Obama '08?

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2051527/posts
Partial History of U.S. Federal Income Tax Rates
Highest and lowest Income Tax Rates 1971 to 2009
...
1971-1981: minimum = 14%; maximum = 70% [CARTER 1977-1981]
1982-1986: minimum = 11%; maximum = 50% [REAGAN 1981-1989]
1987-1987: minimum = 11%; maximum = 38.5%
1988-1990: minimum = 15%; maximum = 33% [BUSH41 1989-1993]
1991-1992: minimum = 15%; maximum = 31%
1993-2000: minimum = 15%; maximum = 39.6% [CLINTON 1993-2001]
2001-2001: minimum = 15%; maximum = 39.1% [BUSH43 2001-2009]
2002-2002: minimum = 10%; maximum = 38.6%
2003-2010: minimum = 10%; maximum = 35%

And, I think, the incumbent Dems will get hurt more come November.

I posted the increases in national debt during the two presidential terms to date. The data - from a government web site - directly contradicts the absurd "data" that Advocate posted earlier. I clearly indicated that the data for Obama was from the start of his term until last Fraiday - that's not one day, it's more than a year.

Is it difficult being a pedant who doesn't read well?

During the 13.5 months Obama has been in office the debt increased from $10.6 trillion to just over $12.6 trillion - a rate of increase of about $2 Trillion/year --- double that of the Bush years.

Both were bad; Obama is much worse.

Your [georgeob1's] argument clearly seems to indicate you think Obama should be blamed from his first day.

Now that you want to agree that it would be silly to use the first day of Obama's term we are left figuring out WHICH day would be the most accurate but by doing that we undercut your entire statement of Obama being worse because of the $2 trillion.

Your argument clearly seems to indicate you think Obama should be blamed from his first day.

Now that you want to agree that it would be silly to use the first day of Obama's term we are left figuring out WHICH day would be the most accurate but by doing that we undercut your entire statement of Obama being worse because of the $2 trillion

No matter when you want to start figuring it, even you must admit that ANY increase in the debt or deficit that happens after Obama proposed his first budget is his responsibility.

ftp://ftp.bls.gov/pub/suppl/empsit.cpseea1.txt
USA Total Civil Employed

2009
January......................138,333
February....................141,687
March........................140,854
April......................140,902
May........................140,438
June.......................140,038
July.......................139,817
August.....................139,433
September..................138,768
October....................138,242
November...................138,381
December...................137,792

2010
January...................138,333
February...................138,641
March................... ???????

ftp://ftp.bls.gov/pub/suppl/empsit.cpseea1.txt
USA Total Civil Employed

2009
January......................142,221
February....................141,687
March........................140,854
April......................140,902
May........................140,438
June.......................140,038
July.......................139,817
August.....................139,433
September..................138,768
October....................138,242
November...................138,381
December...................137,792

2010
January...................138,333
February...................138,641
March................... ???????

Subject: DEMOCRAT TELLS ALL

I am sure the MSM will not print this...they should.

Monday, March 8, 2010
Detailing Harassment, Massa Claims
Democratic Conspiracy Forced Exit
Resigning Congressman swings widely on last live radio show
By Chris Bragg

In his final weekly radio show on Sunday morning, Rep. Eric Massa for the first time detailed the events he believes led to the sexual harassment complaint against him that prompted his resignation from Congress, announced on Friday, but effective Monday afternoon. Massa, a Democrat, also accused House Democratic leadership of conspiring to remove him from office ahead of the reconciliation votes on health care, given his vote against the legislation when it went before the House last November.

“I was set up for this from the very, very beginning,” he said, on what Massa insisted would be the last broadcast of the Sunday morning show on WKPQ 105.3 FM in Hornell. “You think that somehow they didn’t come after me to get rid of me because my vote is the deciding vote in the health care bill? Then, ladies and gentlemen, you live today in a world that is so innocent as to not understand what’s going on in Washington, D.C.”

According to Massa, the sexual harassment complaint stemmed from an incident during a wedding on New Year’s Eve last year. Sometime soon after midnight, Massa said, a drunken male staffer made a lurid comment to Massa about dancing with one of the bridesmaids at the reception.

“A staff member made an intonation to me that maybe I should be chasing after the bridesmaid. His points were clear and his words were far more colorful than that,” Massa said. “And I grabbed the staff member sitting next to me and said, “Pal, what I really ought to be doing is fracking you.’ And then tussled the guy’s hair, and left.”

Massa said that another staff member"disturbed by Massa’s statement"reported it to the House Ethics Committee. Massa said the staffer to whom he directed the comment never was involved with the complaint.

“That staff member never said to me he felt uncomfortable,” Massa said. “He never came to me, he never said a word to me. In fact, he never went to anybody.”

Massa said he learned that a complaint had been filed against him Feb. 8 but that he believed it was only over a minor campaign finance issue. Massa said he only learned of the sexual harassment complaint after he announced he would not run for re-election on Wednesday over what he says is a fatal recurrence of cancer.

As for the charge that House Democrats set him up, Massa said he only came to belief after reading two articles on Sunday morning before his broadcast: An Associated Press article in which House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer discussed the ethics investigation, and a Roll Call article about how the recent departure of several Democrats from the House would help pass health care legislation. Massa said he believes he was the swing vote that would decide the fate of the bill"and that Hoyer’s decision to disclose details of the investigation proves Democratic leadership was out to get him.

With Massa’s resignation, Democrats now need only 216 votes in the House to pass the bill. [emphasis added]

Massa also described a profanity-filled conversation he had with White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel after he voted against the president’s health care legislation last year. Massa called on Emanuel to resign for his own use of profane language during the phone call.

“Rahm Emanuel is son of the devil’s spawn,” Massa added. “He is an individual who would sell his mother to get a vote. He would strap his children to the front end of a steam locomotive.”

http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=19071&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=DPD
OBAMACARE IS COMING
We've heard all the usual complaints about Obamacare, says John Stossel, a commentator with FOX News: it would cost too much, it would forbid insurance companies from penalizing behavior that leads to bad health, it would force everyone to buy insurance (the big cause of sky-high costs). But now John C. Goodman, President, CEO and the Kellye Wright Fellow of the National Center for Policy Analysis points out that Obamacare's inscrutable formulas would have yet another unintended consequence.

Employers of low-paid workers would have an incentive NOT to provide insurance, because the workers could get much greater subsidies in the individual market ($19,400 compared to $2,295).

Employers of high-paid workers would have an incentive to KEEP providing insurance, because it's tax-free and the workers wouldn't qualify for subsidies anyway.

Employers' subsidies are based on the average income of all their workers. So to take full advantage of the subsidies, Goodman points out:

Basically firms with high-income folks will fire their groundskeepers, maids, custodians, etc. and contract out that work to a firm that employs low-wage labor and provides no health insurance.

But getting from point A to point B requires workers to change employers -- and that will not be a smooth affair; a lot of people will be fired and have to search for new employment.

We will be left with industrial organization dictated not by economics, but by a subsidy system that can only be called bizarre, says Goodman.

Obamacare has another big problem:

The House version would create marginal tax rates in excess of 60 percent for workers earning as little as $25,000; this is caused by the steep withdrawal of health insurance subsidies (in the exchange) as income rises.

As is well known by economists and policymakers alike, when people get to keep only one-third of each extra dollar they earn, they react in all kinds of ways that are harmful to the economy; they will choose more leisure and less work.

Health reform is no bargain if it imposes on the middle class the same marginal tax rates that high-income earners faced during the years of stagflation, says Goodman.

Source: John Stossel, "Obamacare is Coming," FOX Business, March 5, 2010; and John C. Goodman, "Obamacare with Lipstick," National Center for Policy Analysis, March 3, 2010.

For Stossel text:

http://stossel.blogs.foxbusiness.com/2010/03/05/obamacare-is-coming/#ixzz0hKniOh5V

Clearly, Obama is responsible for the entire $2 Trillion debt increase during the first 13.5 months of his first term!