I've seen strong feeling (but relatively civil discussion) about topics like handling North Korea or immigration. Things like taxes tend to be far more civil as GP pointed out.

There was absolutely no need to call GP a bigot.

Go look at political conversation in the UK and you'll find large numbers of left wingers / liberals foaming at the mouth about how the government trying to balance its budget is the same thing as hating people, killing them, that austerity is unthinkable evil, that any solution which isn't vast taxes on the rich is evidence of a defective moral compass, etc.

I see you've listened closely to them and engaged with their arguments.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2013/may/15/recessions-h...

"Recessions can hurt, but austerity kills"

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jun/20/engels...

"The victims of Grenfell Tower didn’t just die. Austerity, outsourcing and deregulation killed them"

https://www.theguardian.com/membership/commentisfree/2017/ap...

"The cause of death that dare not speak its name: austerity"

Politicians that aim for a balanced budget without raising taxes = murderers is an exceptionally common refrain from the extreme end of the British left. It's hard to engage with their arguments because I don't share their basic axioms, namely, that they tend to assume there are no tradeoffs in life, and in particular, they tend to assume that tax revenues can be set to more or less any level without any negative side effects.

Of course, if you argued that the Guardian is no longer really representative of mainstream left-wing opinion in the UK I'd support you on that, but I pointed out the extremism of the Guardian on HN a week or so ago and got downvoted a lot ... lots of Guardian readers here I think!

My original assertion was that there's nothing magic about taxes that makes them unusually civil, it's simply that austerity is not an issue in US politics because the government has never tried to balance its budget. I cited the UK as a counter example.

You suggested I had never engaged with their arguments because I described them as based in hatred.

I proved that my description of these opinions was entirely accurate. You can find endless articles like that in the left wing press, or banners at protests that say exactly the same thing. This resolved the point you raised.

Whether these articles have merit or not is irrelevant to my original point.

"I proved that my description of these opinions was entirely accurate. You can find endless articles like that in the left wing press, or banners at protests that say exactly the same thing. This resolved the point you raised." Sure you did.

You conclusively proved that the mere existence of these arguments is offensive to you because you seem to believe that a policy such as austerity (or "tax policy"), which directly cuts the benefits that portions of the population rely on to survive, apparently has no effects and is a mere mathematical debate.

You also consistently proved that you see yourself as eminently rational and arrogantly above engaging with the arguments which are made against your world view. Given this, I'd say that your statement "Whether these articles have merit or not is irrelevant to my original point." is incorrect.

No. I realise it may seem this way to someone in the part of the political spectrum you inhabit, where offence is so central to so much, but I never argued or even implied that these views are offensive to me. I do say they're extreme, but extreme views are not inherently offensive. You've picked a fight with a straw man there.

And I'm afraid arguments about austerity are about tax levels. The alternative is tax is borrowing, which is no alternative at all, as eventually that money must be paid back via even higher taxes (to pay the borrowed amount + the interest). You can also do money printing, but that's simply a tax on cash savings by another name.

All arguments about austerity are ultimately arguments about tax incidence.

You also consistently proved that you see yourself as eminently rational

I didn't discuss my own rationality either. Again, you're setting up a straw man and then attacking it. I said I don't share the same axioms as these people without commenting on the rationality of that position (it's possible for two people to disagree on basic axioms without either being irrational).

You keep trying to drag me into an argument about austerity. I have no interest in such an argument. It's much more relevant that Americans realise that the list of 'dangerous topics' that can get people branded evil/kiddie killer/etc is not restricted to race, sex or religion. Tax policy can certainly be included if the Republicans ever actually reach the point of trying to cut government spending.

That's certainly rarely the case, and next to never the intention.

All i say, and ask is that you think to yourself, is this really racist? or do i just want to vote democrat now?

Where on Earth did you read that into his post? He said those are the kinds of opinions that tend to elicit those responses, not anything about the OP.