Poll - Democrat or Republican?

[Carlene 12]

I just want to make it perfectly clear that the attack on Pearl Harbor occurred BEFORE I was born. I may be old, but I'm not THAT old!

I am just a student of history....and I saw the movie.

I've never been to Hawaii, but I would love to go. Friends have told me that it isn't unusual to see Japanese and American veterans embrace at the site of the Arizona memorial. I am so impressed by that. There is a KFC in Hanoi now. There will probably be one in Baghdad someday, too. Peace...it's a GOOD thing.

[lisah25 3]

I've never been to Hawaii, but I would love to go. Friends have told me that it isn't unusual to see Japanese and American veterans embrace at the site of the Arizona memorial. I am so impressed by that.

The memorial is amazing. I've been there twice, once in 1983 and then this last May. Both times, I've seen older Japanese men, veterans I think, on the memorial crying. People are very solemn and respectful and the whole experience gives me chills.

[BJean 16]

I avoid watching TV news and I don't read the newspapers anymore because of all the frightening bytes, both national and local. But I heard one broadcast in passing the other day that seemed to be saying that the Iraq war has gone on longer than we were involved in WWII. Although I just had surgery and may have been in a drug-induced dream state. Anyone want to challenge that? (Not the drug part, the length of Iraq vs. WWII.)

[dpingl 0]

I really just could not help pointing out some facts about taxtion.

The taxtion of the American people is there. The rich pay the majority of taxes in this country. That is a fact. SEE TAXTION CHARTS @ ANY GOV WEBSITE.

WE, INCLUDING GEORGE BUSH SPEND WAY TOO MUCH. Its only going to get worse. Entitlements are the main sorce. The war has been expensive, I conclude, however that will be short term in comparrsion. but ongoing per 10 year down the road someone is going to have to give up something! :omg: We as a country need to stop the politics and deal in facts, not opinions!

• Since the early 1960s, total inflation-adjusted government spending has increased by almost $10,000 per household.(See Chart S-3.)
  
• Over the same period, inflation-adjusted federal tax receipts have tripled but have still been outpaced by growth in federal spending.(See Chart C-1.)
  
• On its current trajectory, nominal Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security spending will double by 2050, causing total federal spending to reach stifling European levels.(See Chart P-7.)

While federal spending has grown faster than personal income in the past, future federal spending growth will accelerate further as entitlements begin to dominate the federal budget. The federal government will spend more than twice what is spent today on Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid as the baby boomers age over the next few decades.(See Chart P-7.)Higher spending on entitlements will squeeze out other areas of federal spending, such as defense and education. Interest on the national debt will also climb. By 2020, the federal deficit as a percent of GDP will reach twice its historical average.(See Chart P-1.

In return for their tax dollars, taxpayers are saddled with a massive federal bureaucracy that distorts markets by diverting the economy’s most productive resources into expensive and wasteful programs. Past spending growth pales in comparison to projected future spending stemming from entitlements. Lawmakers must recognize that sustained long-term spending increases would eventually lead to long-term tax increases, raising taxes to an unprecedented level in this nation. Regardless of how it is financed, expanded spending on entitlements would greatly reduce economic growth and increase unemployment. The following charts show historical trends and, more importantly, the future problems that loom unless Congress and the President get a handle on federal spending.

[BJean 16]

dpingl: There should be no question over the fact that Americans are over-taxed. Have you checked any of the other industrialized nation's tax rates? Great Britain, for instance? It sort of eases the insult to some extent.

But it isn't just our national income tax that is sucking us dry. The State gets a goodly amount of our annual income in various ways too. Even if you live in Texas or Florida, for instance, and have no personal property tax, these two states get to you in other ways. I've lived both places (and many others) and there seems to be no escaping working many hours per month for the tax man.

Just please reassure me that you know that the Republican dominated Congress and Republican President and his advisors have put us in a much worse condition, regarding federal spending, than their predecessors... Bill Clinton, in particular. You do remember that when Bush took over, we had no deficit, and in fact had a surplus. Now we're right back where the Republicans had us before we got a Democrat in office. How do you expect to cut taxes when our deficit is so enormous?

[BJean 16]

dpingl: There should be no question over the fact that Americans are over-taxed. Have you checked any of the other industrialized nation's tax rates? Great Britain, for instance? It sort of eases the insult to some extent.

But it isn't just our national income tax that is sucking us dry. The State gets a goodly amount of our annual income in various ways too. Even if you live in Texas or Florida, for instance, and have no personal property tax, these two states get to you in other ways. I've lived both places (and many others) and there seems to be no escaping working many hours per month for the tax man.

Just please reassure me that you know that the Republican dominated Congress and Republican President have put us in a much worse condition, regarding federal spending, than their Democratic predecessor. You do remember that when Bush took over, we had no deficit, and in fact had a surplus. Now we're right back where the Republicans had us before we got a Democrat in office. How do you expect to cut taxes when our deficit is so enormous?

[Carlene 12]

Why the rich should pay more taxes

--Mark Rosenfelder

For more than a century it's been generally recognized that the best taxes are progressive-- that is, proportionate to income.

Lately, however, it's become fashionable to question this. Various Republican leaders have trotted out the idea of a flat tax, meaning a fixed percentage of income tax levied on everyone. And in their hearts they may be anxious to emulate Maggie Thatcher's poll tax-- a single amount that everyone must pay.

Isn't that more fair? Shouldn't everyone pay the same amount?

In a word-- no. It's not more fair; it's appallingly unfair. Why? The rich should pay more taxes, because the rich get more from the government.

Consider defense, for example, which makes up 20% of the budget. Defending the country benefits everyone; but it benefits the rich more, because they have more to defend. It's the same principle as insurance: if you have a bigger house or a fancier car, you pay more to insure it.

Social security payments, which make up another 20% of the budget, are dependent on income-- if you've put more into the system, you get higher payments when you retire.

Investments in the nation's infrastructure-- transportation, education, research & development, energy, police subsidies, the courts, etc.-- again are more useful the more you have. The interstates and airports benefit interstate commerce and people who can travel, not ghetto dwellers. Energy is used disproportionately by the rich and by industry.

Beyond all this, the federal budget is top-heavy with corporate welfare. Counting tax breaks and expenditures, corporations and the rich snuffle up over $400 billion a year-- compare that to the $1400 budget, or the $116 billion spent on programs for the poor.

Where's all that money go? There's direct subsidies to agribusiness ($18 billion a year), to export companies, to maritime shippers, and to various industries-- airlines, nuclear power companies, timber companies, mining companies, automakers, drug companies. There's billions of dollars in military waste and fraud. And there's untold billions in tax credits, deductions, and loopholes. Accelerated depreciation alone, for instance, is estimated to cost the Treasury $37 billion a year-- billions more than the mortgage interest deduction. (Which itself benefits the people with the biggest mortgages.)

Who gets to sit on the tax?

Come election season, Steve Forbes, among other millionaires, will be pushing plans for a flat tax. These proposals need to be absorbed with a carload of salt.

A plan where everyone's taxes are lowered is of course simply a tax cut. Here, once again, the question to ask as a voter and citizen is, what government services do you want to cut? Somehow I don't think Steve is proposing to slash corporate welfare or defense. It's more likely a way to attempt to cut social spending through the back door. People like to hear about tax cuts; they don't like to hear about service cuts, even though they're financially equivalent.

A revenue-neutral plan won't change total receipts any-- it'll just redistribute it. Here you have to ask, who gets shafted?

You can't exactly make the poor pay more taxes-- they don't have the money. That leaves only one way to flatten the tax rates-- that is, reduce the taxes the rich pay: soak the middle class. If tax rates go down on the rich, and we're not cutting total taxes, the middle classes have to pay more.

So Steve and the others want the government, already pretty much a subsidiary of the large corporations, to be subsidized even more by the rest of us. About all I can say is, if the American people are stupid enough to swallow this, they deserve to pay for it.

This is pretty shameless, but it's much of a piece with Republican practice in general. For years some nosy folks (such as Sen. Moynihan) have been investigating what states pay the most to the federal government, and which states get the most benefits back. What a surprise: the biggest winners are the western and southern states that vote Republican; the biggest losers are the northeastern states that vote Democratic. Those who whine the most about taxes are those who suck the most from the public trough.

They won't be happy, I suppose, until they can reconstitute a truly medieval system, in which the nobles pay no taxes at all.

[Tired_Old_Man 1]

First let me make the unpopular statement that Americans are not over-taxed. In fact they are taxed at one of the lowest rates of all the industrialized countries in the world.

What we are is over-militarized. The USA spends more money on its military than all the rest of the world combined. And that is not taking into account the tax money that goes to pay all the benefits paid to veterans and all the interest on the debt that would not have been run up if we had not tried to be the world's police force.

We just don't get much for our tax dollars. At least people in other countries get medical care. We in the USA have the mentality of a farming society. We still have this idea of it should not be done by the government. But, we can not do for ourselves anymore, because we live in cities. We need Water delivered and food brought in to us as well as police and fire protection, roads built, etc.

Now getting to dpingl's very interesting item. There is one major fault with it. It assumes that Medicare and Social Security are part of the budget. They were not part of the budget until one of our bright presidents decided he could borrow billions interest free from the surplus of the SS fund. And by combining the two on paper, the general fund and the SS fund, presidents could fool the public and give tax cuts instead of balancing the general fund, while simultaneously borrowing from the SS fund.

According to latest budget, the USA will spend 9% of its 2.25 trillion dollar budget on debt interest. That is about $200,000,000,000 (200 billion dollars).

The national debt according to the US treasury is 5 trillion dollars

plus 3.5 trillion dollars owed Social security or

8.5 trillion dollars total.

http://www.publicdebt.treas.gov/opd/opdpdodt.htm

With treasury notes paying 4%, that would account for the 200 billion interest on the 5 trillion.

If they started paying for Social Security's loan, that would be another 140 billion dollars.

If the Republicans really want to solve the Social Security financial situation, then they should pass a law to pay interest on the $3,500,000,000,000 (3.5 trillion) that the Federal government has borrowed from the SS fund. The Federal government can give the SS fund $3,500,000,000,000 of Treasury notes to cover the debt.

Of course, then the Republicans would have to raise taxes to cover the $140,000,000,000 in interest each year on the $3,500,000,000,000.

Now for the other question. Who has to pay this interest? Yes, the US public. Why is that fair? Who elected the jerks who raided the SS Fund? Who ran away from the facts that the SS fund was being raided? The US tax paying public who still believes in a "free lunch". They benefited. Now it is time to pay the piper.

[Tired_Old_Man 1]

And worse yet. Someone has to pay the $3,500,000,000,000 back to the Social Security fund.

Guess who?

YOU

[terrriho 0]

Hi All,

I am one of the 34% (at least at this time)who voted Republican. I have read this whole thread and found it very interesting. I have enjoyed reading what you all think which is so much better than the political pundits and talking points. It is good to hear from real people. So often any politcal discussion devolves into some viscious attacks either directed at me or the Bush administration. Thank you for this forum and I want to thank "dpingl" for putting herself out there. I won't get into specifics here because it is too easy to get bogged down in the details, citing sources and researching sources. (Don't get me wrong details are important but I am going a more philosophical route). So here are some of my observations:

In my opinion I do not believe we can really know what is in someone's heart (most especially a politician) and if we weren't there can we really know what is said in those cabinet briefings? In the end it is all just speculation.

I have come to believe that the two party system is like a giant pendulum and that it really doesn't matter who is running the country now, the pendulum will swing to the other side and many so-called wrongs will be righted, only to swing back where many so-called wrongs will be righted. So, be patient, I have no doubt there will be a Democrat in the White House at the next presidential election.

Be careful where you hang your hat. Just as soon as you decide to hang with the the democrats then someone screws up (for those who think former president Clinton was just having sex remember he bombed an aspirin factory while trying to deny that relationship) And if you decide to hang with the republicans you are going to have to defend GW's lack of WMD's (I can't, unless it was really really bad intel, but then I wasn't in the briefing room)

I hate the fact that we have come to the place where it is in the best interests of our leaders not to fix what is wrong with our society. While a fix for social security (it is broken) has been in the works for at least two administrations, the democrats can't let that happen while the republicans are in power, they couldn't take credit, and the republicans cannot let that happen when the democrats are in power, they couldn't take credit. We see the same issues with the same dire warnings administration after administration.

I am fast running out of time here to finish this so I just want to point out one more thing and then reserve the right to add more later. Are we safer now? It is a question I hear a lot and I would like to respond. I don't feel safer. Not because things are not being done to stop terrorism but because 9-11 highlighted big time (but wasn't the first, remember the USS Cole, the bombing of one of our embassies and the attack on the Army barracks where over 200 of our soldiers were killed) that this enemy could reach us in our own country. Suddenly there is a danger here I had not perceived before. I choose to think that the steps taken have thwarted some attacks (the shoe bomber, the liquids bombers, the plot in England to hijack planes to the US).

And with that, I must say good by

Terri

[Tired_Old_Man 1]

I really just could not help pointing out some facts about taxtion.

The taxtion of the American people is there. The rich pay the majority of taxes in this country. That is a fact. SEE TAXTION CHARTS @ ANY GOV WEBSITE.

In big bold print it says: SEE TAXTION CHARTS @ ANY GOV WEBSITE.

But instead of using government websites like the one I listed a few posts back, the article you posted was written by and all the linked sites were to The Heritage Foundation who's stated mission is to "formulate and promote conservative public policies based on the principles of free enterprise, limited government, individual freedom, traditional American values, and a strong national defense."

A link to the Republican National Party's website would have been no less biased.

Please do not think that I am saying you were biased. You have a right to be biased. I am biased. I am a Democrat. But the article, which I assume you cut and pasted into this thread is biased because its job is to convince people that conservative values are the right values. So when it states things as fact, I would venture a guess that many of the so-called facts are either opinions or cleverly worded but deceptive statements.

[BJean 16]

Carlene: I agree with most of what you said. But I don't like the idea that defense benefits wealthy people more than poor people. That's saying that WHAT we own is more important than WHO we are. When lives are at stake, it doesn't matter what you own or how many things you have, death is death. The end.

I get what you're saying - obviously when our country is defended against an evil empire, the wealthy benefit more by not losing their wealth than poor people do who have fewer valuable things - but everything is relative and defending our lives is the most important thing, no matter who you are.

Which takes me to Tired Old Man. I agree with most of what you said too, and although I brought up the topic of other countries and their huge tax rates, we need to keep in mind that many of them have things like socialized medicine and other things that we do not have to fund.

I also take exception to a couple of your comments about having a strong national defense. I believe that having a strong national defense is extremely important - pure and simple. I understand about government waste and fraud and the $500 hammer. But if we could streamline spending across the board on all government programs, we could reduce taxes and the national debt. No question that defense spending is out of control. There are always pork barrel programs... Star Wars and all that. They are an abomination, and thanks to the current government the defense contractors have done quite well. But although there should be balance in our defense programs - just as in all government programs - we need a strong national defense. Or it goes back to what Carlene is talking about and some ya-hoo will come over here and take all our good stuff for themselves.

It seems like as long as we have this system of government, we're doomed to obscene deficits. Do you think that term limits would be one way improve all this?

[BJean 16]

Teri: It DOES matter who's in the white house and who's running Congress. It matters who is serving on the Supreme Court. And who's serving on other courts. Voting matters. Opinions matter. I thought I was a bit cynical, but you sound downright resigned to things happening as a normal course of events. (That may sound harsh - I certainly don't mean it that way, I just don't know another quick way to make my point)

I am surprised that people still like to believe that Clinton was so preoccupied with Lewinsky, he went out and used his power to divert attention away from his troubles. Bull hockey. He was acting on information given to him by the Intelligence community and he was trying to protect and defend this country. Republicans at the time accused him of trying to divert attention away from the persecution that they levied against him, but NOW they are saying Clinton didn't do ENOUGH to protect us when he was in office. That tired old song and dance is getting very wearisome at this point. My question is why Bush didn't come into office trying to defend our country against Bin Laden when he took office (before 9/11)? Bush was given the same information that Clinton had been given. And Bush had a Republican Congress to back him up. What's his excuse? He was busy mapping out a plan to oust Saddam and get back into business in Iraq. Too bad 9/11 didn't foil THOSE plans.

As for Social Security, you must understand that there is so much money taken in for SS taxes, all the politicoes eventually just couldn't let it sit there and wait to be paid back out. So they have used it over and over for things totally unrelated to the security of the retired people who paid in all that money. It is broken not because there will be more people than ever getting SS benefits when the babyboomers retire. It is broken because it was used for something other than for what it was intended. Fix the problem, don't take away the program that is keeping our old folks -who paid into it - from being unable to survive in this society. And why in the world would anybody believe that bureaucrats could invest that money wisely when all they've done to this point is bankrupt the system? Fix the PROBLEM - not the program.

[lisah25 3]

I am surprised that people still like to believe that Clinton was so preoccupied with Lewinsky, he went out and used his power to divert attention away from his troubles. Bull hockey. He was acting on information given to him by the Intelligence community and he was trying to protect and defend this country. Republicans at the time accused him of trying to divert attention away from the persecution that they levied against him, but NOW they are saying Clinton didn't do ENOUGH to protect us when he was in office.

This is, to me, a perfect example of how bad partisianship is in our country. When Clinton wanted measures to combat terrorism, including wiretapping measures, Reps said no. That he was going too far. Now, many of the same people support Bush wanting measures all-too-similiar. And Dems who supported Clinton having them are not so sure when it's Bush.

And Clinton acted on bad intelligence. Hum, sounds familiar. (Of course, Clinton bombed a factory, he didn't invade a country. Yes, I am partisian as well!). And some of those who defended him against "wag-the-dog" claims now seem to think Bush uses terror alerts and such to distract people from the problems in his administration.

[BJean 16]

lisah25 - you're making some good points! All too true, which is a good reason to participate in forums like this!