X Mas

[bob johnson]

Originally Posted by Mkelcy

I had a few thoughts on your comments:

Got any back up for that? If you're referring to illegal immigrants, the Board of Supervisors thinks LA County has about 12% of the illegal immigrants in the United States. Because LA County has about 10,000,000 residents, 40% illegal would be 4,000,000 people. Backing that into the 12% number would mean there are roughly 33,000,000 illegals in the United States, an estimate that is over 3 times the Department of Homeland security estimate. Sorry to interrupt your combo PC/illegal immigrant rant, but most illegal immigrants would be perfectly comfortable with a "Merry Christmas" greeting, coming as they do from largely Catholic countires. Once again sorry to interrupt your rant with facts, but the Orange County bankruptcy was largely the result of a ponzi investment scheme gone bad by Orange County Treasurer-Tax Collector Robert L. Citron. Although illegal immigrant costs are clearly a challenge for southern California counties, the Orange County bankruptcy had little to do with illegal immigrant costs and much to do with a crooked government employee.

I'm always surprised how people who claim to be Christians express such unChristian thoughts in the name of Christianity.

With that said, you boys enjoy yourselves and don't mind me.

By the way, Merry Christmas.

California dreamer...maybe you need to read that little post of mine again. You read a lot between the lines. Did I mention the term illegal immigrant?
My daughter is a gemologist and worked for several diamond wholesalers in the L/A area. These were very wealthy Israeli businessmen..some that owned expensive property here and many were US citizens (none of them were illegal immigrants). They dealt primarily in cash or memos..which ultimately usually meant cash. It was nothing to see someone walk in with $1,000,000 or more in diamonds, or $500K in cash. Dope dealers, people that own their own businesses (especially businesses that handle lots of cash) can easily beat the tax game (many of the Asian, Mid Easterners,etc own their own businesses. (they love cash businesses by the way..wonder why). I didn't refer to illegal immigrants causing the Orange County Bankruptsy did I? If you're referring to me as a bible thumping christian, you are way off base again (Ask anyone on this sight)..or better yet go to Musclerides.com...(I get deleted less over there than I do over here and pro touring..look at the disclosure they had to put on me on pro touring. Put damn true on your buddy list and you two can have at it..birds of a feather...

[bob johnson]

Originally Posted by Mkelcy

As a resident of Los Angeles County that number seems extremely high. Assuming that's an accurate quote, I wonder how the LA Times defined "worker." The census data reports a little over 3,800,000 non-farm jobs in LA County in 2003. Now either the census bureau managed to count all jobs held by illegal immigrants for which they are paid in cash - pretty unlikely in my estimation - or the LA Times is claiming there are, in addition to the 3,800,000 reported jobs another over 2,500,000 jobs held by illegal immigrants. For that to be true, however, every illegal immigrant (regardless of age, etc.) would have to be working two jobs (there are estimated to be about 1,300,000 illegal immigrants in LA County). As industrious as most illegals are, that also seems unlikely.

Two other thoughts, (i) the 40% figure, again assuming it's true, likely misleads how much actual tax revenue is lost, as illegal immigrant employees paid in cash are unlikely actually to have to pay much federal or state income taxes under our progressive tax schemes; and (ii) we conviently ignore the fact that the illegal immigrant employees paid in cash are likely cleaning the homes, mowing the yards and cooking in the kitchens of the favorite restaurants of nice folks who bemoan the illegal immigration problem on boards like this.

************************************************** *******

With that, I'm not going to post in this thread any more. It started out with Stuart simply trying to tell a joke; someone was offended he used the contraction "Xmas" (which I've seen used for the more than 55 years I've been able to read and is hardly PC), and then the thread went off on a spree of bashing various groups with whom some folks here apparently disagree.

Sincerely, Merry Christmas to all.

Hot Damn..I would have never guessed you were from California..lol .IMHHO one of the greatest threats to this country is book smart liberals, with very little common sense and no street smarts. They get their liberal arts degrees and gravitate to teaching, publishing,government, etc jobs. They can't make it in the business world so they wind up being the ones who teach our kids and work the printed and TV media so we predominately get the liberal point of view on most issues. It's very stylish to feel sorry and champion the rights of the weak, poor, so called underpriveleged, minorities, etc.(as long as it's not poor white trash..nobody gives a hoot about them..me included) Move the liberals into the projects to live for 1 year..let them become a policeman in a poor area of town..that'll give them some street smarts...I think I'll rely on the LA Times statistics. You can't even read a 2 sentence post without misconstruing 90% of what was said..

[the camtender]

And I thought the answer to the questions here were hidden in my last last post

[bob johnson]

Originally Posted by Mkelcy

I had a few thoughts on your comments:

Got any back up for that? If you're referring to illegal immigrants, the Board of Supervisors thinks LA County has about 12% of the illegal immigrants in the United States. Because LA County has about 10,000,000 residents, 40% illegal would be 4,000,000 people. Backing that into the 12% number would mean there are roughly 33,000,000 illegals in the United States, an estimate that is over 3 times the Department of Homeland security estimate. Sorry to interrupt your combo PC/illegal immigrant rant, but most illegal immigrants would be perfectly comfortable with a "Merry Christmas" greeting, coming as they do from largely Catholic countires. Once again sorry to interrupt your rant with facts, but the Orange County bankruptcy was largely the result of a ponzi investment scheme gone bad by Orange County Treasurer-Tax Collector Robert L. Citron. Although illegal immigrant costs are clearly a challenge for southern California counties, the Orange County bankruptcy had little to do with illegal immigrant costs and much to do with a crooked government employee.

I'm always surprised how people who claim to be Christians express such unChristian thoughts in the name of Christianity.

With that said, you boys enjoy yourselves and don't mind me.

By the way, Merry Christmas.

was it the same crooked employee that has bankrupted the utility industry in California? I guess the Feds will have to bail out the whole state where you guys can have electricity and gas. California led the way in the trading, deregulation and futures in utilities..sounded good on paper...Let's blame it on Enron...

[Mkelcy]

Originally Posted by bob johnson

IMHHO one of the greatest threats to this country is book smart liberals, with very little common sense and no street smarts. They got their liberal arts degrees and gravitate to teaching, publishing,government, etc jobs. They couldn't make it in the business world so they wind up being the ones who teach our kids and work the printed and TV media so we predominately get the liberal point of view on most issues. It's very stylish to feel sorry and champion the rights of the weak, poor, so called underpriveleged, minorities, etc.(as long as it's not poor white trash..nobody gives a hoot about them..me included) Move the liberals into the projects to live for 1 year..let them become a policeman in a poor area of town..that'll give them some street smarts...I think I'll rely on the LA Times statistics. You can't even read a 2 sentence post without misconstruing 90% of what was said..

Bob, I regret doing this because I said I wasn't going to post here again, but I'll make this exception. Because I'm the only person who's posted anything here disagreeing with you, I'll assume your comments quoted above were directed at me.

(1) I'm having a real problem believing you were referring to Israeli, Asian and Mid Eastern businessmen when you said "it would be bad enough if they all paid their way..this way it's inexcusable...get to enjoy the good life on the cheap here.." Somehow, I don't see Israeli, Asian and Mid Eastern businessmen as constituting 40% of the workers in LA County you mentioned or likely, as you suggested, driving LA County into bankruptcy. I recognize BS when I see it, and you, sir, are BS'ing.

(2) You may think me a "book smart liberal, with very little common sense and no street smarts." I guess that's true if you ignore working since I was 12, the 4 years as an enlisted man in the Navy during the Viet-Nam war (and in theater) and the four more years working to save enough so that, with the GI Bill, I could put myself through college and law school and my now 30 plus year legal career. I guess I'd be willing to match my "street smarts" with yours pretty much any day; on the other hand let's see you negotiate a $500,000,000 credit agreement with 35 bankers and their lawyers.

(3) I read all of what you said and, regretfully, think I construed your meaning perfectly. That you now wish to claim to have meant something else is of no importance to me.

(4) Finally, IMHO, one of the greatest threats to this country is folks who hate anything they don't like, don't understand or don't agree with. I may or may not be describing you, I don't know.

And, with that I'm done, or I might say something I'll regret.

[907rs]

I think this thread has run it's course now guys