Budget talks: This is getting nasty

That was my point. At some point it becomes a detriment to the economy if the tax base cannot fund the things that society has decided best be funded collectively. It's in every business's interest that the road leading up to its business be paved and maintained, for example. No one business is willing to or should be willing to, take on that burden. It's also not in every business' interest to higher heavies to protect their stocks. For most, that's what cops are for (private security beyond that is supplemental).

And we can go on and on all the way through a cheaper way to insure retirements so the workforce can be purged and renewed efficiently. It doesn't do the job market much good are a bunch of 68-year-olds hold off on retiring because their 401ks are worth half of what they thought they'd be worth.

 

No problem. We just stop funding all that stuff.

'Cuz we don't wanna pay no taxes for nothin'.

And we especially want to make extra sure the uber-rich don't pay no taxes for nothin.'

Rugged Individualism. Load up on guns.

 

My brother-in-law, who loves the Tea Party mantra, recently adopted a child. He thinks government should stop helping the least deserving in society, including children and the sick. Somehow, he can't get it through his head that his daughter would have been far worse off if the government wasn't involved in the adoption process.

 

But unless the Huffington Post cited it, it's not news. The Wall Street Journal is a fascist rag. Just ask around.

Guarandamn-teed: Fox News, Wall Street Journal will never be cited as credible by the same people who laud Huffington, dailykos and MSNBC.

On a more constructive note: Bill Clinton said he'd lead where Obama isn't. Maybe you should push Hillary into the nomination process for 2012.

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/bill-clinton-advocates-constitutional-option-debt-ceiling-132253374.html

 

Fox News Corp. properties have lost their place at the table. Sorry. It's over. Or maybe you haven't been paying attention to the news?

 

The problem with this (and I'm not picking sides or a fight here, just pointing out an alternate viewpoint), is that "society" may decide to fund some such thing or another collectively, but that doesn't mean that's the way it should be done, or that society as a whole would be better off as a result. Suppose the President put forth a "grand compromise" offer of means-testing Medicare/Social Security in exchange for, say, doing away with preferential treatment for capital gains and removing caps on the income that's subject to payroll taxes. I bet that would poll well. Many, many folks -- in fact a healthy majority, I suspect -- would be in support of such a move. Yet they aren't the ones who'd be doing the paying, and I think their rationales would be just as suspect as those they'd shoot down.

 

The devil would be in the details, but that seems like a fair compromise.

 

Oh sure, if you're in that healthy majority that will: A) see no benefit cut; and B) pay no more taxes, it sounds just fine. But then again, you're not exactly compromising, are you?

 

p://usdebtclock.org/

This ought to cheer up everyone in Congress.

 

I will support lifting the caps on payroll taxes till the day I die.

Everybody pays 6.2 percent. They have been all their lives. There is no sticker shock to it.

If you get a $10,000 raise from $92,000 to $102,000, payroll tax takes 6.2 percent.

If you get a $10,000 raise from $102,000 to $112,000, payroll tax takes $0. Why?

If it starts taking 6.2 percent, is that really so awful? It's really the most painless way to raise revenue (and fund S-S in the process) that I can think of.

 

Yeah I have. And I bet you're talking about Murdoch's issues across the water rather than the recent leaks about the Obama administration's Proletariat-like ways.

 

Why worry about the most powerful man in the world and his, ahem, indescretions when you can go all in on trying to sink Murdoch and Fox News? Operation Gunrunner what? Come on, where are your priorities? The one news outlet that tells both sides can be eliminated! Without the fairness doctrine! Who needs open debate in this country???? One side is all that matters...you know that!