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Democrats May Stop Bush-Era Tax Cuts for Wealthy From Expiring
Democrats are considering a plan to delay tax hikes on the wealthy for two years because the economic recovery is slow and they fear getting crushed in November's election.
Democrats are considering a plan to delay tax hikes on the wealthy for two years because the economic recovery is slow and they fear getting crushed in November's election. (photo by Flickr user Tracy O) It could mean a big reprieve for families earning $250,000 and above annually.
President George W. Bush's tax cuts will expire at the end of the year unless Congress acts to delay their sunset.
Some Democrats are now arguing forcefully that a delay is a win-win plan that would help the federal budget without hurting the economy.
Wealthy families would not have an incentive to cut back on spending and budget writers could assume an inflow of tax funds in future years, making five- and 10-year budget projections look less scary.
Rep. John Yarmuth (D-Ky.), a member of the Ways and Means Committee, which has jurisdiction over taxes, said some of his Democratic colleagues have discussed the idea out of fear of impeding the nation's economic recovery.
"I've heard some sentiment about raising the rate but not making it effective until 2012," he said.
During the 2008 presidential campaign, President Obama said he would not extend the Bush-era tax cuts for families earning more than $250,000.
Obama promised that families earning less than $250,000 would not see their taxes increase.
But vulnerable Democrats in Congress are worried about talk of raising taxes, even on the wealthiest families, when the national economic recovery has slowed.
"I think the recovery is sufficiently fragile that we ought to leave tax rates where they are," said Rep. Gerry Connolly, a freshman Democrat from Virginia.
Connolly said Democrats should not allow the 2001 Bush tax cuts to expire for anybody.
"People in the upper tax brackets have a huge impact, a disproportionate impact on consumer spending," he said.
Sen. Kent Conrad (N.D.), a senior Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, said he could support a short-term extension of the Bush tax cuts for the highest income earners.
He noted that experts predict continued economic weakness over the next 18 to 24 months.
"My reaction would be don't cut spending, don't raise taxes and that would mean on anyone," he said.
Rep. Bobby Bright, a Democrat facing a tough reelection race in Alabama, said tax increases, even if limited to the wealthiest families, could imperil the recovery.
"I don't care if it's the wealthiest of the wealthy, you don't raise their taxes," he said. "In a recession, you don't tax, burden and restrict. The economy is like a ship, and if you sink the ship, all the good you might do goes down with it."
Families who make up the 5 percent of highest earners account for about 30 percent of consumer spending.
Mark Zandi, chief economist for Moody's Analytics, recently declared that a drop in spending by the rich has slowed the economic recovery.
"One of the reasons that the recovery has lost momentum is that high-end consumers have become more jittery and more cautious," he told The New York Times.
Liberals who favor the tax hikes note that these families also take in almost 30 percent of the nation's income, according to Congressional Budget Office data from 2007. The top 1 percent of earners collect 17 percent of the nation's income, according to CBO.
Yarmuth said Connolly and Bright, who don't want to touch the tax rate on the wealthiest, represent a minority opinion in the Democratic Caucus.
But he added concern over the economic impact of raising any taxes has spurred the idea of postponing when higher taxes go into effect.
Discussions are in the earliest stages and it's not yet clear whether the tax impact would be postponed until after November of 2012, when Obama faces reelection.
Even liberal lawmakers from the Northeast have begun pushing to shield some of the nation's highest income-earning families from tax increases.
Rep. Jerrold Nadler, a Democrat from Manhattan, has proposed legislation that would provide adjustments in income tax rates to reflect regional costs of living.
The legislation is sponsored by five Democrats representing New York City, its suburbs and Long Island where living standards and incomes are high.
They are Reps. Tim Bishop, Steve Israel, Nita Lowey, Carolyn Maloney and Carolyn McCarthy.
Rep. Jared Polis, a freshman Democrat from Colorado, said lawmakers are torn between concerns over the economic effect of raising taxes and the budget impact of keeping rates low for earners in the top brackets.
Allowing income tax rates to reset to pre-Bush levels for individuals earning more than $200,000 and families earning more than $250,000 could generate close to $700 billion over the next 10 years.
Families earning more than $374,000 a year in taxable income would see their rate jump from 35 percent to 39.6. Families earning above $250,000 in gross income would see their rate jump from 33 percent to 36.
The debate promises to get more contentious as Democrats near the end of the year.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has reiterated her support for raising taxes on individuals and families who earn the most.
"My position is also that the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest people in America did nothing to grow the economy during the Bush administration, did not create jobs, did not reduce the deficit," she said at a recent press conference.
In the Senate, some liberal Democrats such as Sen. Tom Harkin (Iowa) would like to see the Bush tax cuts expire for families earning $200,000 a year, or even less.
Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.) disputed the argument that raising taxes on the wealthy could hurt the economy.
"One of the most robust periods of economic growth was prior to the Bush tax cuts," he said.
He said large federal deficits, which would be addressed by tax increases, have caused people to lose confidence in the economy.
Chuck Marr, director of federal tax policy at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a left-leaning think tank, said the economic impact of raising taxes on the wealthy is overstated.
He said the spending of high-income people is less affected by moderate shifts in income than is that of middle-income people, who often live "paycheck to paycheck."
"If lawmakers are concerned about the impact on the economy, they would be better off taking money raised from taxing the wealthy and channeling it in policies that deliver more bang for the buck," he said.
Some Democratic policy experts cite unemployment aid and infrastructure spending as policies with greater economic impact than keeping taxes low for the wealthy.
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109 Comments so far
Show AllHeaven's, i am so shocked!
Sarcasm noted -- which was my first thought, too.
Did anyone really think that the Democrats would do the right thing?
To say this would only delay expiration by 2 years is total BS in light of the fact that Republicans will be in control of the US House and Senate from 2011 onward and they will assure that Dubya's tax cuts become Obama's tax cuts and never expire.
The immense pressure to do the " wrong " thing overwhelmed their moral compass and they got all dizzy and lost their direction: they ended up in front of a Mega-Bankster conference giving a speech entitled: " Why I'd Gown Down On Milton Freidman, In A Second, If He Wasn't Dead. "
Dead or alive, they would be happy to oblige.
All power to the Green Socialist Workers Party! Tax the rich! Stop the wars! Cut the military bases! Cut the redundant spy complex! Nationalize health insurance, oil, natural gas, coal, and nuke energy! Cut subsidies to Big Corn and corporations that outsource jobs, and certainly, seriously penalize corpseorations that avoid taxes by setting up tax shelters in places like the Cayman Islands. This way, one could be a serious deficit hawk and still adequately fund education, health needs, decent transportation and infrastructure, and care for the least fortunate of us; let alone preserve social security, medicare, & medicaid.
Kind of like the "debt ceiling", and indexing the alternative minimum tax to inflation -- it's not permanent, it's only a year or two at a time, and another time, and a time after that, ad infinitum.
Pretty much the level of leadership and change I expect from the Democratic wing of the only political party we've got.
Yes ,more money for the rich. And those of us who are poor,tuff. Those of us who are out of work,pull up your boot straps. Those of us that starving or homeless,get a life.Im tired of all these rich jerks running everything,let the redistribution of wealth start,the gap between rich and poor is too great.If the government doesnt do it then the people will.
Gosh Skinhorse,
You don't understand the difference between the rich and the poor. The poor are more motivated to work harder when they have LESS money; but the RICH are more motivated when they get more and more. Every ruling class person knows that. If we knew that we'd be rich too. True, it hasn't worked for me yet, but I can keep hoping, can't I?
"The poor are more motivated to work harder when they have LESS money; but the RICH are more motivated when they get more and more."
Brilliant insight. It could have have been explained through the sarcasm you used!
It busts the whole deception that is sold to us as reason and common sense wide open.
Brother, that didn't take long. No sooner is the ink dry on the Non-Financial Financial Reform legislation and Wall Street and Bush's " ownership society " patrons are making up lies to continue to " comfort the comfortable ". The tax cuts will have little affect on whether million/billionaires buy that 3rd retirement home, take the family to Tahiti, prop up the " stock market/casino " or add a 5th BMW to the home fleet. When you're sitting on millions in T-bonds and making money while the price of good and services has gone down in the last qtr and will continue to for the forseeable future: why not use the extra cash to buy a Blue Dog? Representatives are discounted 30% so you can get a Confederate Dem for, maybe, a 100K. A ConservaDem Senator from a state representing less than 1% of the U.S. population are 40% off retail and can be had, for say, 500K. Afterall, it's only other people's money.
Excellent post, linkwray. I personally don't give a rat's ass about the poor Long Islander schmucks with their high standards of living. Is there anyone with a pulse that still believes there's a two party system here? Like Keith Olbermann said a few years ago, "It's just one party, the Money Party, and their symbol is the vulture!"
THIS IS INSANE!!
Tax cuts have DEMOLISHED the Federal budget ofr 10 years. We need to END THEM.
THE F**KING RICH NEED TO START PAYING FOR THEIR WARS!!
You said it! You should run on that simple platform. And make sure they not only pay in dollars, but with the blood of their offspring. I just drove by an urban high school, and a member of the armed forces, a minority, had about 25 kids marching around the school yard, probably getting them ready for basic training. Off they will go to die and kill for the rich.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFGit_tZDqs
A friend of mine has twins who are as different as they could be.
They are just graduated from high school.
One shaved his head two years ago and hasn't cut his hair since. He's got dreadlocks about 10" long now.
The other has been in ROTC for the past five years. He goes into the Marines in September.
What is the point of raising any taxes when most of it will go to wars? Don't get me wrong. The tax structure needs to be adjusted to pre-Bush levels, pre-Reagan levels preferred, but what will that new revenue go towards? I don't trust Washington on taxes or spending.
Well we hope it doesn't go to wars much longer.
But also, a much greater percentage of the working class' taxes is state and local taxes - and they almost always go to good things like assistance to the poor, infrastructure, environmental regulation, and public transit.
The feds raising the taxes on the rich will have the effect of emboldening a lot of people in places like Harrisburg, Albany, Springfield, Olympia or Sacramento to start to do the right thing.
And, in all but a few states, the poor pay much greater percentage of their income in state and local taxes than the rich do.
http://www.itepnet.org/whopays.htm
The war budget has nothing to do with available money. They decide what they want it to be; use the available revenue to fund it; and borrow the rest. If there were more tax revenue, there would be less money borrowed, thereby reducing the deficit.
Big mistake (amoung many) was lowering taxes during time of war(s), but I guess it was politically more expedient to put it on the credit card and tell everyone we used their money to pay the rent. Hopefully we'll have moved on before anyone is the wiser.
Indeed--the taxes go for wars and to pay for these bailouts of the banks and the health insurance cartel--no one--rich or poor should have to pay for this shit.
It would be great if taxes were spent on Medicare for all, education (open university), infrastructure, green energy, job creation.
A nice dream.......
Obama backing down on something else. . . really? Again?
We could've just hired McCain for this. . . at least we'd know what we're getting with McCain.
Hah hah, Thanks for saving the only logical quote for the 2nd to last paragraph.
"If lawmakers are concerned about the impact on the economy, they would be better off taking money raised from taxing the wealthy and channeling it in policies that deliver more bang for the buck," he said.
This has got to be a no-brainer for our probable one-term president who should allow the tax-break to expire. It recaptures revenue from those who don't need it, which he can apply to whatever policies he wishes to move forward, and tosses a bone to his left-wing. Since the repubs claim they would support some of Obama's policies if he did it without increasing the deficit, it would be fun to watch.
GODDAMN! What is SO freaking difficult to understand? I understood the damage that W's tax cuts were going to do on the very DAY they were announced. I said the EXACT same thing about the Reagan tax cuts.
Look, it's VERY obvious. If you give poor people enough money to live on, they will SPEND it. Instant economy. Give it all to the rich, they will hoard it. Instant LACK of economy. And that is EXACTLY what has happened. We demanded NOTHING of those rich MFs for their getting all those tax cuts, so investment in THIS country dried up almost immediately. Why should they risk it when you've told them it doesn't matter what they do with it?
Reagan gave us Alzheimer's economics, and it works EXACTLY how it sounds. ONLY someone under full blown Alzheimer's COULD believe it would work. Hell, I knew that 30 freaking years ago, what took the rest of the country so long, and why do so many of those in power STILL not get it?
Polis is getting a long, NASTY email from me in a few moments. I am DISGUSTED with his obvious lack of economic knowledge, or even his understanding of REALITY. But that is what happens when RICH assholes get put in to office. And Polis is EXACTLY that. Maybe if enough of us from CO try to educate this MORON, it might stick for a change.
I said the other day that I think senators and congress people should be made to do community service in the states they are from. Maybe THEN they would start to understand SOMETHING about the REAL world. And that it SUCKS to be in the real world. These scum bags live in a complete FANTASY world, and it's time they get shocked right out of it.
ANYONE who votes for this BULLSHIT needs to be sent home as quickly as is possible. They are TRAITORS to the AMERICAN PEOPLE. And I will be telling Polis he is nothing BUT that if he even THINKS of voting for this.
Hello WJM,
" If you give poor people enough money to live on, they will SPEND it. Instant economy. Give it all to the rich, they will hoard it. Instant LACK of economy."
Congratulations. You have said it as well and as succinctly as it can be said. We know that the rich don't spend much of their money because they pay a vastly lower percentage of their income on sales taxes than poor people do.
If you tax the rich and use the money to fund working class jobs, as FDR did, you create a huge economic stimulus.
What is weird, however, is the number of "progressives" who haven't discovered this obvious truth. I heard Alan Grayson say on the radio that you can't raise taxes on anyone, including the rich, during a recession. Come on Alan, your heart is in the right place. You want to take all the money from the Afghanistan budget and use it to eliminate income taxes on the first 35 thousand dollars. Good for you. But you should know that taxes on the rich HELP the economy if the money is used to create jobs.
The conservadems, of course, don't care about the economy. They just want to give more to their rich paymasters. But people like Alan Grayson need a better education in economics.
And I once saw a study verifying exactly what you are discussing. I'll try to find it.
Basically, it showed that a dollar given to a low to middle income wage earner has a several-fold multiplier on the economy. A dollar given to the wealthy has a multiplier of less than one in many cases.
The entire "science" of free market economics is lagely an increasingly transparent ruse; a scam.
Hi SaboCat,
I would love to see those figures. If you find them could you send them to me.
The best figures I have seen show that poor people pay a much higher proportion of their income in sales taxes. But your information is more direct and would have a greater impact if spread around.
Thanks,
Laurenceofberk@aol.com
Hi SaboCat,
If you come back here, look at these figures.
Fiscal Bang for the Buck
One-year $ change in real GDP per $ reduction in federal tax revenue or increase in spending
Permanent Tax Cuts
Extend Alternative Minimum Tax Patch .......................... 0.48
Make Bush Income Tax Cuts Permanent ......................... 0.29 *
Make Dividend and Capital Gains Tax Cuts Permanent ... 0.37
Cut Corporate Tax Rate ... 0.30
Spending Increases
Extend Unemployment Insurance Benefits ....................... 1.64
Temporarily Increase Food Stamps .................................. 1.73
Issue General Aid to State Governments ........................... 1.36
Increase Infrastructure Spending ...................................... 1.59
Source: Moody's Economy.com
In other words, if you extend money to the working class or poor, either through jobs or benefits, you get more than 5 TIMES the multiplier effect of extending the Bush tax cuts.
cf. ___ http://www.economy.com/mark-zandi/documents/Small%20Business_7_24_08.pdf
Google: "multiplier effect",economy,rich,poor,"marginal tax"
1,040 results
Grayson is full of crap--along with his Medicare "buy in" gimmick.
Why not just stand for Medicare for ALL through taxation?
Indeed, why not......
WJM,
Fanned! Awesome post! One of the best I have seen from anyone in a long time!
That's precisely why the rich are rich, they ARE hoarders. And they are shameless thieves, that's how they get their money to begin with.
Yet again they vote to enrich themselves at our expense.
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-5553408-503544.html
Remember these names now and in November.
Today the Democrats too are owned by the rich. Even though large corporations are flush with cash it is not trickling down. Proof enough that trickle down does not work. Yet the Dems will continue to pump money to the top. The only thing a politician worries about is his/her reelection. The people be damned. As long as money is speech, and money is in the hands of the very few super rich, congress will represent the super rich only.
So why continue to vote? It makes no sense to legitimize the existing system. Voting today, under these circumstances, is for fools. Withhold your vote. Wait until it makes sense to vote again but that time is not now.
Fly your flags upside down. Buy nothing from national corporations and make due with what you have. Save food, water, and medical supplies. Get ready to ride out the storm with dignity and courage. Voting for Washington is like voting for a sewer, stop it.
When the rich and the corporations own nearly everything, there is no point in them hiring more workers to produce more goods. There is no one left who can buy them. Everyone is broke or maxed out on debt.
Instead, the super rich corporations use their excess cash to buy out slightly less rich companies, which doesn't risk more overproduction.
In times of vast inequality, therefore, monopolies become more and more concentrated. Our economy becomes even less democratic, and therefore so does our politics. Which allows the rich to write laws to make themselves even richer.
But don't worry. Rampaging inequality always leads to a crash, which will make '08 look like a mere warning tremor.
As long as capitalism exists, this cycle will continue.
Capitalism died when the big banks failed. Now it's just Weekend at Bernie's for the banks. All endings point to a burial.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
Nooo! Tell me that we are not controlled by
ONE SINGLE CORPORATE RULING ELITE PARTY!!!
OBAMA=BUSH
If I was to control the strategy of the Ruling Elite Obama makes a PERRRfect Advertising Campaign and packaging for the same Corporate Plutocratic Fascist product!
REVOLUTION IS THE ONLY ACTION THAT IS LEFT, and RIGHT FOR US TO BEGIN.
See you in the streets!!
Revolution in the streets is not possible now. Haven't you been keeping up with the expansion of Homeland Security)? (current name for the fascist gestapo in the USofA) We must find another way to break the power of the ONE SINGLE CORPORATE RULING ELITE PARTY. I suggest that we all refuse to vote for either a Democrat or a Republican. We need to form constituent groups in all of the Congressional Districts to FORCE our representative to vote on our advice.
If our rep is not really our Representative we need to kick them out of office. If your 'rep' voted for the bankster trillion dollar bailout (and they nearly all did) that person did not vote in keeping with what you want. If your 'rep' voted billions and billions of our tax funds to go to the unending wars (and they nearly all did), that person is not representing you. If your 'rep' did not support a new health care system with the removal of the for profit insurance corporations:
that 'rep' is not representing you.
Don't send him or her back to screw you some more. Coming up soon is the plan to privatize Social Security and Medicare. Looking at the history of your reps job, do you want to keep that person in office?
Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. It would be TOTALLY CRAZY to vote for anyone in Congress now to stay in that position of power.
Revolution is very possible but needs to be revolutionary. Violence is not. Take all your monies out of the big banks, stop paying your health insurance premiums, cut your driving habits in half or more, plant victory gardens, eat well, give away the extra. (during WWII 40% of produce in the USA was from victory gardens.) Turn off the lights when not needed. Blow up the TV. Violence begets violence. We need courage and imagination not bullets. The power elite do not fear bullets, they do fear the truth and courage.
Very well said !
I quit the Dems and I feel so relieved, and I will be glad when the solicitation phone calls stop, along with the mail literature, to ask me how much I will cough up, and please take this survey to tell us your main concerns. Right.
Tele-"marketing" for donations is a low-paying hard job, so after I say my bit, with a curled lip, that I want nothing to do with these people called Democrats anymore, I always say to the person on the phone, Please understand I'm not mad at you, and I know your job is a difficult one." And it is.
I will not vote for high-power dems or high-power republicans, but will vote for local people of either party who have been doing a good job in the County legislature or at the State level or who are newly running and I know who they are -- mostly people I wouldn't vote for. But no more Washington establishment. I will do a write in if the spirit moves me for other people, such as Ralph Nader ... such as Ralph Nader ... such as Ralph Nader ... or Alfred E. Newman maybe.
The suggestion for voters to stay home en masse and not vote is a good one. What if they gave an election and nobody came?
++++++
During World War II and even after, for a short time, the income tax rate on people like Frank Sinatra and other major film stars with mega-incomes, and I'm assuming also the very rich in general, was somewhere around 95 per cent at the Federal level. FDR didn't fool around. Likely they all had their lawyers and loopholes, but I remember Old Blue Eyes bitching and rolling his eyes when he talked about it, but actually good naturedly, because we were at war and he would say that it was worth it, and fly out to put on a show for "the boys" at the front.
This was a real war that people believed was the right thing to do regarding Hitler and his buddies, Mussollini of Italy, and the militarist Tojo of Japan. It also had a beginning, a middle and an end that was a clear objective. Patriotism was a given, but not in the forced way it is now. The people tightened their belts and everyone was pretty much on the same page that this was the right thing to do. Our active involvement in WWII was four years, although we helped out Great Britain beforehand.
And the talk and the dreams and the songs were about achieving and then doing everything to have a World at Peace. And that's how the leaders talked and the generals and admirals. You don't hear that any more. It's just on to the next attack/invasion/occupation and the next one after that on the drawing boards.
And please understand, I am not trying to idealize war, but I believe it was a necessary war. I am not excusing decisions made that we see now as mistakes. But we were different then and so were our leaders and so was the world, and in living during that period, I have a very different sensibility than someone who only reads about that period of time. On a scale from 1 to 10, how America -- its leadership and people -- acquitted itself during that period I think was a +8 and sometimes in certain things it was a +10.
Rating this monster that is called the United States of America now, is the reverse of that scale. Treacherous, Crazy, Over-reaching, Violent Barbarians used to be the other guys ... Nuf' said on that. But I do mourn and have felt for a long, long time the grief of a monstrous betrayal.
Now we people pay through the nose to keep lengthy non-wars going, and the rich make money from them in every which way possible. And beginning with George W. they and also corporations get out-of-sight tax breaks of every kind. General Motors or General Electric and other corporations even got rebates on ten years worth of previous taxes when that pampered, little Skull-and-Bones' rich boy took office. And the representatives of the people in both houses of Congress, say Yea! Yea! Yea!
This place that is called the United States of America has become unrecognizable to me. And I mourn for the dying of the dream that the U.S. would one day fully live up to its promise, apologize and correct its mistakes, and become a true force and energy for good for everyone.
But the music died ... and I don't believe it will ever be heard again the way it once was. And I think that is an important reality to accept as we find our way to a new experience in this place we live, ... whatever that will turn out to be.
peace, cm
********* THERE IS NO HEARTBEAT ON EARTH THAT IS NOT SOMEHOW OUR OWN. **********
The suggestion for voters to stay home en masse and not vote is a good one. What if they gave an election and nobody came?
--------------------------------------
I rather agree with the late anthro Marvin Harris, Cee. He said that revolutions aren't made by staying home or doing one's own thing, they're made by everyone agreeing to act in solidarity. Instead of staying home, we should agree a candidate for each office and vote en masse for that person. Staying home would only work if it were counted as a NOTA vote, which it isn't.
---------------------------------------
During World War II and even after, for a short time, the income tax rate on people like Frank Sinatra and other major film stars with mega-incomes, and I'm assuming also the very rich in general, was somewhere around 95 per cent at the Federal level. FDR didn't fool around. Likely they all had their lawyers and loopholes, but I remember Old Blue Eyes bitching and rolling his eyes when he talked about it, but actually good naturedly, because we were at war and he would say that it was worth it, and fly out to put on a show for "the boys" at the front.
---------------------------------------
Understand, though, that that high rate was only a douceur to make working people accept paying income tax ("Look, they're getting all they can out of the rich bastards, so I guess we have to knuckle under and do our share"). After the war, the rate for the rich dropped, dropped, and dropped again, but working people had to keep paying. A burden that had fallen strictly on the wealthiest 5% was now shifted onto our backs instead. It was *very* slickly done.
Be back to you, Mairead. Am swamped right now, and just took a peek.
Don't disagree, but have a somewhat different take.
I'll let you know when I see you on Board next time whether I did get to Reply to your post. Could be not for a day or a few days.
Always like your cool, measured answers.
peace, cm
Very good post ! I hope people will listen. We can change this. We do need to get some sort of "Bill" or "Proposition" ,something to put before Congress, to stop some of these issues, like Oil, and Fracking for Natural Gas, and Healthcare, and Bank regulation. We need to pull together, Republicans want clean water, I am sure if they were really shown the truth about things, proven how the things they think help them are really hurting them, and the Democrats sure have been lied to also ,we need to think of that saying...The Enemy of My Enemy is My Freind ...because we really all have only one common enemy, and that is our Goverment, and the lying, cheating corporations ,embeded deap within each Official we have in office right now ,with very few exceptions. I am not even sure who I could name that is really working for us.I hope it never resorts to Revolution, but if things don't change soon our Country will be so poisened and dead it will be worthless. The Cancer rate in this Country is astronomical, and growing daily, what kind of future is that ? Without healthcare well, we are doomed. We need to clean up our act and lead the world in Modern Smart Healthy Technology. We have everything we need...The Sun, Wind, and Water....
Agreed!
Just another line item on a long list of disappointments from a party that feels entitled to my vote. When the fires start are you going to join the bucket brigade or pray for a strong wind?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=znQe9nUKzvQ
Great post SJR, and thanks for the link. So our elected officials are, to quote Malcom X, the "house negros" taking care of their masters and we, the unwashed masses, are the "field negroes." Excellent analogy!
And furthermore, here is how they spend your money on themselves.
http://www.aolnews.com/article/the-other-congressional-spending-how-the-house-spent-1-billion-on-itself/19522761?icid=main%7Chtmlws-main-n%7Cdl1%7Clink1%7Chttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.aolnews.com%2Farticle%2Fthe-other-congressional-spending-how-the-house-spent-1-billion-on-itself%2F19522761
BUT!They "will" fix Social Security and Medicare and use that money taken from the poor to fix the budget,see? Tony
Can someone help me out here? Has any D Congress voted to restore a more steeply progressive income tax schedule in the last 40 years? Has any voted to increase taxes for the top income tax bracket?
What about the Estate Tax? Last I checked the Estate Tax is no more. The D Congress allowed this to happen?
As the late, ever-lamented anthro Dr Marvin Harris noted, revolutions are not made by our deciding not to vote for Dems or GOPers. Everyone doing their own thing just creates fragmentation.
Revolutions are made by everyone doing *the same thing*, voting for *the same people*.
I.e., acting in solidarity.