Lookin' For That Apology...

[daveman]

Now YOU"RE agreeing with me. I'm saying taxes can't be cut unless spending is cut at the same time. THAT'S my opposition to this GOP/Obama stimulus package.

Now you're saying do it at the same time, but, you won't INSIST on doing it at the same time, you're willing to let them do the easy part, cutting taxes. That never works. The cuts are never made later.

Pay as you go has to work both ways. No spending without paying for it. No tax cuts without paying for them.

It's funny the way you pretend you want to decrease the size of the government.

Where have you been the last two years while the Democrats were skyrocketing the deficit?

There have been four President's who have been able to get Congress to cut taxes for the benefit of growing the economy...

1. Coolidge
2. Kennedy
3. Reagan
4. Bush II

Only one has been able to follow through on reduced spending at the same time...Coolidge.

BTW, if the Obama-GOP deal goes through, that will be five.

The GOP has been given a wake-up call with this last election: Do what we sent you to DC to do, or go home.

We sent them to decrease the size of the government and get out of the way of the economy.

 

[PoliticalChic]

This is not about 'prosperity'. This is about fiscal responsibility. Fiscal responsiblity is not a stimulus program.

And the stimulus wasn't fiscally responsible, either.

[But let's look at the numbers. According to Recovery.gov, Obama has funded 675,841 jobs. Obama has also increased the debt by $3,219,617,798,657.

The math says that for every job credited to Obama, it's cost us $4,763,868.72.

Do you really want to keep defending that?

The stimulus was not effective at restarting the economy, but it's likely it prevented even deeper deflation. Are you suggesting we'd have been better off without it?

If your complaint is too much money was wasted I dun think you'll find anyone to argue with.

"but it's likely it prevented even deeper deflation."
Nonsense.

Why is it that faith applies here but not in religion??

Instead of 'could be's' how about what actually worked in the past:

"America's greatest depression fighter was Warren Gamaliel Harding. An Ohio senator when he was elected president in 1920, he followed the much praised Woodrow Wilson— who had brought America into World War I, built up huge federal bureaucracies, imprisoned dissenters, and incurred $25 billion of debt.

Harding inherited Wilson's mess— in particular, a post–World War I depression that was almost as severe, from peak to trough, as the Great Contraction from 1929 to 1933 that FDR would later inherit. The estimated gross national product plunged 24 percent from $91.5 billion in 1920 to $69.6 billion in 1921. The number of unemployed people jumped from 2.1 million to 4.9 million.

One of Harding's campaign slogans was "less government in business," and it served him well. Harding embraced the advice of Treasury Secretary Andrew Mellon and called for tax cuts in his first message to Congress on April 12, 1921. The highest taxes, on corporate revenues and "excess" profits, were to be cut. Personal income taxes were to be left as is, with a top rate of 8 percent of incomes above $4,000. Harding recognized the crucial importance of encouraging the investment that is essential for growth and jobs, something that FDR never did.http://www.n-philes.com/forums/showpost.php?p=50819272&postcount=1

"Instead of bailing out failing businesses, expanding government, and redistributing taxpayer money with a "stimulus" plan, Harding responded by cutting spending and removing burdensome regulations and taxes. During his campaign, he argued, "We need vastly more freedom than we do regulation." In stark contrast with the Bush-Obama response of ever-more government spending and debt, Harding had federal spending cut in half between 1920 and 1922 and ultimately ran a surplus.

As a result, the recession that started in 1920 ended before 1923. Lower taxes and reduced regulation helped America's economy quickly adjust after the war as entrepreneurs and capital were freed to create jobs and push the economy to recover. Harding's free market policies lead to the Roaring Twenties, known for technological advances, women's rights, the explosion of the middle class, and some of the most rapid economic growth in American history. Still, he is ranked as one of the worst presidents by many in academia's ivory tower
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/02/obama_should_channel_harding_n.htm


But instead of believeing Santayana, and studying history, you lefties create Keynesian castles in the sky, and take us deeper and deeper into the big muddy.

 

[Big Fitz]

It's funny the way you pretend you want to decrease the size of the government.

Where have you been the last two years while the Democrats were skyrocketing the deficit?

There have been four President's who have been able to get Congress to cut taxes for the benefit of growing the economy...

1. Coolidge
2. Kennedy
3. Reagan
4. Bush II

Only one has been able to follow through on reduced spending at the same time...Coolidge.

BTW, if the Obama-GOP deal goes through, that will be five.

The GOP has been given a wake-up call with this last election: Do what we sent you to DC to do, or go home.

We sent them to decrease the size of the government and get out of the way of the economy.

Now two messages have been sent to DC. One to each party. "Stop ******* around and FIX THIS MESS" or you're going home.

 

[PoliticalChic]

I know they're pissed at P-BO for slowing the revolution.

That isn't it.

Most folks that disagreed with Bush disagreed with his goals and plans more than anything. One thing I did like about Bush is that he had conviction. If he thought something was a good idea, he actively pursued it and he had the leadership ability to bring folks in line behind him. If he thought something wasn't a good idea, he'd fight it with the tools he had. If he didn't care, he deferred to others he trusted.

Obama's problem is radically different. Obama clearly has some strong beliefs, but that's become secondary to his complete lack of leadership skills or his inability to follow through. His tenure so far has been characterized by a complete lack of leadership. Follow the devolution of this Health Care goals into the monstrosity we ended up with. Watch as START falls apart. The Bush Tax cuts? Caved there too. The fact he's having a hard time keeping the military in line. The list goes on and on and on.

I'm actually starting to buy into the Jimmy Carter comparison at this point. Carter was a good and decent man, but his cardinal sin as President is that he was lead by events, rather than leading them. Carter's moments of true leadership (like the Camp David accords) were few and far between. We're seeing Obama fall into the same pattern: he doesn't shape events, they shape him.

That's part of why I think it's entirely likely he's a one term President. If the GOP runs a sane candidate, they'll take the White House in 2012.

Didn't I warn you once about this 'reasonable' thing???

Don't make me go to UPPER CASE!


I agree with the post re: the past, Obama is Carter, but consider this: if the economy is the big problem, a second term Obama with a Repub Congress is the surest way to reduce spending.

The only times in recent memory that has happened is when the two branches are split...and a Repub clean sweep sets the table for big spending.

 

[daveman]

There have been four President's who have been able to get Congress to cut taxes for the benefit of growing the economy...

1. Coolidge
2. Kennedy
3. Reagan
4. Bush II

Only one has been able to follow through on reduced spending at the same time...Coolidge.

BTW, if the Obama-GOP deal goes through, that will be five.

The GOP has been given a wake-up call with this last election: Do what we sent you to DC to do, or go home.

We sent them to decrease the size of the government and get out of the way of the economy.

Now two messages have been sent to DC. One to each party. "Stop ******* around and FIX THIS MESS" or you're going home.

The ones that listen will keep their jobs. The ones who conduct business as usual will collect unemployment.

 

[NYcarbineer]

Well at least this thread will be valuable as evidence for such things as people like daveman guaranteeing us that the cost of this new stimulus bill will be paid for next year by spending cuts.

Once again, show me where the tax rates are being reduced. They are being EXTENDED, not reduced.

Quit lying.

They are temporary tax cuts that are being extended. They are temporary tax cuts that were already blowing up the deficit, and they will now continue to do so.

And the payroll tax IS being reduced.

 

[Big Fitz]

The GOP has been given a wake-up call with this last election: Do what we sent you to DC to do, or go home.

We sent them to decrease the size of the government and get out of the way of the economy.

Now two messages have been sent to DC. One to each party. "Stop ******* around and FIX THIS MESS" or you're going home.

The ones that listen will keep their jobs. The ones who conduct business as usual will collect unemployment.

and provide a 50% boost to the economy per dollar spent on them.

 

[daveman]

Well at least this thread will be valuable as evidence for such things as people like daveman guaranteeing us that the cost of this new stimulus bill will be paid for next year by spending cuts.

Once again, show me where the tax rates are being reduced. They are being EXTENDED, not reduced.

Quit lying.

They are temporary tax cuts that are being extended. They are temporary tax cuts that were already blowing up the deficit, and they will now continue to do so.

And the payroll tax IS being reduced.

What was blowing up the deficit was insane government spending.

 

[NYcarbineer]

Well, 350 posts later, has anyone figured out who should be apologizing for what?

Figures you wouldn't remember the OP.

You made an ass of yourself in your very first post. I remember that much.

lol

 

[Big Fitz]

They are temporary tax cuts that are being extended

Wow, let's try and redefine the issue again. They are current tax rates.

They are temporary tax cuts that were already blowing up the deficit, and they will now continue to do so.

Pardon me for noticing a glaring error in your logic that I must not let go un-highlighted:

Isn't it true that SPENDING causes a depletion in finances, while taxation causes an increase in finances? I mean, you are collecting money while spending... well reduces money in your account.

Therefore, is not the problem overspending and therefore to correct the problem simply a case of cutting spending to reach parity with your income? Isn't that what every citizen and business in the US must do? Why is the government immune from this immutable economic fact?

 

[NYcarbineer]

Once again, show me where the tax rates are being reduced. They are being EXTENDED, not reduced.

Quit lying.

They are temporary tax cuts that are being extended. They are temporary tax cuts that were already blowing up the deficit, and they will now continue to do so.

And the payroll tax IS being reduced.

What was blowing up the deficit was insane government spending.

Which was perpetrated by a GOP Congress that is back in power and you're guaranteeing they're going to CUT spending.

 

[Big Fitz]

Well, 350 posts later, has anyone figured out who should be apologizing for what?

Figures you wouldn't remember the OP.

You made an ass of yourself in your very first post. I remember that much.

lol

Oh do tell? All I can see is you lying pretty much ever post. If exposing you as the intellectual fraud you are is making an ass of myself, pucker up buttercup and kiss it.

 

[NYcarbineer]

They are temporary tax cuts that are being extended

Wow, let's try and redefine the issue again. They are current tax rates.

They are temporary tax cuts that were already blowing up the deficit, and they will now continue to do so.

Pardon me for noticing a glaring error in your logic that I must not let go un-highlighted:

Isn't it true that SPENDING causes a depletion in finances, while taxation causes an increase in finances? I mean, you are collecting money while spending... well reduces money in your account.

Therefore, is not the problem overspending and therefore to correct the problem simply a case of cutting spending to reach parity with your income? Isn't that what every citizen and business in the US must do? Why is the government immune from this immutable economic fact?

This is not a bill to cut spending. This is a bill to reduce revenue by extending temporary tax cuts. Spending has NOTHING to do with this bill.

This is a 900 billion dollar stimulus bill.

 

[boedicca]

But instead of believeing Santayana, and stuying history, you lefties create Keynesian castles in the sky, and take us deeper and deeper into the big muddy.

A well done post!

The lefties have spread faux memes about Harding via their takeover of the education system.

 

[PoliticalChic]

[What baffles me is, how do you expect to both reduce the deficit and reduce taxes? Why is it you think a lower tax rate will increase the overall tax revenues? [/font][/size][/color]

It doesn't. It never has. This is the Free Lunch Myth. This is the right's eat-all-you-want-and-still-lose-weight fad diet.

Lowering taxes has never increased revenues. Of course there have been many times when tax cuts were followed in the out years by increased revenues, but as anyone with a rudimentary understanding of logical fallacy knows,

simply because B follows A does not in any way prove that A caused B. In fact, revenues increased AFTER the Clinton tax INCREASE.

Your wrong, sorry.

The problem is that it’s the same false liberal premise, based on a static conception of human behavior that refuses to take into account that people’s behavior changes depending upon how much of their money they are allowed to keep, and how much of it is seized from them in taxation. It refuses to account for real growth rates in revenues and spending. Which explains why ALL liberal social programs end up costing more than estimated. (oddly enough, always to the surprise of liberals)


For example:

The Colorado tax increase was approved by voters last year and took effect at the beginning of 2005. In order to pass the increase, proponents promised that the measure would raise $175 million earmarked primarily for expanding Medicaid. However, the tax hike only produced $11.1 million in January, which is 24 percent below the monthly average needed to generate the revenue promised
​

This just happened in NY as well
----------------------------------------


SO JFK was wrong:

“It is a paradoxical truth that tax rates are too high and tax revenues are too low and the soundest way to raise the revenues in the long run is to cut the rates now … Cutting taxes now is not to incur a budget deficit, but to achieve the more prosperous, expanding economy which can bring a budget surplus.”
– John F. Kennedy, Nov. 20, 1962, president’s news conference




“In today’s economy, fiscal prudence and responsibility call for tax reduction even if it temporarily enlarges the federal deficit – why reducing taxes is the best way open to us to increase revenues.”
– John F. Kennedy, Jan. 21, 1963, annual message to the Congress: “The Economic Report Of The President”


“A tax cut means higher family income and higher business profits and a balanced federal budget. Every taxpayer and his family will have more money left over after taxes for a new car, a new home, new conveniences, education and investment. Every businessman can keep a higher percentage of his profits in his cash register or put it to work expanding or improving his business, and as the national income grows, the federal government will ultimately end up with more revenues.” – John F. Kennedy, Sept. 18, 1963, radio and television address to the nation on tax-reduction bill

Excellent post.

Isn't it interesting, as Hayek points out, one cannot champion 'equality' without also supporting a 'progressive income tax'...with the rich funding the social programs that are supposed to result in equality.

Interesting paradox, eh?

It is envy, pure and simple...

1. Since one cannot see any objective harm done to the less wealthy by another’s greater wealth, the explanation for the ‘economic equality imperative’ can only be envy. The resentment of luxury in another is evil, in that there is no benefit to depriving others with no gain to ourselves. What is the satisfaction of seeing the better off lessened.

a. President Clinton proposed raising taxes on the rich, even though it didn’t appear that it would increase tax revenues. A sizable portion of the public agreed, even under these circumstances. The motive can only be envy.

2. Sociologist Helmut Schoeck’s observation: “Since the end of the Second World War, however, a new ‘ethic’ has come into being, according to which the envious man is perfectly acceptable. Progressively fewer individuals and groups are ashamed of their envy, but instead make out that its existence in their temperaments axiomatically proves the existence of ‘social injustice,’ which must be eliminated for their benefit.” Helmut Schoeck, “Envy: A Theory of Social Behavior,” p. 179

3. The unspoken assumption is that there is something morally wrong with inequalities. Where is the explanation of what would be a ‘fair share’ for the wealthy to give up? Irving Kristol, as editor of ‘Public Interest,’ wrote to professors who had written about the unfairness of income distribution, asking them to write an article as to what a ‘fair distribution’ would be; he has never gotten that article. Irving Kristol, “Neoconservative: the Autobiography of an Idea,” p. 166

 

[Big Fitz]

This is a bill to reduce revenue by extending temporary tax cuts.

What are you doing spending money you haven't collected yet? Second, revenue is not reduced. The current tax rate is extended. What you're suggesting is that we budgeted for a raise we had not yet recieved from the boss and went out buying big ticket items anyway as if it was a guarantee.

Second if the TARP is being extended in this, that is a major flaw and needs to be removed.

 

[NYcarbineer]

The Congress will never pass the cuts needed to pay for this tax cut,

Umm. What tax cuts? Extending the Bush tax rates changes nothing from the past 9 years after they're passed. There will be a tax INCREASE if they end.

Don't try to push that lie with me that they're a tax cut. There is no reduction in rates NOR a reason to "pay" for this unless you've already spent more money you don't have. These tax rates have been collected now for years and are a known quantity.

Don't try to tell me that when you went to go buy a Yugo, you saved money cause you didn't go across the street and buy a Mercedes Benz. You still bought the damn Yugo.

You don't get to redefine the language to cover a lie.

Then why does this bill have a 900 billion dollar price tag? Why is it being estimated to add 900 billion to the deficit?

You're claiming it will add ZERO to the deficit... So their figures are 900 billion dollars off?

lolol

 

[PoliticalChic]

It's funny the way you pretend you want to decrease the size of the government.

Where have you been the last two years while the Democrats were skyrocketing the deficit?

There have been four President's who have been able to get Congress to cut taxes for the benefit of growing the economy...

1. Coolidge
2. Kennedy
3. Reagan
4. Bush II

Only one has been able to follow through on reduced spending at the same time...Coolidge.

BTW, if the Obama-GOP deal goes through, that will be five.

The GOP has been given a wake-up call with this last election: Do what we sent you to DC to do, or go home.

We sent them to decrease the size of the government and get out of the way of the economy.

I sure wish I was an optimist on this one...

Have you read Angelo Codevilla's essay at American Spectator....sees the members of both parties as cookie-cutter members of the 'ruling class.'

 

[Big Fitz]

Then why does this bill have a 900 billion dollar price tag?

I would love to see why that is being claimed too. I haven't. Unless they've added 900 billion in spending... oh wait! >snap< Now I remember... Obamacare. There's your overspending sherlock.

And I have not falsely called you a liar once. You are calling them tax cuts. They are not. Not at one single point is the tax rate going down for anyone. It is being MAINTAINED. Ergo, you lie.

 

[NYcarbineer]

Well at least this thread will be valuable as evidence for such things as people like daveman guaranteeing us that the cost of this new stimulus bill will be paid for next year by spending cuts.

Where did I do that?

If you have to lie to make your point, your point isn't worth making.

Are you denying that? So, you're agreeing with ME, when I justified my opposition to this budget buster,

that there is absolutely no guarantee (not to mention a mountain of history evidence to the contrary)

that if you pass the tax cuts now, that spending cuts will certainly follow to pay for the deficit in this tax cut stimulus bill?