Why do all conservative claims there is liberal media?

[Mastreditr111]

we manage to win on an 8-year cycle too, dont we?

 

[ComradeDavo]

I don't think the difference is all that large, especially if the government supplies a major amount of their income. If they give you, say, 40% of you money and then tell you "Don't run this story, or we'll cut support for your network" you're in a tight spot. Most people probably wouldn't run the story, and would cave into pressure. It's just too dangerous, too easy for the government to influence.

I'd rather have private companies do that, without government interferance.

Well, I point at the BBC as the ultimate example of a pubically run service with no government influence, so it is possiable.

To make it happen you need democracy and openess, granting complete independence to the media and making sure it is protected.

 

[ComradeDavo]

im going to assume that you are british, as u cite their periodicals. Now, don't take this the wrong way, but on most domestic and foreign policy issues, the views that Europeans consider to be conservative or centrist are considered liberal by Americans... firearm control, welfare programs, negotiation with what we consider to be terrorist states... so though u may see many papers as conservative, many Americans, even democrats, will consider them to be at least centrist, often even liberally biased. And, frankly, though i dont remember alot of clinton's media relations, i do remember that the attacks by American mainstream media were neither so violent nor so numerous as they are against bush... in fact, many of the more "left-wing" outlets took the position that Clinton's personal life has no bearing on the country as a whole

my conclusion is that many americans looking at European news is going to say that it is liberally biased merely because of the different standards on the two continents. (perfect example is the death penalty: 80% of Americans in favor vs. 90% of European citizens opposed, and the news in the two areas reflects that)

Which sums up well how the United States is conservative biased.

 

[tomsnowman123]

NO MORE TAXES...... i already pay 30% of my income to this government.... i will NOT pay more, just to unbias the media. even if it is biased against my views, i can live with it.

How much would a wealth tax or inheritence tax effect you?

 

[Mastreditr111]

the inheritance tax is already 73% and ive never quite understood the concept of a wealth tax... is it like a capital gains tax, because those damn well screw with our economy; its been proven time and time again, because every time the republicans lower it, the economy jumps within weeks

comradedavo: maybe it is you guys who are liberally biased, not us who are too conservative, ever think of that?

 

[Paradigne]

NO MORE TAXES...... i already pay 30% of my income to this government.... i will NOT pay more, just to unbias the media. even if it is biased against my views, i can live with it.

Only 30%??? Are you just counting income? Don't forget about sales tax (8.25 in my city), gas tax, property tax, vehicle registration, taxes on your phone bill, cigarettes, booze... The average person really pays more like 45%...

I do think that there is a tending towards a liberal bias but, IMHO that's just NEWS. Liberals hold more rallies, protests and are generally more vocal than conservatives, so they get in the news more. Bad things happening in Iraq will get more headlines then good things happening in Iraq:

Iraq now has full Cell Phone coverage VS Four more killed in Car Bomb

 

[Mastreditr111]

thats exactly what i mean... it has been calculated that all forms of taxes cost Americans about 30% of their incomes yearly. The 45% figure is applicable to some of the more "moderate" west european countries, while most of them tax 60-70% of income.

 

[tomsnowman123]

thats exactly what i mean... it has been calculated that all forms of taxes cost Americans about 30% of their incomes yearly. The 45% figure is applicable to some of the more "moderate" west european countries, while most of them tax 60-70% of income.

I am willing to pay a little more money if it means giving those who wouldn't normally have oppurtunities to have them, and to enjoy the freedoms many of us get to enjoy.

 

[Mastreditr111]

they do have oppurtunities... they just have to work for them, like the rest of us. No liberal i have ever spoken to seems to understand the concept of "fruits of labor" being directly related to the amount of labor done. The American middle class, the hardest working of the classes here by far, get punished for what the poor do, or don't do, really, as our budget is balance on their backs

 

[Mastreditr111]

having said this, yes there are ...... holy crap are we off topic here!!!!

 

[IglooDame]

I am willing to pay a little more money if it means giving those who wouldn't normally have oppurtunities to have them, and to enjoy the freedoms many of us get to enjoy.

So go ahead and pick the charity of your choice, and start paying them that little more money.

 

[Mastreditr111]

YES thank you!!!!!! they actually work!

 

[tomsnowman123]

So go ahead and pick the charity of your choice, and start paying them that little more money.

Charities can not implement universal health care or tuition-free school nationwide. Schools can be paid for by donations in some communities, but not nation-wide.

 

[bigfatron]

NO MORE TAXES...... i already pay 30% of my income to this government.... i will NOT pay more, just to unbias the media. even if it is biased against my views, i can live with it.

Yeah but, having visited the US very often and compared US programming to the BBC/ITV, I have to tell you: in return for a few extra tax dollars you get far, far better TV!

 

[Mastreditr111]

and i really feel like paying money for TV?? i dont even have cable!

 

[dutchfire]

30%?? In the Netherlands, you pay like 40-50% of your income directly, and then there are the taxes on buying things (19%) too.

 

[Mastreditr111]

i kno... and i dont want to start down that road... you probably pay about 60-70% of your income, in one fashion or another, to your government. If that ever happens here i WILL find some way to blow Washington from the face of the earth.

 

[PCHighway]

they do have oppurtunities... they just have to work for them, like the rest of us. No liberal i have ever spoken to seems to understand the concept of "fruits of labor" being directly related to the amount of labor done. The American middle class, the hardest working of the classes here by far, get punished for what the poor do, or don't do, really, as our budget is balance on their backs

Then you must live in the densest parts of the conservative desert. I'm a flaming liberal, and I have full understanding of labor. You however, have absolutely no concept of what life is like for the working class American.

You weren't there to watch as one of your elementary school peers started falling behind in class because their single mother couldn't afford to buy them glasses. You didn't hear whispered rumors about "little Stacy" who fainted and had to be put in the hospital (wracking up bills her parent couldn't afford) because she didn't have an asthma inhaler. You, "Mastreditr111," never had to console your diabetic friend as he was sadly yet necessarily removed from his guardian; his 68 year old "lazy poor" grandmother whose job at a local Target didn't provide enough income for your friend's insulin. Do you seethe at the fact that the working class is driven to buy unhealthy hamburgers for 99 cents and 3$ Chinese T-Shirts because they can't afford anything better?

Was your first "real" job, outside of selling papers, unloading trucks by Lake Michigan at the age of 15? Was your father left struggling to support your mother's medical expenses because some careless fellow employee popped a champagne cork directly in her eye, leaving her with brain damage in the physical form of light-sensitivity and migraines? Was the only reason you were able to live in the suburbs because your grandparents were able to pay off their house and leave it to your parents, who then sold it and moved? Do you cynically smile to yourself when you walk through a community college in a prosperous neighborhood because it has marble facades, more elevators than are used, and state-of-the-art wireless computer systems all while the community college of a different Chicago neighborhood not so far away has only 20 or so 10 year old Macs and 3 stairwells, one of which has been roped of for 3 weeks because it collapsed in on itself?

Welcome to America, where rampant income tax supports the lazy poor of the nation .

 

[Mastreditr111]

YO man, i didnt say that, I said that many of the people on welfare have the oppurtunity to get off of it.... also every situation u just named is, to put it mildly, a b**ch, but THEY CAN ALL BE OVERCOME. I have never faced many of them, i kno, but i kno people who have... i go to a prep school, but on vast sums of scholarship money. I kno at least 4 people in situations like that, who are there because they work their asses off, just like me. They all have single parents with a high school or worse education, but they are there, just like I am. By the standards of my school i am abysmally poor, and they are far worse off, but they all agree with ME, not your views, MINE. One has seen a welfare "family" where the mother uses the money to by a flatscreen TV and a mustang while her NINE children eat at their house every night because the mom is out at a bar dating, and left no food in the fridge. Another told me about the time a drug addict broke into their house, and when he stood trial, they were called to testify. Then, they were interviewed to see if the man was still a viable candidate for welfare and free health insurance, which had already payed for SEVEN f***ing rehab sessions. Yet, despite this, they go to my school, and they moved to the suburbs, instead of buying expensive cars, or joining gangs. Somehow i doubt life is as simple as im painting to be, yet these four still got out of the slums, and will probably go back to help others someday... maybe I'll join them. And you can sit at home, paying your taxes, confident that they are helping everyone more than enough.

 

[PCHighway]

YO man, i didnt say that, I said that many of the people on welfare have the oppurtunity to get off of it.... also every situation u just named is, to put it mildly, a b**ch, but THEY CAN ALL BE OVERCOME.

That wasn't describing life in the slums. That was all a personal narrative, Mastreditr111. The people in the first section were people I knew, and somehow I doubt they would have been able to "overcome" their situations without any sort of government support, and chances are they didn't. The second section talks about me or my immediate family.

I have never faced many of them, i kno, but i kno people who have... i go to a prep school, but on vast sums of scholarship money. I kno at least 4 people in situations like that, who are there because they work their asses off, just like me. They all have single parents with a high school or worse education, but they are there, just like I am.

I'm not sure what you're classifying as a prep school, but I can safely say that in my school the vast majority of the students work their asses off; there simply is no other way they can live and attend college (even a community college) at the same time.

By the standards of my school i am abysmally poor, and they are far worse off, but they all agree with ME, not your views, MINE.

It would almost be unanimous in the various colleges I've attended that the government should aid the poor with universal health care or some such similar funding. There have been numerous bills proposed to congress that would make corruption almost non-existent. The commodity isn't money in the form of a check, its health care. Yet your conservative pals, even when they see that this could be nearly abuse-proof, refuse to raise taxes or pass such bills that would support the poor.
Where do you get off thinking that the working poor, who have to pay just as large as a percentage as you do or will, have it any easier? They live in cities, but they can't afford cars and the gasoline and parking fees for those cars. Having 30% of their income taken away hurts them just as much, if not more (which is usually the case), as it hurts the upper-middle class and the rich.

You cite ridiculous, not-standard situations in which mother's abuse the welfare system, and completely disregard the fact that the number of children born into poverty has steadily declined, and so has the number of people on welfare as a whole (during the Clinton Administration, anyway). That alone is proof that welfare has been positive, as it helped people get out of whatever rut they were stuck in. I would be very surprised if any of your friends got out of the slums without money from the government, even if only in the form of government tax refunds for students and grants.

You give no thought at the conditions that led to these situations. Do you think it's rare for someone to be born with pre-natal drug addiction in the poorest class? It isn't unheard of for children to be intentionally injected with heroin by drug-dealers and pimps. But of course, pimps and drug-dealers aren't exactly wasting your tax dollars with welfare, are they? You don't have to look far in any urban area to find 16 year old prostitutes living "independently" taking care of their 14 year old siblings. Do you think they get welfare? Hell no.

Just how do you propose those 9 children get out of their situation without any type of government funding? Go into gangs? There is a reason gangs, families, and churches are integral parts of city-life. A sense of community is a must for survival. Someone needs to move out of their apartment, but doesn't have a car? No problem, they just call a distant cousin, gang-member, or fellow church-goer. The difference is, as sad as it sounds, is that gangs are far more helpful to the eldest of the 9 kids you mentioned, who will be stuck getting enough money to support their young siblings and probably wouldn't abuse the welfare system.

MY money was used to give tax-cuts to the rich. Isn't that what conservative tax-busting is all about? It certainly isn't about helping the people who actually have to do physical labor for a living, the vast majority of whom are lower-middle class or working poor. Bush completely destroyed social security when he gave it to the rich; all which he did so after promising to put it in a "lockbox" like Gore had promised. That's the conservative mentality; kill any form of social-help.
As a result, those family members in the lower classes will be forced to take on their parents who are reaching retiring age. This extra economic burden will only make the situation worse. The solution? According to you? Cut taxes?