No Pennies For Elderly & Disabled But Tax Breaks For The Rich?

[The Madcap]

I answered your question 50 times. Bring taxes down on 99% of us, not on 1% of us. This was Obama's original plan, Republicans blocked it.

Still waiting to for you to answer my question.. how does trickle down work? Or at least point to a single instance in history were it hasn't completely failed.....

I'm sorry, I don't recall Obama supporting any measure that would have significantly reduced taxes on the middle class. I remember him offering to extend the tax levels Bush created for middle class incomes, but I don't recall any piece of legislation that would have cut taxes for the middle class. Deciding not to allow raising taxes on the middle class isn't the same thing as cutting them.

So again I ask the question: how does raising taxes on the rich help me?

As for trickle down economics: no, such a theory doesn't work if the middle class is still forced to fork over 40-50% of their income to the government. At that point it makes no real difference because no matter how many jobs are created, the people with those new jobs aren't saving any more money or becoming any more financially stable. And yes keeping tax levels for people making around $100-200K roughly the same for people making $1-2 million doesn't really help anybody. That's why people like me would like to see everybody's taxes come down about 20-30 percentage points. It's not simply a matter or rich people being taxed more than the rest. If we taxed people making $1 million plus 70%, and kept the current tax levels on the middle class, that wouldn't help either. It's about giving middle class Americans the ability to maintain their own personal holdings and see them grow. And they aren't doing that until taxes are lowered. And not 2-3% points, but 15-20%.

Not to get redundant, but, how does raising taxes on the rich help me if my tax levels basically stay the same? What's the point?

[The Madcap]

I was born and raised in California you clown...you couldnt last a day out here

keep crying about your 250k a year...its hilarious to watch someone post who is clueless to the world

Sorry, I was told you weren't an American.

I don't make 250K a year. I've never made more than $130,000 a year. Currently I'm making do with about $30,000 a year.

I lived in Santa Clara for a while. But you're right. I did have to move home. Not because I couldn't last a day out there, but because I didn't want to.

[BeatingBaseball]

I think their only answer to your question, Madcap, is one they don't want to admit:

Raising taxes on the rich assuages their envy. Seeing the rich get punished takes the edge off it a bit.

[Grandmaster B]

It's about the middle class handing over wads of class to the super rich. The republicans give tax breaks to the rich which provide zero economic growth, and that in turn shifts the remaining tax burden onto the middle class.

Your argument is pathetic, typical Glenn Beck lunacy. Get a job. Stop wasting you life sitting in front of the television watching Fox.

can you say owned?

[BeatingBaseball]

That's pretty weak cheese, GrandB. Almost as feeble as the racist crap.

You just can't get away from the fact that on the issues and on the logical arguments - you guys get your ass kicked as usual.

[The Madcap]

I think their only answer to your question, Madcap, is one they don't want to admit:

Raising taxes on the rich assuages their envy. Seeing the rich get punished takes the edge off it a bit.

Yeah, I know. They've done a study on that sort of thing, they failed pretty bad. It's just, I don't know, there's a part of me that keeps hoping there's something more to it than that. Because it's so easy to live one's life and believe what they believe. I mean, it's a world absolved of personal responsibility. Don't you ever wish you lived in a world like that sometimes? Where you could just sit around on your duff and whenever you didn't get something you thought you deserved you could just blame somebody else for it? How much easier would life be if I always had an excuse for everything that those around me accepted? It's like a license for indolence.

And yeah, I know, it's a cheap cologne, but still, sometimes you just have those days when you're busting your ass and wondering for what good, because you think you've reached your limit and you just want to quit, and man living with that mindset would let you. And if everyone else thought that way, then no one would look down on you and call you a wuss, or lazy, or a quitter. You could still be seen as man. Chicks would still want to have sex with you. Because all your cop-out whining would be cool. Your problems wouldn't be an issue. Because we'd all know our problems are someone else's fault. It'd be great. You know, except for that part when society falls apart.

[BeatingBaseball]

And the people for whom that whole dynamic works best is Democratic politicians like the Kennedys, Edwards, Kerry, and Obama types who cash in by being enablers - pretending they give a shit about them - after first persuading them they are not losers, but victims. It's a great gig all the way around.

[lyon804]

can you say owned?

How was he owned? Do you have any formal education? Which is higher your age or your IQ? Do you have the basic comprehension of economics at all? Have you read any of madcap's or BB's post? I am beginning to believe you are not that stupid but are paid to be a troll. You evidently have no job profession because you post here 24/7. People like you continue to argue valid,logical points just for the sake of arguing and for who,what?

[rkelly110]

Quote:BeatingBaseball
Do you believe that it's a good idea that people who pay no taxes get to vote for public officials who will determine tax policy when those people have absolutely no skin in the game whatsoever?


I have to say this has to be one of the dumbest quotes I've seen in a while. Yeah, take us
back to the pre-women vote days. If they are getting screwed by their govt, why don't
they have a right to vote? If only the tax payers voted, they would vote for the people
who would cut their taxes and after awhile, they wouldn't be paying taxes at all and then they
would lose their right to vote. Stupid.

Why do those 47% not pay taxes? Probably because they are at or below poverty level.
It's only getting worse not better.

I agree with most of you, the govt needs to pay more attention to their (our) money.

Lower taxes didn't get us into this mess. It's the cycle of supply and demand. We had
a surplus and there was no demand. Why keep your work force if there's no demand
for your product? You produce as demand warrants. This economy won't recover if
there is no demand. Lowering taxes ain't gonna do shit.

We had a good showing for products sold over this holiday season, which should
translate into growth for the economy next year. People will get back to work who
pay taxes and all will be good.

[big0mar]

All you nimrods who think that people who have a business make that heavy money without breaking a sweat by just ripping off both their customers and employees should really get together - start one - and see just how easy it is. It would be very educational. Too bad Obama, Biden & co. never tried it. You'd soon understand that in the real world of the free market people don't just hand over wads of money to you. You see, they have a choice. You have to offer them a value proposition - and it better be a good one. It is only to the government that we must fork over money without a value proposition or a choice.

I do own my own business. I started as soon as I got out of college.

I work 15 hours a week now. Show up at my office to give operational management some shit, then go home. Seems to be working pretty well.

I will say this though, starting my own business taught me that 90% of businesses out there are shit and do their best to fleece as many as possible.

[BeatingBaseball]

I do own my own business. I started as soon as I got out of college.

I work 15 hours a week now. Show up at my office to give operational management some shit, then go home. Seems to be working pretty well.

I will say this though, starting my own business taught me that 90% of businesses out there are shit and do their best to fleece as many as possible.

In the real world free market, businesses get nowhere by fleecing customers. Again - in free markets customers have a choice. The only way you can prosper by fleecing your customer is if that customer is government or if you are given a franchise protected by government. If you don't understand this I suspect government is the agent of your business prosperity. Is government your customer, bigO? Or do you have some special affirmative action scam going for yourself? That would explain your being a Democrat.

[teecee]

in response to deuce's nominated post:



why can't some choose not to smoke marijauna, while the rest of us smoke it?

[big0mar]

In the real world free market, businesses get nowhere by fleecing customers. Again - in free markets customers have a choice. The only way you can prosper by fleecing your customer is if that customer is government or if you are given a franchise protected by government. If you don't understand this I suspect government is the agent of your business prosperity. Is government your customer, bigO? Or do you have some special affirmative action scam going for yourself? That would explain your being a Democrat.

No. I own an e-commerce business. Nothing from the government.

[big0mar]

Actually I will say this; I, as most small business owners do, benefit immensely from cheap energy. Gas being $3 a gallon is really what makes most American businesses profitable.

I suppose however, thats just a symptom of the evil military-industrial complex fueled by the Government taking my money

[BeatingBaseball]

No. I own an e-commerce business. Nothing from the government.

Congratulations, my friend. You have my respect on that one.

[itchypickle]

I do own my own business. I started as soon as I got out of college.

I work 15 hours a week now. Show up at my office to give operational management some shit, then go home. Seems to be working pretty well.

I will say this though, starting my own business taught me that 90% of businesses out there are shit and do their best to fleece as many as possible.

Please explain 90% 'fleecing'.....and be sure you mean 'fleecing' and not simply capitalizing on whatever margin you can achieve and stay competitive....seeing as how that IS the reason for 90% of business right?

[big0mar]

Please explain 90% 'fleecing'.....and be sure you mean 'fleecing' and not simply capitalizing on whatever margin you can achieve and stay competitive....seeing as how that IS the reason for 90% of business right?

Don't provide adequate service, despite charging for it?

For example, my company has gone through 5 different security companies for our building. Not one has provided decent service. False alarms almost every week, malfunctioning systems, etc.

Don't even get me started on internet providers for my company.

Or shipping companies we have to deal with. Ever ship anything freight? Ever ship anything freight and had it arrive in tact?

Ever try to call your cable company and get a straight answer?

Sure, I have the option of searching for better options on the free market, but one thing I've learned is that the best option a lot of times isn't a very good one.

[itchypickle]

Don't provide adequate service, despite charging for it?

For example, my company has gone through 5 different security companies for our building. Not one has provided decent service. False alarms almost every week, malfunctioning systems, etc.

Don't even get me started on internet providers for my company.

Or shipping companies we have to deal with. Ever ship anything freight? Ever ship anything freight and had it arrive in tact?

Ever try to call your cable company and get a straight answer?

Sure, I have the option of searching for better options on the free market, but one thing I've learned is that the best option a lot of times isn't a very good one.

Okay, I'm with you on those examples...I thought you meant other e-commerce businesses etc.

[BeatingBaseball]

All those guys dropping the ball just provide an opportunity for smarter, better run operations to come in and take the business. That's how the private sector works - if government would just get out of the way and let someone make a buck for themselves doing it. That's how free markets work - and why more government and high taxes do not.

Obama talks about change - but the greatest agent for change in all of human history has been the free market. Every business is vulnerable to the next great idea every single day.

[freelee]

I'm finally ready to admit Obama is a Jew puppet and a sellout.

Fixed

[itchypickle]

Again with the Jew conspiracy

Would everyone PLEASE stop talking about this...we are almost in full control and don't need to be caught this late in the game!

[BeatingBaseball]

Wrong, free.

The Chocolate Chavez and wife Michelle are no big fans of Israel - or America.

[The Madcap]

Again with the Jew conspiracy

Would everyone PLEASE stop talking about this...we are almost in full control and don't need to be caught this late in the game!

hahhahahah.

[rkelly110]

I'll keep it secret for ya itchy.

[lyon804]

Again with the Jew conspiracy

Would everyone PLEASE stop talking about this...we are almost in full control and don't need to be caught this late in the game!

I love this conspiracy the most about Jews... What I will say about Jewish people I have met in my life is that they are very proud, commited, hard working, dilligent, intelligent. Anything I am missing? I worked for a Jewish owned company that was 3rd generation at one time and understand the mentality that makes so many Jewish people successful.

[itchypickle]

I'll admit, sometimes it even makes ME wonder how we end up in some of the positions we do....but if it all comes true...and I miss out on my cut of the gold from the Fed....I'm gonna raise sheol (that's like a Hebrew word on hell)

[Root4Stlrs]

You guys are missing the point. Turn off Fox news. When you live in a nation where one percent of the population controls half the wealth it might be time to consider that they are the problem. If you don't tax it you're playing with half the fiscal resources of your country, and stealing pennies from the poor to further engorge the rich who will repay your largesse by lobbying congress for even more (because you really never can have enough) and investing it offshore because those people will work dirt cheap and, God knows, nobody - well, 98 percent of them - in the US has money to spend, because the nouveau robber barons have it all. I think that's the real scandal here. The debate isn't between the left and the right, it's between the far right and nearer-to-centre right. True lefties would have the tax rate on the really rich where it needs to be - and where it used to be in Eisenhower's day - north of seventy percent.

It's not very complicated, if you raise taxes on the super rich, it naturally follows that the tax burden on the middle class will decrease. A book on simple US history would do most you good. America works better for multiple reasons when the rich shoulder more of the TAX BURDEN.

[Root4Stlrs]

Yeah, I know. They've done a study on that sort of thing, they failed pretty bad. It's just, I don't know, there's a part of me that keeps hoping there's something more to it than that. Because it's so easy to live one's life and believe what they believe. I mean, it's a world absolved of personal responsibility. Don't you ever wish you lived in a world like that sometimes? Where you could just sit around on your duff and whenever you didn't get something you thought you deserved you could just blame somebody else for it? How much easier would life be if I always had an excuse for everything that those around me accepted? It's like a license for indolence.

And yeah, I know, it's a cheap cologne, but still, sometimes you just have those days when you're busting your ass and wondering for what good, because you think you've reached your limit and you just want to quit, and man living with that mindset would let you. And if everyone else thought that way, then no one would look down on you and call you a wuss, or lazy, or a quitter. You could still be seen as man. Chicks would still want to have sex with you. Because all your cop-out whining would be cool. Your problems wouldn't be an issue. Because we'd all know our problems are someone else's fault. It'd be great. You know, except for that part when society falls apart.

Spoken like a 15 year old spoiled brat who has never worked a day in his life.

[The Madcap]

Spoken like a 15 year old spoiled brat who has never worked a day in his life.

So thinking that people who blame society for their problems are wusses makes me sound like the guy that's never worked a day in his life? That's interesting.

Just out of curiosity, because I've been hearing this tax burden issue a lot lately, but how exactly does raising taxes on the rich ease my burden if I'm still paying the same percentage? If we were going to raise taxes on the wealthiest one percent and lower my taxes significantly, OK, then I get your argument. If middle class people had their taxes reduced to the point they were only handing over a more reasonable 10-15% of their income to the government every year, and the super wealthy (the millionaires) were paying more like 60-65%, then I can see how the burden is actually shifted. Otherwise it just seems like we're screwing them just because the rest of us are getting screwed, and that seems completely counterproductive to me, which is why I wrote that sarcastic response you called me a brat for.

Do you see my point at all?

The fact is I do work hard. And so do all of my friends. None of us are rich. We all came from working class or middle class families, and we're a bit pissed off that even though we worked hard to land good jobs we can't leave our wives at home to raise our kids because taxes are taking 40-50% of our income. So please tell me why I should care about raising taxes on people making more than $250,000 a year if that isn't going to help us? What's the point? Seriously, because I don't get it.

And again, that's why I wrote the "brat" post. And I think it's incredibly ironic that you would call me the brat, when I'm not the one blaming people with more money for the difficulties in my life. So, please, in all seriousness, explain your reasoning more in depthly, because I don't see what it is that drives folks like you, as it comes across as nothing more than a bitter, defeatist, selfish, weak, and envious cynicism. And I'm open to believe it's something less pathetic. I'm open to believing it's a positive, uplifting, rational thing, but I don't see what the real day to day applicable improvement is for me or any other middle class Americans who want to pursue their dreams of greater financial independence and occupational freedom.

[BeatingBaseball]

You have a nice theory there, Root. If the "true leftys" were just allowed to get everything where it "needs to be" everything would be so much better. The only problem I see with it is that in all the places, the cities and states, where the "true leftys" have been most disproportionately in control of things (State of California, City of Detroit) - everything is not better - everything is much worse.

Seriously, how do you explain this? How can you deny that reality and history totally repudiate your theory?

I'm really hoping you have a more thoughtful response than just calling me a stupid and ignorant racist.

[The Madcap]

I will say this though, starting my own business taught me that 90% of businesses out there are shit and do their best to fleece as many as possible.

I have to agree with this comment, to a degree. I wouldn't say 90%, but it does seem like there's a damned lot. I've had some problems with some contractors, supply companies, etc, over the last year. We get these trash bags, they have to be made of the cheapest freakin' plastic in damn world. You stick anything in there more than a couple wads of paper, and the bag rips and spills all over you. The first couple times, maybe it's not a big deal. But when then there's that time the bag rips and someone's old coffe splashes all over you, and at that point you start getting a bit pissed off. So I started looking into it.

What I found was that this shitty trashbag company got most of their revenue from government contracts. (I work for the city). They make a living by undercutting the quality companies because municipal/state/federal governments have to go with the lowest bidder. And so the majority of their contracts come from strained government budgets, and any other incoming clientele they just see as an added bonus.

I found the same thing when I looked into the guys that installed our motion censor showers, our soap dispensors, and our new H/Vac unit.

When I vented some of that frustration to a guy who's been working here for 30 years, know what he told me? "You get what you pay for."

And he basically reaffirmed everything I was figuring out, and that's that there is this whole submarket of crappy businesses that exist solely because they can crank out cheap shit to budget crunched goverment departments. They can't create the quality of the better companies, so they go the other route, make what they can for as cheap as they can, and hope it sticks. Which it usually does, because government departments are entangled in miles of red-tape. Like the trashbags. They suck. They're pissing me off. It'll probably be 8 months before we get to switch brands because these jackmules have a written contract as the department's exclusive supplier. It's bullshit. And this is why the government sucks and we should be pulling our tax dollars out of this failed experiment and running on the bare minimum programs we need instead of continuing to feed our coin in there like a damn video lotto machine.

[BeatingBaseball]

Spoken like a 15 year old spoiled brat who has never worked a day in his life.

That's funny, I thought most 15 yr old spoiled brats who have never worked a day in their life were ideal fodder for bullshit liberal theories. They think they know everything, much like our prez, and they're naive enough and haven't been around long enough to know that these same old socialist ideas have been tried many times thruout history and they never work.

Some day the libs are going to be right about something - but I haven't seen it happen yet. Welfare was supposed to reduce crime. The "Great Society" war on poverty sure has solved that poverty problem for us. Gun control in Chicago has truly been a model program. Being your kid's friend and not his parent also worked out very well. And mandating that people who can't afford to buy a home should get to buy one anyway was just one more great lefty idea. So is trying to appease people who want to kill us, just talking them out of it - that makes a lot of sense as well. You can see why libs now jump on things like "global warming." They must figure it will take centuries to prove them wrong on that one.

[statnerds]

GMB - You cannot be this clueless. Or just brainwashed by the public school system?

Explain to why we should pay any taxes at all.

Please explain to me why someone that goes to school and college and possibly grad school should have to pay more in taxes than the people that chose to not better themselves.

You don't seem to understand that the business of government is government. They produce nothing. The post office lost $8 billion last year. Eight fukkin billion.

And if increasing taxes and stealing money off hard working Americans is the answer, you deluded crybaby bitch, why are poverty rates about where they were when you lib fukks started "The War on Poverty" 46 years....46 fukking years of stealing from the evil rich, that work that asses off to give their kids better schools, better lives, better opportunities, and giving to the 'needy' has produced no measurable success at all. Please explain it to me. 46 years they've been pushing this bullshit. 46 fukkin years and still people are poor as shit and the ghetto is still the ghetto...

Could it be you are being lied to and manipulated? Am I mistaken, or is the Hood still the Hood?

[nobs]

I think things have gotten worse for "poor" people since the war on poverty started. Its just human nature, you start giving handouts and they will start feeling entitled to just sitting on their butt and being taken care of.

I believe if the gov't said today no more food stamps, no more section 8, no more welfare, no more WIC, no more EIC, no more free utilities, no more etc. I believe in 5 years most "poor" people would be better off for it. As they would have no choice but to start taking care of themselves.

[BeatingBaseball]

You may have noticed that we have reached the point in the distillation of the argument where the liberals always bail.

Once it boils down to actual historical results and bottom line facts they have no recourse but to retreat because they can't argue on logic and facts. They are totally out of their element - which is of course generalized rhetoric, platitudes and name calling. They come back only when they can start all over again - ignoring the salient points and the truth that has filtered out - and take it from the top.