World Politics

[redtreviso]

Now I would have thought one of you lefties would have had something to say about the Senator's speech just a few years ago. Do any of you agree with what he said then? How about what he's saying now?

Just curious. LOL

You voted for GEORGE W BUSH.,. so stfu already

 

[Hugh Januss]

Now I would have thought one of you lefties would have had something to say about the Senator's speech just a few years ago. Do any of you agree with what he said then? How about what he's saying now?

Just curious. LOL

Quit being a dipstick Scott, even you know the difference between the two situations.

 

[redtreviso]

""As economist Michael Hudson points out, the European debt crisis is really the product of financial warfare instigated by big banks. Yes, these banks are engaged in warfare against the rest of society. What's going on in Greece is exactly what's going to happen in America very shortly. Why? Because in every industrialized country, the big banks are in the process of offloading their bad debts onto governments. They are then forcing these governments to sell off national assets so that the bankers can be paid what they consider to be their due. (For more about this, see the linked video at this web site, about Greece being a dress rehearsal for the US.)

In a nutshell, what it says is that the world is being prepared for the kind of "neo-feudalism" that these banksters (intent on ever more completely becoming our masters and lords) intend to implement. And so it is that America is in the early stages of being subjected to the same type of plundering as Greece and Ireland.

As Hudson explained in 2008, what these banksters and their cohorts are really trying to do is to roll back the Enlightenment, roll back the moral philosophy and social values of classical political economy and its culmination in Progressive Era legislation, as well as the New Deal institutions that embody such legislation. They're not trying to make the economy more equal, and they're not trying to share power -- just the opposite: Their aim is to implement a kind of pre-industrial and even feudal socioeconomic system. What this means is that our economy is being pushed back and put on the road to debt peonage. Hence forth, most manufacturing will be done in Asia and Europe.

What we have here, therefore, is indeed a "Road to Serfdom." It is just the opposite of the government sponsorship of economic progress and rising living standards that we had until Reagan took the White House. Rather, it's the dismantling of democratic government and the dissolution of regulatory agencies, for the purpose of creating this new kind of neo-feudal system. (Don't miss Max Keiser's discussion of this neo-feudalism on the Keiser Report. Just scroll down until you see a picture of economist Michael Hudson on the linked video screen.)""

http://www.opednews.com/articles/The-Ultimate-Goal-of-the-B-by-Richard-Clark-110714-667.html

 

[Hugh Januss]

Wow. You spew stupidity, get called out and commence with the name calling. My God, I have never seen this behavior before.

Yeah come on Chris it's ok to call someone stupid, but azzclown just goes over the line.

 

[redtreviso]

""Where did all the jobs go? Small and medium-sized businesses are the major source of new job creation, and they are not hiring. Startup businesses, which contribute a fifth of the nation's new jobs, often can't even get off the ground. Why?

In a June 30 article in the Wall Street Journal titled "Smaller Businesses Seeking Loans Still Come Up Empty," Emily Maltby reported that business owners rank access to capital as the most important issue facing them today; and only 17% of smaller businesses said they were able to land needed bank financing. Businesses have to pay for workers and materials before they can get paid for the products they produce, and for that they need bank credit; but they are reporting that their credit lines are being cut. They are being pushed instead into credit card accounts that average 16 percent interest, more than double the rate of the average business loan. It is one of many changes in banking trends that have been very lucrative for Wall Street banks but are killing local businesses.

Why banks aren't lending is a matter of debate, but the Fed's decision to pay interest on bank reserves is high on the list of suspects. Bruce Bartlett, writing in the Fiscal Times in July 2010, observed:

Economists are divided on why banks are not lending, but increasingly are focusing on a Fed policy of paying interest on reserves -- a policy that began, interestingly enough, on October 9, 2008, at almost exactly the moment when the financial crisis became acute. . .
""

http://www.opednews.com/articles/Why-Banks-Aren-t-Lending--by-Ellen-Brown-110716-833.html

 

[Anonymous]

Quit being a dipstick Scott, even you know the difference between the two situations.

You mean that in 2006 the Senator voted 'no' to raise the debt ceiling past 8.6 Trillion (read the speech, it's on point) but now the world will spin backwards if we don't go to nearly 17 Trillion?

I mean, why stop at just a 2.4 Trillion increase? Oh, that's right... that's just enough additional borrowing to get us through the 2012 election cycle.

Can't have that hanging over Obama's head when he's in re-election mode....

 

[redtreviso]

You mean that in 2006 the Senator voted 'no' to raise the debt ceiling past 8.6 Trillion (read the speech, it's on point) but now the world will spin backwards if we don't go to nearly 17 Trillion?

I mean, why stop at just a 2.4 Trillion increase? Oh, that's right... that's just enough additional borrowing to get us through the 2012 election cycle.

Can't have that hanging over Obama's head when he's in re-election mode....

Scott=7 times silence..

 

[redtreviso]

""For all those feeling the pinch this Tax Day, rest assured America’s wealthiest one percent have no idea what you’re going through. Not only have they shaved a projected collective $121 billion off their income taxes thanks to Bush’s tax cuts for the rich but, thanks to misuse of agricultural tax breaks, many will not end up paying their fair share of property taxes either.

Take Michael Dell, founder of Dell Computers and the second-richest Texan, who qualified for an agricultural property tax break on his sprawling 1,757-acre residential ranch in suburban Austin and saved over $1 million simply because his family and friends sometimes use the land as a private hunting preserve to shoot deer. Or take billionaire publisher Steve Forbes, who got more than a 90 percent property tax reduction on hundreds of acres of his multimillion-dollar estate in upscale Bedminister, New Jersey, just by putting a couple of cows out to pasture. They are not alone. All across the country, a huge number of America’s wealthiest are tapping into agricultural tax breaks—and none of them have to do any real farming to qualify.""

""Bush has used the farm-tax dodge scheme on at least two properties in the last two decades. When he was governor of Texas, Bush’s lakeside home near Athens, nestled in a secluded pine forest shared with a few other high-powered homeowners, lost its agricultural tax exemption, but was then promptly redesignated as “scenic land” under a similar law and taxed at massively reduced value of $101,770. In 1998, his tax bill was a measly $543.07. (The owner of a $100,000 home in a drab tract development on the very outskirts of Austin would pay somewhere around $3,000.)""


http://www.thenation.com/article/159943/tax-day-farms-owned-rich-provide-massive-tax-shelter

 

[Anonymous]

Scott=7 times silence..

Ah, the comment from the guy who has a thought so therefore the thought must be true.

Btw, who is silent right now?

Why not a 5 Trillion increase? 10 Trillion even. You believe in the Keynes/Krugman garbage. Shouldn't we just borrow another couple of Trillion to stimulate the economy?

Let's just take the national debt to 20 Trillion. That should really stimulate things, no?

In a report released Wednesday—”Estimated Impact of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act on Employment and Economic Output from October Through December 2010″—the CBO said it now estimates the stimulus law cost a total of $821 billion, up from CBO’s original estimate that the stimulus would cost $787 billion.

In the same report, the CBO estimated that in the fourth quarter of 2010 there were somewhere between 1.3 million and 3.5 million people who were then employed who would not have been had the stimulus not been enacted. “CBO estimates,” says the report, “that ARRA’s policies had the following effects in the fourth quarter of calendar year 2010: … Increased the number of people employed by between 1.3 million and 3.5 million.”

Previously, the CBO had said that the number of jobs saved or created was between 1.3 million and 3.6 million, so let’s be generous and go with the slightly higher number.

Take that $821,000,000,000 and divide it by 3,600,000 and you get $228,055.56. Divide it by 1,300,000 and you get $631,538.46. It would’ve been cheaper if we’d just written all 3.6 million people a check for $100,000.00 and called it a day.

http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/2009-stimulus-bill-cost-228055-per-job-saved-or-created/


This govt knows what it's doing. I mean our leaders just ooze competence.

 

[redtreviso]

Ah, the comment from the guy who has a thought so therefore the thought must be true.

Btw, who is silent right now?

Why not a 5 Trillion increase? 10 Trillion even. You believe in the Keynes/Krugman garbage. Shouldn't we just borrow another couple of Trillion to stimulate the economy?

Let's just take the national debt to 20 Trillion. That should really stimulate things, no?





http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/2009-stimulus-bill-cost-228055-per-job-saved-or-created/


This govt knows what it's doing. I mean our leaders just ooze competence.

Just borrow some money from Goldman Sachs scott..Better yet UBS...Tell them Phil Gramm is your savior..

 

[Anonymous]

""For all those feeling the pinch this Tax Day, rest assured America’s wealthiest one percent have no idea what you’re going through. Not only have they shaved a projected collective $121 billion off their income taxes thanks to Bush’s tax cuts for the rich but, thanks to misuse of agricultural tax breaks, many will not end up paying their fair share of property taxes either.

Take Michael Dell, founder of Dell Computers and the second-richest Texan, who qualified for an agricultural property tax break on his sprawling 1,757-acre residential ranch in suburban Austin and saved over $1 million simply because his family and friends sometimes use the land as a private hunting preserve to shoot deer. Or take billionaire publisher Steve Forbes, who got more than a 90 percent property tax reduction on hundreds of acres of his multimillion-dollar estate in upscale Bedminister, New Jersey, just by putting a couple of cows out to pasture. They are not alone. All across the country, a huge number of America’s wealthiest are tapping into agricultural tax breaks—and none of them have to do any real farming to qualify.""

""Bush has used the farm-tax dodge scheme on at least two properties in the last two decades. When he was governor of Texas, Bush’s lakeside home near Athens, nestled in a secluded pine forest shared with a few other high-powered homeowners, lost its agricultural tax exemption, but was then promptly redesignated as “scenic land” under a similar law and taxed at massively reduced value of $101,770. In 1998, his tax bill was a measly $543.07. (The owner of a $100,000 home in a drab tract development on the very outskirts of Austin would pay somewhere around $3,000.)""


http://www.thenation.com/article/159943/tax-day-farms-owned-rich-provide-massive-tax-shelter

Not only have they shaved a projected collective $121 billion off their income taxes thanks to Bush’s tax cuts for the rich

A lie. It was a lie yesterday, it's a lie today and will be a lie tomorrow.

Wash, rinse, repeat.


As for the rest... The govt has this thing called a tax code. Michael Dell didn't write it. Neither did Steve Forbes. But I suppose it makes sense to the promoters of class warfare (your kind) not to mention the stupidity of the tax code (the source of the issue) but to continue to bash those who actually play by the rules as written.

 

[Anonymous]

Just borrow some money from Goldman Sachs scott..Better yet UBS...Tell them Phil Gramm is your savior..

So you are in favor of runnaway debt? Got it.

 

[Anonymous]

""Bush has used the farm-tax dodge scheme on at least two properties in the last two decades.

So Bush wrote the tax code? Good to know.

 

[redtreviso]

So Bush wrote the tax code? Good to know.

The point is........There are MASSIVE instruments in place already and they are taken full advantage of, for those who feel/scream about being so put upon about paying taxes. Entire countries exist just to launder and shelter (US)money.. Pardon me if I don't give a f if someone making 350k has to pay an extra 700 dollars.

 

[Anonymous]

The point is........There are MASSIVE instruments in place already and they are taken full advantage of, for those who feel/scream about being so put upon about paying taxes. Entire countries exist just to launder and shelter (US)money.. Pardon me if I don't give a f if someone making 350k has to pay an extra 700 dollars.

Envy much?


Do you take advantage of the home mortgage tax-dodge scheme?

Why would you do that when the enlightened thing to do, for the good of the collective, would be to send additional tax revenue to Timmy? You want to be part of the solution don't you? C'mon man, lead be example.

 

[redtreviso]

Envy much?


Do you take advantage of the home mortgage tax deduction scheme?

Why would you do that when the enlightened thing to do, for the good of the collective, would be to send additional tax revenue to Timmy? You want to be part of the solution don't you? C'mon man, lead be example.

I mow my yard.. It is no harder for my right wing neighbor who whines like the little republican *&tch that he is, yet he complains and complains.. Go mow your yard scotty and stfu.

 

[Anonymous]

I mow my yard.. It is no harder for my right wing neighbor who whines like the little republican *&tch that he is, yet he complains and complains.. Go mow your yard scotty and stfu.

So then you take advantage of the home mortgage interest tax-dodge scheme.

It's ok man, I do too. We are all tax-dodgers aren't we?

 

[Hugh Januss]

You mean that in 2006 the Senator voted 'no' to raise the debt ceiling past 8.6 Trillion (read the speech, it's on point) but now the world will spin backwards if we don't go to nearly 17 Trillion?

I mean, why stop at just a 2.4 Trillion increase? Oh, that's right... that's just enough additional borrowing to get us through the 2012 election cycle.

Can't have that hanging over Obama's head when he's in re-election mode....

He voted no then because he saw it for what it was, a way of making it appear that the country and economy were still fine while the rich stole that last few dollars from the middle class. Now almost all the wealth is in the hands of people who don't need to create a single new job in order to make money off of their money. Who in fact probably keep very little of their money in the US, because they know we are going down.
Now he is trying to raise the ceiling in a probably futile attempt to repair the massive damage of the Bush years of ultra wealthy profit taking.
You asked me once before who are the "rich". Well it's not you and it's not me, the only difference between us is that you can't tell they are fvcking you.

 

[rhubroma]

Let's say you get your wish. Let's say there is 100% income tax on earned income over $250,000. That would equate to about $1.4 Trillion. It would also only happen one time as there will no longer be any incentive to earn more than $250k.

If we elimnated the military that would save about $700 Billion. That's about half of the $1.5 Trillion we will borrow this year.

So what should we do?

Scott when the republicans refuse to give an inch on capital gains tax, I really couldn't give a damn about the percentages, because it just looks so obscene to the struggling masses.

Politics is also image, perhaps even principle. At least that's what the revolutionary movements fought for and believed in.

Now I'm not so ingenuous as to believe in the success of revolution, because in the end the new power always obeys the rules of power, which are two: to maintain it and, if possible, to increment it. However the alternative is to live without principle. Otherwise it's just about resignation and that's what the leadership profits from more than anything else.

What seems so irrational and obscene in the tax code as it is set up; is that a Warren Buffet who can live more than comfortably on his capital gains alone, is only taxed 17% on them, whereas his secretary who can only live on her labor (which is infinitely smaller than the profit gained from Buffet's capital gains) is taxed at 35% (on her 60 K annual salary).

That the republicans are absolutely against, above all in these times, an increase on capital gains tax in Obama's agenda, only demonstrates how perverse and out of touch with the reality of the majority working class in the country they are.

That the Tea Party, a majority working class movement, so fanatically opposes such a maneuver based on ideology, only demonstrates how little they understand about their own interests and also how much they believe in an American dream that says everybody can get rich, which, in reality (above all today), has not only past its expiration date, but has become a form of collective psychosis.

 

[Anonymous]

He voted no then because he saw it for what it was, a way of making it appear that the country and economy were still fine while the rich stole that last few dollars from the middle class. Now almost all the wealth is in the hands of people who don't need to create a single new job in order to make money off of their money. Who in fact probably keep very little of their money in the US, because they know we are going down.
Now he is trying to raise the ceiling in a probably futile attempt to repair the massive damage of the Bush years of ultra wealthy profit taking.
You asked me once before who are the "rich". Well it's not you and it's not me, the only difference between us is that you can't tell they are fvcking you.

Why am I not surprised you could take the nearly 5 Trillion dollars in debt added under this President and justify continued unrestrained spending all the while blaming Bush and "rich" people (who you still can't define)?

If there ever were a time to put a LOL in, this is it. LOL

 

[Anonymous]

Scott when the republicans refuse to give an inch on capital gains tax, I really couldn't give a damn about the percentages, because it just looks so obscene to the struggling masses.

Politics is also image, perhaps even principle. At least that's what the revolutionary movements fought for and believed in.

Now I'm not so ingenuous as to believe in the success of revolution, because in the end the new power always obeys the rules of power, which are two: to maintain it and, if possible, to increment it. However the alternative is to live without principle. Otherwise it's just about resignation and that's what the leadership profits from more than anything else.

What seems so irrational and obscene in the tax code as it is set up; is that a Warren Buffet who can live more than comfortably on his capital gains alone, is only taxed 17% on them, whereas his secretary who can only live on her labor (which is infinitely smaller than the profit gained from Buffet's capital gains) is taxed at 35% (on her 60 K annual salary).

That the republicans are absolutely against, above all in these times, an increase on capital gains tax in Obama's agenda, only demonstrates how perverse and out of touch with the reality of the majority working class in the country they are.

That the Tea Party, a majority working class movement, so fanatically opposes such a maneuver based on ideology, only demonstrates how little they understand about their own interests and also how much they believe in an American dream that says everybody can get rich, which, in reality (above all today), has not only past its expiration date, but has become a form of collective psychosis.

There are a handful of Warren Buffet's and millions of much smaller no-name investors who risk their capital everyday. Buffet will be fine no matter what the Cap Gain rate of tax.

You want to curb available private equity? Honestly, I really don't care, but I'd imagine if you double Cap Gain taxes two things will happen. 1) Economic activity will further erode and 2) Timmy at Treasury won't see much additional tax revenue.

But at least you will feel better about punishing those who drive the economy.

 

[redtreviso]

Why am I not surprised you could take the nearly 5 Trillion dollars in debt added under this President and justify continued unrestrained spending all the while blaming Bush and "rich" people (who you still can't define)?

If there ever were a time to put a LOL in, this is it. LOL

Its called damage control.. due to how YOU voted.. but lets all stop and worry about taxes on dividend income and write offs for that new african mahogany interior for the Gulfstream .. boo fn hoo

 

[redtreviso]

So then you take advantage of the home mortgage interest tax-dodge scheme.

It's ok man, I do too. We are all tax-dodgers aren't we?

Right.. this is about like confronting a murderer and having him say .. " well you drove 77 in a 70mph zone".. (Chris Dodd's discount loan from countrywide)..

 

[rhubroma]

There are a handful of Warren Buffet's and millions of much smaller no-name investors who risk their capital everyday. Buffet will be fine no matter what the Cap Gain rate of tax.

You want to curb available private equity? Honestly, I really don't care, but I'd imagine if you double Cap Gain taxes two things will happen. 1) Economic activity will further erode and 2) Timmy at Treasury won't see much additional tax revenue.

But at least you will feel better about punishing those who drive the economy.

Someday we will be capable of thinking beyond merely those who drive the economy.

Beyond the economy itself, or else the talked about mutual guaranteed destruction (or the enslavement of the masses) will not only be the stuff of science fiction.

Whereas I'm not so sure what you refer to as so called "driving the economy" isn't in reality the unbridled exploitation of it, under the aegis of government, and to the detriment of the collective. The obsession with so called economic activity, without a more equitable distribution of wealth, in a market without principle where the only governing law is pure greed, has gotten us to precisely where we are. While what you call punishment is what I see as taking responsibility for one's actions. Nothing more. Especially in this hyper-business world, in this management universe.

 

[Hugh Januss]

Someday we will be capable of thinking beyond merely those who drive the economy.

Beyond the economy itself, or else the talked about mutual guaranteed destruction (or the enslavement of the masses) will not only be the stuff of science fiction.

Whereas I'm not so sure what you refer to as so called "driving the economy" isn't in reality the unbridled exploitation of it, under the aegis of government, and to the detriment of the collective. The obsession with so called economic activity, without a more equitable distribution of wealth, in a market without principle where the only governing law is pure greed, has gotten us to precisely where we are. While what you call punishment is what I see as taking responsibility for one's actions. Nothing more. Especially in this hyper-business world, in this management universe.

All he knows is how to kowtow to the "movers and shakers" of the economy because that is what he learned from "Atlas Shrugged".