I takes a crook to know a crook..

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billybud
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Re: I takes a crook to know a crook..

Postby billybud » Thu Mar 03, 2011 5:29 pm

"The banking lobby includes Dick Gephardt, former leader of the House Democrats, Trent Lott, former leader of the Senate Republicans, and former Republican House leader Dick Armey, and putative leader of one branch of the Tea Partiers."

The title of this thread is just sooo appropriate....
“If short hair and good manners won football games, Army and Navy would play for the national championship every year.”

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Re: I takes a crook to know a crook..

Postby Spence » Thu Mar 03, 2011 7:17 pm

billybud wrote:"The banking lobby includes Dick Gephardt, former leader of the House Democrats, Trent Lott, former leader of the Senate Republicans, and former Republican House leader Dick Armey, and putative leader of one branch of the Tea Partiers."

The title of this thread is just sooo appropriate....



The first two are government crooks and the last one is an opportunist. That only helps my point. Three more political leaders helping to push for bad law. The federal government is completely out of control - it runs across party lines. The only way to fix is to return power to the states and hold the political leaders responsible for bad law.
"History doesn't always repeat itself but it often rhymes." - Mark Twain

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Re: I takes a crook to know a crook..

Postby donovan » Fri Mar 04, 2011 9:52 am

There is no difference between big government, big business and big unions. They all have the same purpose, maintain the status quo. Bigness in and of itself is not inherently bad, but when it become so, it is like an aircraft carrier versus a dingy, much harder to turn around and or sink.
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Re: I takes a crook to know a crook..

Postby Spence » Fri Mar 04, 2011 8:16 pm

That is right they are the new aristocracy. The government, big business, and public labor unions. The GE's and GM's of the world aren't who I refer to as "business". They are slowly turning us into serfs.
"History doesn't always repeat itself but it often rhymes." - Mark Twain

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Re: I takes a crook to know a crook..

Postby billybud » Sat Mar 05, 2011 8:10 pm

Well...who do you call business?

The banking industry? Not GE, nor GM, nor all of the major corporations with 10,000 or more employees? Certainly not McDonald's of Walmart..

Oh? Maybe it's the guy who owns the car wash or the local beer distributorship.
“If short hair and good manners won football games, Army and Navy would play for the national championship every year.”

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Re: I takes a crook to know a crook..

Postby billybud » Sat Mar 05, 2011 8:15 pm

But...folks who make things are business.....the soul of what American business once was. Back when we actually made things like steel, TV's, computers, and toasters...shoes and textile goods.

Heck...America's car, the Camaro, is now more foreign than a Toyota pick up. The Camaro is assembled in Canada and has a smaller proportion of domestic parts than the Toyota assembled in Georgia. I know what the British felt like when they surrendered at Yorktown and their band played "the world turned upside down".
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Re: I takes a crook to know a crook..

Postby Spence » Sat Mar 05, 2011 9:26 pm

By the time a business gets as big as GM or GE, they are like government. They no longer know many of the people the employ. They are in so many things that many of their leaders barely know what they make. Government works exactly the same what. The parties or the "board" decide the few guys they want to run the company and then they let the shareholders vote on leadership based on their recommendations. The shareholders rarely know much about any of the people up for the job so they proxy their vote to the board members or delegates.


It amazes me the many people draw a line between government and big business. It is all a distraction, in my view, to keep us from focusing on what really matters. The two parties in this country are all work toward the same goal - to stay in power or regain power. They all look to keep their marketshare and expand their brand. They do anything and everything to further that goal. The president and congress care as much about the people in this country as Jack Welch and his board of directors do about rank and file employees in their companies.
"History doesn't always repeat itself but it often rhymes." - Mark Twain

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Re: I takes a crook to know a crook..

Postby billybud » Sun Mar 06, 2011 12:19 pm

The small business of Florida do know the people that they employ...all of the low wage retail and service staff that supply the restaurants, strip malls, and motels. The tire changers, laundry workers, pest control folks, and Mexican landscape crews.

Small business in Florida employs a very small proportion of the wage earning middle class. The largest employer in most Florida counties is government...state, local, and federal. With the county school board usually leading the pack.

While Walmart, chain stores and fast food restaurant chains and our grocery chains are very large employers...they don't pay a real living wage to a majority of their workers.
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Re: I takes a crook to know a crook..

Postby Spence » Sun Mar 06, 2011 2:12 pm

billybud wrote:The small business of Florida do know the people that they employ...all of the low wage retail and service staff that supply the restaurants, strip malls, and motels. The tire changers, laundry workers, pest control folks, and Mexican landscape crews.

Small business in Florida employs a very small proportion of the wage earning middle class. The largest employer in most Florida counties is government...state, local, and federal. With the county school board usually leading the pack.

While Walmart, chain stores and fast food restaurant chains and our grocery chains are very large employers...they don't pay a real living wage to a majority of their workers.


And you don't see the problem in that. Where does the government get the money to pay all those people. At some point it isn't a self sustaining to have the biggest employer be an non revenue producing entity and get their money from much smaller revenue producing companies. In the end this is a system that can't sustain itself as it is and I would prefer not to have the government taking over all business - and that is the end game here. It is the only way the goverenment can keep up their revenue stream.
"History doesn't always repeat itself but it often rhymes." - Mark Twain

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Re: I takes a crook to know a crook..

Postby billybud » Sun Mar 06, 2011 8:20 pm

Yep...just quit paying teachers so much...my teachers took the oath of poverty (Dominicans and Jesuits).

In Florida, we have the lowest number of state workers per capita in the country and the lowest cost per capita in the country...pretty dang efficient.

The majority of propert tax in our state goes to the education system....
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Re: I takes a crook to know a crook..

Postby Spence » Sun Mar 06, 2011 8:38 pm

When most all the private sector has to pay a higher percentage in health care and a take a hit, I don't think it is asking to much to ask public employees to pay more as well. If Florida can afford it, then good for them. Most states can not. The Federal government can't afford anything.

When the money is there, then you can pay employees more. You can offer better benefits. When it isn't, you can't offer as much. This economy isn't expanding. The tax base isn't there anymore. With the price of fuel reaching record levels and every thing costing more, we are all in for a major change in what we consider normal. With the fed flooding our economy with newly printed cash, record inflation can't be far behind. What is coming is not going to be fun for anyone.
"History doesn't always repeat itself but it often rhymes." - Mark Twain

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Re: I takes a crook to know a crook..

Postby billybud » Mon Mar 07, 2011 8:51 am

Well Spence...if you want equity...how about equity.

It's not as if the state empoyees of Florida were paid at the same level as the private sectror...they are payed less.

Florida state employees who retire do not receive health insurance....many private sector retirees have health insurance as part of their retirement package (33% of Florida's private employers).

"Our elected leaders call for public employees to sacrifice their supposedly lavish salaries and benefits. Letter writers echo this sentiment. The underlying premise, however, is factually inaccurate. Numbers showing that median public sector pay is higher than median private sector pay belie the actual composition of the two work forces.

A 2007 U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics survey showed that approximately two-thirds of public sector jobs are professional or administrative, compared with 51 percent in the private sector. About 20 percent of private sector jobs are low-skilled or temporary, compared with only 2 percent in the public sector".

And...about pensions..

"Pension contributions from state and local employers aren’t blowing up budgets. They amount to just 2.9 percent of state spending, on average, according to the National Association of State Retirement Administrators. The Center for Retirement Research at Boston College puts the figure a bit higher at 3.8 percent.

Though there’s no direct comparison, state and local pension contributions approximate the burden shouldered by private companies. The nonpartisan Employee Benefit Research Institute estimates that retirement funding for private employers amounts to about 3.5 percent of employee compensation."


The average state employee pension in Florida is a little above $15,000 (with health insurance costs for that individual taking near half of that if they under 65).
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Re: I takes a crook to know a crook..

Postby Spence » Mon Mar 07, 2011 10:22 am

I don't know anything about Florida state workers, but in Ohio they retire with 80% of their pay and medical, dental, and eye insurance. They pay roughly 9% of the cost, while the private sector here pays 25% on average. If the Florida deal is good for everyone , then great. It isn't in most states.

Also, regardless of whether or not a system is fair, if you have no money to pay, you have to do something. That is how things work in the real world. Most employers would rather have their employees do really well and make a profit. Today, even the big boys can't do it anymore. The government system of pay is set up lots like the GM model was and we know what happened there. It isn't sustainable anymore. Our economy is on it's last legs.
"History doesn't always repeat itself but it often rhymes." - Mark Twain

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Re: I takes a crook to know a crook..

Postby Spence » Mon Mar 07, 2011 10:42 am

Also, I don't know what percent of the total spending has to do with anything. It all comes down to what you can afford and where you can cut.
"History doesn't always repeat itself but it often rhymes." - Mark Twain

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Re: I takes a crook to know a crook..

Postby billybud » Mon Mar 07, 2011 9:04 pm

In Florida..you get no dental, no medical...and after 30 years, 48% of the average of your "high five" years (which usually amounts to about 40% of current salary.
“If short hair and good manners won football games, Army and Navy would play for the national championship every year.”


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