# Hillary Clinton promises to raise taxes. **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [June 30, 2004, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-promises-to-raise-taxes/252894 "2004-06-30T15:14:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Sublight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@Sublight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sublight)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2004, 3:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-promises-to-raise-taxes/252894/81 "2004-07-01T03:49:08Z")
> [@SPOOFE](#): > > Maybe I’m crazy, Rjung - a distinct possibility - but my hazy recollection is that things were going pretty good until a handful of nutcases tried to blow up New York. Really? I saw my portfolio start to nosedive around April of 2001, recover slightly, take a big hit in September 2001 after the attack, recover again, and then completely tank about midway through 2002. > **[The Motley Fool](https://www.fool.com)** > > The Motley Fool has been providing investing insights and financial advice to millions of people for over 25 years. Learn how we make the world Smarter, Happier & Richer. ---
**Author:** ![Apos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/838e76/32.png) [@Apos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Apos)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2004, 4:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-promises-to-raise-taxes/252894/82 "2004-07-01T04:08:25Z")
> [@Exgineer](#): > > See, **Munch** , when Reagan took office we were in a pretty bad recession. Taxes were cut, but revenues actually increased with economic recovery. Well, you also left out an important part of the story: taxes also were raised under Reagan. So, you know, that helped revenue increase. And revenues did not increase from tax cuts to “pay for themselves” as the WSJ long claimed would be the case, and as you have left ambiguous (of COURSE revenues will increase somewhat with the economic bounce that comes from tax cuts: but increase from the cut level, not from the original level). That hasn’t happened under Bush2 either. > [@](#): > > The Clinton administration was kind of anomalous. Revenues were at an unprecedented level due to a booming (but largely illusory) economy. What was “illusory” about the economy, exactly? We had a bubble, but not one big enough to account to the boom itself. In fact, the bubble was caused by the boom, as most bubbles are. ---
**Author:** ![SPOOFE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c5a1d2/32.png) [@SPOOFE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SPOOFE)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2004, 4:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-promises-to-raise-taxes/252894/83 "2004-07-01T04:11:11Z")
> [@](#): > > Have conservatives all gone nuts? Seriously, what the fuck? Wait, wait, wait. It’s the CONSERVATIVES that have gone nuts, when Libby-Champ Rjung makes the painfully over-simplified claim that the entire recession is directly due to the actions of Republicans? Or does Rjung mean something different than the rest of the universe when he says “Republican”? Wouldn’t surprise me, really, but… ::ahem:: **Seriously, what the fuck?** > [@](#): > > SPOOFE, dude, cut down on the caffeine. I gotcha. I suppose YOU’RE gonna explain to me why it’s okay to say “Republicans All Fault!”, yet when someone questions that retarded logic, it’s met with… ::ahem:: **Seriously, what the fuck?** Man, if THAT was the last straw, I’d hate to see how infinitessimally insignificant the FIRST straw was. ---
**Author:** ![Otto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Otto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Otto)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2004, 5:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-promises-to-raise-taxes/252894/84 "2004-07-01T05:32:17Z")
> [@duffer](#): > > Actually, Congress passes budgets and spending bills. The President either signs it or vetoes it. (Also you get the line-item veto) So while Clinton was in the White House, as of '94 Republicans controlled Congress and wrote the budget. Surplus? Way to go Republicans! Not wading into this shitstorm again, but I have to point out that there is [no](http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/1998/06/25/scotus.lineitem/) federal line-item veto. One was created in 1996, Clinton struck out a few relatively innocuous line items and several members of Congress successfully sued. SCOTUS found the LIV law unconstitutional because it contravened the veto process spelled out in the Constitution. ---
**Author:** ![Otto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Otto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Otto)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2004, 5:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-promises-to-raise-taxes/252894/85 "2004-07-01T05:36:20Z")
> [@Otto](#): > > several members of Congress successfully sued. Sorry, the case under which the LIV was struck down was not one brought by members of Congress. IIRC some members of Congress who had projects in their districts vetoed also sued but my cite doesn’t reference them. The case SCOTUS ruled on was brought by some Idaho potato farmers and New York City. ---
**Author:** ![akennett](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ee59a6/32.png) [@akennett](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/akennett)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2004, 5:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-promises-to-raise-taxes/252894/86 "2004-07-01T05:45:37Z")
> [@Captain Amazing](#): > > And, looking more closely at the Constitution, I see it is actually explicitly spelled out: Then, immediately following, the Constitution explicitely spells out those things which the central government is authorized to do: > [@](#): > > Clause 2: To borrow Money on the credit of the United States; > > Clause 3: To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes; > > Clause 4: To establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization, and uniform Laws on the subject of Bankruptcies throughout the United States; > > Clause 5: To coin Money, regulate the Value thereof, and of foreign Coin, and fix the Standard of Weights and Measures; > > Clause 6: To provide for the Punishment of counterfeiting the Securities and current Coin of the United States; > > Clause 7: To establish Post Offices and post Roads; > > Clause 8: To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries; > > Clause 9: To constitute Tribunals inferior to the supreme Court; > > Clause 10: To define and punish Piracies and Felonies committed on the high Seas, and Offences against the Law of Nations; > > Clause 11: To declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water; > > Clause 12: To raise and support Armies, but no Appropriation of Money to that Use shall be for a longer Term than two Years; > > Clause 13: To provide and maintain a Navy; > > Clause 14: To make Rules for the Government and Regulation of the land and naval Forces; > > Clause 15: To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions; > > Clause 16: To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the > Authority of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress; > > Clause 17: To exercise exclusive Legislation in all Cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding ten Miles square) as may, by Cession of particular States, and the Acceptance of Congress, become the Seat of the Government of the United States, and to exercise like Authority over all Places purchased by the Consent of the Legislature of the State in which the Same shall be, for the Erection of Forts, Magazines, Arsenals, dock-Yards, and other needful Buildings;–And > > Clause 18: To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof. Beyond this list, we get into the territory of unconstitutional usurpations of power. Somehow I don’t think that Hillary’s idea of what she wants to take our money for. ---
**Author:** ![rjung](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/45deac/32.png) [@rjung](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rjung)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2004, 7:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-promises-to-raise-taxes/252894/87 "2004-07-01T07:14:48Z")
> [@Giraffe](#): > > **Have conservatives all gone nuts? Seriously, what the fuck?** Four years of defending George W. Bush will do that to you. The strain is starting to blow those gaskets: Dick Cheney’s F-bomb, Paul Wolfowitz’s House Armed Services Committee meltdown, Donald Rumsfeld’s memos authorizing the use of torture… just add **SPOOFE’s** ranting incoherence to the list. ---
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2004, 11:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-promises-to-raise-taxes/252894/88 "2004-07-01T11:52:44Z")
Let’s stay focused, kids. I do find myself in a surreal space when recent history indicates that having a democrat in the white house leads to fiscal responsibility and having a republican there leads to (IMHO) fiscal madness. But then I realize that what really drives restraint is having the white house in one set of hands and congress in another. The push and pull of budgetary conflict appears, on the evidence, to lead to neither side getting to exercise their more fatuous tendencies. I well understand the ‘cut taxes and watch economic growth offset the revenue cut with increased economic activity’ crowd and, to a certain extent, I agree with them. Obviously an _absurdum_ form of that argument has us paying for everything easily with no taxes whatsoever! Woo! But I find that, regardless of the proponents good intentions, (and I generally think most people do have good intentions) where the theory breaks down is on the spending side. Their simply isn’t any real desire for fiscal restraint on **either side of the aisle**. So cutting taxes, which has the desire of promoting economic health, actually ends up working against the country in the long run through deficit spending. Given that, I see little practical purpose in large-scale tax cuts if not accompanied by spending cuts. Far better to leave taxes where they are until we can acheive some form of consensus on spending cuts. Just doing half the job seems to be counter productive. Sort of like this: Which is better? Tax and spend or no-tax and spend? Ugh. Any way you look at it you lose. ---
**Author:** ![UncleBeer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/977dab/32.png) [@UncleBeer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UncleBeer)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2004, 11:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-promises-to-raise-taxes/252894/89 "2004-07-01T11:53:53Z")
> [@Giraffe](#): > > **duffer** , posts like these make you look like a retard. > [@rjung](#): > > _in response to the above:_ > Whaddaya mean, “look like”? [Join the club, fellas.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=5020059&postcount=67). ---
**Author:** ![UncleBeer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/977dab/32.png) [@UncleBeer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UncleBeer)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2004, 12:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-promises-to-raise-taxes/252894/90 "2004-07-01T12:42:22Z")
> [@](#): > > But then I realize that what really drives restraint is having the white house in one set of hands and congress in another. The push and pull of budgetary conflict appears, on the evidence, to lead to neither side getting to exercise their more fatuous tendencies. I don’t think this explains it, JC. As noted earlier, we had 40 years of Congresses controlled by Democrats prior to the flop during Clinton’s era. And almost wholly Republican presidents during that time. Only 4 years of Carter and about 3 years of JFK on the opposite side. And yet, we had huge and growing deficits all through that period. You may argue that the deficits might have been even greater if both of these branches of the gov’t had been controlled by a single party, but there’s no evidence of “restraint” that I can see in those 40 years. And certainly none now, either. ---
**Author:** ![Uncommon\_Sense](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Uncommon\_Sense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uncommon_Sense)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2004, 2:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-promises-to-raise-taxes/252894/91 "2004-07-01T14:04:01Z")
Would it kill the Democrats to admit that there are areas in this government that could actually be cut? All I ever hear around here, and in general, is that cutting taxes is bad - raising taxes is good. How bout a combination of the two? Maybe raise taxes and cut spending? Cut taxes and reduce spending? Why aren’t the Dems for cutting programs, cutting taxes and bringing the whole spending thing under control? Oh, because it means cutting government jobs,-can’t do that…Let’s just knee-jerkily raise taxes all the time to bring the level of income up to the same level that we’d like to see the spending at. Let’s continuously add new programs without getting rid of the old outdated boondogle-money sucking programs (like the IRS). The governments primary concern should be to serve and protect. Anything else takes a back seat. Yes, I realise the Republicans in Congress are also to blame, but I see most of the Dems on this board wishing for higher taxes and most of the Pubbies on this board wishing for lower taxes and cutting programs. What’s UP? ---
**Author:** ![Giraffe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/giraffe/32/129_2.png) [@Giraffe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giraffe)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2004, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-promises-to-raise-taxes/252894/92 "2004-07-01T16:09:40Z")
> [@SPOOFE](#): > > It’s the CONSERVATIVES that have gone nuts, when Libby-Champ Rjung makes the painfully over-simplified claim that the entire recession is directly due to the actions of Republicans? First of all, I didn’t see him say that. I may have missed it, though, so feel free to provide a link. Second of all, irregardless of what **rjung** did or did not say, could you (or any other intelligent conservative) explain to me how cutting taxes during a war and recession is consistent with the previous fiscal conversatism that was a hallmark of the Republican party? Are you guys for a balanced budget or not? How do you feel about the $500 billion deficit? If you were president, would you have instituted all the same tax cuts? Gone to war unilaterally (thus footing the entire bill)? Should the government be spending way more than it takes in? ---
**Author:** ![Giraffe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/giraffe/32/129_2.png) [@Giraffe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giraffe)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2004, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-promises-to-raise-taxes/252894/93 "2004-07-01T16:17:58Z")
> [@Uncommon Sense](#): > > Would it kill the Democrats to admit that there are areas in this government that could actually be cut? All I ever hear around here, and in general, is that cutting taxes is bad - raising taxes is good. How bout a combination of the two? > Maybe raise taxes and cut spending? > Cut taxes and reduce spending? Your one-dimensional stereotypes are false. I know a lot of Democrats. All of them are opposed to Bush’s tax cuts. It has nothing to do with wanting to keep taxes high. All of them were in favor of **a** tax cut, just not the ones Bush proposed. Most Democrats I know wanted a smaller tax cut (since the projections of future tax revenues were largely based on the boom times and thus somewhat unrealistic) which benefitted the middle and lower classes more. No one likes paying taxes. But we do like having a society where we don’t let old people starve to death, where we have emergency rooms available if we have a heart attack, and where we have roads and parks and all that good stuff. Democrats in my experience value the social programs more than Republicans, while Republicans tend to value military programs and business subsidies more. Both are expensive. You can’t have all these things and low taxes, so hard choices have to be made. Spending more than you bring in is not a viable solution, nor is saying someone likes raising taxes when they want to stop doing this. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2004, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-promises-to-raise-taxes/252894/94 "2004-07-01T17:26:57Z")
> [@Exgineer](#): > > I’ve already read **RTFirefly** ’s post, and checked his cite, but I’m at a loss as to how it makes anything I’ve posted in this thread is inaccurate. OK, you said: “We got deficits [in the Reagan years] because the Democrats in Congress spent it all faster thatn it came in.” Excluding the payroll tax, which is dedicated to Social Security and Medicare, revenue increased by 5.3% per year from 1981 to 1989. Excluding Social Security and Medicare, defense (since Reagan was pushing the defense spending increase) and interest (for obvious reasons), spending increased by 3.3% per year over the 1981-89 period. Which demonstrates that Congress didn’t create the Reagan deficits by spending the revenues faster than they came in. Q.E.D. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2004, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-promises-to-raise-taxes/252894/95 "2004-07-01T17:32:46Z")
> [@Jonathan Chance](#): > > Any way you look at it you lose. And Joltin’ Joe has left and gone away, hey hey hey. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2004, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-promises-to-raise-taxes/252894/96 "2004-07-01T17:35:41Z")
Jesse Helms wants higher taxes too: > [@](#): > > As right as Bush was on war, Helms says, he’s wrong on taxes. “I would not have voted for the tax cut, based on what I know. I think he was eager for attention, so the fellow down at the pool hall could say, ‘Boy, that fellow has guts.’ There is no doubt that the people at the top who need a tax break the least will get the most benefit. I think he just wanted to show he had guts to do something. Too often presidents do things that don’t end up helping the people they should be helping, and their staffs won’t tell them their actions stink on ice. You know, not too many people will criticize a tax cut, but it’s going to be costly.” On the recently passed Medicare law, Helms says Bush was trying to one-up Democrats. [Helms looks at himself through history’s eyes](http://www.businessnc.com/archives/2004/03/capital.html) ---
**Author:** ![Liberal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2004, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-promises-to-raise-taxes/252894/97 "2004-07-01T17:48:03Z")
That’s what I meant when I said that most politicians use vague language, rather than Hillary’s I Intend To Mug You remark. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2004, 6:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-promises-to-raise-taxes/252894/98 "2004-07-01T18:01:30Z")
> [@UncleBeer](#): > > I don’t think this explains it, JC. As noted earlier, we had 40 years of Congresses controlled by Democrats prior to the flop during Clinton’s era. And almost wholly Republican presidents during that time. Only 4 years of Carter and about 3 years of JFK on the opposite side. And yet, we had huge and growing deficits all through that period. No, the deficits waxed and waned through that period. But (going with the ‘on-budget’ numbers, as is my wont) the deficit went from $74B (=15.8% of revenue) in 1981 to $208B (=45.9% of revenue) in 1983. Since WWII, there’s no remotely comparable jump like that in the numbers. (Until Bush II, of course, but we’re talking about the 40 years of Dem Congresses here.) At any rate, Unc, it does blow a hole in JC’s notion that having Congress and the White House in control of different parties is the secret to balanced budgets. My problem was with your description of those 40 years as a slow, steady rise in the Federal deficit. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2004, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-promises-to-raise-taxes/252894/99 "2004-07-01T18:08:13Z")
> [@Liberal](#): > > Good Lord. The blind faith you put into bureaucrats in lab coats hired by career politicians with a vested interest in seizing your liquid assets, and whose studies are funded chiefly by the industries who lobby their bosses is frankly inspirational for people everywhere who might sometimes have lapses of faith. > \ > Why don’t you put down your hundred-year-old hysteria novel… :snicker: ---
**Author:** ![Liberal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2004, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-promises-to-raise-taxes/252894/100 "2004-07-01T20:38:27Z")
Did you have a point with your schoolboy snicker, RT? Or was your sole purpose in this thread to exhonorate Ronald Reagan’s economic policies? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-promises-to-raise-taxes/252894.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hillary-clinton-promises-to-raise-taxes/252894.md?page=6)