State Wobegon

Um. . .


http://abcnews.go.com/ThisWeek/warren-buffett-read-lips-raise-taxes/story?id=12199889

http://finance.fortune.cnn.com/2010/10/05/buffett-says-cut-taxes-for-the-poor/

http://www.mediaite.com/online/warren-buffett-bush-tax-cuts/

http://crooksandliars.com/susie-madrak/warren-buffett-please-raise-my-taxes

 

I used this example on another thread, but I'll use it again. Which car would you rather have? The car with the super-fancy engine with a rusty body, flat tires and a muffler dragging on the ground, or a car with a nice maintained engine with a good body, good tires and a working muffler.

The Republicans are in favor of the first car. They feel that the engine is what drives the rest of the car, and that with a great engine, the car will get to where it is driven to faster. So they keep pouring more money in the engine, making it bigger. Meanwhile, the car keeps bumping along the shoulder because it's falling apart.

The Dems are in favor of the second car. You won't get to where you want to go as fast, but you'll get there. And you won't fall out of the car while you do it because the door stays on (Thanks to the regulations that require doors that are built to stay on. There is one party, however, who rails against regulation. Gee, I wonder who that is?).

The same with taxes. You use the example of doctors (who I think should get tax credits on their med school tuition and expenses), lawyers and restauranters. At the same time, I use examples of Wall Street tycoons who cheat the public, idiot newspaper executives and businessmen and politicians who rail about taxes while collecting taxpayer subsidies for baseball stadiums. There's wealthy of all kinds.

And then there's the poor. Yeah, you have your welfare bums, who sit around collecting a check while spitting out six kids with five fathers. And you also have people who are working their asses off, only to lose their job due to an illness, or because some rich asshole wants a second yacht.

Taxes are the price you pay for a civil society. Ideally, with these deficits, a budget should make no one happy. There needs to be cuts, and there needs to be taxes raised. Yet one side keeps claiming that they are overtaxed, when in reality, the money they would give up would feed a few families and maybe, prevent a dozen people from breaking into that restaurant and stealing the food.

 

Look, I love the framers as much as the next guy, but at the same time I don't really care what their spirits might think about what's going on in the country today and how that may or may not be affecting their movements inside their graves. Specifically, I really doubt the framers' ghosts and/or corpses have anything at all to say about the fiasco that's going on in Minnesota right now, considering it didn't become a state until 1858, long after the Founding Fathers had shuffled off this mortal coil and been buried in graves dug by their slaves. I especially don't care what Thomas Jefferson might think about Medicaid, a public option, co-pays or HRA plans.

And considering the personal relationship between the two - not real good, to say the least - do you really think Jefferson and Hamilton would have been in perfect agreement that Government-sponsored health care was evil?

And since we're talking about former politicians who would be spinning, might as well mention a guy who actually has an idea of what goes in Minnesota and really would be rolling around in his grave. If he was dead.

 

Yes, I know all about these statements. That why I specifically referenced Buffett.

But, he's advocating higher taxes on his income. He's not advocating his wealth be taxed.

It's a big difference.

 

The Dow is over 12,000 because the dollar isn't worth anything. Businesses are not hiring because it's quite apparent the current president is anti-capitalism and they do not want to bring people on when they never know what they are going to be paying in taxes in the next few years...as well as how much employee health care is going to cost them. It's obvious the Bush tax cuts are going to be let to expire and the class warfare came Obama is playinig is going to cost the wealthy a ton of dough. Why hire people and spend money when the government has already told you they are going to punish you for being successful?

 

http://www.forbes.com/2008/05/01/buffett-vahan-janjigian-pf-ii-in_ty_0430soapbox_inl.html

It may seem a bit odd that Warren Buffett, one of the greatest capitalists the world has ever seen, resides firmly in the liberal camp when it comes to tax policy.

Buffett favors higher taxes on both income and wealth. His writings call for higher income taxes at the corporate level and more progressive income taxes at the personal level.

 

Baron, I don't know many people from either side of the aisle who would disagree with you on this solitary point, IF our taxes were merely used to pay for "a civil society" -- national defense, etc. -- and not all this other stuff that is merely a method by which certain politicians attempt to confiscate wealth from people who earn it and transfer it to people who don't in the interest of "fairness."

I don't really understand your car analogy, but there's obviously an enormous philosophical divide in this country when it comes to what people believe our government is actually responsible for funding and what it is not.

I'm with the side that says when we're trillions of dollars in the hole and trying to raise the debt ceiling so we can borrow even more, we need limits on the government (i.e., the Constitution) more than ever.

You're obviously good with telling certain segments of our society that they're "rich" by some arbitrary standard, and since we obviously need the money, they're more responsible for providing "a civil society" than the rest of us.

How you bridge that divide is beyond me.

 

The Ayn Rand contingent is heard from.

 

What did Exxon pay last year in US federal taxes?

 

Well, that is sort of interesting and I hadn't seen it before.

But, the one time Buffett's wealth will be taxed is upon his death. And, he's been planning for years to avoid the government getting the majority of it.

In this case, I'd say actions speak louder than words.

And, maybe you can find other instances where he's proposed this, but it's also interesting that he didn't say it in the other articles you linked to. He's also not quoted in this article.

And, the author of the Forbes piece is only talking about the estate tax -- again, paid upon death.

If you really want to "sock it to the rich", you'd tax their wealth now -- while they are alive.

They don't need all that money, right?

I heard the Rev. Jesse jackson on NPR this yesterday with Tavis Smiley lamenting that the number of billionaires in the country had risen to over 1,000. (As if that's a bad thing.)

The only person I know of who's calling on taxing the current wealth of the rich is Michael Moore:

And, while I don't agree with him, I would argue that if you want to "tax the rich" the way to do it isn't to tax the income of some guy making $300,000 a year, it's to do what Moore suggests.

Go get the real money.

I'll wait for Buffett, Gates, and any number of Kennedy scions to back Moore's proposal.

 

Buffett's "income" is the interest from his "wealth."

His point in the initial example is that his secretary is taxed at a rate of 30% for her income. He's taxed at a rate of 15% on his "income."

He's suggesting, among other things, that the capital gains tax be brought into line with the income tax.

 

Yeah, I understand that, but Buffett has already amassed a fortune of $47B.

Taxing his "income" at a personal rate of 38% vs. the current 15% he pays on capital gains isn't going to put much of a dent in his $47B.

If you want to get at Buffett's money, you need to tax the $47B. Why not a 10% one time tax on that to get us out of this hole?

Show me a Billionaire liberal who will endorse that.