Take how you feel about taxation out of the equation for a second. I don’t know about you but I was amazed that President-elect Obama was able to say that he would increase the tax rate of high earners and didn’t seem to pay a politicial penalty for it. It isn’t something he said months ago and was forgotten. It was something he said again and again for almost a year. His language was much clearer and on point than Walter Mondale back in ‘84 who got creamed for saying in a debate he would raise taxes, but I wonder if it was Obama’s communications skill or America’s dire straits that made it so that he suffered no penalty for the position? Or was it both?
In 1984, “raise taxes” made people think of the tax rates of the 1970s. Now, people think of the tax rate 1990s.
Let me try that again:
“Now, people think of the tax rates of the 1990s.”
I think a big part of it is the growing class divide. The middle class doesn’t have that big a problem with the rich people who have driven our economy into a ditch shouldering more of the tax burden.
When McCain started the “he wants to spread the wealth around” catchphrase in the last debate, I remarked immediately that it was a huge tactical error, that it would have been a good slogan in the 1990’s but that it’s a terrible one in a post-bailout America.
Thad’s on the right track: it’s simple class warfare.
There is an element in America that likes to think of itself as middle-class, that has a resentment towards the rich, the powerful, the high and mighty, and likes the idea of them being “punished” for their success. Obama’s message was readily translated into “I’m going to tax the wealthy and increase help to you,” or even more simply, “I’m going to take their money and give it to you.”
When you’re robbing Peter to pay Paul, Paul seldom objects.
Obama’s message about higher taxes was very, very targeted. He promised that 85% of people would actually see their taxes go down. That means that everyone who didn’t see themselves as part of the top 5% could tell themselves that they, personally, would benefit by raising the taxes on those privileged elites.
Class warfare. Convince enough people that they are tha have-nots, and are entitled to take from those they consider the haves. No new theory, just a particularly skilled and successful application.
J.
Class warfare indeed! It has been waged by the top 5% against the rest of us at least since 1981. Jay Tea only objects to it when the have-nots finally counter-attack.
So tell me, Jay, how are we going to pay for this mess that your pal W has gotten us into? Left up to the current administration, it seems that our children and our grandchildren will end up paying for it. I suppose we could raise everyone’s taxes, so that Joe Sixpack will have a harder time paying for his kids’ new shoes this year. Or, we could ask those who could actually afford it to pay the same tax rate they did in the 90s. You remember the 90s, Jay? When the folks you are so concerned about were being “punished for their success” and yet managed to make money hand over fist?
how are we going to pay for this mess that your pal W has gotten us into?
1. Keep taxes where they are (maybe even lower the Capital Gains taxes) in order to spark investment and grow the economy.
2. Cut spending.
Unfortunately, it seems Obama wants to do the opposite on both counts.
Yes, Farris, sticking to the same trickle-down dogma will surely work eventually. Never mind that it’s driven the economy into the ditch. Just keep right on doing the same thing, and hope for a different result. It’s got to work eventually, right? Because it’s an article of faith. And as every Bush Republican knows, faith trumps fact.
I don’t know about you but I was amazed that President-elect Obama was able to say that he would increase the tax rate of high earners and didn’t seem to pay a politicial penalty for it.
He did pay a political price for it, but not much of one and obviously not enough of one to lose. Team McCain attacked with all they had about “Socialism” and whatnot. But it’s still amazing, what with the stigma the word “taxes” has every since Dutch Reagan (who had to raise taxes after lowering them too much) and George Bush, Sr. (who had to raise taxes after explicitly saying he wouldn’t because of the deficit Reagan left) repeated their dumbed-down mantra over and over and over. Republicans seem to think that bridges and schools and adequate armor for soldiers are provided by elves at night.
Unfortunately, it seems Obama wants to do the opposite on both counts.
Obama wants to get us out of Iraq, which is $10 billion a month or something obscene like that. George Bush, Jr. spent like Sarah Palin on Fifth Avenue. He’s the problem. Pretending otherwise is what got us into this mess in the first place.
Anecdotally, I’ve noticed an acceptance for a gas tax from unlikely precincts–Republicans/righties who scoffed at the very idea as recently as 4 years ago when Kerry was attacked for supporting such a radical idea. We’ve needed a higher tax on gasoline for quite a while. I wonder if there is a…um…climate for one right now, given the political capital Obama has, falling gas prices, and my anecdotal evidence for the acceptance for a boost in the gas tax.
As God is my witness (or not) I swear I hadn’t read this morning’s lead editorial in the WaPo when I made my previous comment:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/11/15/AR2008111502145_pf.html
He did pay a political price for it, but not much of one and obviously not enough of one to lose. Team McCain attacked with all they had about “Socialism” and whatnot.
Considering that even George Will is mocking Republicans for whining “socialism” after Bush pushed through the Medicare prescription drug benefit and propped up the financial sector (which is now thumbing its nose at the government’s pleas that it loosen credit), I don’t think the “socialism” stuff affected anyone whose brain has enough space left from partisanship to actually analyze who is making these claims.
JT, what happens when the lower and middle class people max out their incomes and the top economic quintile’s share is swelling? Here’s a hint: It happened in the thirties.
That class war stuff is pretty weak soup, amigo.
Parthenon, all I intended to do was to point out that Oliver was going on and on about Obama making his grand pronouncement that some people’s taxes would be going up, like Mondale and Dukakis did, and still won, while the most important part of that message was that 95% would get a tax CUT. If you tell a group that 95% of them will pay less money in taxes, and they believe you, getting 52% of the vote is no great accomplishment.
Now if Obama had still won while promising tax plans like Mondale and Dukakis had, then that would be notable. But this win, on those terms? Not so much.
Which then leaves the question of just why Oliver thought he had some grand insight here unanswered…
J.
“There is class warfare… we’re winning.”
Warren Buffet (richest man on earth; most successful investor in history)
In Class Warfare, Guess Which Class Is Winning
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/26/business/yourmoney/26every.html
By BEN STEIN
Published: November 26, 2006
“… Mr. Buffett, with immense income from dividends and capital gains, paid far, far less as a fraction of his income than the secretaries or the clerks or anyone else in his office. Further… Mr. Buffett doesn’t use any tax planning at all. He just pays as the Internal Revenue Code requires. “How can this be fair?” he asked…
“There’s class warfare, all right,” Mr. Buffett said, “but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war, and we’re winning.””
(In case anyone doesn’t know, Buffet & Stein are both conservatives, and both as far right as sanity allows. So much for Jay T.)
SaveFarris: 1. Keep taxes where they are (maybe even lower the Capital Gains taxes) in order to spark investment and grow the economy.
Showing your usual complete disregard for reality, I see. How consistent of you. “Keep taxes where they are”. That is, don’t change anything. The economy is in dire shape and you want to stay with the policies that got us here. 28 years later voodoo economics has utterly failed, yet you blindly keep saying “more of the same”.
Sure, let’s cut the taxes for the rich and count on their good graces to share the wealth. That’s certainly worked well.
Most of the jobs created come from small businesses. Businesses typically owned by people who make less than $250k year. If you want to grow the economy doesn’t it make sense to reduce taxes for them?
“There’s class warfare, all right,” Mr. Buffett said, “but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war, and we’re winning.”
So refreshing, actually, to see rich folks and conservatives who claim to be the victims, who don’t whine as if they were the ones struggling.
SDM: “… who don’t claim to be the victims…”
Damn fingers just aren’t workin’ the keyboard right this AM.
> 1. Keep taxes where they are (maybe even lower the Capital Gains taxes) in order to spark investment and grow the economy.
The theory that investors are just SO caught up in marginal changes in Capital Gains has lost all its punch. Ain’t so. Sure, a 20% rise or fall changes behavior, but a couple of points? It’s a giggle.
> 2. Cut spending.
Every economist of every stripe, save a few backburner ideologues, knows you don’t Hooverize when a serious recession / depression is looming. Not serious.
“If you tell a group that 95% of them will pay less money in taxes, and they believe you, getting 52% of the vote is no great accomplishment.”
I can’t believe you’re dissing Reagan like that!
But seriously … telling the public that ANYBODY is getting a tax hike, and paying little or no price, shows chops, and having a finger on the pulse.
Obama succeeded, where Dukakis and Mondale didn’t, because he didn’t waffle when challenged. Both D and M were ‘bold’ for about one speech or debate, and immediately started to wilt. Obama stuck it back in their face. The Obama team has game, that’s a fact.
I don’t think the “socialism” stuff affected anyone whose brain has enough space left from partisanship to actually analyze who is making these claims.
People with that much brains aren’t voting Republican anyway. Besides, I’m just saying that Obama paid some price. Maybe not even a net negative. But some. Dig?
ed,
I really don’t think so. Where Obama paid a price on the tax issue among people who otherwise might have voted Democrat was where voters believed McCain’s lies about Obama’s tax plan. I was registering voters in Philly in September, and I met an elderly, middle/ working class elderly African American woman who insisted that despite having voted Democrat all her life, she was voting McCain. I was flabbergasted and asked why, and she said it was because Obama would raise her taxes. I said No, he only was going to raise taxes on people making at least $200k a year. (It may have been presumptuous of me, but she really didn’t look like she made $200k.) She said that Obama was only saying that now to get elected, but that in fact he had voted to raise taxes on people like her before and he would do it again.
I realized that she’d probably seen the ads McCain ran in Pennsylvania claiming that Obama had voted to raise taxes on people making $45k a year, which ads were based on Obama’s voting for a budget resolution that assumed the expiration of the Bush tax cuts. The budget resolution of course is hypothetical and does not change the tax code in any way, but I figured trying to explain all that was not an effective use of time, so I said OK and moved on to the next house.
“Obama succeeded, where Dukakis and Mondale didn’t, because he didn’t waffle when challenged. ”
Obama didn’t waffle on most issues. The current New Yorker had an article on the Obama campaign about a critical moment early in the campaign, when the moctroversy about Obama being willing to negotiate with Iran came out. His people were considering how to spin it, but Obama said “No”. He said we negotiated with Stalin, we can negotiate with Ahmandddkddkdkwhatever. He refused to back off, and trusted the American people to understand. The issue you raised is just another example of this strategy.
Elsewhere on the thread, it’s amusing how cons who make $30,000 a year carry the water for people making millions per year. What they don’t realize is that like Willie Sutton when asked why he robs banks, balancing the budget requires that we go “where the money is”. It’s not JT, though he is invited to help Warren Buffett pay his increased tax burden if it bothers him so.
I wonder if Iranian people say “his name’s Enlightened librbrbrblrbrblllwhatever.”
“Unfortunately, it seems Obama wants to do the opposite on both counts.”
Thank god! You clearly have no idea how economics works, because by cutting spending while heading into a recession would kill the economy.
And lowering Capital Gains tax is the worst way of stimulating growth.
Fuck that. You tax the rich and spend the money on infrastructure, thereby increasing the number of jobs.
On a side note, if you really believe the best plan for dealing with a slumping economy is cutting spending, then you should shut up and not talk on the matter until you’ve completed some entry level economic courses in university.
1. Keep taxes where they are (maybe even lower the Capital Gains taxes) in order to spark investment and grow the economy.
Ferris, no president before Bush Jr. has ever lowered taxes during a time of war. And considering the record deficits and the state of our economy. It should be pretty clear why.
And I still find it hilarious that the cons still seem to think that the Laffer curve is an inverse graph, not parabolic. Reminds me of the boss from Dilbert thinking “Theoretically, if we cut costs enough, we can make a profit without selling any products.”
2. Cut spending.
Where? The war? No, that’s the ultra con’s little baby.
“And I still find it hilarious that the cons still seem to think that the Laffer curve is an inverse graph, not parabolic. Reminds me of the boss from Dilbert thinking ‘Theoretically, if we cut costs enough, we can make a profit without selling any products.’”
Exactly. People who don’t know what the Laffer curve looks like but want to use it to argue for tax cuts drive me nuts. I would educate these people, but far too many of them are ignorant by choice.
“No president before Bush Jr ever lowered taxes during a time of war.”
Actually, no leader of any government anywhere, going back to ancient fucking Sumeria, has ever lowered taxes during a time of war. Know why? Because it’s fucking stupid!
If you have so much problem with taxes you can just leave. I’m sure Putin would love to have you.
Obama’s tax policy makes good sense. But that doesn’t mean he would or wouldn’t suffer politically for it. What matters for that is whether he could explain why it makes sense or if the conservative framing of it would prevail.
The various ways that conservative could frame it are very quick and simplistic, so they have the advantage. Say “he’ll raise your taxes”, “socialist” “tax the successful” “destroy business”.
Obama and economists did their best to explain why it made sense. But the media generally stuck to only the stuff that fit into short, easily understandable soundbites. That is that 95% get a tax cut. The most in depth on economics that the media got was when they would have Robert Reich explain our economic situation and why Obama’s plan was the best for us.
Obama should have absolutely dominated the tax and economics front if people were truly informed, but he had to settle for something closer to a draw.
And to SaveFarris…
How in the world are you perceiving a lack of investment? Jobs are being cut from lack of DEMAND. Not lack of investment. Businesses are contracting, not expanding. And if demand were booming, do you really think there wouldn’t be willing investors to fund expansion to meet demand?
Furthermore, cutting spending would be disastrous right now. Thank God McCain won’t get a chance to enact a “spending freeze” to try to send us into a depression.
How many jobs created during the Clinton years?
How many jobs lost during the BushII years?
Saying that the Clinton tax hikes caused job loss & Bush (either one) tax cuts created jobs means you’re living in Bizzaro world.
“Saying that the Clinton tax hikes caused job loss & Bush (either one) tax cuts created jobs means you’re living in Bizzaro world.”
But they do. They do live in Bizzaro world.