During my time at JU I've seen repeated postings arguing against welfare, universal health care, and the role of the government in society proper. Obviously this is a real sticking point with many of the fine users here, and to be honest I've learned quite a bit from reading posts that come from the other side of the fence. To be fair, I do in fact agree with some of the main arguments against welfare. For example, it can definitely encourage complacency and some people will try to abuse the...

Should the rich be taxed more heavily than the rest of society? Yes. Why? If they don't get taxed, then they'll have all the more money to invest in the economy which will create more jobs right? Maybe. The argument about taxation of the rich has been debated from an ideological standpoint many times, but when the great depression hit it wasn't "the rich" who helped put the world back on it's feet. It was Keynesian economics. Economics that the wealthy of the day were so incensed by they actual...

A few nights ago I was sitting in my hotel room flipping through the channels and I happened to catch the democratic presidential debate on CNN. It was a complete gong show in which Wolf Blitzer would continually try to cut off the candidates in mid-answer and the questions were framed in such a way to try and force them to boil everything down to simple yes or no answers. "Are you saying that human rights are more important than national security?" is one such gem he asked. ...

What is a liberal? Well, the answer depends on who you ask. Rather than me sit here and drone on about ideology, I'd like to share with you good folks one of my favorite liberal authors; a fellow by the name of Joe Bageant, who is from Winchester Virginia. He's also a redneck, which doesn't usually fit into the typical stereotypes associated with such a political persuasion. If you believe that all liberals are flawed in their beliefs, check out his site, and if you're really...

Although I have been accused of being a "liberal alarmist" I would like to ask you to leave your political opinion at the door and take into consideration the following. As the old saying goes, money talks: 1) Gold has surpassed 800 $ an ounce in value. Adjusted for inflation, the last time it was this valuable was 1980. 2) Oil now costs $ 95.69 a barrel, which adjusted for inflation is pretty close to the cost of oil in the big crunch that happened during the shortage ...

This is about money. Your money, and the current U.S presidential election. I'm also going to try and explain why your money, the coming election, and the "sub-prime housing bust" are all intimately tied together. FYI, the cause of the recent housing debacle is not because of "poor people with bad credit bit off more than they could chew, gol'darnit!" but goes much deeper and has far reaching implications for everyone. Two things have me scared out of my wits right now; 1) T...

There is indeed no oil shortage, nor is there a food shortage. Global demand for both food and energy has been regularly outpaced by the supply but prices on both commodities have skyrocketed. Despite political rhetoric about needing to produce more oil and build more refineries domestically, that will not change the price, nor will any refineries come online anytime soon. All of those "solutions" will take years and cost a lot of money. Besides, here in Canada we're reg...

Excerpt from an article on the current state of the Union- http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/14046 “By virtually any measure, the United States is the least progressive nation in the developed world. It trails most of Western Europe in poverty rates, life expectancy, health care, child care, infant mortality, maternity leaves, paid vacations, public infrastructure, incarceration rates, and environmental laws. The wealth gap in the US has not been so wide since 1929. The Wal-Mart ...

Is the Surge really working? Although I am an unabashed liberal, I would like to ask the fine folks here to consider this article without political bias. I could care less whether a republican or democratic president was responsible for giving the order to go into Iraq. History does have a habit of repeating itself- so with that in mind I'm going to go ahead and ask if the surge is really working, considering previous occupations and how they ended... first, a little history. Back in janua...

Bush and Cheney have been chomping at the bit to go after Iran for a long time. Back in 2003, shortly after the proclamation that major combat operations had ended in Iraq, there was the widespread belief that most U.S forces would be out of the country within 6 months and available to continue the grand ol' march of freedom. One administration official pontificated that with the speedy fall of Hussein's regime in Iraq it was time to topple other undesirables in the...

Sooner or later the war in Iraq is going to end. I think everyone from all political persuasions can at least agree that at some point, the majority of U.S service personnel will leave the country and come back home. The reasons for coming home however may turn out to be far different than many folks think. When the troops come home, it will not be because of political or military victory. If those do occur it will be counted as an additional bonus and if victory hasn't be...

I've come across an excellent article written by Albert Einstein in 1949- his thoughts on socialism, and the evil of modern-day capitalism. For a guy who's considered one of the brightest minds of the 20th century it is certainly worth the read!! http://www.monthlyreview.org/598einst.htm

For the past 7 years, the Bush Administration has been pursuing tax cuts and government outsourcing with dogmatic fervor. We have heard plenty about the benefits of these tax cuts; acting as a stimulus for the economy, giving business large and small extra capital to invest or expand their operations (hopefully) hiring more workers in-country. Giving extra money back to the little guy so he can afford to buy more goods and services, thereby acting as another primer for t...

In this article I would like to discuss my opinion of GWB. This is not a Bush-bashing article, nor an attack on the right. This is an explanation of why I believe some of the things I do. This may shock some people to hear, but I used to be a conservative and I rooted heavily for GW back in 2000. I have no problem with conservatives or their policies, although I do disagree with some of them. I have no problems with "the right" or even the republican party for that matter. Certain indivi...

Everyone rejoice! All of our economic problems are solved! You know all of that doom and gloom we've been hearing about liquidity problems with major banks not having enough capital to cover their losses and keep running? Well it's all taken care of. Big papa government's stepped in and says they're gonna make it all better. They're going to set up a special corporation that is going to take all of the bad debt that is killing the banks, and at the same time they're going to give money...