Did you know Obama’s health care bill contained a $20 billion a year tax on the richest Americans? I didn’t until I stumbled onto a mention of this the other day, although writing about politics is my life and I knew enough to be angry at the gutting of a national public option. I asked a dozen other friends, half of whom work in health care or health care policy and most of whom are fellow political junkies. None of them knew either. If those who follow these issues intensely don’t know about something that all of us would cheer as a step toward getting the wealthiest to pay their fair share, most American voters sure aren’t going to know either.
Tag: Bush Tax Cuts
Jan 18 2011
Senate’s Conrad Cashes Out
North Dakota “Democratic” Senator Kent Conrad, 62, has announced he is not going to run for re election in 2012. He is the current majority Chairman of the Senate Budget Committee. He is also on Agriculture Nutrition Forestry, Finance, and Indian Affairs committees. 
Conrad said he would serve out his term.“Although I will not seek re-election, my work is not done,” Conrad said in his statement. “I will continue to do my level best for both North Dakota and the nation.”
He says he’s going to spend his remaining time and energy trying to reduce the national debt and dependence on foreign oil. And working on a Farm Bill. http://www.valleynewslive.com/…
Senator Kent Conrad’s legacy will include recommending former OMB head Peter Orszag for his White House position early in the Obama administration (Orszag sharing Conrad’s curious blind spot on what drives the deficit, see more of that here: https://www.docudharma.com/diar… ) , being a phony “deficit hawk,” who couldn’t see anything wrong with increased military budgets and decreasing domestic needs being met, and opposing the Public Option during the Health Care reform legislative battle. Voting for reducing the payroll tax that funds Social Security, and for continuing the Bush Tax Cuts for the wealthiest in Dec of 2010 during the Lame Duck Session. http://www.thestate.com/2010/1… Oh, and being part of that Democratic Senate Supermajority of 2009 That Didn’t Do Any Energy Policy, Global Climate Change, or Tax Code Changes. Other than a lot of stimulus money got earmarked for “research.”
Kent Conrad was also on the President Obama Deficit (“Catfood Commision”) Committee of 2010, which called for cuts in Medicare and Social Security.
“You know, a certain amount of this is shock therapy,” Conrad said. “There are different options and, of course, what everybody has fastened on is the most extreme of the options. But, look, the important thing for people to know is that we are borrowing 40 cents of every dollar we spend. That’s utterly unsustainable. It can’t continue much longer, so it’s got to be dealt with.”
…
“Fundamentally, if we’re going to raise revenue, I don’t think the way to do it is to raise rates. I think the way to do it is to eliminate some of the loopholes that exist in the system,” the senator said.November 14, 2010. Kent Conrad in an interview with Christiane Amanpour on “This Week” about the Deficit Commission
http://abcnews.go.com/ThisWeek…
Dec 18 2010
The Dream Lives!
So here’s the deal. Grab your bootstraps and pull as hard as you can. Elbow everybody else out of the way, and climb over any mountains of bodies in your way. Or stomp them if they won’t be reasonable and just die.
Do unto others before they do unto you, and you too can make the big time. Baby.
The top of the mountain waits for you! The shining city on the hill where the streets are paved with gold and you’ll never have to look another whining starving emaciated worthless shiftless lazy ass bum in the eye again and all the beautiful people look like they just walked off the cover of a magazine.
God loves you and he wants you to live a rich life in heaven on earth.
Believe, my friends. Believe, and you too can live the American Dream. Jeezus loves you too and this is God’s Country my friends!
Give up your whining socialist fantasies and screw the suckers. Be a real self made man or woman. The brass ring is there just waiting for you to grab. You can do this!
Buck up, straighten up, and fly right. If you miss it you have only yourself to blame for being so worthless. The world doesn’t owe you a living. You have to get out there, grab a live baby, and rip it’s heart out with your teeth if you want to live the blessed life of a fulfilled human being.
The only winners are those who die with the most toys. You know this in your heart of hearts, and everyone else is a loser. Just fertilizer. Shit. Made to serve you. The ground upon which you strut in silver slippers, my friends.
It’s get better on the flip…
Dec 14 2010
Not Good News!
I’ve been off and on the telephone this afternoon, after learning that Senator Durbin, was going to vote “yes” on the Obama Tax Cut Deal. I asked, why? Because of the compromise, I was told, i.e, child-care tax credit, $250 for Seniors and Disabled, earned income credit (which we’ve had for so long now, anyway). I was trembling with anger. I did go into a rant, not once, several times. The last call I made, I asked point blank: Why do we keep bending over backwards to the screaming, whining, already rich Republicans and a few Dems? Sen. Durbin has lost my vote and so has President Obama, who’s demonstrated that he has a very good pair of knees! Thank you, the Staffer said, and click!
The Roll Call is still going on, and it is being held open for Senators who have been unable to return due to inclimate weather conditions.
Right now, 79 Senators have voted for the bill, while 11 have voted against it!
I am seeing stars. Called Sen. Durbin’s office back again. I have a proposal, I said –what if I simply offered my house and, whatever Social Security I may have coming to me, to the government now, instead, of it taking from me incrementally? This is where we are headed — Americans have been and are being bled to death — what is to become of them? We are headed toward 3rd world status — we have nothing left to give. The wealthy will be walking amongst dead bodies on the streets — people who hung on as long as they could. How on earth could things be so perverse. I read the rules concerning Unemployment Insurance, why couldn’t we have simply extended those benefits, as is provided for in the rules, in bad economic times? At the worst time of our country, we extend tax cuts that benefit the upper 1% to 2% of the wealthy to the tune of $700 billion to be paid back over the next 10 years. And Social Security will be defunded by those still working Americans by 2% that will not be paid into Social Security Trust Funds, yet individuals must pay taxes on their total income for the year. . . . . I went on — I will not ever vote Republican, but Sen. Durbin has lost my vote. She was the only one of the staffers I spoke to today that seemed to have any concern!
Yahoo/Reuters couldn’t wait to get the news out! Tax deal clears first test in Congress!
By Andy Sullivan and Kim Dixon Andy Sullivan And Kim Dixon – 56 mins ago
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Barack Obama’s bipartisan tax plan was on its way to passing its first test in Congress on Monday but a major Wall Street firm warned that damage to America’s strained finances would outweigh any short-term economic boost.
The $858 billion package, which would keep lowered income-tax rates from expiring at the end of the year, picked up 62 votes in the 100-seat Senate. Voting continued but the tax measure had effectively passed a procedural hurdle and will now go to a full vote in the chamber on Tuesday or Wednesday.
Both chambers of Congress could approve the bill by the end of the week, despite complaints from many Democrats that Obama has given away too much to the Republicans who will soon enjoy greater clout in Washington.
“I think we’ll pass a bill, as opposed to simply not passing anything,” House of Representatives Democratic leader Steny Hoyer said at a news conference. He said he aimed to get a bill to Obama by the end of the week.
Income taxes would rise by an average of $3,000 per household if Congress doesn’t act by January 1 — an unlikely outcome, Hoyer said. [$3,000? for those below $200,000?]
Many economists say the deal could boost the sluggish economy, in part because of a payroll tax credit and extension of jobless benefits, at a time when Congress has shown little appetite for spending-based stimulus efforts. . . . .
But Moody’s Investors Service warned it could move a step closer to cutting the United States’ top-notch triple-A bond rating in the next two years if the package becomes law.
“From a credit perspective, the negative effects on government finance are likely to outweigh the positive effects of higher economic growth,” Moody’s analyst Steven Hess said in a report.
The report could give additional ammunition to Democrats in the House who say the package gives away too much to the country’s wealthiest 2 percent as the country is struggling with budget deficits that are higher as a percentage of the economy than any time since World War Two. . . . .
We can only hope that the House will remain steadfast in its stand against this dreadful bill, which will actually backfire against Americans. There must be a way to demand that Unemployment Insurance be extended NOW without the “provisos” attached by Obama’s tax cut deal!
WE MUST NOT GIVE UP!!!! CALL YOUR REPS. — KEEP CALLING, KEEP WRITING, KEEP DOING EVERYTHING WITHIN YOUR POWER TO FIGHT THIS BILL!
Nov 18 2010
[UPDATE x2] Lame Duck Round Up – 90 Second Summaries
With 90 Second Summaries, we aim to cover policy items due to receive close attention in the coming weeks and months that are not being properly explained by most of the press corps. As a result, over one third of our episodes cover pieces of legislation that are receiving action or are expected to receive action during this lame duck session of Congress. We did not hit every hot topic on the board, but we got to a good number of them. Without further ado, here’s a roundup of the bills we covered that you should know about as the lame duck session unfolds:
Nov 04 2010
Gibbs: Prez could do Bush Tax Cut for Rich. Orszag: “Save” SocSec by Cutting It
More post election incompetence.
They forgot. In the good cop, bad cop routine, one of them is supposed to be the “good cop.”
White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs starts off the Lame Duck post election session:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/…“He would be open to having that discussion and open to listening to what the debate is on both sides of that,” said Gibbs, during an off-camera gaggle with reporters. “Obviously… making those tax cuts for the upper end permanent is something the president does not believe is a good idea.”
The issue, Gibbs said, will be a topic of discussion when the president convenes a bipartisan meeting of lawmakers at the White House in two weeks. Included in that meeting (and working dinner) will be Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Cali.), incoming Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD), incoming Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.), Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky), and Minority Whip Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.).
At his press conference on Wednesday, the president expressed his first openness to date with the process of negotiating on the Bush tax cuts, which are set to expire at the end of the year.
Meanwhile, Peter Orszag, right wing neocon, concern troll “deficit spending hawk,” Wall Street mouthpiece, and former Obama Administration head of Office of Budget and Management (OMB) writes in the New York Times the day after the election, November 3, that the harvest of the last of the middle and working class entitlement programs can’t begin fast enough for his new right wing think tank benefactors at the Council on Foreign Relations.
Sep 25 2010
Olbermann Removes the SMALL {Attention Spans} from “Small Business”
The main GOTP argument for keeping the Bush Tax Cuts in place for the Top 2% — pivots on how it will “hurt Small Businesses” if we don’t.
This simple slogan, fails to take into account one VERY SMALL stat.
[Mitch McConnell] says President Barack Obama’s plan to limit future tax breaks to couples earning less than $250,000 would subject 50 percent of small business income to a tax increase, stalling the job creation engine.
[…]McConnell’s 50-%-of-income figure is based on a July 12 finding by the Joint Committee on Taxation, … that 1/2 of about $1 trillion of business income in 2011 will be reported on some 750,000 personal tax returns filed by people who pay the top marginal rates.
He calls those small businesses. Yet the report says the data “do not imply that all of the income is from entities that might be considered ‘small.’ ” Almost 20,000 of those businesses, for example, had receipts of more than $50 million, it says.
Would Ending Bush’s Tax Cuts Hurt Small Business?
Ryan J Donmoyer, BusinessWeek – 09/23/10
Behold the GOTP — Defenders of the $50 Million-aires!
Sep 23 2010
The Week in Editorial Cartoons, Part I – New GOP Campaign Slogan: Monosexuality=Bad
Crossposted at Daily Kos and The Stars Hollow Gazette
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Christine O’Donnell is fast becoming the face of the Republican Party. Her campaign slogan is — to put it in Marxist language — power to the people. Or, something like that. To quote an oft-used phrase on the internet(s) and one used frequently on this blog, “Teh stoopid! It burns.”
Time permitting, I will try to post Part II of this diary later on this week.
Sep 23 2010
If Republicans got their Way …
If Republicans got their Way … there would be no more Medicare.
If Republicans got their Way … you couldn’t Retire until 70.
If Republicans got their Way … they’d privatize Social Security.
If Republicans got their Way … there would be no more Corporate income tax.
If Republicans got their Way … they’d eliminate taxes on Capital gains.
If Republicans got their Way … they’d cut in half the taxes of the richest 1 percent.
If Republicans got their Way … the Bush Tax Cut for the Rich would never end.
Factlets from The Republican’s Roadmap for America’s Future:
The Ryan Budget’s Radical Priorities
Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
By Paul N. Van de Water — July 7, 2010
If Republicans got their Way … Christine O’Donnell would be their new Class Treasurer!
Sep 19 2010
The Tea Party Express — a PAC without bounds?
This .org website gives a whole new meaning to Industry ‘Front Group’.
It’s a page designed to solicit Donations — and little else.
The Home link — goes nowhere; (ie. back to the Contribute Page)
The About link — goes nowhere;
The Media link — goes nowhere;
The Blog link goes to this blogspot page
TeaPartyExpressBlog.blogspot.com
where the lead story is
Don’t Raise Our Taxes – Don’t Repeal the Tax Cuts
and which has this emotive Scary Image:
let me guess, it’s designed to solicit Donations.
Why should you care?
Well it looks like Tea Party Express PAC, just may be breaking Federal Campaigns Laws …
Sep 11 2010
Is Voinovich just the first brick to Fall from GOP’s Stonewalling Rhetoric?
There is a crack daylight, that may topple the Republican’s Wall of Inaction.
Voinovich breaks with GOP to push for small-business incentives
Lori Montgomery, Washington Post Staff — Sept 10, 2010
Retiring Sen. George Voinovich (R-Ohio) said he plans to help push a package of small-business incentives through the Senate next week, a move that would give President Obama and congressional Democrats a key victory on the economy in the final weeks before the November midterm elections.
In an interview, Voinovich said he could no longer support Republican efforts to delay the measure in hopes of winning the right to offer additional amendments. Most of the proposed GOP amendments “didn’t have anything to do with the bill” anyway, Voinovich said, and amounted merely to partisan “messaging.”
“We don’t have time for messaging,” Voinovich said. “We don’t have time anymore. This country is really hurting.”
Finally a Republican Senator with some Integrity, who is willing work for the folks, that Voted him into Office (instead of working against their interests, for his own gain …)
Sep 03 2010
Republicans BLOCK Bill that would HELP Small Businesses
Instead of wringing our hands and exchanging insults and blame —
We should be, getting up to speed on,
How the Republicans Keep putting the Brakes on Progress!
For Example:
Republicans block small business plan in Senate
Donna Smith, Reuters – Jul 29 2010
Obama has been pushing for passage of the lending measure arguing that getting more capital into the hands of independent community bankers would lead to more small business loans. It is supported by independent bankers and business groups.
Since the 2008 financial crisis, small businesses have found it difficult to obtain loans that would help them expand as the economy recovers from the recession.
[…]Senate Republicans blocked a $30-billion plan to help community banks boost lending to small businesses […]
Some Republicans have cast the small-business proposal as part of what they consider government overreach by the Obama administration.
Huh?
Helping Small Businesses to put people back to work — that’s government overreach?
On what planet?
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