From: garrett@Ingres.COM (It's not what you got, it's what you give)
Newsgroups: ba.politics,talk.politics.misc,alt.politics.elections,co.politics,ne.politics,alt.politics.clinton,alt.politics.democrats.d
Subject: Re: VOTE, BABY, VOTE!
Summary: Correction
Date: 11 Nov 92 03:50:31 GMT
Organization: ASK Computer Systems, Ingres Product Division
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.4-b1

In article <1992Nov11.013643.1579@ucsu.Colorado.EDU>, fcrary@ucsu.Colorado.EDU (Frank Crary)                     writes...
>In article <BZS.92Nov10001715@ussr.std.com> bzs@ussr.std.com (Barry Shein) writes
>>When was the last time Congress approved a federal budget which wasn't
>>SMALLER than what Bush submitted?
> 
>I'm not sure about every case, but I believe the budget Congress passes
>is generally larger than the Bush administration's requests.
> 
Sorry. Every budget that Bush submitted to Congress was larger than the
budget that Congress passed. I'm not as sure about the Reagan era, but
I am sure that the budgets that Congress passed were smaller than what
Reagan submitted for a couple years.

>>Now what would be one way to correct that situation...?
> 
>Eliminate programs that benifit only one section of society.
>
Which section of society do you want to cut-off. The poor? The old?
The disabled? The children? All the above? Where will you weld the knife?

>>You're the one who could use an argument. Thus far you don't have one,
>>other than that you don't like poor people so blame it on them.
> 
>Sorry, I'm arguing the reverse: There is no reason to hate 
>rich people, so why blame it on them? We are all in this together.
>
I'm sure that is exactly what the homeless person feels when the
rich person steps over him and into his limo.

>>>wouldn't: However we got into this mess, we're all in it together
>>>and should be trying, on an equal basis, to solve the problem;
>>>instead, it seems to be politically popular to point fingers and
>>>to try to get someone _else_ to foot the bill.)

Despite your obvious bias for the rich, you have a point. However you
are approaching this from the wrong direction. The question is "Who can
afford to pay for it?" You see despite what conservatives are telling
you the social services sector is about to collapse because of the budget
cuts all through the 80's. It's down to the bone! If you want to balence
the budget on the backs of the poor, then you better budget a whole bunch
more money for police services because stealing food and money will be
the only way for the poor to get by (this is no joke. If you don't 
realize it then you should get out of the suburbs more often.) If you want
to raise taxes on the poor then you will be surely dissapointed because 
the poor have nothing to tax. That's why they call them poor (I know.
I qualify for that tax bracket.)
	Now we can always do what people usually do (and what will 
probably be done again), and that is raise taxes on the middle class.
The problem with that is, taxes were raised on the middle class all 
through the 80's by the states to make up for the money that Reagan 
wasn't sending anymore. To further complicate this, is that the middle
class is shrinking because millions of good paying jobs left the 
country during the 80's and were replaced by low paying service jobs.
You can't keep demanding more from the middle class, or you will end
up with frustrated, formerly working people shooting at police and
tax men. 
	So all we have left is the rich. Who, I might add, grew 
in number significantly during the 80's. Also, the debt really started 
to climb in 82'. By no small coincidence, this also happens to be
the year of the famous Reagan tax cut that cut the taxes for the rich
more than any other bracket. You might say we were in a recession that
year, that's because the debt shot up. Well then, "Why didn't the debt
stop climbing after we were out of the recession?"

Please, think about this.

>>>Defence contractors don't, as a rule, pocket the money the
>>>government gives them.

You haven't been doing your homework then. We aern't talking just
profits, we are talking curruption, and it runs into the billions.
I believe the name of the investigation was "Ill Wind" (or very close
to that). Check out the record of defense contractors during the 
80's, and the number of indictments. You might be very surprised.

 You have $85
>billion to go to account for as much money as flows yearly into
>the pockets of the poor.
>
I have to ask. What exactly do YOU "think" that the poor do with 
this money? Buy lots of drugs and booze? 

>                                            Frank Crary
>                                            CU Boulder
Garrett@Ingres.com