Should Government Bail Out Newspapers?

[cre8tiff]

Nope.

[bushwacked]

what really is the difference? on the one hand, the government says, "here is a check for eleventy billion dollars." on the other hand, the government says, "that check you owe me for eleventy billion dollars, go ahead and tear it up." six of one, half dozen of the other.

 

 

Giving industries and companies billions in a lump sum govt. handout, aint in the same ballpark as reducing their tax burden.

[Azazello1313]

 

Giving industries and companies billions in a lump sum govt. handout, aint in the same ballpark as reducing their tax burden.

 

if it's the same amount, again I ask, how is it really any different?

 

and do you draw such fine distinctions when it comes to, oh, say "giving billions upon billions of dollars to oil companies"?

[Perchoutofwater]

if it's the same amount, again I ask, how is it really any different?

 

and do you draw such fine distinctions when it comes to, oh, say "giving billions upon billions of dollars to oil companies"?

 

 

We should stop all welfare, corporate and individual. We should do away with the income tax as it encourages both the producers and the takers to produce less. Tax property or sales.

[Ursa Majoris]

you know, the technological changes are obvious and paramount, but I have to think the newspapers are also hurting because of a failure of good journalism. the two trends are clearly interrelated.

I'm not convinced of this at all. I think it's more a failure of the consumer and the rise of the sound bite culture where anything that takes more than 30 seconds loses the attention of the lazy f*cks that increasingly make up the population

 

For Exhibit A, I give you the Tailgate - how many times have you seen people here say they haven't read a post because it was "too long"? Doesn't make any difference what quality the post had - it didn't get read because some people didn't have the patience. Doesn't even matter if it was only 15 to 20 lines - still "too long".

[polksalet]

Sad to see the death of real journalism. . . not necessarily the Boston Globe, but newspapers in general.

 

Newspapers employ journalists that actaully need to do research before intelligently writing a story. Magazines cant be far behind . . .

 

Blogs depend too much on misinformation and google searches (of newspapers!) and most television media blurs the line between entertainment and actual news. I.E.- Fox News spends a heck of a lot of time airing shows that are entertainment, rather than news.

 

Too many shows masquarade as legitimate channels of impartial news when they are clearly meant to be entertainmnet with an ideological slant. O'Reilley, Hannity, are all comparable to "The Daily show" or "The Colbert Report".

 

"Time magazine"

[Savage Beatings]

Hmmmm...I'd be up for a friendly wager on this. I say we will not see a federal bailout of newspapers during Obama's first term. As long as we can agree that we are talking bailout proportions of the auto and mortgage industries (i.e...not tax incentives or things like that); full blown federal govt. saving newspaper print companies from bankruptcy with federal tax dollars.

 

For one, the Bush and Obama bailouts were justified in that many people were convinced that the kick in the nuts was better than a crossbow shot to the skull. Two, too many regional papers have already folded to start cherry picking which ones are saved. Three, it would be political suicide and voters wouldn't stand for it.

 

What say yee?

 

So we basically wouldn't know who won for another 3.5 years. What did you have in mind for the wager? Huddle Membership? Sigline?

[bpwallace49]

. Tax property or sales.

 

Doesnt that put a much larger burden on the poor then?

 

Example: The rich dont necessarily eat more food than a poor person, but a disproportionate amount of that poor person's budget goes toward food versus a rich person.

 

I like the idea of a flat tax across the board with a poverty floor. That way the rich cant use accounting tricks to get out of paying anything, and the middle class/ lower financial class pays an even share across thr board.

[Ursa Majoris]

Doesnt that put a much larger burden on the poor then?

 

Example: The rich dont necessarily eat more food than a poor person, but a disproportionate amount of that poor person's budget goes toward food versus a rich person.

You haven't been around here that long, have you? Perch believes in the Gradgrind School of Labor Relations.

 

I like the idea of a flat tax across the board with a poverty floor. That way the rich cant use accounting tricks to get out of paying anything, and the middle class/ lower financial class pays an even share across thr board.

To be fair to perch, this is the basic premise of the flat tax he advocates for.

[polksalet]

Doesnt that put a much larger burden on the poor then?

 

Example: The rich dont necessarily eat more food than a poor person, but a disproportionate amount of that poor person's budget goes toward food versus a rich person.

 

I like the idea of a flat tax across the board with a poverty floor. That way the rich cant use accounting tricks to get out of paying anything, and the middle class/ lower financial class pays an even share across thr board.

 

You like that because

 

1. You are dum

 

2. You are a Marxist

[bushwacked]

So we basically wouldn't know who won for another 3.5 years. What did you have in mind for the wager? Huddle Membership? Sigline?

 

[cre8tiff]

You like that because

 

1. You are dum

 

2. You are a Marxist

 

Ladies and Gentlemen, I present the core arguments of the Republican Party.