Tag: Bush Tax Cuts

Why is it “Deficits don’t matter” — whenever THEY are in Charge?

Let me jog your memory, about one of the more memorable things the Former VP said to a ‘fiscally responsible’ Treasury Secretary — right before he fired him

Former Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill was told “deficits don’t matter” when he warned of a looming fiscal crisis.

OnTheIssues.org

[…]

O’Neill said he tried to warn Vice President Dick Cheney that growing budget deficits-expected to top $500 billion this fiscal year alone — posed a threat to the economy. Cheney cut him off. “You know, Paul, Reagan proved deficits don’t matter,” he said, according to excerpts. Cheney continued: “We won the midterms (congressional elections). This is our due.” A month later, Cheney told the Treasury secretary he was fired.

Source: Adam Entous, Reuters, on AOL News Jan 11, 2004

Maybe “deficits don’t really matter” — whenever the Gophers have the National “Credit Card” in THEIR Pockets — Then it’s Party time, for their friends and buddies in the corporate boardrooms?

Otherwise — it’s “evict the lazy bastards”.  

Cut the Funds for something — NOW!

The Standard Number of Poor Look Good For November

Washington –  Pandercrats in Congress are poised to play a leading role this month in thwarting their party’s effort to raise votes for the incumbents.

A small but growing number of Moderate Pandercrats are balking at boosting taxes on the rich, now that there has been a sufficient gain of numbers of poor to please Wall Street. Many who are retiring anyway or floundering in the polls, face electorates who are planning their retirement going away parties already, and are anticipating a nice slice of cake.  Some represent areas that were loaded with empty foreclosed on sprawlburban mansions, some are reluctant to increase the feeling of voting obligation on anyone while the old 2008 party platform isn’t quite officially ready for the alien autopsy yet.

“The voter’s will is very weak right now.  Voting could lower consumer demand for means tested results, at a time when we want people putting more votes into the other party”  said Sen. Evan Bye, who is auditioning to become a lobbyist.

“We still expect to have an election at some point in November,” Reed spokesman Bib Man Lee said.  “Whether Republicans will allow them to vote for anyone is a whole other story.”

The speaker and the president have been clear they want to extend the middle class tax cuts, but because there is no middle class anymore, they have indicated a willingness to compromise to make the final lame duck session a time of bipartisanship cameraderie.


Rep. Gerald Connolly, DINO -Va., represents the northern Virginia suburbs of Washington, one of the nation’s wealthiest districts. Median family income there in 2008 was $117,892, well above the national average of $63,211. He said that repealing the top rates would have political consequences.

“Sometimes we forget how we became the majority. We did it by winning some affluent districts,” he said.

“The general rule of thumb is that you do not raise taxes or cut spending during an economic downturn. That would be counterproductive,” (Sen. Kent) Conrad, (DINO ND) said.

… at a Kansas City fundraiser in July, (senate candidate)  Robin Carnahan (DINO MO)  said last week that she wanted to extend the Bush tax cuts for everyone.

“Now is not the time to raise taxes,” she said.

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/201…

The ‘Elephant of Debt’ in Alan Simpson’s Entitlement Room

Bipartisan Elephants, Endless Debt and Entitlements, Cats without Food … Oh My!

What IS all this fuss about?

Sometimes a picture is worth a 1000 rants.

CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES

CONGRESSIONAL BUDGET OFFICE – CBO

The Long-Term Budget Outlook

JUNE 2010 – (Revised August 2010)



larger

Image: Federal Debt Held by the Public as a Percentage of Gross Domestic Product

Under Two Budget Scenarios

CBO — The Long-Term Budget Outlook (pdf)

OK sometimes not … What does that Picture mean to me?

2035, Haah!  that’s like a quarter century from now …  you got to be kidding me …

Karl Rove hurls a Time Bomb of Deceit into the Town Square

As if we didn’t have enough volatile “wedge issues” to put the Nation on Perpetual Pause — Karl Rove has decided to stink up the place, with yet another outrageous Word Bomb …

GOPers Revise History: Say Dems Have Tax Hike Ticking Time ‘Bomb’

Christina Bellantoni, TPMDC — August 19, 2010

Karl Rove’s Crossroads GPS this week detailed the “seven public policy initiatives” that will be most important for Congress next year. The group runs ads against Democrats across the country.

On the list at No. 1: “Stop the Obama tax hike time bomb scheduled to detonate on January 1, 2011.”

That’s not a typo. Rove’s group is claiming that Obama set the timer on that so-called “bomb.”

Talk about Revisionist History — of course consider the source — wasn’t it Rove, who claim to have the “Real Numbers” a few years back …

If Republicans got their Way …

If Republicans got their Way … there would be no more Medicare.

If Republicans got their Way … you couldn’t Retire until 70.

If Republicans got their Way … they’d privatize Social Security.

If Republicans got their Way … there would be no more Corporate income tax.

If Republicans got their Way … they’d eliminate taxes on Capital gains.

If Republicans got their Way … they’d cut in half the taxes of the richest 1 percent.

If Republicans got their Way … the Bush Tax Cut for the Rich would never end.

Factlets from The Republican’s Roadmap for America’s Future:

The Ryan Budget’s Radical Priorities

Center on Budget and Policy Priorities

By Paul N. Van de Water — July 7, 2010

GOP Roadmap for America’s Future has YOUR Security in its Sights

The Ryan Budget’s Radical Priorities

Center on Budget and Policy Priorities

By Paul N. Van de Water — July 7, 2010

I. Summary

The Roadmap for America’s Future, which Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) – the ranking Republican on the House Budget Committee – released in late January, calls for radical policy changes that would result in a massive transfer of resources from the broad majority of Americans to the nation’s wealthiest individuals.[1]

The Roadmap would give the most affluent households a new round of very large, costly tax cuts by reducing income tax rates on high-income households;

eliminating income taxes on capital gains, dividends, and interest;

and abolishing the corporate income tax, the estate tax, and the alternative minimum tax.

At the same time, the Ryan plan would raise taxes for most middle-income families,

privatize a substantial portion of Social Security,

eliminate the tax exclusion for employer-sponsored health insurance,

end traditional Medicare and most of Medicaid,

and terminate the Children’s Health Insurance Program.

Media and the Message. CNN; Retain Bush Tax Cuts

 

CNN’s Fareed Zakaria says the easiest way to cut the deficit is to let the Bush tax cuts expire.

copyright © 2010 Betsy L. Angert.  BeThink.org

The day was Sunday, August 1, 2010.  Former Fed Chairman, Alan Greenspan appeared on Meet the Press.  When asked to discuss the Congressional debate on tax cuts, the man known to move markets, a person who leans to the “Right,” offered a decisive decree.  In direct disagreement with Republican officials and the profitable corporations that fund countless political campaigns, Mister Greenspan declared, “Look, I’m very much in favor of tax cuts,  but not with borrowed money.  And the problem that we’ve gotten into in recent years is spending programs with borrowed money, tax cuts with borrowed money, and at the end of the day, that proves disastrous.  And my view is I don’t think we can play subtle policy here on it.”  

This statement was as a slap in the face to corporations, or more correctly to the tycoons who head these firms.  Multi-millionaire media moguls might understand this best.  These television and radio Executives experience firsthand that influence over an industry can translate into influence over an outcome.  Cable News Network Chief Officers are among those who actively make use of this truth.  Tax cuts expired?  “Never;” say network Administrators and the newscasters such as Allan Chernoff, who do their bidding.

It’s Official: CBPP calls Tax Cuts a Boon to Top 1%

The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities economists just confirmed the trends of the last 8 years — Most of the the Economic Gains went to the very Wealthy, while the rest of us struggled to just get by

TOP 1 PERCENT OF AMERICANS REAPED 2/3 OF INCOME GAINS In last Economic Expansion,

Income Concentration in 2007 Was at Highest Level Since 1928, New Analysis Shows

By Avi Feller and Chad Stone – September 9, 2009

Two-thirds of the nation’s total income gains from 2002 to 2007 flowed to the top 1 percent of U.S. households, and that top 1 percent held a larger share of income in 2007 than at any time since 1928, according to an analysis of newly released IRS data by economists Thomas Piketty and Emmanuel Saez.

During those years, the Piketty-Saez data also show, the inflation adjusted income of the top 1 percent of households grew more than ten times faster than the income of the bottom 90 percent of households.

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