[quote=gandalf]I rather liked “Brain-dead GOP zombie fuck-bots”…
But anyway, the Chinaman is not the issue here.
You are correct, and I agree, the union criticism is accurate, there is widespread corruption, not paying into pensions, etc. It does need to get fixed, and now is rather a good time to fix it. We should all have a debate. A good one with facts. I’m actually okay with a balanced discussion of union pension issues.
One of the best examples I can think of is right here in town with the City of San Diego, City employee union, illicit deals to increase benefits, and that got moved through via Republicans mainly, which is hilarious because you don’t hear the zombie GOP fuck-bots criticizing the local GOP for their role in orchestrating these sweetheart union deals for City employees. It’s all about democrats and school teachers in Wisconsin…
But back to my point, which is in fact the larger point, one of proportion, measuring the cost of the bubble in raw dollars — and the cost of the financial crisis dwarfs anything related to union benefits. Hell, it CAUSED the pension bust. Nothing even remotely compares with what happened with finance, insurance and real estate businesses during the bubble, the deregulation, the massive fraud, the leveraging, and the subsequent bust and bailouts. The financial crisis is infinitely more important than pension issues and teacher’s unions, in no small part because it caused the pension issues.
But, I digress! The OP topic was originally about an article about corporate tax evasion. That was the original topic, until it got thread-sharked by brain-dead GOP zombie fuck-bots complaining about democrats and unions…
In a better world, I think this thread could have been a very reasonable fact-based non-partisan discussion on economics and U.S. tax policy, and the gigantic amount of tax avoidance occurring with large multinational corporations.[/quote]
Gandalf: I personally always liked “mindless GOP sheep-fuckers”, but, yeah, the “brain-dead GOP zombie fuck-bots” also has a certain panache to it. Of course, I’m a fucking Raiders fan, so what do I know?
I completely agree in terms of proportion. What Wall Street and the banksters have perpetrated in terms of a fraud on the American people is unprecedented in our history. But it also begs the question: Where the hell are the true Progressives, in the mold of Teddy Roosevelt, to go after these bastards? The sad fact is there is no one in government, from the president on down, willing to take these guys to task.
Which underscores another sad fact: That we, the American people, are getting screwed by our elected officials on BOTH sides of the aisle, and its been going on for years.
I’d also opine that the old saying, “Tax evasion is a crime, tax avoidance is a Constitutionally guaranteed right” holds as true today as ever and what we truly need in this country is real, and effective, tax reform.
