Angry American

What the Occupiers really want

2011-12-07T15:53:00.000-08:00

I recently saw a post linking to a “proposed list of demands” by an individual in the Occupy Movement.
http://occupywallst.org/forum/proposed-list-of-ows-demands
First I want to acknowledge that it says this is a list by an individual. However, for those that even know what they are protesting, they embrace many of these ideas, and I would just like to address the problems with them. As a whole the occupiers may want a number of things, or maybe just want to protest for the sake of protesting, however here I will just address this specific list.

Repeal the Taft-Hartley Act. Unionize ALL workers immediately.
What if I don’t want to unionize, what if I don’t want to pay money to support things I disagree with? Shouldn’t I be free to figure out how to deal with conflicts between myself and my employer? When people go on strike it is often for the smallest reasons and in the mean time the company loses money and it is overall bad for the economy.

Raise the minimum wage immediately to $18/hr. Create a maximum wage of $90/hr to eliminate inequality.
If you raise the minimum wage you will have an even harder time finding a job as the companies will have to lay off more people in order to be able to pay such a high rate. Setting a maximum wage will discourage advancement and so people will do a poorer job. People should be rewarded for the amount of work they do.

Institute a 6 hour workday, and 6 weeks of paid vacation.
That would not be efficient in many areas. Let the particular industry or organization determine what is sufficient.

Institute a moratorium on all foreclosures and layoffs immediately.
Good luck with that, how are you going to force employers not to fire people, if they don’t have the money to pay them, especially after you get your $28 an hour what other choice do they have?

Repeal racist and xenophobic English-only laws.
It is not feasible in many cases to be able to accommodate everyone’s language, that is why English is the de-facto language. When a country implements multiple languages it causes problems, look at China or Canada.

Open the borders to all immigrants, legal or illegal. Offer immediate, unconditional amnesty, to all undocumented residents of the US.
Will there be oversight to this process or will you just let people in willy nilly? What about the unskilled people who come here and contribute nothing to the economy, will they abuse the welfare system? We get enough of that with citizens. However, those who are here illegally often will take money out of the economy by sending it back to their families back home. What if they have a criminal background should they not be extradited? What we need to do is to simplify the legal immigration process. I could go into greater detail but I don't want to take up too much space here.

Create a single-payer, universal health care system.
Eliminating competition will allow for price gouging and decrees efficiency.

Pass stricter campaign finance reform laws. Ban all private donations. All campaigns will receive equal funding, provided by the taxpayers.
While that might appear to level the playing field you shouldn’t require everyone to get equal financing as not all candidate are equal. It is true that politicians can take bribes from companies but creating a set limit causes more problems than it fixes.

Institute a negative income tax, and tax the very rich at rates up to 90%.
I assume negative income tax is the government paying the poor so they are on the same level, classic redistribution of wealth. I am not a fan of income tax. If the rich are taxed 90% how will they pay their employees? Companies sometimes do get tax breaks that they shouldn’t although think an overall lowering of taxes would be better. Also, what constitutes rich? The 1% or from what I have seen those who make over $490,000. (By the way, if the whole world is included in the whole 99% vs. 1% then just about everyone in the US is part of the 1%)

Pass far stricter environmental protection and animal rights laws.
I think it is important not to pollute or abuse animals but these laws tend to go overboard, especially look at California and how the regulation of water to protect fish has caused a drought and cost the farmers a lot of money.

Allow workers to elect their supervisors.
Does that include CEOs? Usually people work their way up to those positions. I suppose if an office wanted to do it that way we should allow it but it could turn into a popularity contest.

Lower the retirement age to 55. Increase Social Security benefits.
Lowering the retirement age will make it even harder to increase social security especially as people live longer. Increasing Social Security benefits will just make it implode faster.

Create a 5% annual wealth tax for the very rich.
Again who are the rich and why should we tax honestly earned wealth? If they acquired it through shady dealings that is another matter but that needs to be handled in a courtroom.

Ban the private ownership of land.
That is probably the biggest step toward socialism, the collective ownership of land.

Make homeschooling illegal. Religious fanatics use it to feed their children propaganda.
This one is so ridiculous it is almost funny. The public school system is terrible, there need to be alternatives. Parents should have the right to teach their kids what they feel is important without the propaganda they are taught at public schools. Besides what of the first Amendment and not interfering with the free exercise of religious beliefs?

Reduce the age of majority to 16.
What would that accomplish? Many 18 year olds even are still pretty immature.

Abolish the death penalty and life in prison. We call for the immediate release of all death row inmates from death row and transferred to regular prisons.
This doesn’t make sense, in fact it contradicts itself, no death penalty or life in prison would mean they are released at some point. Even the dangerous ones? Don't get me wrong I understand the concern with the death penalty but then a violent criminal should not be allowed back on the streets. Transfer to regular prisons is not the same thing as ending life in prison.

Release all political prisoners immediately.
I think I can agree there unless the person was actually violent.

Immediate withdrawal from Iraq and Afghanistan.
Again I can agree

Abolish the debt limit.
So should people be able to acquire as much debt as they want? And I suppose you would also want that debt to be forgiven automatically if not paid off in a certain amount of time.

Ban private gun ownership.
How then will we protect ourselves? The 2nd Amendment is vital for a free nation. If guns are illegal criminals will still be able to get guns, the only people wo won’t will be law abiding citizens.

Strengthen the separation of church and state.
Church and state is one of the most misused phrases. The first Amendment says that Congress shall make no laws respecting the establishment of religion or prohibit the free exercise thereof. This proposal seems like a limit on the latter part which is clearly Unconstitutional.

Immediate debt forgiveness for all.
Like I suspected above, and what of those to whom the debt is owed? Are they supposed to take a loss because they loaned their money expecting to get it back? That would likely decrease the amount of loans given out, which is a good thing, but is even worse for the reason I just stated.

End the 'War on Drugs'.
The war on drugs certainly does have problems and it isn’t working to stop the drug trade and may in fact make it more violent. This is in fact one of the issues that causes more problems on our border.

It is clear to me that if a majority of Occupiers agree with most of these terms than it truly is a socialist movement. Many of these goals are self defeating.
To say something about the occupy movement it is true there is corruption in corporatism, however it is not Capitalism that is to blame. It is the fact that the corporations make deals with the government and the government gives them special privilege; In other words crony Capitalism as opposed to true Capitalism. Just look at GM it should have been allowed to fail, there would be temporary loss of jobs but then one of their competitors (most likely Ford since they didn’t take the money) would pick up most of the jobs.
A vast majority of the protestors from what I have seen don’t even know why they are out there.

A Very Important Question Pro-Lifers must be able to Answer.

2010-12-22T21:24:00.001-08:00

There is one question pro-lifers must address, one of the most if not the single hardest for many pro-lifers to answer it seems. Yet at its core it is actually quite a simple question. As such the pro-abortion crowd will often use it to try to stump pro-lifers and when they can’t get an answer they fallaciously claim that proves that there is no answer. That question is; what should happen to women getting abortion once it is made illegal? If we truly believe that it is the taking of a life, we should be able to answer this question. I think what makes it hard for most people is that they feel sorry for the woman, or think that she wasn’t in her right state of mind. Most would agree that the doctor should face criminal charges as they were the ones actually performing it. We could simply answer that they should be punished the same as if they were involved in the murder of anyone where there are multiple accessories to a murder , and leave it at that, but for the sake of examples and elaboration we should look at several laws relating to the issue. Let us compare it then to cases of women who have killed their children as that is the most analogous. They are deemed mentally unstable but I think they should still face serious penalties. Often times they are enticed into it by boyfriends who do not want to own up to the responsibility.

For the answer to some of this, let us look at how the law dealt with it before Roe v. Wade. Women would face penalties for abortion usually amounting to jail time but usually the doctor was the one who got charged with the more serous crime. When it comes down to it, all involved, the woman, the doctor, and anyone who enticed the woman into it should be held accountable. If we truly believe it is murder why not handle it the same as a murder case? Also consider the fact that if someone kills a pregnant woman they are charged with double murder in many states. In countries such as Chile and El Salvador it is completely illegal and have criminal charges attached to it. What it comes down to fundamentally is a changing of people’s mentality. Once it is recognized as murder it can be treated as such. What does everyone else think? Should the women and the Doctors be charged with different levels of crimes? Should the woman be considered mentally unstable and undergo therapy in a mental institute? What should the level of punishment of the women be in relation to the doctor?

This is partially a response to this video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iD97OVJ4PNw

My Endorsements

2010-10-24T18:15:00.001-07:00

I know this is a bit late coming but I wanted to be sure.

California Governor- Chelene Nightingale (I have been looking into her for a while and she is the only one I really like, voting for Meg would be compromising too much.)

Lt. Governor- I am not too thrilled about however there is a write in candidate Karen England that is good, otherwise possibly Jim King.

Secretary of State- Damon Dunn

Controller- Tony Strickloand

Treasurer- Mimi Walters

Assembly District 44- Alvaro Day*

State Board of Equilization District 4- Shawn Hoffman

District 2- George Runner (not my district but he is a great candidate)

US Rep.

District 29- John Colbert

District 31- Stephen Smith

Propositions

19-This is probably the one I have put the most thought into and yet there seem to be so many pros and cons on both sides,I am pretty undecided at this point. (I support the idea of medical use but we already have that)

20-yes

21-no

22-yes

23- yes *

24-no

25-no

26-yes

27-no *

Some races don't have any candidates I feel strongly enough about to promote them.

I have been following Colorado

Governor- Tom Tancredo

Prop 62- Right to life yes* ( wish I could vote on this one)

* (Most emphatic opinion)

Chelene's website

Alvaro's website

The Hypocrisy of Modern Liberalism

2010-06-29T19:26:00.001-07:00

The liberals of today seem to have contradictory and conflicting beliefs that cannot rationally be justified. On issues of the sanctity of life; They want to defend the life of the guilty yet condemn the innocent.
They fight to keep those on death row from being executed no matter how certain their guilt. They say “What right does anyone have to take someone else’s life”. Well let’s hold them to that for a minute. First off they are absolutely right with that statement, what right did the murderer have in taking someone else’s life?
Also let’s apply it to those that can be biologically proven to be human who have not had a chance to do anything wrong. I am speaking of the unborn; liberals deem it acceptable to terminate the life of one of these humans. They ask “why should a woman have to carry a child of someone who raped her, someone of which she does not want to be reminded?” This is ludicrous why punish the child yet let the rapist get off? There it is again punishing the innocent and letting the guilty go free. They also think having disabilities should be grounds to kill one’s baby. Around 90% of fetuses with down’s syndrome are aborted.
This is often apparent when noting that most vegans who do so because of animal rights are liberal. They care so much about a certain small fish that they would shut off the water supply creating drought and unemployment throughout California. It is even hypocritical by their own standard of survival of the fittest, which they seem to reject at the practical level but preach at the pragmatic level.
Liberals want us to care for the environment, sometimes obsessively so, yet from my own experience, a great deal of those criticizing people for polluting, themselves smoke, which pollutes, to say the least.

The Importance of Animal life outweighs that of human life. PETA or Animal Liberation Front (ALF) are considered major domestic terrorist organizations by the FDA , and while this may be an extreme example, it demonstrates the overall hypocrisy. (Of course I don't always trust who the government calls terrorists).

Again, this can sort of relate to the previous point.

They want to ban guns saying it would make us safer.
What it will actually accomplish. It will keep law abiding citizens from being able to buy guns and only criminals will be able to get them, so therefore the law abiding citizens will be unable to defend themselves so criminals will be running the world. Take for example Switzerland, they have very loose gun laws, pretty much anyone can get a hold of a gun and they have one of the lowest crime rates in the world.

What is a liberal?
A liberal is someone who will take your money and give it to someone else, a conservative wants people to be able to use their money efficiently. A liberal thinks the Government should take care of everything, a conservative thinks people should handle things themselves and that it is more efficient that way

By the way, Conservatives give far more to charity than liberals which makes sense since Conservatives believe charities and the people can handle problems while liberals believe government is the solution to all problems, and also, contrary to popular belief, conservatives average out a little lower on income earned than liberals. They don’t like the government telling them what to do yet they want the government to support them and require by force of law the support of others.

Many complain about consumerism, yet they themselves consume just as much as anyone else. Their big houses and fancy cars attest to this hypocrisy.

They are tolerant of your view, that is what they say, whatever it is as long as it agrees with theirs. However, if your views disagree with theirs, then the tolerant liberals will do everything they can to ensure that your view cannot be heard. Censorship is a liberal idea. Book burnings were done under Socialist and Fascist (yes Fascism is liberal I can go into detail on that later) regimes. They preach diversity yet only want their voices to be heard, so they take control of something such as education as a propaganda tool.

"The American people will never knowingly adopt socialism, but under the name of liberalism they will adopt every fragment of the socialist program until one day America will be a socialist nation without ever knowing how it happened." – Norman Thomas, Socialist candidate for US president, proving the liberal and socialist agenda are one in the same.

http://abcnews.go.com/Health/w_ParentingResource/down-syndrome-births-drop-us-women-abort/story?id=8960803

FDA on PETA
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/12/peta-classified-terrorist-threat.php

The continued undermining of our Constitutional right

2010-03-29T10:39:00.000-07:00

-----This is an older one I wrote, but I posted it here anyway because it still has relevance------

So it seems like a weekly or often times even daily occurrence, where our government proposes a law that will limit our constitutional rights even more. It is difficult to keep up as they do it so fast. To start I have already been labeled a right wing extremist by the department of homeland security for supporting the Constitution and the principals included in it.

which bear some resemblance to the previous MIAC report. They continue chipping away. Now currently,there is an unconstitutional hate crime bill that has just passed that would allow the federal government to add protected groups of individuals and could interfere with 1st amendment rights and would give certain people priority over others, a violation of the 14th amendment protection for the rest of us .
Also, Obama is currently pushing for health care reform like Canada and wants it done as soon as possibly. (Becaue We all want our health care run like the DMV). He also wants that bill to include abortion, which our tax money is already going toward both home and abroad. So against our will if we pay taxes we are supporting abortion. Lest we forget the 1073 page stimulus Bill that was presented only one day before the vote. Then there is Sotomayor, who would prefer to make laws rather than defend the Constitution. It seems like they have either never read the Constitution or are just trying to slip things by, I suspect the latter

Text of hate crime bill: http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-s909/