It seems that in McCain World, most everything (Progressive Taxes, Equal pay for women, equal rights for all, etc) is okay in concept but the devil always seems to be in how to get these things implemented in actuality. Somehow, there are always problems moving from the concept to the actual so they can never be anything more than fine theories for discussion.

But since McCain favors the concept then he is obviously to be marked positive for his conceptual beliefs, right?

Well, we all know that McCain is always being honorable, even then the results hurt people. So when he says that having current workers contributing to the costs of today’s Social Security recipients is an outrage, or when he votes against expanded SCHIP coverage to children without health care/insurance, he’s doing it for honorable reasons.

Thanks for this, Scarecrow.

But that fact did not stop Ridge from playing the idiot on McCain’s behalf. Matthews explained that taxing the wealthy at higher rates than the less wealthy had always been deemed fair, because unlike most Americans, the wealthiest could afford higher tax rates and still live extremely well; taxes were thus “progressive” for a valid reason.

Tweety said that! Not bad

“…he’s doing it for honorable reasons.”

For, like Brutus before him, John McCain is an honorable man.

…as, I am sure, so is Tom Ridge, for that matter.

Digg it!

I saw that. What a farce. I couldn’t make any sense of Ridge, but he seemed to be saying that a progressive income tax has been okay, but when you try to change the rate schedule, so that the point at which someone’s taxes will increase is $250,000, you are, ipso facto, a socialist. He never quite explained the majic nature of 250k.

He also made the argument that, despite what Colin Powell says, just ask troops in the field who they want as C-in-C. It suggested to me that maybe then, we should go back to the failed early Civil War policy, on both sides, where troops elected their officers.

I see. This is just like McCain’s argument that it’s okay to invade Pakistan, but talking about it is dangerous and irresponsible.

For all those who think socialism is a bad word, I give you American socialism:

1) Police department
2) Fire department
3) Libraries
4) Postal service

Ridge took the argument a step further, though he surely knew he was talking absolute gibberish. If there were such a ceiling, it would mean that the marginal tax rates would rise to 100 percent for all income over $250,000, but of course, Obama’s proposed tax rates for the wealthiest would simply return to what they were during the Reagan/Clinton Administrations and would thus rise only slightly over what they are today.

the problem is we insist on calling it “taxing the wealthy” and we are NOT taxing the wealthy

we are reclaiming the assets that were taken from the middle class

what the frig IS it with our dem critters, they continue to play the republican game

we need to stop letting them frame the discussion, getting MY money back is NOT “taxing” anyone, those assets ARE MINE, they are NOT theirs

money is soclialism, public schools, the roads to your house, the electricity to your home, the water to your sink, the trucks that remove your rubbish.

as I said in my first paragraph, the very concept of “money” is socialism defined

Dunno if he’s still doing it, but Brad DeLong used to post nonsensical statements from Bush Administration economic advisors under the heading “Nobody gets out of this administration with their reputation intact.”

Looks like the McCain campaign is following in their footsteps. For a while, they seemed to be leaving to the wingnut man-in-the-street the argument that raising anybody’s taxes is a slippery slope that will inevitably lead to your taxes being raised, but I guess they’re desperate enough now to get Ridge to sacrifice his credibility pushing that line.

if you and your wife were the only people on the planet you would STILL have socialism and the only way you could avoid it is if you lived a hermit

There were 50,ooo anti American Obama supporters who showed up in Orlando today. wonder if Michelle Bachman wants to send in the investigators?

http://www.palmbeachpost.com/b…..digit.html

I thought Matthews let that blithering dillhole off on the question too.

So tell me Mr. Ridge, do you believe that the military should dictate what happens in the US political scene?

Can you then tell me what kind of government is run by the military?

He’s got a ridge of stupidity running through his skull.

-G

yesterday

It absolutely is a bait and switch. McCain is attempting to make middle class Americans already under substantial economic hardship believe they are the ones who will be targeted in order to help those even worse off. It might appeal to survival instincts to oppose helping those worse off when you are already struggling to get by – until the realization hits that it is that same middle class to whom McCain intends to not spread the wealth.

This is all about fear, isn’t it?
McCain/Palin want us to be very afraid of an Obama administration, whether its foreign policy or domestic policy. (And psst, besides, you know, he’s not one of US. /s)

The McCain campaign is all about race and fear. Isn’t that elevating?

Bob in HI

Federal flood insurance

McHoover’s campaign now is all about the ‘low information’ voter.

Anyone with any sense has made up their mind by now, one way or another.

So, all that’s left is a desperate attempt to get votes by wallowing in the gutter with people who are racist, stupid, or both.

My hope is that this is an ever decreasing part of the voting public (the racists, anyway) and that good sense will finally prevail this time.

You can of course be as successful as you want. But success does not have to mean simply greed. Success should include “giving” and “sharing.” There is something wrong with a society where accumulating is the proof of success. I think of the Tlingit Indians of the Pacific North West – who had potlatches – communal events where a wealthy person gave away all their belongings. Where that ability to “give” was a sign of very high status.

We really need to redefine what good citizenship entails and what “success” means in terms of social responsibilities.

Yes. It’s a calculated bait and switch. If McCain had said there’s a businessperson whose net taxable income is $250,000, that would mean the business’ net revenues would probably be over $1,000,000, and few would object that obama wants to raise taxes on that person.

So McCain instead selects “joe the plumber,” whom everyone instinctively thinks of as being middle class, because that’s what we assume about plumbers. Turns out the real Joe had no where never the income or expected income that would trigger Obama’s tax increase. Joe the Plumber was the bait for a phony argument.

Matthews was getting a bit testy with Ridge as he kept asking “who’s going to pay for all this stuff”… even Tweety is breaking the code that the money has to come from somewhere beside the Genie of the Magic Laffer Curve and the Chinese Government.

The Credit Card Conservatives are finally being exposed for what they are… big-spending, big borrowing, asshats who care for no one but themselves.

Don’t the GOPs nostalgize the 1950s? Let’s return to the Eisenhower era, when the top marginal tax rate was 90%. Richistan got to keep a dime for every dollar they made at the top of the ladder. We’d better put some currency controls in place first, so these patriots don’t flee with their wealth beforehand.

In reality isn’t it just the higher tax rate on the income over 250k?

Gawd – if Joe the plumber can make 210K more per year he might have to pay an extra couple hundred bucks over the additional thousands.

Wish I had that problem. Maybe Joe should use the tax break Obama is going to give him today to get his plumbing licence.

And now, thanks to Hot Hank Paulson, BANKS!

Ridge’s credibility left the station a while ago, trailing a bunch of color-coded alerts in his wake.

If they do impose a ceiling from what I understand after about 5 million per year its really not going to “movtivate” most CEO types to work any harder. Just tax 100% at 5million & allow up to .001% overall shares in stock insentive. I dunno something like that. Don’t matter to me unlike Joe I am not blinded by wealth and greed I do not and never will have.

Re-adjust for inflation each time min-wage is updated.

New watertiger at the Mothership

and he’s wrapped in duct tape, with the plastic all flappin’ in the breeze

Here’s what Adam Smith says about progressive taxation, in The Wealth of Nations:

“The necessaries of life occasion the great expense of the poor. They find it difficult to get food, and the greater part of their little revenue is spent in getting it. The luxuries and vanities of life occasion the principal expense of the rich, and a magnificent house embellishes and sets off to the best advantage all the other luxuries and vanities which they possess. A tax upon house-rents, therefore, would in general fall heaviest upon the rich; and in this sort of inequality there would not, perhaps, be anything very unreasonable. It is not very unreasonable that the rich should contribute to the public expense, not only in proportion to their revenue, but something more than in that proportion.”

It is amazing to me that such truths can be obscured by the flat-taxers.

the only people who react badly to the term “socialism” are rich people. tell the other 95% of the country that obama wants to “share the wealth” and they think that sounds like a GREAT idea.

as usual, that mccain bunch misses the perspective of the average american.

JK Galbraith once said that the doctrine of the eighties was that the rich were not working because they had too little money, and the poor were not working because they had too much. This is heads I win, tails you lose Republican economics in a nutshell.

Ridge nevertheless touched a vein that I think runs through the American lumpenproletariat. That is the notion that they have a real chance of making it big. I think this goes all the way back to the frontier, when ordinary people who settled new territory could expect to make returns on their investment well in excess of 100 percent per year (return on clearing trees off the land in winter). I dunno. But there is that view, and what comes with it is fear the ‘government will take it all away.’

I remember years ago standing beside the geyser in Calistoga, when a local came up to me and said wasn’t it terrible that it was being protected for public use — i.e. watching. It was private property, and the person who owned it — I think it might have been himselfl l– should have the right to exploit it any way he wanted. He lost his chance to get rich.

I know a number of my high school class mates who didn’t go to college but managed to buy land in Kitsap County when it was cheap, and made a fortune. They think the same way. Ridge is on to something. But my guess is that the people who feel that way are fast becoming a minority. Let’s hope so.

“Ridge is on to something. But my guess is that the people who feel that way are fast becoming a minority. Let’s hope so.”

Sounds like the Amway formula, which the Brits have attempted to shut down in the courts as a scam. From the Times Online, November 27, 2007:

http://business.timesonline.co…..951266.ece

“[The prosecutor] Mr Cunningham told the court: “The prospect of substantial rewards and easy money has been at all times, and remains, illusionary.”

The investigation discovered that 71 per cent of agents made no income from Amway in the year 2005-06 and that 90 per cent had made a loss after paying the £18 fee to renew their registration. In fact, just 101 of the agents shared 75 per cent of the bonuses.

“The reality of being an IBO is that a substantial majority make minimal financial returns,” Mr Cunningham said. “Our case is founded on the selling of the dream on one hand and the loss or minimal financial return on the other.”

Mr Cunningham told the court that Amway operates a “pernicious” scheme, which encourages agents to recruit family, friends and colleagues to the group so that they themselves could move up to “that very narrow group that makes any money”.

He said that the Amway scheme involved targeting the “gullible”, “deluded” and “vulnerable” to join the scheme and accused the group of “dream selling.”

“Amway presents itself to be life changing and life enhancing – if you choose to participate,” Mr Cunningham told the court. “The millions of aspirational achievers, the idea that this is a success in global terms – we will show otherwise.”

No wonder Amway founder Dick de Vos is a Republican!!!

@STTP in Ohio:

Anyone with any sense has made up their mind by now, one way or another to vote for Obama.

Fixed that for you.

There are two kinds of “undecided” low information voters out there. One kind doesn’t want to vote for a black guy, and is looking for an excuse. I think most of those have plumped for McCain by now. The other kind wants a change, but is worried Obama is a shot in the dark. McCain is telling them “You don’t know who Obama is, and trust me, he’s very scary.” Powell is telling them, “I know who Obama is, and he’s not as scary as McCain.”

The second kind of low information voter isn’t put off at all by Obama’s – or Powell’s – skin color, and they trust Powell a hell of a lot more than they trust McCain.