# Will The Republicans ever figure out why they lost? **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [December 26, 2012, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224 "2012-12-26T21:33:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 79
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2013, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/1561 "2013-07-18T01:01:21Z")
> [@Fear\_Itself](#): > > Turnout is calculated on eligible voters. Blacks and latinos have the lowest rates of registration, while the wealthy have the highest. We can register more reliable voters than you can. I would say our demographic has a lot more potential for growth than yours. Are there any stats available on registration rates? Between motor voter and Democratic-allied group working hard to register minorities, I’d be surprised if they have a significantly lower registration rate these days. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2013, 1:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/1562 "2013-07-18T01:03:21Z")
> [@SpoilerVirgin](#): > > You’re also discounting the possibility that there are people in the top 5% who vote Democratic who _support_ raising taxes on the top 5%. Many of the people who vote Democratic so so because they believe in using government to benefit society, even at the risk of some personal pain. I’d suspect that Democratic politicians have done internal polling, plus talked to their donors, many of whom are in the $100-250K range. I think that if Democrats felt they could get away with raising taxes on low six figure incomes, they would. I know many millionaires want their taxes raised, but I have yet to hear such sentiment from upper middle class people. Anyone here making under $250K who are willing to pay more? ---
**Author:** ![Jack\_Batty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jack_batty/32/3201_2.png) [@Jack\_Batty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jack_Batty)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2013, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/1563 "2013-07-18T01:08:17Z")
Raise my salary to $250,000, and you can double my taxes. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2013, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/1564 "2013-07-18T01:37:57Z")
Well, I’m making $45,000, and I won’t accept a tax increase. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2013, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/1565 "2013-07-18T02:21:53Z")
And you think Republican policies are more likely to benefit you than Democratic ones? What’s the matter with Kansas indeed. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2013, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/1566 "2013-07-18T02:36:40Z")
Anyone who pays income taxes benefits more from Republican policies. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2013, 2:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/1567 "2013-07-18T02:57:50Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Anyone who pays income taxes benefits more from Republican policies. Name a few. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2013, 2:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/1568 "2013-07-18T02:59:57Z")
Republicans ask less of us while delivering the same level of services. The main people hurt by Republican policies are those who don’t pay taxes and ask ever more from those of us who do. ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2013, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/1569 "2013-07-18T03:02:06Z")
How dare they! ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2013, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/1570 "2013-07-18T03:03:55Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Anyone who pays income taxes benefits more from Republican policies. Not if the country goes broke or goes to manufactured crisis by those Republicans. > **[Not All Crises Are Manufactured Equally](https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2013/03/guide-next-manufactured-crises/317777/)** > > The Republican Party has earned such a reputation for stubbornness that the kind of extralegal presidential powers George W. Bush used to handle terrorists are now popping up in discussions of Barack Obama's budget negotiations with... > [@](#): > > Government shutdown: Fight (in January), Cave (now). The GOP will not go Full Newt at the end of the month, when government funding runs out, even though Gingrich himself endorsed it. When asked in January why the GOP would threaten a shutdown when it already had bad poll numbers, Rep. Paul Ryan responded, “We don’t have much to lose, do we?” Texas Sen. John Cornyn wrote at the time, “It may be necessary to partially shut down the government in order to secure the long-term fiscal well being of our country…” But now the GOP thinks that’s a bad idea. The House will vote Thursday to keep the government funded through September 30, The Washington Post reports. “The president this morning agreed that we should not have any talk of a government shutdown,” Boehner said Sunday on Meet the Press. > > Debt Limit II: Fight. Paul Ryan told The Washington Post’s Ruth Marcus that the GOP will fight for spending cuts in exchange for a raise in the debt ceiling this summer. While the debt limit was seen as a political loser earlier, it’s “Not this time,” Ryan said. Boehner said he remains committed to getting spending cuts equal to the amount that the debt ceiling is raised, which is ultimately unsustainable, even if Obama were to sign Ryan’s budget into law. Will that math cause the GOP reconsider this final showdown? It’s too soon to tell. On this, I do agree with Steve Benen from the Maddow Blog: [http://maddowblog.msnbc.com/\_news/2013/07/08/19353533-house-gop-draws-up-menu-for-debt-ceiling-crisis?lite](http://maddowblog.msnbc.com/_news/2013/07/08/19353533-house-gop-draws-up-menu-for-debt-ceiling-crisis?lite) > [@](#): > > We’ve reached a level of true madness here. We are, after all, talking about paying for things congressional Republicans have already bought, and so they have to raise the debt limit to avoid default. And yet, their official position is, in effect, “Give us a treat or we’ll start deliberately hurting Americans. No goodies = no peace.” > > But it’s this “menu” that really rankles – Republicans will promise not to threaten to hurt Americans on purpose for a certain period of time, based on which part of Paul Ryan’s House GOP budget plan Democrats accept. > > If Democrats agree to more means testing of Social Security benefits, Republicans will agree not to hold the nation hostage again for a short while. > > If Democrats agree to cut food stamps for struggling families or block-grant Medicaid, Republicans will agree not to hold the nation hostage again for a slightly longer period of time. > > And if Democrats agree to privatize social-insurance programs altogether, Republicans promise they won’t threaten to hurt the country again on purpose until after the president leaves office. How gracious of them. > > This is dangerously stupid and reflects a degree of post-policy nihilism that’s hard to fully appreciate. This is arguably the single dumbest, manufactured, self-imposed crisis imaginable, but at least for now, it’s going to happen anyway. ---
**Author:** ![PigArcher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/bcef8e/32.png) [@PigArcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PigArcher)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2013, 12:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/1571 "2013-07-18T12:27:06Z")
> [@adaher](#): > I’d be fine paying more if I knew it was going to things that are universally beneficial like schools, health care, and social programs, rather than defence spending and cutting taxes on the rich. > [@adaher](#): > > Anyone who pays income taxes benefits more from Republican policies. No, because they do the exact opposite of what I described above. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2013, 12:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/1572 "2013-07-18T12:58:25Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Anyone who pays income taxes benefits more from Republican policies. Not at all. We’re not all obsessed with playing the game “he who pays the least taxes wins”. Taxes are the cover charge of living in a civilized society. Republican policies result in tax cuts at the top and an ever greater wealth disparity between the haves and the have-nots. If you want to see a feudal society with robber barons at the top and serfs at the bottom, keep punching that R ticket. ---
**Author:** ![Truman\_Burbank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecc23a/32.png) [@Truman\_Burbank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Truman_Burbank)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2013, 1:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/1573 "2013-07-18T13:27:29Z")
As a family we’re filing very low 6 figures. I’d pay more. I’ve lived in California my whole life, and I’m old enough to have benefitted from a public school system that once was among the finest in the world while being affordable. Now my own kids are approaching college age, and the JCs are a joke, and the university fees are very high. I’d pay more taxes, not just because it might end up being nearly a push for me personally if tuitions went down substantially, but because I am willing to pay more to help those fortunate, and I believe that only government can substantially help, as a class, the least fortunate among us. Sure, you can point to Horatio Alger exceptions, but I won’t be satisfied until the kids in South Central have schools comparable to Beverly Hills. ---
**Author:** ![Onomatopoeia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/onomatopoeia/32/4145_2.png) [@Onomatopoeia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Onomatopoeia)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2013, 2:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/1574 "2013-07-18T14:17:46Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > I know many millionaires want their taxes raised, but I have yet to hear such sentiment from upper middle class people. I consider myself upper middle class. My and my wife’s combined household income is more than $250K and we’d be willing, and can easily afford, to pay more in taxes, even though I run an S corp, the taxes for which are borne by me personally. I will agree with this statement: > [@adaher](#): > > Anyone who pays income taxes benefits more from Republican policies. although I would amend it to: Anyone who pays income taxes benefits more from Republican \*\*tax \*\*policies. I am able to legally mitigate my personal tax burden via benefits available to me as a principal in a corporation, and adjustments to shareholder distributions that the average employee does not have. Also, not to get too heavily into a discussion about taxes, or place too much weight on anecdotes, or definitions of what constitutes middle class, but the individual tax burdens of many members of my extended family (whose incomes are on average a fifth of mine) relative to their incomes are much higher than mine. So no, I wouldn’t be okay with raising taxes on those making lower middle class wages, but I think I would be for those making $200K and above, and definitely for those making $250K and above. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2013, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/1575 "2013-07-18T14:22:45Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Anyone who pays income taxes benefits more from Republican policies. No, they don’t, they just get to take a bit more of their paychecks home. That’s something, but it’s not everything. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2013, 2:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/1576 "2013-07-18T14:30:30Z")
And that’s only in theory. When federal income taxes are cut, there is a domino effect that means that other taxes will rise, you’ll get less in exchange for it, cuts in services and programs will result in other things becoming more expensive. ---
**Author:** ![Onomatopoeia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/onomatopoeia/32/4145_2.png) [@Onomatopoeia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Onomatopoeia)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2013, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/1577 "2013-07-18T14:37:25Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Anyone who pays income taxes benefits more from Republican policies. Actually, reading this again, I’d qualify my agreement with it as the higher one’s income, the higher relative tax benefit one receives. Also, once one reaches certain general thresholds of income, other factors come into play that increase personal tax benefits. Someone making, say, $400K a year will probably have a much more robust compensation package that includes perqs in addition to base salary than a standard at-will employee making, say, $90K will have. Also, those making higher-end salaries will tend to be employers rather than employees, which opens the door to many tax loopholes and other tax advantages. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2013, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/1578 "2013-07-18T14:43:11Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > No, they don’t, they just get to take a bit more of their paychecks home. That’s something, but it’s not everything. For small values of people, it is. ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2013, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/1579 "2013-07-18T14:46:04Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > I know many millionaires want their taxes raised, but I have yet to hear such sentiment from upper middle class people. > > Anyone here making under $250K who are willing to pay more? Yep, I am. And I reject the notion that pay a few less dollars in taxes is going to benefit me more than social justice, a safety net, universal education, comprehensive regulation, sound infrastructure, affordable health care, sex education for all, and a healthy environment would benefit me. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2013, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/1580 "2013-07-18T15:13:29Z")
> [@BobLibDem](#): > > For small values of people, it is. Or for people of small values . . . [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224.md?page=78) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224.md?page=80)