Life and socialism and stuff

[The Fake Lonnie Finch]

People who vote are all, "This is socialism!" or "That isn't socialism" and "This isn't fair" or "That isn't fair."

The thing is, who gives a crap?

Just ignore the people who are too lazy to work and get ahead in life. In fact, celebrate it because they are not competing with you.

They accpet whatever small pay they get for their job, plus whatever fixed amount the government pays them to be lazy.

They will never compete with you. You will always have more. You will always be more because you realize that you control your life and career.

If they want to feel they are at the whim of the rich, let them feel that way. That mindset will never allow them to do any better than working at places like Wal-mart.

Just let them be what they are...and, be nice to them when you forget what aisle the cornbread is on and have to ask them.

[Rudy]

Well said. I just wish we could debate topics level headed, but then I realize this is GMG.com, and we can even agree on a damn logo.

[Coffee and TV]

Whatever you say, Mitt.

[GreenMachine]

Whatever you say, Mitt.

Helluva zinger

[MDH]

You (TFLF) lean more right than I, but I whole heartedly agree sir. I actually tend to apply that attitude to politics in general. As a CPA/CFP/future hopeful CFA I view potential higher taxes/greater regulation as a challenge. When I one day succeed at beating them (legally) I will be all the happier.

Having previously lived in Canada, I love 'murica.

Edited November 24, 2012 by MDH

[GreenBat]

Helluva zinger

This coming from someone that doesn't believe Barrack Obama is his president.

[GreenMachine]

This coming from someone that doesn't believe Barrack Obama is his president.

You got me there partner.

[The Fake Lonnie Finch]

You (TFLF) lean more right than I, but I whole heartedly agree sir. I actually tend to apply that attitude to politics in general. As a CPA/CFP/future hopeful CFA I view potential higher taxes/greater regulation as a challenge. When I one day succeed at beating them (legally) I will be all the happier.

Having previously lived in Canada, I love 'murica.

It's not really a challenge. There aren't enough people that make over $250k anyway for new taxes to make a real difference. It's just the same hot air left-leaning politicians have used all over the world for better than a century.

What has it gotten the poor here? Nothing. They still live in bad neighborhoods and still get second rate educations. They're too lazy to do anything else.

Instead of taking inventory of their lives, they take the easy route and assume people who have more money than them have gotten it unfairly.

The reason rags-to-riches stories are so great is that there are not very many of them. For every one who figures out that you've got to work to succeed, there are tens of thousands of others who will sit on their asses and pretend that politicians can help them get up the rungs.

They'll always be angry at anyone doing better in life. Wal-mart is just the current target. A few years back, it was Exxon. It doesn't mean anything. Wal-mart will still be doing as well as Exxon is still doing long after the "striking workers" have faded into wherever it is they came from. All it does is give the news crews something to do besides report on the weather and sports.

No one was ever taxed into poverty. In fact, you'll be the beneficiary of any new tax law and regulations because "the rich" will come to you for advice on how to avoid/lessen the impact...which you will do. As well as tax attorneys. I'm tempted to jump back into school part-time and pick up an LLM in Taxation to take advantage of it.

It's all for show. That's why I don't vote. That's why I can look at people who simply move cans and boxes from one area of a store to another and go on strike and just chuckle. They don't see the big picture and never will. They're at home tonight killing themselves with cigarettes, liquor, beer, and weed, and calling each other on their free cell phones thinking something is happening. If it weren't so sad, I'd laugh out loud instead of just chuckling.

I'm lucky. I had a dad who told me I'd have to study and work hard to succeed. These poor people, they don't even want the dads around because it screws up their welfare checks and food stamps. With dad out of the house, these poor folks listen to politicians instead. Good. They get what they deserve - lie after lie, fantasies about sticking to "the rich," and a permanent ticket on the mouse wheel of failure.

The worst thing in my eyes is the churches that sit by and do nothing about it. They snuggle up with the politicians instead of doing their biblical job - helping the poor. Down in those poor neighborhoods, all the churches do is aid and abet the politicans in lying to the poor.

It'll never change. It will never change. The churches and politicians (and tax attorneys) are making too much money off them to want it to change.

[FirefightnRick]

It's not really a challenge. There aren't enough people that make over $250k anyway for new taxes to make a real difference. It's just the same hot air left-leaning politicians have used all over the world for better than a century.

What has it gotten the poor here? Nothing. They still live in bad neighborhoods and still get second rate educations. They're too lazy to do anything else.

Instead of taking inventory of their lives, they take the easy route and assume people who have more money than them have gotten it unfairly.

The reason rags-to-riches stories are so great is that there are not very many of them. For every one who figures out that you've got to work to succeed, there are tens of thousands of others who will sit on their asses and pretend that politicians can help them get up the rungs.

They'll always be angry at anyone doing better in life. Wal-mart is just the current target. A few years back, it was Exxon. It doesn't mean anything. Wal-mart will still be doing as well as Exxon is still doing long after the "striking workers" have faded into wherever it is they came from. All it does is give the news crews something to do besides report on the weather and sports.

No one was ever taxed into poverty. In fact, you'll be the beneficiary of any new tax law and regulations because "the rich" will come to you for advice on how to avoid/lessen the impact...which you will do. As well as tax attorneys. I'm tempted to jump back into school part-time and pick up an LLM in Taxation to take advantage of it.

It's all for show. That's why I don't vote. That's why I can look at people who simply move cans and boxes from one area of a store to another and go on strike and just chuckle. They don't see the big picture and never will. They're at home tonight killing themselves with cigarettes, liquor, beer, and weed, and calling each other on their free cell phones thinking something is happening. If it weren't so sad, I'd laugh out loud instead of just chuckling.

I'm lucky. I had a dad who told me I'd have to study and work hard to succeed. These poor people, they don't even want the dads around because it screws up their welfare checks and food stamps. With dad out of the house, these poor folks listen to politicians instead. Good. They get what they deserve - lie after lie, fantasies about sticking to "the rich," and a permanent ticket on the mouse wheel of failure.

The worst thing in my eyes is the churches that sit by and do nothing about it. They snuggle up with the politicians instead of doing their biblical job - helping the poor. Down in those poor neighborhoods, all the churches do is aid and abet the politicans in lying to the poor.

It'll never change. It will never change. The churches and politicians (and tax attorneys) are making too much money off them to want it to change.

While I agree with your sarcasm I have No idea why you throw churches under the bus? They are not all taking granny for all her wealth in exchange for a sweatshop-packaged prayer cloth. Catholic Charities help thousands every year with everything imaginable. The day my mother was told she had 4 months to live a lady from CC's Fort Worh office walked in the room and handed her an offer to pay a portion of her pharmaceuticals at her pharmacy of choice....and we are not Catholic. And The Salvation Army, a Christian based ministry has helped people for over a 100 years. If it weren't for them half my customer base wouldn't get fed most times.

Rick

[The Fake Lonnie Finch]

I throw churches under the bus for a myriad of reasons, chief among them being that they have tax exempt status but have budgets where salaries and maintenance dwarf missions and charity.

Up here in North Dallas/Suburbs, there a many of these megachurches that have spent millions on facilities and keeping large staffs. Meanwhile, in South Dallas, people starve, have utilities turned off, etc.

We were members of a now expanding Methodist church up here for about a month...until they passed out the annual budget and began asking us how much we intended to pledge for their plans for expanding the building. With less than 10% going to missions and charity, we simply quit that church. Pathetic.

The churches in America are doing the devil's work for him. It's really no more plain than that.

I am the chief of saying unpopular but true things, and the church isn't spared - if it acts like a business, tax it like a business. If it says it is a religious organization due a tax exemption on those grounds, then make them open their books and see if their money is going to the places the Bible says churches should be going with their money.

I highly doubt God is impressed with gymnasiums, bookstores, coffee shops, baseball diamonds, football fields, etc. As to that pesky Jesus, I recall him driving those doing business in the Temple out of it.

I laud the few programs you speak about. But, the truth is, enough money is pumped into churches by "christians" to do far more than is now being done. What is happening now is churches pushing for political leaders to do the work they are supposed to be doing. It's wrong.

As to the Catholics, don't even get me started. Having married a Catholic, I had some premarital chats with the very FW Diocese that was involved in shifting around child molesters. Against that background, they had to nerve to ask me to pay for an annulment because I was divorced.

As much as the Catholic Charities may do, the Catholic Church itself has wasted millions hiding, covering, and defending molesters. It's despicable.

[GTWT]

Churches do good. Churches do bad. Church is a very human thing. I will agree that if a church acts like a business it should be taxed as a business. I also think that if a church acts as a political organization it should lose its tax exempt status.

[The Fake Lonnie Finch]

Church isn't human; religion is. Church is supposed to be "the bride of Christ." Religion is mankind's intepretation of things they believe to be "spiritual." Keep religions away from me, please.

Glad to have someone on board who would challenge churches whose purpose is more business-like than charity-like. It's not difficult to spot. Most churches will have that "budget sermon" in December or January, and hand out the budget, telling you how much they need per week to keep on doing the Lord's work.

I'm still searching the scriptures for Jesus' and Paul's budget sermons. I remember Jesus telling his apostles to pay the temple tax and to render unto Caesar. Paul also urged compliance with fiscal laws of the day.

But, again...we're in America, where people run around reading Revelation and trying to jam America into it.

There was a Sammy Hagar song about two decades ago that went something like, "Saving my money and buying my way into Heaven...."

Edited November 27, 2012 by The Fake Lonnie Finch

[adman]

You'll love this TFLF.

http://www.hpumc.org/job-opening-director-of-creative-communications/

The wording is a whole lot like the job description of a brand manager at a fortune 500 company. (They even use the word "brand" in it.)

[Mean Green 93-98]

Church isn't human; religion is. Church is supposed to be "the bride of Christ." Religion is mankind's intepretation of things they believe to be "spiritual." Keep religions away from me, please.

Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world (James 1:27).

I'm still searching the scriptures for Jesus' and Paul's budget sermons.

1 Cor. 16:1-3; 2 Cor. 8-9; et al.

[Coffee and TV]

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/17/business/yourmoney/17costco.html?pagewanted=all&_r=1&

[FirefightnRick]

Church isn't human; religion is. Church is supposed to be "the bride of Christ." Religion is mankind's intepretation of things they believe to be "spiritual." Keep religions away from me, please.

Glad to have someone on board who would challenge churches whose purpose is more business-like than charity-like. It's not difficult to spot. Most churches will have that "budget sermon" in December or January, and hand out the budget, telling you how much they need per week to keep on doing the Lord's work.

I'm still searching the scriptures for Jesus' and Paul's budget sermons. I remember Jesus telling his apostles to pay the temple tax and to render unto Caesar. Paul also urged compliance with fiscal laws of the day.

But, again...we're in America, where people run around reading Revelation and trying to jam America into it.

There was a Sammy Hagar song about two decades ago that went something like, "Saving my money and buying my way into Heaven...."

Proof we can find something to hate against just about anything. Supreme court justice Hugo Black would be proud of you for sure. And I'm sorry you live in such a sorry part of Texas. Its probably the Yankee invasion that has infested that region?

I've never witnessed a church where I live or have attended that wasn't doing a lot of good for those it serves. Even in the arm pits of Fort Worth where I work I see the extremely poor Church's reaching out to a lot of people and helping those who won't help themselves, especially when the weather turns cold.

Rick

[Censored by Laurie]

Its probably the Yankee invasion that has infested that region?

Must be that. Bunch of Hedonists bringing the decadence, pagan-orgies and science to a land that wants none of it.

On a related note...will I need my passport when I fly from America into DFW?

[The Fake Lonnie Finch]

Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world (James 1:27).

1 Cor. 16:1-3; 2 Cor. 8-9; et al.

Yes. One verse says to save money and give; the other speak metaphorically about the essense of Christ. But, neither are a budget sermon like the ones today where we're saving up for buildings, gyms, coffee shops, bookestores, etc.

[The Fake Lonnie Finch]

You'll love this TFLF.

http://www.hpumc.org...communications/

The wording is a whole lot like the job description of a brand manager at a fortune 500 company. (They even use the word "brand" in it.)

This is, for sure, later 20th Century/early 21st Century Church, Inc. It would be interesting to see the budget of this church.

[FirefightnRick]

Must be that. Bunch of Hedonists bringing the decadence, pagan-orgies and science to a land that wants none of it.

On a related note...will I need my passport when I fly from America into DFW?

You gonna apply for dual Citizenship?

Rick

Edited November 27, 2012 by FirefightnRick

[Mean Green 93-98]

Yes. One verse says to save money and give; the other speak metaphorically about the essense of Christ. But, neither are a budget sermon . . .

I wasn't just referring to one verse in that second reference, I was referring to two chapters, all about giving and what giving should go toward.

. . . like the ones today where we're saving up for buildings, gyms, coffee shops, bookestores, etc.

A church needs a place to meet and worship . . . but gyms, coffee shops, and bookstores have absolutely nothing to do with the work of the church.

[MeanGreenTexan]

Yes. One verse says to save money and give; the other speak metaphorically about the essense of Christ. But, neither are a budget sermon like the ones today where we're saving up for buildings, gyms, coffee shops, bookestores, etc.

We left our old church in Plano because after our long-time, very solid pastor retired and the new young guy came in, we left a perfectly good building to build a fancy new place, then slowly, the Word was phased out of sermons in favor of principles and sugar-coating. By the time we left, you didn't need to bring your Bible to church because there was only 1 verse used (sometimes out of context), and it was put up on the giant screens while the rest of the time was spent posturing and providing life lessons.

Slick new building though! The youth building was equipped with Xboxes and other cool stuff!

I'll say though that after serving at a South Dallas church, gyms can be immensely useful in providing a safe haven for kids and adults alike who would rather ball than be out on the streets. "Coffee shops"? Not so much... maybe they can provide a safe haven for hipsters who would rather drink the latest organically-grown bean that some people in Africa/Central America grew that you've probably never heard of.

[Censored by Laurie]

Slick new building though!

For me, the only redeeming thing about Church are churches. Love 'em...some...hell, if not most...of the world's most beautiful examples of architecture are/were churches.

I'd think that my opinion would hold true to those who actually give two-flips about what is said and takes place inside...which is why it's beyond me that so many people frequent the old air-plane hangers with more technology than Jerry-World that are being passed of as churches now.

[MeanGreenTexan]

For me, the only redeeming thing about Church are churches. Love 'em...some...hell, if not most...of the world's most beautiful examples of architecture are/were churches.

I'd think that my opinion would hold true to those who actually give two-flips about what is said and takes place inside...which is why it's beyond me that so many people frequent the old air-plane hangers with more technology than Jerry-World that are being passed of as churches now.

There is certainly something to be said about some of the old church buildings in Europe (Hagia Sophia, Notre Dame, etc...) and even several in N.E. You're spot on, they're beautiful.

You'll often-times find that inside those grand buildings, Sunday mornings are very liturgical, reverent services, which would be the exact opposite of what you would see at the cool new building I was referring to, which is almost like you're at a comedy club or something.

[FirefightnRick]

We left our old church in Plano because after our long-time, very solid pastor retired and the new young guy came in, we left a perfectly good building to build a fancy new place, then slowly, the Word was phased out of sermons in favor of principles and sugar-coating. By the time we left, you didn't need to bring your Bible to church because there was only 1 verse used (sometimes out of context), and it was put up on the giant screens while the rest of the time was spent posturing and providing life lessons.

Slick new building though! The youth building was equipped with Xboxes and other cool stuff!

I'll say though that after serving at a South Dallas church, gyms can be immensely useful in providing a safe haven for kids and adults alike who would rather ball than be out on the streets. "Coffee shops"? Not so much... maybe they can provide a safe haven for hipsters who would rather drink the latest organically-grown bean that some people in Africa/Central America grew that you've probably never heard of.

I hear ya. What gets me is the new music. The wife and kids love it. I don't care for it much. If you can't sing or hear a good version of "Amazing Grace" now and then...without it being a funeral.....then where can you?

Rick