Obama at Democratic Fundraiser: Tea Partiers Should Be Thanking Him for Tax Cuts

Yeah, that $13/week was a really big help, that is, if you were one of the lucky ones who still HAVE a job. What a joke this man is.

Actually, I am one of the 53% who do pay income tax and I say taxes are too high. Sometimes jhw539, it really is about the numbers.

Tax cuts my arse. I paid more this year than any other year. Lot’s of deductions not counting this year, three grand in student loan interest and I get to deduct 2 dollars – 2! This country is rigged to favor the bums makes no sense to even try anymore.

jhw539 a survey found that the Tea Partiers are highly educated and have higher than average income. We’re just tired of the bottom feeders who skim on the bottom.

Newsflash- (not really, this is well known)
America-haters (0bama, Pelosi, Waxman, Fwank, Boxer, Franken and many others) and idiots (Biden, Dodd, Murray, Kerry, Leahy, Franken, Klobuchar) are running the country.

Gee didn’t notice that tax break this year. Oh wait, I completed an education and continue to work 60 hours a week, so I have to pay for the 40% single mom and their kids, the high school drop outs, illegal immigrants and the rest of those that made poor decisions. Sounds fair to me.

It is not just about paying taxes, it is also about our national debt. Even if someone is not paying income tax directly, they pay indirectly because all taxes are always passed down to the consumer.

Whether or not the stimulus act created any jobs depends upon what your state spent it’s share of the money on.

_________”Tick Tick Tick. One year after the stimulus and we are still losing jobs. The Repubs will take the House in November, then the lame duck Joker in 2012.”________________________
Hey, Antonio, One question for you: which president approved the stimulus bailout money? If you have problems remembering, I’ll help you out: It was George Bush, the same person who lied and invaded Iraq that we are still wasting billions of dollars as we speak. Do you see how ridiculous your post sounds?

I had my taxes reduced this year and I had a higher income. Thanks President Obama

Truly unbelievable wack-jobs complaining about taxes and the deficit. Are you forgetting it was the war-bound freak, you voted into power, who got us into this mess?

We should thank him for a tax cut and he is amised. Is he insane.
I think he has not lost touch with America he never had touch with America He is the president for the inner city welfare people and thas all he understands and cares about.
This joker is a millionare and he does not understand the voters He thinks he can fool us with bummper sticker sayings and he can not.
We will kick all the democrats out and repeal ObamaCare. People can no longer be folled they know what the democrats are now.
They can no longer hide behind slogans.

This is the funniest thing I’ve ever heard. I suspect Obama was practicing for the annual White House Press event and testing his material on a friendly office. If he really thinks that what we experienced today (April 15) were tax cuts, I’d enjoy the opportunity to have him compare my taxes and income for the last 53 years. He is probably the best recruiter that the Tea Party has. And to jhw539…the CBS/NY Times survey showed that Tea Party members are not a cross-section of America. In general, they are more highly educated and have an above average income. Gender is about equal and you are more likely to find that the age tends to be above 45. Because of age, there are likely members who don’t pay taxes. The difference between the non tax payers in the Tea Party group and those among the liberals is that the Tea Party group is not asking for more from the government. In fact, we want less.

I have asked these questions before and never get an answer so I will try again:
1) where were these people when Bush took us to an illegal billion dollar war?
2) where were these people when the economy tanked and the bail out was unveiled by…..BUSH
3) where were all these people when Bush turn a budget surplus into record-breaking deficit?
I guess the principles only apply to the other side.

Millions of Americans DO have a lower tax burden this year
Because they are UNEMPLOYED !!!!
And 0bammie doesn’t give a $hit.
Fair thee well, unemployed 0bamaLoons.

For all the things Bush did wrong there is one thing he did right.
Bush mocked terrorists.
Obama mocks Americans.
They are starting to tax everything they can, and more, and even talking about a VAT tax, and this idiot has the balls to mock us and then say we should thank him? While he has ignored trying to fix unemployment, I dont think the 10 million without a job are thanking him either.

The Tea Party is about 18% of the American Population. That hardly qualifies as “Speaking for average Americans”. Nor is it the majority of Americans. Most of us normal Americans can see the rampant manipulation of the Tea Party movement by Beck, Limbaugh et.al. We are smart enough to actually research pending bills, and have a memory that is longer than last week’s Glen Beck Show. Actually, I do kind of hope that the Tea Party sticks around for the 2012 vote. They’ll split the Republican Party and guarantee President Obama’s re-election.

Our own President does not know the difference between a tax cut, and tax credits? No wonder he wants to put astronauts on asteroids.

re: “congress going to have to make a choice that is “very simple, between special interests and the American people.” To the speech writer — this line needs work. As I am the Amercan people (o.k. — i”m a individual – so make that singular) I have a personal special interest: ME, MOI, MIJ, ME的, mich, saya, mnie. меня, mí, MIG,tao (that’s “me” ). So is this legislation — pre-piranha-chomp fest to be construed something that will hurt one’s job but help one personally? I don’t get it. As far as doing what’s “right for the American people” goes — you do that one person at a time. I am not in the center of the bell curve — I’m on the part which skews off the page. What I want to know is, how will “I”, as a member of the set of people, the speech writer calls the “American people” — even whilst way off to the side of a scatter graph — be receiving preferential treatment and why should i relax instead of becoming a leader in the collection of people called “one-person special interests” be disarmed into believing I am safe? It isn’t like I have all the time in the world to listen to this — I”m dying here. I see rhetoric influencing absolutely everyone in the “political analyst, media metrician standard industrial classification code group” because now they have something to talk about — but when reduce to practice – make-work-jobs don’t work for me. Anything in this legislation worth dying for?.

My taxes, and my kids taxes were lower this year. Thanks President Obama. Also my soon to be college graduate youngest daughter has a job! Even better.

Ignorance was only bliss during the bush years, apparently. Now ignorance is blind and rabid hatred of Obama and any motion to make this country more humane, just, and fair for more than just the upper middle class.

Pompous, effete, snarky…as usual, our dear POTUS just can’t resist the one liner.
Thank you? Oh THANK YOU for the historic and epic, never seen before, debt and budget deficit. THANK YOU for crapping on the 10th amendment of the Constitution with the HCR bill. THANK YOU for the stimulus bill which was obviously a laundry list of dem district payoffs.
I’m just so damned grateful. That’s why I spent my evening at a local tea party and renewed my commitment to boot the Congress, regardless of the district that they represent.
See you in November, sweetie. Will you be laughing in your beer, then?
Doubtful.

He’s wasting his breathe. Many of these people are nut cases. The wealthy play these people like idiots. The conservative ideology just wants to stop spending because their pockets are full. They feed on desperation and want to maximise their gains buying up people’s lives for pennies on the dollar. More than likely their pockets started out full. They pass it from one generation to the next. Unless you like waiting outside of factory fences hoping for work you better be throwing republicans out of office. If the republicans regain control the stimulus spending will stop and the country will fail. All you unemployed republicans better be taking notice because your checks will be stopped to. The irony of it is even the wealthy will be broke if the US government fails. Fitting end to the greed. The wealthy will not be able to trust those they pay to protect them.

Lefty logic: Bush was wrong for starting a fiscal fire, but Obama is a hero for dousing it with gasoline.

Let me also remind you that President Clinton left a SURPLUS and the national debt lowered to BUSH, your other idol.
Where were you then?
Sorry Sunshineflorida, but Mr. Clinton DID NOT have a surplus. Creative bookkeeping is the norm in DC…that’s why I’m scared to death to know what the real costs of healthcare will be and just how deeply in debt we really are.

Me thinks it the Tea party targeting uneducated Americans . Those who forget the past will repeat it G.W Bush. Lets hope this does not happen.

Wait until Obama gets reelection cinched. You will find out how much he wants to tax each and every one of you. The bottom line to all of this is with our current lousy economy, the budget and debt is fiscally unmanageable. Eventually taxes will have to go sky high on everyone.
Any economist who can add agrees on that one. Big taxes are in all of our futures. Someone throws you a few pennies and you think they are wonderful? Well, he has one big surprise for you once he gets reelected!

People of the USA…We are argueing about which Clown is the worst LIAR!
Washington “business as usual” is the Enemy! Obama’s Washington has had more secrecy, Backroom dealing and arm-twisting than ANY other.
CHANGE? For the WORSE!

I wish I could thank George W. Bush for leading our country through a huge disaster instead of into one like Obama. Lets not forget under Bush we had 5 to 6% steady unemployment for much of those 8 years including the World Trade Center toppling over and the Wall Street stock market crash. Obama has no disaster of his own to deal with, slathered banks (BANKS!!!) and car companies with billions of dollars because they claimed to need money! Obama so far has given us a new bill to pay in the mail someday and 14 months of steady 8 to 10% unemployment!!!!
Lets go over some of Obama’s unkept promises:
1. I will make unemployment the #1 priority of 2010 – he didnt he forced healthcare reform mandates on us (then talks about nukes, then about mars, talk about gay rights anything but unemployment or the economy)…
2. I will not force people to buy health insurance (he is)
3. I will close Guantanamo Bay Prison (he didnt)
4. No family making less than $250,000 will see “any form of tax increase.” April 8th, 2010:
Smokers, tanning aficionados, the happily uninsured: More taxes coming at ya!
5. No more earmarks (an out right lie)
6. No more Patriot Act (nope he supports it now)
7. Will bring our troops home by 16 months (may still happen but very doubtful)
8. Transparency (except for closed door bribes and deals)
9. Obama once said he would not hold terrorists indefinitely. Well, now that he thinks about it, yeah, it’s not a bad idea.
10. During the campaign Obama promised to create 5 Million new jobs in renewable energy. Now Obama’s promising to create 2.5 million new jobs, and only some of them are going to be renewable energy.
11. The Bipartisan Pledge. Except if youre a Republican and you disagree LOL

To top it all off he didnt even end the war and bring our troops home. They still languish in Afghanistan – human targets for bullets and bombs. Our children. Yet he had the nerve to accept the peace prize!

Tell us exactly what is wrong with being white male and old??? Those are the people who ordinarily vote!!!

I am so tired of the stupid posts about “if you didn’t complain about Bush, you can’t say anything against Obama”. People WERE angry about Bush’s spending and many other things! Obama ran more against Bush than he did McCain. Obama promised to do better and cut the National Debt. Remember?? We are even more angry now because Obama is worse than Bush. We feel played for fools. We know the red ink spending has to stop or America is in really big trouble. And faster than many realize.

Ah, Government by Snark.
Is it 2013 yet?

As a member of the Tea Party, I am very upset that our lobbying efforts failed to protect Insurance Execs pay hikes and ability to increase rates by 47% and drop coverage for no reason, we tried so hard to keep these tried and true Republican Principles in effect. That communist!

Hey Rey, This sounds like you:
We had eight years of Bush and Cheney, but now you get mad! When you think the President should get away with anything he wants because you believe Bush did.
You didn’t get mad when the Supreme Court stopped a legal recount and appointed a President. And it was okay for voter fraud using orgainizations like Acorn.
You didn’t get mad when Cheney allowed Energy company officials to dictate energy policy. But letting the labor unions and the pharmacuticals in the health care decisions is okay.
You didn’t get mad when a covert CIA operative got ousted. But its alright for her to selectively get her husband chosen for the assignment so he can bash the President.
You didn’t get mad when the Patriot Act got passed. But it’s alright now that Obama supports it.
You didn’t get mad when we illegally invaded a country that posed no threat to us. And its alright to let the illegals invade us.
You didn’t get mad when we spent over 600 billion (and counting) on said illegal war. Because we could have spent it creating another entitlement for the 50% who don’t pay any federal income tax.
You didn’t get mad when over 10 billion dollars just disappeared in Iraq. But it’s alright to spend a Trillion to create just a few temporary jobs.
You didn’t get mad when you found out we were torturing people. So now we can let them loose and back on the battlefield.
You didn’t get mad when the government was illegally wiretapping Americans. But Clinton’s warrentless physical searches are okay and Obama’s okay to continue with the wiretaps.
You didn’t get mad when we didn’t catch Bin Laden. So now it’s time to leave Afganistan so he can return to his old ways.
You didn’t get mad when we let a major US city drown. There was no need to be mad at the Democtratic Mayor who didn’t want to evacuate or the Democratic Governor who couldn’t respond. Only the Republican President.
You didn’t get mad when we gave a 900 billion tax break to the rich. Even though we all got a 10% cut, they should have gotten the same $900 break you did.
You didn’t get mad when, using reconciliation; a trillion dollars of our tax dollars were redirected to insurance companies for Medicare Advantage which cost over 20 percent more for basically the same services that Medicare provides. So it’s okay to do it again to take over the healthcare system and cut $500 Billion from Medicare while claiming that it will extend the program.
You didn’t get mad when the deficit hit the trillion dollar mark, and our debt hit the thirteen trillion dollar mark. Actually, Bush left office it was 7 trillion dollar debt and 1 trillion deficit. But now that it’s Obama its okay to work with a 1.5 trillion dollar defict with special spending giving us the 13 trillion dollar debt because he can blame the past administation.

…. You didn’t get mad when over 10 billion dollars just disappeared in Iraq….You didn’t get mad when you found out we were torturing people…You didn’t get mad when the government was illegally wiretapping Americans…You didn’t get mad when you saw the horrible conditions at Walter Reed…You didn’t get mad when we let a major US city drown…..
and so on…
—————
Awesome post, Rey Diaz. The collective amnesia is truly amazing, though some did get mad (Bush was extremely unpopular; its just that now they’re going glossing all that over and setting themselves up to do it all again…. like dupes.) What strikes me as odd is that some get mad now (though I actually think the anger is rooted in fear, being naturally risk-averse, and greed) that we have a President, admin and Congress that has worked together to
sign an Executive Order on government contracting to fight waste and abuse,
pass and sign the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, restoring basic protections against pay discrimination for women and other workers,
renew dialogue with NATO and other allies and partners on strategic issues,
end media blackout on war casualties and the return of fallen soldiers to Dover AFB,
successfully manage TARP,
quickly pass and sign the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, which kept states afloat and helped the economy begin its slow recovery so that we are now experiencing positive GDP and job growth while also investing in infrastructure, science, technology, health and green initiatives,
launched plans to boost lending to and give tax credits to small businesses,
provided the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) with more than $1.4 billion to improve services to America’s Veterans,
limited lobbyist’s access to the White House (though we have a long way to go);
passed and signed the Children’s Health Insurance Reauthorization Act, which provides quality health care to 11 million kids – 4 million who were previously uninsured;
provided the Department of Veterans Affairs the largest spending increase in 30 years to improve medical facilities and national cemeteries, and to assist states in acquiring or constructing state nursing homes and extended care facilities;
passed and signed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, joining other civilized countries in their devotion to the health security of their citizens and making access more equitable (though we have additional work to do),
passed and signed the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010, reforming the student loan program in a way by making it more efficient and improving the Senate health reform bill,
ended the previous stop-loss policy that kept soldiers in Iraq/Afghanistan longer than their enlistment date (hat tip to the site Accomplishments of President Barack Obama)
… and so on. There’s much more, like unveiling a bolder, fresher vision for Nasa spaceflight and through the president’s summit this week, expanding the effort to achieve nuclear security.
But I suppose all that is really worth getting mad about as opposed to all that went down during the previous eight years. Never mind that “earmark spending is down 40 percent from 2006, when the Republican-controlled Congress spent a record-high $29.5 billion on earmarks ” (per ABC) or that this week the Dow Jones closed above 11,000 for the first time in a year and a half.
(See Business Week’s article “Why the Obama Plan Is Working: Polls say the economy is heading in the wrong direction. Markets say it’s back on track. This time, the markets are right” — another darned thing to be upset about/sarc. )

Posted by: Rey Diaz | Apr 16, 2010 12:10:45 AM
You finally got mad when the government decided that people in America deserved the right to see a doctor if they are sick
OMG….Rey….good post until to got to this one (well several others too.but tooooooo many to coutn)..are you SERIOUS…OMG. Don’t you understand what has been done? Have you read any of the medical reform law? (dont’ worry about it…it was obvious those that voted for it didn’t either) Some of it good,but for the most part it is a cluster%^&*()_ and every american in 4-5 years will wonder what happened if this horrible piece of ^&*(isn’t fixed. Yes, insurance companies need to be brought in to the fold, they needed regulation. But this act/law or piece of ^&*)*&&&^ whatever you want to call it is the WORSE- it will benefit the insurance companies and penalize the average person…you need to read it and study the implications. Or we can continue with the ba ba ba little sheep routine. This coutry is going to hell in a handbasket the fastest I have ever seen. And yes, you are right. It isn’t the current administration, it was the one prior and the one prior to that. When is it going to stop….the question is….WHEN are we going to stop it …….DOES ANYONE VOTE ANYMORE…or just those in the cemetery and homeless shelters??????????

All I can say is this. The President came into office with a mess on his hands. One that took 8yrs to make and everybody expects him to make the perfect moves and get us out in a little over a year? Seriously? Nobody can do that. You try. Also, Republicans, you had your time. You had 8yrs and out of 8yrs you had 6yrs of a Republican dominated Congress. So when I hear all this backlash and the Republicans saying they have better ideas on how to fix things. WHERE WERE THESE BRIGHT IDEAS 8YRS AGO?? Where were they?? I don’t want to hear it now. You HAD your time. I DONT want to hear it now. All this tea partying. Where were you guys when President Bush was ruining this country for 8yrs? Answer that question. You had some folks protesting here and there but not at the level they are now. I think I know why but I don’t have to say it. Also, if you want to be taken seriously, dont use an idiot like Sarah Palin to represent you. The majority of America will never vote for her. Maybe a certain section of the country buys into her mess but the rest of us laugh at her. She is as unfit as they come. And had McCain NOT chosen her for a VP selection, he might have won. Romney or Huckabee as his VP might have won it for him.

Tell us exactly what is wrong with being white male and old??? Those are the people who ordinarily vote!!!
__________
I forgot to add that many tea partiers appear to be on Medicare– and I do find that highly… um… ironic (or hypocritical). And then of course there’s social security.
just sayin.

Tax cuts?!? And the media of course lets him get away with this lie. These idiots are cooking up even more ways to tax you. Bush tax cuts to expire soon. Taxes on stock transactions. Death tax returning. VAT tax being batted around now. My income is certainly less than $250,000 (you know, the level O specified during the campaign that wouldn’t see a single dime of tax increase) but I guaran-frickin-tee my taxes will go up and go up a lot with this community organizer as pres.

Dear Democratic voter,
You owe all of America an apology. You allowed yourself to be incited into a mob by the dishonest party leadership from 2000 on, starting with Gore’s toxic response to losing a tight race and ending with this pompous punk playing President.
Time to wake up. A vote for any Democrat this year means you actually want to further empower the most coercive, power-mad leadership in our history. It means you’re fine to sign away your Right to Liberty for the privilege of begging the IRS for cheap health care.
Anyone who votes Democratic in 2010 is either a rube or a thief. Get clear and think for yourself.

I also recommend Bruce Bartlett’s Forbes article called “The Misinformed Tea Party Movement:For an antitax group, they don’t know much about taxes.”
the shoe seems to fit pretty darned well…

Jayhawk honey…where the hell you been and oh my what is this demo or rep talk…are you serious? Get with the program. After the passing of healthcare reform those parties are gone and the American People need to recapture their country. Teaparty people are not just repub or demo’s. They are real people that have been with either party and are now feed up and can’t take it anymore. Can’t you even see that it “just ain’t workin’ anymore” in DC…goodlord???? They are people that think and live and try to earn a living in America despite what THEIR government is doing to them which is beating them down financially (you do not want to know the freedoms we have given up the past 10 years) it is not just from one party. If this country doesn’t get over this republican / democrat control and take back their brains, their beliefs and their integrity, this country is lost. DC isn’t working and it hasn’t in over 10-15 years…..what don’t you GET?????

Carol,
Are you serious?? I mean really. I take it your Republican. Thing is I agree with more than a few Republican ideals. I am more of a moderate Democrat. But that aside, are you for real?? How about you apologize to for the time period of 2000-2008. Then if the country is really jacked up and no better in 2012, I will comeback and apologize to you. How about that? I don’t remember the deficit and all the problems being here before 2000. I recall that we had a surplus and everybody was working and things were different. That’s what I recall. Then slowly but surely, things went to hell and nobody said nothing. The Republican led Congress said nothing. Now they have all these great ideas that nobody will listen to. President Obama gets in office and its all his fault? He’s been on the job a little over a year maybe? You can’t be serious. An apology? Maybe in 2012. Maybe. And for the record. If a Republican is running on something that makes good sense to me this fall, I might vote for him or her. If he/she is a tea party member, I will not vote for him/her under no circumstances. I am a Democrat but I voted for President Obama because he was the better candidate. I kind of leaned towards voting for McCain but his decision to pick Palin proved to me that he doesn’t make good decisions and can’t be given the keys to the kingdom. You want the Republicans back. PASS A BILL. Legislate. Tell them in Congress to help pass something and stop crying and complaining while the American people are suffering. We need results. Stop blocking everything that comes up. Everything doesn’t have to be 100% perfect but give us results on something and participate and stop the complaining. You will not get swing votes that way. The moderates and swing voters will determine who gets in and we see clearly who is BSing and who is not.

Obama ought to be careful he doesnt break his arm patting himself on the back for nothing like that.

“…but I guaran-frickin-tee my taxes will go up and go up a lot with this community organizer as pres.”
———
And there you have it, folks. Another person who completely ignores where things are currently. Your taxes “will go up”?!
Apparently, people have completely missed the point. Your income taxes WENT DOWN in 2009! So, protesting “higher taxes” when you’re paying less than you did under the Bush administration is, um, odd (some might even call it crazy).
Clearly, the Tea Party is nothing more than disgruntled Republicans who dislike the Republican Party, but hate Obama even more. And apparently, you guys hate Obama so much that you’re willing to attack him for “raising” your taxes, even when he’s — no matter how you look at it –actually CUT your federal taxes.
So, turn off FOX News, and pick up the Wall Street Journal, or turn on ABC News, or pretty much any other legitimate (that’s the key word here) news source that actually wants to inform you and not just play with your emotions and mind to manipulate you to constantly attack Democrats, and find out the real truth about your federal income taxes — and a few other things.

What’s interesting is that the general public is more supportive of a third party than the Tea Party is…
If you look at the recent NYT/CBS poll, when respondents were asked whether they agree with those who support third party and independent alternatives to the ruling Democratic-Republican two-party state (something I support, though I think we need four or five parties, actually– a full range of choices that breaks up the corporatist oligarchy) 46% of ALL respondents answered in the affirmative, compared with only 40% of tea party partisans.
52% of Tea Partiers disagreed, and the majority indicated they were Republicans.
NYT: “The 18 percent of Americans who identify themselves as Tea Party supporters tend to be Republican, white, male, married and older than 45.
They hold more conservative views on a range of issues than Republicans generally. They are also more likely to describe themselves as “very conservative” and President Obama as “very liberal.”
…They do not want a third party and say they usually or almost always vote Republican. The percentage holding a favorable opinion of former President George W. Bush, at 57 percent, almost exactly matches the percentage in the general public that holds an unfavorable view of him. “

This is the main problem with Obama – he doesnt care about the average person – only special interests in the guise of caring about people (he is a liar). This will bite him in the rear end eventually when peoples unemployment checks stop coming and they have no job with elections drawing closer and closer. We are talking 10 million people with no job or income by this summer when their 99 weeks run out. Where is his concern for these families?

Obama is all smoke and mirrors. He is making everyone think that he is helping them by throwing them a few quarters here and there. But the bottom line is that they aren’t his quarters to throw at people. I can’t say dollars, because we don’t have that much to throw at anyone. And people buy his rhetoric as gospel when in fact he is just so egocentric and self-centered that he is driving the bus with no hands.
Our country is totally in danger – not from terrorists or enemy forces, but from creditors and bankers of foreign governments that are about to pull the plug on our rampant spending. Obama is ignoring all of this and instead preoccupied with his own place in history.
I didn’t like Bush at all, and I voted for Obama – but I sincerely regret that vote now as the man who I thought would fix things is taking this country and putting it into the toilet. Take the health care bill for example. The people that are still for it – a minority I might add – don’t even realize that it won’t help many people. Putting lots of people on Medicaid is not helping them. It certainly isn’t reforming health care. So we spend a trillion dollars that we don’t have to put together some garbage legislation that really fixes nothing. It just spends more money and buys a few votes.
That is what Obama is all about – promise them everything – talk a lot – deliver mediocrity – and try to convince everyone that you are helping them. Sorry, but I am one fool that isn’t going to by that nonsense anymore.

sa mead: Well, I am middle aged and a bit more (more than I’d like anyway). The fact is that the voting system is broken. One party puts up a joke for a candidate and the other one walks away with a landslide. Or campaign promises are broken one after another. Either way, we are duped. It is a game to get reelected and become wealthy after the presidency. Look at Bill Clinton – he and Hillary are worth hundreds of millions. Obama will be worth at least that. Hell – he made $5.5M this past year mostly on selling his books! He’ll be making $20M a year by the end of his presidency and probably $50M a year after that.
So politics isn’t about public service anymore. It’s all about super-celebrities. We have J Lo, Michale Jackson (RIP) and many others. But presidents and lots of politicians go on after their terms and become wealthy superstars.
You hear Obama talk now about the fat cats on Wall St. – but he is making close to what they make and will exceed it before long. They are all so into themselves and into what they want history to think of them. But what about us??????

Except for a few bumps along the road, the voting system in our country still works, doesn’t it?
Posted by: sa mead | Apr 16, 2010 2:01:40 AM
______________________________________
Sure it does . . . right wing extremists have always been weird – they still are.

stop raping my country!
Posted by: clinging2mygunsandreligion | Apr 16, 2010 2:11:56 AM
How do you spot a wingnut?
Besides fearmongering, references to rape.
I don’t get the preoccupation, but there is a preoccupation
Or obsession.
Its odd.
Anyone care to explain it?
(e.g. “We are being told that we have to hope [Obama] succeeds, that we have to bend over, grab the ankles … because his father was black.” Rush Limbaugh; and then there was all the throat cramming with the health care reform legislation– )

You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift.
You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift.
You cannot lift the wage earner up by pulling the wage payer down.
You cannot further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatred.
You cannot build character and courage by taking away people’s initiative and independence.
____
wish you would have sent Bush a needlepoint of these points in particular. I doubt he would have paid attention, but your preaching to the wrong choir, kiddo.

Posted by: Keith | Apr 16, 2010 1:52:12 AM
And I find spitting on Congressmen offensive–
Posted by: progressive mama | Apr 16, 2010 2:14:19 AM
Show us proof that his actually happened, please. Otherwise, stop spreading propaganda.

Posted by: bailmeout2 | Apr 16, 2010 1:54:31 AM
Awwwww…. sticks and stones. You’re Frank Luntz-inspired talking point screen name says it all anyway.We wouldn’t have gotten along. LOL.
As Warner said of McConnell (who was also inspired by Luntz’s talking points): “”It appears that the Republican leader either doesn’t understand or chooses not to understand the basic underlying premise of what this bill puts in place.”
Or as he put it in an interview with Ezra Klein:
” Look, if you haven’t spent the time with these issues, there’s an easy way to pop off with sound bite solutions that just don’t work. And I know at this point in the process Republicans need to be against stuff in order to negotiate. But it’s laughable to say that $50 billion [the size of the "Orderly Resolution Fund"] is enough if a series of firms go down.
This gap funding may be enough to keep lights on for literally hours or days so you don’t have flight from the firm where the value of this entity collapse upon itself. It’s there because what we’ve heard is that the challenge in a crisis is to buy enough time to keep the lights on for a few days till you get the FDIC in here. You could make it smaller. Corker and I spoke about $25 billion. But remember, this is funded by the industry. The notion that it’s taxpayer-supported is just plain wrong. And here’s the hypocrisy of the Republican leader’s comments. I can guarantee you that if there had not been some pre-funding, the critique would’ve been: “Look at these guys! They’ve left the taxpayers exposed! What’s going to keep the lights on for these few days? It’s going to be Treasury funds or Federal Reserve funds. The taxpayer will be exposed!” (WaPo)

The Republican right chant . . .. We were not in Power; We were not in Power . . .

Thank Obama??? Sure – thanks to Obama and the Democrats spend-o-rama, my taxes went UP – by thousands of dollars. Not only did my income tax go up, I get to pay more in taxes on fancy medical devices I need like tampons and contact lenses. I did, however, get a 10% pay cut so I could keep my job in the face of the superfantastic health care bill. Now a VAT is looming on the horizon, along with gas taxes that will be coming as part of crap and trade. Thanks, Obama.

I repeat.
Condescension, arrogance and insults instead of substance.
That’s all you’ve got? Sticks and stones…
I bet you stick your fingers in your ears and go “a la la la la la” when you don’t like what you hear.

Come November 2012,I would like to hear
VP Biden say “it’s a big deal” when he and Barack Hussien Obama go home.

The truth is that the American people he’s speaking of is every one of us. The special interests that have a hold of the federal government in our recent history have held a structure in which the American dream becomes a further reach for us all.

Tell us about Klein and the secretive Journolist.
———
Tell us about the epistemic closure in the modern conservative movement (see Julian Sanchez, Andrew Sullivan, Jonathan Bernstein, Matt Steinglass, Matthew Yglesias, McMegan–ugh!– Jonah Goldberg, Jonathan Chait, Conor Friedersdorf and so on– and feel free to weigh in on where you stand.
(Though, yes, we already know its with the wit and wunderkind–/sarc.– Glenn Beck)

Posted by: Where’s the Proof? | Apr 16, 2010 2:40:44 AM
Yes,there were several witnesses. Cops were there. It was widely reported. You have the odd view. You’re claiming all the witnesses lied. Prove it.

Tell us about Klein and the secretive Journolist.
———
Tell us about the epistemic closure in the modern conservative movement
Posted by: progressive mama | Apr 16, 2010 3:11:52 AM
I don’t quote those guys you listed. You constantly quote Klein. I’m just adding some context.
BTW: Do YOU think the country’s deficits are sustainable?

Posted by: Where’s the Proof? | Apr 16, 2010 2:40:44 AM
Yes,there were several witnesses. Cops were there. It was widely reported. You have the odd view. You’re claiming all the witnesses lied. Prove it.
Posted by: progressive mama | Apr 16, 2010 3:18:57 AM
First of all, get your facts straight. Lewis claimed someone yelled the “n” word. Cleaver claimed someone spit on him. When I asked for proof of the spitting you said you believed what Lewis said. So it seems you are mixing things up.
Second, with all the astro-turfing going on who know really what is going on and who is doing what. And I believe that was when Pelosi lead them through the crowd – almost like it was a setup or at least a taunting act.

KOoLaID that is so clever. Those original thinking righties repeating the squawk . . . squawk . . . .squAWk . . .
Posted by: tierra | Apr 16, 2010 2:36:41 AM
Ah well, tierra, you have to admit the use of caps was a little artsy and cute, yeah? Like the little girls that heart their i’s in their names?
Whenever the koolaid accusations come out, I know I’m dealing with doofuses that don’t know much about politics and have to resort to the tired.

Then if the country is really jacked up and no better in 2012, I will comeback and apologize to you. How about that?
Posted by: Jayhawk | Apr 16, 2010 1:53:35 AM
You better get ready for your 2012 apology tour, Jayhawk:
Jobless claims rose “unexpectedly” (again) last week
In the first three months of 2010 foreclosure filings rose 7% compared with the previous quarter – a 16% jump over the first three months of 2009
“Recent changes to the federal foreclosure-prevention program were billed as helping the unemployed, but in the long run, they actually make it harder for people without jobs to keep their homes.” -Miami Herald, 4/16
Commercial foreclosures are expected throughout 2010 peaking in 2011
Government growing bigger and deficits rising rapidly
Do I need to go on?

It seems to me that republican’s are so suspicious of everyone and everything. They have issues with every form of government. People like that must feel they cannot be trusted – so why trust anyone else. They seem to think everyone is ‘out to get them’. What a miserable way to live.

It seems to me that republican’s are so suspicious of everyone and everything. They have issues with every form of government. People like that must feel they cannot be trusted – so why trust anyone else. They seem to think everyone is ‘out to get them’. What a miserable way to live.
Posted by: JF58 | Apr 16, 2010 3:56:24 AM
That’s weird. I don’t feel like that at all. But if it seems that way to you it must be true.

Furthermore, I don’t remember the Democrats out in droves, holding signs and attacking Bush for stealing the 2000 election. Democrat’s have more class. Republican’s are bullies who scream and belittle to get their own way.

Our goal is to empower the individual to take back the country our forefathers fought for.”
What’s wrong with that? It almost sounds… well “progressive.”
Posted by: For the Record
well…. seems ‘you’ folks only come out of the closet to do the tea party and militia thing when Dems are in the White House.
re: ‘the country our forefathers fought for.’
the rural farm economy that could only prosper from the cheap labor provided by slavery
btw: always wondered where the founding forefathers stood on issues like genetic medicine, space travel, nukes, clean water regulation, climate change, and airport screening.

Posted by: PO’d | Apr 16, 2010 4:13:16 AM
So you’re against “citizen involvement” then?

Furthermore, I don’t remember the Democrats out in droves, holding signs and attacking Bush for stealing the 2000 election. Democrat’s have more class.
Posted by: JF58 | Apr 16, 2010 3:59:21 AM
They don’t have to. The liberal media took care of the whole thing for them.

So you’re against “citizen involvement” then?
Posted by: For the Record
c’mon big guy… answer the questions…
otherwise you’ll just seem like another right-winger who changes the subject any time he faced with direct questions.
re” take back the country’
from whom, and how, are you now identifying with the violent militias, advocating insurrection ..and what would you do with it if you could..

Posted by: For the Record | Apr 16, 2010 4:06:13 AM
You can google real wages since 1970 and you can also go to the Center of Budget and Policy Priorities. If you search under poverty trends or median income trends, you’ll find all kinds of interesting things to read. You can start here, if you’d like “Poverty and Share of Americans Without Health Insurance Were Higher in 2007 – And Median Income for Working-Age Households Was Lower – Than at the Bottom of Last Recession
For Poverty Rate and Non-Elderly Median Income, Worst Performance on Record For Any Six Years of Economic Growth”

Posted by: GK | Apr 16, 2010 4:23:49 AM
you’ll be able to get coverage via a high risk pool within either 90 to 180 days (can’t recall now– but unless you’re under age 19, yes, there is a wait time till the exchanges are up and the mandate kicks in. The high risk pools will start up this year though)
For an implementation time line, see “Timeline for Health Care Reform Implementation: Health Insurance Provisions ” at the Commonwealth Fund web site.

Posted by: GK | Apr 16, 2010 4:23:49 AM
you’ll be able to get coverage via a high risk pool within either 90 to 180 days (can’t recall now– but unless you’re under age 19, yes, there is a wait time till the exchanges are up and the mandate kicks in. The high risk pools will start up this year though)
Posted by: progressive mama | Apr 16, 2010 4:35:57 AM
But I didn’t hear anything about these high risk pools during the debates. All I heard about was no pre-conditions…

Posted by: GK | Apr 16, 2010 4:35:12 AM
I’m curious whether they teach you tactics and then you project them onto others. LOL. Sorry… that was the first thing I thought of when I went to the cheesy website.
But the rhetoric you originally quoted was nice. It covers up the corporatist reality really nice. Lots of goofballs will fall for it and run around talking about liberty while they remain slaves to corporate power and help the status quo remain the status quo.

But the rhetoric you originally quoted was nice. It covers up the corporatist reality really nice.
Posted by: progressive mama | Apr 16, 2010 4:42:32 AM
Yea, kind of like Pro-Choice to cover up their real agenda: Pro-Abortion.

they hear and see what they want to see, and later feel disappointed.
Posted by: progressive mama | Apr 16, 2010 4:46:02 AM
Why didn’t the main stream media tell the public this? ABC had a whole show with the President himself. Isn’t it their job as the “Fourth Estate.” I don’t remember one MSM story specifically about pre-conditions for those over 19 not taking affect until 2014 – when they knew that was a big deal in the passage. I think they were deliberately not drawing attention to it because they do the work of the Liberal establishment. What do you think?

The high risk pools are for people who are already uninsured. If you are being taken to the cleaners or have crappy insurance, you have to wait until 2014.
Please no one be stupid enough to go without insurance enough to get into a high risk pool. That’s a bigger risk.

I can’t tell you how happy it makes me to know we the people amuse the great King Barrack,and he’s right we should thank him
for forcing he health care bill down our collective throats.
If anyone out there thinks your not going to pay higher taxes, I’ll sell you this bridge I own in Brooklyn.

I didn’t vote for this President, but I believe he has done more for the American People, than the last 10 presidents. It’s good to see someone leading the country for the people and not the corporation. Keep it up, President Obama.

Yes, Children get amused quite easily.
What default condescending arrogance and total lack of wisdom to insult the one group of American voters who could thwart your plans, instead of at least appearing to “feel their pain” as had the other lying president – Bill “I never had sex with that woman, Ms. Lewinsky” CLinton.

The comment about the President destroying the credibility of the political party is one sided. John Boehner, and Jim Demint DESTROYED the credibility of the Republican party, just as these tea partiers are destroying the actual rememberance of an important piece of American history. The Tea partiers of today are a front for a group of greedy rich people who use the words “Socialism” and stories of government control, rumors about “Death Squads” as tactics to motivate their puppets, while their only real interest is in making as much money as they can. How many of these “Patriots” were out their outsourcing their(our), jobs to other countries, or using automation to eliminate employee costs? These people are capitalists, who are now threatening to send our jobs to other countries, but what was their excuse before Obama took over the world. We elect our government officials to help run this country, but when it comes to controlling the capitalism, they want a free reign, to take what they want. Their is a middle ground which both parties need to work towards, that has a lot of middle class people who hold this economy, good or bad, in their hands. Right now that middle class has no spare change though.

While Obama has gone out of his way to dispell any notion of American exceptionalism, righteousness, or superiority…he is quite clearly convinced of his own.

lETS GET THIS RIGHT HE IS SUPPOSE TO BE THE PRESIDENT OF THIS COUNTRY AND AS THE PRESIDENT YOU ARE SUPPOSE TO UNITE THE PEOPLE YET HE SCOFFS AND TRIES TO RIDICULE A LARGE MAJORITY OF THOSE AMERICANS WHO HAVE CONCERNS? WHAT KIND OF LEADERSHIP IS THAT? ITS ATTITUDE LIKE THIS THAT WILL MAKE SURE HE IS A ONE TERM PRESIDENT AND WILL GO DOWN AS THE WORST IN ALL TIME.

He really doesn’t get it. I can see why the 50% of the country that don’t pay taxes love this loser. They all get their tax credit (welfare). Typical Dem. You can’t fix stupid but we can vote them out. Can’t wait for Nov to get rid of these socialist.

Doesn’t get what discreettool? Your taxes went down this year.

>Gee, this guy’s arrogance knows no bounds. When is the next tea party rally..I plan to go. Anything that gets under his skin is worth it.<
I have seen the very opposite. Whenever a piece of his legislation passes, or when he punches back over the constant snipping of you naysayers, it seems to make you guys go apoplectic. He right! …it is amusing!

“This man has serious problems. He honestly believes everything he says.” – Amanda
I hear ya Amanda and you are so right.
That’s what happens when you get raised poorly.
Stanley did a lousy job and then handed the boy over to the Grandparents solidifying the mental damage started by the father. I feel for Barack, he is not right in the head. It’s becoming increasingly apparent he is mentally sick and needs treatment. It’s so sad to see him floundering day after day.

” You realize that hitler and his crew planned propaganda for 10+ yrs of exactly this type to get the uneducated, ” – Real American
Finally! Someone owns up to how Obama got elected.
Planned slick propaganda.
Targeting the uneducated.
Works every time.

JF58 said “I don’t remember the Democrats out in droves, holding signs and attacking Bush for stealing the 2000 election”
Your memory must not be very good then.
That’s all we heard for 8 years. You do realize that after the Supreme Court ruled that a study was conducted and the following was found:
AP: A vote-by-vote review of untallied ballots in the 2000 Florida presidential election indicates George W. Bush would have narrowly prevailed in the partial recounts sought by Al Gore, but Gore might have reversed the outcome – by the barest of margins – had he pursued and gained a complete statewide recount.
Palm Beach Post: Al Gore was doomed.
He couldn’t have caught George W. Bush even if his two best chances for an official recount had played out.
USA Today: George W. Bush would have won a hand recount of all disputed ballots in Florida’s presidential election if the most widely accepted standard for judging votes had been applied.

“Obama referenced the Florida Democratic state Sen. Ted Deutch’s victory in Tuesday’s special election to replace Rep. Robert Wexler, a Democrat who is retiring. To loud applause from the crowd, Obama tempered the reaction: “Let’s not get too excited,” he said. “It’s a Democratic district.”
The president said that Republicans were saying this would a referendum on him, the Recovery Act and the recently passed health care legislation.
“Maybe it was,” he said to laughter and applause.
“Here’s what I think: I think if we stay true to our principles, if we do what’s right for the American people, then elections will take care of themselves,” Obama said.
=============================
Have your laughs now Obama and Dims. This district is OVERWHELMING Democrat (heck, Kerry carried it 66%-33% in 2004), but the Republican received more votes than would be expected based on party affiliation.
200 more days until the “referendum” on Obama/Reid/Pelosi and ObamaCare/rest of Obama’s far Left agenda. Can’t wait.

For those who are making a big deal about TEA party rally attendance (it was a weekday). TEA party folks WORK for a living, a concept foriegn to most obama supporters. And I have never been to one, busy having a life.

I don’t understand all of the lame comments for or against the Tea Party. All goverment from your local, state, and fedral get money from you the people, there is nothing any goverment can give you that is free, they sell nothing, they make nothing, we all pay taxes in some way. Goverment needs to step back and look at all they have done in the past what has really worked not much, people fail at things all day long, I have a good company at this time but I have had 3 others that didn’t fair as well and no longer are around I learned from them and moved on so would others if we let them and not think it is the goverments job to take care of everyone. We will all pay for what erver goverment gives away we have to they have only what they take from you and me.

tip612, you are ignoring that a huge part of our deficit was due to Bush’s tax cuts for the rich. And it did squat to stimulate the economy.

You can defend the tea party movement but I have a different opinoin since attending a rally in DC. I went thinking this was about taxes..and came away disgusted. I spoke to people there who were passing out literature from the John Birch Society. Some of the signs and the comments I heard were disrespectful and downright racist in tone. And, sorry, I did not go there to overthrow our government – I went there to give them my opinion about taxes and smaller governement. This movement may have started out grass roots but has been taken over by RADICALS who want to overthrow our government. My question is, and I asked someone at the rally this question .. “so you want to overthrow our current governement but what do you plan to replace it with?” From the people there, I suspect the answer would be with John Birchers or a similar, extreme right wing ideology.

“This man has serious problems. He honestly believes everything he says.” – Amanda
“I hear ya Amanda and you are so right.
That’s what happens when you get raised poorly.
Stanley did a lousy job and then handed the boy over to the Grandparents solidifying the mental damage started by the father. I feel for Barack, he is not right in the head. It’s becoming increasingly apparent he is mentally sick and needs treatment. It’s so sad to see him floundering day after day.” — Noz
My sympathies. The mental damage you have suffered is far more extensive because of how you characterize President Obama by giving a factual description of Bumbling-BUSH. In fact it was so sad to see BUSH become the butt of jokes day after day, for his eight years in office.

“tip612, you are ignoring that a huge part of our deficit was due to Bush’s tax cuts for the rich. And it did squat to stimulate the economy.”
Ah, more partisanship and willful ignorance from The Left.
1.) Tax revenues to the federal coffers INCREASED after tax cut
2.) Tax cuts were across the board, not just to “the rich
3.) Bush’s annual deficits were (a.) highest when Dems were in control of Congress, and (b.) at their highest LESS THAN HALF of Obama’s deficits in FY09 and FY10
4.) Average unemployment during Bush’s 8 years in WH was <5%. Obama 9%+
While "Bush Did It!" is an convenient, knee-jerk, and partisan response which requires no critical thinking, it is a response that usually holds very little water. (sidebar: my biggest disappointment with the Bush presidency was what I believed to be profligate spending…logically, I am not a fan of Obama as by comparison Bush was a penny-pincher).

Nate Silver makes an interesting observation about the Tea Party (aka old white male Republicans for Sarah Palin even though they know she’s not qualified):
“tea-partiers are disproportionately attached to, and perhaps influenced by, FOX News. And they are particularly enamored of Glenn Beck. Nationally, just 18 percent of people have a favorable opinion of Beck (the majority have no opinion whatsoever about him). But most tea-partiers do. Do the math, and you’ll find that 59 percent of those who do think highly of Beck consider themselves a part of the tea-party. This is, in fact, the single biggest differentiator of any of the items that the NYT asked about: not ideology, not any particular political belief, but whom they watch on television…”(FiveThirtyEight blog)
Also, “They are largely disinterested in the existence of a third party. “

“Noz, if most Americans got federal tax cuts who are the tea party people representing when they rally for wanting lower taxes?”
You just don’t get it – Recent polling indicates majority (or at least a plurality) of Tea Party members do not believe they are being taxed “too much” now – They are concerned that runaway govt. spending/federal deficits (as witnessed under first 16 months under Obama) will compromise the strength of the country and will lead to increased taxes on ALL Americans (are you familiar with the VAT tax that is being kicked around in some Dem. circles? hint: it is a tax on ALL Americans)

“tip612, you are ignoring that a huge part of our deficit was due to Bush’s tax cuts for the rich. And it did squat to stimulate the economy.”
Ah, more partisanship and willful ignorance from The Left.
____________
Nope. Bruce Bartlett isn’t from the Left:
“Conservative protesters should remember that the recession, which led to so many of the policies they oppose, is almost entirely the result of Bush’s policies. According to the National Bureau of Economic Research, the recession began in December 2007—long before Obama was even nominated. And the previous recession ended in November 2001, so the current recession cannot be blamed on cyclical forces that Bush inherited….Conservatives delude themselves that the Bush tax cuts worked….”
Fareed Zakaria, GPS:”…the Bush tax cuts are the single largest part of the black hole that is the federal budget deficit.”
Center for American Progress (google for full anaylysis and data): “The policies of the Bush administration, which included tax cuts during a time of war and a floundering economy, are clearly the primary source of the current deficits….Overall, changes in federal law during the Bush administration are responsible for 40 percent of the short-term fiscal problem. For example, we estimate that the tax cuts passed during the Bush presidency are reducing government revenue collections by $231 billion in 2009. Also, because of the additions to the federal debt due to Bush administration policies, the government will be paying $218 billion more in interest payments in 2009.”
Denial doesn’t change the numbers or facts.

Posted by: tjp612 | Apr 16, 2010 9:37:08 AM
Nice use of bogeyman buzzwords (Alinsky, scary!!!)… its based on the poll results. There’s data to back it up. Doesn’t mean there aren’t exceptions. But it comes from the responses of those who identify with the Tea Party. We don’t really have to say much, because your tea party friends said it themselves.

Yeah, thanks for maxing out America’s credit card and sticking the bill with our kids/grandkids.
Obama proves everyday how out of touch,arrogant, and delusional he really is.

That $200 billion in tax cuts did nothing to help the economy or increase consumer spending.
Consumers and small businesses are sending Obama a big message “We don’t trust you” enough to hire, or spend our money.

“are you familiar with the vote count on the topic yesterday or do you just like being in a paranoid state? (pssst- 85-13 in the Senate not interested in pursuing a VAT)”
Yes, I am. So do you believe that this has been put to rest and we will not hear about need for a VAT during the balance of the Obama administration? (I’m not optimistic)

Bartlett in not Left?
__
Nope. He’s just a realist, like David Frum so you all have driven him out to achieve epistemic closure and make it complete. lol.
I’ll say this though since you are an apologist for Bush– on that count, you ARE a very typical tea partier– per the poll, they blame George W. Bush and Wall Street far, far less for the economic situation than the rest of the country does. They are really out of touch. (Its the Fox News/Glen Beck connection, I’d bet.)
So these people are NOT angry at Wall Street or big business –they don’t blame the money people at all.
And they don’t understand the facts: 88% of them think the government’s stimulus program has either had no impact on the economy or made it worse.
74% think the economy would have improved just fine without any government interference
(They also don’t seem to like poor people–73% of them think that government benefits encourage people to remain poor (73%) while only 33% of the country as a whole believe that.)
lol.

And if you aren’t thankful for Obama already you will have so much more to be thankful for soon:
“Amnesty poison pill
Vast health bill for new legals
On Saturday, Senate Major ity Leader Harry Reid told a Las Vegas audience: “We are going to pass comprehensive immigration reform” this year — using the “comprehensive” buzzword that everyone knows means amnesty for the 10.8 million or more illegal aliens now in the country.
But that amnesty means even more than it used to — because Democrats this year broke with long-standing precedent to ensure that, if legalized, these aliens would immediately qualify for ObamaCare’s health-insurance subsidies.
Reid’s remarks were just the latest in a series of pledges from Democratic leaders in Congress, as well as from President Obama, that they’ll really try to pass an amnesty bill this year — no matter how controversial.
Reid: Passed ObamaCare with hidden help for legal immigrants.
Yet the controversy should be worse than ever — thanks to a disturbing change buried deep in the 2,400-page ObamaCare legislation: the effective end of the “public charge” doctrine.
This doctrine is nearly as old as US immigration law itself. It is the rule that no alien can be allowed into the United States if he is going to become a burden on the US taxpayer upon entry — a public charge.
In 1996, Congress added teeth to the doctrine by imposing a five-year bar on legal aliens receiving federal means-tested public benefits. In other words, no feeding at the public trough until you’ve been supporting yourself for five years. But now Democrats have eliminated the five-year bar with respect to the new health-care benefits.
The new law’s authors plainly realized this wouldn’t be popular. While the House health-care bill stated quite plainly that the five-year bar did not apply, the Senate version that became law did it via a torturous process that involved defining the health-care subsidy as a “tax credit” (though it’s available even to people who don’t pay taxes) and declaring that a lawfully present alien who’s not eligible for Medicaid (because of the five-year bar) is eligible for a health-care “tax credit.”
Why sneak such a provision into the law, when it goes against the sound economics of the public-charge doctrine and further burdens American taxpayers?
Perhaps to create a long-term constituency for ObamaCare.
Barely 40 percent of the American public favors the new law. Elections this fall and in 2012 will likely slash support for it in Washington; without a constituency to fight for it, it could be doomed.
And the best way to build a constituency is to extend its benefits to as many people as possible.
By setting aside the public-charge doctrine and allowing newly legalized aliens to become eligible for ObamaCare immediately, the amnesty would create 10.8 million new ObamaCare constituents, dependent upon Uncle Sam for free health care.
Five years later, those constituents would be naturalized citizens, voting Democratic to keep ObamaCare in place.
This hidden time bomb in the ObamaCare law was buried deeply and with deliberation. But when it explodes, the American taxpayer will feel the blast: Adding 10.8 million largely low-income people to those covered by the health “reform” will further explode the cost of an already unaffordable measure.
Obama and his Democratic allies will likely attempt to sell amnesty to the public with claims that it costs little and has nothing to do with health care. Both claims will be false.
But don’t expect members of Congress to read the bill. And don’t expect the few who do to find the hidden traps. In his remarks on Saturday, Reid also said, “We’re going to do immigration reform just like we did health-care reform.”

Not “thankful: for the $8 a week “tax cut” from Obama? (after all, don’t you understand that he reached into his own pocket to give you that money? It belongs to him.) But wait, there’s so much more:
Amnesty poison pill
Vast health bill for new legals – Reid: Passed ObamaCare with hidden help for legal immigrants.
On Saturday, Senate Major ity Leader Harry Reid told a Las Vegas audience: “We are going to pass comprehensive immigration reform” this year — using the “comprehensive” buzzword that everyone knows means amnesty for the 10.8 million or more illegal aliens now in the country.
But that amnesty means even more than it used to — because Democrats this year broke with long-standing precedent to ensure that, if legalized, these aliens would immediately qualify for ObamaCare’s health-insurance subsidies.
Reid’s remarks were just the latest in a series of pledges from Democratic leaders in Congress, as well as from President Obama, that they’ll really try to pass an amnesty bill this year — no matter how controversial.
Yet the controversy should be worse than ever — thanks to a disturbing change buried deep in the 2,400-page ObamaCare legislation: the effective end of the “public charge” doctrine.
This doctrine is nearly as old as US immigration law itself. It is the rule that no alien can be allowed into the United States if he is going to become a burden on the US taxpayer upon entry — a public charge.
In 1996, Congress added teeth to the doctrine by imposing a five-year bar on legal aliens receiving federal means-tested public benefits. In other words, no feeding at the public trough until you’ve been supporting yourself for five years. But now Democrats have eliminated the five-year bar with respect to the new health-care benefits.
The new law’s authors plainly realized this wouldn’t be popular. While the House health-care bill stated quite plainly that the five-year bar did not apply, the Senate version that became law did it via a torturous process that involved defining the health-care subsidy as a “tax credit” (though it’s available even to people who don’t pay taxes) and declaring that a lawfully present alien who’s not eligible for Medicaid (because of the five-year bar) is eligible for a health-care “tax credit.”
Why sneak such a provision into the law, when it goes against the sound economics of the public-charge doctrine and further burdens American taxpayers?
Perhaps to create a long-term constituency for ObamaCare.
Barely 40 percent of the American public favors the new law. Elections this fall and in 2012 will likely slash support for it in Washington; without a constituency to fight for it, it could be doomed.
And the best way to build a constituency is to extend its benefits to as many people as possible.
By setting aside the public-charge doctrine and allowing newly legalized aliens to become eligible for ObamaCare immediately, the amnesty would create 10.8 million new ObamaCare constituents, dependent upon Uncle Sam for free health care.
Five years later, those constituents would be naturalized citizens, voting Democratic to keep ObamaCare in place.
This hidden time bomb in the ObamaCare law was buried deeply and with deliberation. But when it explodes, the American taxpayer will feel the blast: Adding 10.8 million largely low-income people to those covered by the health “reform” will further explode the cost of an already unaffordable measure.
Obama and his Democratic allies will likely attempt to sell amnesty to the public with claims that it costs little and has nothing to do with health care. Both claims will be false.
But don’t expect members of Congress to read the bill. And don’t expect the few who do to find the hidden traps. In his remarks on Saturday, Reid also said, “We’re going to do immigration reform just like we did health-care reform.”

“You would think they should be saying thank you,” the president said to applause.
.
little oBama Antoinette making fun of hard working AMERICAN citizens. He has never accomplished a single constructive thing in his life and he has the arrogance to belittle WORKING taxpayers who gave up a day of work to exercise their PATRIOTIC right to protest.

Lydia – I understand how government works. And the armed forces is the ONLY thing the federal government is permitted constitutionally to fund.
You sound like the less wealthy people in this story:
Every day, ten men went to a restaurant for dinner. They always ordered the same meals, and the bill for their food always came to exactly $100.00. They did this day after day, year after year, without variation.
They did not divide the cost of the bill up equally among them, however. Since some of the men were more wealthy than others, they all agreed that an equal split would be unfair to those with less money. So, the men decided to pay the bill in precisely the same way we all pay our income taxes.
The first four men paid nothing at all. They ate for free. The fifth man paid $1.00; the sixth paid $3.00; the seventh paid $7.00; the eighth paid $12.00; the ninth paid $18.00. And the tenth man, who was by far the richest of them, paid exactly $59.00, which was most of the $100.00 bill. He didn’t mind, however, since he could afford to pay that amount. All was well. The ten men were happy with this arrangement, and they continued to eat at the restaurant every single day, enjoying their time together.
Then one day… the owner of the restaurant threw them a curve. As they stood at the counter to pay their bill, he announced that he would reduce the cost of the meals for them. “Since you are all such great customers, and I am so appreciative of your business,” he said, “I am going to reduce the total bill for your meals by $20.00. From now on, your ten dinners will cost you only $80.00.”
The men were pleased. But the situation did present a problem. How were they to divvy up the savings among them? Obviously, they could not simply credit $2.00 (one-tenth of the $20.00 savings) to each of the ten men, since that would mean that the first four men would actually be getting paid $2.00 to eat! No good. It only seemed fair that the first four men, who paid nothing to begin with, should likewise not get any of this $20.00 refund. But still, there was a problem. If they now divided the $20.00 savings among the remaining six men, that would be $3.33 per man. If that amount were subtracted from each man’s payment, then the fifth man and sixth man, who had been paying $1.00 and $3.00 respectively, would then be getting paid to eat. That wouldn’t work, either. No, the solution to this problem required some ingenuity.
Just then, the restaurant owner, who had been listening to the discussion, interrupted. He offered a solution. He suggested that the fairest way to settle this dilemma would be to reduce each man’s bill by the same proportion as he had been paying in the first place. The owner walked over to his calculator and figured out the amounts each man should pay. And so it was agreed.
The fifth man, instead of paying $1.00, now paid nothing, just like the first four men had always done. The sixth man paid $2.00 (reduced from $3.00); the seventh paid $5.00 (reduced from $7.00); the eighth paid $9.00 (reduced from $12.00); the ninth paid $12.00 (reduced from $18.00). This left the tenth man with a bill of $52.00, instead of his previous bill of $59.00. The men paid their bill according to this arrangement, and they left the restaurant, satisfied.
Outside the restaurant, however, the men began to compare their savings. The sixth man started complaining. “I only got one dollar out of the $20.00 savings. That’s not much,” he said. He pointed to the tenth man and declared, “And he got $7.00. What gives? That’s not fair. He’s rich. He doesn’t need the money. Why did he get $7.00, when I only got $1.00?”
“Yeah, that’s right,” exclaimed the fifth man. “I only saved a dollar, too. It’s unfair that the rich guy got seven times more than I did! I surely have a much greater need for money the he does.”
“That’s true,” shouted the seventh man. “Why should he get back $7.00, when I got back only $2.00? That stinks! The wealthy get all the breaks. The rich just get richer.”
“Wait a minute!” yelled the first four men in unison. “We didn’t get anything at all. Not one stinking cent! The rich fellow, who drives here every day in a Lexus, got $7.00, and we all take public transit to this restaurant, and we got nothing at all. This system exploits the poor.” With that, the men became angry. “And I lost everything,” said one of the four. “My wife left me, my daughter is in the hospital, and I can’t get work. I could sure use a break. Instead, I got not one lousy penny of the $20.00, and I have to watch this guy who’s filthy rich take $7.00 of it! I won’t stand for it!”
The nine men surrounded the tenth. Their anger mounted as they continued to express their resentment at what they thought was a supreme injustice. Finally, they lost control of their senses. They beat up the tenth man. They left him bloody in the street, and they went home.
The next day, the tenth man did not show up for their regular dinner. The nine men sat down and ate without him. But when it came time to pay the bill, they discovered something: they were $52.00 short! Needless to say, that was the last time those men ever ate at that restaurant.
I wish I could say that these nine men learned a valuable lesson, that they came to understand the principle upon which a tax cut is based. But they didn’t. They were too stupid to understand.

oops forgot the quip from Balloon Juice… but that’s likely a good thing. LOL.
Rick Perlstein also mentions that three things are different now than they were 50 years ago, when the same old same old happened in correlation with Kennedy’s election:
Back then there were even more reactionaries, the media covered the story with “more moral courage and civic wisdom” and…
“The third, and most crucial difference: back then, when it was Medicare, the center-left much more firmly understood the concept of the reactionary — that this small and predictable minority of obdurate Americans would automatically fight any serious social reform as harbinger of the apocalypse.
Politicians had the moral confidence to push it through nonetheless, past the shrieks of the scared extremists and their corporate ideological partners. Meanwhile, they rhetorically stigmatized the shriekers — confident that wise and enlightened legislation would before long establish cherished social rights (keep the government out of my Medicare!).”

Posted by: ellsbells930 | Apr 16, 2010 10:32:01 AM
And yet… let’s say the restaurant is New York….
Ezra Klein wrote yesterday: “Here’s my question for folks who think slight changes in marginal tax rates will drive rich people to move to another country: How do you explain New York? According to the Tax Foundation, it’s got the second-highest tax rates in the nation. And moving from one state to another isn’t very hard. But there are plenty of rich people over there. And more seem to arrive every day!
Rich people actually have a lot of money, so you’d expect tax-rate determinism to be much more prevalent among people with middle-class incomes. But I’ve certainly never met anyone who’s moved from one state to another to change their tax burden. Taxes just don’t seem to be a huge driver of behavior, which given the importance of friends and family and culture and climate and commerce and employment and inertia and kids in school and everything else that binds us to where we live, is rather as you’d expect.” (WaPo)
It works for the suburbs around me too.

We the Tea Party people should thank Obama–for waking us up.
What does Obama fear most?
An informed public and fierce independence.
Obama mocks the Tea Party because we are informed and strong, and nothing threatenes his agenda more than that.
Obama prefers uninformed and needy.
They keep him in the White House.

He is SO full of himself. I’m sik to death of hearing him and his name. We’re on a sinking ship and he’s holding the only bucket……….

This is poor journalism, poor at best. I read it to see why this country is so screwed up. I wrote the president to day and asked him why I should thank him? He thinks he is right. He is sure he is right. The bombers who blow themselves up are sure they are right, yet all of us are sure they are wrong. How can someone so wrong think they are right? Well, the entire democratic leadership is completely wrong, will find that out in November, and the leftist new media will follow. Each and every one of you should be ashamed. Move to Europe!!!

Message to Barack, et al…We will remember in November. Mock us at your peril.

So Talmag: Do you think people earning over 50,000 a year are RICH?
See, this is the problem. Who is deciding who is “rich”?…Is it 18 year olds who work at Ritas?
The tea party profile that has been all over the news is accurate in that most of us have JOBS and educations…most of us have paid our way and live modestly….we have families, college expenses, aging parents…and we make over 50,000…so…YOU think that makes us rich and that is why we are angry, because we realize that we will be taxed more because we are RICH?
Now I understand.
November 10
November 12

Obama is like a pregnant bride waddling down the aisle, squished into a snow white dress….. Baby? what baby?- Taxes? what taxes?

Mock away, Obama, it’s so funny that you have to acknowledge us at all. We’ll see ya in November.

Taxes? what taxes?
Posted by: cindy | Apr 16, 2010 12:24:19 PM
Be specific and precise. What taxes?
Because you sound like the paparazzi that photographs every sign of normal curves on celebrities who sell magazines and suggest its a baby bump. LOL. Nine months later, no baby….
David Leonhardt (WaPo)(reguting Tony Fratto’s criticism of his post yesterday)
” from 1979 to 2005 the average federal tax rate for the very highest-earning families fell 11.4 percentage points. For the bottom 80 percent of earners, the rate fell only 4 percentage points, and the drop was fairly equal across different sections of this bottom 80 percent, as you can see from the C.B.O. numbers. The drop was smaller for the top 20 percent of earners as a group (exempting the very richest households): about 2 percentage points. In fact, the very highest-earning families now pay only a slightly higher tax rate than the merely affluent.
What, then, explains Mr. Fratto’s statistics showing that the wealthy are paying a much larger share of taxes than in the past? Simply the fact that they’re earning a much larger share of income. The amount of tax they pay on each dollar of income has dropped — but they’re earning vastly more dollars, so they’re paying more taxes.
Once you think about it in this light, you see the problem with Mr. Fratto’s definition of tax burden. He is arguing that the tax burden on the wealthy has risen, but his argument boils down to the fact that the wealthy are paying more taxes because they have have received a big raise over the past 30 years and no other income group has. If this is what it means to have your tax burden increased, I know a lot of middle-class families who would be happy to accept.”
See “Debating the ‘Tax Burden’ and from his post yesterday:
“There is no question that the wealthy pay a higher overall tax rate than any other group. That is an American tradition. But there is also no question that their tax rates have fallen more than any other group’s over the last three decades. The only reason they are paying more taxes than in the past is that their pretax incomes have risen so rapidly — which hardly seems a great rationale for a further tax cut.
So why are those radio and television talk show hosts spending so much time arguing that today’s wealthy are unfairly burdened? Well, it’s hard not to notice that the talk show hosts themselves tend to be among the very wealthy.
No doubt, like the rest of us, they don’t particularly enjoy paying taxes. They are happy with the tax cuts they have received lately. They would prefer if other people had to pick up the bill for Medicare, Social Security and the military — people like, say, firefighters, preschool teachers, computer support specialists, farmers, members of the clergy, mail carriers, secretaries and truck drivers.”

Scheiffer also said, “”This is the core anti-Obama, anti-incumbent vote out there. These people are to the right of Republicans. But they really don’t like Barack Obama. They don’t like his programs…” failing to mention this, also available at the same site:
“Fifty-two percent believe too much has been made of the problems facing black people. Far fewer Americans overall — 28 percent — believe as much. Among non-Tea Party whites, the percentage who say too much attention has been paid to the problems of black people is 23 percent.”
Nor did he address their allegiance to Bush and birtherism, despite facts, allegiance to Glenn Beck or support of Sarah Palin despite thinking she wouldn’t be an effective President.
One wonders what happened to the alleged education and whether the education was in something exotic like conspiracy theory brainwashing. Lol.
But Jon Stewart was right when he pointed out that some of the coverage isn’t really fair and tends to generalize, just like the coverage of liberals and progressives.
Despite that, I won’t unilaterally disarm. Sorry.
If they’re really average Americans, as you claim, and not better educated, its important to recall that the average American IQ is below average (below 100)– and the average conservative IQ is lower than the average liberal IQ, according to recent studies.
The willful ignorance and lack of logic gets old. I don’t blame the President for being amused.

mamma…we are either going to raise taxes to address our fiscal insolvency or cut spending..Judging by the cash for appliances program that starts today..where you buy an appliance, submit your receipts, and the government sends you back an American Express gift card up to $1,500..it looks like we will be raising taxes.

Posted by: progressive mama | Apr 16, 2010 12:52:17 PM
A class warfare post and then a race warfare post. All before noon.

A class warfare post and then a race warfare post. All before noon.
Posted by: Foghorn Leghorn | Apr 16, 2010 1:02:49 PM
Well versed in class and race warfare? Or naive enough to think it hasn’t been a war raging for years?
LOL.
If I’m supposed to feel bad because you noticed, I do not. I’m very engaged in the battle. (you forgot to note the intellectual snootiness… its there too)

Judging by the cash for appliances program that starts today..
——–
Speaking of that, I love that so many stores are also adding on great deals. We’re doing renovations on a cabin and our house so I bought two new fridges and a new dryer and dishwasher–all Energy Star.
But I digress.
So you acknowledge you’re like the paparazzi and assuming there’s a baby bump– because after all, maybe you’ll be right– it’s possible. (but not fact as of right now…)

class warfare and racial warfare are started and continually fueled by the left.
_____
Of course you’d claim that. funny thing is I don’t think it was a leftie marching around with racist Obama signs and calling me names because I was campaigning for an African American in the summer of 2008.
Ran into similar types in Ohio.
But anyway….
David Brooks: ” But over the past few decades, the Republican Party has driven away people who live in cities, in highly educated regions and on the coasts. This expulsion has had many causes. But the big one is this: Republican political tacticians decided to mobilize their coalition with a form of social class warfare. Democrats kept nominating coastal pointy-heads like Michael Dukakis so Republicans attacked coastal pointy-heads.
Over the past 15 years, the same argument has been heard from a thousand politicians and a hundred television and talk-radio jocks. The nation is divided between the wholesome Joe Sixpacks in the heartland and the oversophisticated, overeducated, oversecularized denizens of the coasts….
…no American politician plays the class-warfare card as constantly as Palin. Nobody so relentlessly divides the world between the “normal Joe Sixpack American” and the coastal elite.” (NYT, 10/08)
I’d also recommend the piece on the grotesque elitism of Sarah Palin at TNR
(Leon Weitseltier):
” At the Tea Party convention in Nashville, Palin made a similar claim for the moral superiority of ordinariness, twangily championing “real people, not politicos, not inside-the-Beltway professionals,” and “everyday Americans,” and finally “the people.” Palin is packaging herself as the perfect image of the American mean. It is an affront to the heartland. But since the pitch is working-…a few clarifications are in order. For a start, there are no unreal people. Even Mitch McConnell is real. Even Frank Rich is real. The invocation of “the people” sounds inclusive, but it is a technique of exclusion. (This was also the case in the preamble to the Constitution.) It is based upon a particular definition of “the people.” How do Palin and the partiers know who the real Americans are? The mystical certainty of her divisive intuition reminds me of what intellectual historians used to call the “epistemological privilege” of Marx’s proletariat, his reprehensible old idea that access to truth is a feature of class position. Palin, too, is idealizing the proletariat for the uniqueness of its understanding, though her economics is starkly indifferent to its tribulations.”

Well versed in class and race warfare? Or naive enough to think it hasn’t been a war raging for years?
LOL.
Posted by: progressive mama |
It’s leftist demagoguery.

” He’s talking about much needed banking reform so we don’t have to put through another bailout when the banks squander away our savings. Would you rather repeat what happened in 2008?” – SuperG35
Dood, he’s got ya hooked Big Time.
We didn’t need to do what NoBo said we had to in 2008.
They did that to save his elite buddy’s butts.
We don’t need the banking reform those socialists are talking about.
All they had to do was let the big boys fail and support the mid to small banks who weren’t in trouble. That would have been a huge lesson provided by capitalism. The mid and small banks would have grown quickly to fill the void, we all would have got loans easier as well as refinancing and best of all, the Stupid Weenies™ who caused the mess would have been out of work.
Once again NoBo doesn’t have a clue because he has no experience in the areas he keeps sticking his nose in.

And today the tax rate is lower than 2006 for all but the highest earners in America.
In fact, our federal tax rate has been relatively steady over the past three decades, with recent declines. Though many ignored the Obama administration’s tax cut for the middle class for its positive effects, tax refunds this year were up by over 9 percent, reflecting that tax cut on middle class Americans.”
Posted by: progressive mama | Apr 16, 2010 1:07:59 PM
__________________________________

mamma, I’m all for stores offering great deals..I am not all for the government putting together some sweet deal with American Express to hand out gift cards as an enticement to buy appliances..paid for by your fellow struggling Americans! Good God almighty…do you think this is a good thing?..even if you are in the market for a fridge (or two) I’m guessing you have kids, does it bother you at all that they will be stuck with the bills for these gift cards, the clunker rebates, the weather stripping program, the homebuyer credits, the banking rescue, the GM bailout, the stimulus, the latest Afghan surge,the making home affordable flop, the NASA deep space program, the new healthcare entitlements…

Posted by: cindy | Apr 16, 2010 1:55:53 PM
Cindy, try to be realistic. It was the Republican Bush administration that cut taxes (ie. payments on the credit card) and then ran up the deficit until it doubled the national debt.
If the Republicans hadn’t cut the payments on the credit card, we’d be in far better shape with far less debt. They’re the ones who decided not to make the payments and stick our kids with the debt.
Oh yes, and it was unfortunate the economy collapsed on their shift as well – an unfortunate little thing . . .

Obama at Democratic Fundraiser: Tea Partiers Should Be Thanking Him for Tax Cuts………………. Why, Mr President did you leave town on BOTH of the Tea Party rallies in Washington? Why didn’t you stick around to tell them they should be thanking you.

Steady for three decades – WITH RECENT DECLINES. Taxes have declined recently. My gawd.
Posted by: Foghorn Leghorn | Apr 16, 2010 2:12:23 PM
___________________________________
You’re the one claiming taxes are high – why don’t you go right ahead and prove that?
And yes, after the Bush Republicans cut the payments on the credit card (cut taxes) he and the Republicans overspent and passed along their doubled national debt to the next administration – and to our children.
That is the responsible Republicans in operation.

Wrong. Please see earlier pm-mama’s post on historical taxation levels.
Foghorn Leghorn | Apr 16, 2010 1:43:43 PM
Please please PLEASE – anyone who cares, GOOGLE UP REAL DATA. The facts are clear and consistent.

People are paying low, low taxes right now.
Foghorn Leghorn | Apr 16, 2010 1:57:04 PM
Well, forty some percent of Americans are paying ZERO nation income tax right now. Some are making money thanks to Reagan’s brainchild, the Earned Income Credit. Is that low enough for you? How many people need to pay zero national income taxes before taxes are low enough? How long can our nation run on the Republican ‘charge it’ plan?

“And yes, after the Bush Republicans cut the payments on the credit card (cut taxes) he and the Republicans overspent and passed along their doubled national debt to the next administration – and to our children.
That is the responsible Republicans in operation. ” – tierra
Darling tierra, let me advise you to stop complaining/degrading/criticizing the Bush administration over things that Obama is doing 3 to 4 times more. It sounds like grade school when you complain about the Repubs caulking up debt for our children when your hero is doing it faster bigger and better, yet you don’t say anything bad about Barry. All you do is spread drool stained rose petals at his feet.

jhw: “I’m baffled how you can be honestly confused to hear that taxes in the US are low.”
Care to weigh in on U.S. corporate tax rate vs. other countries in the world?
If you think these (high) rates (2nd highest in the “developed” world, just behind Japan) do not matter, think again (I’m expecting, of course, that I’ll need to spell this out for you in a subsequent post)…

Care to weigh in on U.S. corporate tax rate vs. other countries in the world?
tjp612 | Apr 16, 2010 2:32:24 PM
Exxon-Mobile made $36 billion in profits in 2009. They paid $0 – not one cent – in US corporate taxes on that. Can you do the math on what that REAL rate is for me?

You claim we are paying “low, low taxes”. I called bs and used pm-mama’s post to rebut.
Foghorn Leghorn | Apr 16, 2010 2:32:48 PM
Why not use a REAL SOURCE?
Anyone reading for the sake of learning something, leave now and google around a bit. Sites with .gov on the end are usually good primary sources.

do you really think your sons will be fine because your ancestors were helped by gov programs?..
____
That’s not why I think they’ll be fine. That’s why I think they ought to help out others via their taxes and not shirk the responsibility that comes from living in a civilized nation where things like health care, infrastructure, green initiatives, and energy independence serve the commmon good alongside a strong national defense and emergency response system.
I think they’ll be fine because my husband and I are both small business owners who happened to be in industries and have stock portfolios that allowed us to see very early on what was coming– and, hence, we did the pragmatic things and we’re much better off now than we were in 2006, 2007, 2008. We felt the squeeze early, we adjusted to circumstances without clinging to the status quo– and our sons will be fine. I’m not an alarmist. I don’t freak out. I deal with reality.
Republicans have a terrible track record on the deficit and, hence, I don’t support them. I believe there are enough sensible people that will vote in people who will do what we need to do in the future. Given the backlash of the fearful, there may be some bumps in the road as many people don’t look at data and facts but vote very emotionally, giving in to fearmongering. But we’re on a better track than we have been.

progressive mama wrote: “If enough Dems stay in office and Obama is re-elected, we’ll make progress on the deficit. ”
.
Based on what evidence? When was the last time DEMOCRATS submitted a BALANCED budget?

“Well versed in class and race warfare? Or naive enough to think it hasn’t been a war raging for years?”
The next phase in the class battle will be Republicans claiming it’s ultimately the solemn duty of the middle class to deal with the debt they did a whole lot to help create instead of repealing the Bush tax cuts.

Tierra..dealing with what Bush left behind is a reality..YOU AND I AGREE..but playing the BUSH BLAME game . ..
____________________________________
I don’t play the BUSH BLAME game – I blame the Republican policies under Bush. They are the ones who cut taxes (payments against the debt) and increased spending and then watched the ‘strong, stable’ economy they had supposedly created collapse like a deck of cards. ‘Strong, stable’ Republican economy – sure thing.

You claim we are paying “low, low taxes”. I called bs and used pm-mama’s post to rebut.
Foghorn Leghorn | Apr 16, 2010 2:32:48 PM
Why not use a REAL SOURCE?
Anyone reading for the sake of learning something, leave now and google around a bit. Sites with .gov on the end are usually good primary sources.
Posted by: jhw539 | Apr 16, 2010 2:38:31 PM
I think this is a first. Usually people on the right are quite aghast at who and what I cite. LOL.
but the IRS has a lot of great graphs, data, numbers, charts… all that.
NPR and Matthew Yglesias both posted a couple charts regarding the tax rates of the wealthy– one graph shows the sharp incline of income and the other graph shows a very steady decline in taxes paid as a percentage of income. I also enjoyed Matthew’s snark: “this decline in their tax rates has created exciting new incentives for them to apply their talents. And that, in turn, is why the 2000s were a so much more economically successful decade than the 1990s, not just for the Top 400 but for the rest of us as well. Thanks to their skyrocketing incomes and falling tax rates, we’re currently all enjoying the fruits of prosperity, rapid growth, and low unemployment. Thanks rich guys!”
(Another interesting post at NPR: “Some Of The Rich Ask For Higher Taxes”:
” Hollender, co-founder of the eco-products company Seventh Generation, says he doesn’t believe in trickle-down economics — the theory that what benefits the rich helps everybody.
“These arguments are really about keeping money in the pockets of people who already have too much money,” Hollender says.
It might seem strange and novel that some rich liberals like Thompson and Hollender would campaign against their own financial interests on taxes. Naturally, they could give away their money — and they both do some of that.
And they say their embrace of taxes isn’t as weird as it might seem. There may be plenty of evidence to suggest otherwise. But these wealthy individuals point to a recent Quinnipiac University poll showing nearly two-thirds of those with household incomes of more than $250,000 a year support raising their own taxes to reduce the federal deficit.
In the past, other superrich people, including Warren Buffett and Bill Gates Sr. — father of the Microsoft founder — have championed their pro-tax stance. They said their wealth should be taxed heavily to support the public institutions they say allowed them to succeed. “

Based on what evidence? When was the last time DEMOCRATS submitted a BALANCED budget?
gk | Apr 16, 2010 2:57:57 PM
More recently than Republicans. I think that was the main point, what is yours?

Posted by: tjp612 | Apr 16, 2010 3:35:19 PM
Again conveniently ignores the almost free-fall economic collapse under the Bush administration – after the Republicans had 6 years to make sure the economy was ‘strong and stable’.
And conveniently ignores the effects of those millions of layoffs, bankruptcies, foreclosures, etc on local, state and national deficits and budgets.

(b.) U.S. tax policy (and, as applicable, cumbersome regulations) disincentivize U.S. corps. from keeping jobs in U.S.
tjp612 | Apr 16, 2010 3:28:33 PM
I guess that’s why Google started in Mexico, and Intel is based in low-tax Costa Rica, and airplanes are all made in third world, and Japan doesn’t manufacture *anything* anymore right?
Blindly pointing to the top US corporate income tax rate is meaningless in a vacuum – you think a corporation would be better off in Germany where they MUST provide 35 days of paid vacation (7 WEEKS OFF) every year and it’s easier to take out a hit on an employee than fire him (not to mention mandatory full pay maternity AND paternity leave, workplace regulations far exceeding OSHA, and other perks)? At least in the US companies are taxed on profit, not saddled with endless and expensive employment regulations (costs incurred regardless of whether a company is breaking even) seen in every other first world nation. Not to mention all the loop holes – looking at the money REALLY collected, the US takes 2.2% of the GDP in corporate income taxes while the average for OECD countries is a much higher 3.4% of GDP.
Hopefully anyone who actually cares about this subject will google up some sources on my supporting arguments and decide for themselves the real facts. The CBO put out an excellent study on this in November 2005 “Corporate Income Tax Rates: International Comparisons” and it is a favorite subject of magazines aimed at business owners who put their money where their mouth is.

Blindly pointing to the top US corporate income tax rate is meaningless in a vacuum…
Posted by: jhw539 |
Though less meaningless than blindly pointing to ExxonMobil’s 2009 tax liability.

“Countries do not create corportation in the U.S. Individuals do”
And there you have it. Corporations don’t care a hoot in heck about anything but the bottom line. It’s high time we treated them so.

When does Obama and Democrats take responsiblity for economy? Obama got his “stimulus” package and unemployment increased. It’s Obama’s economy now.
___________________________________
Nonsense. This is the economy that was left after the Republican Bush administration – an almost completely collapsed economy.
The collapse economy i not Obama’s doing. Is he now left to attempt to fix the mess left after the Bush administration – yes he is.
But you will remember, the collapse under Bush was the largest since the Great Depression – this is not as easy as flicking the channel on a TV.
Under Reagan, unemployment got steadily worse for 2 years, peaking at 10.8% and then staying at %10 for 6 more months. Even the smallest study of history and economics would put your comments into perspective.

Doesn’t this article we are posting about have the headline “Tea Partiers Should Be Thanking Him for Tax Cuts”? Strange isn’t it.
Posted by: Shoe | Apr 16, 2010 4:01:54 PM
________________________________________
Not really. In times of almost complete economic collapse it is widely recommended some tax cuts be put in place.
Obama is simply pointing out the the tea partiers that he has done this – given tax breaks. Tea partiers are delusional enough to think the Democrats have been wildly raising taxes. Delusional.

“There’s a good article on Politico about ‘the two Obamas’. The one who is practically worshipped inside the DC beltway, and the one who is, well, not very well liked outside of it.”
Posted by: Shoe | Apr 16, 2010 4:04:42 PM
______________________________________
More nonsense.
Gallup has the President at 49% approval rating – and you pretend only a select few in Washington like him?
Reagan fell to 35% – I guess almost nobody liked him according to your ‘logic’.

“Again, a stunning display from the Left of fundamental market economics. Which is why they are disasters at guiding the economy and governance in general”
Compared to whom?

It’s going to be more amusing when Obama becomes a lame duck president.
Of course he really can’t get votes from fellow Democrats without bribes.
Now that’s funny!

We should thank you!!! HELL NO! Obama is so stupid he has no idea what he is doing in that office the only reason he won was cause he was black and every one wanted a damn change the blacks wanted to feel equal to the whites. Cause half of them still didn’t! Obama just wants to mess the United States up cause he is a spy and is trying to bring america to be a poor country so that it doesnt have the beauty and wonders we have to offer, he need to be impeached now before he mess this country up anymore! Were going to be laughing at you Obama when you are leaving office NEVER to return again! WAKE UP AND LOOK AT WHAT WE THE AMERICAN PEOPLE WANT!! No more higher taxes!Oh, and for the him saying there are more jobs no he’s so blinded there are more people out of jobs then last year! What plant is he getting his infromation from!

The liberals have never had any problem with giving away anything that did not belong to them.

“Again, a stunning display from the Left of fundamental market economics. Which is why they are disasters at guiding the economy and governance in general”
Compared to whom?
Posted by: Skip | Apr 16, 2010 4:23:36 PM
____________________________________
Good question Skip – they’re stumped on that one.

“You might remember this – it was largely in 2008. The country is still suffering BADLY from that. Try to pretend that didn’t happen. Try to pretend it didn’t put the country in the mess its in. Obama is not responsible for the collapsed economy – he is responsible for trying to get up out of the mess left by the Bush administration.”
You know what else I remember of 2008? Reid and Pelosi were in control of Congress!
It’s the Democrats fault!

This cannot be a true statement. If you based your support purely on deficit spending, there is no way would be such an ardent admirer of Barack Obama and his ilk.
Posted by: tjp612 | Apr 16, 2010 3:35:19 PM
_________
I don’t base my support purely on deficit spending, but it is an important consideration– and since I’ve been able to vote, Dems have the much better record.
You were confused about Bruce Bartlett earlier, he’s a conservative and former Republican, now independent, who served as a domestic policy adviser to President Ronald Reagan and a Treasury official under President George H.W. Bush. Given his former loyalties, I take his willingness to speak out seriously. I could quote others, but he’s from the conservative world.
From his blog at Capital Gains and Games: “The problem for conservatives is that they don’t actually want to do anything to cut spending because that’s politically unpopular. So they have talked themselves into believing that if they just keep taxes down and refuse to support new ones that spending will magically fall on its own. Until they leave this dream world and are willing to not only support really big spending cuts but work hard to get them enacted, I don’t intend to pay much attention to them … Given the actions of Republicans over the last 10 years, they have zero–ZERO, ZERO, ZERO–credibility on the budget. Their record in power was to cut taxes willy nilly, enact every Republican sponsored pork barrel project no matter how worthless, create a massive new entitlement program to buy the votes of the elderly, start new wars without paying for a penny of the cost and then pull off a Big Lie.. by claiming that they are the party of fiscal responsibility. Anyone who believes this is [lots of colorful terms that basically mean ignorant or intellectually dishonest and very partisan] who doesn’t care anything about the truth as long as his side is winning.”

You know what else I remember of 2008? Reid and Pelosi were in control of Congress!
It’s the Democrats fault!
Posted by: tjp612 | Apr 16, 2010 5:09:07 PM
________________________________________
Nonsense. The Republicans had the presidency and the majority in congress for 6 straight years.
Six straight years to build a stable, strong Republican econony.
What happened after 6 years? Their ‘stable’, ‘strong’ economy collapsed like a house of cards.
I guess the Republican policies didn’t build a stable, strong economy after all. It built a sham, house of cards economy . . .

“Given the actions of Republicans over the last 10 years, they have zero–ZERO, ZERO, ZERO–credibility on the budget.”
So Obama/Reid/Pelosi run up annual deficits (two years in a row with more to come) that for the first time is measured in TRILLIONS and they have credibility on the budget? Really? How so?
Bush = Bad
Obama = Exponentially worse

I guess that’s why Google started in Mexico, and Intel is based in low-tax Costa Rica, and airplanes are all made in third world, and Japan doesn’t manufacture *anything* anymore right?
Blindly pointing to the top US corporate income tax rate is meaningless in a vacuum – you think a corporation would be better off in Germany where they MUST provide 35 days of paid vacation (7 WEEKS OFF) every year and it’s easier to take out a hit on an employee than fire him (not to mention mandatory full pay maternity AND paternity leave, workplace regulations far exceeding OSHA, and other perks)? At least in the US companies are taxed on profit, not saddled with endless and expensive employment regulations (costs incurred regardless of whether a company is breaking even) seen in every other first world nation. Not to mention all the loop holes – looking at the money REALLY collected, the US takes 2.2% of the GDP in corporate income taxes while the average for OECD countries is a much higher 3.4% of GDP.
Posted by: jhw539 | Apr 16, 2010 3:46:52 PM
_____________
nice post.
I remember reading during the campaign that while our corporate tax rate is considered the second highest in the world, we actually collect the fourth lowest in corporate taxes relative to the size of the economy, and one of the reasons for the ranking mismatch is the complexity (calculating out the deductions, credits and subsidies.

“What happened after 6 years? Their ‘stable’, ‘strong’ economy collapsed like a house of cards.”
Democrats took control of Congress after 6 years.
“I guess the Republican policies didn’t build a stable, strong economy after all. It built a sham, house of cards economy . . .”
Perhaps the Democrats in Congress mismanaged the stable, strong economy.
Place the blame anywhere you want, tierra. Obama knew what he was getting into and every president “inherits” challenges. There are many who were willing to give him a chance to move the dial in a positive direction (as witnessed by the 53% of voters who voted for him and the close to 70% of American who approved his job performance a year ago). Obama’s chief economic advisor stated that if the “stimulus” package did not pass, unemployment would surpass 8% (it moved past 10% and the same advisor is not predicting unemployment below 8% anytime before 2011).
The patience of Americans is waning and they do not approve of Obama’s performance across a number of measures, including the economy and healthcare (ironically, plurality approve of performance in Afghanistan). Republicans lead Democrats on the generic congressional ballot. Pundits of all stripes are predicting Republicans to take 30-60 House seats with an outside chance of taking control of Senate. This is a stunning reversal. So, keep going to the “Bush Did It!” well with assigning any degree of culpability to Obama is either willfully ignorant or blindingly partisan.

“Perhaps the Democrats in Congress mismanaged the stable, strong economy.”
ROFLMAO!
Strong and stable economy?
Built on a housing bubble made all the worse by derivatives assuming that bubble would never burst?
In a country that went from a budget surplus to half a trillion dollar deficits in short order under Republicans?
Tell us again how you understand economics?
We all could use the laugh.

“Strong and stable economy?”
tierra’s term, not mine…calm down….

“Think Republicans will be the first to dial down the war spending or implement tax increases and smart spending cuts?”
How do tax increases help the economy?
I’ll re-phrase my prior question: Why are more jobs being created in states with lower tax rates (TX, FL, TN, etc.) than in states with higher tax rates (CA, NJ, IL, NY, etc.)?
()

“But by all means, let’s ignore what has proven to work and instead promote re-distributionalist policies”
The greatest economic booms this country has experienced relied upon higher taxes on the wealthy and government programs like the GI Bill to either educate the workforce or the creation of infrastructure like the interstate highway system.

“See any of the posts and comments of so-called conservatives horrified at the thought of privatizing parts of the spaceflight program?”
Because when its their job dependent upon government money it matters.
Right wing ideology appeals to the selfish and the self centered so don;t be surprised when they ignore their so called sacred principles rather cavalierly.

“I am awash in the irony of a Social Democrat accusing conservatives of fearing privatization.”
Which part is ironic?
The sanctimonious free marketers demanding government subsidies part?

“Strong and stable economy?
Built on a housing bubble made all the worse by derivatives assuming that bubble would never burst?” – Ryan C
Kinda like that wonderful economy Clinton built on the Tech/Internet Bubble.
Ryan, blaming the cycles of commerce on Presidents is stupid and childish. Surely you can now understand that after the Clinton example comment above.
ROFLMAO!

Obama is simply pointing out the the tea partiers that he has done this – given tax breaks. Tea partiers are delusional enough to think the Democrats have been wildly raising taxes. Delusional.
Posted by: tierra | Apr 16, 2010 4:06:11 PM
Actually, the tea partiers are more concerned about what’s COMING now that Obama is getting his grip on our country. Think about this… if only 47% of Americans are paying federal taxes, yet Obama is passing ‘reform’ packages that will require MORE taxes to pay for them, the burden gets heavier and heavier on the other 53%. Not everyone in that 53% is ‘wealthy’. Most of them are like me. Not rich, but not ‘poor enough’ to get government goodies handed to us. As more and more legislation passes, but the number of tax payers doesn’t increase, I would think that is going to lead to serious problems. Don’t you?

How do tax increases help the economy?
Posted by: tjp612 | Apr 16, 2010 5:51:59 PM
We were talking about the deficit.
How does lowering the deficit once the recovery is stable help the economy? Do you know? When does it need to be done and why?
Good lord. Its kinda sad that I won’t even be surprised if you don’t know and you’re just talking about the deficit for no concrete reason– though I thought you kinda sorta knew what you were talking about despite the fear of reading anything anyone could possibly characterize as liberal or progressive or leftish. LOL.

“I am awash in the irony of a Social Democrat accusing conservatives of fearing privatization.”
Which part is ironic?
The sanctimonious free marketers demanding government subsidies part?
Posted by: Ryan C | Apr 16, 2010 5:59:40 PM
You’re more generous than I, Ryan C. I don’t think some of them even understand the free market, to be honest. They just memorize rhetoric and don’t get the inconsistencies between what they say, support and do.
I’m convinced its really about conserving the status quo for most of them because they’re rooted in fear and they’re most comfortable doing what their bosses/partriarchs tell them to– but then pretending its about something more Wild West or something to feel cool. Although “pretending” would denote a certain amount of self awareness and calculation I don’t often detect at the Joe Six Pack level (otherwise referred to as the “real American” level).Hence, there’s the “duped” and/or happily ignorant argument– just mouthing rhetoric and voting in wholly owned subsidiaries of special interests.

“You’re more generous than I, Ryan C.”
That would be a first.
“I don’t think some of them even understand the free market, to be honest. They just memorize rhetoric and don’t get the inconsistencies between what they say, support and do.”
“I’m convinced its really about conserving the status quo for most of them because they’re rooted in fear and they’re most comfortable doing what their bosses/partriarchs tell them to”
I would agree.

“Think about this… if only 47% of Americans are paying federal taxes”
Your premise starts out with a lie.
40% pay no net federal income tax.
They pay plenty of other federal taxes.
Posted by: Ryan C | Apr 16, 2010 6:52:56 PM
Taken from an Associated Press article by Stephen Ohlemacher on April 7, 2010:
About 47 percent will pay no federal income taxes at all for 2009. Either their incomes were too low, or they qualified for enough credits, deductions and exemptions to eliminate their liability. That’s according to projections by the Tax Policy Center, a Washington research organization.
The result is a tax system that exempts almost half the country from paying for programs that benefit everyone, including national defense, public safety, infrastructure and education. It is a system in which the top 10 percent of earners — households making an average of $366,400 in 2006 — paid about 73 percent of the income taxes collected by the federal government.
The bottom 40 percent, on average, make a profit from the federal income tax, meaning they get more money in tax credits than they would otherwise owe in taxes. For those people, the government sends them a payment.
By the way Ryan C, I don’t appreciate your ‘opinion’ that my post started out with a ‘lie’. If you don’t like it, take it up with the AP writer.

He has not cut taxes, he has increased them over 600B if I remember correctly & it is going to increase another 2T by the time we are able to get him out of office. The Tea Party People shouldn’t be thanking him, they should be trying to get him impeached.

The majority of Americans believe Obama will raise taxes on those making less than $250K.
In other words–they don’t trust him.
Go figure.
Even some of those still supporting him DO NOT trust him.

The federal tax burden on the economy is $36,000 for a family of 4.
If Obama thinks he should be getting glowing thanks, maybe he should think again.

Thanks Obama.
For creating or saving millions of Republicans!!!!
Newsflash for Obama.
Mocking the Tea Party is not too smart since many are Independents. They put him in the White House and can take him out.
I thought Obama was brilliant.

“Mocking the Tea Party is not too smart since many are Independents”
Sarah Palin hijacking the Tea Party movement will fix that. Any ‘Independent’ who likes Sarah Palin is really just another Republican who’s too ashamed to admit it.

Unpresidential, out of touch, thin-skinned, petty, condescending, terrified.
Obama reminds me of other leaders that feels the need to control everything because they are so afraid of free speech and strong independent thought.
Nothing scares them more than knowledge.
Obama likes his people uninformed and dependent on him.
When they aren’t he berates them.
Usually in front of his rich friends.

Obama laughing it up with his rich pals and looking down his nose at the working class of America.
He just can’t help himself.
That massive ego will be the end of Obama.
Who will get the last laugh?

Any ‘Independent’ who likes Sarah Palin is really just another Republican who’s too ashamed to admit it.
Posted by: Skip |
While you’re at it can you stereotype the folks that despise her for us.

===========================
In the ObamaNation, there is no “United” States of America.
===========================
Obama has clearly divided this country into two camps – the “us” camp and the “them” camp. He loves the “us” citizens. He has no problem denigrating citizens in the “them” camp and encouraging those in the “us” camp to do the same.
===========================
The ObamaNation is one of class warfare, pitting one citizen against another. And it all starts at the top.
===========================
Dear Mr. President,
Could you please demonostrate some degree of respect for all citizens.
===========================

Nonsense. When you’ve got people parading around with Obama depicted as Hitler with signs protesting …
Posted by: tierra |
Honey, you are at least two stereotypes behind.

Oh and contrary to popular belief taxes dont have to be raised
___________________________________
Oh they certainly will have to be raised after the Republicans under Bush cut taxes, increased spending, doubled the national debt and then watched as the economy went into almost free-fall collapse destroying millions of jobs, local, state and federal budgets.

” . . . . increased spending, doubled the national debt and then watched as the economy went into almost free-fall collapse destroying millions of jobs, local, state and federal budgets.” – tierra
Wow when I read the above I thought tierra was finally criticizing the Democrats and Obama.
Then I looked again and saw “the Republicans under Bush”.
Her quote could have easily read the following and been more accurate than the original. Note: I had to remove the cut taxes part because the Demos would never do that.
The Democrats under Obama increased spending, tripled (was doubled) the national debt and then watched as the economy went into almost free-fall collapse destroying millions of jobs, local, state and federal budgets.

Obama sucks. End of discussion.

A Sarah Palin Hater™ is someone who lives in fear of moral values and consequences.
___________
How lame. If you ask those who actually believes she’s hotter and smarter than Obama, or liberals, or “you” and would be willing to vote for her for President (or at least say as much to aggravate those who find that notion rather absurd) … a Palin hater is anybody who isn’t on the bandwagon— or is unreal— or unAmerican— or into an unAmerican (aka liberal or progressive or pragmatic) agenda— or lives in unreal America (aka cities)— or can see that Sarah Palin is a phoney baloney.
And of course anyone willing to be as snarky or divisive or feisty in response to her snarkiness, divisiveness and feistiness– because, you know, all that is only admired if you’re doing it for the so-called “conservative” team.
lol.
Moral values and consequences have nothing to do with it. I actually think many conservatives don’t even understand moral values or consequences. Palin manages to wriggle out of accepting responsibility for her own actions (I didn’t really quit; I’m not a quitter, I’m just not governor anymore; she avoided the findings of Branchflower’s report in responding to questions about whether she abused her power as governor using a ham-handed and co-ordinated application of pressure on Monegan out of personal interest; its Katie Couric’s fault that she bombed in her interview… and so on; even McCain’s aides said her book was a piece of fiction)
Morality and consequences *is* part of their rhetoric– part of the attempt to feel better about themselves and better than somebody–anybody!– while clinging to the status quo and grasping for validation of their fear and greed. But the rhetoric–again–doesnt’ match up with reality or results.
Its amusing to me that the Palinista crowd applauds dishing it out, but feigns horror (and whines) at getting it dished back.

“The only thing I could glean from what he said was Palin Haters don’t like hunting”
Shooting wolves from a helicopter is not ‘hunting’….and neither is getting tanked and shooting truckloads of helpless little birds in a confined area like Cheney likes to do. Even those of us who don’t participate in the sport know real hunting requires some skill.

Most people don’t hate Palin, they just recognize she’s not that smart and should be nowhere near the reins of power.

“Most people don’t hate Palin, they just recognize she’s not that smart and should be nowhere near the reins of power.”
tierra
Why tierra, that didn’t stop someone as dumb as Barack Hussein Obama.
Palin is smarter than him.
Remember, smart is as smart does.

Noz, how was it smart for Palin to quit being governor?
Or is your definition of smart going where the money is? In that case she is smart to quit to make time for ‘writing’ books and hitting the paid speech tour. But is that what we need or should want in a elected official, someone who goes where the most money is for them? That kind of person does not belong in a public service job, for obvious reasons.

The federal tax burden on the economy is $36,000 for a family of four.
The feds take in 2.7 trillion a year and there are 300 million residents of the US. Do the math.
Do they pay it as ‘income tax’?
No, they mostly pay it as ‘high prices’ because we’ve chosen to ‘tax the rich’ , i.e. the producers of the goods and services we buy.
What do producers (‘the rich’) do when their taxes go up? The same thing you would do , they raise the prices of their product or service to cover the additional expense.
So who really ends up paying the taxes for ‘the rich’?
You do.

Tax incentives are not the same thing as tax cuts. Tax cuts require the government to reign in spending. Tax incentives redistribute other people’s money to incentivize a firm to do something they wouldn’t normally do (ceteris paribus).
Why would a small business spend $15k – $100k (or whatever) to get a couple of grand in tax incentives during these uncertain times?
We’ll see you in November.

“Noz, how was it smart for Palin to quit being governor?
Or is your definition of smart going where the money is?” – Lydia
Geee, I haven’t been following this so I don’t know how the media has painted the story but my understanding is it was the frivolous lawsuits that drove her out. Partisan passionate folks with lots of money using our legal system as a weapon.

“Speaking at a Democratic fundraiser tonight, President Obama touted his administration’s tax cuts and said that the recent tea party rallies across the nation have “amused” him.
“You would think they should be saying thank you,” the president said to applause.”