Registered?
Commenting on WE Blog now requires you to be a Kansas.com member. Use the links above to register, if you haven't already, or to log in.Contact us
Follow us
Daily Archives
-
Recent Comments
- Skeptic on Jail consultants straining patience
- Chas on Health care reform would save state money
- cosmos_originally on Open thread 11/22
- Politico on Health care reform would save state money
- Politico on So they said
- Pleefer on Open thread 11/22
- cosmos_originally on Open thread 11/22
- Phantom on Open thread 11/22
- Phantom on Open thread 11/22
- Rage on Open thread 11/22
Open thread
- By Phillip Brownlee
- Posted at 1:05 a.m.
- Filed under Open thread
- Permalink
- Comments RSS
- Both comments and trackbacks are closed

63 Comments
We had an election about judicial retention and the Secretary of State doesn’t report the results? Did I miss the newspaper reporting about this? Why can’t I find any results in newspaper searches?
The Pittsburg Sun published a story about the dozen judges up for retention:
Twelve Kansas judges up for retentionhttp://www.morningsun.net/stories/110206/local_20061102004.shtml
The unofficial 2006 General Election Results reported by the Secretary of State doesn’t mention the judicial retention races:http://www.kssos.org/ent/kssos_ent.html
WHY?
The Sedgwick County General Election Results gives info about the judges:http://www.sedgwickcounty.org/elections/election_results/Gen06/index.html
33% voted AGAINST retention of Supreme Court Justice Robert Davis in Sedgwick County. Isn’t that a bit high?
Johnson County Results are here:http://www.jocoelection.org/results110706-4.htmAlmost 32% voted against the Supreme Court Justice in JoCo.
Shawnee County reported 35.5% against the Supreme Court judge.http://www.co.shawnee.ks.us/elresults/results.shtmWhat do the voters in Topeka know?
25% is a common “No” vote in a judicial retention election in Kansas, but 33-35% is a bit high, showing the electorate’s frustration about judges.
When will the Secretary of State report the results of these statewide races? What about the results of all 12 races mentioned by the Pittsburg Sun?
When will this page be updated?http://www.kssos.org/ent/kssos_ent.html
How about this hugely political matter about dirty coal fired plants? More coal fired plants is taking a huge step backwards. Nasty drift could easily come by way of Wichita. Our focus should be on wind,solar and hydro.
SPITZER TO SUE BUSH ADMINISTRATION FOR GUTTING CLEAN AIR ACT
EPA Plans to Exempt Half of Air Pollution Sources from Key Clean Air Rules
Attorney General Eliot Spitzer announced today that he will file a federal lawsuit against the Bush Administration for endangering air quality by gutting a critical component of the federal Clean Air Act.
Changes in the Clean Air Act announced today by the Bush Administration would exempt thousands of industrial air pollution sources, including some coal-fired power plants, from the New Source Review provision of the Clean Air Act. New Source Review requires that industrial plants add modern air pollution controls when they are upgraded or modified and substantially increase air pollution.
Spitzer said that this major weakening of the Clean Air Act will further degrade air quality in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic states, areas of the country already struggling with dirty air caused in significant part by industrial pollution carried into the region by prevailing winds. New York and the northeastern states are particularly concerned about sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions, which cause acid rain, smog and an increase in respiratory disease.
“The Bush Administration is attacking the Clean Air Act, which has been a cornerstone of our national commitment to environmental cleanup for two generations,” said Attorney General Spitzer. “The Bush Administration is again putting the financial interests of the oil, gas and coal companies above the public’s right to breathe clean air. It is incumbent on the states to take action to ensure that the public health and environment are protected.”
The New Source Review lawsuit will allege that the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is exceeding its authority by enacting rules that weaken the Clean Air Act. When Congress adopted the Clean Air Act in 1970, its intention was to improve the environment and protect public health by lowering levels of air pollution. The Bush Administration’s new rules and regulations would have the opposite effect of allowing higher levels of air pollution.
In 1999, eight states, including New York, joined the federal government in suing numerous coal-burning power plants for violations of the existing New Source Review provisions of the Clean Air Act. Attorney General Spitzer has also sued coal burning power plants in New York State for similar violations.
http://www.oag.state.ny.us/press/2002/nov/nov22b_02.html
http://www.b-e-f.org/GreenTags/
Nice post RH.
Coal-fired plants aren’t going away for some time. For the money squandered in Iraq, we could have installed high-efficiency pollution-capture systems on every coal-fired generation facility in America, and moved rapidly to expand nonpolluting alternative energy production as well.
Welcome to the coal lobby. Since now coal mining states are under Democrat control, we will see more push towards dirty coal. Follow the money and the politicans.
Never send a republican to do a Democrats job! Thanks guys(republicans) for being so damn worthless!http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061121/ap_on_go_co/cluttered_congress
WASHINGTON – Republicans vacating the Capitol are dumping a big spring cleaning job on Democrats moving in. GOP leaders have opted to leave behind almost a half-trillion-dollar clutter of unfinished spending bills,
There’s also no guarantee that Republicans will pass a multibillion-dollar measure to prevent a cut in fees to doctors treating Medicare patients.
The bulging workload that a Republican-led Congress was supposed to complete this year but is instead punting to 2007 promises to consume time and energy that Democrats had hoped to devote to their own agenda upon taking control of Congress in January for the first time in a dozen years.
The decision to drop so much unfinished work in Democrats’ laps demonstrates both division within Republicans ranks and the difficulty in resolving so many knotty questions in so short a time. GOP leaders promised their House and Senate members the December lame duck session would last no more than two weeks, or until Dec. 16 at the latest.
Now, with the agenda shrinking, a session that will be the last for 45 retiring or defeated House members and senators should be wrapped up by Dec. 8.
That could work against efforts to forestall a cut in physicians’ Medicare payments. Under a formula dating back to 1997, Medicare payments to doctors for office visits will drop an average 5 percent on Jan. 1 — unless Congress steps in. Keeping them the same for another year would be expensive, about $10.8 billion, and chances are mixed at best for the doctors’ lobby.
Driving the decision to quit and go home rather than finish the remaining budget work is a determined effort by a group of conservative Republicans to prevent putting a GOP stamp on spending bills covering 13 Cabinet Departments — and loaded with thousands of homestate projects derided as “pork” by critics.
Re: Judicial Retention; I don’t know if those figures are traditionally reported; suspect not, unless the vote to not retain is in the majority.
Also, FWIW, I happened to receive the Kansans for Life “voters guide” in my mailbox before the election; this waste of dead trees advocated voting against retention for Justice Davis, for no reason I could ascertain from the alleged literature, which I suggest was a reason for the allegedly high “no” vote in Sedgwick County.
And an article from Salon about the political media:http://daoureport.salon.com//synopsis.aspx?synopsisId=5fff6777-7441-461b-b44c-f3465b67df1d
Hate merchants: Limbaugh, Hannity, O’Reilly, Coulter, Beck, Savage, Ingraham and their ilk poison the airwaves and do the GOP’s dirty work. Why are they given a platform by the media? And with so many right-wing liberal-bashers, why do reporters feel the need to pile on? Jamison Foser tackles the second question: “Given the magnitude of the Republicans’ loss, we might expect the journalists and pundits who have so mercilessly mocked Democrats as bumblers and fools, the political equivalent of the Washington Generals, to turn their snide comments and patronizing jokes on the GOP. With Karl Rove apparently wandering around in a daze, wondering what the hell happened, surely his spectacularly incompetent reading of the electorate has earned him months, if not years, of ridicule by the likes of Norah O’Donnell, Chris Matthews, and Mark Halperin.
We all know how the pundits would chortle if Democrats took an electoral thumpin’, then responded by elevating their most liberal members to the party leadership. We’d hear how their policies and their demeanor were anathema to “real Americans” — and how their reaction to defeat shows just how clueless these effete liberals are.
But those waiting for similar treatment of the GOP at the hands of the nation’s political reporters and pundits shouldn’t hold their breath. It isn’t coming.
You can read the entire article by watching a short ad. Well worth it, imo.
Nasty ol’ mean republicans! Of copurse the demcrats are really great on the environment!
Clinton locked up the nation’s largest source of sulfer free coal when he made SW Utah a national park.
His ties to the Lippo Group made the reason real obvious. And it wasn’t environmental concerns!
http://laissez-fairerepublic.com/indocoal.htm
Hank
Freeper link? No thanks.
I travelled through south Utah a couple years ago. Pretty place that does not need the aesthetic improvements of strip mining.
Wasn’t going to be strip mining.
Hank
Hey Walker,
Actually, a nuclear plant will require as much if not more cooling water than a coal fired plant.
Coal, nuclear, or oil is merely the heat source for a steam plant. The steam plant needs a heat sink to operate.
In western Kansas the heat sink would be cooling towers and they require a lot of water to replenish losses due to the evaporation. A lot.
Hank
“Dirty” coal can be cleaned up. Ask our resident chemist, Ben H.
It just takes the political will to do it.
BTW, I heard something about gasoline made from coal that’s cleaner than the gas we have now.
If we had any leadership from this administration, it’s what we would have done instead of seizing Iraq’s oil.
Yes hank. It is estimated that the plant proposed by Sunflower Electric, based in HAYS, is going to require some 30,000 acre feet of water.
That is one foot of water covering 30,000 acres.
Or as we would say in Texas, “a bunch” of water.
But hey, it isnt coming out of HAYS’ water in the Smoky, so who cares, right?
I hope you care.
And I see the new spin is to oppose the plant based on emissions not water.
Ya dont think there is any political spin for governor leadership there, do ya?
BOTH are bad. But she doesnt want to open that water can o’ worms. It would expose her whole administration’s dirty deeds regarding water.
Better to say no based on emissions …. at least for the next four or five years.
I just know she hopes the whole water issue will go quiet until she leaves office. And the mess for someone else to clean up.
No mention of this yet?
Does everyone over 50 still remember where they were on this day in 1963?
I do. Do you?
In eigth-grade math class in Wellington, Kansas; the school didn’t have a hot lunch program, and the students either went home for lunch, brought a “brown bag” (highly discouraged by the school administration), or went to a local eatery for lunch. The teacher jumped all over the students who were tardy that afternoon, refusing to believe their explanation of staying in the car with parents to listen to the radio reports of the assination, and began handing out detention slips. When the announcement came over the intercom, buttressing the claims of the tardy students, she became quite upset, but I don’t recall her withdrawing the detentions.
“assination”=”assassination”; geez, I need a proofreader quick!
Yep, I was sanding down a ‘51 Mercury getting ready to paint it in Ralph Wilson’s “Winfield Body Shop”.
Hank
November 22, 1963.
Sitting in my mother’s car while she ran in, Sherman’s Drugstore, Thirteen Mile and Rochester Roads, Royal Oak, MI.
I had just returned from a school camping trip that morning – no school in the afternoon.
I remember sitting at the top of the stairs when we got home, listening to the radio or TV playing in the living room below – Walter Cronkite and his now-famous announcement that the president had died.
For what it is worth, I can remember what I was wearing that day……..
The world changed that day and America changed with it.
I pulled out of WU’s parking lot going north on hillside, during my freshman year. I turned on the radio and noticed the cars pulling over to the curb.. I did too. It was a real shock- the whole day!
I was not yet born. My similar moment would be the loss of the shuttle Challenger.
JR, I remember the first time I dated someone who was too young to remember that day. It was a shock to me, as up to that point, I thought EVERYONE knew what that day was like.
I know the Challenger affected people too.
Some kids today will have 9/11 as their “where were you” memory.
I was in the office the day of the Challenger explosion. After the shock wore off, I worried if any of my clients in Houston has supplied any of the faulty parts.
Thankfully, the answer was no.
It was also a terrible day for America.
As for November 22, 1963, to quote Cher “If I could turn back time..”
I can only imagine what the Kennedy assassination was like. I have only the Challenger explosion for a comparison.
I think the all the time, sound bite media and the huge variety of media has watered down our societies capacity for tragedy shock. Yes there was 911 but it was such a larger event than Kennedy or Challenger by compasrison.
Remember the loss of the second shuttle? There was hardly a reaction at all.
It’s sad the loss of national mourning. It had the capacity to bring out the best in us.
From Kennedy’s death came a renewed commitment to righting injustice and landing on the Moon.
The loss of the Challenger brought calls to forge ahead in space.
911 had that capacity too. It COULD have unified the world against international terrorism, Instead it was used to further the interest of ONE P(resident ) and his parties political agenda.
Times they have changed and not for the better.
I was in 7th grade English class in Clearwater, KS, when the radio via the intercom came on to announce that the President had been shot. I’ve NEVER in my life been in a room that was so quiet. The entire school (junior high and high school in one building) was silent.
We then went to our social studies class, where we found our teacher crying. All we did for that class was listen to the radio. Many of us were crying.
School was open the day of JFK’s funeral and we were all required to attend. No classes. Each classroom had a TV (brought by teachers, I’m sure), and we watched it there. I’m sure the administration thought that if school was let out, we’d waste the day, instead of honoring our fallen president. Some might have. Most of us wouldn’t have.
And then there was Bobby and MLK…
The death of our President affected me greatly in 1963, but the deaths of MLK and JFK in 1968 really broke my heart.
I have to wonder – wistfully perhaps – how our world would have changed had JFK, MLK and JFK been allowed to live.
In my humble view, MLK is the greatest American ever.
If there is a God, John, Martin and Bobby are at Her side.
“The only thing I want integrated is my coffee!” Malcolm X Posted by Ian Santiago.
That is not what Malcolm said, Santiago – you can’t even Google worth a (insert.)
“If I have a cup of coffee that is too strong for me because it is too black, I weaken it by pouring cream into it.” – Malcolm X.
“An integrated cup of coffee isn’t sufficient pay for four hundred years of slave labor.” – Malcolm X.
“I am not a racist. I am against every form of racism and segregation, every form of discrimination. I believe in human beings, and that all human beings should be respected as such, regardless of their color.” – Malcolm X.
“You don’t have to be a man to fight for freedom. All you have to do is to be an intelligent human being.” – Malcolm X.
Try respecting truth, Santiago, not making up false quotes to support your Aryan fantasies.
I was in the 4th grade at Eureka elementary school which was on West Street in Wichita – near where Star Lumber is now (the school was torn down long ago). The principal came in to tell our teacher about the President’s assassination. The teacher told us. I remember thinking (on a 4th grade level) “Boy, reality has fundamentally changed, what is going to happen now?”
We were let our of school to watch the funeral at home. After the funernal our mothers let us go outside to play. We climbing trees when another friend came out and said “Someone has shot Oswald!”
We replied “No, you dumbass, Oswald was the one who shot Kennedy!”
Later when we went inside to watch TV, we found out our friend was right. I remember it as a very scary and troubling time.
Vaughn:My boss (Wellington native) wants to know if you can recall the teacher.
I was in first grade at the time in Manhattan.The teachers wouldn’t talk about it, but the kids coming back from lunch at home told us.For some reason, I thought it was later in the day, so at recess, I walked home (a little over a mile, but not far enough for a bus in those days), and walked in the front door just as Walter Cronkite delivered those famous words.Meanwhile, the principal was frantically looking for me, called home and my mother took me back just in time for an all school assembly where they “officially” broke the news to us.
Mr C: Mrs. Garber, IIRC; may she rest in peace.
Mr C, ask your boss if the name Isabella Mickey (8th grade U.S. History) rings any bells.
Here’s the Nature article abstract, Mr. Coconut is referring to. As any intelligent reader can see, there is no mention of race here. The copy number variations (CNV) has implications in terms of disease and gene treatment thereof.
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v444/n7118/abs/nature05329.html
But, if you have racists glasses on all the time, guess what you end up seeing…all the time, everywhere?
WS, I can recall where I was at when those two things occurred:
MLK – working at Dillons #45, Wellington, Kansas; the store manager put the radio on over the store intercom, so everyone would know what was happening. I recall the few customers in the store just standing in the aisles in shock, as I went by, sweeping the floor.
RFK – at home in (again) Wellington; watching the tube after a hard day’s work at Oxwell, (to make more money for KU than I could earn at Dillons) my dad making not so kind comments. When the camera zoomed in on RFK prone on the floor, he turned to me and said “He’s a dead man”. We continued to watch, I believe CBS, late into the night, he being one who believed in all of his kids knowing what was happening.
A side story; when the 1960 presidential election drug on late into the night, my dad came and awakened me at 2:00 a.m., as he felt it important that I be a witness (via the miracle of radio) to what he considered a historic event. I recall sitting in the kitchen of the farmhouse in which we lived, outside Whitewater, and watching the snow fall as the voices from the radio kept saying that the election would turn on the Chicago results.
This is a .pdf of the whole _Nature_ article above.
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v444/n7118/pdf/nature05329.pdf
It gets a little speciality specific in its language, but they did in fact do a clustering statistic comparing the populations they sampled from (i.e., Yoruba from Nigeria, Japanese, European descent living in Utah, and Chinese). There was a 0.11 (from a range of 0 to 1.00) clustering statistic. The similarities on this genetic feature, copy number variations (CNV), were more similar within the populations sampled than between populations. But there was pretty obvious dissimilarities in the given populations also. The authors comment on the evoluationary advantage of variablity (or diversity, Mr. Coconut). So, this highly technical paper DOES NOT in any way, in my humble opinion, support the harboring of racist attitudes and I submit it would take pretty twisted and depraved, or at least seriously uninformed, mind to suggest otherwise.
Interesting quote in today’s paper…in a story by Stan Finger about holiday traffic safety. He writes that according to state statistics, 6 people a day are killed in Kansas by drunk drivers. That would be about 2,190 people a year….
Actual stats from KSDOT suggest tht an average (over the last 15 years) of 83 people per year are killed by alcohol related causes.
Little innaccurate reporting, wouldn’t you think?
You know, Vaughn, I may be just an old bastard, but I still look back on those days and think that the world would have been a better place had those three lived.
I have to believe that – or any thought of idealism goes out the window.
“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called Sons of God” – Some Jewish Guy from about 2000 years ago – Matthew 5:9.
WS, I fully agree, as an old…. too.
Raptor, perhaps he’s arithmetically impaired and that’s why he went to J-school; or, perhaps his editor is similarly impaired; or, his editor made a cut to the article without reading it to see if it made any sense. In any event, your arithmetic is better than his appears to be.
Apparently the City of Lawrence wants in on the fun as to the proposed coal-fired plant at Holcomb:
http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2006/nov/22/city_commission_opposes_western_kansas_power_plant/?city_local
raptor-Good eye. I read it too, but didn’t stop to run the numbers. There was an article a while back about how many kids were backed over by cars every day and it was amazingly large. I suspect it was bogus also. If it was a real number, I think we may have heard more of it. Maybe we’ll get a correction on page 2
“According to state statistics, nearly six people a day are killed in Kansas in alcohol-related crashes. Most of those victims weren’t the ones drinking. Accidents involving alcohol-impaired drivers are more than twice as likely to result in death or injury.”
The above if from this article by Stan Finger:http://www.kansas.com/mld/kansas/news/local/16070949.htm
It seems to me that that 6 people killed a day from “alcohol related crashes” is different from saying drunk drivers kill 6 people a day. Could you provide a link to your data, Raptor? I have searched the KSDOT site and have yet to find the 6 people per day information.
It occurred to me that I remember hearing that annual motor vehicle fatalities were in the 40,000 range, which would mean that Kansas, having a bit less than 1% of the national population, would have to be an awfully dangerous place to drive if it accounted for 5 times as many deaths, on a per capita-adjusted basis, as the national average.
According to the federal government, there were 471 motor vehicle fatalities in Kansas in 2003, out of 44,800 nationally, i.e. a bit more than 1%.
http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/transportation/motor_vehicle_accidents_and_fatalities/
Raptor, maybe that meant 6 per day during the holidays? That seems more accurate.
I want to say that in all my family, the wealthy side of my family are the only ones who drink, and they think NOTHING about getting behind the wheel afterwards. I think they think that only poor people are drunks who cause accidents.
Thank you for the link, heartlander. Federal data in 2003 = 471 deaths from motor vehicle accidents involving alcohol. That would be 1.29 deaths per day which is considerably less than 6 per day. I will try to write him to see if I can figure out what he is talking about.
Best wishes to all (yes, this includes Ian Santiago) for a happy Thanksgiving. Shutting down for the day (and maybe the week)… Stay safe, y’all; don’t eat more than twice as much as normal; and, if you are consuming adult beverages, for goodness sakes, don’t drive.
Over and out.
From:http://www.therationalradical.com/outrages/class_warfare.htm
Bogus “Class Warfare” ChargeRepublicans are once again using verbal sleight-of-hand against the Democrats, and so far seem to be getting away with it.
When Democrats criticize the Bush tax cut plan, Republicans charge that the Democrats are using “class warfare” arguments, or even that they’re actually fomenting class warfare.
Pointing out the economic injustice of the Bush tax plan isn’t conducting class warfare. The Bush tax plan itself is class warfare.
A plan enabling the richest 10% or so of the population to aggrandize unto themselves even more of the nation’s wealth than the 71% they already own, at the expense of the middle and working class — that is class warfare with blood and guts, real life consequences.
It’s like when Southerners accused Martin Luther King, Jr. of causing racial conflict when he marched against segregation. King’s exposing and protesting against racial injustice was not the cause of racial conflict, the racial conflict was caused by the oppression of the African-American population.
Likewise, any class warfare that exists is caused by the Republican assault on the financial integrity of the poor and working class — NOT by those who expose it
Assume there are 100 people who have $100 to split up. No one expects it to be divided perfectly evenly at $1 apiece, but everyone involved expects that some basic fairness will be used in the process that will split up the money.
Now let’s say the $100 winds up being divided as follows:
1 person gets $38.104 people get $5.32 each
5 people get $2.30 each
10 people get $1.25 each
20 people get .60 each
20 people get .23 each
40 people get1/2 cent each
The distribution of wealth brought to you by the 2001 Bush tax cuts for the wealthy. Unless you Republican posters are making over $300K per year, you would be better off with the 2000 tax plan.
http://www.therationalradical.com/dsep/wealth-distribution.htm
“Assume there are 100 people who have $100 to split up…”Posted by: Steven Davis | November 22, 2006 at 07:06 PM
Cute post but that’s not the way it works. The tax cut is pro rata. That is, it depends on your income.
It doesn’t come out of one big money pot like the cute math show.
Nice try, JM, but thanks for playing the game.
SD posted facts – not BS like most on your side.
The “tax cuts” did benefit the rich – the already rich – and did virtually nothing for the working man.
As it worked out, it was 100 billion for the rest of us and 800 billion for the already rich.
That’s cute.
BTW – JM, who is going to pay off the deficit?
Raised hand, raised hand!!!!!!
I know! My grandchildren and their children and their children!!!!
Do I getta star now?
“The tax cut is pro rata. That is, it depends on your income.”
Yes. The example illustrates the current distribution problems and is not an exact model of how it works.
I have seen a chart somewhere recently and can’t seem to find it. I will keep looking. It graphs the possession of wealth of the top 1% – the current amount of wealth held by that group is rougly equivalent to the early part of the century – the Robber Baron era through the 1920s. The richest one percent did not need Bush’s cuts – they gained considerably through the 1990s. When we cut into what the middle class have, we are potentially creating social problems that may be difficult to overcome.
JM, are you defending Bush’s welfare for the rich? I think that is a pretty untenable position for any number of reasons.
Bush = poison for the middle class
All,Check out Bush’s continuing war on science and rational thought:
http://www.slate.com/id/2154249/?nav=tap3
Bush math:
Bush: the deficit this year is going to be a thousand ka-billion!!!!
Actual deficit: three hundred billion.
Savings, thanks to Bush: 700 ka-billion!!!!
Thank you, George, you saved my great, great grandchildren 700 ka-billion dollars!!!!
No matter how you cut it, the deficit is still $300 billion.
Clinton left you a SURPLUS of $258 billion and a plan to pay off the National Debt within ten years.
Bush math: evil.
George Bush: the Mathmatician.
Article from the Wall Street Journal:
* In the past 33 months the size of America’s entire economy has increased by 20 percent. He quotes National Review Online’s Larry Kudlow as reporting, “In less than three years, the U.S. economic pie has expanded by $2.2 trillion, an output add-on that is roughly the same size as the total Chinese economy.”* In the 2 1/4 years before the 2003 tax cuts, economic growth averaged 1.1 percent annually; in the three years since, it has averaged 4 percent per year, and in the first quarter of this year it was 5.6 percent on an annualized basis; inflation-adjusted per capita gross domestic product (GDP) has grown 7.8 percent from 2003 through the first quarter of this year.* According to the government’s establishment survey, in the 36 months since the tax cuts became law, 5.3 million new jobs have been added to the economy.* According to its employment survey, 288,000 jobs were added in May and 387,000 in June alone.* The unemployment rate dropped from 6.1 percent in 2003 when the bills were signed to 5.4 percent at the end of 2004 and 4.6 percent today, and that rate has gone down for men, women, blacks and Hispanics.* Incomes are up too. As Stephen Moore noted in the Wall Street Journal, “the percentage of Americans earning more than $50,000 a year rose from 40.8% to 44.2%” between 2002 and 2004. As for very wealthy families, the portion of total income “captured by the richest 1%, 5% and 10% of Americans is lower today than in the last year of the Clinton administration.”* In spite of Democrat claims that the tax cuts would starve the federal government, disastrously reducing revenue from taxes, federal tax receipts jumped a hefty 15 percent – $274 billion – last year and 13 percent – $206 billion – in the first nine months of this fiscal year, which, as the Journal points out, means the nine-month increases for the past two years represent the highest growth rates in 25 years. Looking ahead to the end of this fiscal year, total inflation-adjusted government receipts will likely be 23 percent above 2003 when the Bush tax cuts were signed into law.
Copy and paste is not original thought, Santiago, whoops, JM.
Nice try, Federal spending increased under the House, Senate and Presidency, all controlled by Republicans, by NINE percent.
Under Clinton, Federal spending increased by less than FOUR percent.
Those figures do not include dollars spend for the War on Iraq.
Increases of the National Debt under Democrats – ONE trillion dollars.
Increases of the National Debt under Republicans – EIGHT trillion dollars.
Who is going to pay off the National Debt, JM?
As far as the economy goes, did you all see the news where people are planning to spend LESS this holiday season? For such a robust economy, we’ve all suddenly become really thrifty.
“Who is going to pay off the National Debt, JM?”
Democrats will have to pay it off. And the BushBots will scream in horror when they do – accusing the Democrats of ‘overtaxing’. That is what irresponsible deadbeats always do.
To use Fleettwood’s method:
Rep = deadbeat debtor
“
In economic terms, it’s hard to find any clear links between deficits and the economy. In fact, as lower tax rates have expanded the economic pie, thereby throwing off a huge volume of new tax collections, the deficit has come down to only 1.9 percent of GDP. As for overall U.S. Treasury debt, this remains below 40 percent of GDP
— lower than any of the other G7 industrial countries.
What’s more, both 10- and 30-year Treasury bonds currently yield less than 5 percent, strongly suggesting that there is no looming U.S. debt crisis.
The latest Treasury report on budget spending and tax receipts is noteworthy. Revenues continue to soar at roughly a 12 percent pace, a trend that began more than three years ago when the Bush tax-cut plan was implemented. Meanwhile, spending continues to expand at an 8 percent rate. So here’s the tragedy: If Congress had held spending in the last three or four years to 6 percent annually — still twice the inflation rate — we would have a balanced budget by now.
During the Gingrich congressional years, and particularly during the fight for the balanced-budget amendment of 1997, limited spending coupled with low tax rates was the winning message that gathered both conservatives and Ross Perot independents into the GOP tent.
Now is the time to return to these very same principles.
The missing part of the formula is reduced spending. This was originated by the Gingrich Republicans and a policy we should return to immediately. Why? Because it works.
Did you have trouble sitting down today, JM?
Well, that’s because Bush sold your ass to the Chinese.
Bush was shocked to find out that the Chinese wanted to be paid back with Chinese money – Bush thought that we would pay back the debt in Monopoly money.
Whoops!
I’m gonna guess JM is your garden variety Republican.
He’s got his and anyone who aint got there own aint trying.
That about sum you up JM?
test test
Go away, Santiago.
Big Business Republican con-artists are traitors who sold out the American people to make a profit. As a result they will end up in the Ninth Level of Hell where the Devil will eat them alive. (from Dante’s Inferno)
Anything for the Almighty Dollar eh?
“the Ninth Level of Hell where the Devil will eat them alive. (from Dante’s Inferno”
Damn, that sounds like a hell of a way to go.
And I thought I was having a bad day.
And if the GOP can constrain itself to its small government, fiscally conservative ideals, I’ll beat you to the polls, JM. The GOP has been spending itself into the dirt like a bunch of college freshmen, with their t-shirts and credit cards.