The Lunatics are Now in Charge of the Asylum

[Pat Hartman]

This is the early rollout article.

How debit cards for migrants compare to NYC welfare benefits

Migrants will get twice as much per week to spend on essential goods.

www.newsweek.com

 

[Pat Hartman]

Sales tax is a local tax just as property tax is a local tax. It is used to fund services like garbage pickup, schools, and city streets. It is not used to fund give-aways like college debt forgiveness and debit cards for illegal aliens and free airline travel to the destination of your choice.

 

[Isaac]

@GaP42 I appreciate your thoughtful q&a, yes.
I still see a very generalized trend -

1. The Democrats are known as the tax and spend party. This has changed somewhat in recent years, but, it is still true (IMO) that their general way of going about solving problems always tends to be far more $ spent than Republicans.
2. The main core of Democrat voters tends to include most low income people - i.e. non taxpayers
(i.e. when I was growing up, our family was seen by people as an anomaly - poor, but Republican. We voted Republican on principle, even though voting Democrat would have been in our best interest when it came to government handouts. My father felt that fair is fair and we weren't interested in taking other people's money as much as we were having the freedom and responsibility to earn our own).
3. Those people eagerly vote Democrat, and from my own personal experience in talking with them, it almost always involves the simple fact that they are promised more free government services (which we know comes from various sources, but income tax is a big one).

Does that seem fair to you? Is there a solution that's fair?

 

[ColinEssex]

The one and only thing I've held fast to from the beginning, and still do, is that it's unfair for people who pay no taxes (let's say, because of lower incomes) to be voting on raising taxes for the rest of the people. That and only that.

You seem to keep saying that the reason for voting is to raise taxes. Are there no other issues of equal or more importance that people vote for? Or is an election purely about how much tax people do or don't pay?
How about environmental issues, or housing, or transport, or maybe updating infrastructure like roads etc. Or don't they enter into it.
 Col

 

[Isaac]

You seem to keep saying that the reason for voting is to raise taxes. Are there no other issues of equal or more importance that people vote for? Or is an election purely about how much tax people do or don't pay?
How about environmental issues, or housing, or transport, or maybe updating infrastructure like roads etc. Or don't they enter into it.
 Col

See my previous post about the core demographic of the Democrat party, and the general incentives people have to vote.
It's well known that the "economy" (in other words, my bank account and what I am getting for myself) are the chief reasons people vote - but in talking to Democrat voters I have known, this holds true as well. most of them are voting Democrat because the Democrats are promising them something - and that something costs money.

And Housing, Transport and Infrastructure all cost money. Which usually comes from tax increases.

The Democrats are always promising people stuff that costs huge amounts of money that comes from tax increases - people vote Democrat because they want these things ( some of which you've mentioned) - those things come from raising taxes on half the population. It makes little sense. Poorer people need to be taxed at some small percentage so that every time a solution requires a tax increase, they DIRECTLY feel their skin in the game.

You'd have less money wastefully spent and a lower national debt.

Does any American want to become like Greece and other countries that have finally become so indebted and bankrupt they had to implement austerity measures? This trend I am talking about leads to stuff like that.

 

[Space Cowboy]

Does any American want to become like Greece and other countries that have finally become so indebted and bankrupt they had to implement austerity measures? This trend I am talking about leads to stuff like that.

Why do you continually sell America short?

The economy of Greece is based on exporting Olive Oil, it was never going to able to maintain parity in the European economic Zone.

There is lots of high Quality olive oil oil in Europe, what with Spain and Italy, its a competitive market.

From what I see of republicans at Trump rallies, many of, if not most, appear to be tramps or people that should be in mental institutions.

 

[Isaac]

Why do you continually sell America short?

The economy of Greece is based on exporting Olive Oil, it was never going to able to maintain parity in the European economic Zone.

There is lots of high Quality olive oil oil in Europe, what with Spain and Italy, its a competitive market.

From what I see of republicans at Trump rallies, many of, if not most, appear to be tramps or people that should be in mental institutions.

If you think the US debt situation is not an emergency, I think you're making a big mistake.

 

[Pat Hartman]

From what I see of republicans at Trump rallies, many of, if not most, appear to be tramps or people that should be in mental institutions.

I think you should see an optometrist

What does a person who belongs in a mental institution look like?

 

[ColinEssex]

What does a person who belongs in a mental institution look like?

Either Trump or Biden.
Col

 

[Space Cowboy]

I think you should see an optometrist

What does a person who belongs in a mental institution look like?

The thing I am most looking forward to is when Trump comes out of prison and he has not had his hair stitched on or dyed for six months and he has no Phony Tan.

A Fat Balding grey haired pale old man, He is fake inside and outside top to bottom.

Who else could lose an inheritance of a half Billion dollars, going bankrupt, even though he has had free reign to commit fraud, several times. He will auction off his prison uniform.

 

[Space Cowboy]

Putin in one hand and Orban in the other,

"Let me have it boys" HA HA

 

[GaP42]

@GaP42 I appreciate your thoughtful q&a, yes.
I still see a very generalized trend -

1. The Democrats are known as the tax and spend party. This has changed somewhat in recent years, but, it is still true (IMO) that their general way of going about solving problems always tends to be far more $ spent than Republicans.
2. The main core of Democrat voters tends to include most low income people - i.e. non taxpayers
(i.e. when I was growing up, our family was seen by people as an anomaly - poor, but Republican. We voted Republican on principle, even though voting Democrat would have been in our best interest when it came to government handouts. My father felt that fair is fair and we weren't interested in taking other people's money as much as we were having the freedom and responsibility to earn our own).
3. Those people eagerly vote Democrat, and from my own personal experience in talking with them, it almost always involves the simple fact that they are promised more free government services (which we know comes from various sources, but income tax is a big one).

Does that seem fair to you? Is there a solution that's fair?

Thank you - 1. I try to assess/consider other valid views, 2 I do not like self-professed experts or politicians announcing simplistic solutions when the reality is much more complex/ nuanced than the one-liner being pushed (especially when it takes so little reflection/analysis 3. Lack of compassion/ consideration of others in difficult situations, although that does not mean open pockets - more about better, innovative, effective approaches.

Re your points
1. That may be a general impression but is it entirely true -- what happened with US Debt during Trumps term? How does debt increases compare across a range of presidents. This does not of course look at where / how effective was the money spent.

2. The claim that the main core of Democrat voters are ... non-tax payers is patently false and overstatement. DO you think the unemployed are overy represented amongst the Democrats? How many register to vote? How many bother to vote? How many hold left-leaning vs right-leaning views? There appears to be a significant proportion who might be deemed red-necks who hold what appear to me ill-considered irrational views. Do not know if there is any statistical info around this.
3. So this point - given my answer to point 2 seems rubbish.

So do I think it is a fair assessment - clearly not.

 

[Isaac]

The claim that the main core of Democrat voters are ... non-tax payers is patently false and overstatement. DO you think the unemployed are overy represented amongst the Democrats?

this I take issue with and stand by my original assertion. perhaps I could have worded it better?
I think the vast supermajority of people living off of government services or welfare vote Democrat, Period. Why would you not?
Why would you vote for the party constantly talking about cutting your services.

Democrat solutions are usually expensive and on questionable topics - meaning things I don't even think we should be spending much money on.
Republicans solutions can sometimes be expensive (but less often), and often involve de-tangling aspects of government that have gotten too fatty rather than creating new and more government. Republicans when their solutions ARE expensive, it's usually for something really worth it, like military spending.

Even if I don't think project 2025's manifesto represents me or Republicans, yet let's take it for a moment, as it did come from a group of conservatives. Read through it for a bit, or at least MSNBC's summary. How many things in that plan represent spending huge amounts of money to fix a problem? Very, very little. Now read through the average Democrat bill. It's all about spending more money - and usually lots of it. Usually to provide people more 'services' of some kind - free child care, younger preschool, more programs, more welfare, more things that aren't the government's responsibility in the first place - and certainly shoulnd't be the responsibility of the half of the country who isn't using the services but is paying for them.

I've grown weary and am comfortable respectfully agreeing to disagree, as we won't see eye to eye on the basic worldview/purpose of gov. differences we have. It has been a good discussion and I am satisfied that my honesty muscles got exercised in the challenging of my ideas.

 

[GaP42]

As a proxy for non-tax payers, the official unemployment rate is 4%. So is this is the pool of voters from which there is a "supermajority" that votes democrat and lives off government services? Substantial Not. And they vote as a block, they are all politically engaged? No real stats to support either way. Perhaps it is simply your political bias on this.
We may disagree on many of the political positions on specific issues and policies put forward by political parties. However I hope we would not be too far apart on the basic purposes of government or support for democratic processes.

 

[Pat Hartman]

Who else could lose an inheritance of a half Billion dollars, going bankrupt,

Where do you get your news? Stephen Colbert?

 

[Isaac]

As a proxy for non-tax payers, the official unemployment rate is 4%. So is this is the pool of voters from which there is a "supermajority" that votes democrat and lives off government services? Substantial Not. And they vote as a block, they are all politically engaged? No real stats to support either way. Perhaps it is simply your political bias on this.
We may disagree on many of the political positions on specific issues and policies put forward by political parties. However I hope we would not be too far apart on the basic purposes of government or support for democratic processes.

Some time back, I was holding out hope that I could get you to verbally agree on some very generic, halfway-vague problem statement, such as:

- There is too big a pool, and increasing in size, who don't pay income taxes, yet enthusiastically vote for the party promising to tax - and - spend more to give them more free services....at the expense of the other side who does pay taxes and uses little to no services. This isn't fair and it's not sustainable in the long term, the pool of non-taxed people will likely grow. (or we already know that last part is true, because it DID).

 

[Pat Hartman]

Substantial Not.

You are assuming that only the unemployed don't pay taxes. Fact not in evidence. It is even possible for the wealthy to not pay taxes if they fit into the right loopholes.

I remember when Obama released his tax returns.

Today, the President released his 2015 federal income tax returns. The President and the First Lady filed their income tax returns jointly and reported adjusted gross income of $436,065. The Obamas paid $81,472 in total tax. The President’s effective federal income tax rate is 18.7 percent.

In 2015 my husband and I had an adjusted gross income quite a bit less than the Obama's did and our effective income tax rate for that year was 23% Apparently the Obamas had better deductions available to them to get rid of a lot of their ordinary income so they ended up with a lower percentage of ordinary income vs capital gains than we did which reduced their overall tax bill and that is what brought down their average rate.

 

[Isaac]

People receiving Unemployment actually DO pay taxes on it.

 

[The_Doc_Man]

From what I see of republicans at Trump rallies, many of, if not most, appear to be tramps or people that should be in mental institutions.

You are lucky that you didn't direct that statement at one of the forum's members. (But then again, perhaps you did and just don't know it.) That kind of talk is unkind and uncalled for. And incorrect. Trump's followers run the gamut from big business to blue-collar workers who are tired of seeing their tax money siphoned away from their home communities. The Biden followers include homeless people and illegal immigrants. Do you like that characterization as well?

 

[The_Doc_Man]

People receiving Unemployment actually DO pay taxes on it.

I was fortunate to never be on unemployment (though I came close once). But I have known people from my college days who confirmed that they had to report tax liability including unemployment compensation. They had liability, but with various exemptions and deductions, the tax due was minuscule to zero.