RE: Any other centrist atheists?
February 13, 2013 at 7:52 am
(This post was last modified: February 13, 2013 at 7:58 am by Anymouse.)
I was made homeless for eleven years by a divorce court taking my veterans compensation for eleven years for alimony. Shoot, epilepsy was even enshrined in my divorce document as the reason for the divorce.
I'll tell you, living homeless in the winter in Missouri and Illinois and Nebraska is no fun.
And there are a lot more people homeless that are not mentally ill than one would might think. While a larger percentage of the mentally ill are homeless than those who are not, they do not make up all the homeless.
I finally wrestled my disability back from my ex-wife (with the help of my current wife, who took in a homeless vet and married him - there's patriotism for you
, and a good lawyer).
But not everyone can live in an inexpensive area of the USA, nor does one get all the benefits of living in expensive areas.
For example, we just bought a new car (a Smart). It cost $13,000, all of which was saved money. The house we bought here in Nebraska two years ago cost $18,000 (also saved money). Property taxes on such an inexpensive house (and that price is average here) amount to about three weeks wages at minimum wage.
If everyone moved here to avoid the high cost of such places as Manhattan (NY, not Kansas), there are no jobs and we would have no place to grow y'all's food.
The state has proposed repealing all corporate and individual income taxes, and financing everything by sales taxes (presumably that means our sales tax will go way up). Regardless of whether you are Warren Buffet in Omaha, or me on veterans disability in the Panhandle, our sales tax will be precisely the same on such things as milk and bread. (I suspect Mr Buffet will pay more sales tax on such things as caviar and good wines, because we don't buy those things).
Mr. Buffet has not come out yet with a position on the state sales tax proposal, though he has on Federal income taxes (the rich are already getting away with too much, and he is the richest). There is no question the income tax proposal is punitive for the poorest in the state, and those who are traditionally not taxed under the income tax (like disabled vet compensation - the state can get their hooks in my disability if they do it with a sales tax).
Food is real cheap here, but electricity, gas, travel, anything beyond which a town of 128 people can provide is horribly expensive.
It does have one advantage: there is no Wal*Mart within sixty miles.
I'll tell you, living homeless in the winter in Missouri and Illinois and Nebraska is no fun.
And there are a lot more people homeless that are not mentally ill than one would might think. While a larger percentage of the mentally ill are homeless than those who are not, they do not make up all the homeless.
I finally wrestled my disability back from my ex-wife (with the help of my current wife, who took in a homeless vet and married him - there's patriotism for you
, and a good lawyer).But not everyone can live in an inexpensive area of the USA, nor does one get all the benefits of living in expensive areas.
For example, we just bought a new car (a Smart). It cost $13,000, all of which was saved money. The house we bought here in Nebraska two years ago cost $18,000 (also saved money). Property taxes on such an inexpensive house (and that price is average here) amount to about three weeks wages at minimum wage.
If everyone moved here to avoid the high cost of such places as Manhattan (NY, not Kansas), there are no jobs and we would have no place to grow y'all's food.
The state has proposed repealing all corporate and individual income taxes, and financing everything by sales taxes (presumably that means our sales tax will go way up). Regardless of whether you are Warren Buffet in Omaha, or me on veterans disability in the Panhandle, our sales tax will be precisely the same on such things as milk and bread. (I suspect Mr Buffet will pay more sales tax on such things as caviar and good wines, because we don't buy those things).
Mr. Buffet has not come out yet with a position on the state sales tax proposal, though he has on Federal income taxes (the rich are already getting away with too much, and he is the richest). There is no question the income tax proposal is punitive for the poorest in the state, and those who are traditionally not taxed under the income tax (like disabled vet compensation - the state can get their hooks in my disability if they do it with a sales tax).
Food is real cheap here, but electricity, gas, travel, anything beyond which a town of 128 people can provide is horribly expensive.
It does have one advantage: there is no Wal*Mart within sixty miles.
"Be ye not lost amongst Precept of Order." - Book of Uterus, 1:5, "Principia Discordia, or How I Found Goddess and What I Did to Her When I Found Her."
