Is John Edwards a complete retard?

[bdk3clash]

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I think it's clear that a majority of the federal budget is composed of social programs that Democrats demand. Do I need to be more specific? Are you disputing that Democrats demand this spending (and more)? Do I not hear Democrats brag about how they had to "fight" for these programs for decades, facing stiff opposition from Republicans?

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Fair enough, though this doesn't address the larger point (to me) of Republicans having 12 years of Congressional control and 6 years of single-party government to do something about spending issues if they had wanted to.

Looking back at your original statement you did write that you "blame Republicans for not putting a dent in it when they had the chance," so to be fair you seem comfortable assigning some level of blame to Republicans for spending woes. I guess I just disagree with primarily blaming Democrats for current spending woes when Republicans have had every opportunity to do something about this issue for a long time and didn't.

[Al68]

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I think it's clear that a majority of the federal budget is composed of social programs that Democrats demand. Do I need to be more specific? Are you disputing that Democrats demand this spending (and more)? Do I not hear Democrats brag about how they had to "fight" for these programs for decades, facing stiff opposition from Republicans?

[/ QUOTE ]
Fair enough, though this doesn't address the larger point (to me) of Republicans having 12 years of Congressional control and 6 years of single-party government to do something about spending issues if they had wanted to.

Looking back at your original statement you did write that you "blame Republicans for not putting a dent in it when they had the chance," so to be fair you seem comfortable assigning some level of blame to Republicans for spending woes. I guess I just disagree with primarily blaming Democrats for current spending woes when Republicans have had every opportunity to do something about this issue for a long time and didn't.

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I thought I was clear that I blamed both. For the same reason you just stated.
And, believe me, even if I blame the situation more on Democrats than Republicans, I'm more angry with the Republicans because they're the ones that disappointed me.

[odellthurman]

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I think it's clear that a majority of the federal budget is composed of social programs that Democrats demand. Do I need to be more specific? Are you disputing that Democrats demand this spending (and more)? Do I not hear Democrats brag about how they had to "fight" for these programs for decades, facing stiff opposition from Republicans?

[/ QUOTE ]
Fair enough, though this doesn't address the larger point (to me) of Republicans having 12 years of Congressional control and 6 years of single-party government to do something about spending issues if they had wanted to.

Looking back at your original statement you did write that you "blame Republicans for not putting a dent in it when they had the chance," so to be fair you seem comfortable assigning some level of blame to Republicans for spending woes. I guess I just disagree with primarily blaming Democrats for current spending woes when Republicans have had every opportunity to do something about this issue for a long time and didn't.

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I thought I was clear that I blamed both. For the same reason you just stated.
And, believe me, even if I blame the situation more on Democrats than Republicans, I'm more angry with the Republicans because they're the ones that disappointed me.

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Until just over 30 days ago, Republicans controlled the U.S. House, the U.S. Senate, the Presidency, and a majority of the State governments. Why, then, did we not see a decrease in governmental spending?

[Bill Murphy]

In any other year he'd be DOA now, but maybe not 2008. He has to do something to make up for his lack of star power compared to Hilly & Barry, so "honesty" is prolly as good a try as any.

[Copernicus]

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A claim isn't evidence. Wild dishonest propaganda by polititians is not evidence either.


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The percentage of total income tax revenues paid by the rich is higher after the tax cut than it was before it. Look at the numbers. The numbers are evidence.

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are you seriously claiming, in 2007, that the Bush tax cuts were not a tax cut for the wealthy? please refer to your first quote

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And there could be no transfer "to" the wealthy unless there is a source that the money is transfered "from". There is no such source.

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if income taxes are cut, someone pays for it - if spending is cut, then the transfer is from whoever would have benefitted from the spending. Borrowing the money (as with running a deficit) simply means that we will have to pay for it later

if tax cuts disproportionately benefit the wealthy, as with Bush's tax cuts, then yes, we have effectively transferred money to the well off from the rest of the population

[/ QUOTE ]

Apparently you dont like looking at facts. Once again, the proportion of total taxes paid by the wealthy increased (as they always have after tax cuts supposedly "for the wealthy").

[Copernicus]

Back on the original topic, yes hes a retard. His hiring of and handling of his campaign bloggers is likely to be the end of his campaign.

I wouldnt be at all surprised to see his campaign funding dry up immediately. This makes Dean's rants look comical in comparison. Im an atheist and was offended by their comments.

[bdk3clash]

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Apparently you dont like looking at facts. Once again, the proportion of total taxes paid by the wealthy increased (as they always have after tax cuts supposedly "for the wealthy").

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Not sure what specific "facts" you're referring to, since you didn't bother to include any, but we've had a similar discussion on this forum before. In that thread, it was discussed that the total share of income tax paid by people earning more than $200,000 did go up between 2002 and 2004. But so did the number of people earning more than $200,000, as did the average income of those earning more than $200,000. Furthermore, filers earning more than $200,000 paid, on average, 4% less federal income tax in 2004 than in 2002, even though they earned on average 10% more. Similar trends can be found by looking at those earning more than $1,000,000 per year.

Wall Street Journal editorial titled "How To Soak the Rich (The George Bush Way)" (first two paragraphs only, subscription required for full article, full text of article available in the original thread linked to above.)

MediaMatters debunks the "logic" of said article

IRS.gov .XLS format spreadsheet if you want to figure all of this out for yourself.

[Copernicus]

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Apparently you dont like looking at facts. Once again, the proportion of total taxes paid by the wealthy increased (as they always have after tax cuts supposedly "for the wealthy").

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Not sure what specific "facts" you're referring to, since you didn't bother to include any, but we've had a similar discussion on this forum before. In that thread, it was discussed that the total share of income tax paid by people earning more than $200,000 did go up between 2002 and 2004. But so did the number of people earning more than $200,000, as did the average income of those earning more than $200,000. Furthermore, filers earning more than $200,000 paid, on average, 4% less federal income tax in 2004 than in 2002, even though they earned on average 10% more. Similar trends can be found by looking at those earning more than $1,000,000 per year.

Wall Street Journal editorial titled "How To Soak the Rich (The George Bush Way)" (first two paragraphs only, subscription required for full article, full text of article available in the original thread linked to above.)

MediaMatters debunks the "logic" of said article

IRS.gov .XLS format spreadsheet if you want to figure all of this out for yourself.

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There are numerous offsetting effects caused by tax rate cuts and the growth in the economy (income category creep) that arent captured well in groupings that dont track that creep. When you have an income category that spans less than $10,000 for example, the people moving out at the top and in at the bottom makes period to period comparisons of raw numbers non-comparable.

The 200,000+ AGI category is also a particular problem because at the lower end the marginal tax rates vary fairly widely because of the effects of deductions and AMT.

There are 3 basic facts that clearly refute any claim that tax rate cuts were disproportionately in favor of the wealthy in their effect

1. GDP has increased
2. Tax revenues as a % of GDP have increased
3. Not only does the percentage of total revenue paid by the "wealthy" increase, but the higher you go among the wealthy, the bigger their increased ADJUSTED SHARE, where there adjusted share is their increase in the proportion of total taxes paid divided by the increase in their AGI.

For example, looking at the top earning group, their proportion of the total tax revenues increased by 154% from 2002 to 2004. But, someone says, their income has grown too. However, if you divide out their 108.9% increase in income from the 154% increase in their share of the tax burden, you still get 144% increase, and that relationship is monotonically increasing the higher you go in the wage scale.