ACORN

[classicman]

not sure what that smilie means, but that point seems to have been lost to many. I bet if you asked 100 average people on the street, most probably wouldn't know that.

Originally Posted by classicman

not sure what that smilie means, but that point seems to have been lost to many. I bet if you asked 100 average people on the street, most probably wouldn't know that.

Most people, including most of those who identify with the Tea Party movement, as well as several prominent Cellar dwellers, did not know that over 1/3 of the $787 billion Recovery Act was in the form of middle class tax cuts and targeted tax relief....the largest middle class tax cut in years.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Of course not, they just know they're paying more, not considering they're making more. What they are worried about is the massive tax increases that are coming, because Fox and company told them they're coming.

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by Redux

Most people, including most of those who identify with the Tea Party movement, as well as several prominent Cellar dwellers, did not know that over 1/3 of the $787 billion Recovery Act was in the form of middle class tax cuts and targeted tax relief....the largest middle class tax cut in years.

Maybe they can just produce those "Millions of Shovel Ready Jobs". Most people do not believe the Recovery Act worked or is working to put America back to work as your party promised. You will have to come up with something new.

Originally Posted by TheMercenary

Maybe they can just produce those "Millions of Shovel Ready Jobs". Most people do not believe the Recovery Act worked or is working to put America back to work as your party promised. You will have to come up with something new.

Obama stimulus reduced our pain, experts say
Unemployment would have hit 10.8% — higher than December's 10% rate — without Obama's $787 billion stimulus program, according to the economists' median estimate. The difference would translate into another 1.2 million lost jobs.
http://www.usatoday.com/money/econom...stimulus_N.htm

The third national survey of economists in recent months in which the consensus is the stimulus has made a difference.

Perhaps you can cite anything that shows it has not had a positive impact.

[Undertoad]

Originally Posted by Redux

Unemployment would have hit 10.8% — higher than December's 10% rate — without Obama's $787 billion stimulus program, according to the economists' median estimate. The difference would translate into another 1.2 million lost jobs.

That comes to $655,833 per job.

[TheMercenary]

You don't believe that Tax increases are coming?

The coming catastrophe
Solving the debt crisis requires both cuts and taxes — do we have the stomach for it?

THE ADVICE was meant for the folks tackling the toughest job in Washington, but the American public needs to hear it as well.

This week, Rudolph Penner and Robert Reischauer, both former directors of the Congressional Budget Office, briefed the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform about the challenges they’ll face in finding ways to cut the federal budget deficit to a sustainable level.

That task is so difficult that some fear it can’t be accomplished in today’s polarized Washington. Len Burman, the former director of the Tax Policy Center and now a professor at Syracuse University, worries that little will be done until calamity looms.

“Our history is that we are good at crises, but we are not good at dealing with long-term problems,’’ notes Burman, whose article “Countdown to Catastrophe’’ in the latest issue of the Milken Institute Review should be required reading in Washington. “But if we wait until a crisis happens, it will be too late because the consequences will be disastrous.’’

Oddly, says Penner, who led CBO from 1983 to 1987, foreigners tend to be more optimistic that the United States will summon the resolve to fix the problem. In his remarks to the panel, he used a Winston Churchill quote to sum up the mood he finds abroad: “You can count on Americans to do the right thing after they have tried everything else.’’

Let’s hope so, for the deficit challenge will loom like an appointment for a root canal once the recovery takes hold. Confronting it requires a recognition that tough choices simply can’t be avoided. Indeed, Reischauer, who led CBO from 1989 to 1995, had this blunt advice for the panel.

“First, don’t waste time looking for silver bullets or new approaches that hold out the promise of painless sacrifice,’’ he said. “There are none to be found.’’

As both he and Penner told the commission, the basic math of budgeting dictates that the problem be addressed on both the spending and the revenue side.

“The magnitude of the required adjustments is so large that spending cuts will have to affect programs we all care about and benefit from, and revenue increases will have to come from a wide swath of Americans,’’ said Reischauer, who considers himself a fiscal conservative with liberal values. “In other words, raising taxes on the rich or corporations, closing tax loopholes, eliminating wasteful or low-priority programs, and prohibiting earmarks simply won’t be enough.’’

Penner drew on a National Academies of Science and Public Administration study for concrete examples of what deficit-reduction packages that relied only on spending cuts or only on tax hikes would look like.

Under a cuts-only approach, Social Security recipients would see their cost-of-living adjustments reduced. Medicare premiums would rise, as would the public pension retirement age. The Pentagon would have almost no money for new arms systems or for Afghanistan-scale military operations. All other spending would have to be lowered as a share of GDP.

If we simply tax our way out of the problem, Penner said, the total federal tax burden would increase by 50 percent by 2040.

Assuming income tax rates rose in tandem until the top rate took half of an upper earner’s income, we’d also need a value-added tax that ramped up to 7.7 percent by that date. Further, Social Security and Medicare taxes would also have to rise.

A fiscal conservative, Penner said he’d like to keep tax increases to a minimum, but concluded: “Some combination of tax increases and spending cuts will be necessary as a practical matter.’’

That reality will require both Democrats and Republicans to compromise. Further, President Obama will have to acknowledge openly that we can’t solve the deficit problem just by raising taxes on those with incomes over $250,000.

That’s a daunting task in this political climate. It will demand a far-sightedness and fortitude that’s hard to spot right now, either in Washington or in a country that’s grown accustomed to a fiscal free lunch.

And yet, act we must. The only question, really, is whether we do it at a time of our own choosing or wait until a crisis forces action upon us.

http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ed...g_catastrophe/

[Shawnee123]

Don't forget 'pasty.'

[xoxoxoBruce]

Hey Obama, keep government away from my Social Security and Medicare.

[classicman]

That would be them, I guess. Then again their interpretation is as valid as yours, I guess.

To get back to the original question.
T=taxed
E=enough
A=already

Oh and you never replied to UT -

That comes to $655,833 per job.

Originally Posted by classicman

That would be them, I guess. Then again their interpretation is as valid as yours, I guess.

To get back to the original question.
T=taxed
E=enough
A=already

Oh and you never replied to UT -

Voodoo economics....or simplistic to the extreme.

You cant simply divide the money spent by the number of jobs created....there are numerous other equally important factors that impact the cost/benefits of job creation programs, including the increase in income tax revenue and decline in UI payments and other govt assistance program, the resulting productivity increase and contribution to the GDP, more money circulating in the economy (when people have jobs, they spend money), secondary jobs created or saved......

The fact is that no one knows for certain what would have happened w/o the Recovery Act....but the economy is improving and many economists attribute it, in part, to the Recovery Act.

I dont think it was worth the risk to do nothing and there were no other viable proposals. As much as the Tea Party crowd hates it (while many followers benefit from it), I suspect they would have blamed Obama if he did nothing and the economy continued to tank as it was when he took office.

[Spexxvet]

Originally Posted by classicman

To get back to the original question.
T=taxed
E=enough
A=already

Classic, what do you want to eliminate to reduce your taxes? Remember, according to this article, 52% of our taxes go to Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, CHIP, and other "safety nets". Then another 21% of our taxes go toward defense and security.

[Undertoad]

You could include the future interest on that spending too.

Ah well. The explanation is simpler, you know. There are times when the smartest minds can't predict the future. Those times are all the times.

[classicman]

Huh? Someone asked what that stood for - I answered.

To answer your question - some of everything.

[xoxoxoBruce]

As long as I can remember, there have been articles in the paper, or things on TV, pointing to the federal government spending huge sums of tax money on things like studying the sex life of fruit flies, aiding foreign governments, and making life easy for some very rich, or very poor, people. This leads to a pent up frustration in the working class, who feel they have no control over their lives, or their government. Even more so, since the oil embargo of the early 70s, and subsequent blatant corruption of Congress with corporate money. That feeling of helplessness made people grumble, but most were living a fairly good life if they kept their head down, and kept plodding.

Along comes the TEA party, and people say, hooray, finally an chance to vent my frustration, an avenue for changing all this shit that's wrong, a chance to take back the Congress from the corporate pigs. But frustration doesn't lead to real change without organization. Unfortunately, some clever charlatans saw this opportunity to take the lead, feed the frustration with piles of bullshit, and turn the TEA party into another political tool, without most of these good people even knowing they'd been had.

Taking back control of the government, is only possible when people get involved at the local level, and clean up the government from the bottom up. It wouldn't be easy, it wouldn't be fast, but it's the only way to defeat big money for control of the future. Just voting won't do it, when someone else is controlling your choices.