Is Mitt running for president again?

That was Bill, lest there be confusion.

"If Dershowitz was a good friend to Epstein, he was a better lawyer. Along with a dream team of attorneys that included Gerald Lefcourt, Roy Black, and Ken Starr, he was successful in getting federal investigators not to charge Epstein with moving his victims across state lines and other associated crimes."

Ken Starr and Alan Dershowitz are strange bedfellows indeed.

 

Jet Blue Vein

 

Voted Romney in 2012, likely to vote Republican, but would need to see the match-up.

 

Any Republican who said they were going to start downsizing the military, make an honest effort to get away from the Middle East and start taking away tax breaks for the rich would start to get my attention. That would at least show that they are not towing the line of the rich white guys.

 

START downsizing the military? They won't have much to start. The Army will be at pre WWII numbers by the end of 2015, thanks to sequestration. From a max of about 550,000 in 2010-2011, we should be below 450,000 by December. Reports say we're headed for 420K. Infantry BCTs are going away like crazy, the Army's dumping helicopters and canning three aviation brigades -- two this year, one at Ft. Campbell (THE helicopter place), one in Germany and one in Korea in 2017. That's 35% of the aviation force simply going away.

 

Yeah, but the $400 hammers ...

 

When you say "downsizing the military" do you mean by head count or by budget. if you go by budget the FY 2015 is $840 bil. How much
would you look to cut out ? $100 bil or so?

"Tax breaks for the rich" seems so broad. You need to define it better. Are you basing on annual income? Net worth? Stock holdings?
Anyone making over $350,000 ?

 

Anyone else in favor of a financial transaction tax? It always seems among the most logical to me when these discussions come up. Technology has substantially brought down the cost of financial transactions over the last decade or so, leading to a huge increase in trading volume. A small fee attached to these transactions could raise billions with little, if any, harm done to anyone or any corporate entity. It may have a marginal effect of simmering down the volume of speculative trades, which wouldn't bother me a bit.

 

Don't see the purpose?

 

Paying the bills and providing tax relief to the middle class.

 

So nobody would pay it but tons of people would substantially benefit ... Wow, I think we should get right on that, right after we perfect this perpetual-motion device.

 

Who said nobody would pay for it? Financial institutions that do most of the trading hate the idea. It would effect their earnings, so of course people would pay for it. It would, in fact, effect all investors, including pension funds and mutual funds, so it would touch pretty much everyone with an investment, however, it would be barely noticeable to the huge majority of people. The concept has a lot of support in economic circles.