Fiscal Cliff Talks Will Likely Target Medicare, Social Security, Programs For The Poor
Monday, November 12, 2012
Card-carrying member of the ACLU, yes.
Who are you a sock-puppet of?
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Fiscal Cliff Talks Will Likely Target Medicare, Social Security, Programs For The Poor
What a silly and uninformed comment.
To begin with, economics has nothing to do with style of governance (a Constitutional democracy).
But more importantly, what we're talking about has nothing to do with changing the style of America's democracy, i.e., capitalism. In fact, we do not have what Fox ranters believe we have in operation. In capitalism, free markets aren't propped up with taxpayer dollars. Corporations don't receive welfare.
FWIW, I'm a proponent of a mixed economy, regulated Capitalism. I'm probably more committed to the Constitution than you, going so far as to condemn Obama along with Bush for Constitutional offenses.
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Fiscal Cliff Talks Will Likely Target Medicare, Social Security, Programs For The Poor
Lie number 3) U.S. corporations are over-taxed.
Example: Republican presidential candidate Tim Pawlenty
We have the highest corporate tax rate, or one of them, in the OECD nations.Actually, as measured in terms of share of GDP, the U.S. has the lowest corporate tax burden of any OECD nation. While the official tax bracket may seems high -- 35 percent -- if one takes into account various loopholes and tax dodges, the effective tax rate is considerably lower, or around 27 percent, which comes in as slightly higher than average for OECD members. And according to ace tax report David Cay Johnston, the bigger you are, the less you pay -- the effective tax rate for the biggest U.S. corporations is only about 15 percent.
There you have it, for future handy reference. Poor people do pay taxes, the biggest corporations don't pay enough, and the United States, as a whole, has a low tax burden overall.
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Fiscal Cliff Talks Will Likely Target Medicare, Social Security, Programs For The Poor
Lie number 2) The U.S. suffers from high taxes.
Example: The Wall Street Journal's Stephen Moore:
What all this means is that in the late 1980s, the U.S. was nearly the lowest taxed nation in the world, and a quarter century later we're nearly the highest.Totally untrue. As measured in terms of total tax revenue as a share of overall GDP the average tax burden for countries that are members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in 2008 was 44.8 percent. The U.S. -- 26.1 percent. The U.S. pays less taxes, as a share of GDP, than Denmark, Sweden, Italy, Austria, France, Netherlands, Germany, United Kingdom, Canada, Spain, Switzerland and Japan.
Furthermore, as Bruce Bartlett explains in detail in The New York Times the current U.S. federal tax burden, measured, again, as a share of GDP, is only 14.8 percent -- a 60-year low.
KEEP READING
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Fiscal Cliff Talks Will Likely Target Medicare, Social Security, Programs For The Poor
The Top 3 Lies About Taxes:
Lie Number 1) Poor people don't pay taxes.
Example: From The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities:
At a hearing last month, SenatorCharlesGrassley said, "According to the JointCommittee on Taxation, 49 percent of households are paying 100 percent of taxes coming in to the federal government." At the same hearing, CatoInstitute Senior Fellow AlanReynolds asserted, "Poor people don't pay taxes in this country." Last April, referring to a TaxPolicyCenter estimate of households with no federal income tax liability in 2009, Fox Business host Stuart Varney said on Fox and Friends, "Yes, 47 percent of households pay not a single dime in taxes."The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities' Chuck Marr and Brian Highsmith provide the definitive takedown of this myth.
In 2009, Congress' Joint Committee on Taxation found that 51 percent of households owed no federal income tax. According to Marr and Highsmith, that figure was inflated by special recession-related factors -- In a more typical year, "35 to 40 percent of households pay no federal income tax."
But that doesn't mean that these households pay no federal taxes at all. Far from it: Nearly all working Americans pay payroll taxes to fund Medicare and SocialSecurity. In 2007, the poorest Americans -- taxpayers in the bottom fifth of income -- paid 8.8 percent of their income as payroll taxes. The next fifth paid almost ten percent. The top 20 percent of earners paid only 5.7 percent.
And of course, these numbers don't include state and local taxes or excise fees like gas taxes, which tend to have a regressive impact that hits poorer Americans harder. Bottom line: only 14 percent of Americans don't pay either federal income taxes or payroll taxes -- and that group is made up primarily of "low-income people who are elderly, unable to work due to a serious disability, or students."
The rich have gotten rich off of the sweat and labor of others and then have taken those profits to buy politicians who've gamed the system so that they wouldn't have to pay taxes through all manner of tax schemes not available to the poor and middle classes. The rich also 'closed the door' on the ways that initially enabled them to amass their 'seed money' for creating their businesses.
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Fiscal Cliff Talks Will Likely Target Medicare, Social Security, Programs For The Poor
Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.
We've been through this before and went on to enjoy a vibrant economy and the greatest middle class in the history of the world.
FDR. The Great Depression.
There is a blue print, and it begins with a massive stimulus (not the picayune one that Obama, the Reagan wannabe, asked for). A massive stimulus, funneled into infrastructure projects, green and sustainable energy, social programs, Medicare For All, technology, etc., is the solution to our economic and environmental problems.
That's what we thought we were voting for and who we thought we were putting into power in 2008 when 10 million more Americans put Obama and Democrats into power. Now we get to see if Obama has the stuff to grow into that great leader. So far, he's off to a terrible start.
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Fiscal Cliff Talks Will Likely Target Medicare, Social Security, Programs For The Poor
Have you been paying any attention at all to the discussions taking place over "trickle down" and how it doesn't work?
About how corporations and the rich have gotten tax breaks for the past several decades, and specifically Bush's tax cuts, and they don't create jobs, and don't cause corporations to hire? How the corporate mentality (and Romney is a prime example of how CEOs operate) after acquiring businesses is to lay off employees, break the companies up and sell them off for parts?
What creates businesses and wealth is DEMAND. When money is in the hands of people who spend it. The rich tend not to spend. They have what they need and want. The poor and middle class are the job creators. They purchase goods, and that is what creates jobs and businesses.
This isn't a difficult concept to understand. What's blocking you from getting it?
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Fiscal Cliff Talks Will Likely Target Medicare, Social Security, Programs For The Poor
You're a little confused. We've had tax breaks for the rich and corporations for 3 decades and it's caused America's decline and the elimination of the middle class.
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Fiscal Cliff Talks Will Likely Target Medicare, Social Security, Programs For The Poor
Canada is north, and Canada is no Russia.
When deposits at banks are guaranteed by the US government, i.e., the US taxpayer, they don't merit being regarded as private:
Bailout Recipients:
We're tracking where taxpayer money has gone in the ongoing bailout of the financial system. Our database accounts for both the broader $700 billion bill and the separate bailout of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
For each entity, we provide a “Net Outstanding” amount, which shows how deep taxpayers are in the hole after accounting for any revenue the government has received (usually through interest or dividends).
Companies that failed to repay the government and resulted in a loss are shaded red. You can see a list of those investments here. All other investments either returned a profit to the government or might still be repaid. Recipients of aid through TARP’s housing programs (such as mortgage servicers and state housing orgs) received subsidies that were never intended to be repaid, so we don’t mark those as losses..
Note: Subsidies are listed separately from the investment programs. So, for instance, Bank of America is listed twice – both as a mortgage servicer and as a bank.
Want just the numbers all in one place? See the detailed view here.
Americans' shared resources (oil, gas, water, minerals, etc.) are being given away to corporations for the profits of a few. There is no earthly reason why any private corporation should be stewards of and profit off of these limited and finite resources instead of the American people. Even Americans' roads and bridges and highways and railways and other modes of transportation (what being free really is all about, the freedom to move about), developed and built with American taxpayers' money and labor past, are being privatized - Only the rich will be able to use them.
Think, by the way, about other countries purchasing whole areas of Americans' roadways, privatizing them and populating those areas with their own nation's citizens. That's already being discussed in some corners. Do you want the Koch brothers owning them?
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Democratic Super PACs Trim Conservative Advantage In Congressional Races
After 2008, Obama and Democrats refused to use the political capital given by them when 10 million more voters went to the polls and voted for them.
In both 2010 and 2012, whether Democrats gained seats or lost control of the Congress, Obama said he was going to do more caving.
What was he hoping to achieve by doing that by announcing that before an election (along with Obama's flip-flopping on just about every pledge and continuing Bush-Cheney policies and putting Republican-like legislation through Congress), if not to discourage and suppress Democratic voter turnout in the midterms?
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Democratic Super PACs Trim Conservative Advantage In Congressional Races
Obama and the DLC worked their butts off to PREVENT more progressives/liberals from getting elected. Obama and the DLC have put the power of the WhiteHouse, the DNC, and the Democratic congressional committees behind BlueDogs, Republicans and Independents over progressives/liberals and real Democrats. Some, but not all, examples:
BlueDog BlancheLincoln over progressive Democrat Lt. Governor BillHalter.
Republican-turned-Independent ArlenSpecter over progressive Democrat JoeSestak.
Republican-turned-Independent LincolnChaffee over Democrat FrankCaprio (which, in turn, was an effective endorsement of the Republican JohnLoughlin over Democrat DavidCicilline for the congressional seat Democrat PatrickKennedy retired from, and all of the other seats up for grab in RhodeIsland).
Republican-turned-Independent CharlieCrist over liberal Democrat KendrickMeek.
Obama supports voting third parties, even when it risks Democratic turnout.
Republicans, with the smallest minority, have managed to thwart Democrats, who've had the greatest majority in decades. You would think that with Republicans controlling the House, Democrats would've turned the tables and thwarted Republicans' continuing legislation like Bush's tax cuts for the rich? Are Democrats just stupld?
Obama never pressured BenNelson (or BlancheLincoln, or any BlueDog). The Democratic leadership could've taken away committee chairs (BlancheLincoln's, too) of members in their caucus that filibustered a PublicOption for healthcare. They didn't.
The DNC could've taken away reelection funds. They didn't.
Reid could've actually forced Republicans and turncoat Democratic senators to filibuster. He didn't (and doesn't).
The ProgressiveCaucus could have kept their pledge about not voting for a bill that didn't include a robust PublicOption. They didn't.
Obama DID unleash the attack dogs to go after HowardDean when Dean said ACA was a lousy bill. Dean was then forced to get back into line. Obama went after Kucinich, the last remaining holdout on the ProgressiveCaucus, for threatening to vote no on the healthcare bill, and we all know how that ended.
KEEP READING
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Democratic Super PACs Trim Conservative Advantage In Congressional Races
After the midterms, Obama assessed that the message of the election was that voters liked his efforts at bipartisanship, and wanted him to move even farther to the right (which he did):
Obama Urges Bipartisanship, Not Gridlock
Obama vows to ‘redouble’ efforts toward bipartisanship
Then there was Obama's signaling that he would extend the Bush tax cuts for the rich before the midterms, which he did after the midterms.
Do you know what Obama said he'd do if re-elected to a second term?:
Explaining this spring how he would manage to enact his agenda in a second term, Obama was still looking forward to sitting down and cutting deals. This time, he said, Republicans would be nicer because he’s not running for re-election.Obama's either corrupt or he's the very definition of 'insanity', "doing the same thing over and over again hoping for a different outcome". Or his supporters are.
Whether it's Obama Watering Down Regulations More Than Bush, Study Shows, or making Americans more enemies by stepping up drone attacks on sovereign nations, or instituting Simpson-Bowles as he's expected to do, or pushing the job-outsourcing Trans-Pacific free trade treaty through like he did with the S. Korea and Colombia and Panama treaties, how is any of that good for us or any different than what Romney would have done?
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Democratic Super PACs Trim Conservative Advantage In Congressional Races
Before the 2010 midterms, Obama broadcast that he would be doing more of the same, more caving,, to Republicans, more Republican-like legislation, even if Democrats remained the majority and in control of both Houses of Congress:
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Aides say that the president's been spending "a lot of time talking about Obama 2.0," brainstorming with administration officials about the best way to revamp the strategies & goals of the White House.
And despite the predictions that Democrats may relinquish a large degree of legislating power, including perhaps control of the House & even Senate, Obama isn't thinking of the next two years as a period that'll be marked with the same obstructive nature from the GOP.
"It may be that regardless of what happens after this election, [Republicans] feel more responsible, either because they didn't do as well as they anticipated, & so the strategy of just saying no to everything & sitting on the sidelines & throwing bombs didn't work for them," Obama says. "Or they did reasonably well, in which case the American people are going to be looking to them to offer serious proposals & work with me in a serious way."
DickDurbin says Obama's post-election agenda "will have to be limited & focused on the things that are achievable and high priorities for the American people." TomDaschle says Obama has to reach out more: "The keyword is inclusion. He's got to find ways to be inclusive."
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Democratic Super PACs Trim Conservative Advantage In Congressional Races
I wrote this two years ago and was told by Obama's 'most ardent supporters' that I was mistaken:
The TeaParty is an effective nemesis for Obama and helps him and the DLC deliver to their (and Republicans') CorporateMasters. The TeaParty is a paper tiger, a scapegoat, and not the real problem. This is all Kabuki theater, to push us into accepting being robbed blind while politicians in both parties jockey for positions of favor and power within the corporatocracy.
If Obama and DLC-Democrats had believed the TeaParty a threat, had they wanted to put the TeaParty down, the time to do it was during the healthcare debate when the TeaParty was coming to prominence. When Democratic members of Congress were cancelling TownHalls because of the threats by gun-toting teabaggers, disrupting Americans' long-honored traditions of peaceful debate in the public square. Instead of taking to the bully pulpit, instead of increasing security on government properties hosting these events, Obama disappeared from the healthcare debate to cut secret deals with BigInsurance, PhRma, hospitals, the AMA, etc., and then he lied about it, all the while that the TeaParty grew and bullied at TownHalls.
What Obama also did during the same TownHall time period? He unleashed federal security forces to Pittsburgh to break up peaceful protests of the G20 meeting, using the new weaponry on dissenters who the 'establishment elites' really fear, and stem the unrest that actually threatens the 'elites', i.e., the American people taking back their government. -http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/blog/2009/sep/25/sonic-cannon-g20-pittsburgh
Obama has no problem quelling dissent or inspiring our better angels when he wants or needs to.
Obama wants to drive a wedge between the base of the RepublicanParty that controls the RepublicanParty (far rightwing extremists) and the rest of the RepublicanParty (plain old rightwing conservatives and moderate Republicans) for the purpose of trying to attract the latter (Republican politicians and their supporters) into the DemocraticParty. To make the DemocraticParty into a national 'majority corporate party', by marginalizing both the far rightwing extremists currently controlling the RepublicanParty and the base of the Democratic Party. In order "to govern, from the center, for 100 years".
The TeaParty serves this end it several ways. Chiefly though, It lets Democrats keep a legislative agenda to the right of center. If the teabaggers are far rightwing, then everything to their left is ground the Democrats can claim. And that's a lot of corporate-money ground.
Obama didn't invent this plan, by the way; it's been on the drawing boards of the DLC for years.
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