Ummm. No. Because that is utter nonsense.

As you demonstrate here with some reliability, you wouldn't know nonsnese if you tripped over it. Which if you open your mouth again, you may just do.

Yep, and there is no graft in the GOP. Its all those nasty Democrats

Well, I'll tell you what, Anjin; Next you come upw ith it showing on the GOP side, you just let us know, OK? Meanwhile, 'they do it too' isn't a defense except in Bill Clinton's mindless.

Had it occurred to you that constitutional issues were one reason it was handled as a defense matter?

Ummm. No. Because that is utter nonsense. And, unless I am mistaken NASA is not military, though they do work with the military and support them on various projects.

You must be ROYALLY pissed at Democrats, then. Did and I just felt themselves a raise? Apparently, their graft isn't making them enough money.

Yep, and there is no graft in the GOP. Its all those nasty Democrats. Well we can count on one thing bit, you will never go one thought beyond where your idiology allows you to go.

Today's question is how many former Bush admin officials have been convicted of various crimes... hint, its more than a few.

And, as I have said before, I think Pelosi and Reid are lightweights at best.

At what point did the constitution provide governmental spaceflight to the moon?

Had it occurred to you that constitutional issues were one reason it was handled as a defense matter? At all points, that whole deal was about the militarization of space, much as the left likes to deride the concept.

And yea, I am pissed about the bonus/compensation issue too. I have no problem with someone making a lot of money for doing a good job. I do have a problem with someone cleaning out the cash drawer after they have run the joint into the ground...

You must be ROYALLY pissed at Democrats, then. Did and I just felt themselves a raise? Apparently, their graft isn't making them enough money.

No? Then you have other motivations... you know... the ones you keep telling us don't exist.

Now that the wind is gone out of this sail, pretty much, let me point out once again that what we're really dealing with here is the lack of ability to deal in simple logic.

One example of course is these two figures in juxtaposition: $2,700,000 Million vs $165 million.
In the leftist driven bizarre-o world that we now exist in the latter is the bigger problem. Then again, let's remember that the people who have this particular problem of determining which is the more important figure also are the ones who put democrats in charge in all three branches of the government. There, too, we are dealing with the emotional, rather than the factual. I've been saying for quite some time that Mr. Obama as supporters dealt more with emotion than fact, and thereby that mere fact would never defeat Obama. One of the points that Mr. Obama was elected on was "he will take care of pay my rent" . Anyone remember that one?

Given all of that, do we really anticipate that anyone so lacking in logical ability is going to be able to make a determination of which of the two dollar figures is of greater import?

That lack of ability doesn't bode well for our future, I think.

Can someone explain to me why there is such anger for "people who took out mortgages they couldn't afford," and yet so much sympathy for AIG executives and their million dollar bonuses?

After all the "people who took out mortgages they couldn't afford" just wanted to own their own home.

And the AIG guys were making super-risky plays with other people's money.

Morality wise, one of these things is worse than the other.

Perhaps the correct position would be that neither AIG execs or homeowners should be bailed out by the government, but I'm not willing to risk total financial collapse to field test that theory.

Frankly, it isn't innumeracy of the masses that I find most perplexing, but the complete lack of empathy of people like you.

Read your Rand. Empathy is communist weakness. Selfishness in the true morality. To loot everything you can get your hands on with no consideration for others is the only truly noble act.

My only conclusion is that most people are innumerate. When a number gets too big they just can’t grasp the magnitude of that number. Here is one way of trying to get a grasp on the magnitude of these numbers. If you took 170,000,000,000 one dollar bills and stacked them one on top of each other (not end-to-end) it would be 11,537 miles high. If you took 750,000,000,000 one dollar bills and did the same thing it would be 50,899 miles long, or it could go around the earth twice at the equator. Why people are worried about a stack of one dollar bills that is only 11 miles high beats me.

Discussion (52)

(puts on his math tutor hat)

First of all, it's pointless to count how many battleships you could build with $178,000,000 in melted-down quarters or whatever. Those things don't help people understand big numbers, they put hard-to-imagine numbers in terms of other hard-to-imagine numbers. So let's forget that exercise. (In case your wondering what does help people roughly compare big numbers, the answer is scientific notation.)

As to why people are concerned with the million dollar bonuses more than the billion-dollar losses, it's not innumeracy, it's psychology. Having to cover somebody's bad debts to prevent a calamity is one thing. But the idea of then rewarding the irresponsible gambler with million-dollar welfare checks is much more upsetting in a basic fairness kind of sense. Plus, the two events didn't happen independently, and aren't being judged as independent abstract events. After the financial sector has spent years pocketing fictitious returns, selling fraudulent mortgages, then in the last year being responsible for everyone's 401k getting cut in half and your neighbors laid off and foreclosed, all these things add up, and when you hear that after all this, the people responsible think they should now be made even wealthier, on the taxpayer dime, it's no surprise at all that the public's outraged. What's surprising to me is that the executives of these companies haven't been murdered by angry mobs.

"nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation."

I am thinking that the checks the government wrote to AIG with all the zeroes at the end cover the "just compensation" thing pretty well...

Go ahead, Bernard, tell us this isn't all about wealth envy.

Still flogging this very, very tired horse, eh bit?

You've flung this lame canard at me more than once. It's kind of funny really. My boss is one of those rich people I supposedly hate so much. Every day I go to work and bust my ass to make him richer. Happy to do it too. He pays me well, treats me well, and is a nice guy who earned every penny he has.

Yep, I am one of the angry left, swollen with envy for all that possess more than I :)

And yea, I am pissed about the bonus/compensation issue too. I have no problem with someone making a lot of money for doing a good job. I do have a problem with someone cleaning out the cash drawer after they have run the joint into the ground...

At what point does the constitution provide for governmental takeover of private enterprise?

At what point did the constitution provide governmental spaceflight to the moon?

You really don't have a clue how the constitution works, do you?

Congratulations, Bithead, you have just summarized the total failure of the modern GOP in one sorry sentence: "There's some possibility this solution might not work, so let's just not do anything at all!" Welcome to The Party Of No (Ideas).

Do you understand that freedom itself, involves risk? You may be willing to sacrifice your freedom for a government 'guaranteed' outcome. Too many are, I fear.

I am not.

Look, what you are advocating is to allow the government to separate individuals from their property without any due process whatsoever. You guys are tossing around allegations or "speculations" about criminal fraud without any command of the facts. You are screaming blue murder to punish somebody, not because they're guilty - not even because you're mad at them - but because you're mad at the company they work for. It's infantile rage transference, and nothing more.

The bill would impose a 90 percent tax on bonuses given to employees with family incomes above $250,000 at American International Group and other companies that have received at least $5 billion in government bailout money. It would apply to any such bonuses issued since Dec. 31.

Now frankly, I'm not 100% convinced this method _is_ legit - I don't know nearly enought about tax law to have any idea if it'll stick during the inevitable court challenges. But I don't see how it's unconstitutional nationalization.

But to bring things back to Steve's original point - which is that this smacks of a witch-hunt that takes the focus off the utterly insane cost of the bailouts in general - I can't agree entirely with Steve. These aren't random execs across AIG that have everyone up in arms, it's specifically the office that _bankrupted the company_. And these bonuses were tucked into their contracts knowing that the jerks getting them had already done their damage. I don't know if it rises to the level of criminal fraud, but if AIG was still publicly held, you can damn sure bet the shareholders would be howling with outrage over these payouts. They just wouldn't have the ability to do anything about it. Congress (apparently) does.

suggestive evidence.

"Suggestive evidence" was not meant to suggest any definiteness at all, and I certainly apologize if I gave a different impression. I thought I had been quite clear that I was just speculating on this issue. If I had meant to be definitive, I would have said, "there is unambiguous evidence."

Now, as for 'true' nationalization, where the gov't just walks in and says "this is ours now, boyo" - well, that's a different thing altogether. It is also clearly not what is currently happening right now...