I should say it is about refining some views by experience.
Young people are more prone to fall into nice idealistic social justice ideologies .
Later in life when seeing a lot abuse of the system one refines the views a bit.
Same thing for hardcore capitalism by the way.

Nixon fits right in he won a campaign largely on labeling his opponent a pinko-commie he even passed out flyers that where printed on pink paper.The problem is that the term pinko was coined back in the 20's to describe one with leftist leanings a "red" was the card holding communist and the actual doctrine spreader.The very right wing in the US use pinko in an attempt to link anyone not in agreement and having liberal leaning as some how being a communist even though very few left leaning people are anywhere near that level.

@MH I would say that more people tend to either become more moderate over time or stay about the same.I think many people imitate the leanings of their parents as well often without really thinking about it.

I disagree MH. Experience is what shapes a large portion of a person's perspective. Take capitalism - if you start a business, work hard and thrive, you see capitalism as a successful system. If your neighbor does the same thing, but fails, he has an entirely different view of the system. Depending on the investment (monetary, time and emotional) that he has put into a failed enterprise, his view of the system you used to succeed could be extremely jaded.

The problem here is that the "left" today takes a noble desire - the idea that your friend shouldn't fail - and moves it to an extreme - he should be supported - using the success you earned in your own business. What they fail to see is that if you take out the risk - you also take out the reward. You provide no incentive for the work necessary - if your guaranteed an outcome - regardless of how hard you work or how much you slack off, why would you work hard? This applies to all sorts of economic policies...

Tax the wealthy? Really? Up the capital gainst tax? Capital gains are already double taxed - you are taxed when you earn the money you invest - and then your taxed on it again when you make money. Take more taxes, you remove any reason to invest.....

Trickle down economics is not a perfect system. However, if the left actually cared about facts - it would find the following:

In Jan 1980, we started a recession. By the end of 1983 unemployment was at 9.6%. However, the fiscal policies of ERTA (the "Reagan tax cuts") began to show results - while the labor pool grew by more than 6 Million people - unemployment dropped over 2% in 1 year. *It takes time for investments to create jobs - factory build time, etc...* Compare that with a job pool that has SHRUNK in the last 2 years....

I digress. To a person who leans left, they can't see the fact that incentivizing investment from the private sector is what creates jobs. Instead - they see it as the government's role to "provide" - without realizing that government is - by its very nature - inefficient. Take $5 from a person, send it through government and you get a return significantly LESS than $5 worth. Government adds MASSIVE overhead. Business - for all its "evils" - thrives on profit - so it has an incentive to be as lean as possible. This is good in some ways - bad in others. Too lean means employees can suffer, etc. The thing is, to a true liberal (and not those who just lean), government is who owns the money in the first place - so its not "taking" from one person - its not really theirs to start with. Its simply a question of who "owns" what.

Now - lets tie this together. You are successful, so you love a capitalist system. Your friend failed - perhaps through no fault of his own - so when someone comes to you and says "we have to change the system" - you say "heck no - I love this". What do you think your friend says? Especially when the "change" means he won't have to worry about failure, he will get "taken care of" - he will be "equal" to you in outcome? Its pretty clear his response will likely be different than yours.

This is how the true far left works - it takes advantage of human nature. It works on "fairness" - or so it claims - but it really uses promised entitlements without hard work to insure an outcome - and make no mistake - humans are by nature "lazy". If we were not - it wouldn't be called "work", now would it?

*Also - remember the discussion on professors? This is another reason academia is leftist - those that go out into the real world and succeed USUALLY (with a few exceptions) don't decide to teach - they instead build upon their successes in the world. Academia offers a place for those who have not succeeded (again - there are exceptions) to find a place where they can be successful and in a position of authority - without having to actually have been able to point to any "real world" success. Thus - a system in which a "fair" outcome is guaranteed - is often very appealing to those who cannot face the prospect of "real world failure".

I will call foul on this. The Reagan 'tax cuts' also featured rollbacks and tax increases in both 1981 and 1982. Additionally Reagan compensated throughout his administration by increasing the payroll tax. As such, the Reagan tax cuts, and their effect on the economy is misleading. Reagan benefited by being in office during a natural cyclical economic upswing. Those supposed tax cuts and their effects are largely ahistorical and used as propoganda by so-called 'Reagan Conservatives' to justify thier image of big government.

I like you Haplo, but I think you are wrong here.

"*Also - remember the discussion on professors? This is another reason academia is leftist - those that go out into the real world and succeed USUALLY (with a few exceptions) don't decide to teach - they instead build upon their successes in the world. Academia offers a place for those who have not succeeded (again - there are exceptions) to find a place where they can be successful and in a position of authority - without having to actually have been able to point to any "real world" success. Thus - a system in which a "fair" outcome is guaranteed - is often very appealing to those who cannot face the prospect of "real world failure".

I do not agree with this opinion there are many professors that had very successful careers in the "real world" and decided that they wanted to educate others in their fields so that others might have chance at success.For example I have some neighbors that where both teachers and later administrators in the school system when they retired they both took jobs as professors educating others how to become educators.The husband was a dog handler for the Army in Vietnam and later went to school using his GI Bill I would say that makes him very experienced in both life and in the field that he teaches in.Most school shave a mixture of backgrounds on not every single professor has no experience in their field of instruction to in fact they all must have some experience.

I would argue that there are no where near as many openings for a person seeking to become a professor in their given field for most any job.The idea that professors are all mostly left wingers is a scary story that hard core right wingers wish to promote.The realty is that the mixture is much more varied and largely depends on the field being taught and at many schools there where be professors of vary view on politics and theory.


I also diagree that humans are by nature lazy wed not have come this far if we where that is just your own personal negative view.

Conservative in what definition/sense of the word? As an old joke it would not need numbers to back it up. After all, it is a joke.

I like you too, Takeda. Its all good.

Now, do you mean TEFRA? Or the 82 and 84 "base broadening" measures that reduced tax shelters and "leveled" the playing field? I don't subscribe to the "Reagan never raised taxes" stuff, but the reality is that its not just how much taxes are collected......

The important part of taxation is WHERE taxes come from. A broad based, low tax increase doesn't "hurt" that much - and allowed for a Capital Gains cut of massive size. That is what spurred the economic growth in the middle of the 80's. Investment creates economic growth.

To say that Reagan profitted from a "natural cyclical economic upswing" ignores one important reality.... The country had been in "stagflation" for over a decade - economic cycles take 3-5 years on average to transition. Such a transition had not happened - because the policies in place kept it from doing so. As soon as governemental policies allowed business conditions to be changed, investment started and the cycle began to move again. A few years later, the effects of that change were seen.

You bring up a point about "Big Government". Government expenditures vs GDP actually INCREASED under Reagan - in essence he "grew the government". Something you won't hear many conservatives "admit". But its simple fact. What has to be taken into account however is where that growth was - in the "guns vs butter" battle, Reagan went with guns. Defense spending increased dramatically.

This brings up one point I strongly disagree with compared to many on the "right". Defense spending is out of control. There IS a military industry complex - and it wants every dime it can get. While I disagree drastically with Ron Paul on HOW to keep this nation safe, we could meet our security goals and protect our global interests without the massive military spending we have today.

One unfortunate side effect of Ronald Reagan was the right's utter unwillingness to revise military spending. Peace through strength can be insured without bankrupting the country. However, military spending is classified as "discretionary" - and the biggest problem with governmental spending is "mandatory" (entitlement and debt service) spending - not discretionary.

I would - were I able - be willing to cut military spending in exchange for reform of entitlements. How is it that those in Washington - on both sides, are not willing to do the same?

This would be huge. Problem is the entitlements pool is getting deeper by the minute.

Unfortunately, your right. If we simply means tested Medicare, required medicaid adult recipient (or sponsors when the recipient is a child) to pass drug desting - did the same for welfare recipients - as a condition of eligibility, got rid of "corporate welfare" entirely (if capitalism really works - why do industries need massive subsidies?) and reduced military spending - specifically the R&D boondoggles - we could end up not just reducing "the deficit" - which is lip service and is nothing more than reducing overspending - whereas true "deficit reduction" means paying toward the debt itself - we could solve much of the spending issues this nation has. Combine that with real tax reform that doesn't push business into going oversees, and we could have our economy - and future - roaring and bright like a bonfire again. On top of it all - gasp - enforce the laws we have on the books regarding businesses hring illegals, take welfare away from illegals - and we wouldnt have to be talking about the "immigration" problem - it would solve itself for the most part.

I'm not business owner-just a working guy.
The general view of functioning state here is more of a EU model with exceptions.
Not a nanny state but with some government responsibilities toward its people.
Public nationalized health care,education and limited security in case of unemployment is the basis.

There also some relics from 60s 70s socialism experiment.
Like Union protected minimal efficiency fat salaries nationalised Electric Company that need to be reformed.
A good remainder on how thing should not be run and how to make dent in a pocket:D
Israel moved from hardcore socialism to capitalism and now pushing back a bit.
American model is a bit too cruel for us.

Obviously I'm being a little sarcastic there!

But the fact that there are plenty of old socialists (in fact their organizations are flooded with old farts and have trouble attracting youth!) and the fact that the popular support and basis for socialist governments is NOT airy-fairy intellectuals but organized industrial labour - about as far as you can get from people of "no real world experience" - does punch some holes into this.

I call it a joke because calling it something else would just be plain offensive, as is the assertion that apparently there's only one legitimate way of having a 'real' or 'mature' life experience. That assertion in itself is a pretty good indicator of intellectual immaturity and lack of social/political awareness - what some here have now taken to calling the Bubblehead syndrome.

Demand creates jobs. Taxes on entrepreneurs can be lowered to zero and they can all open factories but if there's no one to buy the output, it does nothing. Until the right realizes this, their economics are just as head-shakingly wrong as the left's.

The top 1% may buy a 50 yachts and Maybachs a year, but it's the much larger middle class that buys 100,000 Chevys and 36" TVs - which one creates more jobs? The 50 products or the 100,000?

Demand creates jobs. Not handouts to the rich.

Unless Obama's in office, then it's like "OMG things aren't better RIGHT NOW!"

Not a joke, I am watching it happen among my group of friends, sure some will take longer than others and many will possibly never see the light but it does happen.I have heard many times over my life that this happens in addition to reading in various places.The old saying "If you are not a liberal when you're young, you don't have a heart.If you are not a conservative when you are older, you don't have a brain"

Which is why it would be interesting for young bubbles to give a brief resume of his "know nothing" faculty members who ain't done anything in the real world. After all he is apparently doing law and law school does have a habit of packing itself with proffesors who are pretty much top of their game and then advertising how its teachers have such wide and distinuished experience in a proffesional capacity.

:har::har::har::har::har::har:


Poor bubbles, don't you realise you opened with an example of the places which you read:doh:
don't you get it yet? you really delivered on this one:rotfl2:

It's part true. I was a commie in high school. Viva la revolucion Che Guevara top fan Tito forever kind a brat. Then college came and I started to shift towards the center and increasingly started to hate communism.

But center is where I stopped. I hate the left, I call them comunists and I hate the right, I call them fascists. And this party ideologies are tearing my country apart