Won't happen. revolving doors and lobbyists.

that's too chocking of an idea for me

Nope, not gonna give The Weakly Standard a page click.

The Weekly Standard is coming out against corporate welfare?!? God damn, it's good to finally have you guys on board. The true irony here though is that without right wing welfare subsidizing this magazine, it would cease to exist. You'd think these neocons would be too ashamed to keep harping on the fact that George Soros forks over a lot of cash to liberal think tanks considering the fact that there wouldn't be a single place for these nutcases to spew their bullshiat without Richard Mellon Scaife paying for all of it.

The problem with the battle cry of 'welfare reform' is that it's almost always by people who don't want to reform, but remove and rescind it, or at least rewrite it so that it's as good as gone. And yes, while there are corporate welfare queens who have eight kids so that they can waste the money away, if you take that money away all together then you'll end up harming the eight children. They're not allowed to make the decisions about what to do with the money, and they need it more than their mother does.

The same is true for 'corporate welfare'. Yeah, some CEOs abuse it. Badly. Instead of punishing the workers for it, who are already being punished by their CEOs, we should aggressively take down those who DO misuse it and try to improve the situation so that the company (analogous to the family) is never placed in that environment again.

Or we can all scream about teleprompters and Bush and fling shiat like monkeys and hope to God that everything magically fixes itself.

Well I am chocked. CHOCKED!!!!!

*chokes*

angryjd: Well I am chocked. CHOCKED!!!!!

Beat me to it.

/have you no chame, sir?

Where were they 5 years ago?

/Oh, that's right
//Outrage after the fact is meaningless

Lost Thought 00: Where were they 5 years ago?

/Oh, that's right
//Outrage after the fact is meaningless

Clearly Congress doesn't think so. How else do you think we got this week's ridiculous tax provision?

Corporate welfare reform? In my right wing rag?

It's cute how they put all the blame on the Democratic president and the Democratic congress, but if that's what it took to wake up even the conservatives to the need for corporate welfare reform, that's fine.

Oh, wait. Just finished the argument. They're defining "corporate welfare" as what's only been going on the past six months - pumping cash into a system that lobbied its ass off to gain the deregulation it had a hardon for and then used that free rein to spend trillions on hookers and blow funny money financial vehicles like the junk-based CDOs.

May they also recognize that the caving of the gov. into their puerile lobbying demands for no oversight is also corporate welfare, as well as the sweetheart business supports and protections they enjoy.

God, short-sighted as always. It's not just the cash, stupid (stupid being the Weekly Standard). Like a scruffy Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist said on TV last week, what they were asking for in this deregulation binge was akin to asking for stoplights and traffic laws to be rescinded: we're responsible drivers! We don't need this regulation of speed limits and stop signs!

Imagine there were a group lobbying for this. Imagine them making these arguments and being taken seriously. That's precisely what these corporate welfare queens do. For some reason we take their promises of how well deregulation will improve traffic flow and how they will never, ever, drive dangerously left to their own devices, as some kind of argument meriting attention, and that's what has to stop.

*ahem*

RON PAUL!

/proof that it won't get people elected, which is sad.

subby shokes headline

Chocking?

"The first party or political leader to apply the lessons of welfare reform to the financial crisis will benefit the country-and profit at the polls. either be run out of Washington on a rail or be taken out by an assassin's bullet."

That's the way these scumbags work.

That headline is chockfull of fail.

Totally emotive wharrgarbl. What a crappy, crappy editorial. Also -1 on the headline subby. Must be a really slow news day eh mods?

MissFeasance: *chokes* *shokes*

FTFY

Well, the article is the usual gibberish from WS, but ending corporate welfare? Absolutely. Big business is, in general, a menace to a free society in any event. The fact that they drain the public coffers to get bigger, and, indeed, eventually become so big that their collapse can destroy the lives of millions of people and so we have to throw even more money at them, is just unfathomably wrong.

Unfortunately, there's no one out there interested in stopping them. The American political scene is absolutely controlled by capitalists, from centrists to ultra-rightists. No one is interested in putting the reins on.

Man On Fire: Won't happen. revolving doors and lobbyists.

Not to mention power retention - nobody in DC wants to give up control, they want more.

Nabb1: Lost Thought 00: Where were they 5 years ago?

/Oh, that's right
//Outrage after the fact is meaningless

Clearly Congress doesn't think so. How else do you think we got this week's ridiculous tax provision?

Hey, better late than never. Once the dust settles on this whole bonus issue, then Congress can get to work on something more current and relevant, like a non-binding resolution against Hitler.

A Dark Evil Omen: Well, the article is the usual gibberish from WS, but ending corporate welfare? Absolutely. Big business is, in general, a menace to a free society in any event. The fact that they drain the public coffers to get bigger, and, indeed, eventually become so big that their collapse can destroy the lives of millions of people and so we have to throw even more money at them, is just unfathomably wrong.

Unfortunately, there's no one out there interested in stopping them. The American political scene is absolutely controlled by capitalists, from centrists to ultra-rightists. No one is interested in putting the reins on.

This.

/The ruling ideas of each age have ever been the ideas of its ruling class.

Lumi: Corporate welfare reform? In my right wing rag?

It's cute how they put all the blame on the Democratic president and the Democratic congress, but if that's what it took to wake up even the conservatives to the need for corporate welfare reform, that's fine.

Oh, wait. Just finished the argument. They're defining "corporate welfare" as what's only been going on the past six months - pumping cash into a system that lobbied its ass off to gain the deregulation it had a hardon for and then used that free rein to spend trillions on hookers and blow funny money financial vehicles like the junk-based CDOs.

May they also recognize that the caving of the gov. into their puerile lobbying demands for no oversight is also corporate welfare, as well as the sweetheart business supports and protections they enjoy.

God, short-sighted as always. It's not just the cash, stupid (stupid being the Weekly Standard). Like a scruffy Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist said on TV last week, what they were asking for in this deregulation binge was akin to asking for stoplights and traffic laws to be rescinded: we're responsible drivers! We don't need this regulation of speed limits and stop signs!

Imagine there were a group lobbying for this. Imagine them making these arguments and being taken seriously. That's precisely what these corporate welfare queens do. For some reason we take their promises of how well deregulation will improve traffic flow and how they will never, ever, drive dangerously left to their own devices, as some kind of argument meriting attention, and that's what has to stop.



No seriously. You win 1 internets. Good examples and all.

FYI the has been on the Libertarian Platform for years.

A Libertarian is what you are when you realize that the Federal government has no place bailing out people or businesses. But that peoples personal lives are not yours to manage. You know a good neighbor.

Inescapable Future of Humanity: Or we can all scream about teleprompters and Bush and fling shiat like monkeys and hope to God that everything magically fixes itself

Hey, you mock that as though it's a bad plan! What gives?

globalwarmingpraiser: FYI the has been on the Libertarian Platform for years.

A Libertarian is what you are when you realize that the Federal government has no place bailing out people or businesses. But that peoples personal lives are not yours to manage. You know a good neighbor. you decide that it's okay for businesses to fark you, but it's not okay to protect yourself.

Nader tried it and failed. He also said it at least a decade ago. Benefit at the polls? Yeah right.

Zero out the business subsidies and zero out the taxes too. And then I don't want to hear any more pissing and moaning about regulations, because that is one big-ass compliance headache that's gone off business' shoulders.

Also, if Congress (okay, maybe not THIS particular Congress) wants to go after some dick-measuring CEO's compensation package at that point, be my guest.

Except what they describe isn't the full scope of corporate welfare. I'm sure most Farkers are familiar with the GAO report that found that 2/3 of American corporations paid no federal income taxes between 1998 and 2005, and 68% of foreign companies doing business in the U.S. avoided corporate taxes over the same period.

Let's stop all forms of corporate welfare and make them pay their fair share.

A Dark Evil Omen: globalwarmingpraiser: FYI the has been on the Libertarian Platform for years.

A Libertarian is what you are when you realize that the Federal government has no place bailing out people or businesses. But that peoples personal lives are not yours to manage. You know a good neighbor. you decide that it's okay for businesses to fark you, but it's not okay to protect yourself.

Yes because Libertarians are so against the idea of sueing for fraud.

brainiac-dumdum: Except what they describe isn't the full scope of corporate welfare. I'm sure most Farkers are familiar with the GAO report that found that 2/3 of American corporations paid no federal income taxes between 1998 and 2005, and 68% of foreign companies doing business in the U.S. avoided corporate taxes over the same period.

Let's stop all forms of corporate welfare and make them pay their fair share.

Actually all businesses in the US passed their share of income taxes on to the consumer. It is how they pay them. TMYK.

globalwarmingpraiser: FYI the has been on the Libertarian Platform for years.

A Libertarian is what you are when you realize that the Federal government has no place bailing out people or businesses. But that peoples personal lives are not yours to manage. You know a good neighbor.

Libertarians run up against reality an awful lot though, especially when limited resources are involved. If a resource can be depleted, or a practice causes severe pollution harmful to humans, you can bet your ass that anything unregulated - the market as a whole, individual businesses - will take the short-term view, and cause massive problems.

The libertarian assumption that pure greed and callous disregard for consequences will be taken care of by competition is in reality a very costly illusion. Unregulated businesses tend to drive their competitors out and become big monopolies that then implode spectacularly if the situation changes.

Government regulation is absolutely required to protect a) sustainability, b) the environment, and c) average people.

leonarodsan: Nader tried it and failed. He also said it at least a decade ago. Benefit at the polls? Yeah right.

Nader mixed it with a fifth of crazy, and never put forth a logical argument for not only what we should do, but also how to get from here to there.

Same problem with Kucinich and Paul, decent ideas if we were building society from scratch. But we aren't, and the costs of blowing up society and starting over are too high

globalwarmingpraiser: A Dark Evil Omen: globalwarmingpraiser: FYI the has been on the Libertarian Platform for years.

A Libertarian is what you are when you realize that the Federal government has no place bailing out people or businesses. But that peoples personal lives are not yours to manage. You know a good neighbor. you decide that it's okay for businesses to fark you, but it's not okay to protect yourself.

Yes because Libertarians are so against the idea of sueing for fraud.

brainiac-dumdum: Except what they describe isn't the full scope of corporate welfare. I'm sure most Farkers are familiar with the GAO report that found that 2/3 of American corporations paid no federal income taxes between 1998 and 2005, and 68% of foreign companies doing business in the U.S. avoided corporate taxes over the same period.

Let's stop all forms of corporate welfare and make them pay their fair share.

Actually all businesses in the US passed their share of income taxes on to the consumer. It is how they pay them. TMYK.

As a consumer I don't pay income taxes. I pass that cost onto my employer as a part of my compensation.

globalwarmingpraiser: Actually all businesses in the US passed their share of income taxes on to the consumer. It is how they pay them. TMYK.

Yes, tax incidence theory. I don't see a legal way to avoid its um, incidence.

globalwarmingpraiser: Actually all businesses in the US passed their share of income taxes on to the consumer. It is how they pay them. TMYK.

ALL of them? NOBODY gouged?
Did they pass on a fair amount?
What IS a fair amount?
What about those oil companies posting billions and billions in profit?

DemonEater: globalwarmingpraiser: Actually all businesses in the US passed their share of income taxes on to the consumer. It is how they pay them. TMYK.

ALL of them? NOBODY gouged?
Did they pass on a fair amount?
What IS a fair amount?
What about those oil companies posting billions and billions in profit?

He has maybe only the slightest idea of what he's talking about. He just likes to pretend he has an inkling.

globalwarmingpraiser: A Dark Evil Omen: globalwarmingpraiser: FYI the has been on the Libertarian Platform for years.

A Libertarian is what you are when you realize that the Federal government has no place bailing out people or businesses. But that peoples personal lives are not yours to manage. You know a good neighbor. you decide that it's okay for businesses to fark you, but it's not okay to protect yourself.

Yes because Libertarians are so against the idea of sueing for fraud.


If you really believe that fraud is the only - or the worst! - way that big business harms every worker and every consumer, then you are hopelessly deluded.

globalwarmingpraiser: Actually all businesses in the US passed their share of income taxes on to the consumer. It is how they pay them. TMYK.

Um, I think you missed the point that 2/3rds didn't pay any federal taxes.
The amount they would have passed on to their customers would have been zero.

globalwarmingpraiser: Actually all businesses in the US passed their share of income taxes on to the consumer. It is how they pay them. TMYK.

On second thought, I can't let this one slip by...

No, passing our share of income taxes on to the consumer isn't that cut and dry.

Let's say I own a company (because I do) and the government decides to raise my taxes. Can I "pass that cost" onto the customer?

Well, probably not.

You see, as a businessman, I don't charge 80% of what I think the market will bear - because that's not how businesses function. I charge exactly the highest price I can get for my products and services - and if I think I can get away with raising my prices, I would - government raising my taxes or not.

Seriously.

What the hell do you think my responsibility is to my investors?

Random Reality Check: globalwarmingpraiser: Actually all businesses in the US passed their share of income taxes on to the consumer. It is how they pay them. TMYK.

On second thought, I can't let this one slip by...

No, passing our share of income taxes on to the consumer isn't that cut and dry.

Let's say I own a company (because I do) and the government decides to raise my taxes. Can I "pass that cost" onto the customer?

Well, probably not.

You see, as a businessman, I don't charge 80% of what I think the market will bear - because that's not how businesses function. I charge exactly the highest price I can get for my products and services - and if I think I can get away with raising my prices, I would - government raising my taxes or not.

Seriously.

What the hell do you think my responsibility is to my investors?

Ok, was simplifying to the guy in the thread. If taxes are raised on you a business owner, then one of three things happens you have to either lower profits, hurting your investors, lay of an employee, hurting said employee, or raise prices. Any of these things hurts the individual. Is that better.

Duh.

globalwarmingpraiser: Ok, was simplifying to the guy in the thread. If taxes are raised on you a business owner, then one of three things happens you have to either lower profits, hurting your investors, lay of an employee, hurting said employee, or raise prices. Any of these things hurts the individual. Is that better.

If it funds a proper safety net and universal healthcare, it's by far worth the price.

Man On Fire: Won't happen. revolving doors and lobbyists.

Are you somehow implying that ultra-rich trans-national corporations love being fleeced by the public and if they aren't, they'll take their ball and go elsewhere?

Say it isn't so!

/the "free market" is a fantasy

RemyDuron: If it funds a proper safety net and universal healthcare, it's by far worth the price.

Then tax the individual to fund said safety net.

Hiding the true cost of government by making businesses into de facto tax collectors is one of the ultimate weasel moves of all time (at least until this particular Congress came along).

I want to see how much I'm really paying for my government whenever possible, not hidden somewhere in the price of everything I buy and every investment I make.

Gulper Eel: Then tax the individual to fund said safety net.

Aren't corporations considered people? Aren't they made up of people? We tax transfers of money, it's how it works, why should corporations be exempt?

Why did subby have to ?

Random Reality Check: Let's say I own a company (because I do) and the government decides to raise my taxes. Can I "pass that cost" onto the customer?

Well, probably not.

Read a phone bill? Ever?

The addition of taxes or surcharges, so long as they are approximately uniform across a sector of business and thus escapable, will often be accepted as an excuse for a price increase or surcharge if enough providers do it or there's little enough choice.

RemyDuron: globalwarmingpraiser: Ok, was simplifying to the guy in the thread. If taxes are raised on you a business owner, then one of three things happens you have to either lower profits, hurting your investors, lay of an employee, hurting said employee, or raise prices. Any of these things hurts the individual. Is that better.

If it funds a proper safety net and universal healthcare, it's by far worth the price.

1) Universal Healthcare is going to hurt everyone in the long term. This is due to the decrease in experimental treatments funded by Rich people.

2) Our safety net is in the end causing more problems than there were before the great society programs.

3) If you are taking earned money and giving to to those that have not earned it are you not in fact rewarding failure.

Bankrupt companies need to die. Propping up the sick candlestick maker only delays the inevitable and isn't fair to the light bulb company.

It's painful but it's the only way. The bankruptcy frees up resources for other enterprises.

Noone is too big to fail. Any attempt to cheat this rule will make things worse.

Bush was wrong. Obama is wrong. No politicians seem to understand this. It seems like the general population from parties do understand it.