Why I'm not voting for "W" (Resume)

[DaveH]

Well, first of all a flat tax has not ever been implemented, so how can you say it does not work - proven time and time again? I can't follow what you are trying to say after that, please re-type in english...

2k3WRXND wrote:
Flat taxes do NOT work - proven time and time again, inefficient ways of stirring up economic growth since lower-middle class target markets, often the target markets to reoccuring products, have a lower available disposable income. Carter tried this, didn't work. We need to use Reagonomics, which Bush is modeling his tax income barrier after. Tax breaks for the upper class which will inspire economic growth, job opportunities, and enhanced research funding along with other side traits such as inreased/volume income to non profit organizations.

[Jim]

Ok Let me clarify WHY i think this:

1st) Bush cuts revenue and increases spending, thus increasing the national debt. Don't think it matters? think again. The money is going to be coming from somewhere... who's paying for it right now? foriegn countries. Who's going to have to repay them in the future? The citizens of the united states. Look, you can build an image of sucess by spending all of this money we DONT HAVE, that will, in the long term, have to be paid off.

2. Taxes suck. The rich hate them, the poor hate them. The fact of the matter is, the government needs them for revenue. Bush gave tax cuts to the rich, has it stimulated the economy in the short run? has it affected unemployment? nope. It's a proven fact, that when you depend on the rich and this "trickle" effect, they use the extra money to better thier personal finacial situation, not for the benifit of society as a whole.

3. Job loss. There is NO denying that the job outlook while bush has been in office has been terrible. This is a direct indiciation that the middle class (that bottom 60% in the tax brackets, aka the middle class), is suffering.

Reaganomics doesnt work.

[stephen bradley]

I like BUSH

[Jim]

Government spending does have an undeniable correlation to economic growth. THIS is the purpose of government spending. Think for a second. What got us out of the depression? was it giving tax breaks to the rich? nope. it was massive amounts of government spending.

The purpose of government spending is to encourage consumption, provide something for the public good, and influence the level of total demand in the economy

[HandoEX]

Gov't spending on what?!? Are you saying that the gov't should be kicking out more money to boost our debt? Gov't spending is already ridiculous. More economic growth can be generated by tax breaks for those with higher income than by simply increasing gov't issued freebies to those with low income.

[Jim]

Not talking about welfare, talking about government spending that creates incentives for investment. Government builds a new building on a public university. What the benifits? Contractors get $$$, People work to build it $$$$, the general public gets a better education -> better educated society -> etc.. etc..

Look. If you were in the top 1% of the tax bracket, chances are your not going to go out of your way to spend any extra money then you would have already on something for the public good.

[Jim]

I suppose though, the republican view would be that all those homeless people should get off thier asses and get jobs, the government doesnt need to provide healthcare, becuase if people worked, they would idealy have it anyway...

[DaveH]

I personally do not want the government spending my money for me. The job of the govt was not (as set up by the founding fathers) to provide health care, or whatever else private sector the govt is trying to get into now. I suppose you can argue that govt spending can influence the economy, but it is a flawed and anti-free market way to do it. IMO the govt should be in charge of as little as possible, and should be using as little of the peoples money as possible. As far as massive govt spending goes... we already have that every day of the week!

[fallguy]

Jim wrote:
Not talking about welfare, talking about government spending that creates incentives for investment. Government builds a new building on a public university. What the benifits? Contractors get $$$, People work to build it $$$$, the general public gets a better education -> better educated society -> etc.. etc..

Look. If you were in the top 1% of the tax bracket, chances are your not going to go out of your way to spend any extra money then you would have already on something for the public good.

Goverment doesn't create jobs....please. It was found out that Kerry will raise taxes on those making 85k or more ....not 200k like he said. Also, those making 200k or more are actually alot of small business owners who file S corp on their taxes. What your describing Jim is actually a socialistic society....something that we are close to right now. Take from rich and give to poor. The "rich" (200k or more) are the ones starting new businesses and creating jobs for the poor. Raising taxes like Kerry proposes will not spur economic growth...it defeats it.

[fallguy]

Jim wrote:
I suppose though, the republican view would be that all those homeless people should get off thier asses and get jobs, the government doesnt need to provide healthcare, becuase if people worked, they would idealy have it anyway...
The republican view is not to enable them more and have them rely on the goverement, but give them the skills so they can get a job and better themselves. The first step is to get off their asses I suppose.

[HandoEX]

Point well taken. I doubt anyone would disagree that stimulating the economy through gov't spending on these types of investments help everyone. I see that the problems with gov't spending lie in free kick backs to poor people. If gov't spending is intended to boost employment, no one should argue with that. The downfall of gov't spending lies in the fallbacks of programs like welfare. The company I work for is a billion dollar company. IT's economic progression has a direct impact on me and the way I feed the economy. The more money this company makes, the more money I make. The more money I make, the more money I spend on goods and services.

[DaveH]

Ok, just for a minute lets assume the govt needs to supply healthcare... we all need healthcare right? Well shucks we all need food too, maybe the govt should supply all the food. Heck, we all need housing, maybe we should all have govt housing. While we are at it, we all need a car, heck maybe we should combine GM/Ford/etc into the USA Auto company and we all get free cars every couple years? A nice minivan for everyone with low emissions and low HP so we don't hurt ourselves driving it...

Jim wrote:
I suppose though, the republican view would be that all those homeless people should get off thier asses and get jobs, the government doesnt need to provide healthcare, becuase if people worked, they would idealy have it anyway...

[integra_gsr98]

Another thing you have to look at is the way small busineses are paying their company taxes. Many small businesses are setup and pay on the personal income tax level that everyone else on here does. By taxing the "rich" or "upper middle class" you are actually taxing the small businesses that provide for a large majority of job creation in the US.

Kerry is not a proven leader either. What has he done in the senate in the last 20 years? 5 bills in the last 20 years that he has sponsored have managed to get passed. 1 every 4 years is good, right? Kerry has no plan for the future of the United States, he just continues to state how everything Bush has done in the last 4 years has been wrong. Hindsight is ALWAYS 20/20.

[Guest]

Jim wrote:
Bush gave tax cuts to the rich
To be fair Jim, I received a tax cut in the form of no marriage penalty. People w/ children received increased tax cuts on their children. I am all for that.

[Guest]

I actually agree with a lot of what the republicans are stating here (mostly Dave and Matt), BUT the only questions I have are:

1. How are we going to repay the deficit w/o raising taxes?
2. How are we going to fund the Social Security shortages of the future that were somewhat caused by us using the surplus that had been set aside for Social Security (Bush promised that 2 trillion would be set aside for SS...it's spent, I understand why it was spent, I just want to know how we are going to repay it. That's all)

The only answer I can think of is taxes...not just for the rich, but for all of America. Regardless of who is in office, taxes will have to be increased somewhere to pay off our foreign debts.

[STiSchucky]

heh. just goto a US mint, tell them to give you 300,000,000,000 and go on and pay for it. i dont see why not..mints are US Gov't property, and the president runs the gov't...

[amicheze]

RX8ownage wrote:
heh. just goto a US mint, tell them to give you 300,000,000,000 and go on and pay for it. i dont see why not..mints are US Gov't property, and the president runs the gov't...

inflation?

[Guest]

RX8ownage wrote:
heh. just goto a US mint, tell them to give you 300,000,000,000 and go on and pay for it. i dont see why not..mints are US Gov't property, and the president runs the gov't...
that would still be far short of the 880,000,000,000 that we owe (cummulately) to Japan and China.

[Guest]

not to mention it would weaken the dollar to lows that we have never seen.

[STiSchucky]

tjamz wrote:
The plan to hunt down terrorists.....woops, decided to stretch our military and attack a country that has never (prior to the current war) killed one US civilian nor did they have the means to attack us AND had no connection to Al Qaeda(duelfer report, 9/11 commission, etc... all confirm this)....I agree Saddam was a bad man, he killed many innocent civilians in his own country, but there are MANY other "leaders" that fit this description. Seems odd to me that of the 3 countries in the axis of evil, we attack the only one that doesn't have and wasn't capable of nuclear weapons....hmmm....who's the biggest threat?

The plan to finance the war, sorry, don't agree there either. Someone has to repay the debt, I'd prefer to pay it now, through either higher taxes or extreme reductions non-critical govenment programs (I know, Kerry doesn't want to cut a ton of programs, like I said we are different and he's not perfect like me )

Everybody knows, Iraq would have, and probably did harbor terrorists from late 2001 to present times. All of these car bombs, road side bombs are performed by She-di-Yene(sp?) soldiers, which are basically terrorists. Well, Saddam and Osama don't see eye to eye in some things such as religion. But if they had to cooperate with one and nother, they would do so. You say we had no right to start a war with Iraq, yet your candidate voted to get Saddam. Getting him was a big boost in the war on Iraq, and terror itself. But just because he never attacked, or killed any Americans(doubt that, just dont remember it) since the Gulf War doesn't mean he had any plans to do it in the future with soldiers based world wide, and key allies with much hated Israel and a Turkey country whose been nothing but big help for lending us air force bases and also troop support. Saudi Arabia is the only neighboring Arab country that is kind of on the ropes with everything. My gut is that we shouldn't really trust them.

North Korea and Iran are big concerns to, no doubt. If Kerry was elected, he would probably leave these countries be, let them develop a few nukes and then use them on a European country. Then we'd all be back at square 1 blaming Kerry for being to sensitive with terrorists/evil countries and giving them time to strike without us being the first ones to hit them first. Those 3 countries are the only 3 I can think of with actual radical leaders. The part where you said many, please give some examples, with communist ambitions, not just a country that just harbors and supplies terrorists with little groups such as Sudan and tiny tiny parts of Pakistan.

Eventually to pay for the war, there will be no tax-cuts but just raises, no matter who the president is. And right, neither will cut a large amount of gov't funded programs, as it would set off a few tree huggers that fortunately recieved a screw job. Which would start all this bickering and blah blah blah.