I dont defend the rich because of any emotional attraction to them.

I do so because attacking the rich is bad for all of us.

By making the “rich” our whipping boys, we do not look in the mirror and correct our own problems.

Also, again, we measure wealth by income, in all of these studies. I know several wealthy people who legally show less than $50,000 in income on their tax returns. Taxing income prevents wealth accumulation and distorts decision making. The truly wealthy don’t need much income. The surgeon who just started making real money at age 30 might be showing $200,000 or more income, but he also has student loan debt greater than YOUR house!Income tax returns are a poor method of measuring wealth. There is no way to “amortize” or spread that out over time. The person that sacrifices for 10 or 15 years and makes it “big” should not be punished with higher rates.

I prefer doing business with the self made businesspeople and the blue collar types that have been frugal and saved all their lives.

Many of those people scratched and saved, some even went bust a few times before their efforts paid off. They finally made it because they did not envy others, they did not blame others, and they fixed their own problems.

And who ever told Manny the world was fair?

This is the Eagle’s definition of “getting hosed”.

That doesn’t speak to the start of the recession. There are specific guidelines about the start of recessions and the facts don’t fit your picture. Greenspan should have dropped interest rates in Oct. of 2000 but being a good friend of Al Gore’s he wanted us to think the economy was better that he actually was.

It backfired and we all paid the price.

Published on Friday, March 10, 2000 in The NationAlan Greenspan Intends To Take The Glow Off Gore’s Best Feel-Good Issue–The Stock Marketby William Greider

http://www.commondreams.org/views/031000-102.htm

This article is pretty informative about what makes up a recession. It also points up what Greenspan should have done and didn’t do in March 2000 when the stock started to slip. The real recession was underway in the fall of 2000.

The budget was balanced after the Clinton tax increase. You will notice, of course, that I did NOT say that it was balanced BECAUSE of the tax increase.

It is fairly well known that you can stimulate the economy with deficit spending. Borrow a quarter of your annual income and your personal economy will be stimulated.

The new result is that the Debt is due and it is due now.

Mark Foley was elected to Congress in 1994 as a Republican and he has always been a member of the GOP.

You deliberately spread a lie that was intended to make Democrats culpable for Mark Foley.

There is no point in discussing anything else with you. Your facts have proven to be anything but factual.

And, if you are going to claim that I “do the same thing yada, yada” post proof of your accusation before you take a shot.

Also two prominent scientists (MIT no less) came out today calling Gores attacks about GW nonsense. Saying it is real doesn’t make it so either. Ignoring the facts is foolish.

Maybe you spent to much time today slinging mud and not enough researching.

“The unemployment rate bottomed at 3.8 percent in April 2000, and started deteriorating steadily from there (during the Clinton administration).

The fed funds rate — the overnight interest rate administered by Alan Greenspan and the Federal Reserve — peaked at 6.5 percent in 2000, and had to be lowered in an emergency move on January 3, 2001, “in light of further weakening of sales and production” (during the Clinton administration).

As the chart below shows, GDP growth fell off a cliff in the third quarter of 2000 (during the Clinton administration). Despite the shock of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, growth started to revive in the fourth quarter of 2001 (during the Bush administration).

http://www.nationalreview.com/nrof_luskin/luskin200405050850.asp

With the exception of George W Bush who takes the War on Iraq “OFF BUDGET” so that they do not show i the total deficit projections.

Reagan PROMISED that his tax cuts would stimulate the economy and balance the budget, a process GHWB called “voodoo economics.”

It never happened. The budget was finally balanced in 1999 AFTER Clinton RAISED taxes.

So, how did Clinton raising taxes lead to a surplus budget?

BTW – Most economists conclude that the recession began in March 2001.

However, those who claim that Clinton “balanced the budget” use current revenues vs current expenditures to make that claim.

Clinton, like every Congress and every President, uses the “surplus” in SS to fund the General Fund expenses.

That is what those “bonds” in the “trust fund” do, they convert SS payments into general revenue.

“Deficits are caused not by wild-eyed spending, but by periodic recessions” John F. Kennedy.

Kennedy’s comments aside, it is important to note that federal revenues have always gone up dramatically after every tax rate cut. Spending, unfortunately, tends to go up even faster sometimes.

Bush 1 raised tax rates, a dumb move politically and economically.That hurt the economy and also hurt the deficit.

Rather than focus on debt or deficits or any other factor, government should focus on GDP growth.

Keey our eyes on growth and everything else, financially speaking, will work itself out just fine.

Before you dismiss this arguement answer this: WHO will pay taxes if businesses shut down and unemployment rises?

“Only full employment can balance the budget, and tax (rate) cuts will pave the way to full employment.” John F. Kennedy to the Economic Club of New York.

Lloyd Bentsen, Democrat Senator and running mate if Mike Dukakis, quoted JFK when Bentsen supported Reagans tax cuts on the floor of the Senate.

Your argument is disingenuous. Reagan and Bush I ran up HUGE deficit. What was the excuse then?

You are correct when you say there are many folks adversely affected by the AMT who were not within the class of “nontaxpayers” for whom the AMT was created. Thus, the need for indexing as an example.

A closing thought: I believe there should be some form of taxation on Private Activity Bond income, which is income tax free under current law, but which is subject to the AMT, assuming the conditions for imposition of the AMT on a taxpayer are otherwise met. If the bonds were issued directly by the entity involved in the activity, this income would be subject to income taxation; why should the fact there is a governmental unit issuing the bonds change this result? Perhaps the more direct way to attack this is to remove PABs from the general definition of “tax exempt” security.

Please remember, the AMT came about as a legislative response to a very select few number of people paying no income tax at all.The law is a ass, and hard cases make very bad law.We try to use a sledgehammer to pound a thumbtack, we dont index for inflation, and we are stuck with the AMT.Now, we have the AMT, which makes life hard for lots of people it was never intended to affect at all.Envy is a very bad thing!Envy brought us the AMT, a rule that prevents people from doing what is best with their money.

Understand how it complicates your life, Paul; I think while we might disagree on other things, I think we would agree that this particular thing needs an overhaul, at a minimum.

I dont mean to be a smart ass, but I dont know how else to explain my feelings about the deficit:

Raising taxes wont cure the common cold.I dont like the common cold.Lets raise taxes to cure the common cold!

Sorry, again, but logic fails in your arguement.

Raising tax rates does not raise revenues.

Our country carried higher debt levels, as a percentage of GDP, under FDR, Truman and Eisenhower.

In my opinion, the Cold War and the War on Terror warrant the same attention as WW2.

We paid down that debt. We will pay down this debt. (As long as the greenies dont kill the economy with carbon taxes.)

We have to run the numbers twice, for a whole lot of people, just to make sure we dont get ourselves in trouble.

Of course, for the accountants and attorneys that live off of “billable hours” — well they like the AMT!

There is not X amount of wealth in the world to have.

This study says that of te wealth made, those at the top are making more of it than those at the bottom.

Everyone is still getting richer, just those at the top got more.