Did you just play the race card Charles? I'm going to get another cup of coffee and read this over again just to make sure.

At least the man making $250,000 didn't whine about the cost of his nanny.

Ha! I agree with you completely, Charles. I cringe anytime bullshit like what has spewed forth from these two douchebags makes it into the national news.

How could people not hate that? FUCK. I hate that!

Also there's this

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-02-29…

Is his salary enough to afford the world's smallest violin? Because it's playing for him.

Umm. So rich black people don't have the caucasian materialism disease? Ok, I'll just have to forget that gaudy golden statue of "Missy" in Missy Elliot's foyer on Cribs.

Aren't they just disproving their own no-help-for-anyone talking points with this kind of thing? If life is "hard" for an urban family at $250k, then it must be at least 10x as difficult to live at $25k.

I'd think that they'd be making the reverse argument - that life is easy without ANY money or resources - so that they can justify killing off every program devoted to education, health care, infrastructure, art, etc, etc

@6: This is not universally true, and certainly wasn't as widely true in the past as it is today.

If you look into older people who have a solid retirement situation nowadays, a lot of them set their lifestyle when they were young and first established their family, and then stuck with that even as their income rose. Sure they might go on a couple more trips a year or something, but they paid off their houses and invested in retirement.

Smart people still do this. Intelligent people who put thought into how they live their lives will NOT simply spend more as their income rises. In fact, as my income has rose to 2x what I made in my 20's (though still a fraction of what those rich assholes make), I have *cut back* on my expenses; canceling my cable entirely, cooking at home more, etc. So that I can pay off debts faster (now only my car loan remains), and invest more in my retirement.

The reality is those 2 rich assholes, and many like them, are douchebags. Spoiled, rich, douchebags who are not only oblivious to the position of privilege they hold, but too blind to realize what assholes they are being.

I grew up poor. Like holes in my shoes poor. Now my wife and I make a combed income of $160K. We think of ourselves as rich. How could we not? We live in a nice house in a core area of Seattle, eat well, live well, save at a high rate, donate a good bit to charity, and send our son to a good daycare, and have the occasional nice vacation. How in God's name could these douchers complain about money being tight? Personally, I'd like to see taxes go up a little for me, quite a bit for people making over $250K, and a lot for people making over 1 million. And use the money for the common good.

If you can't achieve a comfortable quality of life on $250,000/year, you're doing it wrong. You're either really bad with money or incapable of living within your means.

Yes, we get it - you're don't have Bill Gates money. You're still rich compared to 90% of the people around you.

@ 1, it's not playing the race card if it's true.

Schiff can't be very smart if he's feeling "stuck" on $350K, even in New York City. Does he really need a summer home in Connecticut? Does his daughter really need to be at boarding school? Is 1,200 square feet way too little for three people? Is it a terrible burden to have to handwash your dishes? Such problems I should have, in my 900 square feet with no dishwasher and no summer home to retreat to.

Nice to know that the people making $30K to $40K a month are living paycheck to paycheck just like everyone else.

Even though I don't earn anywhere near this guy's salary, I agree with him.

$250,000 basically buys you a slightly enlarged version of the typical lower middle class lifestyle. Plus, you pay a premium in price because you feel you have to live in a more expensive neighborhood, or near a university, which means you don't actually get more space and so forth.

The other thing is this guy is wage dependent. Should he or his wife get injured, or die, or lose his job (not likely for a tenured prof, I know, but still) their family would plunge in status. Rich, to me, means never having to work again.

In my view, based on all the inflation of the past 30 years, people have to reorient their thinking to the reality that a lot of us people walking around thinking we're still part of the "middle class" have actually fallen into a kind of poverty based on the cost of 21st century lifestyles.

In fact, I think its a good sign that someone like this feels this way, as he's more likely to throw his lot in with say an Occupy or a Tea Party than simple subscribing to the system as he might happily have done in the past.

Another thing I've been reading about is international purchasing power. In some countries like China, although we often hear about insanely low wages, given the social services like health care and other "built in" features, many of them have actual purchasing power higher than some "middle class" or "professional" workers here in America.

If all the poor voted, it would be a much more fair world. But, alas, they don't. So on it goes.

Why do sloggers hate Charles? Because posts like this one are common.

@11 - spot on. I make half that (single income) in a good year and have exactly zero grounds to complain economically. I'd like to see a modest tax increase for my bracket, going progressively higher on a fairly steep curve as incomes rise.

@17 PPP (purchasing power parity) numbers are readily available and well understood - and Chinese "slave labor" factory workers do not enjoy the PPP equivalent of the American middle class or professional class, not even close.

Gotta say, I would love to have that problem. Regardless of how much money is earned there's always some douche that thinks he or she deserve more just because they are. If that 350k is so bad you are stuck, try living for a while in my shoes. I dare you.

Charles has white guilt. That is sometimes a consequence of living in Seattle or working at The Stranger.

He does whine a little bit, but frankly, $250,000 in 2012 is only approximately $139,693.89 in 1990 dollars. I think we're getting old Charles, money aint what it used to be...

"If his taxes went up, he said, he would have to cut back."

Cutting back is unAmerican and what "the poors" do. Never cut back.

@22: "Charles has white guilt"

What does this even mean.

@24

Robert Mugabe.

@27... yeah you cling on to that thought. Know what Amri-cani means? Or Amris? Or Imp? Just a nice picking of slurs used against americans... sadly. When 9/11 happened I heard more people wondering what the americans would do to us all because of this than wondering why you where attacked. Its unfair, sure, I know enough americans to be aware that your just like people everywhere - but make no mistake, you have a huuuuuge PR-problem.

Sorry to burst your american bubble.

But @Charles - I dont think that impopularity is because of your economy. Allot of countries have a more stable economy than you but arent as impopular. I think old cold war sentiments still linger aswell as some Post-Bush/Iraq-war doubt about your intentions with all that military force. A large number of misdirected missiles, awkward photos, videos of soldiers beating up civilians and some stills from guantanamo have not sold you into the world at large.
(or maybe allot of people are like me, be wary around people who seems to enjoy imperial rome a tad bit too much)

well.... if the rich paid more in taxes and things were structured right, we'd have single payer and and he wouldnt have medical bills, need two cars (because wed have better transport) and daycare. etc. everyone would have those things available to them for free.

Charles, I'm registering 50% valid point from this post, and 50% hatred and envy for the upper middle class, most of whom have worked their asses off for a long time and eaten truckloads of shit to get to the point where their making $350,000 per year.

BTW - raising a family in NYC on $350,000 isn't far off from doing the same in Seattle on yours and your wife's salary.

@29 Free? Where'd you get the idea it was free?

The World doesn't "hate" Americans... We are the envy of the World. It's easy to hate the best. We've got by far the largest economy and some of the best natural resources, and don't even get started on our military's force projection capabilities. Don't confuse hate with jealousy, they're different but often confused. USA!

It's a little thing called Player Hating that I hear the kids talk about on their hip hop ipods.

@32, my main point is it's not sustainable. that way of life is already too excessive. cutting back is not even a bad thing. the problem with revolutions has been the failure to develop new habits and modes of fulfillment. revolutions always end up being exactly about jealousy, and so all that happens is the continuation of unsustainable modes of fulfillment.

#33

That's why I live in Kent.

Yeah, you are probably right, rich white people who whine about not being richer are worse than dictators who engage in genocide, the systematic rape of women, and keep generations-old violent conflicts going. Great reporting Charles.

36), you only see violence with your eyes. it's people like you who are killing this planet and causing the most suffering.

Masterful troll is masterful.

@6
I agree. These people are trying to redefine "rich" or "wealthy" as "being impossible to live beyond my means for the rest of my life and my kids' and grandkids' lives". And maybe longer.

They're wealthy, self-obsessed douchebags.

I agree with Charles that this guy is a worthless pile of shit. But really?

You're really going to go moralizing about SUV's and wanton unconscious consumption being worse than intentional mass rape and genocide? C'mon.

I mean sure. I get the long term harm and long term suffering angle here, but you're really pushing the sanctimonious "What? not me! I'M BLACK! We're all blameless little nature people" thing a little hard. Consumerism is pretty bad and is fueling a whole bunch of problems. But I can safely say that being given the choice between being forced to rape your own mother at gun point then heave a machette through her skull OR getting a computer job and buying a new Escalade, I think I know what your average Congolese would likely choose.

I mean, fuck Charles, then why don't we ALL go back to living in mud huts and dying of dysentery at 27? Right? Fuck development aid to Africa, right? We wouldn't want them to become evil consumers, like us.

It sure as shit would cause less "long term suffering", wouldn't it?

And I know you, when geven half the opportunity, max out your credit cards buying heaps of polluting shit just like every other American.

@33

Well said. Thank you!

I got a friend that has this crazy idea about using machines to do our jobs to free our minds to come up with revolutionary ideas. It was a hard to swallow idea, about abolishing a monetary system and just saying, "heh, work if you want, create if you want, or do nothing, here is what you need to live, take what you will, we now have machines to do the work, so do something that fulfills you."

Not a bad idea, would change the world, but maybe we wont be ready in my lifetime... But I sure do like the idea of doing whatever I want, and contrary to popular belief, money can often interfere with this... Too many commitments.

@40, now we are talking, now we are getting somewhere. i still disagree with you, but you are in a place where we can make real progress. where you are now is where I really believe more americans should be. also remember that i'm a technologist and urbanist. there's no going back to huts. what is needed is new thinking about the nature of violence that is easy to see and violence that is hard to see. this is my starting point.

@42 shouldn't our starting points be what you and I do.... like before blaming rich turds like this Schiff guy. Let's start with you and me.

We can't have it both ways. We can't simultaneously say this guy, his out of touch world views—his consumption— both represents an infinitesimal percent of humanity (they do) and then go on blame him for all the worlds woes. That's simply too convenient. And the math doen't add up.

He is the 1%. Even though they consume quite a bit, it pales in comparison to the cumulative consumption of the 800 million (and growing) pseudo-middle class technological civilizational consumers in the US, Western Europe, China and India.

We can say his class represent and spreads a model of lifestyle that is killing the world. Sure. But here you and I are living in a technological capital society better than Maharajas used to live - with indoor plumbing, any type of entertainment and food at the touch of our fat fingers, and easy leisure travel to anywhere in the world. Every sane person on this planet is clamoring to live just like us. And why not? Well. Because it's literally killing the future of human civilization along with about 70% of the world animal species.

BUT, Charles, if there were only 1 million people living that way, like the Republicans want, with the rest of the world living in non-consuming unprotected diseased Favelas, the cold hard fact is the world would be just fine sustainability wise.

And yet suffering would be that much worse. So.

Rather than sit and blame the white man and his richness, who only out of sheer dumb luck of history and geography got to the top of the heap, let's find a way out of this for everybody. His race is purely coincidental. If the Mongolians would have been in the fertile crescent during the ice age THEY would be sitting on the boards of all major corporations right now.

Our real problem: No compassionate social system we know of can reduce suffering and support the number of people we will soon have on this rock. This we know for a fact. Anybody says different they have a selfish agenda.

There is really only one way: A deliberate, gradual but massive, and controlled contraction in human population along with raising the level of rights and education for the worlds poorest women. And very few in your cherished third world wants to do this, let alone here.

As for you and me: We need to stop having kids. You and me. We need to then substitute the money and care we would spend on our children and spend that on kids in places like Africa. we can stop consuming all we want, but as long as we keep creating new consumers to take our place what we do is for nothing.

Here's a thought. You hate this country so much, move out of it. With the exception of Mudede, who can just fuck off and die. Incoherent stupidity is annoying. Idiotic economic theories discredited everywhere they've been tried are irritating. But a priviledged stupid foreigner like the halfwit Mudede pontificating on how bad the place he lives is? That's just pathetic.

Hate this country and are from somewhere else? Who the hell cares? I don't think much of the French, and they rightly don't care since I don't live there, pay taxes there, or vote there. I don't think much of pretty much any African nation (though this isn't the fault of Africans, per se, but of the tragic effects of colonization and backwards cultures colliding), but since I'll never even visit that benighted continent they also presumably don't care.

But particarly Europeans and Canadians- We saved your sorry stupid
asses too many times for the stupid denunciations of us to be anything but comical. Just thought you should know.

@44: Did you even read the goddamn article, you nitwit?
Charles isn't saying that he hates America. He's pointing out that even though we are an incredibly privileged country, even the rich among us often complain that their lives are too hard and that they have trouble making ends meet, and that such whiny behavior offends foreigners who actually ARE dirt-poor?
Didn't your mother ever tell you to "finish your dinner; there are starving kids in Ethiopia/Somalia/North Korea"?

Incoherent stupidity is annoying.

Indeed! But we keep hoping you'll learn better.

most of whom have worked their asses off for a long time and eaten truckloads of shit to get to the point where their making $350,000 per year.

Right. Like low-wage earners don't eat truckloads of shit.

BTW - raising a family in NYC on $350,000 isn't far off from doing the same in Seattle on yours and your wife's salary.

BTW, the median household income in Manhattan, never mind the outer boroughs, is $64,127. That Schiff guy makes more than five times that. Still think he's poor?

The median household income in Seattle is $45,736.

You the last time SB posted from his "house" in "Italy" I thought, wow, that dude must have the most boring life on the planet or have some really bizarre fetish I can't comprehend to go and post to an Internet forum that hates his guts. Who get's off on that?

And. What's more pathetic: Going to Italy with your wife and then sitting there in Tuscany at 6 in the morning typing out hate screeds to homosexuals on a chat forum?

Or. Operating under the delusion you're in "Italy" with your imaginary wife and typing out hate screeds?

That my friends is a conundrum I'm happy to not dwell on.

Concocting this weird persona is one thing, but furnishing it so transparently with an imaginary envy checklist that he thinks will get those liberals goats because, like, they love places like Italy and shit. This is what the cumulative intelligence of internet Trollery has wrought?

The only exposure you used to have to delusional shut-ins was when the authorities found their mummified corpses gripping 800 page manifestos as they decay on the toilet of their basement apartments. Gee. Thanks, internet.

But then I realize it's even more likely he's some sort of A. Birch Steen Markov Chain text generator. And the geek in me want's to make one too.

@48 So then we have 10 billion consumers instead of 800 million? The math just will not hold up. Consumerism wouldn't even remotely be a problem if the population of the planet could stabilize at 3 billion.

The lag time between population reduction after people begin more consumption and the massive increase and demand on raw materials and the strain on natural systems is simply far too long. Not to mention the creation of massive economic bubbles because human labor is way too cheap because the supply is overwhelming.

We have to do both raise living standards for poor women and population control. And we have to it without over burdening natural systems any more than we are now.

Just crossing our fingers and hoping more of the same will magically resolve all our problems is a recipe for disaster.

@51 I think the sort of individual-centered economic freedom conceptualized by our system is great in the context of a 18th century world population and technological level. But it falls apart when you get the to the scale and accelerated development we have now.

Of course all the other social systems (Marxism, Feudalism, Anarchism, etc) fall apart much, much faster and are relics of their time that don't appear to scale at all.

I wish I had an answer. It's some path somebody hasn't invented yet.

I think the unfortunate truth is humans won't change how they do things until they are forced to by circumstance. And this makes me very sad.

@37: Tell that to the thousands who are brutally oppressed everyday, the women who are enslaved, and the children who starve because of selfish warlords. Do they only see the violence with their eyes? People who are not like you actually do matter you know.

Your elitism is astounding, and the hypocrisy rings clear. "People like me?" So I guess you live in a mud hut, only eat raw foods, and do not use any heating or air conditioning in your house. I do not support waste, I do not support unhindered capitalism, or the depredation it causes on the weak. But claiming that people who want more is worse then people who murder and oppress generations of people is a Marxist fantasy.

The bigger problem is not our culture, but the unbridled population explosion worldwide. I understand fully that our culture is not sustainable with current technology, but claiming this is worse than genocide is so philosophically bankrupt, it has to be a rhetorical move, or else you are just that hyperbolic all the time.

@ 53 - Excellent post, and I agree completely.

Just one thing, though: ".. a Marxist fantasy." I think that may be a bit.. um.... redundant.

:-)

Speaking as someone from the rest of the world, Seattleblues is actually a prime example of what a lot of people hate about America, much more so than Todd Henderson is.

But particarly Europeans and Canadians- We saved your sorry stupid
asses too many times for the stupid denunciations of us to be anything but comical. Just thought you should know.

Only Americans (and only the more ignorant ones) believe this kind of propagandistic bullshit. If there's any country you can point to as the reason we're not all goose-stepping and sieg heiling right now, it's the U.S.S.R. (does the name Stalingrad ring a bell?), but even then it's not that simple. Seriously, while the U.S. made a significant contribution to both world wars, nobody in the rest of the world believes that the U.S. singlehandedly "saved our asses." Christ.

To be clear, I don't personally "hate Americans" at all. "I hate Americans" is an absurd statement, for the same reason that all ethnic and nationalistic hatred is absurd.

I remember reading some time ago in a women's forum some girl complaining about how she was a "poor" mother on social benefits. She was american and reading her posts you'd discover she lived in a house with reliable heating, had a reliable internet connection and two computers,owned a car (however "old" you might consider it) and I am only asuming, she probably had other household appliances, one or several credit cards.... I live in Argentina, I am an Ob-gyn and I have a pretty good life. But I DO know what poor is. My patients at the hospital, who are mostly inmigrants from Bolivia and Peru and Paraguay live in houses that blow in winter winds, WILL NEVER EVER EVER have an internet conection, even dream of owning a car, don't qualify for any kind of credit and will really really really spend most of their life knowing what they will eat tomorrow but not certainly next week. And I live in a big city. In rural areas in their own countries they would probably be barefoot as no shoes ever, for life.
But you know what? They have their babies at the hospital and recieve care of whatever level (even MONTHS of NICU units) totally, TOTALLY FOR FREE. I am paid by the city to work there, (well paid, by the way) and every single soul of whichever countrie or inmigrant state gets the best medical care we can for absolutely nothing. And we are certainly not communists.
So all things considered americans saying they are poor sound like spoiled brainless children who do not know even how to share. If Argentina and Uruguay, for example DO HAVE UNIVERSAL FREE MEDICAL CARE AVAILABLE how USA can't? Shouldn't you guys stop going around invading (I am sorry, "freeing") countries and spend money differently?

I am Charles Mudede. I will relate an anecdote and then tell you that it is universally true and make up a lot of additional shit about it that has no basis in reality. But, based on some books I read, it tells a good story. Thanks for the page views.

A Question with muliplte answer's. Let's start off with the Self inflated and Arrogant view most Americans hold themselves in (see the moronic comment from 44, he's a prime example). We consistently hear from you that America is the best country in the world, yet we shake our heads at your 3rd world view of not providing Free Health care to all (just Greed and Selfishness on your behalf) Ref: http://www.gadling.com/2007/07/05/what-c…
We cringe when we hear of yet another mass shooting and can't understand how you can proudly stand by your Archaic Gun Law's which allow over 9,000 of you to be murdered each year, which once again put's you in the 3rd world category (Ref: http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_mu…)
Your corporate greed is astounding, with no thought or care given to the impact this can have on the world (GFC for starters, and yes, we all have them, but you more so than most)
And let's not start on the War Mongering Creature most of the world see's you as
You see, it's not that we hate America, you could say it's part Contempt. America has many fine qualities and a large part of the world should take note of them, it's just that your redeeming qualities are greatly dimmed by what we find beneath the surface

The sequence thing is cheap, Chalz.

He probably needs to live in an expensive neighborhood to avoid an hour's commute. He probably bought a house, because as you say he has the whitey disease. I don't really consider My buddy lives in poopy Brooklyn and pays nearly 1k each month in rent.

The world hates America because we turned Europe and Japan from fascist, genocidal world of warcraft clans into the world's most prosperous, socially progressive cultures, eradicated smallpox when we were the only industrialized nation, pried the colonists off Africa's ass, neutralized or pacified the central planners who were starving their people by the millions and made the world watch as the history came out and it became obvious that the USSR was rabid and global communism a perverse failure, backed the Middle East's only social-democracy over its terrorist enemies, stopped the Serbs in Bosnia and Kosovo, stopped Saddam in Kuwait, saved millions from famine in Somalia and crashed some helicopters, put billions into fighting AIDS and malaria, led the world in medical research financing, put a man on the moon, put rims on everything, wore timbs on any scene, fed the North Koreans when the Chinese wouldn't, provided free all of the shit that facilitated the Arab Spring and didn't take (or receive) any public credit for keeping the military out of the street in Cairo but accepted the flack about financing Mubarak, made women economically valuable in China so they didn't ALL get thrown into garbage heaps, put gay and otherwise free people on media that gets broadcast everywhere, sent female secretaries of state to scold Salafi kings and generally balled out. Did we invent the internet?

we also did a lot of f'd up shit in Latin America, backed up Mobutu and committed genocides against the first North Americans and African slaves (who we chained to rickety boats) in an ocean.

there are lots of good reasons to hate us and lots of bad people who don't do much thinking and just see us shining. between the two we're easy to hate

ps the USSR + Germany alliance is the reason WW2 started in Eurp so no it's not propagandistic bullshit to say that we burnt the game in your defense and in defense of the Chinese

@60
Please don't take credit for the US eradicating smallpox. Yes, you contributed, but so did many other countries around the world across centuries, beginning with the famous Englishman Edward Jenner who is considered the father of immunology to the great Australian Microbiologist Frank Fenner who implemented the vaccinations, tracked, and confirmed the eradication of the disease whilst working for WHO. That's the World Health Organization, not the US Goverment. I agree with quite a bit of what you have mentioned above, but it also show's again the Self inflated and Arrogant view most Americans hold of themselves. Plainly put, 99%of what you have mentioned you take credit for, and soley by, the US. Utter nonsense. Countries like Australia, England, Canada, etc have been there and stood shoulder to shoulder with the US in many way's, from World War, to Nato, to feeding the starving. Would you also believe that without the sattelite dish in Parkes Australia there would of been no moon landing on that day, nor many other missions to the moon. Next you will say you invented the Black Box....( Australian David Warren by the way). There is no doubt America is a great country, but it's perception of itself and the role of the rest of the world is distorted to the point where all you seem to know is "me me me". Here's an easy way to help change the world's thought's on you, give credit where credit is due
Ps, WW2 started because Hitler invaded, and England and the Commonwealth had no choice in the end but to stop him so therefore declared war. Hitler didn't give a rat's ass whether he had an agreement with Stalin or not, it was going to happen anyway. This was 2 years before the US joined in response to Pearl Harbour, so don't be so naive' and arrogant enough to think you entered and finished the war by yourself. It was a combined effort from many countries