Bring back Keyes...

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fyrestarter

New member
After reading MicroBalrog's thread on Alan Keyes' stance on machine guns, I did a little research on Keyes' stance on important issues during the 2000 election.

The answer had been staring us in the face all along. Alan Keyes' should be the President of the United States of America.

Keyes' stance on various issues

If John Kerry pulls out a victory, I say we begin a grassroots campaign to elect Alan Keyes as the Republican Nominee in 2008.

I don't know if I agree with the "Technology" section...in fact, I know I don't, but he's dead on right 90% of the time. I wish he'd back off from the whole "God" thing, too. One can be moral without being superstitious. But, hey, there are worse things to be than Christian. I'm off to Amazon.com to buy his book, Our Character, Our Future. Finally a man who actually believes that this country can be saved. Thanks, MicroBalrog for bringing this to my attention.
 
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Destructo6

New member
The answer had been staring us in the face all along. Alan Keyes' should be the President of the United States of America.
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If you look back through the threads around the time of the last race for the Republican presidential nomination, there were quite a few of us that advocated the same.
 
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4 Wheel Drive

New member
I heard a nasty rumor that Mr Keyes wanted to suspend federal tax on black Americans as a reparation for the decendants of slaves. I have not been able to independently corroborate the story, but, if true, it makes me sad. Thought we had a winner in Keyes, and I liked several of his ideas over and above RKBA.
 
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Timmit

New member
I heard a nasty rumor that Mr Keyes wanted to suspend federal tax on black Americans as a reparation for the decendants of slaves. I have not been able to independently corroborate the story, but, if true, it makes me sad. Thought we had a winner in Keyes, and I liked several of his ideas over and above RKBA.
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I heard the same thing on some random talk radio program, but haven't seen it anywhere since *shrug*.
 
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TheBluesMan

Moderator Emeritus
Many people say they have heard him say that, or know of someone who did.

Nobody can prove it, but they keep repeating it.

So lives the lie.
 
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fyrestarter

New member
Reparations for slave decendants seems like a concept so antithetical to Keyes' philosophy, that I'm willing to believe it's just not true. In every other instance of programs that give unfair monies, advantages, etc. to black Americans, Keyes is opposed. Heck, as far as I can tell, Keyes is completely opposed to income tax for everybody:

"If you need a tax cut today, all you’ll need to do is change your habits of consumption. You’ll be back in control of your own destiny. That is the tax approach that I recommend. Radically different from what they’re all talking about. They want to remain the gate keepers of your money. I want to put you back in charge of that money. Abolish the income tax."

--GOP Debate in Johnston, Iowa Jan 16, 2000.

"The income tax is a twentieth-century socialist experiment that has failed"

--Organizational website, RenewAmerica.us, "On The Issues" Aug 3, 2004

The only thing that comes remotely close to Keyes mentioning suspending income tax for blacks is this:

"Under my national sales tax proposal, poor folks wouldn't have to pay taxes, because the proposal would include a market basket of goods and services in all the basic areas of necessity of life that would be exempt from taxation."

--Organizational website, RenewAmerica.us, "On The Issues" Aug 3, 2004
 
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fyrestarter

New member
Sigh....that's really a shame. Alright, anyone know of any Keyes-esque politicians who aren't so ridiculously blinded (and pressured) by race?

Is there anyone left in this country that is more concerned with the present-day meritous contributions of individuals rather than with the historical grievances of an ethnic minority group? The only way to improve this country is to deal with problems of the here and now, and the financial placation of perceived injustices is not a viable solution.
 
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Selfdfenz

New member
1st
The very idea of reparations is just about so evil to me personally I might stop working over the thought one red cent of my tax $ would be paid to anyone that NEVER was a slave and has had federally controlled and subsidized entitlements and benefits neither my children nor I could never have.

What the pro-reparations blacks want is a check in the mail from all the non-black taxpayers in the US. A big fat shame check.

Think of Keyes model this way:

You gotta be working to get the benefit of it. Sit on you ass at home and you get nothing. Let's not overlook the fact he may have come up with a pretty good idea.

If you are working black ok it's a raise and you aren't liable to stop working all of a sudden. But knowing you are going to "not be required to pay taxes" might make an employer be a bit slow to hire or to promote you since they subconsciously know you get a speacial deal from U. Sam. Could it cause resentment in the work place? Possibly so.

If you are an unemployed black that min. wage job might look just good enough with no fed tax deducted to get you into and keep you in the work force. That could be the real wisdom of his idea. You gotta be working to get the benefit. After a while, dropping back to the poverty level looks like a pretty weak option. When the time for a free ride runs out, if the taxes are eased back on over a number of years, those people stay in the workplace and the country comes out a winner.

Keyes might be a wizard IF he had said it only applies to blacks making below a certain level AND limited it to say 5-10 years and that is it, no more gravy train! Never !
I'd be in favor of of this if it was linked to killing every piece of affirmative action legislation in the US.

I'll BIH before I pay taxes for reparations checks that show up in someone's mailbox that never was a slave and makes more than I do already!

I think blue collar America might just get a tad hot and bothered paying reparations to a bunch of black lawyers and doctors who can get their kids into ivy league colleges (becasue they are black) while the cotton mill worker would be happy to get his kid in any college at all. Support for reparation could and should cost a lot of wrong-headed congressmen and women in Washington their jobs and when this thing gets big enough, very likely will.

Now, having said all that, I think our country is so immortally screwed up we will see the reparations checks being printed and mailed in ten years or less.

S-
 
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Raccoon

New member
Well, Alan Keyes is still worth supporting...

Look, I don't know the truth about the reparations proposal attributed to Alan Keyes and I don't really care given that he's solid on so many of our other issues.
If so many of us can accept so much other garbage off of Mr. Bush (AW Ban Renewal, Campaign Finance Reform, Regularization rather than Elimination of Illegal Immigration...and the list goes on) then we can put up with one flaw of Mr. Keyes especially on a side-show issue that isn't going to be transformed into policy sometime soon.
If I were going to do slavery reparations it would be in a strictly symbolic sense. I'd build a Museum of Slavery and it wouldn't just be about Slavery in the American South (which was relatively benign in comparison to its Carribean counterpart). I'd talk about that but I'd talk about the whole filthy history of the institution going back to the beginning of human history.
The fact is, almost everyone in fact I'd bet money and say everyone on this forum has an ancestor who was a slave. You might have to go back very far but if you had a time machine and a god-like genological companion guide you could find one of your ancestors getting cracked with a whip while doing unrenumerated labor (or worse).
While we Americans should always be conscious of the stains on our past we need to each of us and I mean each of us recieve reparations by remembering that our freedom isn't free.
If you don't like the Slavery Museum idea because its too general here's another one.
Let's pass a law that abolishes all the local and state gun laws that disproportionately affect African Americans who live in urban centers at the mercy of armed thugs and unsympathetic police (who are angry because they've been left alone to deal with said armed thugs). Now getting rid of what amounts to racist gun control sure sounds like reparations to me! But again this fix would benefit everyone who lives in those restrictive areas (especially DC) but it would be done in honor of the past suffering of African-Americans.
We, will ensure that African Americans are forever armed (like the rest of us) so that no one will ever try to reenslave them or lynch any one of them again. Its least we can do for our brothers and sisters.
 
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TheBluesMan

Moderator Emeritus
Dammit, Timmit. :(

You could knock me over with a feather. I have always held that Ambassador Keyes was above selling out his convictions for votes. I guess not... :(
 
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mvpel

New member
Ending the income tax for black people - a good start towards starving the ravenous beast of Federal government.
 
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Quartus

New member
Alas, Dr. Keyes is NOT the man I once thought he was. I supported him AVIDLY when he ran for the nomination some years back. Since then I've changed my mind.

He's just not Presidential material. Frankly, he's a bit immature. First there's this nonsense of him running around expecting everybody to call him "Ambassador Keyes". Hello, folks! We don't have Titles in this country! He served once as ambassodor! That doesn't convey a Title For Life! It's rather pompous. Great men are humble men. Dr. Keyes is not.


Oh, and then there's the business of his old campaign debts STILL not being paid, but he managed to give himself a salary. Legal yes, but petty. At BEST it was unwise, as it gave his critics a ready made attack on his character. Oh, and he doesn't appear to have learned his lesson. The Illinois GOP had to warn him not to do it this round. He agreed, but why did it even have to be mentioned?

Then there was his contempt of the rights of private property and free association that he displayed when he tried to crash a Presidential debate to which he was not invited. Yes, it was low and cheesy to keep him out, but yes they had a right to do so. Keyes refused to acknowledge that right.

Then there's his stance against Michael New. I'm sorry, Dr. Keyes, we MUST have "every soldier deciding the legality of his orders", if we are to be any better than the Nazis. "I vass yust followink orderss!" We heard it at Nuremburg, and we heard it at Abu Gharib, and if Dr. Keyes is right, it's a legitimate defense.

Frankly I'm saddened but not surprised at his slavery reparations gig.

I hope he wins the Senate seat, but I couldn't support him for President.
 
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MicroBalrog

New member
Great men are humble men

Not necessarily. Being proud of deserved rewards is perfectly OK.

Also, I'd say repealing the income tax for blacks is akin to creating, say, an exception from the FOPA-86 for ex-cops. Enforcing the rights of one minority to accelerate the enforecement of everyone's rights.

Microanti-graduatedincometaxliberalBalrog
 
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