Shila

--> @Shila

Congressional Democrats can’t decide whether to soak the rich or hand them an immense tax break. In a tribute to policy incoherence, they’ve settled on both. 

The House on Friday approved the $1.2 infrastructure bill after decoupling it from an even larger entitlement measure — the reconciliation legislation — pursued by progressives and the president. The content of the latter remains fluid and its fate remains in doubt, particularly in the Senate.

In order to get moderates on board for the massive social spending bonanza, Speaker Nancy Pelosi has revived an old favorite. Last week she discreetly made sure that the reconciliation bill includes a gift to wealthy residents of high-tax blue states in the form of a healthy increase in the federal write-off for state and local taxes — known as the SALT deduction. Democrats have been wailing about the provision ever since Republicans in 2017 imposed a $10,000 cap on such deductions, which made it more difficult for big-spending politicians in California, New York, Illinois and other liberal enclaves to disguise their imprudent fiscal decisions. Ms. Pelosi now seeks to bump the cap to $72,500.

This would overwhelmingly benefit high earners. The Wall Street Journal reports that a Tax Foundation model calculates nearly 88 percent of taxpayers making more than $1 million would get a tax cut under the Democratic plan, with filers earning beyond $250,000 getting 70 percent of the savings.

This from a party whose faithful regularly drone on about the rich not paying their “fair share” and only a week ago were floating the idea of taxing billionaire capital gains before they’re even realized. But the hypocrisy runs even deeper.

In addition to the SALT giveaway, Democrats would hand tax subsidies worth up to $12,500 to well-off Americans who buy electric vehicles. Under the current bill, the credit won’t phase out until individual earners hit $250,000 in annual income, or $500,000 for married joint filers. There’s also a tax credit for electric bikes — electric bikes! — including high-end models that run as much as $4,000.

Meanwhile, Democrats claim to have this $1.9 billion reconciliation bill “paid for” with higher taxes on corporations and the rich. That would be much easier, of course, if they weren’t taking away with one hand while giving back with the other through SALT relief, EV handouts and other subsidies. But the idea that this bill pays for itself is accounting fiction: In a master stroke of fiscal gimmickry, every new entitlement in the measure is designed to sunset — which will never happen. Whatever final number Democrats pin on this donkey, expect the true cost to be triple.

The infrastructure bill may be stuffed with pork, but the reconciliation spending barrage is a dangerous house of cards.

https://www.reviewjournal.com/opinion/editorials/editorial-democratic-hypocrisy-on-the-rich-and-taxes-2474308/

--> @Shila

Even with the picture, the truth of my humanity exists.

Also not so much a dehumanized picture of 'myself, as a character from a video game.

--> @Shila

@Shila

There is very little reported rape among transgenders and LGTB. etc.

The military will see a dramatic drop in rape cases as transgenders and LGBT fill the ranks.

Delusions of grandeur, again?

Hard to think of raping a transgender in uniform knowing the person is actually a man out of uniform.

You're not the brightest bulb in the box. 

T are less than 0.5-0.8% of the population, LGBQ are less than 6% of the population. Their participation in the AF are significantly less, so no, there will not be any dramatic drop in rape cases in the service. 

You people who never served have absolutely zero business commenting on actual service and its implications for others. Just piss off. Unless you enjoy embarrassing yourselves with such ignorant stupidity. 

--> @Shila

If you could not respond to my posts that would be great. We don't have anything in common on any human or intellectual  level.  This will be my last response to anything you post.

--> @Stephen

Jesus spoke about god at a very young age. His views did not evolve over time. Jesus even believed This childish god was his father.

The Boy Jesus at the Temple

Luke 2:41 Every year Jesus’ parents went to Jerusalem for the Festival of the Passover. 42 When he was twelve years old, they went up to the festival, according to the custom. 43 After the festival was over, while his parents were returning home, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem, but they were unaware of it. 44 Thinking he was in their company, they traveled on for a day. Then they began looking for him among their relatives and friends. 45 When they did not find him, they went back to Jerusalem to look for him. 46 After three days they found him in the temple courts, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. 47 Everyone who heard him was amazed at his understanding and his answers. 48 When his parents saw him, they were astonished. His mother said to him, “Son, why have you treated us like this? Your father and I have been anxiously searching for you.”

49 “Why were you searching for me?” he asked. “Didn’t you know I had to be in my Father’s house?”[a] 50 But they did not understand what he was saying to them.

51 Then he went down to Nazareth with them and was obedient to them. But his mother treasured all these things in her heart. 52 And Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and man.

This story has always amused me.

Here we have a woman chosen by God himself above all other women on the planet to be birth mother of his son and not even noticing that their "treasured" holy charge was absent until after a whole day's travelling!?  And they only recovered him after three whole days!!?

 Some "blessed among all women" she was, wasn't she? I am sure social services would have something to say about that if it were to happen today. 😂

And why on earth were they "astonished"!? Had this "blessed among all women" forgotten that the child that she had given birth to was gods son? 

Why didn't "they understand what he was saying to them"!? He was the son of God!

What is really hard to believe is how our spiritual detractors can make claims to being more "intelligent" and "logical" while demanding literal translations of religious narratives, anyone with even a basic understanding of religious narratives, would not call this "intelligent" or "logical".

Religious narratives achieve greatness because of their power to generate meanings, not in their value as an historical record. 

Originative religious texts are not historical records. The unexamined assumption that both sides of these debates adopt is that of historicism, the presumption that religious texts are historical records. Historicism attempts a reinterpretation of the transcendent dimension in the story that defines it as religious in the first place, it assumes that narrative, implies record, it doesn’t.

I believe that this innane literalism is contrived by people with ideological agendas that want science and faith to be at odds. These dogmatic fundamentalists, both Theists and Atheists alike, presume a referential interpretation of the religious narrative, and when they do they are overlaying an alien intentionality onto the story. Historicism negates the religious text by forcing a referential interpretation onto it, a purpose it was never designed to serve. Even among believers this mistaken analytic treatment of religious texts only sharpens doctrinal debate and results in divisiveness, it does not foster religious awareness, and again, the text is negated. 

--> @Shila

That the profile picture doesn't look human, doesn't matter.

Your's is currently various pink and white geometric shapes,

Of course we both know we are not those profile pictures, but instead humans operating electronic devices.

--> @Shila

There is very little reported rape among transgenders and LGTB. etc.

The military will see a dramatic drop in rape cases as transgenders and LGBT fill the ranks.

Delusions of grandeur, again?

You clearly know nothing about the Salem Witch Trials. 

https://salemwitchmuseum.com/locations/border-disputes/

https://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/real-life/true-stories/what-really-happened-during-the-1692-salem-witch-trials/news-story/8433744aaef7dffb81badfa11cd4bf76

https://www.on-a-limb.com/2015/09/5-things-about-the-salem-witch-trials-that-surprised-me.html

I never said they were

No. That is not what I did at all. I provided links backing up my original response to what I said to you, not what you said in response to me.

Says the one deficient in reading comprehension and interpersonal communication skills.

--> @Shila

"Their opinions maybe less relevant but they want to be liked too." OMG your condescension really really does have no bounds does it. I don't think you are aware of your own existence. But with that said I am sensing troll also based on previous replies to different subjects and people.

RationalMadman: Also, this is a callout thread but Shila has been obnoxious to me so idc.

--> @badger

How come time flies like an arrow but fruit flies like a banana?

Because of grammatics. The first “flies” is a verb and the second “flies” is a noun.

If a bot can detect grammatical variance, then this makes this test virtually nonsensical; if a bot cannot, then just treat Shila like any bad debater. You can debate with Shila on everything and it would make sense, more meaningful than asking this question.

--> @Shila

How come time flies like an arrow but fruit flies like a banana?

--> @Shila

Well, I'm still human

--> @Shila

Trump fixed the limit on SALT tax deductions to 10,000$. That we done primarily to hurt blue states. But his 2.6 trillion tax cuts to the rich just added to the deficit 

Think how many more trillions the deficit would be without the rich paying their fair share. Take a W when you can. Eat the rich. he wasn't really hurting blue states, he was hurting the rich people in Blue states.  I don't care about rich people no matter what state they live in.

--> @Shila

Yes he did appear to the 12 for 40 days and they watched him rise into heaven (Acts 1:1-8).

But he also appeared to some on the road to Emmaus (Luke 24:13-35).

And Paul said Jesus appeard to over 500 people, even telling his readers that many are still alive. (1 Corinthians 15:6). This is significant because, if Paul were making this up, he would not have said that, because Luke and others compiled eyewitness statements about Jesus's life from every source they could find. Surely these 500 people would have stated they never saw Jesus and therefore fact check Paul. But we see no such historical record existing.

Paul, himself, is a particularly interesting witness of the Resurrection because he was becoming a prominent Jewish religious leader who gained fame and prominence from stoning Christians. He thought the entire Christian religion was a cult. His views we so passionate about it that he stoned Christians to death himself. 

To Paul, the only thing that actually changed his mind was literally seeing Jesus risen from the dead, and being blinded by it, so that he had to be guided to the God following man who healed him.

Paul's life after being a Christian was no laughing matter. He was broke, imprisoned multiple times, shipwrecked, literally floating out to sea, beaten, and whipped for his testimony.

Who would give up prominence, fame, and fortune to be poor, beaten, imprisoned, and shipwrecked? Only someone who truly believed what happened to him. 

In various accounts of Paul, not one man calls him crazy or irrational, and there isn't any chance it is a mental disorder because of his coherence and intelligence and scholarliness.

I have both a trade and a bachelor's. And a good trade too, like kinda fancy, e&i tech, paid me well while I was at it. 

Then I got bored and went back to college. Did a computer science degree. 

I mean my trade is tiddlywinks compared to my degree. And 3 months out of the degree I was earning more than I had been working with 5 years experience in my trade. 

College is serious shit. No way I'd pay American fees though. 

I came up with a new word...

Plagiarism.

This is probably the turning point in the war. Good on Ukraine.

I don't quite understand dehumanization, myself.

Even if one hated a people, that they are human seems undeniable

-> @Shila

dded 09.11.22 01:31PM

--> @Shila

Where does it say witches were landowners?

Witch definition: a woman thought to have magic powers, especially evil ones, popularly depicted as wearing a black cloak and pointed hat and flying on a broomstick.

You clearly know nothing about the Salem Witch Trials. 

https://salemwitchmuseum.com/locations/border-disputes/

https://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/real-life/true-stories/what-really-happened-during-the-1692-salem-witch-trials/news-story/8433744aaef7dffb81badfa11cd4bf76

https://www.on-a-limb.com/2015/09/5-things-about-the-salem-witch-trials-that-surprised-me.html

You just proved my point witches were not landowners.

I never said they were. 

ME: " Religion was used as the easy excuse to kill the landowners or their spouses to run them off."

Reading comprehension matters. 

The Salem Witch Trials clearly say the landowners were framed as witches to deprive them of their land but in actual fact they were not witches.

No shit sherlock. 

Nope. How many times? Man in his natural state cannot survive without external heat. How long does it take before the obvious sinks through your dense skull bone. Obviously a Billion more years of evolution in your case.

--> @Shila

Polytheist-Witch: Chicken shit.

--> @Shila

The Republicans also supported Bush W. and Bush W. saw a recession, housing and stock market crash. So republicans know what to do to hurt the democrats.

First, the Republicans were hurt by the recession. In the 2008 election, Democrats won a majority in the House, a supermajority in the Senate, and the presidency. 

Second, despite all his faults, I don’t think you can blame George W. Bush for the recession. The financial crisis was caused by a bunch of housing loans going bad, and that turned into a recession due to a slow Fed response (leaving interest rates, while low, higher than the “natural” rate of interest). 

Again, I feel the need to clarify that I’m a liberal. I would have supported Obama in 2008, and supported Clinton in 2016 and Biden in 2020 (and I’ll support Biden in 2024 as well). I think there’s a bunch of problems with both the Bush and Trump administrations. I just don’t really think you can blame the Great Recession on Bush, nor blame Trump for current inflation. I think the former was no politician’s fault, and the latter was in part the fault of the Biden administration. 

--> @Shila

That's fine as long as the rich in Blue States are taxed because they need to pay their fair share. 

Just think of how bad inflation could have been if SALT was allowed to remain allowing Rich Democrats to avoid taxes?

Biden needs that revenue more than you or Trump does and we should all be thanking the 2017 removal of SALT tax deductions for the rich.

--> @Shila

Polytheist-Witch: Follow through on your death threat or don't say anything, pussy.

--> @Swagnarok

It's unlikely Putin isn't prepared for an extended war and may even welcome trading blows with the west over a prolonged period at this point using Ukraine as a proxy to drain resources from the west. The war is really about who will control the petrodollar and the stakes are far more than the land in Ukraine. If Putin can undermine the US dollar by encouraging more deficit spending on an unwinnable war, he may be willing to make that trade if it means a relatively stronger ruble and the emergence of a Sino-Russian economic alliance and dominance in Asia. The musings that Ukraine could possibly regain all the Eastern territory lost to Russia that they had to have a civil war to gain in the first place is pure fantasy, even if the west were to go trillions in debt to make it happen.

https://oilprice.com/Geopolitics/International/Ukraine-War-Accelerates-The-Fall-Of-The-Dollar.html

That is the real reason Putin wants this war. ^^^

--> @Stephen

You.You crazy cat.  

You are Man of the match every game.  ( if there was a TEAM Atheists ) .

You never get acknowledged for the thoughts you provoke and the interlect that you bring to the forum.  

'Tips hat '

--> @Shila

Yes that is what he is talking about, you are correct.

--> @Shila

Oh you are more than welcome.

--> @Shila

Agreed

-->

@Shila

Yes you are correct, thanks for pointing that out and clearing that up for me. I'll try harder to figure out what all the human rights are that no one disagrees on or believes should be a human right.

-->@TWS1405

Stop being an intellectual coward? You assert I’m making a straw man twice, refuse to explain why, or clarify what your position actually - then call me a bunch of names. Hardly the pinnacle intellectual bravery. 

I - on the other hand - explained, logically, why that particular position is white supremacy - you have no answer to that : and I explained how and why my characterization of your position is entirely accurate - you have no answer.  I’ve responded to every point.

It’s hardly intellectual cowardice to not agree with some nonsense you just made up from nothing.

I presume, however, that you’re going to round off this exchange by calling me names and refusing to actually respond to any of the arguments, throwing out a number of excuses as to why you wont respond; and then capitulate like you have in every other thread. 

--> @Shila

Well, we are into 326 pages of argument now. So are you ready to deliver you verdict?

You are still arguing about rape.

So raping ten year old children is what Christians are doing to increase their numbers.  You really talk shite a lot of the time.

Try to stay on topic.

Nope. The thread - THE TOPIC - is concerned with if or not atheists are hypocrites, you cretin. And it was YOU  that brought rape into the thread not me.

Here>>.

"in the news was a 10 year old girl raped and pregnant forced to have the baby. That too is part of the solution to grow the Christian population".#320

I simply replied;

"So raping ten year old children is what Christians are doing to increase their numbers.  You really talk shite a lot of the time".#321

So don't even attempt to put your perverted opinions and thoughts onto my shoulders. AND STAY ON FKN TOPIC!

At an 1855 “American convention” held in Philadelphia, the American Party adopted a platform that would have sweepingly denied political and civil rights to immigrants. Speaking during a downpour, a nativist politician from New York told the crowd, to cheers: “American as I am, I decidedly prefer this rain to the reign of Roman Catholicism in this country … I, as an American citizen, prefer this rain or any other rain to the reign of foreignism … I go for America first, last and always.”

The phrase “ America First”was invoked during the first Red Scare to defend against Bolshevism and on the floor of Congress to pass the raft of laws that imposed racial and ethnic quotas on immigration in the early decades of the 20th century, not to be lifted until the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965. And it was a favorite slogan of the resurgent Ku Klux Klan, which in the 1920s was a nativist, anti-immigrant, anti-Catholic, antisemitic, antilabor and red-baiting fraternity as well as a white-supremacist one. The point for all these groups was always the same: to defend “real America” against the threats posed by anyone they deemed less than a real American

Today’s Trumpers are as bad as the Know Nothings. 

dded 09.11.22 01:31PM

--> @Shila

Where does it say witches were landowners?

Witch definition: a woman thought to have magic powers, especially evil ones, popularly depicted as wearing a black cloak and pointed hat and flying on a broomstick.

You clearly know nothing about the Salem Witch Trials. 

https://salemwitchmuseum.com/locations/border-disputes/

https://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/real-life/true-stories/what-really-happened-during-the-1692-salem-witch-trials/news-story/8433744aaef7dffb81badfa11cd4bf76

https://www.on-a-limb.com/2015/09/5-things-about-the-salem-witch-trials-that-surprised-me.html

--> @Shila

See Avery’s advice to white people below:

Next time you're going to use skin whitener, you should eat it instead.

I laughed when I read that.

You opened the door for that one

it had the effect of raising taxes on blue state Americans with upper middle class incomes and higher home values.

I'll be voting Republicans then since they are the only party to "tax the rich"

--> @Shila

Christians burnt witches. Turning atheists against witches too is one way to keep the flames alive.

That had less to do with religion and more to do with a land grab. Religion was used as the easy excuse to kill the land owners or their spouses to run them off. 

--> @zedvictor4

Evolution:

Indeed, it is an interesting subject I have found. Right up until it comes to Homo sapiens then there appears to a giant leap in man's progress that even Darwin failed to explain. Hence my point that man in his natural state is not one suited to the natural world.

Regards to you and yours Stephen.

 Thank you

--> @Shila

Yeah... but they haven't found the body though...

In the eyewitness accounts, 500 people saw Jesus resurrect. There is no body, but record of a crucifixion, a tomb, and more.

And furthermore, if you read the eyewitness accounts, you will find that Jesus said he gave his life up voluntarily and he would rise from the dead after three days and three nights. 

The only way to kill God is precisely if He lets you. And even moreso, just his human body died, not his spirit.

Then he rises from the dead three days later. Like. Once again, we haven't found the body despite knowing the tomb, there being a historical record of his crucifixion, etc. Pretty powerful and convincing stuff if you ask me.

Also, people to this day are still healed of things after prayer to God. That, to me, is the clincher. People are just miraculously healed of cancer, multiple sclerosis, and more. These are not just flukes, either. They are medically documented miracles. There are doctor's notes, x-rays, scans and more.

One such book of these miracles is called Ten Healing Miracles by medical researcher H. Richard Casdorph. As the title suggests, he medically documents 10 miracles that happened after prayer to God. It's literally physical proof of miracles after prayer to God, written by a medical researcher with 100 published articles. 

--> @Lair77

If you’re looking to get into the STEM fields, it is worth it. Some fields, such as law and architecture, are pretty saturated, so buyer beware. Degrees in the social sciences are mostly a waste of money unless someone is intent on becoming a schoolteacher. For-profit universities are almost always a ripoff… again, buyer beware. Worst case scenario? Going into debt for a social science AND then dropping out. Both the system and yourself are ripping you off there…

What matters a lot, and no one has mentioned yet, are internships in one’s desired field.

TWS1405 wrote:

The death jab is far more related to actual deaths than the illness itself. ~ New Studies Confirm The Vaxxes Are Killing And Injuring People In Too Large Numbers (allnewspipeline.co

--> @Shila

Yes that is what he is talking about, you are correct.

--> @Shila

Um could you not respond to my posts, I find then mostly condescending and tiresome

->

@Shila

You’re such a denialist, it’s laughable.

Avery just wiped the floor with you and all you can do is keep sounding like a broken record. LOL!!!

Next time you're going to use skin whitener, you should eat it instead.

Polytheist-Witch,

Atheists are hate-filled and angry with theists because they think they're better than them. Most resent their parents for being religious and making them learn any type of religion. They constantly argue the Bible is fact and then get upset when someone says they think the Bible is fact. They constantly talk about how we abuse our children and we're mentally ill and that's why they're better than us and our children should be taken from us. They're here to vent that hate because if they did it on the people they know that were theists they wouldn't have any friends or family. It's more than sad it's actually kind of scary. The atheist here is evangelical in their atheism.

Wow, you’re just full of yourself. Delusions of grandeur for sure. 

Atheists are NOT hate-filled angry with anyone. Anyone!!! 

The problem with theists is their fanaticism with their religious faith to the point where they have such vitriol for those who don’t agree with them. Your comment above is a shining example of that fact. History is also repeat with example after example of the violence done in His name in order to “spread the word.” So no, it is to you theists who are the “hate-filled angry” ones with anyone and everyone who just wants to be left alone to live their own lives, culture and faith as they have done their entire lives, generation after generation. 

--> @zedvictor4

I cant think of an educated  coherent response without coming across  like Shila.  allrightythen

What's your thoughts on gay sex? Like what do you picture?

It's theoretically possible and desirable that the human brain could be redesigned to remove its tribal elements. Perhaps something as simple as removing the more ancient part of the human brain would suffice, maybe by manually recoding human DNA to make the RNA not produce it (or to have it non-functional). Although, it's likely (if possible) going to be rewiring many parts of the brain to ignore or circumvent the tribalistic parts (I'm not sure how integrated tribalism is in the human brain).

This should have drastic implications for politics, given that tribalism basically drives the voting decisions for most people. Ideas should become the leading way that politics is conducted, instead of group self-interest. This would allow for rapid, unified development in technology and critical thought as no time would be lost on race-based politics (and other tribal battles).

I do worry about the free-loader problem (i.e. people not contributing their part to group activity). Tribalism does seem to protect against it. I doubt making humans non-tribal would also make them selfless.

I'm interested to hear other people's thoughts on this. I'm not a neuro-scientist so I'm not sure how grounded in reality all of this is.

--> @Stephen

Mrs Zed fine.

One perfect eye now, and one not so perfect awaiting it's new lens.

Evolution:

From boom to bust and everything in between.

A we're a part of it for less than a Universal nanosecond.

And I can still get three bottles of IPA for a fiver and afford a cheese and pickle sandwich.

Heaven on Earth can be as simple as that.

Regards to you and yours Stephen.

--> @Shila

It is not hard to see whites as racist.

It really is, though.

Whites started the end of slavery. Whites bend over backwards in their countries to accommodate other races. The polls referenced in the OP shows that Whites are not the most racist. Whites are the most tolerant of having a different race as their neighbor: A fascinating map of the world’s most and least racially tolerant countries - The Washington Post .

You really have to stretch and bend the truth to make Whites racist, or just be totally ignorant of any meaningful data.

They picked skin colour to identify race and made it an subject of discrimination based on us and them.

Lol "skin color".

Buddy, race isn't just skin color. That's why the Bantus genocided the Khoisan. That's why the Chinese are genociding the Uyghurs. That's why the Palestinians and Israelis are trying to wipe each other off the planet. They can pick phenotypic traits (skin color is only one of those) and hate each other based on that.

But you're right. All those races are White people. It's literally only ever White people hating people based on race. "They picked skin color" at that time everyone knows, too.

Blacks took notice of whites using melanin as a standard to measure superiority of races where less was seen as more and albino whites at the top.

Asians saw themselves as neutral having focused on education, family and accumulation of wealth.

Yep. Black people always get along. No ethnic based conflicts in places like Kenya! Ethnic conflicts in Kenya - Wikipedia 

Asians have a stellar record, too, always staying away from racial conflicts. China and Japan are the best of friends (historically, too). Uyghurs love to give the Chinese a cuddle. It's impossible to find any racism in Asia Racism in Asia - Wikipedia 

With the introduction of skin whiteners the whites have less to be racist about and the blacks have turned to other white attributes to criticize.

Let's all end racism by whitening our skins to be as bright as the sun!

This has created the perception that blacks are more racist because they are highly critical of white superficiality and the whites are less albino white than desired despite using skin whiteners to reduce melanins. 

Next time you're going to use skin whitener, you should eat it instead.