The looming sequester

[Andy9o8 2]

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(example - every deduction allowed means those that don't take the deduction are paying more to take up the slack. mortgage deductions, tax incentives, exemptions, etc etc etc - get rid of them all)

Agreed. And no special treatment for one source of income over another (like hedge fund managers only pay 15%).

agreed - flat rate, starting at dollar number 1. all income is income.

You'll never get widespread agreement to that. Paying 20% on $1 million/yr still leaves you with.. uh... ... $800k left over to buy that summer home and 4th car with. In the real world, the family of 4 collectively earning $40k/yr is hammered a whole lot than Biff and Muffy are more by 20% coming off their income. So the lower-middle class is going to insist on keeping the graduated tax rate; and the GOP won't have enough votes to kill that. So, the GOP will insist on keeping the bargain-basement rate on capital gains, and the Dems won't have enough votes to kill that.

[rushmc 23]

And the panic continues

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DHS to release thousands of illegal immigrants, blaming budget cuts

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/02/26/dhs-to-release-thousands-illegal-immigrants-blaming-budget-cuts/

"America will never be destroyed from the outside,
if we falter and lose our freedoms,
it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
Abraham Lincoln

[StreetScooby 5]

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I don't know about you, but I'm more than a little sick of providing the security umbrella for the NATO countries so they can give their citizens national health care while laid-off workers in the US go uninsured. I'm sick of paying for Belgians' health care so that we can pretend we have "defense".

I would love to see us completely stop protecting western democracies. Time for them to pay their own way.

We are all engines of karma

[rushmc 23]

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I don't know about you, but I'm more than a little sick of providing the security umbrella for the NATO countries so they can give their citizens national health care while laid-off workers in the US go uninsured. I'm sick of paying for Belgians' health care so that we can pretend we have "defense".

I would love to see us completely stop protecting western democracies. Time for them to pay their own way.

I can agree with this in principle

"America will never be destroyed from the outside,
if we falter and lose our freedoms,
it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
Abraham Lincoln

[rehmwa 2]

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(example - every deduction allowed means those that don't take the deduction are paying more to take up the slack. mortgage deductions, tax incentives, exemptions, etc etc etc - get rid of them all)

Agreed. And no special treatment for one source of income over another (like hedge fund managers only pay 15%).

agreed - flat rate, starting at dollar number 1. all income is income.

You'll never get widespread agreement to that. Paying 20% on $1 million/yr still leaves you with.. uh... ... $800k left over to buy that summer home and 4th car with. In the real world, the family of 4 collectively earning $40k/yr is hammered a whole lot than Biff and Muffy are more by 20% coming off their income. So the lower-middle class is going to insist on keeping the graduated tax rate; and the GOP won't have enough votes to kill that. So, the GOP will insist on keeping the bargain-basement rate on capital gains, and the Dems won't have enough votes to kill that.

It's none of my business how much money is leftover after taxes, if we had a system that treated income equally for all.

(yeah - I actually don't have an issue with a personal exemption. Except for the fact that the cutoff point of the exemption can be pushed up and up until 51% of people don't pay taxes and 49% of the people pay for everything. IMHO - If every dollar was taxed, the wage and salary markets would adjust eventually so the standard of living of lower income earners would recover - the trick would be how to migrate to that situation....especially since the trend is always in the other direction)



agree, that the current tax system has a lot of "wrongs" created to try to balance out all the other wrongs put in place.

I don't think you stereotypes of the Dems standing one thing and the Reps for the other is really true either - both teams have a vested interest in keeping the code as nuanced and complex as possible in the attempt to give everybody the illusion that they get preferred treatment. Again, it's a zero sum game. That's why it's just an illusion.

...
Driving is a one dimensional activity - a monkey can do it - being proud of your driving abilities is like being proud of being able to put on pants

[OHCHUTE 0]

He says he has an important job. OK, US supplies subsidies to oil firms then collects royalties. I'm not sure how the numbers work out, but if this person isn't collecting enough to warrant keeping his job, he should be laid off.

Gov't officials are using this BS to scare people. It's a joke. They need to cut back. That's why they voted the cuts. Why don't DOD officials and Beltway bandits owners take a haircut. That would really solve budget problem.

[billvon 2,991]

>Gov't officials are using this BS to scare people. It's a joke.

OK. If it passes, and it hammers the economy, are you willing to take the blame for being wrong?

[wmw999 2,447]

Nothing would please some people than to have an economic downturn start during Obama's second term. It puts him clearly into the blame seat.

Wendy P.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[GeorgiaDon 362]

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You see, Marc, the national health care of 100 million Europeans and other US allies is being subsidzed out of YOUR WALLET! Because for every buck of YOUR taxes that covers the US contribution to the security umbrella over the home of someone living in Brussels or Tokyo (what the hell do you think our aircraft carrier task forces are for?), that's one buck of their own tax money the Belgians and Japanese DON'T have to pay for their own defense, so that Belgian or Japanese buck is freed-up to be invested into a National Health Care that EVERY SINGLE ONE of our allies has, but the US does not. Belgians and Brits and Aussies and Japanese don't lose their family's health insurance when they get laid off at age 45; only Americans do. And this is why.

I agree with you.

However, the problem is that the reason for the level of US spending on the military long ago became dissociated from the idea of protecting anyone, much less the Belgians and the Brits (and lets throw the Canadians in for good measure). None of those countries have faced any serious military threat in a long time. Military spending has become the teat that a very large segment of the US economy suckles from, either directly or indirectly. It is the primary mechanism of transferring wealth from some areas (largely blue states, as it happens) to others (largely red states). Notice how much squealing and bleating accompanies any suggestion of closing redundant military bases. Does anyone think this country would be able to sustain the current aerospace manufacturing industry if it weren't for military contracts? The military is the epitome of economic welfarism, and the country is totally addicted to it, as Eisenhower warned of long ago.

I also wonder if the tradeoff you suggest would occur even if the opportunity arose. Decisions at the national level about access to health care is a direct reflection of the moral values held by a society. Every other country with the resources to deal with the issue has decided that it is morally reprehensible for people to suffer, be incapacitated, or die because they are too young to have saved the money to pay for medical treatment, or work in a low pay/no benefits job (as most jobs seem to be these days in the US anyway). Only in the US does a substantial chunk of the population seem to think that access to health care is a commodity no different than buying a yacht. Hmmm, I've got $300,000 to blow, should I buy a yacht or get cancer? Does anybody really think people make such choices? Or do they just not give a fuck about anybody except themselves, and maybe their own kids (on a day when they are feeling magnanimous)? It's perverse that the only "national health care system" in the US is restricted to the retired, so money is taken from working people to pay for health care for the retired/elderly. Working people pay for health insurance they have no access to themselves, so they have to go and buy more insurance (if they can afford it) to cover themselves. But it's OK, because if you can make it to 65 then you'll have insurance (well, sort of). What a country!

So, while it may be true that the wealthiest country in the world can't afford to ensure access to health care for it's citizens, because it would prefer (for economic reasons, not defense) to support a military machine that has metastasized out of all reasonable proportion, even if the money were to be deflected from military spending I doubt it would be spent on health care access.

Don

_____________________________________
Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996)
“Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

[billvon 2,991]

>Nothing would please some people than to have an economic downturn start
>during Obama's second term. It puts him clearly into the blame seat.

Agreed. I have been amused watching so many politicians say "Obama is being alarmist; nothing will happen if the sequester occurs. And it will be all his fault."

[kallend 2,027]

So Boehner says This.

Which article of the Constitution says that it's the Senate's job?

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The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[rushmc 23]

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Nothing would please some people than to have an economic downturn start during Obama's second term. It puts him clearly into the blame seat.

Wendy P.

Wendy, it would had to improve to start with

And all the crap that is happening now IS on him

"America will never be destroyed from the outside,
if we falter and lose our freedoms,
it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
Abraham Lincoln

[rushmc 23]

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So Boehner says This.

Which article of the Constitution says that it's the Senate's job?

Obama, the Senate and the Dems dont care what happens

They got the lapdog medias help to blame the republicans and in the end, that is all they care about

"America will never be destroyed from the outside,
if we falter and lose our freedoms,
it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
Abraham Lincoln

[kallend 2,027]

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He says he has an important job. OK, US supplies subsidies to oil firms then collects royalties. I'm not sure how the numbers work out, but if this person isn't collecting enough to warrant keeping his job, he should be laid off.

Gov't officials are using this BS to scare people. It's a joke. They need to cut back. That's why they voted the cuts.

Not true. The reason they voted for the cuts is that the cuts are so STUPID that the plan was to force a compromise to avoid them actually going in to effect.

Unfortunately the Party of No doesn't seem to comprehend the concept of compromise. And Obama's error was not realizing this when he signed the bill.

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[billvon 2,991]

>Obama, the Senate and the Dems dont care what happens

They're not the ones saying "let it happen." They're not the ones saying "it's not big enough; it should be bigger." That's the GOP.

If the GOP wants it, looks like they will get it. They are trying desperately (as you are) to pin any responsibility for their actions on Obama, but per polls, it's not working. Like they say, you can't fool all of the people all the time.

[rushmc 23]

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>Obama, the Senate and the Dems dont care what happens

They're not the ones saying "let it happen." They're not the ones saying "it's not big enough; it should be bigger." That's the GOP.

If the GOP wants it, looks like they will get it. They are trying desperately (as you are) to pin any responsibility for their actions on Obama, but per polls, it's not working. Like they say, you can't fool all of the people all the time.

It was Obamas idea after all

Wonder why he will not man up?

Oh, he has the media doing his CYA

"America will never be destroyed from the outside,
if we falter and lose our freedoms,
it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
Abraham Lincoln

[billvon 2,991]

>It was Obamas idea after all

House vote on the Budget Control Act of 2011 (where the sequester came from)

Democrats for: 49%
Republicans for: 73%

[rushmc 23]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-hkPwdpVxUE

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ewvAv5N5L5A

It was Obamas idea

"America will never be destroyed from the outside,
if we falter and lose our freedoms,
it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
Abraham Lincoln

[rushmc 23]

Or this

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kj1y3q92sog

"America will never be destroyed from the outside,
if we falter and lose our freedoms,
it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
Abraham Lincoln

[rushmc 23]

In the end the spends increase cuts mean very little


Just another Washington "crisis" to keep us distracted

The next big one is at the end of March

"America will never be destroyed from the outside,
if we falter and lose our freedoms,
it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
Abraham Lincoln

[billvon 2,991]

>It was Obamas idea

Keep trying! Maybe if the GOP whines enough more people will support them.

[rushmc 23]

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>It was Obamas idea

Keep trying! Maybe if the GOP whines enough more people will support them.

Well, even Carney says it was

I think you need a new propganda source

"America will never be destroyed from the outside,
if we falter and lose our freedoms,
it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
Abraham Lincoln

[toolbox 0]

>Since this whole thing was Obama's idea to begin with
I guess he liked the sequester before he didnt like it

How very true,yet the liberal media down plays this,and instead attacks the GOP.

[rushmc 23]

You do know the sequester does not cut one penny of spending in 2013 dont you

It only reduces the increases in spending

"America will never be destroyed from the outside,
if we falter and lose our freedoms,
it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
Abraham Lincoln

[rushmc 23]

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>Since this whole thing was Obama's idea to begin with
I guess he liked the sequester before he didnt like it

How very true,yet the liberal media down plays this,and instead attacks the GOP.

The media has convinced billvon

Despite the truth

"America will never be destroyed from the outside,
if we falter and lose our freedoms,
it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
Abraham Lincoln