Pardon the long delay. I've been moving, and there have been complications getting internet.
CanadianJeff wrote:
You must expand on the line "People who want their taxes...." for the rest of your argument to follow.
The difference I was addressing was between centralized, collectivized spending priorities and individual, diversified spending priorities. Some Americans believe the experts in Washington better realize where the real need is and can be trusted to get their tax money there; these people feel that taxes sufficiently qualify as charitable giving to fulfill their emotional or moral need to "do their part" to some significant degree. The rest of the population believes that tax money is perhaps a legal responsibility, but certainly not a moral accomplishment; any moral need that exists to give to charity must be accomplished elsewhere if it is to be accomplished at all.
To the first group, higher taxes mean greater charity provided. There is no reason for them to oppose higher taxes except personal sustainability or greed. For the second group, higher taxes reduce charitable giving by depleting disposable revenue. There is no moral reason in their eyes to support tax revenue beyond basic government subsistence. It's the classic divide: Federalists vs. Anti-Federalists, Coolidge vs. Roosevelt, Carter vs. Reagan, and now Obama vs. the Tea Parties.
stratos wrote:
last President to truly cut spending that I can think of was Regan.
Reagan only cut non-defense spending. Since he won the Cold War, I think his defense spending can be considered a valuable investment; without it and the post-war cuts in defense spending signed by George H.W. Bush, the Clinton-era budget surplus (tiny as it was) would never have been possible.
George W. Bush was also fighting a war, thus explaining his deficit spending. Though there's no sign yet of it being as valuable an investment, it's helpful to remember two things: 1) Bush had the budget on track to be in surpluses by now if it hadn't been for the financial crisis, 2) Obama has in 2 years increased the national debt by more than all 8 years of Bush. Any criticism of Bush's spending (of which there should be a great deal) must acknowledge that the past two years have in no way improved upon his methods.
The only President to actually pay off the national debt was Andrew Jackson, who financed it by shipping all of the Indians to Oklahoma (the "Trail of Tears") and selling their land to settlers.
andyt wrote:
the top 1% hold as much wealth as the bottom 95%
I'd be curious where you got that figure. According to
this page, the top 1% fairly consistently holds about 1/3rd of the America's wealth. For your figure to be right, 1/3rd of the nation's wealth goes to the top 1%, another third to percentiles 2 through 5, and the final third to 6 through 100. I'd expect that middle group to be much wider, though I can't definitively dispute you.
I did find
calculations based on IRS figures stating that the top 1% pays more in taxes than the bottom 95%. That doesn't prove they make as much in income, just that they pay more in taxes.
andyt wrote:
I remember Rayguns first term - He caused a huge recession.
Of course, Reagan caused his first-term recession but Obama inherited his. I believe that's called a double standard.
Unemployment combined with inflation was already a problem before Reagan came into office (Carter called it "Stagflation"), but both were gone by the end of Reagan's second term. Check the "historical data" links in the right column of
the Bureau of Labor Statistics website. The Consumer Price Index (CPI) is the most trusted, non-partisan measure of inflation. Watch prices go from increasing 1% or more
per month 16 out of 17 months (Feb 1979 to Jun 1980) to holding steady or even declining slightly by 1986. There have never been two consecutive months of >1% monthly inflation since the mess Reagan fixed. To put that in perspective, every $1 saved on the 1st of Feb 1979 was only worth 83 cents by the end of June 1980.
Active Member 
CKA Super Elite 
