Obama says: "Drill Baby Drill!"

I thought pretty much the same thing, but if you will review FactCheck.org, you will find that while similar, the details are significantly different.

I have grown to be very leary of pass-along articles read on the Internet. Where once I passed-along articles, I now check with the above site, as well as several others. Most of what you read is not accurate.

 

I get tired of the argument that "we are broke" or "we are spending beyond our means". The true fact is that we take in less in taxes than we spend, which is a different point. (see also deficit spending). We are still the wealthiest country in the world, but we have successfully, in the last generation, had a massive redistribution of wealth,, but not in the traditional "socialist sense". In this case, it has been from the bottom up! This has been achieved largely through tax policy. Has this policy benefited the middle class tax payer? In one sense, yes, as it is a demonstrable fact that ~ 48% of all US tax payers pay no federal income tax at all. But at the same time that has happened, real wages and incomes have stagnated, few people have employment based health care coverage, and state and local governments have been forced to pick up much of the tab.

At the same time, the very wealthy have enjoyed dramatic increases in wealth, both in annual income, as well as in ownership of ever greater percentages of the total net worth in the country. The trend in tax policy has continued to enforce this. When the top 400 wealthiest people in the country, make more than the bottom 100,000,000 there is something wrong, and that is truly not sustainable!

One only has to look at the numbers, (and they have been cited ad nauseium) to realize that if we simply went back to the marginal tax rates of the Clinton era (remember budget SURPLUSES?) you would wipe out a substantial portion of the defict!

The other great falsehood is that these are the people that "create" jobs for other working people, and if you continue to give them tax breaks, then they will create those jobs. This is also, demonstrably false. Trickle down economics has been shown time and again not to work. Even David Stockman, (no flaming liberal) RR's director of OMB has come around, and agrees.

Now, one can argue, and I will willingly join the argument, that we as a country spend too much money on too many things. If one wishes to have an open and honest conversation and put everything on the table then that is a good starting point, but to blame poor people for being poor, and extrapolating that they are lazy, or free loading is disingenuous! Are there people who take advantage of the system? Sure, but for every "Welfare Queen" sucking up a few hundred dollars a month that they may not be "entitled" to, there are dozens of corporate denizens working the system for far more money! Just listen to the CEOs of the major oil companies!

My prescription to "save the country" is pretty simple. Accept that everything is on the table, including defense spending, SS/Medicare and TAX INCREASES!. Return tax rates to the 1990's levels, eliminate subsidies for oil companies, coal, big ag etc. Recalculate SS to slowly raise the age of eligibility to reflect demographic real world trends (same with medicare) subject all income to SS taxes instead of cutting it off at ~$150k, perhaps means test those for SS eligibility going forward, cut out the waste that is the military industrial procurement process, (is it any great surprise that we have defense contractors in every congressional district? One can't kill a weapons program anywhere, even if the military doesn't want it, because it means "job" in someone's district.) and I would go to a single payer health care system. A single payer system, if all else stayed the same would reduce our total outlay (as a country) for health care by about 25-30%, and it would cover everybody, so that those that are insured don't end up paying for those that are not,, as we do now.

So yes, let's have a rational discussion on spending priorities, as ones pork barrel is another's sacred cow, but don't cloak it in the premise that "we are broke"!

 

Ok so this economy is actually a product of both the demon-crats and the republicants. Going back to Carter when we went off the gold standard and since then federal reserve has been printing money like gang busters. Reagan, both Bushes, Clinton, were all big spenders and have dug us in a 14 trillion dollar hole of debt that Obama and Geithner think we can "spend our way out of." Obama is the biggest spender and fraud of the century btw. I'm tired of people blaming the other party when in fact both parties have contributed to this mess not too mention gullable americans who vote in these clowns.

 

More to the point, this economy is the result of champagne taste on a beer budget. Americans want to live well, but not pay for it. We want it all, we want it now, and we want someone else to pay for it. It doesn't work for personal finances, and it doesn't work for a national economy either.

Tom

 

Why to go back to Carter? What happened to big surplus Clinton left behind???

 

The difference between democrats and republicans is that democrats tend to tax and spend, while the republicans tend to spend and not tax! Neither is a great economic model, but clearly the former has more efficacy.

The reality of the "prosperity" of the 90s and early 2000s was largely a shell game, base on borrowed money. Money that largely came from the piggy bank that people though they had in the equity in their houses. When that bubble collapsed, so did the rest. Real income, real economic grow was flat at best, and probably, net/net in decline, certainly for the working classes in this country.

One can blame Obama for current deficits, but few would argue that the cliff we were headed for was pretty bleak. Simply put, these guys have saved the economy for the time being. Ging forward, it will remain to be seen if we can continue to save it is not clear. I would posit that surgical spending cuts are needed, but clearly, tax increases are really needed.

Icarus

 

Wasn't used to pay down the national debt.

 

Not until there is some serious change in the culture... otherwise it is just throwing away our money.

 

Why weren't you complaining back then about what it was used for? tax cuts? unnecessary wars?

 

Spidy, I agree, we must change the culture!

I suspect that you and I have a diffent idea of what that change should be.

I for one, think we need to change the culture that continues to concentrate more and more ad more wealth in fewer and fewer hands ( a demonstrable fact in the last 3 decades!) at the expense of the working class, along wight he mis directed demonization of those same working poor, try to cast them as "free loaders". For every case of someone being too lazy to work, I would posit that there are hundreds if not thousands who would like t work more, at at better jobs, but don't have the chance, for a variety of soci-economic reasons.

Like I said before, are the cases of welfare fraud and abuse? of course, but that is nothing compared to the rife white collar crime and abuse that happens each and every day.

We are a better country than this. Our current course and speed is not sustainable, nor is it morally or ethically proper, and indeed, to use a phrase that you might be able to relate to,, it is un Christian!

Icarus

 

$106K in 2010

 

Wj,

Thanks, I knew it was over $100 k.

At $106k it is even crazier. Why should those dollars over $106 be exempt?

Icarus

 

Its $106.8K for 2010 and 2011

...if you are self-employed your first $106K is taxed pretty hard $16K SS Tax, 25% USTax Incremental rate, State Tax 7%, Estimated Tax for next quarter (State + Fed). Plus IRA...that plus mortgage, food, energy is about the annual budget. All do have a one time SS tax discount in 2011 thanks to Congress.

 

Yea, but at $100,106,000, the SS tax is still only,,, ~$16K if you are self employed, 1/2 that if employed by someone else.

Icarus

 

Those "blame obama" ads ("polls") are on yahoo-main and chatgroup pages. The latest one is "repeal obama" . For what? getting bin laden? lol.

"obama socialist?" is another good one. At least they know how to spell "socialist."
And then there's "obamacare" and what else? can't recall.

All brought to you by the koch brothers, the libertarian oil billionaires, who are making the american media rich spreading a lot of garbage on obama through advertising. only in America.

The sad part is there are people out there who believe this crap.

 

keynesian? yes! socialist? no!

 

To be fair, only the $106k that is taxed is considered 'social security income' for the purposes of benefit calculation. However based on projections even if you remove the cap and pay benefits for those wages, it's still an improvement.

 

News yesterday said Repubs (behind the scenes) now believe Obama is presumptive victor in next election. I suppose something could go wrong for Dems, but those other folks should stop saying unfair garbage.

 

Obama is a liar??? or is he compromising his values to meet the "needs" of a very fickle American Public that has the foresight of a mole?

i dont see his statements to be any more or less true than any other president in my memory. what about WMD, the persecution of Valarie Plame? the pardon of whats his name by Clinton on the last day of his term?

it goes on and on. its funny, but i still say that when faced with good and right, we Americans want nothing to do with it.

Jimmy Carter is only President i can think of that had any real integrity. he knew our problems and issues 30 years before we did but we vilified him. there is little doubt in my mind that historians will look upon him as the most underrated president of all time.