Stephen Trapani wrote:
jeff wrote:
Stephen Trapani wrote:
jeff wrote:
Stephen Trapani wrote:
jeff wrote:
Stephen Trapani wrote:
jeff wrote:


Think about what you're saying. Cheney, who was selected by Bush
as his running mate, so badly wanted to be *vice-president* that
he surreptitiously promised to sacrifice the well being of the
country so these companies could make billions and billions of
dollars in profits.

No. He did it out of habit. It's the system he knows, the people
he trusts. It just turns out that his friends, relatives,
associates etc. are the ones who make money.

So anyone with a habit of taking such huge risk

What risk? I'd bet that Cheney could reveal the identity of a
secret agent just for political purposes and get away with it!

So you think massive corruption worth billions isn't much of a risk.
I see.

When you make the rules, the risks are minimal. When your
chief-of-staff will take the fall, the risks are minimal. And for
billions of dollars, the risks are acceptable. If you're connected
enough, the SEC doesn't bother to investigate when you dump stock a
few weeks before announcing major losses. Only a few ever get
punished - that's only when the crimes are in the Enron scale.

In my lifetime, Nixon has gotten in criminal trouble he couldn't get
himself out of, so has Clinton,

Really, I thought Clinton was "acquitted."

and so have about fifteen Congressmen
that I can recall. All for offenses that pale in comparison to the
supposed corruption we're discussing here.

Well frankly, I wasn't discussing anything specific here. You seem to
be defending some Cheney/Halliburton crimes.

But yes, I would say that if the truth was told it would reveal issues
that are far worse than a blow job. But its hard to call it all
"corruption" in the traditional sense. For instance, the current credit
crisis was caused by relaxing the rules and ignoring all the signs. Was
that criminal? Maybe a few will take the fall but most of the guilty
have pocketed the cash and are free.


I'm not sure why you think they are all above the law. I mean, back in
the seventies I used to believe the whole trilateral commission/ rich
people ruling the world stuff. But upon further thought and observation
it just doesn't wash.

Odd, I was skeptical at the time, but now I'm more of a believer.
However, I'm not claiming it a global conspiracy, I'm claiming just the
opposite: the system works differently for those at the top. Its like
the old SNL skit with Eddie Murphy disguised as a white man who finds
everything is free for him.



to do so much for the people he loves

Omigod! You're pouring it so thick!

No, this is your theory. You're saying he's doing it for his friends.
He must love them or really really like them, or what? Why is he
doing this then if it's not love?

Oh, I thought you were claiming he (or "they" in general) do it "for
love of country." No, as I said, favors are given because that's the
way the system works. Give someone from a well connected family a
small stake in a business, perhaps a baseball team, and suddenly a
stadium is built with public funds. Out of love? No, that's
something you keep bringing up. Its a way of life.

Ah, so now you're saying Cheney got his payback *before* he was VP.

I'm not saying there was any specific payback. You're the one who's
insisting there can't be anything fishy unless you can find a specific
payback.

When he acquired the shares of Halliburton, the Bush/Cheney ticket
wasn't even a gleam in anyone's eye. Cheney certainly wasn't on the fast
track to any big position of power at the time, so in order for your
theory to make sense,

My theory? What's my theory?

And Cheney already had a "big position," he had been the Secretary of
Defense, before that the Minority Whip. If you go through all the
records you find a number of links between the Bush family, Halliburton,
Dresser and Kellogg (KBR). Cheney has a nice nest egg, perhaps $30-100
million from his tenure at Halliburton, he has no need of a financial
"payback."

tens of thousands of never was's are being groomed
and paid large amounts just in case they end up as vice-president.
That's the only way it could work, right?s

Sorry, this gibberish has nothing to do with what I'm saying. Cheney
was picked as VP because he was a Bush family friend who could be
trusted to play the game the "Bush" way.


Like, no one could have known, say, six years ago, the position Obama
would be in now, but just in case, him and many others like him are
being given favors and whatever, *large* favors, worth billions, just in
case. Have I got that right?

Only in your warped view of the world. Why are you claiming that the
only explanation for the Halliburton scandal is that years earlier
someone was groomed to be in the position. How about, Cheney showed as
minority whip that he could do a good job as the elder Bush's Secretary
of Defense. Then Halliburton decided that a former Secretary of Defense
who ran the First Gulf War, and had fed them lots of business, might be
useful as a CEO. Then he happens to buy Dresser (Bush's grand daddy
just happened to be a director and daddy worked there) and so on. Then
Halliburton gets massive no-bid contracts and Cheney ends up worth $100
million. Now, I'm not claiming there was a conspiracy here, or even
that there was anything illegal (though I'm guessing there was), I'm
only claiming things seemed to work out very nicely for Mr. Cheney.
Perhaps the stockholders of Halliburton's competition don't see it the
same way. Perhaps the US public doesn't think they got their money's
worth. But it worked out just fine for Cheney and his friends.


No, he's just dealing in the world he helped create. You're trying to
base an argument on "rich people would never commit a crime because
they have too much to loose."

No, my argument is that the logistics of your scenario (which BTW
qualifies as a giant conspiracy, terminology-wise) doesn't make sense.

I've said its not a conspiracy, its a way of life.

The money/favor trail would be too easy to trace and there are too many

and why does there have to be a trail? The SEC investigation against
Bush from his Harken Oil days never quite happened. Does there need to
be a trail?

rabid reporter types out there who are searching for such money trails,
many of them on Cheney himself, right this minute, I'm sure.

And they will never find it. However, his Chief-of-Staff was convicted
- that should say something.


Most of the conspiracy theorists who investigate start realizing this so
they stop proposing that guys like Cheney are doing it for themselves
and suggest they are doing it for someone else, which makes even less
sense, as I've explained previously.

Actually, they probably think its the right thing to do. Nixon always
thought he was doing the right thing.

No, *you* are the one who said things are the same as they've been
for thousands of years before democracy existed.

Not exactly the same, obviously, but unchanged in many ways.

Perhaps you should read a basic history book.

Been there, done that.

but you failed to take George Santayana's advice


Read about the Patricians and Plebeians in ancient Rome. Even after
centuries of fighting when the Plebeians were given equal rights, the
wealthy families ruled. All that really changed was that Plebeians
could rise to power as the old Patrician families died out.

That system, of course, was not a liberal democracy, like ours.

Really? In some ways it was more liberal. I thought it was interest
that there were two Consuls, one Patrician and one Plebeian. Can you
imagine two co-presidents, one Republican and one Democrat?


Whether the common folk have right stamped on bronze tablets, or
written in the Magna Carta or the Constitution doesn't change the fact
that the rich and powerful are rich and powerful.

Yes, well, a free economy *should* reward those who do more to earn
more, shouldn't it? I mean if I discover the cure for cancer, shouldn't
I be able to make lots of money and live in the lap of luxury? We want a
society like that don't we? For god's sake, let's make even more of a
reward for the guy who discovers the cure for cancer, and the guy who
builds me a reasonably priced car that runs on water, and the guy who
makes great Chinese food within fifteen minutes of my home! Don't you
agree?

Ah, so that should include being able to break, bend, or bypass any law?

I don't mind that they have money, and I expect them to lobby to keep
more. However, they tend to cross the line on occasion.


The children of the wealthy get their "youthful excesses" expunged,
while the same violation means 15 years for others. One could go on
all day on this theme, but only a fool believes the rich and poor
are really equal under the law.

Well, the average rich individual supports many many times more of
the governments expenses than the average poor person. You know that,
right?

Well duh, they enjoy a privileged position.

They even pay a larger percentage of their income. Did you know that?

That is one of the myths that Rush loves to spout, but it simply is
not true. If you think I'm wrong, bring it on!

No point in arguing about that, the point is that they pay way way more
per person than poor people. At least you're not arguing with that.

Lots of poor people pay almost nothing, because they have almost
nothing. Its hard to make a government work based on what the poorest
people can contribute.


They do have ways of making it less, but it's still way way more than
the poor guy. Like, say, a million dollars compared to five thousand.

Do you have a point here? Because someone just getting by only pays
$5K in taxes, someone else making millions should only pay $5K?

Well, I'm not saying they should pay the same, I am saying they are
contributing way way more, financially, to our society/govt already,
they don't use that much more than any one else without paying for it
and I don't understand why this inequity is not taken into consideration
by the left.

Very strange argument you're making. You're saying that the person who
makes 700K a year doesn't use 10 times the services as the person who
make 70K a year, so why should he pay 10 times the taxes? Interesting
argument, but its hard to really put a dollar value on very safe
communities, high quality health care and education, etc. Is it worth
10 times as much? But more to the point, is it worth it to invest 10
times as much in the future society to to ensure that your children have
a safe society?


It looks a lot like people who want to do more for the poor, but not
themselves, they want someone else to pay for it. This is morally
inferior, not morally superior.

Ah, its the fault of the poor! Every criticism of conservatives is
answered by "its the lefty commies who hate America and want to give
everything to the poor!" Yes, only the rich know how to live properly.



It's very easy to see this as unfair, especially if the rich person
worked hard for his money. He isn't using any more of the government
than the poor person.

Oh, really??? What color is the sky in your world, Steve?

So he needs more police protection, he drives more on federal roads, he
uses more what? And while you're at it, explain how he uses 200 times
more free federal government services than the poor guy.

I don't know any rich person who would trade places with a poor person
so he could pay less in taxes. I don't know who your hypothetical
people are - the truly poor get very little, they can't use roads, the
can't get health insurance, they can't get medications, and so on. But
if you're comparing to the lower middle class, which is beginning to
pay, by percentage, at a level close to rich, them you're comparing to
someone whose income is at the $10 million (or more) a year level. This
seems like a pretty extreme case. But, even so, the super rich who live
in my town seem quite happy to pay the property tax on a $10 million
house, even though its probably 50 times the national average.




Why is he having to pay so much more? Why do you resent him being
able to decrease it?

Did I say I resent it? Frankly, I benefit from it! Everyone has a
right to lobby for their position. The question is, why do the
conservatives love to make up nonsense to support their positions?
The answer is, their policies only benefit to top few percent, so they
need issues like gay marriage to win elections!

The policy of reducing taxes for those who earn more is supposed to
benefit the economy by creating more incentive to make more business.
Doesn't that make any sense?

Trickle down? VooDoo economics? Its certainly appreciated by rich
people, but its never been shown to work. Perhaps it made more sense
when the marginal tax rate on the super rich was extremely high, but
lowering their effective rate from 27% to 22% didn't help the common
folk that much.

So, okay, you think democracy has helped the average person, but not
much.

I'm not trying to quantify anything. Democracy has made a profound
difference. But the rich and powerful are still rich and powerful.

Right, they create more, earn more because of the value they create, and
can spend more. This is the best system anyone has thought of so far.

And you think it would be even better if the laws did not apply to the rich?

But to deduce from this that Cheney is part of some massive conspiracy
doesn't wash.

Omigod! There's a massive conspiracy? I'll bet you think the
Democratic Party is massive conspiracy to steal the country and give it
to the poor!