Virginia May Help People Pay For Space Burials 145
PolygamousRanchKid writes "Want to be buried in space? Virginia would help pay for it under proposed legislation that aims to boost the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport.
The bill, which the General Assembly will debate next year, would provide a Virginia income tax deduction up to $2,500 a year for such burials. Proponents hope the measure will provide revenue for the spaceport, which is expanding because NASA decided to cancel the space shuttle program. The facility, which describes itself as a 'full-service, FAA-licensed spaceport,' is located at Wallops Island on Virginia's coast."
This is a terrible idea (Score:5, Funny)
If they are in space then they will become space ghosts because GOD can't get to them there, like it says in the BIBLE GOD does not exist outside of the Ionosphere that is the line of the Italians who will drink all our water from space with dead people. Besides, they smell and PASTA need I SAY MORE!!!!
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We lost our pork (Score:1)
now we need to survive on bullshit! what a waste of government time instead of finding a real solution
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It's yet another sham in a long list of shameful activities where the people's money is squandered to prop up the corporations that seek to oppress us.
They aren't spending any of "the people's" money - they're letting people keep some of their OWN money IF they spend it on a space funeral instead of an impermeable crypt buried in the ground. No different than deductions for "green" energy, hybrid cars, having children, etc. Not sure how a company that launches ashes into space is "oppressing" anyone.
Anything that keeps more money in private hands and out of bureaucrats' control is a good thing, IMHO. Less money for those that not only seek to oppress u
Re:Corporate Welfare (Score:2)
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You are defending social parasites. When people or corporations use publicly funded resources and don't pay a fair share, they are freeloaders. It is a form of stealing. It is no different then putting enough money in a newspaper vending machine to open it and then taking multiple copies, or going into a field and stealing produce. Your are getting something for nothing and the burden falls on those who do pay what they owe.
Note that I didn't "defend" anything, other than reducing taxes in general. And what you have said you can also say about food stamp recipients, people who qualify for AFDC, and home owners that take a mortgage interest deduction. In fact there are thousands and thousands of state and federal tax deductions for all kinds of activities. I'm assuming you put Michael Moore in the same category, for taking a refundable tax credit from Michigan for filming there?
I agree with you though that people like Al Gor
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That sounds nice and conservative, but while we all personally hate taxes, this it just government picking winners and losers and thereby encouraging certain behavior. Deductions for "green energy" and "space burial" are both overreaches of government.
Yea, I have to agree with that. I had a bit of a knee-jerk reaction to the claim that somehow this was supporting an "oppressive corporation". But you're right that this just amounts to more government intervention in what should be a free market.
If they're going to be coming up with new deductions and credits, I'd much prefer they get behind something like the Universal tuition tax credit [virginiainstitute.org] than this "space burial" idea.
Idiotic plan (Score:3, Insightful)
They want to encourage development of the space port. That's a reasonable goal I guess.
Doing so by subsidising what is surely the most pointless reason to launch something into space and also the most wasteful way to dispose of a human body is just stupid.
Re:Idiotic plan (Score:5, Funny)
the most wasteful way to dispose of a human body.
Pfft. Hardly. When it's time for me to kick the bucket I plan on piloting the Burj Khalifa directly into the Louvre.
I'm still working out the details.
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When it's time for me to kick the bucket I plan on piloting the Burj Khalifa directly into the Louvre.
You are Randall Munroe and I claim my $64,000.
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"Need" is inherently subjective. I see no real distinction between arguing that people who "NEED" the plethora of government services currently provided, and arguing that dead people "NEED" to be launched into orbit. For example, doling out cheap health insurance doesn't make me safer or healthier. To the contrary, it takes money away from things
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"Need" is inherently subjective.
Not to somebody who can't afford health insurance and who is dying of cancer or some preventable illness.
But my argument was really more about hypocrisy than about health care or the concept of "NEED" [alternet.org].
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But my argument was really more about hypocrisy than about health care or the concept of "NEED".
Of course, it was. I should have known the thread wouldn't stay on topic. I personally am deeply offended by hypocrisy... in others. Ba DUM tish!
I can't help but notice the claimed "pushback" in the article against Ron Paul didn't really happen.
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I find it sad that you don't consider healthcare to be a need. Personally I find it liberating to know that if I get sick or have an accident (neither of which by definition I have anyway of predicting) I won't have to sell my house in order to pay my medical bills. You want freedom? It's right there.
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Except that Health Insurance is out of the price range of so many Americans - around 16% [wikipedia.org]. That's 45 million people who have no coverage.
As for who provides it - government, or a private company they both have their faults. I'd rather it *were* provided by government, not some money grabbing corporation whose *only* concern is making money from my misfortune. They are a company after all and there to make a profit, not serve the needs of their clients. Sure they serve the needs of some of their clients, or t
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Except that Health Insurance is out of the price range of so many Americans - around 16%. That's 45 million people who have no coverage.
As I suspected, that number includes people who merely choose not to have health insurance. That's not the same thing as being unable to afford health insurance. Also, that number includes people with serious and often chronic medical problems. Those people should get health care not health insurance.
Please explain to me why healthcare costs twice what it does elsewhere in the first world
Because there's a vast often artificially created demand for artificially constrained health care services. That's not going away until we constrain demand (including by making people pay a significant part of
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It's the main reason why America's healthcare system is more expensive than elsewhere and in such a shocking state.
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In the midst of MASSIVE deficits, a health care crisis and a looming depression; the absurdist tradition of spending money on frivolous economic plans (like sending dead people into space) while keeping health care and other "socialist" spending away from the people that actually NEED it is, of course, the ideal of the post-modern Conservative movement.
By all means, let's enslave all the people with jobs and property, take all their money, and distribute all public and private resources based on solely on need, while working the most able and productive as much as they can stand. I'm sure that will last a few years before there's nothing left for anyone. Why wouldn't everybody want to spend 80 hours a week working their ass off for other people's "need"? I'm sure no one would make any sort of need-based claim that's not legit, would they? Makes perfec
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The next time you want to have a tantrum because you are afraid that someone will take away you favorite toy, do the rest of us a big f
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You realize that no one is really suggesting anything like this at all
You are a fool if you really think that's true.
And, as I pointed out, the idea that government should be able to confiscate more wealth because there are people in need is how they get people to go along with the plans for the NWO [endoftheam...ndream.com].
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I am glad that you are against paying police officers (who often make 80 to 90 K a year in big cities), whose soul purpose is to use tax payer money to finance their lifestyles, while they get paid primarily to put poor people in jail; including black people, drug users, people who protest against corruption and immorality, etc. Pretty much the same with the military; the true crime here and the REAL socialism is that billions of dollars are spent each year to fund the military and their adventures in oil producing countries. I bet you are too ignorant to know that the conservatives in the United States originally backed the Tali-ban in Afghanistan because they thought their religious repression would make for a stable oil producing country for American oil companies. I'm glad to see you are against the Conservative values of greed and corruption, and against forcing peace loving people to pay taxes to the military and the police.
I can't really disagree with your sentiments, there. I thought you were being facetious about the police there at first, but I understand where you're coming from. I do see a need for police, though, and the need to make sure they're compensated for their risky legitimate protection of the citizens. Of course, police are funded and supported locally, as they should be, not militarized and controlled by the remote and unresponsive Federal regime in Washington - the sources of the issues you raised.
I am also glad to hear that you are against corporations enslaving poor people with low wages while the managers and their owners use their financial influence to ensure that worker protections, banking protections, etc are not enacted to help protect the vulnerable from the corrupt people who enclosed public land for their own personal business enterprises, and who enthusiastically pollute the public air and land and force innocent children to breathe in filthy smog that enriches the (leadership) of the Right Wing. When you say you are against slavery, I am glad to here this. Because a person who is against being enslaved is naturally against corporatism, greed, and religion.
Whoa, w
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It must be interesting to live in your world. Here you have encountered a person that respects the power of the individual human, and all you see is pure evil. Am I on your list of persons that must die, as the New World Order is created?
You do not know me, but you already hate me. I do fear "loosing" [SIC] my job, getting sick, or anything of the kind. I live paycheck to paycheck these days, already lost my house and renting a much smaller space. I work as many hours as I can when I can get the work.
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Come to think of it, maybe I would be better off in Europe, too, where at least the only drug available to treat my wife's rare terminal pulmonary disease has been approved for distribution. Why the FDA would reject approval is beyond me - it's only going to cost lives. But then that's probably good for them, less people demanding medicare and medicaid to pay for that drug, and less alive to collect SS in the future.
Interesting and all, but (Score:3, Interesting)
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Texas lets you do that (Score:3)
Also, if you don't want to DIY (Score:4, Informative)
Are you sure you've researched this? You seem to have missed a lot.
Re:Interesting and all, but (Score:4, Informative)
There's apparently an organization in Colorado that's gotten permits [kindredcommunity.com] to perform open-air cremations on a funeral pyre.
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The solution is to label yourself a magician, then have the stunt go "horribly wrong."
A more accurate title might be... (Score:2)
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It's been proven by mid-level bureaucrats that spending money on expensive vanity projects generates wealth and jobs!
Heck, at the end of my block the city used federal stimulus money to build a dog park. It created a fourth of a dozen part-time jobs (running the toll-booth thing) paid for by money the city doesn't have. A win all around!
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It's been proven by mid-level bureaucrats that spending money on expensive vanity projects generates wealth and jobs!
Heck, at the end of my block the city used federal stimulus money to build a dog park. It created a fourth of a dozen part-time jobs (running the toll-booth thing) paid for by money the city doesn't have. A win all around!
Could be worse, they could have only hired a sixth of a dozen, or even a twelfth of a dozen.
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I didn't get that. The state isn't paying for the stupid project, are they? They're just letting people pay for the stupid project and not be taxed for it.
Your language suggests that they're taking the money from the government - as if it were the government's money to begin with, and what right has this jerk to waste it how he sees fit? That worries me. And I don't think one needs to be a libertarian nutcase extremist to find fault with that reasoning, either.
2500$ deduction in taxes if you spend it on the space port?
how is that not a 2500$ deduction in taxes?
if it wasn't governments money to begin with, how could you deduct from it. eh.
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If it was government's money "to begin with", why do they have to take it from my paycheck?
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Because otherwise you would refuse to pay for society.
It does cost money you know.
Society is NOT government.
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No, the rich space-nerds of Virginia will get a $2500 one-time (per corpse) tax break to finally, if post-mortem, achieve a lifelong dream of flying in space. The rest of Virginia doesn't even notice $2500*spaceNerds.count() missing from the general revenues, since spaceNerds.count() is low and $2500 is a small amount of money compared to a state budget. The total per year probably won't even be equal to a single kindergarten special ed teacher assistant's yearly salary. Goddard/Wallops Island Spaceport
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The people of Virginia may be forced to waste their money on a stupid pork project.
You're using it wrong. A tax deduction is not "pork" - that's actual revenue earmarked for supporting only a small constituency. All states provide tax deductions for spending on some business or another that brings jobs and revenues to their state. This one is no different than the Michigan tax deduction that Michael Moore took advantage of for filming one of his movies in the state. Well, actually, it is different, because this is a $2,500 deduction from gross income, whereas what Moore got was a refu
2500 per year? (Score:4, Funny)
Who gets to make the tax deduction? And if it's on the dead guy's estate, why per year? I mean, how many times to they expect a person to die in Virginia, anyhow?
Per year is actually per person (Score:1)
The deduction is not continuous. It applies to the year the person dies and/or the "space burial" is paid.
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Per year? (Score:5, Funny)
"Today, we say farewell to Uncle Bob's left arm. We're all thankful knowing it will be joining his torso and the rest of his limbs in heaven. Amen"
"Psst! Aunt Sally, no more tax breaks, please. We're all sick of driving out here to see yet another funeral/blast off."
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I'd suppose that the taxes would apply to remaining family, not the deceased person.
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The parent is saying that the deceased can be re-used several times if you cut them into small pieces and send them off a piece a year, translating into multiple instances of tax relief for the family.
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Oops, meant to reply to the parent of this post.
That being said, tax relief does not result in net profit, just in lowering the effective costs of something you'd do anyway. So unless there's an added benefit, I would prefer not to cut up family members this way just for tax relief :-)
Planetes (Score:2)
Planetes [wikipedia.org], anyone?
Lets give them more garbage to work on!
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It even had an episode on space burial, though I didn't like much their take on it.
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Yeah, the differences in culture are sometimes very surprising. And she's so pushy, too!
So let me get this straight... (Score:2)
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Believe me, this all makes perfect sense in Virginia. I live here, I should know.
Hopefully they find a use for the spaceport before they decide to use it for deporting illegal immigrants.
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Correction, they're gonna use it for deporting illegal aliens.
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It's not a space launch of eternal rest (Score:2)
Contradiction in terms (Score:1)
To bury someone means to place their dead body underground, in the earth or a tomb. Being launched into space is pretty close to the opposite of burial.
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To bury someone means to place their dead body underground, in the earth or a tomb. Being launched into space is pretty close to the opposite of burial.
So then I guess we should rename "burial at sea" to just plain simple "body dumping". Burial now has the common connotation of any type of interring of a body in any location: sea, land, or space. Could you have been any more pedantic?
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Burial now has the common connotation of any type of interring of a body in any location: sea, land, or space.
Unfortunately for your argument, "interring" means "covering with earth".
Could you have been any more pedantic?
I certainly hope not. What you deride as "pedantic", I consider "accurate".
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To bury someone means to place their dead body underground
...or place their live body under a large volume of paperwork.
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We should come up with a new term maybe. (I like latin: Corpus dispositum)
bad precedent (Score:4, Interesting)
That's like saying it's okay to junk-up our orbit with space debris. "It's just for a little while", yes, then, people will pay more and expect justice from their government when they demand to be put into a stable orbit. "You condoned it for them, so me, too!" Burial in space should necessitate being put on a tracjectory that would actual take you into OUTER space, not in orbit around the Earth.
Okay, I would accept one stipulation: your container has to be highly magnetized. Whilst in orbit with the rest of the junk, you will have to do some sweeping up and junk collection on behalf of a grateful Earth. Then, when you re-enter, you can bring the junk in with you and you can all incinerate together.
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IIRC, most space burials are sub-orbital - they re-enter and burn up after 90 days or so, becoming a pollution non-hazard.
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Which makes it even more pointless... cou could just drop the ashes out of a plane. Same result.
Hey! (Score:1)
Heaven's Gate Cult (Score:2)
Subsiding what? (Score:5, Insightful)
Support for a budding enterprise might be worthwhile, but what socio-economic benefit is there from disbursing cremated ash in space? If I was a VA taxpayer I'd be wondering what I'm paying for.
Presumably the spaceport is primarily for putting up satellites, which can be useful infrastructure.
Why subsidise a frivolous use of rocket fuel instead of satellites?
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Support for a budding enterprise might be worthwhile, but what socio-economic benefit is there from disbursing cremated ash in space? If I was a VA taxpayer I'd be wondering what I'm paying for.
Presumably the spaceport is primarily for putting up satellites, which can be useful infrastructure.
Why subsidise a frivolous use of rocket fuel instead of satellites?
The private space industry (that is, private rockets and launches) is in a very early seed stage. To make it grow, you have to be able to support whatever market exists for the technology now, so that the industry can grow into supporting really interesting and much more important functions.
Think of it like the very early Internet. When the government funding was virtually gone, and it was handed over to private investment, where did most of the funding for new technologies come from? That's right: Porn
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How about if someone wants something, they pay for it? I know it is a crazy, radical, outlandish, insane idea but we may want to give it a go. If you want to donate your money to the infant staged private space industry then more power to you. Why do you have to put a gun to my head and force me to give to it?
Agreed, it's the way it should be. But then someone comes along and wants to build a public library and thinks it's okay to put a gun to my head for that. And it's not just a tax deduction for the people building it - they want to do it all with confiscated money.
Keep these C molecules on Earth please (Score:2)
We need them for new life...
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Just don't take my title! (Score:2)
I hope to be the first American to die in space. That would be enough to be notable for Wikipedia I think.
I have been and always shall be.. (Score:1)
Perhaps they shoud subsidise retarded summaries? (Score:3)
I can just about comprehend dead people paying taxes. But the thought of them coming back to life and, umm, redying on an annual basis has got me confused and a little disturbed.
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But the thought of them coming back to life and, umm, redying on an annual basis has got me confused and a little disturbed.
Dead folks vote in elections in every state of the Union. In each election, they tend to vote early, and vote often. Dead folks also cash their social security checks.
They are a very influential part of the electorate, so I'd be mindful of talking kindly about them . . . them being dead, and all.
I don't know ... (Score:2)
The Good, The Bad, The Awesome (Score:1)
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Excellent idea, pull a random percentage out of your ass, without even stopping to consider the most fundamental issues, like:
How much tax is being collected right now
How much tax would be collected under your scheme
How much tax is needed to cover what the government spends
Looking at Wikipedia, the lowest tax bracket in the US is 10%. Highest is 35%. So if you put that in practice you've just cut tax revenue by a huge amount.
I've not done the calculations, but I'd be surprised if you could pay for the milit
Red state shenanigans (Score:3)
So, this is how a former blue state, now red, looks at fiscal responsibility?
Bio-mass (Score:1)
Helping? (Score:1)
Really? (Score:1)
Anyone else? (Score:2)
I misread the headline as:
Viagra May Help People Pay For Space Burials
Pork (Score:2)
Pork pork porketty pork pork.
Re:No please. (Score:4, Informative)
Perhaps if you'd taken the time to RTFA before rushing to get first post, you'd have realized they're cremated first.
Re:No please. (Score:5, Funny)
Screw that. I want my meat-sack like body launched whole into space when I'm dead!
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Re:No please. (Score:5, Interesting)
I want to be cremated by the very atmosphere that sustained me!
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Two of my grandparents are buried like that. Cremated first, then buried.
Not sure why. I guess it's not as creepy as keeping the ash in an urn over the fireplace, and not as trite as scattering them somewhere.
Personally, I'll take whatever option is cheapest.
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And how exactly does this make them not space junk?
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Great, lets release hundreds of thousands of bits of dust and small particles into space.
At nearly 30,000kph its still more than enough to ruin space craft.
Re:No please. (Score:4, Informative)
Re:No please. (Score:4, Informative)
Even fine cremation ashes at orbital velocity can damage satellites.