...why does the American public buy this garbage over and over again regardless of the empirical evidence of the stupid/evil things corporations do when left to their own devices?

I'm a freaking Republican myself but this issue annoys the *bleep* out of me. We JUST had a massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico and this entire financial crisis is due in large part to the non-regulation of the oil and financial sectors and they want to REDUCE regulation further, wtf???

why are you still republican if you think they are fluff?

There's a lot of dumb people in the world.

Right now I'm mainly still Republican so I can vote for non psychotic candidates in my primary.

republican policies ensure their constituency is a good mix of the rich and the ignorant

Regulation when necessary but not necessarily regulation?

People forget that most fire regulations and building codes were initially put in place in response to some very horrific fires and accidents long ago.

I think the underlying issue is that enforcing regulations costs money and according to some folk anything non-crime/military related that costs government money = bad.

And anyone who disagres must therefore be ignorant, right? Aye carumba.

trumper, you're a fellow Republican and have worked for a Rep campaign. I feel like I'm taking crazy pills when I talk to most reps because they just naturally assume that corporations will behave ethically or beneficially if left to their own devices because it is in their best fiscal interest to do so and that is NOT the case at all.

Generally speaking, as a Republican (I prefer more to identify myself as a moderate conservative) I do want to reduce, localize and streamline a number of regulations to reduce the cost of doing business. But I was also afforded the opportunity to see the regulatory process beyond the bubble presented by the media.

For instance, my dentist has a two employee/two-owner situation (he and his wife). He was cited by the state's Department of the Environment for failing post appropriate notice about the use the affects of an x-ray machine to employees who use said machine. The irony being he is the ONLY employee who uses it and he was cited as the owner for failing to notify himself. this caused him two days of inspections because the Department's re-inspector failed to come out the first day despite making him book a four hour time window to be available and then came two hours late the second day. Beyond the stupidity of the regulation applying to sole-practioner-owners, it's also absolutely retarded that it's administered by the Department of the Environment when he also has to be inspected by the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene's Dental Board.

Don't like that example? I can tell you about a local restaurant owner in Washington, DC who was shut down for a day because they failed to provide a document notifying new employees about the potential health hazards of heptatis. In this situation, they consulted the District's Department of Small and Local Businesses who provides relevant forms for new businesses. Except, the DSLB doesn't cooridinate with the health department and the health department doesn't notify new food-handling businesses about this requirement. The best part is that this citation was issued 5 YEARS AFTER THEY OPENED! They had two of their original employees who were both managed that had been required to pass food safety management classes that included this very same information. Hence this business lost a day of productivity because of a regulation that they were unaware of in a pile of regulations that run in tens of thousands of pages. Better yet is that the actual small business department didn't know this regulation existed. Riddle me the efficiency in this regulation or in the regulatory enforcement?

Seriously, go to regulations.gov and peruse the current regulations. Those are just the federal regulations pending.

I bet half of the sample people on here who complain about the prevalance of lobbyist's also want more regulations.

I definitely get your examples there. However the absolutist tone of Reps is irritating me because they pretty much seem opposed to ALL regulation of business. If there is anyone who thinks the financial sector needs LESS regulation they are absolutely batfluff insane.

I could understand that frustration, particularly when you're talking about big corporations. What I don't think most people (r or d or i) understand is that big corporations pursue more stringent laws/regulations on their own industries as a means of preventing other companies from rising in the ranks to challenge them.

I expect corporations act in their own self-interest. If they're publicly traded then that typically means they're motivated by quarterly earnings and/or dividends. I think they act ethically so much as they're afraid of criminal or civil repercussions. But I think that's more human nature than anything else.

I agree with you if you're saying those Rs claiming we should be totally devoid of any regulation are crazy. The pure marketplace is more of a dream than communists arguing for a pure society of sharing everything. They're just not really practical.

But I do believe that the regulatory system is pretty screwed up in it's current existence and it has really provided a 4th level of government to bureaucrats in DC. I've worked on fed regs before too. The public gets to comment, but that rarely deters agency action.

That's what I thought you were saying (see my above post) and as much as it pains me to say it, I agree we can't live in a regulation-less world.

Eh, the financial sector will find a way around any regulation promulgated. Sometimes it's advantageous for the markets and sometimes it's not. They're the ultimate system gamers. If they can use a complex set of derivatives to mask true risk then they will. Given the volume and size of the economy, it's unrealistic to expect you will ever be able to fully monitor their comings and goings. Hence a lot of their industry is more about self-policing than government intervention. Shoot, look at the cycle of staff turnover at the SEC. It's like a train circuit from NYC to DC that keeps going back and forth.

I think the type of regulation I'd like to see is the kind businesses would not be in favor of :P

Firstly hedge funds need to be flat out outlawed. The idea that you can essentially bet on companies or countries failing, thus giving yourself a vested financial interest in making them fail is absurd on it's face. Outlaw default swaps while you're at it. You shouldn't be able to have multiple owners of a single debt.

Moreover inspectors and corporate executives need to be absolutely prohibited from contact with one another outside of a professional environment e.g. inspections/official meetings etc... They aren't supposed to be friends or good ole boys, there's SUPPOSED to be somewhat of an adversarial nature to their relationship.

Also corporations need to stop being treated as people. I was stunned that the Supreme Court ruled that corporations as entities have the same free speech rights as individuals and can spend unlimited cash on political causes.

I am a Prescint Chairman for the local Republican Party here and a full timeReal Estate investor.

A few things,

The current banking collapse is the result of Clinton and Reno threatening banks with sanctions if they did not increase lending so that minorities would have a larger percentage of home ownership. For the record, I am doing fine, and absolutely loved that you could go into a bank a few years ago with a wheelbarrow and leave with it full of cash. It really helped me grow.

As a member of the very, very lowest level of Local Republican leadership, I am in a very conservative area where most Republicans are over the top social issue demagogues. I find that even with the position I have, I split my ticket and vote Democrat locally more often than not. We are so conservative here that the Democrats have the same views as the moderate Republicans on the national level.

Wahington is full of nut jobs on both sides of the aisle. Local politics is where it is real..

Brink: There is not a single cause for the massive collapse of the economy. But I would be heavily prepared to argue that credit default swaps where banks chopped up sub prime mortgages and repackaged them as good investments (aka they intentionally lied) to investors and then turned around and used hedge funds to bet that these investments would fail(to cover their own asses) is a much bigger culprit then Clinton/Reno. If you or I did something like that we'd be in jail.

Hedge fund managers do push the envelope some time, but really a hedge fund is just a big investment fund. I think your issue is with the industry in general haha.

I understand your public/private point for regulating your friends, but the reality is if your pay in the public sector is 1/5 of that in the private sector then why on earth would you stay? Not to mention the insane cost of living in the DC area. Rent for a small 1 bedroom apartment in Alexandria,VA averages about 1,500-1,600 a month minus utilities, parking fees, etc. And if you drastically increase the pay of the public sector employees then average Americans will go nuts about it. It's a real catch-22. Good luck at solving it.

Disagree entirely with you on the USSC ruling regarding corporate free speech. Why should a corporation be treated differently than a non-profit, media outlet or any other organization of people? They have interests too and they represent people too, be they clients or voters or readers.

@Brink--I find myself disagreeing most with my part on social issues as well. Namely, I become more libertarian there. But Democrats where I live tend to be very liberal and Republicans very moderate. I guess it's all relative. Or, as Mao put it, where you sit is where you stand.

And good study yesterday by Progressive Public Policy Institute (haha, yes im citing the progressives!) about how moderate Blue Dog races cost nearly 2-3x as much as a liberal race. Same is true on R side. It's just the parties fight so much for the flip seats and with redistricting and people redistricting themselves the red and blues have become more red and more blue.

Brink has a point although I don't blame it all on Clinton/Reno as it's a combo of factors. Requiring home lenders to offer loans to people who couldn't qualify for a credit card today was probably piss poor policy. The flip side is the investors repackaging those loans 10x over and calling them AAA was also probably piss poor. But it starts with relaxing the lending standards and basically requiring they offer loans to people who couldn't afford them (and this didn't stop under Bush by any means, it accelerated). Bad public policy begets bad business policy begets bad economy outcomes.

trumper: It's not just a big investment fund. It's not like they're sitting around investing in Nintendo because a new console came out. They are literally betting on the failure of debt.

As far as regulation I know if I were running for office I'd sell the people on it. Paying a six figure salary to keep the financial sector honest is saving money when compared to the Obama stimulus. Dosn't seem like a hard arguement to make at all.

Corporations are not people. Dogs and staplers do not have free speech rights either. As far as I'm concerned non-profits should be able to be regulated also. Media is different as it is specifically constitutionally protected. As it stands corporations when it's all added up have MORE rights and priviledges then flesh and blood human beings.

Forget piss poor policy. Taking bad debt, repackaging it as good debt, selling it and then betting on that debt to fail should be considered criminal conduct and executives should be going to jail over it.

While we are on this subject it's supremely annoying that Washington can't see the obvious compromise to balancing the budget. Close ridiculous corporate tax loopholes and severely cut spending including social program reform. (AKA reduce spending and increase revenue simultaneously) It's absolutely absurd that large corporations can pay 10-15% in taxes while individuals even in the low tax brackets pay 25%+. It's not like these large corporations are even the job creators for the nation anyway as most of them are cutting rather then creating.

My post was actually a quote from Mr Burns, although to be fair he was talking about owning TicketMaster and including ridiculous service charges on tickets.

In that case, quote away. Mr. Burns is TOM's likely envisionment of an R business

At the time I'm pretty sure the concept of bad debt didn't exist. Easy to use hindsight, hard to use foresight. Let's say you're the HUD Secretary in 2004 and you say this isn't right, what do you think the response would be in Congress? I gurantee you would be anti-opportunity or racist or some other charge. Yet with hindsight you would be visionary.

I fundamentally disagree on the corporate voice. Let's say the Orkin Man Pest Control company is being vilified by xyz local Republican candidate simply because the ahole candidate had a beef with the company. Why shouldn't the company be able to buy an ad saying this guy's a douche and going to drive us out of business? Because he's running for office? Blah.

I would be fine closing tax loopholes if there were serious agreements on reducing mandatory entitlement spending and caps on discretionary increases--aka a balanced budget amendment. But that will never fly.

As a European I think pretty much everything the republicans stand for is complete lunacy.

Not that the Democrats are entirely much better in many cases but at least a better option.

Really what I think America could do with is some other third or even fourth option of what to vote on. The system quite clearly isnt working.

How do you view an American Republican? My experience is many Europeans view them as gun-toting and Bible-thumping when I think today's average Republican is more of a fiscal conservative and social libertarian...at least that's how the party looks about 10-15 years down the road as the next generation takes over.

We're definitely idling along, but we're not on the verge of domino-style collapse. I mean Society Generale is leveraged 50 to 1 and that's in a supposed strong economy. I'd rather be in our shoes than most European shoes economically-speaking.

trumper: It'll never fly because the Michelle Bachmanns of the world will never vote for any "tax increase" (which is what they call closing a loophole) on the Republican side and the Nancy Pelosi's of the world will not vote for any restructuring of the entitlement programs. That's the gridlock stupidity we've come to.

Actually, the scuttlebutt around DC was that they had agreed to a restructuring of tax code that would have eliminated those loopholes, lowered personal income rates slightly, but come out as a net revenue increase (aka what Bachman would call a tax hike). It had the signon from some of the bigwhigs, but Obama had granted some serious entitlement reforms in it too, which got torpedoed by House Dems. It came very close to happening.

It's a shame it didn't. If that happened and was successful that would have gotten Obama a second term. The thing Democrats don't seem to get is if we get a positive cash flow going we can actually afford to spend some. But as long as we are a trillion in the red every other day we will always be in belt tightening mode.

"If there is anyone who thinks the financial sector needs LESS regulation they are absolutely batfluff insane."

Well.. I wouldn't say that the financial industry in the US is necessarily over/under regulated as opposed to the fact that it is *badly* regulated. For such a pro-free market country I am amazed at the fact that for many types of non-mandatory insurance, companies still need to file for rate approval in many states and as such this simply encourages these companies to start lobbying/meddling in politics where they otherwise wouldn't bother.
Something like SOX is also somewhat of an insane knee-jerk reaction as 1) you essentially immobilize companies from the ability to do business and 2) it's only selectively enforced due to political reasons.
From personal experience I can tell you that there is a general lack of sanity in the financial regulatory environment in many countries. I can cite examples where the industry has actually wanted more effective/stringent regulations and yet the regulator has turned around and basically set up the industry for the next financial crises in 10 years.

~~~~~~~~~

Having said all that if Trumper is correct: "today's average Republican is more of a fiscal conservative and social libertarian" and the GOP actually started to reflect those things would be somewhat saner but as an outsider I would say that there appears to be a very strong social conservative element there and the GOP for the moment can't survive without that group. IMO social conservatism is very damaging to a country.

TOM and Martian hit on my 2 major complaints about the currently widely accepted Republican doctrine...

1. wearing blinders to the realities of privatizing too much government, especially where social welfare is involved. I hope this one is more party line rhetoric than actual belief, because the alternative is that Republicans don't understand that some things in a government/society NEED to be done, even if at a loss, to ensure the greater good of the nation. It's kinda like how if you have 1 crappy house on a block of really nice houses it drives the whole block's property values down, and they can only be brought up by repairing that crappy home - the same holds true in societies. Privatizing these things just ensures profit trumping social well being in practice and philosophy. There are certainly things that CAN be privatized, but one of government's primary roles is to ensure that those that cannot effectively be privatized are still provided, and I believe this ideology is lost on the modern Republican party, as is the concept that a private corporation will act in the interest of their shareholders first, and everyone else second (if at all)....as they rightfully should in the appropriate circumstances.

2. Regulation of private corporations is ABSOLUTELY necessary when their actions directly affect non shareholders/stockholders. A series of recessions, or even a possible depression (only time will really tell), should have made this abundantly clear, as should the semi-failed measures to shortcut those fiscal collapses by the Democratic majority in the current administration. Allowing financial groups to hold the country hostage is dangerous to us as a nation, our security, and human well being, and letting corporations/special interest groups serve their own interests while forsaking the vast majority of the population of the country to better serve the upper echelon of society is a dangerous game to play, and one that has historically ended in financial ruin (Japan, anyone?).

I find myself identifying with a lot of Republican philosophies, but because of the absolutist points of view on the 2 issues mentioned above I would be hard pressed to vote for any Republican candidate that "tows the party line", especially one that falls on the far extremes of either philosophy.

I'm not a huge fan of the current Democratic approach either, but at least in my book social well being should always trump financial well being on a list of priorities for governance...especially since the latter generally follows the former.

The Republican Party is caught up in reactionism. Until the teaparty surge dies down, they won't be able to make any sort of logical or reasonable steps to the political center.

There is a definate moderate body on both sides of the debate that what to protect when necessary and get out the way elsewhere, and thereby provide effective governance at the lowest price point. However, they are split into minority positions in both parties, and parisan politic reign as the best opposition candidate is elected.

We need to pass a world-wide referendum on a one-world democratic government that strips out all the regional pandering and applies logic and reason as its basis. Otherwise, we'll just get their piecemeal as the WTO and such standardize our affairs and open holdouts over the decades.

My experience is that large corporations only want more regulation of their industries when it benefits them - ie regulations specifically intended to protect their market share and hamstring potential competition, not to make their products or manufacturing process safer.

The problem with allowing business to regulate itself (talking on a large scale here, not some dentist who hangs a shingle on his house or some mom and pop restaurant), is that businesses are a) inherently anti-competitive, and b) interested in their bottom line - increasing revenue, decreasing expenses, and limiting liability exposure - as a result, they can be counted on only to do the right thing for them (or more specifically, the thing that will increase short term growth), and not for the long term viability of their business, the market, the consumers, or the nation.

The main problem cause of the recent financial sector crash and resulting recession is deeper than the real estate bubble, hedge funds, and credit default swaps, and goes to the heart of the corporate culture in this country. One of the main things that separate small businesses from the large corporations is that the officers of large corporations are rewarded solely for short term growth, rather than long term stability and profitability.

That culture has ruined most of our big industry and is eroding this country's greatness.

I work in a highly regulated industry. My company is a good example as to why Republicans are anti-regulation. In our yearly report, we list government regulation as the number one threat to our company and the biggest obstacle to our future expansion. In fact, we have ended all plans to expand further because the obstacles the government creates makes expansion too difficult and unprofitable.

That's not right. A company's biggest threat should not be the government, it should be its competition. Competition makes companies better. Jumping through hoops to appease the government makes them less efficient and less productive. Its government meddling that causes most problems. When you provide implicit guarantees that you'll bail out a failed company, you incentivize placing short-term interests over long-term interests.

When you provide incentives to make bad loans for political reasons, and then implicitly guarantee quasi governmental institutions that buy, package and distribute those loans you'll bail them out if things go wrong (FNMA, FDMC), you create financial crises.

In the same breath though Klown, couldn't it also be said that a government's biggest threat shouldn't be a company? I mean, last I checked it was a whopping 9 banks' policy of leveraging funds that didn't really exist far beyond reasonably safe practices that sent the US into its current financial state. Well, that and the public's unwitting (*edit: /uninformed*) willingness to buy into it hook, line, and sinker.

+1e^100

Because there are no limits to how much corporations and private interests can spend to influence/sway public opinions.

I'm pretty sure if you could pull back the curtain and see how certain social movements were initiated you'd find some men with cash and plans that would get most people charged and jailed for subversion.

Seriously, the main problem is most business are beholden only to their stockholders. Which makes them out to screw everyone else as much as they can get away with in order to get the best bottom line. When a company is slowing in growth who takes the hit? Not the stockholders. Employees salaries get slashed or their positions get eliminated. Prices go up, service quality goes down, all just to protect their margins so that they can meet target payout to stockholders. They do not have the mentality of making a better product to increase market share, their mentality is simply to eliminate competition altogether. That's a ridiculous model for virtually every major corporation to follow and why they need to be regulated.

I know of multiple CEOs saying (parapharsing) "it is the governments duty to create jobs and our duty to create profit, even if that means laying off 80% of the workforce". Ultimately businesses are not out to stimulate the economy and if that happens it is just a lucky by-product of their profit, and not the intention.

on the point of stocks, you realize that once you remove direct corporate ownership, about 75% of the remaining stocks are owned by wealthy (in the top 10% income bracket) individuals directly or indirectly right? Everyone elses 401K and personal investments don't even make a dent really.

Stocks are not widely held.
(Direct corporate ownership are corporations holding investments in their name for their profit, and not investing it on behalf of someone else, this isn't a bad thing really I"m just clarifying what I mean)

It works both ways. If you downsize at every occasion to meet quarterly earnings then you scare of potential employees who could help you acheive higher returns. Worse yet, you make capital decisions based on maximizing the quarterly profits, which can be disastrous down the road. Some investors will reward you, but only so much as they can make a quick buck. The long-term investors will bail because eventually someone will downgrade you seeing that you have lost key talen, sales are down, etc.

In that situation the two were interdependent. The banks had more to lose than the government because at the end of the day after a depression the government is still standing, but the banks aren't.

Except that in practice what you are talking about is long term. Most CEO's and boards of directors are only looking at a 5 year time horizon maximum. The way they are incentivized is to maximizes their dividends/bonuses which is via maximizing share holder return over the short run. I see this in practice a fair bit. (I'm not on a board of directors but I'm at a high enough position that I deal with said individuals and show them pretty pictures :P Most of them aren't mean, evil, or vindictive people, but just like me, their goal is to collect as much salary as they can.)

As long as unemployment is high they don't worry about scarring off potential employees except the ones near the top and those aren't the ones usually subject to mass layoffs anyway. I should also say that some of them would rather simply lay off more experienced workers in the name of savings and rehire uni grads when things turn around. The cycle is endless in those terms really.

There's a quote in the wealth of nations about this which effectively says that owners also collaborate to drive wage costs down just like workers (unions or otherwise) try to collaborate to drive costs up, only they use their influence and are less public about it.

As a young Republican, I have a few things to say about my politics.

Where it concerns Social Issues: I am opposed to abortion, but feel that there are many more important issues to deal with. For clarity, I oppose abortion except to save the life of the mother; I am undecided on whether abortion should be legal in cases of rape/incest. Abortion is pegged at the bottom of the line of issues to be addressed right now.

I am opposed to death penalty (life imprisonment instead) due to the remote chance that an innocent person could be executed. Better to send some to jail for life and give them the maximum time to prove their innocence if wrongly convicted than it is to execute an innocent person. This issue is pegged just slightly ahead of abortion. (Note the consistent point of view between abortion and the death penalty.)

I believe that religion and government should be able to influence each other (mostly indirectly), but not dominate one another. Our constitution does not protect the government from religion. It protects religion from the government and it is important to understand the difference here. Religion as a pillar of morality and rightness in the world should offer guidance and comfort to our leaders. Religious morality (as with all moralities) has the right to influence government within the confines of all other rights. When taken that way, it can help build strong nations.


To regulations: We need a comprehensive review of the regulations that already exist. Does anyone even know where we stand on regulations? Like other things we're not even at the starting point for regulating anyone. The starting point is knowing what regulations we actually need and how we need to implement them.

To taxes: Like regulations, we're not even at the starting point. Start by reviewing the taxes we already have, so that we know what's coming in and how much doing/getting taxes costs the people (or companies) and the government. Simplify the tax code, everyone pays the same rate. Certain environmentally damaging activities pay additional fees or taxes to operate (this allows for regulators and officials to mitigate the environmental damage and for otherwise uncompensated stakeholders to be compensated for activities which negatively impact them). Forestry regulations and requirements are an example of such fees, requirements, and taxes. On this note, a tree farm would be exempt from such requirements.

First, define what we need.
Second, determine what we have.
Third, adjust what we have to what we need.

Oh my what a load of rubbish. But just to poke a hole in one of your misconceptions.

Religion and morality have absolutely nothing to do with eachother. You can have a great set of morals and be the biggest atheist around, and then on the flip side you can (quite obviously) be a devout catholic and hump little boys all day long and get away with it. Who's morals are the better?

That only religious peopel can have morality is a total load of rubbish and seems to be a very common misconception. But then again religious people dont really tend to take criticism very well (nor do they really do critical thinking very well IMHO).

Myself I will be marching proud in a few weeks time for a Secular Europe through the streets of London!

Come join me everyone!

Details found here:
http://secular-europe-campaign.org/

(hopefully some day you get the same in America, then you can really be the Land of the free that you are all so keen on)

Short-term unemployment allows them to do that, but today's unemployment hurts their rewards mechanisms. I think there is a subtle shift back to stronger producing companies over the longer haul at the moment.

I did not say that only religious people could have good morals or even that religious people did have good morals. I merely stated that the moral guide which religion can offer is not a bad thing. Furthermore, I specifically stated that all moralities had a right to influence the government. By stating, "as with all moralities," I acknowledged that morals are not just nurtured in religion or even religious at all. I also stated that religious morality can (not does) help build good nations.

Please actually read my post before you criticize it. Don't put words into my mouth that I have not said. If I had meant to say them, I would have.

**Important note: These views are mine alone and do not reflect Omega's position in any way, shape, or form.

Well in my opinion anyone that believes in a magic man in the sky should be automatically disregarded for any place in government, if you believe in fairy tales then you shouldnt govern a country. I DO NOT want anyone that has those kind of childish fantasies guiding anything to do with my life. That is why church and state absolutely has to be separate. :)

Angel1, you need to read the Constitution again: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." Relgion is independent of morality as can been seen by the variability of the morals in any religion.

Just because you are ignorant of existing regulations, does not mean the relavent industries are. There are continual reviews and tweaks going on at various levels of government. Your suggested starting point of knowing what regulations are needed implies some sort of empirical knowledge. If based on political theories like 'trickle down economics', you end up with what is perceived as needed, instead of what actually is needed.

On taxes, unfortunately Republicans (notably the Tea Party) are against closing loopholes in tax law, such as for private jet owners. Political ideology trumps rationale thought. However, would you be willing to pay 10-20% more taxes, so that billionaires can pay the save level as you? Just convince the rest of America to do the same, and you have the deficit problem solved.

Religion and morality do not necessarily have any connection, to state that they do is as equally false as your statement that religion cannot have a connection to morality. The simple fact is that for many people religion is a source of moral guidance. Multifaceted and stable socities tend to be more moral than unreligious societies. How many Europeans count on their government to aid people in times of natural disasters? How many Europeans would take their own personal boats out to rescue flood victims? During the Nashville flooding, the government basically just set up sign up stations to keep track of the people going out to rescue other people (some doing so as their own homes were flooded). That's an example of morality that simply isn't as prevalent in Europe as it is in the US.


Just because the relevant industries are aware of the existing regulations does not mean that they do not need a review and that they should not be altered to appropriate levels and to reduce redundancies. If you want more regulations, first show us exactly what we really need. If you want to make a deal, don't be intransigent against dropping redundant or useless regulations.


It's is not to pay the same amount in taxes, it is to pay the same percentage in taxes. $100,000 * 10% taxes = $10k total taxes. $10m * 10% taxes = $1m total taxes. Two very different income levels and two different total tax burdens. Imagine that, fairness in taxation. Oh, one more thing. No loopholes, no exceptions. The only offsetting revenues would be the cost of a new home against the pay out of a sold house and other similar transactions for businesses. I understand this could get dicey, but if I am to make the provision for residential real estate, I must also make it for commericial real estate.

As to ViLSE: Your absolutist position cannot be assaulted. It must merely be sidestepped. Nothing that could be said against it will change your mind and it's therefore pointless to say anything at all against your position. I simply disagree with you.