It might sound odd, but perhaps this is in some ways what we need, that the public makes the mistake of allowing and supporting people like Huckabee so that they experience first hand what it’d be like to live under oppressive/unfair conditions, so that they will rebel against it.

One word: Scapegoat.

If the human race hasn’t learned the lesson after thousands of years of suffering under theocracy in various forms, do you really think anything will be learned from another one?  Especially one that will have unprecedented power and tools to control the lives of those he rules over?  Suffering rarely breaks willful ignorance.  What it does do is give those causing the suffering the opportunity to turn that ignorance in whatever direction they want. The ignorant masses willingly believe whatever they are told. 

For an example, see the percentage of US citizens that believed that Saddam Hussein was responsible for the September 11, 2001 attacks on the US.

A stupid, fearful population is very easy to control.  Huckabee represents a massive shift toward ignorance, and fear mongering is just par for the course for the US government.

Bahamat- Britain already has a graduated tax system.

Lostalaska- Yep, no more amendments to the constitution, and get rid of all the ones you already have.

BB- I don’t expect the entire human race to learn, especially when death + new life keeps pressing the reset button, but on an individual scale, if someone suffers enough they will see very plainly what caused it, and may rebel against it. Push people too far and they won’t want to obey the dictators orders or ideas anymore, they’d hate him and would only obey through fear or a feeling of compulsion, and it’d be with resentment. The public would suffer far more than the one in power, but the public will probably be more emotionally understanding people for it, and those who they affect will have an easier time. If you want to put the public off an idea, like as what happened with fascism or communism, show people how brutal it can be.

LH- But tax is still banded, and the rules are different between bands. There is a sudden change in fairness when someone changes band, it’s like a staircase has lots of flat levels with sudden jumps between. Graduated tax is fairer than flat rate, but as is it’s not as smooth as it could be and rate doesn’t vary with the penny

Graduated tax is fairer than flat rate, but as is it’s not smooth and rate doesn’t vary with the penny

Even though it would be relatively trivial to come up with an algorithm for nearly perfect smoovitude.  And we should do that.  As it is, many people get a $100 raise and end up paying an extra $200 in taxes, which is just silly.

“Fixing those pesky biology, chemistry, geology, history, mathematics, physics, astronomy, philosophy, government and economics courses in high schools.”

And then we’ve gotta bring back Home Ec and Stenography for the girls.  Girls only need some secretarial skills, to give them something to do until they meet the right man, and fulfill their biblical role serving their husbands and raising their children. They’re crowding the boys out of the classes they need to be good breadwinners so that the little woman can stay home to raise the children, and not have to worry her little head about work and money and that sort of thing.

As it is, many people get a $100 raise and end up paying an extra $200 in taxes, which is just silly

Not here. Boy your system really needs fixing.

In the UK (VERY rounded figs to give the idea, make the maths easier)
0-£5k at 0%
£5k-35K @20%
£35k+ @ 40%

but only of the income in that band
ie £34k
£5,000 at 0% = 0
£34k-5k =£29k @ 20% = £5800 (ie subtract the £5k band)

£36k
£5,000 at 0% = 0
£35k-5k =£30k @ 20% = £6000
remaining £1000 at 40% = £400

Total £6400, the extra £600 is from the extra £2k they get.

Even if your right on £35k, and get a £100 pay rise, you only pay the 40% on £100, not everything.

Only an idiot of a government would run it different, or as you say, pay rises could penalise you.

Only an idiot of a government would run it different, or as you say, pay rises could penalise you.

lol.. forgive me for twisting tails, here, but versus a flat tax (or no tax at all, not to say both aren’t wierd/absurd) aren’t you already doing that? Punishing people who earn higher incomes by taxing them more?

versus a flat tax (or no tax at all, not to say both aren’t wierd/absurd) aren’t you already doing that? Punishing people who earn higher incomes by taxing them more?

Realistically no, since 40% of $100,000 is less of a burden for that person than 40% of $10,000 is to that person.  Given, having to pay 40k out of 100k would suck, but having only 6k out of 10k in take home pay would not just suck, you couldn’t really live off it.  That’s not to say that anyone could live off $10k nowdays, but the flat tax is definitely less fair to the poor than a graded tax is to the rich.

reminds me of a software keynote a year or so back from a developer at Google.

You can’t please everyone - instead, aim to displease everyone equally.

lol.. forgive me for twisting tails, here, but versus a flat tax (or no tax at all, not to say
both aren’t wierd/absurd) aren’t you already doing that? Punishing people who earn higher incomes by taxing them more?

Well flat-taxers certainly see it that way, but I’m talking about the perverse “steps” that our tax system sometimes produces where a small raise bumps the taxpayer into a higher bracket, and the difference in taxes exceeds the amount of the raise.  The progressiveness of our tax system (which i do support) moves in unnecessarily large steps instead of a smooth progression.

I can’t complain too much, but the progression could be smoother.  For two years I worked a part-time side job to make ends meet.  My income was about $3500 higher for those two years, and it cost me almost $1000 each year in higher taxes.  I went from below the “poverty line” to barely above it, and it came as a bit of a surprise that my tax burden had doubled.  I couldn’t buy a decent used car, get a decent apartment, or even think about having a child(or a pet, or an investment plan, or an unexpected illness)with the extra $3500.  But I sure did feel the crunch when I was filing my tax return.
And then I look at where that money goes…
but that’s another rant.

Wait, wait, wait just a goddamned minute here.  What just happened? 
After reading the main post, and then weaving my way through 34 comments, I ended up leaving a meek bit of personal commentary about the imperfect nature of the American tax system.  Luckily, after submitting my comment I was redirected to the top of the page!
There is a fucking lunatic running for president on a platform that even well-known wingnuts have been afraid to endorse!  And he isn’t being laughed out of the debates!
I don’t care about the fact that his ideas will fail this time around; it’s all about testing the deep waters of ignorance.  The closer he gets to acceptance on these grounds, the easier it will be to “normalize” such notions next time around.  And yes, when dealing in lunatic politics, the slope really is slippery!  How many more election cycles until christian amendments to the constitution are considered inevitable instead of unlikely? 
I could draw some parallels to the last several decades in a few well-known middle-eastern countries, but the “conservatives” wouldn’t get it, and the “liberals” would accuse me of muslim-bashing.
The rational community has to respond to this.  This is insanity, the one area where I am not willing to fight fire with fire.  I’m too young to be casing clock towers.

I’d like to second the sentiments expressed in Neil’s most recent comment. The fact that Mike Huckabee has not been relegated to the status of “crank” by a majority of Americans--the fact that he is even still in the race--indicates just how low we as a nation have sunk.

Me, I’ll be brushing up on my rudimentary knowledge of Italian...just ‘cuz. Though I really should be learning Dutch, because let’s face it, Amsterdam is the greatest place on Earth. 

Not to decry the wonderfulness of Amsterdam, Sadie, but for a Californian the winters there are pretty dismal, with only about four hours of daylight and overcast… Believe me, I lived there one winter.

Of course, there are compensations…

I’m trying to work out why only 4 hours a day- a little exageration possibly? (Sadie- FYI today’s sunrise/sunset in the South of England is 8am to 4.10pm - about the same as Edmonton in Canada (same Lat))

To keep the Thread Nazis happy- Huckabee bad blah blah, seperation on church and state blah blah.

Yes the rich pay more than the poor, but then their disposable is much more- like I said before many costs are fixed- petrol, MacDonalds etc.  There is a basic income that you must have to buy the essentials.  More than that lets you get luxuries.  The rich can also invest surplus income, generating more income.  More steps are fairer, but seen as making the system more complicated.  Guess who argues that simplifing the tax system is better because everyone can understand it.  In the words of Sam Vimes- “Follow the money”.

Interesting comment on BBC radio- policies do not seem to be a major concern amoung voters- as far as I can tell its beauty and soundbite.

Okay, Hussar, that was a bit exaggerated.  I looked it up, and Amsterdam, at 52° North (a couple degrees south of Edinburgh), has a bit more than seven hours of what they jocularly refer to as “daylight” in the winter.  But it seemed pretty dismal to me, the three months I spent there.  It’s not much better here in Vienna, at 48° North, especially if the south windows in your apartment just face across the courtyard.

But we’re getting a new apartment, hoorah! with windows and a balcony to the south!  Maybe we’ll be able to grow lemons!

Okay, Hussar, that was a bit exaggerated

Does I was right song and dance.

I forget how far north Europe is.  Southern Spain is 36 North- Thats approximately the Virgina/North Carolina border.  New York is a few miles south of Rome, and LA is down with Lebanon.

Course the upside is longer summer days.  I remember an interview with a rep from the Icelandic tourist board, saying how German Tourists complain about the fact they can’t get to sleep, because the sun is still up!  I think I would happily live in Vienna, South facing windows on a courtyard and all.

Heard on the Radio this morning Fred the Actor was calling another Rep (poss Huckabee or Romney) a LIBERAL.

Neil, thread drift is a fact of life, as is the fun of getting back to the topic - yeah!  The crazier each one gets, the saner the crazy ones between them and sanity appear to be to the vast numbers of American Idol watching, global warming denying, pastoral politics pursuing walking advertising demographics who make up the bulk of voters.

No worries, and no thread nazi here!  I wasn’t trying to take anyone to task(except maybe myself), I was just truly surprised at how quickly the subject changed into something more comfortably sane. 
The press has been taking it real easy on this nutter.  Any journalist could, with a minimum of effort, expose a book’s worth of insanity straight from Huck’s mouth, and at least ask some pointed questions about his theocratic ambitions.  Instead we get some perverted Fox-style fair and balancing act, where any joker who can sway a few loonies gets automatic respect and positive coverage. As long as
he’s attatched to one of the two parties that get covered, of course.  If this asshole were an independent, we could have safely laughed his ass back to the pulpit by now. 
He has a serious race going, on a platform that USED to keep people out of consideration.  This stuff was the domain of the Pat Robertsons and the Jerry Falwells, now it is becoming mainstream.  The republican drift to the right has done enough damage over the last two decades or so by appealing to divine authority and human prejudice-now they don’t even feel the need to hide their dishonest tactics or imperial ambitions.
When we do take the final crap on reason by electing our first American Ayatollah, how long before we start hearing about the “divine right of presidents” or some such?  How many men of faith does it take to tear down the standards of a secular government to the point where the damage is permanent?

Neil- not enough content about the thread title in your last post, so under the US Constitution (the bits they don’t admit to) you have to have your bare buttocks pelted with lightly salted asparagus. Don’t blame me, blame John Hancock- he put it in, but his writing was too big to fit in the essential clause “if your name is Thomas Jefferson.”

The problem is that US Primaries are notorious for candidates drifting to the extremes to capture the ‘Core vote’.  They usually move back to the centre to catch the floaters.  The problem is of course if the candidate doesn’t do this.  It makes sense for the other party to drift that way to to pick up those left behind.

They usually move back to the centre to catch the floaters.

A little less fat in one’s diet reduces the chance of floaters.

aren’t you already doing that? Punishing people who earn higher incomes by taxing them more?

I think the difference is that with the UK, if someone enters a new, higher band, the higher rate only applies to what’s above the minimum of that band - so different sections of your income is taxed at different rates, rather than the whole of it.

LH - Notice the graduated system is like lots of flat lax levels - one flat tax rate for those in a certain range, another flat tax rate for those in another range - it’d be fairer to have a slope than a staircase

Bare buttocks pelted with lightly salted asparagus?  Hmmm...I knew that our founding fathers were men of vision, but the prescience of this insight amazes me.  The couldn’t have known it, but that is the very thing that would put me in my place.  Any mention of licorice whippings for petty offenses, or allowing females to duel by way of jello wrestling?

A little less fat in one’s diet reduces the chance of floaters.

This information is accurate and useful.  It would be even more useful if posted on the bathroom door of every Greyhound bus in the fleet.  Those floaters can get dangerous if the driver has to slam on the brakes.

As far as Fuckabee goes, I know that candidates do a lot of grandstanding and say lots of silly things to get noticed, but it is still a distressing thing to see such anti-constitutional claptrap getting the spotlight.  I’m still waiting for Chuck Barris to ring the gong and the audience to break out in derisive laughter; the longer it goes on, the more I doubt that any such moment is coming.  I don’t care how likeable or mild mannered Huckabee is, he seems to honestly believe that there is a pressing need for more God in our politics, when it’s already so God-soaked you can hardly sense any other issues except the reek of the pious.

He might swing back to center a bit if he gets the nomination, but it would take one hell of a swing to land him anywhere near the center. 
I think his only change would likely be AWAY from center and his “christian charity” social views, so as to line up more closely with the fiscal conservatives of his party.  In my opinion, the only thing keeping him from greater popularity among repubs is his seeming friendliness.  The war hawks, corporate interests, and law & order fanatics probably don’t think he’s tough enough to kill all the people who need killing.  If he can get over his christian conscience and take the Republican mantra of “might makes right” to heart, he might just prove to be the guy for the job.

The frightening thing about US Politics is that because Religeon is so wide spread every one has to been seen to be promoting it, to avoid being labeled ‘anti american’.  ‘Atheist’ is a pointless insult in Britain.

And DoF- if you continue to lower the tone we will let Neil loose on you with a tin of peaches in syrup.  He sounds a creative lad…

Creative?  Well, maybe.  But my humor is so lowbrow that my nipples have eyelashes.