Bobcat1

Are you from Ferguson?

That is not a typical photo however. I have lots of guns and a bit of cash. I have never been inclined to take such a photo and I doubt that many people reading this forum have done so either. 
 
It means nothing by itself but it tends to show a bit less of the choir boy image that is being portrayed by some of Brown. In some ways it is the reverse of what is being done to the officer involved and to the police in general. It is taking something that in itself means nothing but one side or the other is using it as proof of guilt. 

So you have to have a previous criminal record before you can rob a convenience store?
 
And kids who are about to go to college do not commit crimes......
 
Good to know.....

media, council members, etc… ..alot of these guys were arrested days ago for doing their job out there.

ESO already hit it. 
 
A family that is making $25,000 a year for a family of four is living paycheck to paycheck. Heck, many families making $75,000 a year are living paycheck to paycheck. The only difference is the size of the home, the number of vehicles and the quality of food. They are still spending almost every dollar on expenses whether it is bologna or steak. 
 
So if we take a family making $25K and remove all taxes except what they spend, they will be taxed on 100% of their income as they are literally spending every dollar that they make. Even if you exempt some things as non taxable, they are still spending every dollar.
 
Now let's move up to that millionaire and every area has plenty of them. Let's say a family is making $1M a year. How much of that is being spend on goods (or services if that is taxed) and how much is being put in stocks, the bank and other such ventures where goods are not purchased? They might be spending $200K on actual goods so they are only taxed on 20% of their income. Instead of our current progressive tax where the more you make, the higher your tax rate, we would have a regressive tax where the more you make the less percentage you pay as it is not being spent on goods or services as the "fair tax" proponents want. 
 
Of course in our fantasy world we could start taxing savings accounts, 401Ks, IRAs, etc. I am not talking about your interest income from those which is taxable but merely deposits. That is the only way you are going to get those millionaires to pay their "fair share". But who will it hurt? So when that family making $25K a year finally saves $500 and decides to start putting some away..... oops!, they are hit with a 10% tax at the time of deposit so that $500 is not only $450. See how long it will take at 1% interest from banks to make up that loss from merely making a deposit. 
 
Simply put, there is no way that we can tax goods and/or services only and have it hurt the rich guy and not destroy the less fortunate. The very rich might make millions or even billions a year but you can bet they aren't spending that money. The poor family on the other hand is spending every cent. 

Huh? Factual? It's just one big long opinion.

Yep. It is great when a warning thread turns into a shining example. 

Hardcore conservatives and liberals have been brainwashed by their parties into thinking that their way is the only way. The staunchest of these groups go to the point of "defending" their side's belief at all costs, no matter how good a point the other side makes. At times, it's easier to resort to insults or changing the subject than it is to actually admit that the other guy made a good point or proved you wrong, and that's a common tactic on this site from people on both sides of the argument. Another mitigating factor is the sheer number of biased opinion pieces that are being passed off as factual in an attempt to create talking points. Again, people on both sides are guilty of posting misleading articles, which usually leads to one side rallying around the talking point, and the other side proving it false rather than discussing the point, which also leads to conflict. I much prefer general topics being introduced with discussion about the issue over fake news articles that are critical of one side or the other being used to misrepresent the truth.

This whole thing is crap. It was really fun now it's just dumb. Nobody post links for knowledge and info. Every post is bait. Big girl defend this. Eco. What's your take on this. Things have gotten so personal on this board it's all about let me show this poster up with this or that. Rather than bounce ideas. The last successful thread was probably, should teachers carry guns and the one on assault rifles. When you post a link and your first post is let's hear the libs/Republicans defend this. Your asking for a argument not a discussion that can go places.

I suggest both of you stop. Now.

I asked for this forum to be created after being contacted by Admin about complaints that the Locker Room had more politics that other issues and was turning into a one sided continual diatribe. For that reason the powers in control agreed to try a political forum so that at least there would be a non-political place to post other than sports issues (Locker Room) and someone could ignore politics by merely not viewing the forum. Apparently some people do not have that ability to draw themselves away from a train wreck however. 
 
This forum has degraded into the same topics over and over. Even the titles of many threads call out other members or the "other side". That alone should tell you that it isn't about an issue per se but in fanning the flames. Topics such as:
 
How we know Smitty is a low intelligence quotient human being
Big GIrl: your thoughts on unqualified supervisors
16 threads without a reply
Teabaggers hate main stream media...........
Big Girl, what do you think of this analogy
 
Other threads are continually posted about our side against your side like "low information voter" threads, Republicans/GOP are criminals or teabaggers are racists.
 
In my opinion an example valid political topic would be, should PAISD get a new bond after just passing one a few years ago or even Will Hillary run (but leaving out personal snipes). A person can easily give an opinion that PAISD does or does not need a bond without calling Obama poll numbers into it or mentioning race for the sake of mentioning race. You can answer that Hillary will run and be almost guaranteed a win or that she will likely opt out after not wanting to face examination of her time as Secretary of State or Benghazi issues. There is nothing wrong with either side if respectfully given.
 
If it was up to me, I would be deleting threads without the need for explanations that do nothing but post another opinion about one side or the other by posting a link from a politically slanted website that shows Dems/GOP are crooks, Obama lied, teabaggers anything, etc. Especially threads only call out one side or the other or are directed at an individual. If you want to flame, go to another website. There should be some valid political threads without all the silliness.  
  Not so long ago we almost lost all political posting from the Locker Room so this spin-off forum was created as sort of an experiment. It looks like the experiment is about to fail. If admin approves I will start deleting threads (probably a majority of ones created lately) and if people don't like it, they can move on to another website. There are plenty of places to post political opinions on the Internet. I would like the ability to discuss some issues if it can be done with respect and especially if it has some local issue even if it is a national story with local interest like the Keystone Pipeline.    If not, I think Admin will simply delete this forum and not allow any political issues in the Locker Room. 

Bump.  And also, knock off the name calling!  If you can't have a respectful conversation, don't post!!!

Because they can and nobody is willing to stop them.
By the way, the new forum title is too fitting. It's a shame that this is what this section of the forum has turned into. Thankfully, football season is almost here!

Wasn't she a big part of his foreign policy while she was Sec of State?

Some of these threads have gotten ridiculous and it hasn't been that way very long.

Most posters have been on here for a while but the posts have gotten child like only recently....hmmmm...wonder why?

What about smokers, drinkers and drug users? Should they be taxed?
 
What about boxers, MMA fighters, thrill seekers?
 
 
This subject is pretty silly.
 
Has this forum come to this kind of talk?

Is he still saying that there will  never be another team like Ozen and another coach like Boutte?

This board is going to be what you make of it.

I first started commenting on this board as a sophomore in high school. That was a little more than five years ago. At that time, we had posters who would make smitty look like Larry Sabato.

One was DickVitale, who I've already jokingly mentioned in this thread. You think Big girl is bad about reducing everything to racism? DickVitale was a Houston area basketball coach who thought that everyone whose favorite color wasn't black was racist. You don't like President Obama? Racist. You think taxes are too high? Racist. You think we spend too much? Racist. You agree with the war in Iraq? Racist. You like vanilla ice cream instead of chocolate? Racist. You're white? Racist. It didn't matter what it was, everything was a matter of race to him, and he would bring up his racial commentary in every single thread regardless of the subject over and over and over again, just like smitty and some of the others do with Benghazi and Cloward and Piven and whatever else.

And Dickie V wasn't alone. We had another poster called stang4life who was very much the same way. She was never as confrontational as DV, but she was an expert at provoking people via emotional manipulation. BlueDove liked to get on the bandwagon too; he was much more active on this part of the board then than he is now. DV's most serious internet ally, though, was a poster named SFA85. He accused us all of "hiding behind our mother's skirts" in our "lilly white neighborhoods" because we wouldn't meet him outside of the World Gym in Beaumont to settle things with our fists like he kept demanding. Just about every thread he commented in contained some kind of emasculating insult or physical threat.

You know what kept this board going at that time? Do you know why most of us stuck around? Because most of the people here recognized all of that for what it was and chose not to sink to their level. Hippy, and tvc, and westend, and bullets, and baddog and a handful of others called the crap where they saw it, and then got back to the topic of the thread. There wasn't any of the trolling you like to do. And do you know what happened? DV and SFA kept trying to push the envelope until they got themselves suspended and, at least in DV's case, eventually banned. stang4life found her little petty tactics less and less effective and one day finally decided to basically tell us all we were beneath her and she was leaving the board.

For about a year and a half after that, this board couldn't have been much better. You would come in here and find a dozen different threads with real discussions taking place - no threats, no insults, no irrelevant tangents about this news source or that special interest group. Just real discussion. Granted, the cycle eventually restarted itself when a guy named True Blue showed up, but the point is, the longer you choose to emulate their tactics, the longer you perpetuate this cycle. Instead of saying this board of "FUBAR" and choosing to help keep it that way, I think we'd all be better served if we stuck to the substance of the debates and didn't delve into this political pettiness.

This board has gotten boring.  I try to hang in and contribute, but in the end, it's just the same old recycled stuff.  

I agree
 
and I also can't stand when someone answers a question WITH ANOTHER QUESTION!
 
Example: Why did Bush go to Iraq?  
 
                Why does Obama want to rule the world?
 
Answer the question asked, then ask your question.