OT: Elections/Politics thread, part 5

[Jared]

The hell with the CEO's. They need to be in jail. How about small business? I posted this a few pages ago. I had two small business that grossed ove 250,000 a year. My net after expenses was under 30,000. Is that rich? Not to me. I had to close the doors too both of them because of taxes owed.

I'm pretty sure (though not positive) that the 250k limit Obama is talking about is not based on the gross, but is rather based on household income. I'm pretty sure that the taxes of your small businesses would not be increased, but rather decreased under the Obama plan.

EDIT: Discussion of the point here:

http://www.factcheck.org/elections-2008 ... _bunk.html

[Brando70]

I'm not sure I'd classify someone making $250k a year as 'stinking rich.'

All these talk Obama loves to reiterate about CEOs making tons of money and 'closing corporate loopholes' are jargon and 'talking points' more than actual policy with any meat to it. It makes a neat and tidy news story when you hear about a few CEOs run amok like with Enron or Tyco but the reality is those are isolated cases of people who committed crimes regardless of who is in the oval office. It has nothing to do with tax policy.

And what happens in 2011 when the George Bush tax cuts sunset under a Dem congress and Prez Obama? That will raise the tax rates for people making as little as $28k a year.

The problem is, it only takes a few of those CEOs to cause significant economic ripples. I agree that their actions are apolitical, but deregulation tends to increase the tendency to cheat. It's human nature -- if you think you won't get caught, you're more likely to break the rules.

Excessive regulation is not the answer, but we've clearly had a lack of proper oversight and enforcement of business for quite some time, going back to Reagan. And that includes the Clinton administration, which was pretty pro-business by Democratic standards.

[Naples39]

I agree with you Brando. I should've quoted Mac's post because that's mainly what I was responding to.

[JRod]

The hell with the CEO's. They need to be in jail. How about small business? I posted this a few pages ago. I had two small business that grossed ove 250,000 a year. My net after expenses was under 30,000. Is that rich? Not to me. I had to close the doors too both of them because of taxes owed.

I'm pretty sure (though not positive) that the 250k limit Obama is talking about is not based on the gross, but is rather based on household income. I'm pretty sure that the taxes of your small businesses would not be increased, but rather decreased under the Obama plan.

The whole Joe the Plumber thing is populism and the press ate it up.

What does taxes have to do with him buying the business? Nothing. The financial crisis would have more impact currently than taxes do. If he can't get credit to finance him buying the business, he's can't really pay taxes on that business.

Anyway, like Jared said, he would pay taxes on his adjusted profit of the business. Now I don't know if Obama's plan is like the personal income tax system where you pay the percent in that bracket. In other words, small businesses don't pay taxes on the first 250k but they do after 250k. Or if you make over 250k you pay the adjusted rate from the first dollar.

Obama whiffed on this. And his poor defense led this to be an issue.

[macsomjrr]

Joe the Plumber gets it. He calls it what it is. Socialism. No thanks. If you worked your ass off to be a success you shouldn't have to carry the water for those that don't work at all.

http://cosmos.bcst.yahoo.com/up/player/ ... 6&src=news

Nobody is saying you should "carry the water" its simply called spreading the wealth and giving back to those who got you where you are in the first place. It makes economic sense to have a strong and healthy middle class while those whose household income goes over $250,000 simply pay more so that those who don't can feed their kids, experience decent healthcare and expect a proper education. Its called taking care of your fellow Americans. It isn't a hand out, its a hand up.

[RobVarak]

The hell with the CEO's. They need to be in jail. How about small business? I posted this a few pages ago. I had two small business that grossed ove 250,000 a year. My net after expenses was under 30,000. Is that rich? Not to me. I had to close the doors too both of them because of taxes owed.

I'm pretty sure (though not positive) that the 250k limit Obama is talking about is not based on the gross, but is rather based on household income. I'm pretty sure that the taxes of your small businesses would not be increased, but rather decreased under the Obama plan.

EDIT: Discussion of the point here:

http://www.factcheck.org/elections-2008 ... _bunk.html

Jared's correct as to income tax.

Many small businesses are corporations, however. Obama, in full pander back in July, suggested that he would be "open to" lowering corporate tax rates. Since then he's been mum on the topic and hammered McCain for proposing cuts across the board to corporate tax rates.

If being "open to" cuts reminds you of "looking into" offshore drilling then your insticts are excellent.

Obama always claims that due to "loopholes" the marginal tax rate paid by US corporations is not that bad. That is a gross oversimplification and misleading as well. First of all, use of the term "loophole" implies that the businesses are escaping taxation that they really should be paying. Given the fact that most of the factors that impact marginal corporate tax rates stem from the regulations of depreciation, the reality is that they are simply conducting their business as the law dictates.

Secondly, those depreciation rules differ enormously from industry to industry and asset to asset. As a result, businesses face very different marginal tax rate environments.

The upshot is that if you're incorporated you're not going to see any tax break from Obama, and you very well may face less business-friendly rules about depreciation, debt write-offs, capital gains etc.

And that's on top of his bait-and-switch income tax reform.

[Naples39]

The whole Joe the Plumber thing is populism and the press ate it up.

I see it completely opposite.

I look at the whole Joe the Plumber thing as countering Obama's populism on the campaign trail. Obama has built his campaign on talking points of CEOs making tons of money and how he will cut taxes for 95% of families, as if his tax increases only touch the elite who we don't like very much right now. The whole point that made Joe the Plumber compelling is it shows that Obama's policies don't just affect the elite.

Sorry for all the posts right now---brutally bored at work this afternoon.

[wco81]

It shouldn't be surprising. The ideological right in this country favors faith-based, rather than fact-based reality.

Scientists are scorned or suppressed if they try to report findings which don't conform to their orthodoxy, such as global climate change.

I don't want to step on the "Ripping Christians" part of the thread,but what Scientist was suppressed?

I've always thought the ostracizing was the other way around, as the 'consensus' of scientists warning of global warming essentially blacklist anyone who dares to disagree or label him a wacko.

Now if you want to criticize evangelicals for some of the nonsense and hijinks around intelligent design I won't disagree with you.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline ... essed.html

[Brando70]

I agree with you Brando. I should've quoted Mac's post because that's mainly what I was responding to.

WTF are you doing agreeing with me? That's not in keeping with the spirit of this thread

I don't mind politicians using stories of specific people to illustrate their points. What was odd last night was the way McCain and Obama kept bringing up Joe the Plumber. That's when it turned into pandering.

I remember playing a debate drinking game with some fellow freedom haters in 2004, and there was some word that Bush kept saying that caused us all to get three sheets to the wind. It may have been "freedom" or "security." "Joe the Plumber" would have delivered that level of inebriation.

I'm kind of sad that there wasn't a "need some wood?" or "Internets" moment. I think all the politicians stuck pretty close to their talking points. I will miss that about Bush -- when he'd forget his lines, the most entertaining stuff could come out of his mouth.

[webdanzer]

EDIT: Discussion of the point here:

http://www.factcheck.org/elections-2008 ... _bunk.html

I love how the non-partisan factcheck.org ends their analysis of this one with an:

OH AND BY THE WAY HE'S JUST LIKE BUSH!!1! HAHAOMG!!

[bdunn13]

"over $250,000 simply pay more so that those who don't can feed their kids"

Uhhhh if you can't feed your kids, then don't have them. Its not my job to feed someone else's kids. It's MY job as a father to feed my kid(s).

Otherwise you reward failure and punish success.

" experience decent healthcare"

Again, not my job to take care of anyone else. And, if we socialize healthcare, you will see the quality of care drop just like it did in Canada.


" and expect a proper education."

Money does not educate. You can't use money to make kids that don't want to learn to learn. Our schools are not failing our kids, our kids are failing our schools.

[bdunn13]

Not sure of the accuracy of this, but its scary if true.

http://principleandpolicy.blogspot.com/ ... rease.html

[wco81]

I'm not sure I'd classify someone making $250k a year as 'stinking rich.'

All these talk Obama loves to reiterate about CEOs making tons of money and 'closing corporate loopholes' are jargon and 'talking points' more than actual policy with any meat to it. It makes a neat and tidy news story when you hear about a few CEOs run amok like with Enron or Tyco but the reality is those are isolated cases of people who committed crimes regardless of who is in the oval office. It has nothing to do with tax policy.

And what happens in 2011 when the George Bush tax cuts sunset under a Dem congress and Prez Obama? That will raise the tax rates for people making as little as $28k a year.

You need to look up the Enron Loophole and the role of Ken Lay in the energy policy we have today.

Wasn't just some rogue CEOs. They had access to Washington through their political patronage. They didn't have to break any laws, they had laws rewritten to sanction their activities.

When industry lobbyists get to draft the actual policies and laws governing their industries, as energy and pharmaceutical lobbyists got to do, there are no accidents.

[Naples39]

I don't want to step on the "Ripping Christians" part of the thread,but what Scientist was suppressed?

I've always thought the ostracizing was the other way around, as the 'consensus' of scientists warning of global warming essentially blacklist anyone who dares to disagree or label him a wacko.

Now if you want to criticize evangelicals for some of the nonsense and hijinks around intelligent design I won't disagree with you.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline ... essed.html

You initially said the 'ideological right' suppresses, but your link is just focused on the Bush administration. I didn't realize the two were synonymous.

I also still stand by what I originally said--there has been plenty of suppression by both sides on the global warming debate. It's a poor choice of topic if your trying to portray one side as enlightened and the other as anti-science. Some examples from a quick google search:

Scientists skeptical of man-made climate fears meeting at the 2008 International Conference on Climate Change in New York City described the “absolute horror stories” about how some scientific journals have engaged in “outrageous and unethical behavior” in attempting to suppress them from publishing their work in peer-reviewed journals.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1981617/posts

Scientists who dissent from the alarmism have seen their grant funds disappear, their work derided, and themselves libeled as industry stooges, scientific hacks or worse. Consequently, lies about climate change gain credence even when they fly in the face of the science that supposedly is their basis.

http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110008220

[pk500]

Nobody is saying you should "carry the water" its simply called spreading the wealth and giving back to those who got you where you are in the first place.

You're willing to surrender more of the money you earn to bloat the inefficient bureaucracy in Washington even further? What in American government in the last 30 years gives you even the SLIGHTEST inkling that the Federal government will trim bureaucracy and target the most needy with its ever-expanding list of social programs?

Can Obama walk on water, too?

Take care,
PK

[Naples39]

You need to look up the Enron Loophole and the role of Ken Lay in the energy policy we have today.

Wasn't just some rogue CEOs. They had access to Washington through their political patronage. They didn't have to break any laws, they had laws rewritten to sanction their activities.

When industry lobbyists get to draft the actual policies and laws governing their industries, as energy and pharmaceutical lobbyists got to do, there are no accidents.

"Lay was found guilty on all six counts of conspiracy and fraud by a jury of eight women and four men. In a separate bench trial, Judge Lake ruled Lay was guilty of four counts of fraud and false statements."

I find it interesting that someone so rich and powerful would commit all these crimes when he 'didn't have to break any laws' to scheme and get rich.

[pk500]

I remember playing a debate drinking game with some fellow freedom haters in 2004, and there was some word that Bush kept saying that caused us all to get three sheets to the wind. It may have been "freedom" or "security." "Joe the Plumber" would have delivered that level of inebriation.

If you played that same game during the primaries with Guiliani and the words "terrorists" and "9/11," you were drunk within 10 minutes -- even on light beer.



Joe Biden may be a blowhard, but he was right on one issue: Rudy Guiliani can't utter more than two sentences without the term "9/11" in at least one of them.

Take care,
PK

[pk500]

Again, not my job to take care of anyone else. And, if we socialize healthcare, you will see the quality of care drop just like it did in Canada.

Speaking of Canadian healthcare, I've remained very good friends with a newspaper reporter in Halifax, Nova Scotia, with whom I covered the AHL in the late 80s when I was a reporter in Binghamton, N.Y.

My buddy had a hernia operation in 1993, and his hernia problem is returning and will require surgery. But since the condition isn't deemed a medical emergency, he said he is on a waiting list of EIGHT MONTHS to get the surgery.

So that's the kind of efficient, patient-centric healthcare system people want in America? Uh, no thanks.

Take care,
PK

[bdunn13]

So that's the kind of efficient, patient-centric healthcare system people want in America? Uh, no thanks.

Take care,
PK

I use to work for a healthcare company, Canada was where a good majority of our business was located. The details of the business was basically, we were contacted by Canadians and we would set up appointments for them with American Doctors as they could not get any treatment in Canada.

The reasons they couldn't get care were b/c of an overloaded system and brain drain. Canadian doctors were seeking other professions as a result of the poor healthcare system, some were coming to the States to practice.

I think you would see similar things in this country. Less people would want to become doctors. You would see more engineers, lawyers in turn less people would actually get healthcare than they do now.

[Teal]

And the worst things that happened had nothing to do with Lewinsky. They had to do with ineptitude in foreign affairs, mishandling of the international terrorist threat, laying the foundation for the current economic crisis and decimating the military.

Right. It's Clinton's fault.

This from someone who's quick to blame everything on Bush. Right.

[Feanor]

My buddy had a hernia operation in 1993, and his hernia problem is returning and will require surgery. But since the condition isn't deemed a medical emergency, he said he is on a waiting list of EIGHT MONTHS to get the surgery.

So that's the kind of efficient, patient-centric healthcare system people want in America? Uh, no thanks.

Take care,
PK

Waiting lists are a huge problem in the NZ healthcare system, too, although I'd rather be on an 8-month waiting list than be told by my HMO that the operation wasn't covered and that I'd never get it.


I heard about this interesting story about McCain ads on youtube today:

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20 ... downs.html
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20 ... downs.html

Basically, youtube has taken some McCain ads down because rightsholders had flagged them for incorporating copyrighted material. The McCain campaign (rightly) argued that brief snippets of news broadcasts in campaign ads is pretty obviously fair use, but under the rather draconian rules of the DMCA that Senator McCain supported, youtube can not afford to be the judge of that.

I hope the same thing happens to Obama ads so whoever the next president is, they will have a bit more understanding of how easy the DMCA is to abuse.

[Teal]

It shouldn't be surprising. The ideological right in this country favors faith-based, rather than fact-based reality.

Scientists are scorned or suppressed if they try to report findings which don't conform to their orthodoxy, such as global climate change.

I don't want to step on the "Ripping Christians" part of the thread,but what Scientist was suppressed?

Don't bother, Jack...it's an indefensible position. Just baseless rhetoric.

[Teal]

The hell with the CEO's. They need to be in jail. How about small business? I posted this a few pages ago. I had two small business that grossed ove 250,000 a year. My net after expenses was under 30,000. Is that rich? Not to me. I had to close the doors too both of them because of taxes owed.

I'm pretty sure (though not positive) that the 250k limit Obama is talking about is not based on the gross, but is rather based on household income. I'm pretty sure that the taxes of your small businesses would not be increased, but rather decreased under the Obama plan.

The whole Joe the Plumber thing is populism and the press ate it up.

What does taxes have to do with him buying the business? Nothing. The financial crisis would have more impact currently than taxes do. If he can't get credit to finance him buying the business, he's can't really pay taxes on that business.

Anyway, like Jared said, he would pay taxes on his adjusted profit of the business. Now I don't know if Obama's plan is like the personal income tax system where you pay the percent in that bracket. In other words, small businesses don't pay taxes on the first 250k but they do after 250k. Or if you make over 250k you pay the adjusted rate from the first dollar.

Obama whiffed on this. And his poor defense led this to be an issue.

Nope. His rare honesty slip about 'spreading the wealth around' led this to be an issue. It's not a non issue in the slightest...it's at the core of the man's principles and ideologies.

[JackB1]

And the worst things that happened had nothing to do with Lewinsky. They had to do with ineptitude in foreign affairs, mishandling of the international terrorist threat, laying the foundation for the current economic crisis and decimating the military.

Precisely. This is what most concerns me about the prospect of an Obama-nation.

From a foreigner's perspective, that is so amusing it's not true. Ineptitude in foreign affairs...inability to deal with an international threat and econonic crises....

That could be either Bush, it would appear to me.

Exactly. It's funny when I hear people that are so afraid of what Obama might do. What is everyone so afraid of? We just experienced one of the worst Presidents of all time for the past 8 years and they are afraid of what might be next? I am more afraid of what might happen between now and Jan 09.

[Teal]

Precisely. This is what most concerns me about the prospect of an Obama-nation.

From a foreigner's perspective, that is so amusing it's not true. Ineptitude in foreign affairs...inability to deal with an international threat and econonic crises....

That could be either Bush, it would appear to me.

Exactly. It's funny when I hear people that are so afraid of what Obama might do. What is everyone so afraid of? We just experienced one of the worst Presidents of all time for the past 8 years and they are afraid of what might be next? I am more afraid of what might happen between now and Jan 09.

Dude...even Bush pales in comparison to Jimmy Carter and Herbert Hoover.