Friday, January 7, 2011

The Standard Perception of the Wealthy

Today I had a jousting with an individual who goes by the name of Solar on a comments section to a news article (his comments are in quotes):

Trickle down economics primarily benefits the very wealthy, which of course, even further widens the already enormous divide between the very wealthy and everyone else.

How does it affect you that there are a bunch of billionaires in the USA? The only way that it affects you is in your perception that someone out there has more money than you! And that bothers you. Wealth 'inequality' is the product of a successful free market system. It lets those with the hard work, risk tolerance, and ideas thrive.

The socialist system works the other way. It doesn't catapult people from the lower ranks to economic prosperity, but instead prevents everyone from reaching economic prosperity. Now tell me how a system where there is no 'wealth inequality' is a good thing when everybody is poor?
How does it affect me? That's easy: 1. I do not accept that MY air and water belong the David Koach's and Exxon Mobil's of the world to do as they please. MY air and water belong to ME. You hear that? Do not @#$%&! up my environment to put more dollars on your already over-stuffed pockets. Got that? 2. I do not accept that Wall Street has the right to leverage the American dream, i.e., the housing market, then when they lose that over-leveraged bet, look to ME to bail out their miserable @#$%&!. Got that one? Wake up you miserable FOOL! I don't mind billionaires who care about the environment, support legislation to improve the environment, and try to do some good for ordinary people with their money. But I do have a problem with billionaires who buy lobbyists to advocate less consumer and environmental protections. In other words, I have a problem with Republican billionaires. Open your eyes FOOL!

Solar, 1) So what you are saying then is that you'd be okay with bad water as long as the guy running the company isn't rich? If they brought in a poor Chinese manager, then you'd be okay with pollution then? And is Mark Zuckerburg somehow polluting your water that we don't know about? That would make a great headline that everybody would like to know about. Please share.

See, here you are making an absurd accusation that somehow a person being 'rich'' means that they are polluting your water. Oh and by the way, Exxon Mobil is not a person, it is a corporation.

2) It looks as if you continue to move farther away from your original statement. But okay, so you think it is fine if Americans take out loans on everything that they really can't afford, such as over-sized houses, hummers and home equity lines for vacations? And you are okay with the fact that the government mandated through the Community Reinvestment Act that banks have to provide sub-prime loans if they are allowed to service geographic areas? And you are okay with the conflict of interest where mortgage backed securities were created by a government sponsored entity that provided the catalyst for the underestimating of risk to take place?

So once again you didn't prove a point how someone being wealthy negatively affects you.

See you are invoking a logical fallacy that goes along like this: All 'Rich' people like ice cream. All terrorists like ice cream. I hate terrorists, therefore I hate 'Rich' people.

So you think that only Republican billionaires buy lobbyists to do these things, eh? LOL, it is obvious that YOU are the fool!!

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