US tea party

[bush_cheney2004]

It's sickening how U.S. conservative and religious media reinvent their own history to suit their present day needs, and the Tea Party protests are just the latest manifestation....

Irony and comedy in one post....a royal Canadian opining what is sickening about Americans invoking their own history in any way they choose.

[ironstone]

Yes, having reporters out there taking the side of the people at the tea party...very balanced....

And the CNN reporter didn't show enormous bias?

[Carinthia]

I don't know about Boston, but there were 15,000 - 20,000 people in Atlanta's, which isn't bad considering it was held in the evening, when most people just want to relax after work.

Keith Olbermann said that the Atlanta Police reported there were about 5000 who showed up. Considering the fact that I can't find any credible news site that is reporting that 15,000 to 20,000 showed up, I would think this to be the truth. If their were huge numbers who turned out anywhere across the country, you can bet Fox would have reveled in reporting it. They haven't. It was a wash out.

If you have a credible, unbiased, and non blog link to the story that 15,000 or more turned out I would be interested in seeing it.

[Carinthia]

And the CNN reporter didn't show enormous bias?

The man she was trying to interview shouted her down and would not answer her question about the fact that Americans are now eligible to receive a $400 rebate. They were protesting tax laws implemented by the Republicans. Doh!

Shouting everybody down is the Republican way, unless they are being interviewed on Fox News because nobody there asks the tough questions. Desperadoes!

[WIP]

Irony and comedy in one post....a royal Canadian opining what is sickening about Americans invoking their own history in any way they choose.

But you can't deny it because you may have read about the Boston Tea Party when you were in highschool, and you know that your conservative friends are trying to re-invent American history on this and other issues.

[bush_cheney2004]

But you can't deny it because you may have read about the Boston Tea Party when you were in highschool, and you know that your conservative friends are trying to re-invent American history on this and other issues.

Nope.....Boston Tea Party would have been part of the history curriculum way before "high school". My conservative "friends" are free to do whatever they wish to garner publicity for their cause, as do my liberal "friends".

Neither have to worry about wannabe criticism from across the border, because the event has been invoked at other times in other countries no less:

The Boston Tea Party has often been referenced in other political protests. When Mohandas K. Gandhi led a mass burning of Indian registration cards in South Africa in 1908, a British newspaper compared the event to the Boston Tea Party.[62] When Gandhi met with the British viceroy in 1930 after the Indian salt protest campaign, Gandhi took some duty-free salt from his shawl and said, with a smile, that the salt was "to remind us of the famous Boston Tea Party."[63]

American activists from a variety of political viewpoints have invoked the Tea Party as a symbol of protest. In 1973, on the 200th anniversary of the Tea Party, a mass meeting at Faneuil Hall called for the impeachment of President Richard Nixon and protested oil companies in the ongoing oil crisis. Afterwards, protesters boarded a replica ship in Boston Harbor, hanged Nixon in effigy, and dumped several empty oil drums into the harbor.[64] In 1998, two conservative US Congressmen put the federal tax code into a chest marked "tea" and dumped it into the harbor. [65]

In 2006, a libertarian political party called the "Boston Tea Party" was founded. In early 2009, a series of citizen gatherings called "Tea Parties" began to protest recent government spending under the Obama administration, such as the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.[66][67][68]

Source: Wiki

[Shakeyhands]

Irony and comedy in one post....a royal Canadian opining what is sickening about Americans invoking their own history in any way they choose.

I don't get why you don't stick to American forums BC, you stated time and time again you feel we shouldn't worry about what happenss down there, why not go post somewhere else? I just don't get why you continue to post here.

[WIP]

Nope.....Boston Tea Party would have been part of the history curriculum way before "high school". My conservative "friends" are free to do whatever they wish to garner publicity for their cause, as do my liberal "friends".

Neither have to worry about wannabe criticism from across the border, because the event has been invoked at other times in other countries no less:

I don't care if they historical events to back their causes; the problem is misrepresenting the actual historical events that they are referring to. Actually, from you list, it seems that Gandhi was the only one who made a legitimate comparison with the Boston Tea Party, since it was the same British East India Company that was given tax advantages to give them a tea monopoly, also was given a monopoly of the salt production and trade in India.

[bush_cheney2004]

I don't get why you don't stick to American forums BC, you stated time and time again you feel we shouldn't worry about what happenss down there, why not go post somewhere else? I just don't get why you continue to post here.

I've already answered that question several times, and it doesn't matter anyway. Try as you might to chase this annoying American pain-in-the-ass away, I would still be here in the spirit of every pitiful post that depends on the USA for not only reference and substance, but for the very definition of what Canada is or wants to be.

Why do you still post here?

[bush_cheney2004]

I don't care if they historical events to back their causes...

Of course you don't care....or know of such previous reprises of the Boston Tea Party. It was a seminal event in American history, and it is understandable how/why you just can't relate to repeated representations for political gain.

[JerrySeinfeld]

The man she was trying to interview shouted her down and would not answer her question about the fact that Americans are now eligible to receive a $400 rebate. They were protesting tax laws implemented by the Republicans. Doh!

Shouting everybody down is the Republican way, unless they are being interviewed on Fox News because nobody there asks the tough questions. Desperadoes!

Excuse me? What vid were YOU watching?

She asked him a question and then when he tried to answer it, she interrupted him and shouted HIM down. She refused to let him answer the question.

[WIP]

Of course you don't care....or know of such previous reprises of the Boston Tea Party. It was a seminal event in American history, and it is understandable how/why you just can't relate to repeated representations for political gain.

Nice! You lose your argument, so the only alternative is to parse a quote to change the meaning and turn it into a straw man argument. Is this what they're teaching you at your local Rush Room?

[bush_cheney2004]

Nice! You lose your argument, so the only alternative is to parse a quote to change the meaning and turn it into a straw man argument. Is this what they're teaching you at your local Rush Room?

No, they are "teaching" that whatever raises the hackles of royal wannabes has to be a good thing.

Time for tea.....

[Shakeyhands]

I've already answered that question several times, and it doesn't matter anyway. Try as you might to chase this annoying American pain-in-the-ass away, I would still be here in the spirit of every pitiful post that depends on the USA for not only reference and substance, but for the very definition of what Canada is or wants to be.

Why do you still post here?

Oh.... I see. Where have you answered it? I'll take a look.

[BubberMiley]

...the only alternative is to parse a quote to change the meaning and turn it into a straw man argument.

This is funniest when they actually believe they're presenting a rational and coherent argument.

[Metal Jam]

I can't imagine why anyone would champion high taxation and deep spending.

Considering the deficit from the previous administration was already steep, with what wisdom did Congress draw upon to spend trillions more?

I shake my head

[punked]

I can't imagine why anyone would champion high taxation and deep spending.

Considering the deficit from the previous administration was already steep, with what wisdom did Congress draw upon to spend trillions more?

I shake my head

Better then the Republican model of no one but the poor pay taxes and still have deep spending.

[JerrySeinfeld]

Better then the Republican model of no one but the poor pay taxes and still have deep spending.

What the hell are you smoking?

10,000 new yorkers pay for over 70% of that city's budget.

The richest 2 percent of the US pays for virtually the entire federal budget.

[Shakeyhands]

What the hell are you smoking?

10,000 new yorkers pay for over 70% of that city's budget.

The richest 2 percent of the US pays for virtually the entire federal budget.

cite?

[punked]

What the hell are you smoking?

10,000 new yorkers pay for over 70% of that city's budget.

The richest 2 percent of the US pays for virtually the entire federal budget.

No one paid the federal budget with Bush. You have to tax someone to pay for the stuff.

[Metal Jam]

It is better to leave silly things unfunded, then it is to raise taxes. Some good ideas are to eliminate failed programs, simplify the tax code, adopt a flat rate sales tax to replace the federal income tax. Oh right - and limit spending to something sustainable.

[punked]

It is better to leave silly things unfunded, then it is to raise taxes. Some good ideas are to eliminate failed programs, simplify the tax code, adopt a flat rate sales tax to replace the federal income tax. Oh right - and limit spending to something sustainable.

You mean all things Obama has promised? Good glade we cleared that up.

[WIP]

What the hell are you smoking?

10,000 new yorkers pay for over 70% of that city's budget.

The richest 2 percent of the US pays for virtually the entire federal budget.

And so they should! Although one of the objections that U.S. progressives make is that all of the tax talk is about income tax. When it comes to payroll taxes and social security taxes, the rich are not paying the bill -- it's the middle class.

The top 2% of income earners have a large onus of blame for the dismal state the U.S. economy is in today - producing funny money schemes instead of actual manufactured products. These are the people who have had leadership roles in the private sector economy. New York has benefited from the ridiculous growth of the financial services sector over the last 20 years or so; but this growth - reaching 21% of total U.S. GDP - occurred at the same time that manufacturing shrank to 12% of GDP, largely from outsourcing the making of real, actual products to countries like China and India.

Much of the growth in wealth on Wall Street (not including the phony wealth bubble created by new derivative investments) came directly from the sharp rise in stock values of blue chip companies that improved the bottom line by sending their manufacturing overseas to lower their production costs. That may have helped Wall Street, but what did it do for Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, North Carolina? How were they helped by free trade and lower income taxes and estate taxes over the Bush years?

The hollowing out of manufacturing is slowly turning the U.S. (and we have the same trend up here) into something resembling most third world countries -- where there are a few filthy rich people running the economy, and controlling the government, a not much larger middle class, and a vast underclass of poor people who provide cheap labour if they work at all. So how much should those richest 2% be paying for destroying the middle class through their selfish greed and shortsighted policies?

[JerrySeinfeld]

Huh?

The richest 2% are the ones who invest capital and create manufacturing jobs.

Obama's tax increases directly penalize small business owners who earn over $250,000 per year, which in turn discourages investment and the commensurate jobs it creates.

And instead what we get in place is a huge increase in government spending (an unprecedented $12 TRILLION - with a "T"), and it's commensurate bloated buraeucracies and their useless unproductive inefficient employees.

Great. Annex the economy as a government program, crowd out efficient private allocation of capital and turn the USA (the world's greatest economic engine) into Scotland, where 75% of the GDP is government spending and suckling government teet is a national pastime.

Meantime we'll apologize to theocratic holocaust deniers and shake hands with communist dictators.

YAY Obama!

Edited April 21, 2009 by JerrySeinfeld

[WIP]

Huh?

The richest 2% are the ones who invest capital and create manufacturing jobs.

And how many manufacturing jobs are they creating? Within the United States that is!

Obama's tax increases directly penalize small business owners who earn over $250,000 per year, which in turn discourages investment and the commensurate jobs it creates.

So, allowing the Bush tax cuts to expire, and resuming the tax rate on income OVER 250,000 is going to kill small business? Anyone else believe this besides you and Joe the unlicensed plumber?

And instead what we get in place is a huge increase in government spending (an unprecedented $12 TRILLION - with a "T"), and it's commensurate bloated buraeucracies and their useless unproductive inefficient employees.

Your debt problems won't be solved until Obama or some future president starts to dismantle the U.S. industrial-military complex of maintaining hundreds of foreign and military bases and buying billions of dollars worth of new gadgets for war that have consistently taken over half of your tax dollars over the years through times of peace and times of war. And it may come involuntarily like it did to Russia, when a collapsing economy forced them to abandon their empire.