tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7342454496014200176.post1405805644430997889..comments2023-05-05T06:38:34.592-04:00Comments on IMHO: Welcome back!Niceguy Eddiehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03896896323840121445noreply@blogger.comBlogger9125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7342454496014200176.post-16573107350466194862011-01-18T22:29:25.000-05:002011-01-18T22:29:25.000-05:00@Jlarue - Agreed, 100%
@Mauigirl - Meh, it ain...@Jlarue - Agreed, 100%<br /><br />@Mauigirl - Meh, it ain't all THAT bad. I find it more amusing than frustrating, most times. It's only bad when I'm asked a direct question (rare, since I'm still at the "kids" table with all the "kids" and all of their (and our) childeren) by someone who assumes I'll agree with them (you know: because I'm so smart!) and I'm forced to find a vastly more diplomatic way than I'd typically use here to show them how misguided they are and why. It's a lot easier, trivial in fact by comparison, to make that argument here, in my more *traditional* style. LOLNiceguy Eddiehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03896896323840121445noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7342454496014200176.post-67588072665585549622011-01-17T17:05:24.043-05:002011-01-17T17:05:24.043-05:00Oh gosh, you have my sympathies having to deal wit...Oh gosh, you have my sympathies having to deal with all of that political disagreement. Lucky for me, both my in-laws and my late parents are/were Democrats so we didn't have too many of those family disagreements. My aunt (mom's sister) is the one outlier. She was a Republican for many years and now she votes Democrat, but still has a number of weird(to me) beliefs. She says she is not anti-gay; but would probably agree with your family members about most anti-gay issues. I find we cannot discuss any of these things or I lose my temper! Good for you, keeping it together enough not to cause a war!Mauigirlhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15529827915262851910noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7342454496014200176.post-51162736476053649762011-01-12T07:55:19.685-05:002011-01-12T07:55:19.685-05:00I am laughing still about Kevin's assertion th...I am laughing still about Kevin's assertion that we are all doomed to eternal damnation for the repeal of DADT. That statement says so much. So very very much.Janet LaRuehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07548074457924805219noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7342454496014200176.post-52727760151412466632011-01-10T18:39:51.764-05:002011-01-10T18:39:51.764-05:00@Steeve – I couldn‘t agree more. Unfortunately ou...@Steeve – I couldn‘t agree more. Unfortunately our media LOVES shedding tears on behalf of the rich. Apparently it really sucks to be a multi-millionaire in America these days.<br /><br />@JLarue – LOL, my parents still have the W. magnet on their fridge. My mother had a W. sticker on her car (which is now my car) at one point, but one of my [liberal] aunts pulled it off at one point!<br /><br />@Classicliberal – I don’t know why blogger seems to think your comments belong in the spam-box. (I certainly don’t!) But I managed to fish it out and get it posted. Great points. (Which I’ll be borrowing at some point!) It’s amazing how easily led the idiots in this country are. (And thus even more amazing that the Democrats keep failing to lead them!)<br /><br />@Kevin – I’d say that you might have actually constructed the most effective argument against the flat tax possible: It was used by the Communists! Although… the fact that Jesus was a long-haired, sandal-wearing, hippy-liberal who gave the sick free health care hasn’t put them off of HIM yet, so… maybe not.<br /><br />Thank you all for your comments! It’s good to hear from you all again. Happy New Year!Niceguy Eddiehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03896896323840121445noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7342454496014200176.post-3009718461440282532011-01-09T17:48:23.567-05:002011-01-09T17:48:23.567-05:00One other thing... I recall an economics/political...One other thing... I recall an economics/political class that discussed the various tax systems and according to the professor, the flat tax was a beginning tax model because it was easy to implement (which is why I believe former Soviet Union states considered the taxes). As countries progress - especially into a capitalist system - there develops a need to create a more complicated tax structure.<br /><br />I may be getting some of the details off in my summary, and I can't really cite any info without digging through my old note books, but I am always reminded of this when I hear various arguments for changing the tax system.Kevinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13492761988793782893noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7342454496014200176.post-40115765452017514632011-01-09T17:44:18.893-05:002011-01-09T17:44:18.893-05:00Considering DADT will doom America, we might as we...Considering DADT will doom America, we might as well just live with "Obamacare" and all the liberal evils, because they would make passing time better while waiting for our eventual eternal damnation... :)Kevinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13492761988793782893noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7342454496014200176.post-11411889654784399132011-01-08T21:19:44.427-05:002011-01-08T21:19:44.427-05:00As of 2007 (before the current recession which wil...As of 2007 (before the current recession which will make the numbers even worse), the top 1% of earners took in 23.5% of the income. To put that in context, the bottom 50% of earners took in only 12-14% of total income.<br /><br />Far more grim is the picture painted by <i>wealth</i> inequality (the top 5% of Americans own over half of the wealth in the U.S.; the top 20% own over 80% of it).<br /><br />The tax code is written in such a way that compliance, beyond a certain level of wealth, is, for all intents and purposes, voluntary, and that's not "voluntary" in the way all tax compliance is legalistically said to be voluntary--that's "voluntary" as in you only pay if you want to pay. Big Oil is the most profitable industry on earth; it is the lowest taxed industry in the U.S. (the biggest companies not only pay nothing, but get huge subsidies from the government every year).<br /><br />The "flat tax" schemes that have been thrown around for two decades aren't income taxes. They're consumption taxes, and are regressive, falling most heavily on those least able to pay. The advocates of these schemes use "simplification" as a selling-point, but that's a con-game, because there's no reason why the progressive income tax couldn't be made just as simple. It isn't complex because evil government bureaucrats took it on their bad ol' socialist selves to make it that way--it's complex because every special interest in the U.S. spent a fortune to buy legislators for the purpose of carving out their own little hole in it, their own little excuse for not having to pay anything. Nor is it the case that the "flat tax" is "fair." Those at the lower end of the wealth spectrum can't afford to pay more, and those in the middle can be significantly harmed by higher taxes. Those who have most of the wealth can pay higher taxes without suffering any real economic harm, and <i>that's</i> fair.<br /><br />The decades after the second World War featured incredibly steep, graduated taxes (the top rate was 70-90% in those years), income inequality sharply declined every year, unionism was the strongest it has been in U.S. history, and industry was heavily regulated. The result was that the U.S. became the economic powerhouse of the world.<br /><br />This all fell apart in the '70s, when the liberalism that had helped produce this prosperity went into decline.<br /><br />All right, I'll confess I cut-and-pasted most of that from something I'd written a few months ago, and just modified it to sort of comment on some of the things under discussion here. I'm having a really bad time just now, and I'm not really up to thinking about most things very deeply, or writing about them, either. I threw this out because it sort of fit that tax talk.classicliberal2http://lefthooktheblog.blogspot.com/noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7342454496014200176.post-7327924344600421632011-01-08T12:42:20.387-05:002011-01-08T12:42:20.387-05:00"Conservatives are basically whiny little bit..."Conservatives are basically whiny little bitches"<br /><br />Ahhh, good to have you back! I am tired just reading about the assaults on your liberal defenses! It sounds exhausting! I fortunately come from a liberal family except my mother who actually cried when Nixon resigned! I used to have to drive her around and her car has a Bush bumper sticker but I kept a magnetic radio station bumper sticker hidden under the mat in the back seat and would slip it out and cover the Bush one before driving her car. LOL!Janet LaRuehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07548074457924805219noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7342454496014200176.post-22681967586533079952011-01-06T01:13:31.808-05:002011-01-06T01:13:31.808-05:00The flat tax not only fails empirically, it can...The flat tax not only fails empirically, it can't even get off the ground logically. The whole thing is a braindead emotional kneejerk to make taxes fair. These idiots tell their kids that life isn't fair, but they still want to force fairness on large-scale policy with big consequences?<br /><br />I want the tax policy that <i>produces the best results</i>, and I don't care how unfair it is. Even if we can win an argument that the best tax policy is also the fairest, there should be no time wasted in the effort.<br /><br />If someone says that the rich (read: "small business owners") are being treated unfairly, the correct answer isn't "no they aren't", it's "boo friggin' hoo, crybaby".steevehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12620735494191381865noreply@blogger.com