I don’t think that’s quite fair.
There is a philosophical debate about what is the appropriate role of the federal government: how big should it be?
The “starve the beast” folk think that the federal government is too big and should be cut back.
Now, in your opinion, cutting back significantly may amount to a failure of the federal government, but from their perspective, it would be restoring the federal government to its properly limited role, not a failure.
Not according to the Founding Fathers who did not want a standing army.
They contemplated a defensive apparatus, in a way they never contemplated a DOE:
Its more than a philosophical difference. The Republicans are so sure that the country would be better off with them in power that they are willing to see the nation suffer for long enough to hand the reins of power over to them. They are Republicans first and Americans second in this case. They spent the Bush years forgetting entirely about the notion of small government but now… NOW small government is really really REALLY mportant. Its not small government they are devoted to, it is a Republican government they are devoted to (that and tax cuts).
Impossible until you get immigration under control.
Please stop just saying, and get to stepping. Don’t let the door hit you in the ass on the way out. If you can leave the resources that the American people provide to you and do better, please feel free. For all the nonsensical whining about confiscatory practices that fly in the face of the bible, there’s nothing preventing you from leaving. I suggest you get while the getting is good.
Although Ayn Rand may have felt different, people who have gotten weathly off of America are not that special. Someone else will replace you in a heartbeat, pal. So, Argentina, Galt’s Gulch, wherever you think the perpetual energy machine is.
Leave America to the people who love it enough to want to participate in keeping it going.
I’d wager dollars to doughnuts I’ve given more (fiscally and otherwise) to America, by orders of magnitude, than have you. Enjoy the ride on my nickel, though.
Is that your point? That’s you’ve contributed so much more than some other person that you can threaten to go live in Argentina and still be a patriot? Hmmm. I don’t see the logic there.
I thought you were suggesting that if it wasn’t in your economic interests to remain, you might just leave us. I’m inviting you to please explore your options, you patriotic Argentinian, you.
(Side note: What was the non-American source for all of your contributions to America, by the way?)
The bottom 50% of this country hold less than 1% of the wealth. The top 2% hold over 90% of the wealth, so of course they are going to be the ones paying most of the taxes. They have most of the money.
Huerta88 is making a great show of protesting the 35% marginal tax bracket, like if he earns 200K, fully 70,000 is going to be confiscated by the government. Except he knows really well that he can easily shelter 25% of that income from tax. And that the 35% doesn’t kick in from the first dollar. And that with help from an accountant he can probably easily shelter up to 50% of the income, which will get him below the 35% bracket altogether. And it gets better the more money you have.
I also agree that no one in the country should be getting a free ride. I know people for whome the minimal subsistence they can get on government programs like food stamps, WIC, Medicaid, etc are plenty, and they can work a little under-the-table job to get some spending money to supplement it. This is wrong, but much like the guy who asks for a free cup of water at McDonald’s, and then goes to fill it out of the soda machine, it’s really hard to enforce without significant expenditure.
That’s what I’m not doing. I’m protesting moving it to 39.6%. See me on record upthread as saying I can grudgingly live with 35% (all I’ve pointed out is that the current regime is hardly one in which “the poor” are subsidizing “the rich”).
Why should I care if your taxes go up to 80%? It’s not like you give a shit what happens to other people. Why should they care about you?
I’d ask for your evidence that I don’t care, except you have none.
That still isn’t going to get you anywhere near a 35% total tax rate, unless you were very, very rich and very, very stupid (in not making use of any deductions). Which you clearly aren’t. Your continued implication that you’d pay 35% in tax makes me wonder if you ever filled out a tax form, or looked at the the bottom line against your income.
As for eliminating $106 billion in the budget, you would have to check with GOP congressmen about how their constituents would feel about all that money (and jobs) vanishing. Probably not too good. Unless you were asleep for the last ten years, you know tax cuts do not cause spending cuts - they cause deficits. (While the Clinton tax increase caused a surplus, indirectly.) It would be nice to talk about real and practical politics, not your fantasy of what would happen in a world where the Laffer curve works for moderate tax rates.
I’m not quite at $200K, though close, but I know a small increment in incremental tax rates would be fine. I was in the top bracket during the bubble, and I had no trouble keeping motivated. Try to read what Damuri Ajashi wrote about marginal utility - we’ve been over this before and it explains the reason for taxing the rich more very well.
Except you’re speaking of it as if you actually pay 35%, which you don’t. I’d wager that the number of people paying within two percent of the top marginal rate is probably lower than 1% of all people making over 200K, which is itself a vanishingly small percentage of the population.
Do you even understand the concept of rights? Judging from the nonsense you posted I am assuming you do not.
That’s a lot of typing to not even respond to my post. It really is simple. People who do not contribute any money to the system should not be able to have a say in how the money of those who do contribute is distributed. This would apply to someone down on their luck for a while or those who live their entire lives without contributing.
I’m actually pretty curious what your definition of rights would be? Care to illuminate us on how you define the term for the sake of the discussion?
What MY dfinition of rights are? Are you joking?
One Sunday at mass we sang the old Shaker song “Simple Gifts.” My father, after mass was over, went fuming to the car. “It’s no gift to be ‘simple,’” he said. “It means stupid. There’s nothing admirable about it.”
That’s a lot of typing to say yeah, your idea really is simple, with a side order of meanness and elitism–exactly what we want in a country.
Do you honestly believe this? That, for example, a head of household that looses his/her job (and thus has no federally taxable income for a year), should be barred from voting in any federal election that year? Even if the economic platforms of the respective candidates may have played a large role in them losing their job in the first place (and their prospects for getting another one)?
Because this idea is, to be blunt, bat-shit crazy. And would likely end in mass protests and perhaps, ultimately, revolution (especially if you instantly disenfranchised large percentages of the population).