Forums | MacLife

From what I've seen - the complaints are largely:

A) Tax code that is far too complex
B) Increase in the percentage of Americans who don't pay any taxes, increase in the share of taxes paid by the higher tax brackets
C) Increased federal spending
D) Obama not keeping his promise about transparency, signing the stimulus before there was time for anyone to read it, let alone the time he promised in his campaign

Those seem to be the major objections.
And they are not giving republicans a pass either - they (the demonstrators) are pissed at both parties.

resedit wrote:

From what I've seen - the complaints are largely:

A) Tax code that is far too complex
B) Increase in the percentage of Americans who don't pay any taxes, increase in the share of taxes paid by the higher tax brackets
C) Increased federal spending
D) Obama not keeping his promise about transparency, signing the stimulus before there was time for anyone to read it, let alone the time he promised in his campaign

Those seem to be the major objections.
And they are not giving republicans a pass either - they (the demonstrators) are pissed at both parties.

+1

Before the rest of you dismiss this as a right wing conspiracy/event, you should know why they were protesting.
If any of you watched the Glen Beck special last night, this is pretty much what they told you. There was also a large push for the fair tax movement as well.
Furthermore, if you looked at Fox you would have seen a large number of American flags and people chanting USA. They aren't right or left wing, they are patriots. Compare this to some other protests that have that smurfing che flag and shirt everywhere.

Also compare which protest groups are demanding something from someone else, and which ones are demanding to be left alone. One has the che flags, and one sports the US flag.

Very rarely is there crossover.

Jdude wrote:

Before the rest of you dismiss this as a right wing conspiracy/event, you should know why they were protesting.
If any of you watched the Glen Beck special last night, this is pretty much what they told you. There was also a large push for the fair tax movement as well.

I have serious concerns for anyone who considers Glen Beck worth their time.

Furthermore, if you looked at Fox you would have seen a large number of American flags and people chanting USA. They aren't right or left wing, they are patriots. Compare this to some other protests that have that smurfing che flag and shirt everywhere.

Of course you would have!  FOX was a promoter for the event.  Do a bit of googling, and you'll see plenty of photos of signs and t-shirts comparing the president to Hitler or Mao, you'll see signs accusing others of marxism, socialism, and communism (and yes, signs identifying political rivals as 'traitors'). 

Also compare which protest groups are demanding something from someone else, and which ones are demanding to be left alone. One has the che flags, and one sports the US flag.

Very rarely is there crossover.

Oh I know!  Like "I want my country to stop sending troops to occupy foreign lands."  The nerve of some protesters!

What the hell is a "che flag," anyway?

A flag with the face of Che Guevara on it. Che was a a both a great and terrible man, a diplomat and an executioner, both idolized and reviled. His fans include Nelson Mandela & Jean Paul Sarte and his detractors include the Cuban exiles living here in the US.

Jdude wrote:

One should use all possible sources to develop their opinion. You dismiss Beck because you do not agree with him.]

You know less about me than you think you do.  I find 99% of the talking heads on the cable television shows to be completely useless--regardless of their political stripes.  Do you think I'd waste a second watching Keith Olbermann?   

You won't see those flags flown as a preferred style of government.

What does that have to do with my point?  So, 'tis patriotic to call for revolution, secession, or to identify political rivals as "communists," "marxists," "socialists," "fascists," etc. etc. etc.? 

Che gueverra. The red flag with the dude's face on it. Most often seen in shirt form. Socialist, murderer, tortured people who didn't agree with him. Real famous dude.

I know who Che is.  Why mention them?  Are you asserting that any protest not involving "patriots" necessarily involves large numbers of "Che flags?"  What contrast were you attempting to draw? 

I was just thinking yesterday about how annoyed some on 'the right' get by protesting--I was wondering if we'd eventually hear an argument trumpeting their protesting over that of others.

bratboy wrote:

Jdude wrote:

One should use all possible sources to develop their opinion. You dismiss Beck because you do not agree with him.]

You know less about me than you think you do.  I find 99% of the talking heads on the cable television shows to be completely useless--regardless of their political stripes.  Do you think I'd waste a second watching Keith Olbermann?   

You won't see those flags flown as a preferred style of government.

What does that have to do with my point?  So, 'tis patriotic to call for revolution, secession,

no, unless we were living under a Hugo Chavez or Mugabe government. Our legal and political systems work. There is no need for revolution in this country.Change, yes. Violent revolution, no.

or to identify political rivals as "communists," "marxists," "socialists," "fascists," etc. etc. etc.?

only if it is accurate and applies.

Che gueverra. The red flag with the dude's face on it. Most often seen in shirt form. Socialist, murderer, tortured people who didn't agree with him. Real famous dude.

I know who Che is.  Why mention them?  Are you asserting that any protest not involving "patriots" necessarily involves large numbers of "Che flags?"  What contrast were you attempting to draw?

The contrast as I see it is that these people protested for their nation. The guy who shot a few cops in oakland? The protests on his behalf were in front of the National socialist building and che flags were flown. That is the contrast I see. I know that this doesn't represent the whole side. But seriously - why celebrate the killing of cops by a multi time felon?

I was just thinking yesterday about how annoyed some on 'the right' get by protesting--I was wondering if we'd eventually hear an argument trumpeting their protesting over that of others.

Not from me. Everybody can protest as they wish, over any stupid thing they wish. But in the example I cited above, they sure as hell didn't win me over to their side. They pushed me further away.

The protests yesterday were for people who think the government is too large and that taxes are too high. Were I not already on their side, the message would have appealed to me for other reasons. How many cop killers do you think showed up to the tea party protest?

resedit wrote:

From what I've seen - the complaints are largely:


B) Increase in the percentage of Americans who don't pay any taxes, increase in the share of taxes paid by the higher tax brackets

Who doesn't pay any taxes?

iSeamas wrote:

I have a friend who was out teabagging yesterday.

He's all up in arms about Obama.

He works for AIG, and was 100% for the AIG bailout.
(but against all other bailouts of course)


Odd that the vast majority of these protesters are going after Obama whe he is going them a tax CUT.

Or are we to assume that all these teabaggers are earning over $250K per year?

There have been people upset about taxes and size of government since, well, taxes and government existed.

But were there "tea party" protests when Bush initiated the bailouts? When he launched No Child Left Behind? The PATRIOT Act? When he instituted tax cuts that favored the wealthy and pushed the payments to everyone's children?
No, no there weren't.
One of the alleged triggers of this "populist uprising" was Santelli's prescripted rant against giving aid to mortgage holders.
Yes, you heard that right. A supposed populist movement was NOT started when vast amounts of money was sent to the banking institutes but when Obama proposed using some money to help the people.

It's terribly obvious to me that the genuine long-time anger of a lot of people is being used by right-wing think tanks to try to protect the moneyed elite.

Last edited by Tallgeese (2009-04-16 10:01 am)

Tallgeese wrote:

It's terribly obvious to me that the genuine long-time anger of a lot of people is being used by right-wing think tanks to try to protect the moneyed elite.

Bingo.

I saw a photo today of a poster from an event which read something like "A 3% tax increase for the wealthiest 5% equals 100% tyranny."

Really.

Just heard a spot on the local news with a woman who was protesting because she thinks that illegal immigrants are the reason her taxes are so high.

Also,

I came across this humorous editorial, noting that some of those are identifying Obama as a "fascist" (and yet also a "communist") are at the same time apparently allying themselves with "right wing extremists."  This again goes back to the DHS report, and how pundits on the right are now proclaiming that their friends are under surveillance:

Rewind to Tuesday morning: a Homeland Security report covering potential threats from "right wing extremist" groups, including militias, white supremacists and neo-Nazis, was obtained by talk show host Roger Hedgecock. And, predictably, the gang who can't seem to decipher basic high school level social studies concepts, kneejerked into one of their paranoid tantrums -- insisting that the report was entirely about them.

Almost right away, the far-right blogs and FOX News Channel were set ablaze with reports that the Obama administration was targeting conservatives with a massive surveillance operation. But here's the thing: the DHS report wasn't about conservatives. The word "conservatives" doesn't appear anywhere in the report. It was all about radical domestic terrorist groups who happen to subscribe to outlandish ideologies well beyond the mainstream of political discourse. Notwithstanding this very clear distinction, Malkin and the broader wingnutosphere lost their collective shpadoinkle and insisted the DHS was targeting the mainstream tea baggers.

Now, when this story first broke, I was at a bit of loss as to how to accurately interpret the right's wildly conspiratorial, victimized reaction. Either Malkin and Beck were just as confused and incoherent as always, and, in their loud noises anti-government rage, they were inadvertently coupling themselves with right wing extremists. Or they not-so-subtly admitted that there isn't much difference between a garden variety conservative, a garden variety wingnut and a garden variety right wing extremist -- that they're all basically militant racists who are plotting to blow up federal buildings. I don't know.

There's one thing we know for sure, however: they're definitely freaked out about the government's post-9/11 intelligence apparatus -- the very same bureaucracy they actively and vocally cheerlead throughout the Bush years. Malkin, in particular, was one of the most outspoken and cheerleadery endorsers of allowing unchecked executive power via the vice president's office, the NSA, the CIA and the military, while encouraging these agencies to use any means necessary to smoke out the evildoers. This included illegal wiretapping, rendition, suspension of habeas rights and every awful provision found within the USA PATRIOT Act.

Yet in light of this DHS report, Malkin seems to believe that the government might be spying on people. Her people. "Right wing extremists."

So they're suddenly worried about privacy are they? Whatever happened to Rush Limbaugh's maxim: "Our civil liberties are worthless if we are dead!" Or Senator Big John Cornyn's words of wisdom: "None of your civil liberties matter much after you're dead."

Link.

Last edited by bratboy (2009-04-16 10:39 am)

Would you prefer Clinton's cigar?

But not nearly as 'bi'-partisan
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.p … teabagging
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.p … =teabagger