You're so stuck on my original statement that you just keep attacking based on it, regardless of the clarifications which followed and the fact that I have continued to admit that I should have been clearer. I guess you just want to attack and nothing else matters. You weren't clear on my conclusion, so I clarified. Are you seriously so bent on attacking me that you can't accept that I clarified the statement? Of course, it is slightly more nuanced than that, I assumed (quite wrongly) that people were capable of parsing out the fact that I was talking about tendencies and correlation as opposed to causality. You can't refute the argument, so you choose to attack the one statement I made which didn't explicitly state my assumptions and underlying thinking process. I guess when you are unable to refute the argument, delusions and attacks are all you're left with.
Ironic since you're typically the first one to throw insults. Even in this argument, you fired the first insult. Nope, I'm annoyed b/c after I called you out on your originally incorrect statement, you denied it was incorrect, "clarified" it to change its substance, and then continually attacked me. So when you stated causality, you assumed people would actually know you were talking about tendencies and correlation as opposed to causality? Your original argument has already been refuted. Even though you refused to admit this, you acknowledged it by "clarifying" your original argument to change its substance.
Yes, I did, and it was justified. My response post to the one where you called out the lack of causality was this... Instead of looking through the literature to find a study which could have addressed the point that I made (the one which STILL stands), you chose to continue going on about causality even AFTER I admitted without reservation that causality wasn't established. The very first thing I did was admit that causality wasn't established and offered my interpretation of why the study still supported the point I made. This happened BEFORE your silly wager offer. After all of this, any insults I delivered were earned. No, I thought that anyone who was interested could read the article and understand the point I was making. It was apparent that you could not do so, leading me to post the clarification quoted above. After this, you decided to continue to attack on the causality point (which I wholeheartedly admitted immediately) without actually trying to refute the larger point. No, it hasn't. You haven't provided so much as a shred of evidence that a higher minimum wage leads to net job losses. You have merely continued to attack on the causality point, which I have repeatedly admitted is the case from my very first response to you.
GladiatoRowdy, Since you can't seem to grasp the crux of the argument, I'll spell it out for you so clearly that a child would be able to understand it. First, you made an erroneous statement: This statement was incorrect b/c you claimed causality (bolded), and the supporting article said that causality couldn't be established. After I called you out on this, you agreed that causality wasn't established and insulted my critical thinking ability (bolded): To which I responded: Clearly, the "conclusion" I'm referring to is causality. Since I even reference the author's explicit statement about causality, this should be obvious. And here was your reply: So you deny making such a conclusion. Hence, my response: At that point, I figured it was free money for the tipjar since you originally did make such a conclusion: After I brought up the tipjar wager, you immediately changed your argument: Reading comprehension FTW!!!
In a way I think the best thing that could happen would be for the Republicans to get back the Presidency, and both houses of congress. Then they could completely institute a flat tax, cut gov't spending to 1/3 of what it is now, and eliminate all the things they want. Then when the country completely falls apart from that, there would be a landslide in the other direction, and we could actually fix the problems they created plus the ones we have now.
I am torn on this. On one hand I agree with you: let them destroy everything, let the people see what they are really all about, and then perhaps the anger on the streets will lead to real radical change (of course, my guess is that the radical change I am talking about is much more chaotic and radical than what you are talking about, but that is a moot point right now). However, on the other hand -- isn't that exactly what they did under Bush. Under Bush they spent the surplus, got us involved into wars, tanked the economy, the whole shebang. And just a few years later the country is acting brand new, like that **** never happened. So, even if they do get complete control and crap the bed again, their ability to prey upon people's nationalistic, jingoistic, racist and religious mentalities in order to spin things in their own favor can not be underestimated.
You don't have an argument, all you have been claiming in this thread is that causality wasn't established in the study I cited, which I admitted in my very first reply to you. Yes, which I fully admitted in my very first reply to you. Note that you left out the part of my post where I clarified my stance, the part which you continue to ignore and refuse to respond to. Clearly, my conclusion did not have anything to do with causality, which you would have understood if you read my first reply to you in its entirety. Not only did I admit to the lack of causality in the article, I explicitly stated my ACTUAL conclusion, one that you continue to refuse to address, instead droning on and on about the two words "lead to," ignoring the points that actually have a bearing on this thread. Yes, you completely ignored my ACTUAL conclusion for some idiotic reason and continued to go on about two words I wrote in this thread even after I explicitly stated my ACTUAL conclusion a second time. No, I clarified my conclusion in my very first reply to you, you chose to ignore it, but that ignorance is your fault, not mine. Not only did you ignore it the first time, you actually edited the clarification out in this very post. wekko's ignorance FTL!!! Note that you STILL have not addressed my points about the minimum wage, nor those brought up in the original posts. Congratulations on finding two words I posted ("lead to") which were inaccurate, would you care to address the clarified conclusion or the topics brought up in the original posts or are you going to continue to foam at the mouth about those two words?
Bush wasn't bad enough - they didn't blame the Republican platform, they blamed Bush - that was the problem. We need it to happen again with a Romney for people to say - crap, it's not the guy, it's the entire freaking party philosophy.
