Budget talks: This is getting nasty

Dow closes up 423. We're back. Nothing to see here any more. Move along.

 

Which makes no sense. How can they possibly expect to take down the frontrunner if they don't attack him aggressively?

Have they unofficially conceded the nomination already and are trying to make nice with Romney in hopes of getting VP or a cabinet post?

 

It reminds me of one of those Olympic bicycle races where all the riders go slow around track until one breaks out and they all take off.

 

I don't expect you to take my advice, but I'm also unsure why you'd judge my success based on the car I drive.

I sure don't.

A car is a depreciating asset. I use it for work, and I beat it up pretty good.

I haven't had a car payment in over 6 years, and I've never been one to define myself by material assets -- certainly not by my car. If I wanted too, I could purchase nearly any new car I wanted to -- for cash. But, right now, I don't see the need.

Now, as for you, are you going to tell us who you are? It's becoming more obvious every day.

In just those two posts, the phrases you used, the complaints you repeated, and your parenthetical allusion to being banned previously, gives you away.

You are so transparent.

 

Maybe they all think the race doesn't start until Perry shows up at a debate?

 

If you buy a new car you can deduct the depreciation and in effect lecrank will be helping you pay for it.

 

It's regressive because the same staple at the same price costs a poorer person a higher percentage of income. If I make 10 dollars and you make a dollar and we both pay 10 cents of tax on a gallon of milk, you've paid 10 percent of your income for that tax, I've paid one percent. And it's a staple product so given an apples-to-apples comparison to income tax rates, lower incomes pay higher taxes as percentage of income.

So that makes up for the progressive rate of income tax. If you take away the progressive rate of income tax, the tax system in general becomes decidedly regressive.

 

Our overall tax system is nowhere near "decidedly regressive." If you frame it in a percentage-of-income format, it is essentially neutral. If you frame it in absolute terms, it is decidedly progressive. You can frame it either way -- and plenty do -- but the case that it's clearly regressive is just about impossible to make.

 

That's why I used the qualifier "If you take away the progressive rate of income tax."

 

Well, sheesh, if you're gonna get all technical on me and expect me to actually read ...

Sorry, read right past that qualifier.

 

Sam Walton drove an old pickup truck around town. Seems to me that not spending a bunch of money on a car when you don't need to is pretty smart financially.

 

I have to agree with YF and Yeverything else on this one. I have a '99 Honda, totally paid off with only 105,000 miles. I've always thought the best thing to do is buy a car new and drive it into the ground.