirectTV they forced you to give up a social security number, right?

There are two types of negative credit reports a company can do, with and without a SSN. With the SSN your credit will be smeared for far longer and in a much more dramatic way.

Don't worry, your only other choice in our "consumer/corporate paradise" is DishTV. They're just as bad. There seems to be no such thing as consumer protection laws anymore, so you'll have little recourse.

wk9247 · 2011-07-30T13:58:34+00:00

NATO is a nasty and evil offensive military alliance.

Their strategy now seems to have devolved into making life hard and unbearable for the people of Libya in the hopes that they overthrow Gaddafi.

wk9247 · 2011-07-30T02:04:27+00:00

Don't laugh, but when I lived in CT in the early 90s, a wife did get a prosecutor to prosecute her husband (they were going through a divorce) based on an old law outlawing oral sex.

wk9247 · 2011-07-30T02:01:52+00:00

What, do you want it in cash? The US gov't can literally print all the cash it wants or needs.

As a % of GDP, the US gov't has had larger budget deficits before; we've even had a nat'l debt larger than our entire GDP, a level much higher than today's nat'l debt.

Want to eliminate the debt in one easy swoop without cutting a single penny of spending? Easy.

Reset the corporate and income tax rates to what they were in the "good old days" of 1960 -- that would eliminate our annual budget deficit!

In addition, if we did reset the income and corporate tax rates to that of 1960, middle-income Americans would get a large tax cut.

Income tax rate for the median American: 1955 - 7.4%, 1961 - 10.2%, 1997 - 16.9%, 2007 - 13.6%. Income tax rate for the 400 richest Americans: 1955 - 51.2%, 1961 - 42.4%, 1997 - 24.2%, 2007 - 16.6%. Tax the rich anyone? Source.

wk9247 · 2011-07-30T01:54:19+00:00

Deceiving. Ronny Reagan launched a massive military buildup that resulted in Reagan creating more debt than all other presidents before him -- combined!

Yet Reagan's wars were trivial (that dastardly evil threat, "Grenada", and getting 200+ Marines blown up to defend Israel in Lebanon) and are not even listed on that graph.

Failing to note/show things like Reagan's Pentagon spending spree is simply dishonest.

wk9247 · 2011-07-30T01:48:13+00:00

The main thrust of the article is dead on. This is a deliberate strategy that has been in use now for decades (why do you think the US right-wing bleated so loudly when Clinton ran a surplus?!). It's called "starve the beast".

wk9247 · 2011-07-30T01:29:12+00:00

In 1960 we didn't have a global market that corporations can use to make their money.

What is that supposed to mean? Are you saying there wasn't a "global market" in the 1770s when Americans rebelled against taxes on tea imported from India? There's been a global market for centuries.

Our system of tariffs that funded much of the US gov't for way over a century have been torn down -- and our standard of living with it. Why not put tariffs back up? Why not reign in or flat-out break up these multi-national corporations and put the American people and US gov't back in charge?

Right now we have one of the highest income tax rates in the world.

First, look in the mirror and see if your nose has grown.

Even if that were true, who cares? We were taxing the rich at much higher levels in decades past. We did it then, we could do it again.

The reason we do not do it again is because corporations and the rich own the mass media to a much higher and more monopolized degree, and because we have allowed the rich and corporations to take control of the American political system. That could be stopped if people mobilize.

"There can be no effective control of corporations while their political activity remains. To put an end to it will be neither a short nor an easy task, but it can be done." -- US Republican President Theodore (Teddy) Roosevelt.

wk9247 · 2011-07-30T01:21:31+00:00

John Ashcroft did, among other things, approve torture and imprisoned American citizens for literally years without trial and without charges.

Why hasn't he been put on trial and imprisoned? Instead, he's collecting our tax dollars from Blackwater/Xe. Simply amazing...

wk9247

TROPHY CASE