General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Why we must resist the bullying of Will Pitt and others here. [View all]DFW
(54,379 posts)Did anyone threaten Will Pitt's safety? If so, they deserve a visit from their local constabulary. And--Tom Paine's uncomfortable words caused him to be hounded from country to country. DU is just an internet board, and the man, perfectly capable of making his own decisions (and I am ALWAYS pro-choice) chose to bow out--a decision I went on his thread and disagreed with, by the way.
It is worth noting that Paine, by the way, wanted "jails [that] are empty of prisoners," and a country where "the taxes are not oppressive," two things that do not seem to jive with the presiding sentiment on DU these days. Of course we need jails--where should we be putting rogue killer cops, frackers who poison cities and CEOs who get rich off of pollution, "accidental" firearm deaths and shady offshore deals that allow them to pay zero taxes? And who decides what level of taxation is oppressive and what is not? That is a moving target no one has managed to hit yet--nowhere, ever. My man in Geneva (CH, not NY) yells and screams about his marginal bracket being being bumped up to 25% when he hit a six figure income. I tell him he's living in a tax paradise and he tells me, no, I'm the one that's living in a tax hell (Germany).
Like Paine, I am a friend of happiness--as in life, liberty and the pursuit thereof. I like to think I have attained a reasonable degree of it. I am also relatively confident this puts me in the minority.