Not going there. SYnapse must be trolling.

SYnapse - then why do all the Liberals around here always want to talk about how to take money away from some people (the "rich") to give to others, but never seem to want to focus on discussing improving oneself, starting a business, etc.?

As I have pointed out many times, most Liberals are extreme hypocrites...they live their lives one way, but aspouse different beliefs.

I'll bet you *do* want to grow your own wealth and not rely upon others...and then you look down your lonnnng nose at the "less fortunate" (code word...liberal speak for minorities) and say they can't make it on their own, can't possibly be expected to be self-reliant like you (white guy) are without a helping hand (i.e. redistributed wealth from conservative white guy).

So yes...some Liberals do want to grow wealth...and they don't seem to ever want to give it away (or else they would...) but they always have great ideas how to take other people money and spend it.

Thanks for playing.

@Draug - I don't think he is trolling at all. I think he, as are most Liberals, is deluded and of a split mind...there is the mind that views his own money/self/ambition in one way, and then there is his Liberal mind that views most others as helpess and in need of help from government redistribution.

He just doesn't realize he has these two minds...like a true schizophrenic.

Because they're not really Liberals.

SYnapse...you are not a true Liberal **in your personal life** most likely. You are probably fiscally responsible, self-reliant, proud enough to work hard and earn what you want, and be patient for the things you can't have. You know...like a Conservative. Most Liberals I know live a Conservative life style.

And then they start talking politics, and every other word is a scheme to dig in to the pockets of others, and speaks of government-reliance, and a complete absence of self-reliance.

It's truly fascinating...

And it's truly, amazingly, disgusting *BIGOTTED*.

I just want equal economic opportunity ie a lazy rich person shouldn't be able to stay rich, and an ambitious poor person shouldn't stay poor. If you leave everything unregulated that's exactly what happens - consolidation of wealth.

But then, SY, you aren't a liberal because Conservatives agree with that assessment of "lazy rich shouldn't stay rich and ambitious poor shouldn't stay poor". The difference is, a true free market doesn't consolidate wealth. IT takes government interference to do that. In a true free market, where you must buy everything, the rich person who does nothing with his money eventually spends it all and doesn't make more and the poor person who has ambition makes money and claws his way out of poverty.

Nope in a true free market I get rich, use my riches to stay rich and get richer, a minority achieve this and the inequality gap widens.

If you are using your riches, then you aren't lazy. You can't both actively use your riches to get richer and be lazy. They are polar opposites.

Why would a rich person give his money to a poor person who can't do him any favours? Better to help each other out in a clique. Better to advertise yourself than to make way for smaller businesses, better to buy them out than to favour competition. Better to fund research articles in favour of your product, better to reduce wages, better to cut costs, lower the quality of the product. This is what happens to a free profit based economy, and you're blind if you don't see it.

"f you are using your riches, then you aren't lazy."

I don't believe that there is any merit from earning profit, let's clarify. You can have trillions of dollars and have absolutely no merit. Let's replace lazy with immoral or detrimental. Like keeping inventions under wraps because you can make profit off the less innovative product for a while longer. Like selling polio vaccines instead of giving them to the public.

By the way, I am all for programs that help a person who *wants* to get ahead make that dream a reality. But government isn't required for those programs.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SCORE_Association

SCORE is a great non-government program designed to help new businesses get off the ground and get ahead. And venture capitalists would still be investing in ideas without the government.

Do we agree that the gap between rich and poor should not be too great?

Also do we both believe in a minimal standard of living? Ie people should not starve to death no matter what.

Actually, people should starve to death if they are capable of work and simply won't. If they are incapable or are trying to find work, then we should have a minimum standard of living (but it shouldn't be cushy, not should prison be, the workhouses of Dicken's day would probably be more along the lines of my view).

As far as the gap, this is a misnomer. I am in the top 20% of household incomes off my salary alone. I qualify as rich. I make just over 100k in salary. The bottom 20% average about 24k in income (either earned or handouts) right now. So 80k difference between my W-2 earnings and theirs. The problem isn't the gap between the defined "rich" and the defined "poor" (top 20% versus bottom 20%). The problem is the demotivating aspect of handouts in the form of "TV/cable" and "private apartments" and "appetizing food" and "designer clothes". Our prisoners even live high on the hog. Turn living on welfare and prison into something truly undesirable (basic sustenance and prison style jumpsuits with no entertainment) and you will see people pull themselves out of poverty.

The only exception to my view should be the handicapped, elderly, or children.

Now, should a person be trying to get work or be working but still not quite making it, that is where subsidies should kick in to make their life a little better than the workhouses. I've always been a fan of a 5 to 1 ratio. You get X dollars per year to live on. For every 5 dollars you make, we only take away 1 from the subsidy. So if you get say 10k per year to live on (requiring you to live in the workhouse most likely) then when you are making 25k per year, we still give you 5k. if you are making 40k, you still get an extra 2k subsidy. When you hit 50k you are on your own.

Or maybe make it 4 to 1, but give you the first 10k of earning without subsidy penalty. So make 10k and get the full subsidy, make 20k and get a 7.5k subsidy, 30k and get a 5k subsidy...

Both encourage people who can to go out and work.

There would, of course, be a separate set for handicapped, elderly, and children guaranteeing them a decent (not middle class, but private housing, TV, better than jumpsuit clothes and better than gruel food) but it would be closely monitored and stringently controlled to prevent abuse.

See, I believe that everyone has a naturalistic right to life, food, shelter, education. Regardless if they killed a thousand people.

I also believe that the gap between rich and poor should not be too high, as it will lead to civil disorder, "looters" and what have you. Work should be rewarded but at the moment it is not based on the merit of that work. Garbage disposal people are paid far less than footballers or lawyers. The markets estimate of their value is not proper as garbage people are much more necessary than footballers.

"See, I believe that everyone has a naturalistic right to life, food, shelter, education."

I believe every person also has a naturalistic RESPONSIBILITY to fend for themselves to the best of their ability.

Most Liberals also think this naturalistic right includes a cell phone, cable TV, enough spare cash for booze and cigarettes, etc. If the natural right meant "just enough to survive" then I might agree with you. But Liberals want to redistribute enough wealth to make the lazy *comfortable* based upon my wealth.....and yet so very few Liberals give enough of their own wealth the a) lift a poor person out of poverty while b) bringing themself down to that same level, because THAT would be fair, and they are all about fairness.

Thus, again, their lifestyle hypocrisy flied directly in the face of their states philosophy.

But I Am glad to see that despite his initial post, Synapse has turned full-on liberal just like I described – i.e. Liberals want to take from others, and that is his soul focus. His “natural rights” point doesn’t include “responsibility”…the Conservative has to remind him of that facet of living…

Thanks for playing, SYnapse...you proved me right yet again.

"See, I believe that everyone has a naturalistic right to life, food, shelter, education. Regardless if they killed a thousand people."

That is one key difference. I don't believe in natural rights like that. I believe we have what rights society gives us and, if we abuse society, society has a right to take them away, including life.

I do agree that the garbageman (or more importantly, the fireman, policeman, and EMT) should be paid more. But I don't believe the entertainers and sports stars should be paid less. They are paid what the market will bear for what entertainment value they bring to the table. But the key difference is I don't believe the garbageman brings more value than the athlete or the entertainer. I also don't believe the entertainer or the athlete brings more value than the garbageman. In fact, I don't believe there is a means to judge the value a person brings base don the job they do. So we must judge their compensation based on their monetary contribution and the skills/knowledge required to do the job. The top athlete brings tons of money to the team and the team owner via the fans and the advertising. He or she deserves every penny they make. I bring money to my employer because I have certain skills that few people have. I earn every penny I make. The garbageman does an essential job, but doesn't have a skillset that makes him worth what I am worth. So while he may be underpaid (depending on the municipality, some make pretty damned good money with the national average being 43k per year), he shouldn't be paid what the guy who lives down the street but has a specialized job that required him to go get an education and years of experience makes.

I believe we have what rights society gives us and, if we abuse society, society has a right to take them away, including life.

That would be true if a society was voluntary, and didn't swear you in when you were under the age of consent for other things like drinking. Also, we have signed many Acts which say opposite, in light of abuses of human rights in the past.

Ironically, what you said sounds very socialist. Society is bigger than the individual to you?

I don't think you should earn rights by trading them with responsibilities. That's not the meaning of rights. Rights mean that every person deserves those things, for being a human being, nothing else. Or even for simply being a living creature. Humans deserve not to be murdered because they have earned it by being humans. That's what I mean by a human right.

Society is bigger than the individual if the individual should trample other individuals. Society doesn't outrank the individual when the individual keeps to himself and chooses not to interact excessively with society. It's a balancing act, I readily admit. And one where my own views often sway from side to side somewhat. But I've always been a believer in personal responsibility and that society should not force the individual to contribute if they don't wish to.

So, I believe in the right to not be murdered, but not the right to have everything given to you without effort on your own part. If you chose to not participate in society, that is your right, but also your curse for society no longer is obliged to support you.

The problem is your school of thought has a sect of people which believe that individuals on the bottom rung deserve to be there, and therefore have no desire to help them. In truth, many are the victims of bad luck/birthrights/opportunities and would excel if someone gave them a chance.

If charity was done automatically, on impulse like in many Islamic countries, government wouldn't need to do it. But in our society you wouldn't stand a chance in hell of surviving off personal favours.

I don't think you should earn rights by trading them with responsibilities.

So tell me SYnapse, in your ridiculous Liberal Utopia...what happens when **everyone** decides to live the Life of SYnapse, and decides, "I have natural rights...and I'm going to exercise them...." and *everybody* stops working and just sits back and waits for their *rights* to roll in in the mail so they can cash them at the bank?

The problem with your fucked-up view of "rights" is that in order to YOU to have your rights, Draug and I have to go to work and pay taxes so you can be a worthless piece of shit, doing nothing and contributing nothing.

It's funny how Liberal "rights" always impose on others, and are never accompanied by a set of RESPONSIBILITIES.

Tell me SYnapse...exactly what is an individual responsible for? All you want to talk about is what he has a right to receive...but you never want to talk about what he is responsible to do. You validate my OP with every post, my friend.

I work and I live in Britain where it's not necessary, your argument is defunkt. I know people that personally live on benefit, so why do I work? To better myself, to earn more, etc etc. People will still do that in my utopia. I just believe the people who don't are entitled to a minimal standard of living.

In short "what happens when **everyone** decides to live the Life of SYnapse, and decides, "I have natural rights...and I'm going to exercise them...." and *everybody* stops working and just sits back and waits for their *rights* to roll in in the mail so they can cash them at the bank?" <- will never happen. People hate to be bored. Also I love the ad hominem.

"The problem is your school of thought has a sect of people which believe that individuals on the bottom rung deserve to be there,"

However said that? Conservative ideology wishes for *every* man to be wealthy. We want every man to have opportunity to exercise his own abilities and become successful. First and foremost, SYnapse, I want you wealthy because I want you to be a consumer, to participate in the economy, and maybe buy my product, just as I hope to buy your product, and thereby we all benefit.

When people are only takers...when they add no value to society...they only destroy wealth, and that hurts everyone.

You use the word "deserve" as if it is a moral judgement. If a Conservative were to use the word "deserve" in the context of someone's social-economic status, it would be in the sense that you "deserve" to be where you are if you have failed to properly apply yourself and improve your position in life.

Nobody promised the world would be equal in outcome. The funny thing is, no Liberal ever tries to make himself equal with anyone...they only want to take from one and give to another, and leave themselves out of the transaction.

SYnapse...there was no ad hominen in that, SYnapse. And I love the way you avoid the logic behind the question. That question takes your philosophy to the extreme to see if it holds water, and upon realizing that if everyone believed and lived by your philosophy, everyone would suffer and starve - thus demonstrating the failure of your philosophy - you essentially admit defeat, and demonstrate that you are wrong.

Thanks for playing.

"If charity was done automatically, on impulse like in many Islamic countries, government wouldn't need to do it. But in our society you wouldn't stand a chance in hell of surviving off personal favours. "

I say bullshit to this. Charity *does* happen in our society, but as long as the government keeps tasking money at virtual gunpoint, we'll never have a chance to know just how charitable people can be. The rich that don't give, often don't because the government treats them like shit and steals their money. Why should they donate voluntarily?

Your flaw in your logic is that you assume the status quo would be maintained even if the government stopped picking our pockets. I say we don't know that (and we don't) unless we give it a chance.