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Kamala Marx

I was referred to in the post you replied to. Keeping me out of that category would be correct. Putting me in that category would be incorrect. Fiscal responsibility has long been my top domestic issue. I’ve done battle on this for years here. Fact is fiscal responsibility isn’t part of Trump’s agenda and he proved it as President. He’s even stopped talking about it this time around.

True. In fact, if Trump was a fiscal conservative, I'd probably be able to set aside my dignity once again and vote for him. I've always been more about policy than personalities. But he fails the test on both of them -- even if I do think that Kamala Harris is, on balance, worse on policy.

At least he's not wanting to exacerbate the higher education funding debacle by saddling taxpayers with the student loans of people who haven't paid them back...and, in the process, making utter fools out of the people who did. That shit needs to come to an end. The first thing they need to do with that fiscal black hole is stop digging -- entirely rethink the student loan approval process. And, as far as the distressed loans people already have, look for ways to build them into the BK code.

Sadly, I just don't think there are that many genuine fiscal conservatives at the policymaking tables these days. And it probably has a lot to do with the failures they had when they were.
 
I think Republicans who supported Trump in the primaries need to step back and wonder why they did. Dumping Trump was the smart thing to do and we didn’t do it.
Sorry stollpa have you looked at the gop convention nearly all white men with no concerns for POC but to deport them or take away their civil or voting rights. They hate children and people who do not look like them. They want to go back to when the Klan walked the streets freely.. You talk about Harris and Walz you are stuck in the Jim Crow days. Im sorry you feel that way. America is changing.
 
True. In fact, if Trump was a fiscal conservative, I'd probably be able to set aside my dignity once again and vote for him. I've always been more about policy than personalities. But he fails the test on both of them -- even if I do think that Kamala Harris is, on balance, worse on policy.

At least he's not wanting to exacerbate the higher education funding debacle by saddling taxpayers with the student loans of people who haven't paid them back...and, in the process, making utter fools out of the people who did. That shit needs to come to an end. The first thing they need to do with that fiscal black hole is stop digging -- entirely rethink the student loan approval process. And, as far as the distressed loans people already have, look for ways to build them into the BK code.

Sadly, I just don't think there are that many genuine fiscal conservatives at the policymaking tables these days. And it probably has a lot to do with the failures they had when they were.
He was not a fiscal conservative. HE gave tax breaks to the rich and big businesses. 2 Hell with everyone else.
 
He was not a fiscal conservative. HE gave tax breaks to the rich and big businesses. 2 Hell with everyone else.

A) I agree that Trump's not a fiscal conservative. That's one of the primary points I was making.

B) The TCJA very much did reduce corporate taxes -- which was a long overdue policy change that needed to be made. Our corporate tax rate was way out of whack with the rest of the industrialized world and led to all kinds of perverse incentives and outcomes that were not at all in our national interest. Even people (including Biden) who have proposed raising it from its current level are only proposing putting back a fraction of the rate that was trimmed.

I had my share of quibbles with the TCJA. But not this part of it. We live in a competitive global economy and it makes no sense to have significantly higher corporate taxes than competing nations....unless we want to encourage capital being parked and invested overseas.

C) If the TCJA individual rate cuts end up sunsetting on schedule next year, you and everybody else who has bought into the falsehood that it cut taxes for the rich and "2 Hell with everyone else" are going to be asking why the hell your taxes just went up if Trump never cut them to begin with.
 
I was referred to in the post you replied to. Keeping me out of that category would be correct. Putting me in that category would be incorrect. Fiscal responsibility has long been my top domestic issue. I’ve done battle on this for years here. Fact is fiscal responsibility isn’t part of Trump’s agenda and he proved it as President. He’s even stopped talking about it this time around.
I understand why you responded. Trump is more fiscally responsible than Harris, which are my only options unfortunately.
 
A) I agree that Trump's not a fiscal conservative. That's one of the primary points I was making.

B) The TCJA very much did reduce corporate taxes -- which was a long overdue policy change that needed to be made. Our corporate tax rate was way out of whack with the rest of the industrialized world and led to all kinds of perverse incentives and outcomes that were not at all in our national interest. Even people (including Biden) who have proposed raising it from its current level are only proposing putting back a fraction of the rate that was trimmed.

I had my share of quibbles with the TCJA. But not this part of it. We live in a competitive global economy and it makes no sense to have significantly higher corporate taxes than competing nations....unless we want to encourage capital being parked and invested overseas.

C) If the TCJA individual rate cuts end up sunsetting on schedule next year, you and everybody else who has bought into the falsehood that it cut taxes for the rich and "2 Hell with everyone else" are going to be asking why the hell your taxes just went up if Trump never cut them to begin with.
WRT your third point, Bruce Pearl will be IU’s MBB coach before we see an honest and accurate accounting in the media on your point about how the cuts impacted all levels and how sunsetting them will impact all levels going forward.
 
Sorry stollpa have you looked at the gop convention nearly all white men with no concerns for POC but to deport them or take away their civil or voting rights. They hate children and people who do not look like them. They want to go back to when the Klan walked the streets freely.. You talk about Harris and Walz you are stuck in the Jim Crow days. Im sorry you feel that way. America is changing.
I'm not Stoll.
 
WRT your third point, Bruce Pearl will be IU’s MBB coach before we see an honest and accurate accounting in the media on your point about how the cuts impacted all levels and how sunsetting them will impact all levels going forward.

True. And for all the kvetching about the corporate tax rate being lowered, it's interesting to look at the chart on revenues generated by the corporate income tax. The lower tax rate went into effect in 2018. Revenues barely dipped that year from where they had been in 2017. And look at what they've done since.

Screenshot-2024-08-07-165624.png
 
True. And for all the kvetching about the corporate tax rate being lowered, it's interesting to look at the chart on revenues generated by the corporate income tax. The lower tax rate went into effect in 2018. Revenues barely dipped that year from where they had been in 2017. And look at what they've done since.

Screenshot-2024-08-07-165624.png
Just so.


. . . . . .But, but, but , “they’re not paying their fair share.”
 
I wouldn't necessarily equate egalitarianism to Marxism (or any strand of communism).

But what's missing is how exactly she plans to realize that vision. And that's where she'd run into a problem. It's where egalitarians always run into a problem. They ultimately have to heighten restrictions on the natural order -- where outcomes are always going to be disparate -- to try to bring about their utopian vision of less inequality. You can't pay Paul without first robbing Peter.

The central tenet of this is that "Peter will be fine. He has more money than he could ever need. But the Pauls of the world actually need it. And why should a small handful of people have all this excess wealth when so many other people live (at best) subsistence level lives?"

And that makes sense, as far as it goes. It's certainly alluring. And it also happens that even the freest of economies will have (and need) some wealth/income redistribution. It's so easy to get caught up in black/white, 1/0, either/or, all/nothing thinking on this. But only people on the fringes think we should either have little or no redistribution or little else but redistribution. What's actually being sought is either less or more.

And she's making the case here for more. People on the left will always clamor for more. I've never known any of them to say "OK, I'd say we've done enough." As such, they tend to get oblivious to tradeoffs on the other side -- because they're so fixated on the ideas that (a) "Peter will be fine", and (b) "We haven't yet gotten the results we wanted yet for Paul, so we must continue doing more."

They rarely give much consideration to the idea that Peter may not go along with their plans -- which is why I think they always eventually end up having to figure out ways to eliminate Peter's options to avoid it. That's what Lula is seeking with the global minimum wealth tax. It's also why the Berlin Wall was built -- fully 15 years after the city was partitioned into half capitalist/half communist. Too many East German Peters had voted with their feet by leaving.

I always thought that Thomas Sowell described this myopia brilliantly:

iu
Lady Thatcher said of socialism, "The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money."
 
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white privilege, white supremacist , you want life back to the Jim Crow days. YOU ARE WHO YOU ARE.
Honestly, Willdog. I hate white people more than you. I get it. Every time I see some shit lib white dorky dude or a purple haired chubby white gal, I hope you guys win. All I ask is you take out the libs first. Leave us white conservative gorgeous males alone. I’ll go hang out in a mountain somewhere in West Virginia. I love John Denver.
 
Just so.


. . . . . .But, but, but , “they’re not paying their fair share.”
If they ever actually get their wish of "their fair share" bullshit, and every CEO/ business owner/ entrepreneur throw their hands down and says fvck it.
Todays democrats will know what it is like, to make soup, for the 13th time, with the same pealed potato skins and starve to death. Of course at that point, they will have achieved their "total equality" bullshit.
Let this wave of Marxist win and we all..... well not all, but the inner city people.... will look like Auschwitz survivors. Of course that is their goal, it makes the population much easier to control. Anyone that disagrees with this, is simply not paying attention to Baltimore, New York, Camden, Detroit, St Louis, Dem controlled inner cities.
 
If they ever actually get their wish of "their fair share" bullshit, and every CEO/ business owner/ entrepreneur throw their hands down and says fvck it.
Todays democrats will know what it is like, to make soup, for the 13th time, with the same pealed potato skins and starve to death. Of course at that point, they will have achieved their "total equality" bullshit.
Let this wave of Marxist win and we all..... well not all, but the inner city people.... will look like Auschwitz survivors. Of course that is their goal, it makes the population much easier to control. Anyone that disagrees with this, is simply not paying attention to Baltimore, New York, Camden, Detroit, St Louis, Dem controlled inner cities.
Atlas Shrugged
 
True. In fact, if Trump was a fiscal conservative, I'd probably be able to set aside my dignity once again and vote for him. I've always been more about policy than personalities. But he fails the test on both of them -- even if I do think that Kamala Harris is, on balance, worse on policy.
I find this a fascinating aspect of our democracy. We (I do it, too) think of our vote for a politician as a signal of who we are, as a person. Or we assign moral blame to people when they say they voted for politician X if during that person's tenure, something bad happened in the nation. Some also use it as tribal signaling, I guess.

It's downright silly when you think about it. Yet I'd venture the vast majority of voters feel that way.
 
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I find this a fascinating aspect of our democracy. We (I do it, too) think of our vote for a politician as a signal of who we are, as a person. Or we assign moral blame to people when they say the voted for politician X if during that person's tenure, something bad happened in the nation. Some also use it as tribal signaling, I guess.

It's downright silly when you think about it. Yet I'd venture the vast majority of voters feel that way.
Spot on
 
The things that we call "tax cuts" are really not tax cuts at all. They're better described as tax burden redistributions. We're pushing the burden of taxation to some other taxpayer, either present or future. The costs of government have to be paid for one way or another, one day or another. And if we have tax policy that results in net less tax revenues today, then that just increases the need for debt financing.
"he things that we call "tax cuts" are really not tax cuts at all. They're better described as tax burden redistributions. We're pushing the burden of taxation to some other taxpayer, either present or future. The costs of government have to be paid for one way or another, one day or another. And if we have tax policy that results in net less tax revenues today, then that just increases the need for debt financing."

That would be true if tax revenue had gone down. That's not the case with Trump's tax cuts and, in fact, are rarely the case. Tax cuts stimulate business growth and increase revenue, which is what the tax cuts did.

Debt financing today is strictly due to over spending. Massive over spending.
 
It certainly seems that way. It's the "solution" that is most politically expedient (which is why governments throughout history tend to choose it) -- but also most economically harmful.



I realize that more goes into tax revenues than just tax rates. Revenues are as much a function of growth as they are policy. However, I don't think we're on the side of the Laffer Curve where, long-term, lower tax rates are going to produce more tax revenues than higher ones would.
I’d take the other side. I wouldn’t be surprised if we could lower taxes significantly and increase revenues.
I realize this. Spending has been on a growth curve. Revenues just tend to bounce around a regression towards a mean. In fact here's a chart showing them side by side since 1950 (as % GDP).

Screenshot-2024-08-07-154910.png




Maybe not. But I doubt the TCJA rates set to sunset next year are going to be extended -- unless one party gets a trifecta. It'll be an automatic tax hike. And it's not as though I'm longing for a tax hike. What we most need to do is pare back spending (and especially the non-discretionary spending).

But, like you, I'm not expecting this to happen. I think they'll just continue monetizing it -- so they can at least blame it on Kroger, WalMart, and McDonalds.
I would be really surprised if they don’t continue the tax cuts. Even liberals realize when their paychecks get smaller. We probably disagree the most with their ability to increase taxes. I don’t think they can significantly raise them. They would end up tanking the economy and less revenue in my opinion.
 
"Although the majority of Americans still prefer capitalism according to these surveys, the majority has become rather thin. The growing alienation with capitalism in the US is attributed to a number of factors including the increasing wealth inequality, job insecurities and inadequate social safety nets."

There is the challenge. The Republicans must do more to appeal to these people if they want to govern the United States.
 
True. In fact, if Trump was a fiscal conservative, I'd probably be able to set aside my dignity once again and vote for him. I've always been more about policy than personalities. But he fails the test on both of them --

Sadly, I just don't think there are that many genuine fiscal conservatives at the policymaking tables these days. And it probably has a lot to do with the failures they had when they were.
What you facebwith Trump is not personality, but pathology. Psychologically he is unlike any candidate in history and checks all the boxes of a toxic narcissist. As such, he really cannot, within the scope of his psyche, care about anything other than self promotion and power.

If he had already served longer than Teddy Roosevelt, he would aptly throw up his hands, declare himself the greates of all time and then tell everyone that politics are not for him.
The man doesn't care about anything other than himself. Even without the insurrection he is completely unfit to be a leader of any kind.
 
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Honestly, Willdog. I hate white people more than you. I get it. Every time I see some shit lib white dorky dude or a purple haired chubby white gal, I hope you guys win. All I ask is you take out the libs first. Leave us white conservative gorgeous males alone. I’ll go hang out in a mountain somewhere in West Virginia. I love John Denver.
nothing wrong with that
 
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I’d take the other side. I wouldn’t be surprised if we could lower taxes significantly and increase revenues.

I would be really surprised if they don’t continue the tax cuts. Even liberals realize when their paychecks get smaller. We probably disagree the most with their ability to increase taxes. I don’t think they can significantly raise them. They would end up tanking the economy and less revenue in my opinion.
Eliminate the federal ACA insurance subsidies and enhanced ACA Medicaid funding. It’s so entrenched that it couldn’t happen overnight….probably 7 to 8 years is doable.

We have to start cutting or eliminating a lot of these federal programs
 
True. In fact, if Trump was a fiscal conservative, I'd probably be able to set aside my dignity once again and vote for him. I've always been more about policy than personalities. But he fails the test on both of them -- even if I do think that Kamala Harris is, on balance, worse on policy.

At least he's not wanting to exacerbate the higher education funding debacle by saddling taxpayers with the student loans of people who haven't paid them back...and, in the process, making utter fools out of the people who did. That shit needs to come to an end. The first thing they need to do with that fiscal black hole is stop digging -- entirely rethink the student loan approval process. And, as far as the distressed loans people already have, look for ways to build them into the BK code.

Sadly, I just don't think there are that many genuine fiscal conservatives at the policymaking tables these days. And it probably has a lot to do with the failures they had when they were.
I think there are still quite a few fiscal conservatives there. The problem that you have is that it isn't high enough up on the priority list. I think if you were to inject members of Congress with truth serum and ask them what was most important to them, #1 on 99.9% of the lists would be "getting re-elected".

The conversation you have to have with the public about the debt and deficit is a hard conversation because you are taking away things that the public basically believes they have gotten for "free". (In reality they have just pushed the bill to future generations.) Fiscal conservatives have also hurt themselves by removing one of the ways to show the public the true cost of our current governance from the table. Tax people. You raise the tax rates to fund this stuff on everyone (not just rich people because there aren't enough of them to cover all this) and you suddenly start getting the attention of people to the real problem. You want this level of government? OK, here is what it costs. You don't want to pay that? Then let's talk about what we can cut.

That is a hard discussion that could very well cause an individual to not get re-elected. So we just don't have it. Both sides spread the fantasy hoping the house of cards falls on someone else's watch.
 
You don't have to sell me on the idea that Governments are wasteful and should be as small as possible. I’m for deregulation and smaller government so they're not allowed to pick winners and losers(or at least fewer). I have a great idea. How about we lower all of our taxes so Governments don't have the capital to pick winners and losers? Also, we should pass an amendment eliminating deficit spending.
Ahhh deregulation. On board if you all agree to remove all caps on damages and understand the trial lawyers will be released upon the corporate world. I think there's a downside to deregulation that people don't want to talk about b/c we believe corporations will suddenly put consumsers ahead of profits. That's silly thinking.

But no caps. Anywhere. And businesses have to be able to fail. No bankruptcy either. I want the CEOs house if their product kills babies in Alabama.

We live in a competitive global economy and it makes no sense to have significantly higher corporate taxes than competing nations
Nor does it make sense for corporations to foot the bill for their employees health insurance. But........socialism, right?
 
Nor does it make sense for corporations to foot the bill for their employees health insurance. But........socialism, right?

I don't see any issue with the concept of fringe benefits. I don't think employers should be forced to offer any particular benefit package as a matter of law. But the labor market is competitive just like any other market is. And employers/companies have to consider their value proposition to their employees just as much as they do their customers.

Not only is this not socialism, it's literally market capitalism in practice.

I'm in construction. And there's nothing (either in law or in any collective bargaining agreement) compelling us to furnish take-home vehicles to key employees -- except the fact that our competitors will gladly do it to woo those key employees away from us.
 
I think there are still quite a few fiscal conservatives there. The problem that you have is that it isn't high enough up on the priority list. I think if you were to inject members of Congress with truth serum and ask them what was most important to them, #1 on 99.9% of the lists would be "getting re-elected".

The conversation you have to have with the public about the debt and deficit is a hard conversation because you are taking away things that the public basically believes they have gotten for "free". (In reality they have just pushed the bill to future generations.) Fiscal conservatives have also hurt themselves by removing one of the ways to show the public the true cost of our current governance from the table. Tax people. You raise the tax rates to fund this stuff on everyone (not just rich people because there aren't enough of them to cover all this) and you suddenly start getting the attention of people to the real problem. You want this level of government? OK, here is what it costs. You don't want to pay that? Then let's talk about what we can cut.

That is a hard discussion that could very well cause an individual to not get re-elected. So we just don't have it. Both sides spread the fantasy hoping the house of cards falls on someone else's watch.
I don't disagree with any of what you posted, but the current monetary system/central banks are the underlying issue. It allows for the endless deficits. I think Republicans finally threw in the towel and realized being fiscally conservative doesn't get you enough votes when the government can tax us through inflation. The GOP lost the war when we went off the gold standard in 71.
 
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Not only is this not socialism, it's literally market capitalism in practice.
Sorry. i was inelegant.

I meant removnig the burden from the employer and moving to a single payor health insurance scheme with the single payor being, obviously, the government.

Agree that the offering of benefits is useful in attracting talent. But, these days, it's just a thing nearly every corporation of any size (of which they employ the vast majority of people in this country) is forced to do (by the market, not the law). health insurance is profit driven and I don't think provides any great benefit to health care itself.

We think of the rising cost of college education having free access to capital through student loans. The colleges take little risk. I think there's some kind of cousin to health insurance in this respect as well.
 
True. And for all the kvetching about the corporate tax rate being lowered, it's interesting to look at the chart on revenues generated by the corporate income tax. The lower tax rate went into effect in 2018. Revenues barely dipped that year from where they had been in 2017. And look at what they've done since.

Screenshot-2024-08-07-165624.png
I was all for lowering the corporate tax rate. It was the logical thing to do and history has proven it was the right thing to do. I hope congress will not allow that cut to expire.
 
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I linked a couple minutes of Harris expressing her Marxist beliefs. I commonly refer to the left as socialist/communist and just wanted to point out I was right again.

Elon Musk is a great example of someone being really good at certain things and making an obscene amount of money doing those things really well, but generally speaking he's a moron. He clearly doesn't know what 'literally' means and probably doesn't know what a communist is.

We as a country need to get away from putting the uber rich on a pedestal as smart people in areas where they have no clue about.
 
I think there's a downside to deregulation that people don't want to talk about b/c we believe corporations will suddenly put consumsers ahead of profits. That's silly thinking.

Hold on a second. Who thinks that corporations will put consumers ahead of profits? That seems like a really obvious straw man. I'm willing to be convinced otherwise -- if you can cite somebody actually saying this. But I'd be really surprised if you could.

The primary purpose of for-profit enterprises is, as the name suggests, to generate profits and, thus, returns for their shareholders. Everything else they do -- which is a lot -- follows this. Take that away, and eventually the entity must be dissolved.

The primary purpose is not to provide jobs, nor to serve customers, to make good products, to pay taxes, to be customers of other businesses. All of those things are good and desirable, all of them are necessary to serve the primary purpose. But none of them are themselves the primary purpose -- they are all means to an end.

And there's absolutely nothing wrong with this.
 
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Hold on a second. Who thinks that corporations will put consumers ahead of profits? That seems like a really obvious straw man. I'm willing to be convinced otherwise -- if you can cite somebody actually saying this. But I'd be really surprised if you could.

The primary purpose of for-profit enterprises is, as the name suggests, to generate profits and, thus, returns for their shareholders. Everything else they do -- which is a lot -- follows this. Take that away, and eventually the entity must be dissolved.

The primary purpose is not to provide jobs, nor to serve customers, to make good products, to pay taxes, to be customers of other businesses. All of those things are good and desirable, all of them are necessary to serve the primary purpose. But none of them are themselves the primary purpose -- they are all means to an end.

And there's absolutely nothing wrong with this.
The quiet part out loud! "How much we value our customer is directly correlated to that number on the bottom line of the spreadsheet". And as you say, that is just fine.
 
Apparently Marxism just isn't all that popular. And this was peak honeymoon and before the Walz debacle.

 
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