Comments on: At Berkeley, Leftists And Unions Unwittingly Face Off http://www.eastbayconservative.com/2009/11/23/at-berkeley-leftists-and-unions-unwittingly-face-off/ Words from a Non-Leftist Tue, 27 Apr 2010 21:31:08 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 hourly 1 By: MacMarion http://www.eastbayconservative.com/2009/11/23/at-berkeley-leftists-and-unions-unwittingly-face-off/comment-page-1/#comment-3622 MacMarion Tue, 23 Feb 2010 02:39:42 +0000 http://www.eastbayconservative.com/?p=235#comment-3622 Again, James you just read the blog and you still don't get it. Taxation is theft. The government steals from the rich (40% of taxes come from the richest 1% of our population) and gives to the undeserving. Our society can't afford to pay for everything everyone wants. That's why capitalism works and socialism doesn't. We each need to pay our own way. Again, James you just read the blog and you still don’t get it. Taxation is theft. The government steals from the rich (40% of taxes come from the richest 1% of our population) and gives to the undeserving. Our society can’t afford to pay for everything everyone wants. That’s why capitalism works and socialism doesn’t. We each need to pay our own way.

]]> By: Mark Ross http://www.eastbayconservative.com/2009/11/23/at-berkeley-leftists-and-unions-unwittingly-face-off/comment-page-1/#comment-3544 Mark Ross Thu, 26 Nov 2009 18:43:40 +0000 http://www.eastbayconservative.com/?p=235#comment-3544 Dear James R, I was present when Milton Friedman agreed with you. The University of California is another of his examples of Robin Hood in reverse (much like Social Security). Poor people pay sales tax, part of which goes to an "exalted" institution of "higher" learning that they will never attend. Benefits to all of society? UC is way overrated. Personal freedom is much more productive in a grand "social" sense than an indoctrination center on steroids. On the other hand... the villains who get to dispose of the taxes that are stolen from the rest of us haven't a clue as to where it would do the most "benefit." Dear James R,
I was present when Milton Friedman agreed with you. The University of California is another of his examples of Robin Hood in reverse (much like Social Security). Poor people pay sales tax, part of which goes to an “exalted” institution of “higher” learning that they will never attend. Benefits to all of society? UC is way overrated. Personal freedom is much more productive in a grand “social” sense than an indoctrination center on steroids. On the other hand… the villains who get to dispose of the taxes that are stolen from the rest of us haven’t a clue as to where it would do the most “benefit.”

]]> By: James R http://www.eastbayconservative.com/2009/11/23/at-berkeley-leftists-and-unions-unwittingly-face-off/comment-page-1/#comment-3543 James R Thu, 26 Nov 2009 01:23:51 +0000 http://www.eastbayconservative.com/?p=235#comment-3543 "The state has bankrupted itself paying for education for the bottom rung of society"? "Cut funding for the poor and the stupid"?! Good golly, it leaves the imagination little work to do in figuring out just what "investments" you think the government should be making. What ROI do you think can be expected from 'investing' in the education of those who would have likely paid for it anyway? Or are transfer payments to the upper middle class your idea of social justice? I'm sure it makes you feel better to think of the poor as stupid, the implication being that you - the rich, presumably - are smart and not simply lucky. A convenient argument to salve the souls of the guilty and justify an arbitrary oligarchy in which you find yourself (even more arbitrarily) at the top. Others consider the poor a health meter of society, a meter which is dangerously low these days. We, as a society, need to continue our investment in this under-utilized resource or risk having our culture crash. “The state has bankrupted itself paying for education for the bottom rung of society”?

“Cut funding for the poor and the stupid”?!

Good golly, it leaves the imagination little work to do in figuring out just what “investments” you think the government should be making.

What ROI do you think can be expected from ‘investing’ in the education of those who would have likely paid for it anyway? Or are transfer payments to the upper middle class your idea of social justice?

I’m sure it makes you feel better to think of the poor as stupid, the implication being that you – the rich, presumably – are smart and not simply lucky. A convenient argument to salve the souls of the guilty and justify an arbitrary oligarchy in which you find yourself (even more arbitrarily) at the top. Others consider the poor a health meter of society, a meter which is dangerously low these days. We, as a society, need to continue our investment in this under-utilized resource or risk having our culture crash.

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