DebateGate
General Category => 3DHS => Topic started by: MissusDe on October 14, 2008, 07:10:46 PM
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James Carter and James Miller III
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
COMMENTARY:
Once upon a time and far, far away from mainstream America, lived a U.S. senator named Barack Obama. Mr. Obama had a gift, a truly wondrous gift. He could spin troublesome facts into political gold. And perhaps, with enough spinning, he could even spin himself into the White House.
Bill Clinton understood this. He called Mr. Obama's spin "the biggest fairy tale I've ever seen." Like other fairy tales, this one requires a total suspension of disbelief. Jack (of Jack and the Beanstalk fame) had his magic beans. Mr. Obama has his magic facts. Consider the following so-called facts:
-- Magic Fact No. 1: Senator Obama will cut income taxes "for 95 percent of working families, 95 percent."
It would be truly magical to be able to cut income taxes on 95 percent of working families when only 68 percent of tax filers actually pay the federal income tax. According to the Internal Revenue Service, of the 136 million income tax returns filed in 2006, 43 million returns reported positive adjusted gross income but had no income tax liability because of assorted deductions, exemptions and tax credits.
So how do you give a tax cut to someone who doesn't pay income taxes? Mr. Obama proposes a massive program of "refundable tax credits." Those on the receiving end would simply get a check from the federal government. In other words, they would pay a "negative tax."
By wrapping a thoroughly liberal position - larger welfare benefits - in the mantle of tax cuts, Mr. Obama has very nearly managed to neutralize one of the defining issues of this presidential campaign. If that sleight of hand isn't magic, we don't know what is.
-- Magic Fact No. 2: Mr. Obama pays "for every dime" of his proposals.
According to the nonpartisan National Taxpayers Union Foundation, Mr. Obama has offered 73 proposals that would collectively increase federal spending $365.6 billion annually. That's literally a $1 billion-a-day spending increase. And, unfortunately, that figure doesn't include the cost of Mr. Obama's 88 other spending proposals for which no reliable cost estimates exist.
How does Mr. Obama propose to pay for these new and expanded spending programs? He begins by squeezing defense spending. He would then repeal "the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans." (Never mind that the Bush tax cuts are already scheduled to expire and that the revenue is already included in the government's budget forecasts.) Finally, he would "close corporate loopholes, [and] stop providing tax cuts to corporations that are shipping jobs overseas."
These steps would not come close to paying for the senator's spending proposals. Assuming they offset $100 billion of new spending, paying for the other $265.6 billion (still ignoring the cost of Mr. Obama's other 88 programs) would require an across-the-board income tax increase of 19 percent. And, of course, this figure does not reflect the tax increase that would be necessary to pay for Mr. Obama's "tax cuts."
The IRS reported earlier this year that the top-earning 5 percent of taxpayers shouldered 60 percent of the federal income tax burden in 2006. If Mr. Obama insists upon having a tiny fraction of Americans shoulder the cost of his spending and tax proposals, the tax increase on those taxpayers would have to be huge - far larger than the 19 percent tax increase described above. This would slow investment, employment and economic growth - and, yes, total governmental receipts.
Sen. Hillary Clinton once threatened, "We're going to take things away from you on behalf of the common good." Perhaps she would have been Mr. Obama's ideal running mate after all.
-- Magic Fact No. 3: Economists overwhelming favor Mr. Obama's economic policies.
The Obama campaign likes to say it has the support of professional economists. Yet, that "fact" is based on two, methodologically flawed polls circulating the Internet. True enough, majorities of those surveyed said they favor Mr. Obama's economic policies. What else would you expect from a poll where Democrat responders outnumbered Republicans by nearly 3-to-1? Only 17 percent of the surveyed economists were Republican. In the second poll, Democrats outnumbered Republicans nearly 5-to-1. Only 10 percent of the respondents were Republican.
Meanwhile, more than 500 economists from across the country, including five Nobel Laureates, have signed a statement supporting Sen. John McCain's economic plan. (For the text of the statement and a complete list of the signatories, see www.economistsformccain.com (http://www.economistsformccain.com).)
The fairy tale candidate may yet become the fairy tale president. But will the story end with "and the American people lived happily ever after?"
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2008/oct/14/fairy-tale-candidate/ (http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2008/oct/14/fairy-tale-candidate/)
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Tax cuts only pay for themselves when REPUBLICANS grant them.
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Eye opening, isn't it. Thanks Miss De
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Tax cuts only pay for themselves when REPUBLICANS grant them.
So is Obama lying when he promises a tax cut to 95% of american working families?
XO?
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One thing is certain: the next president, whoever he is, will not be able to rack up the debt that Juniorbush did. Interest rates will go up, and China will not have so much to lend.
If you look at past presidents, the deficit has gone up with the past Republican presidents (Reagan, Olebush, Junorbush, and down with the Democrats (Clinton and Carter).
Republicans tend to piss away money abroad on wars, Democrats tend to piss it away at home.
No president can really do a budget until he is in office and knows what the figures really are. A lot is hidden in CIA and other secret crap.
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In other words, apparently Obama is lying
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I suggest that no one can know what the government can or cannot do unless they have ALL the figures, and the only way to do this is to be president.
It's a whole lot less a lie than the ones that were used to get us into that war.
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In other words, apparently Obama is lying. Glad we got that cleared up
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In other words, apparently Obama is lying. Glad we got that cleared up
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That is not what I said, and in other words I said what I said, not what you heard.
Who are you, Peewee Herman? "I know you are but what am I?"
Twit.
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No. In other words, he's doing what McCain is doing. Proposing a plan without knowing the actual facts.
It is not a lie unless you know the facts, and neither of them does.
I still maintain that a Democrat is statistically more likely to be financially responsible than a Republican.
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No. In other words, he's doing what McCain is doing. Proposing a plan without knowing the actual facts.
It is not a lie unless you know the facts, and neither of them does.
I still maintain that a Democrat is statistically more likely to be financially responsible than a Republican.
He ceratinly spouts his promise ;like he has every intention of carrying it out.
Do you think it irresponsible of him to make promises he can't keep.
Being the Anointed One and all won't that tarnish his halo?
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He ceratinly spouts his promise ;like he has every intention of carrying it out.
Do you think it irresponsible of him to make promises he can't keep.
Being the Anointed One and all won't that tarnish his halo?
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Politics is the art of the possible, as they say. A candidate indicates what his ideal goals are, knowing, as every sane and thinking citizen knows, that whatever he accomplishes will be in concert with what the nation's resources are and what the Congress will permit.
FDR did not end the Depression, but he gave people hope, and they believed enough in him to elect him four times.
McCain believes in everything Juniorbush believes in, as far as political issues go: he is a maverick only in that he considers Juniorbush to have been incompetent at doing the wrong things, while he wqants to do the wrong things more competently.
McCain promises victory in Iraq. General Petraeus, who knows Iraq better than pretty much anyone, refuses to use the word victory, because it is unrealistic: the US cannot win an Iraqi Civil War. That is another very arguably unfulfillable promise.
One major problem facing us now is world opinion of the US. Obama, by his election alone, will inspire more confidence and goodwill abroad than McCain is likely to achieve in a four year term. The current global mess requires unity of purpose, and Juniorbush has made nearly everyone in the world suspect us and dislike our cowboy ways, typified by this fool of a cowboy president in his cowboy boots.
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Yeah but we are talking about Obama now, and everytime i turn around he gets caught in another lie.
And apparently that is no longer a problem for you guys.
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Yeah but we are talking about Obama now, and everytime i turn around he gets caught in another lie.
And apparently that is no longer a problem for you guys.
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You are talking about Obama. I suggest that since no one knows what the future, it isn't really possible to lie about the future.
I don't see Obama getting caught in any lies.
Perhaps you should stop turning around. It might be that your dizziness is causing your misperceptions.
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If you make a promise and do not keep it, because the promise you made is impossible to keep, is that not a lie?
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It is not a lie unless you know the facts, ....
I am glad that you arn't mad at Bush for "lieing" anymore.
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It is not a lie unless you know the facts, ....
I am glad that you arn't mad at Bush for "lieing" anymore.
The diffi sthat Bush did know:
White House knew there were no WMD: CIA
Submitted by davidswanson on Sat, 2006-04-22 13:37. Evidence
By Reuters
The CIA had evidence Iraq possessed no weapons of mass destruction six months before the 2003 US-led invasion but was ignored by a White House intent on ousting Saddam Hussein, a former senior CIA official said, according to CBS.
Tyler Drumheller, who headed CIA covert operations in Europe during the run-up to the Iraq war, said intelligence opposing administration claims of a WMD threat came from a top Iraqi official who provided the US spy agency with other credible information.
The source "told us that there were no active weapons of mass destruction programs," Drumheller said in a CBS interview to be aired on Sunday on the US network's 60 Minutes.
"The (White House) group that was dealing with preparation for the Iraq war came back and said they were no longer interested," he was quoted as saying in interview excerpts released by CBS on Friday.
"We said: 'Well, what about the intel?' And they said: 'Well, this isn't about intel anymore. This is about regime change'," added Drumheller, whose CIA operation was assigned the task of debriefing the Iraqi official.
He was the latest former US official to accuse the White House of setting an early course toward war in Iraq and ignoring intelligence that conflicted with its aim.
CBS said the CIA's intelligence source was former Iraqi Foreign Minister Naji Sabri and that former CIA Director George Tenet delivered the information personally to US President George W Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and other top White House officials in September 2002. They rebuffed the CIA three days later.
"The policy was set. The war in Iraq was coming and they were looking for intelligence to fit into the policy," the former CIA agent told CBS.
US allegations that Saddam had WMD and posed a threat to international security was a main justification for the March 2003 invasion.
A 2002 National Intelligence Estimate, to which the CIA was a major contributor, concluded that prewar Iraq had an active nuclear program and a huge stockpile of unconventional weapons.
No such weapons have been found, however, and US assertions that they existed are now regarded as a hugely damaging intelligence failure.
But Drumheller, co-author of a forthcoming book entitled On the Brink: How the White House Has Compromised American Intelligence, rejects the notion of an intelligence failure.
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/node/9141 (http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/node/9141)
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I am glad that you arn't mad at Bush for "lieing" anymore.
There you go again. You and slurs twisting everything I say.
I said nothing of the sort. Juniorbush KNEW that there were no WMD's and lied about how there were. And since then, because of his lies, about 4000 soldiers have died, several million Iraqis have been driven from their homes and 30,000 Americans have been wounded.
Bush lied like a very large, wall to wall babycrap yellow shag rug.
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>>There you go again. You and slurs twisting everything I say.<<
So we're changing the definition of lie back to it's original definition? Or is it still different only for Repubilcans?
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its = belonging to it
it's = a contraction of it is.
There! now your post is not entirely useless. If properly heeded, it will make you smarter.
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Ooooooo, be very afraid. The criptofascist spelling nazi, strikes again.
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<chuckle>
Hey, I can't edit my posts! The spelling Nazi is after me and I can't edit my posts!