Saipan claims ComputerLand founder owes taxes • Hacker News Board

Re: Saipan claims ComputerLand founder owes taxes

#51

Post by lotharbot » Tue, Sep 13, 2011, 2:23 PM UTC

lucasjung wrote: post #24

bugsy wrote: post #2

I remember ComputerLand stores. Sounds like he was a hard working guy who earned his success. Saipan is one of the most corrupt backwards places on earth. As a US trust territory, for many years they had slave plantations that produced clothing for chinese companies which was labelled "Made in USA". Many workers were kept under brutal conditions, raped, beaten and killed. The Saipanese are mostly incredibly lazy and…

I wouldn't have downvoted you, but then your edit included some incredibly bigoted and unwarranted stereotypes: > ...fundamentalist christian [sic] ignorant half retarded hillbilly sex fiend town... > Typical small town american [sic] fundamentalist hillbillies... > Southern Bible Thumping Fundamentalist > The fundamentalist missionaries infected them with the peculiar sort of madness, entitlement, laziness and corru…

Keep in mind that "Christian Fundamentalism" didn't even exist until the end of the 19th century. Trying to pin anything that happened in the 17th or 18th century on "fundamentalism" is a mistake.

Re: Saipan claims ComputerLand founder owes taxes

#52

Post by raganwald » Tue, Sep 13, 2011, 2:31 PM UTC

yardie wrote: post #49

raganwald wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I earn $1.00 and owe 20 cents in taxes, I’ve earned my success in the amount of eighty cents’ worth of financial prosperity. If I keep the entire dollar, I have earned my eighty cents AND I owe 20 cents in unpaid taxes. This gentleman has not been convicted of any crime, but it is certainly possible that he has “earned his success” AND that he owes money for unpaid taxes.

did you not read the part where they backdated the changes? So if you owe 5 cent in taxes and pay that and then a few years later the gov't says "we changed the code you owe us 50 cents and this retroactively applies to the last few years." You would be perfectly okay with that?

As a citizen, I would be perfectly ok with hiring a lawyers and tax accountant and disputing the charges using the existing system we have for disputing taxes and/or having unjust laws stricken off the books.

Re: Saipan claims ComputerLand founder owes taxes

#53

Post by lotharbot » Tue, Sep 13, 2011, 2:52 PM UTC

rhizome wrote: post #13

krschultz wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I imagine the downvotes have a lot more to do with the way you wrote and not what you wrote.

Well, elevating form over content is a hallmark of the superficial. Formalism dictates that the way something is said is more important than the meaning of the words.

I wouldn't say we've elevated form over content. Only that we require form to meet certain minimal standards. This requirement allows us to keep discussions productive and evidence-focused -- in other words, our standards for form result in improved content.

Ignoring those requirements leads to low-content discussion like, for example, this one.

Re: Saipan claims ComputerLand founder owes taxes

#54

Post by lucasjung » Tue, Sep 13, 2011, 4:08 PM UTC

lotharbot wrote: post #51

lucasjung wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't have downvoted you, but then your edit included some incredibly bigoted and unwarranted stereotypes: > ...fundamentalist christian [sic] ignorant half retarded hillbilly sex fiend town... > Typical small town american [sic] fundamentalist hillbillies... > Southern Bible Thumping Fundamentalist > The fundamentalist missionaries infected them with the peculiar sort of madness, entitlement, laziness and corru…

Keep in mind that "Christian Fundamentalism" didn't even exist until the end of the 19th century. Trying to pin anything that happened in the 17th or 18th century on "fundamentalism" is a mistake.

In the modern sense of the term, that is true. However, one could certainly make an argument that Oliver Cromwell, et al were fundamentalists, as well as the original settlers of Plymouth. You could go back even further in time and apply the term to various Catholic orders at certain points in history.

All that being said, I was just using his term (in quotes) for the sake of continuity of conversation, and it was not my intent to lend credence to his application of the label "fundamentalist" to 18th- and 19th-century missionaries.