Thomas wrote:From memory, the tax cuts' contribution to the deficit is around $300 billion per year. If you let me run a deficit like that, I can create 6 million jobs with average salaries just by employing people to dig ditches in the morning, then fill them up in the afternoon. Tested against this placebo policy even the Democrats don't want, job creation under Bush looks very disappointing indeed.
<grins>
(sorry guys, i'm in an expressing-my-appreciation-for-good/funny-posts mood)
Just to jump in with something perhaps timely on Veterans Day: Despite the administration's rhetoric, veterans' benefits are being cut. Krugman reports on it today, as do others. If that ain't hypocritical, I don't know what is. Cynical, too, as men and women in the armed forces put their lives on the line to salvage Operation Iraqi Freedom in time for the next election...
One needs to keep in mind that OSS profile of Hitler which linked sentimentality and national authoritarianism.
There is something about flag-flying and fervent statements of patriotism which has always made me nervous, for that reason. Hitler was able to express deep concern for small children, became vegetarian because of his concern for animals, but expressed his love of country and "god" by gassing Jews and gong to war. It was way beyond hypocrisy: it was psychotic. I think looking at Hitler and other leaders who have this psychotic split teaches one that patriotism must always be based on reality -- be a patriot only when you're sure your leaders are doing the right thing, and that they are telling the truth.
Thus speeches at Arlington coupled with cuts in benefits. Thus behaviors and attitudes towards loss of life in military actions one has initiated. Be careful with the flags and hymns -- make sure that you know what the loss of life is for, what it's really FOR.
Thomas wrote:
georgeob1 wrote: How would you have distributed a cut of the same net size differently?
Keep the estate tax, the inheritance tax, and the highest tax bracket. Cut it out of the lowest tax bracket, which every taxpayer pays no matter how much he makes. If you have a federal sales tax, cut it out of that, too. Most importantly, let all of the tax cut take effect immediately, don't phase it in over a decade. This isn't too far from what the Democrats have proposed, so I don't see why doing nothing at all would have been the only practical alternative.
I doubt that you could achieve the expected dollar value of the cut by focusing it only on the lowest bracket - the distribution of actual collections by bracket would prevent it. Apart from that I wouldn't argue much with your prescription -- except that it wouldn't motivate me to earn more.
It would be more accurate to say 'this isn't too far from what some Democrats proposed at one point or another during the debate'. Had Bush proposed this instead, I believe the level of Democrat opposition would have been about the same. It had become a campaign issue for them.
georgeob1 wrote:I doubt that you could achieve the expected dollar value of the cut by focusing it only on the lowest bracket - the distribution of actual collections by bracket would prevent it.
Fair enough. You go on to cut it out of the second lowest bracket then. The idea is to start with the brackets that many people pay, then proceed to the brackets that few people pay.
Quote: Apart from that I wouldn't argue much with your prescription -- except that it wouldn't motivate me to earn more.
Fair enough. So America doesn't have a federal sales tax (something I didn't know), and you are in the top income tax bracket. No offense, but given that, your motivation to earn more wouldn't be on the top of my political priority list
Meanwhile, blazing a trail for the Great Helmsman, Michael Moore has been at the London Palladium.
Moore ridiculed the variety of voting technologies used in the US, claiming the pencil-and-paper systems used in countries such as the UK and Canada are still the best method of avoiding vote-rigging.
"In Canada they mark an X in a box, and then people sit and count the votes by hand with representatives of the various parties watching everything. There are hardly any roads north of Toronto but the Canadians manage to get all their votes in four hours after the ballots close," he said.
Jokingly, he asked for someone in the UK audience to explain to him in detail how exactly to put a cross in a box so that he could report the intricacies of the system to US authorities.
it's all voting machines here, now. only some small towns - and amsterdam, for some reason - still use pencil and paper.
kinda takes the fun out of election night - everything is in within an hour or two, and all that rests is analysis and discussion. it was more exciting when the results kept trickling in throughout the evening, and one would eagerly await how amsterdam and rotterdam would give a last-minute leg up for labour.
oh, one vital thing tho - everyone uses the same voting machines. <nods>
nimh wrote:it's all voting machines here, now. only some small towns - and amsterdam, for some reason - still use pencil and paper.
kinda takes the fun out of election night - everything is in within an hour or two, and all that rests is analysis and discussion. it was more exciting when the results kept trickling in throughout the evening, and one would eagerly await how amsterdam and rotterdam would give a last-minute leg up for labour.
oh, one vital thing tho - everyone uses the same voting machines. <nods>
I've said that quite a few times (on other threads): I can't understand this!
Within about two hours, we usually get the results here - all (90%) done with pen and paper. (In my small polling local, we finish usually counting 30 mins after closure; town has usually the results 1 1/2 hour later, same time county.)
I admit, however, that
WHEN you get somewhere some unclear results, it may last until midnight until we get the complete results.
I'm not sure I understand the urgency when it comes to getting voting results. What is it which makes getting a quick result more important than getting a result in which voters can have confidence?
eh - in countries where people mistrust the process, the longer it lasts, the greater the suspicion. after all - the longer it lasts, the more opportunities to tamper. especially if it lasts overnight or into a second, third, fourth day ...
walter - hey - you're german. nuff said ;-).
(actually - perhaps your voting precincts are smaller? then the counters would be done more quickly?)
nimh wrote:
(actually - perhaps your voting precincts are smaller? then the counters would be done more quickly?)
The one, I'm usually counting with, just has about 1,000 voters.
The two others in our village (all in the same school) have 1,500 and nearly 2,000 voters.
As far as I know that's about the same number all over Germany - becoming greater now, since they don't find enough volunteers for sitting there half the day and doing the counting afterwards.
Quote:A FULL report into how an administrative blunder resulted in more than 3,000 postal votes being rejected at the district council elections in May is due to be presented to Harlow Council within three months.
An inquiry was launched in June after a printing error meant the ballot papers were printed without an official perforation mark.
At the time all three political parties on the council backed calls for an independent investigation into how the mistake occurred, with Labour leader Kevin Brooks describing it as a "calamity" for the town and the council.
Meanwhile, situation normal in British local elections
Washington Post
Iowa Democrats to Hold Another Clinton Show, Irking Some Candidates
The Iowa Democratic Party's annual Jefferson-Jackson Dinner is next month's political event of the century. It's a golden chance for some presidential candidate to grab the attention and imagination of the nation's media -- and a fair percentage of the likely voters in the Iowa caucuses not 10 weeks thence.
So some of the nine candidates for the Democratic nomination are privately steamed that the star of the Nov. 15 dinner will be . . .
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.).
"Outrageous," one Democratic source said.
This is not the first time a Clinton overshadowed the field in Iowa. In September, the candidates schlepped to Sen. Tom Harkin's annual steak fry to play supporting roles in former president Bill Clinton's show.
State party Chairman Gordon Fischer insists the candidates should actually be thrilled. "This is the penultimate statement that she is not running herself," he said of the former first lady, who remains the dream candidate of many party loyalists. "She wouldn't come to emcee this dinner if there was a ghost of a chance that she was going to run. She will be introducing each of the candidates and will be required to say flattering things about them."
Miffed or not, eight of the nine Democratic aspirants have said they will attend the dinner, where they will have about five minutes each to pitch themselves. Fischer is still hoping to hear from the ninth, Al Sharpton.
Why invite another Clinton? Fischer can cite nearly 9,000 reasons. The party sold that many tickets to the dinner in a mere 50 hours, at prices ranging from $40 for a nosebleed seat to $750 per plate at the best tables. Hillary Clinton has also agreed to be the draw at two receptions before the event and at a post-dinner soiree.
After a pause to allow donors to hit the ATM, the New York senator will appear the morning after at a brunch to benefit her political action committee.
Shouldn't she be home working towards the betterment of New York State?
jeez, I would think the repubs would be delighed to have her away.
McGentrix wrote:Shouldn't she be home working towards the betterment of New York State?
That's a hoot! We have a president who's spent a good chunk of the past year raising funds for his re-election campaign. All in the name of fighting terrorism, of course...
Yeah,but we are talking about Hitlary here, not Bush. It seems that some of you have a Bush obsession...
Hitlary is just plain evil while Bush just surrounds himself with it.
Just plain evil? McG, you need to get out more...
dyslexia wrote:jeez, I would think the repubs would be delighed to have her away.
I for one am happy to have her sowing dissention among the ranks and shooting the actual candidates in their collective foot.
Hey, she's drawing attention to the event. More power to her. Plus, just seeing her name in print seem to raise the blood pressure of the True Believers to dangerous levels...
