tkhayes

here is the 'capitalism' behind immigration laws: Alabama, Arizona, Texas, Georgia, Florida – Anti-Immigration Laws Raise Private Prison Stock Prices whaddya know - prisons are publicly traded. You can buy stock, go to shareholder meetings and complain that you are not making enough money from your stock - vote for a board of directors in that company that is willing to lobby the government to come up with more ways to put more people in prison, enhancing your stock value. scary part is that no one (OK, few) seems to see anything wrong with this model. especially the companies that run private prisons.

I love how they say "Christianity is on the defensive...." and "...the mainstream...." They seem to forget that the religious dogma is actually the 2000 year old 'science', the 'mainstream' if you will. Evolution and its theories are barely 150 years old, it is the 'new' and apparently it is on the defensive. poor poor religion- so few supporters... geeeez..... Defend it all you want religious zealots, but unless you fail to believe in DNA, medical technology, carbon dating, basic mathematics and such, then that granite shield underneath Newfoundland is actually 500 million years old just like science tells us it is. Does not matter if you do not believe it, it is still true and defendable at every level of science. - lots of people believe that guns will not fire if they pray to Jesus... scares the fuck out of me that we are still feeding this crap to kids,

it's my only option - I canot provide 'universal healthcare' for myself, even if I wanted to.

Yes, and if that 'employer' was the USA government, we could provide it for everyone in the country, at 'great expense' but certainly less per capita that we are spending today,

um, I did not vote for Obama. I currently do not support him. 'EVERYONE' was my quote, not his. I am advocating that EVERYONE pay more, yes. try to pay attention a little more.

wow, is that all you got? Your mother must be so proud....

Yes, that's why I support Universal Healthcare - it's all about me...

no one minds paying an increase in fuel tax (well they do but it is easier to swallow), than a user fee. A user fee means the jumbo jet pays $100, which is a drop in the bucket, and the Cessna 150 pays $100, which is a huge impact. Hypothetical example. If they charged a 'doctor fee' to 'use the services off the HHS Dept', well, General Electric would have to pay $100 to use the services for their employees, and YOU as an individual would also conceivably have to pay $100. It is a scale of impacts. If everyone had to pay $2 more every time they went to the doctor as a fee, it would generate just as much revenue and would have less individual impact. First, show me that the FAA needs the money. I have yet to see an outline of NextGen, what it is, how it will work and how much it will cost, even an estimate. THe right wing is so hell-bent that everyone should be paying "for their own shit" and all that "personal responsibility" crap, I find it hard to believe that anyone would advocate a tax that supposedly pays for something that cannot be described Again, if they want to say - "hey - we are simply raining taxes to help pay for the deficit or we are going to fund education or healthcare with it", then I will consider this tax differently, as I have already said.

I think the class warfare term was generated by the right wing. Most of us on the left have suggested over and over again that taxes have to go up for EVERYONE for the mess to get resolved. Guys like Boehner and the right sit that and go 'NO', hence the term the 'party of NO'. The right insists that it is ONLY a spending problem, not a revenue problem. so again, I assume you wrote you congressman again this morning to express your desire to pay higher taxes to help out?

I am all for that too - unless you read somewhere where I am not. Did you write your congressman to express that opinion? I bet you did not. I did. many times over the past several years. so much for hypocrisy.

I've been called worse names by better people than you... Using Davincis logic then / I would assume then that all of you must be in favor of the aviation tax.... No?

You deny there is a difference between health care and health insurance so there is no point in continuing the discussion Health insurance companies do not provide health care of any kind I'm done - arguing with someone who thinks the tax issue and HC issue are simply defined by only 2 choices for any question I can be against a war but still pay taxes that fund one. I can support universal healthcare without necessarily independently providing it for my staff or anyone else I can support safe driving without banning drivers from my business who have tickets and YOU do not provide healthcare for your family - you only provide insurance

It's always got to be so fucking EXTREME with you guys.... no one said they hate anyone, no said they were asking for a free ride. A little more compromise.... perhaps that is all that is being asked for.

No I don't. I cannot provide healthCARE for ANYONE at Skydive City. I can only provide health INSURANCE. Health INSURANCE is **NOT** healthCARE. It never was and it never will be. However the country as a whole, has the ability to provide healthCARE to all of its citizens. Again, your argument is invalid. If I were to provide everyone who skydives at Skydive City AND my staff and your mother with health insurance, I would actually be going 100% against what I believe in. I would simply be propping up the system that exists today, which I consider to be flawed and worthless. You say you have read my posts but apparently you have not. I have stated clearly this case so many times in the past that I have lost count. And once again - you attempt to (unsuccessfully) to back me into a corner somehow. I have and I did. I have a belief structure and I regularly lobby my government representatives to make the changes to align the country with that belief structure. read above. I am thinking globally - "Universal Health Care". I am acting both globally and locally.

Yes, and that is not the only argument for Universal healthcare. Universal health care is not my, nor Skydive City's issue to resolve. It is a nationwide issue so for you to assume that I should be taking singular action to resolve it is invalid and nonsensical. Yes, i am fine with certain taxes going up and for the government to provide certain services and not others. That is called the "political process" and I am allowed to have an opinion, and to participate in the process to see it through, just like you are. I am allowed to judge whether or not the FAA is within its budget and needs more money. And I am allowed to judge whether or not I think the healthcare system in this country is adequate. JUST LIKE YOU ARE.

These are only two of the points. From your point of view, there is only ONE point, and that is incorrect. There are many purposes of the justice system, or the death penalty. you cannot simplify it into one or two things. If a jury of his/her peers can sentence him/her to death, why cannot a jury of his/her peers free him 30 years later or commute the sentence ot life when questions about the guilt arise? The Casey Anthony case in FL recently - she may very well have been acquitted since the death penalty was on the table - she may very well have been convicted if it was not.

When I was younger, I was much more in favor of the death penalty. As I get older, I am more reluctant to enforce it. I do firmly believe that there are people out there that do not deserve to breath the same air as I do. Osama Bin Laden, Hilter, several mass murders I am sure, but at the same time, I also firmly believe hat society cannot ever execute an innocent person, which I think was probably done last night in GA. Even one is too many, what to do , what to do.....

Well bullshit- you are shortening the cost issue and healthcare into nothing more than two points and only two points. And two points of your choice - so your 'point' is quite invalid. I have stated many times what my stance is- I can't help it if you don't get it. I have more concern about people falling down the stairs and going bankrupt than I am about the higher risk activities. Using your logic, any activity that results in an injury would therefore have to be deemed high risk and therefore banned Now try to stay on topic FaA taxes - did you write your congressman today? Cause I did again?

Not true. If you do not have health insurance, it does not directly affect my operation or my bottom line (in directly it might). I have no incentive to require skydivers to carry health insurance. I can care about health care and not require that just like I can care about safe driving, yet not require proof of auto insurance for all my skydiving customers. Your point is not actually a point, it is a silly example.

read my post above for clarification if you wish.. maybe, it's not black and white answer as are most subjects. If you want a yes or no answer, you're not getting one from me.

Opposite. Everyone does not have to fly, but everyone DOES need health care. Aviation is already expensive. An aluminum box mounted to the bottom of a C-182 engine that could be made for $100 by a local shop costs $1200 at the minimum. We run airplanes on 1950's designs, yet it remains about the safest form of transportation in the world, self proclaimed by the aviation industry and the FAA. So why would it need more money? We could drastically LOWER the cost of aviation by reducing the standards and deregulating much of the parts industry. (just as one example) There I go again, talking like a conservative position. if aviation had ten times as many accidents every year than it has today, it would still be the safest way to travel. It would be deemed 'unfortunate', but it would also be a fact. I am not sure why it would be unacceptable. Same for the cost of cars. side impact airbags adding thousands of dollars to the cost of a car. Better driver training might yield the same results, but we have never pursued that avenue. We are willing to spend endless amounts of money to save one 'aviation life' yet refuse as a society to save tens of thousands of lives every year from disease (and at a lower cost). We spend billions to fight a war to avenge the deaths of 3000 people when we have killed 6000 soldiers and hundreds of thousands of others in the process. I side with Ron Paul on that one. (conservative again) So would I be OK with the $100/flight to pay for health care? Given that there are about 10M commercial flights every year in the USA, it would generate some $1B in revenue. I guess that would be one way to pay for part of it. Another way to generate $1B would be to tax everyone equally to generate it, which would make more sense, since those are the people that directly use it. As I have said, these are all hypothetical, and hence have absolutely no meaning despite everyone's attempt to somehow back me into a corner on the issue. The proposed FAA tax is NOT being generated to pay for health care. I maintain, and I still maintain, that health care (and wars and education) costs money. We first decide on whether or not we want it, then we tax the masses to pay for it. Since we are already 'taxing' a large portion of the population through health insurance policies to pay for those that are not paying their share of the 'insurance', it seems to make sense that if you want everyone to pay their fair share by creating a system where everyone is taxed and everyone gets the benefit. Now you tell me - is that a conservative or a liberal viewpoint - ??

Read the next sentence in my post -- I stated it clearly

I do have that viewpoint, you apparently have not read my threads and my couple of essays. i have never once said that anything is free. I just disagree with what we should be funding, i.e. wars versus education and healthcare. It is not an 'industry specific' philosophy, it is a societal philosophy. How to pay for it? Taxes mostly. corporate and personal. They may as well ALL be personal since every deficit any country has, as a total, corporate, and government is borne by the people. It is a cost to society. ie Greece. So do we need $100/flight to fund the FAA? No we do not. Therefore I will argue against it. Do we need $100/flight to pay for healthcare? Maybe we do, but that is a specific funding issue that could be addressed when it arises (which it has not) I am not just a liberal, I am also fiscally conservative in many ways. We spend too much on wars. When we build a building, we force society (and the private sector) to bear unbelievable costs due to regulation, ie fire codes for one, which I now have a personal vested interest in. When we build roads and intersections we put up WALK/DON'T WALK lights where no human being ever walks because some fucking rule says we have to. These are VERY FINANCIALLY WASTEFUL things that actually come from a conservative viewpoint. We Fund the NIH for diabetes research because people are too fucking fat, yet we will not fund bicycle lanes when we build a road.....or public education on the subject. (conservative viewpoint) I believe in welfare reform. If you are getting a check and you are capable, then you can work at a soup kitchen or pick up garbage, or paint over grafitti - there is always something you could be doing. (conservative viewpoint) BUT, we could and should be funding education through to the Bachelor degree level. We should be scrapping free trade and putting up walls (tariffs) to protect our manufacturing infrastructure. We should be funding universal healthcare or similar variation of it. (liberal viewpoint) And when that gets put on the table, the tax discussion will come up, and you will see my support for those programs.

I'll bet you $20 right now John, that the next Government, most like Republican majority, RAISES taxes across the board during their term, either by DIRECT tax increases and new taxes, and/or the expiration of old tax breaks. They'll blame the previous administration of course. everyone does. It's a fact of life, the government will not ever balance the budget without doing that, regardless of who is in power. And yes, we (all Americans) will pay for it. Sorta exactly what i have been preaching all along - it costs money to run the country, decide what we want, develop the tax base to pay for it. I am not actually contradicting myself. I am trying to protect my business and my customers from unnecessary increases in costs (FAA funding). Now if they come up with taxes to pay for universal healthcare/better education/better justice system/drug rehab, I will gladly raise prices to pay the taxes to pay for that.

um, there's sorta a difference between thinking someone is rich and them actually being rich. Tax the shit out of aviation - I do not care. $100/flight = $4-5 increase in jump tickets. if you want that, then go for it. Have you written your congressman today about that? 'cause I sure as fuck did.....