catchall political thread

[Batistachamp]

been meaning to make one of these for a bit.

[enforcer]

[Adam]

I f***ing love this pic.

[nothing to see here]

Linda McMahon benefits from political silly season in Connecticut

It's less than two weeks since Linda McMahon won the Connecticut Republican Party's senate primary and already she's started throwing the dirt at her Democrat opponent Chris Murphy.

Her first TV advertisement since officially obtaining the nomination, rather than focusing on her positive message of job creation, concentrated instead on Murphy's record of absenteeism from the Congressional financial crisis hearings in 2007-2008:

If you skipped 80% of your meetings for your job, would you get a promotion? During America's financial crisis Chris Murphy served on two committees trying to avoid a financial meltdown, but Murphy skipped nearly 80% of those urgent hearings. Maybe Chris was at the plush secret congressional health club which you pay for. Or maybe Murphy skipped work to raise money to keep his $170,000 a year job. But Chris Murphy didn't show up for the job you paid him to do.


f course, in an ordinary job, if you had next to no experience, then you wouldn't get immediately promoted to one of the most powerful positions in the company, which is the political equivalent of what Linda is trying to do. We just have to take it on trust that Linda won't be equally as picky about the meetings she would choose to attend as a Senator, given that she has no record to compare to Murphy's.

Murphy responded, like most politicians sadly do, by avoiding the questions posed by Linda's ad, emphasising his voting record and trying to steal Linda's job plan thunder:

Linda McMahon will do and say anything to get ahead. Like running false negative ads. My voting record is 97%. I'm focused on creating jobs. Like when I convinced Congress to invest in cleaning up this industrial site, putting 75 people to work. Next, companies here will expand and attract hundreds more Connecticut jobs. I'm Chris Murphy and I approve this message, because that's not just a plan, that's real.


Unsurprisingly, Linda's campaign manager, Corey Bliss, quickly sent out an email to her supporters to ridicule Murphy for "touting a $15 million earmark that created 75 jobs" at "a staggering $200,000" each, because job creation in Republican eyes is only good when it comes from the private sector or benefits them politically.


Which was a reckless move, as according to Don Michak of the Journal Inquirer, WWE, while Linda McMahon was still its CEO, took advantage of the same tax subsidies for job creation in their movie division that she was bashing Murphy for:

McMahon was asked how her campaign could attack Murphy when WWE has said it created 52 jobs with $10.4 million in state tax credits it collected for work done during her tenure as its chief executive officer. That also amounted to an expenditure by taxpayers of $200,000 per job.

Linda's feeble answer was that "I'm not attacking that in any way". I guess she's not personally responsible for what her campaign manager says on her behalf.

So with that line of attack thwarted, Linda continued to aggressively go after Murphy's missed committee meetings:


During the financial crisis Chris Murphy skipped nearly 80% of his committee hearings. In his ad Murphy says McMahon is wrong, but in their fact check the Courant says this about Linda's ad quote "the main assertion here is on target. As such, we rate this ad generally accurate.". Murphy didn't show up nearly 80% of the time and you pay him $170,000 a year. Check the facts: Chris Murphy isn't being honest with you.


Obviously Linda feels she's onto a winner here with part of the local media backing her up. Indeed, a poll conducted by Rasmussen Reports after the ads had aired, showed Linda leading the race 49%-46%, though it's very early days yet, so take it with a pinch of salt, but it may mean that the election will be a lot closer than previously thought.

However, Rob Simmons, who Linda defeated in the 2010 Republican senate primary and obviously has no respect for her as a politician, broke party ranks to defend Murphy from what he felt was a misleading characterisation of being lazy:


But Simmons said there are a few reasons why lawmakers would not attend hearings. For one thing, they sit on a number of committees and subcommittees, he said. There are times when committees and subcommittees meet at the same time, forcing legislators to either choose one and skip the other or try to split his or her time between the groups, Simmons said....

Simmons said he felt that being present for a vote was more important than attending hearings, which are designed to give lawmakers an opportunity to learn about issues and ask questions of experts.

"When someone comes to testify, unless it's really high profile, attendance is not high," Simmons said.

Part of the reason for that is some lawmakers consider themselves well-versed on certain issues


Simmons begrudgingly supported her in 2010, but it doesn't look like he'll do so again in 2012, which may prove problematic for the McMahon campaign.

With Linda's slacker smears gaining traction and Murphy being down in the polls already, he's already resorted to attacking her WWE record:


As CEO of World Wrestling Entertainment Linda McMahon had a plan. Shift profits overseas to avoid U.S. taxes. Deny her employees healthcare and disability [benefits] to increase her profits. Now McMahon has another plan: tax cuts for the wealthy, including a $7 million tax cut for herself. McMahon's plan for the middle class: cuts to medicare and education. Linda McMahon: always for her, never for us.


Expect more such adverts as the race heats up, which will probably be effective in redefining her as a rich but empty-headed pornographer posing as a kindly grandmother to quote Chris Powell.

Though hopefully he isn't stupid enough to continue airing those ads during Monday Night Raw in Connecticut, where they will hit the demographic that is least likely to buy into his anti-WWE rhetoric. WWE was already crowing about this development in their own press release to the Connecticut media last Tuesday, not to help Linda McMahon of course, whose campaign is completely uncoordinated with WWE, despite her husband owning the company:



It is apparent that the same people who have consistently denigrated and mischaracterized the WWE and our family friendly environment for political gain have officially changed their point of view about our content.

For the second week in a row, Mr. Murphy's campaign continues to run advertising in our programming with his new ad airing yesterday at 10:30 p.m. on USA during ‘Monday Night Raw'. While past political rhetoric has been unjust, it pleases us to know that Mr. Murphy recognizes that WWE's TV programming is a highly effective way to reach families and voters in Connecticut.



Actually, most of the remarks criticising their past product for being overly violent and sexualised has come from the Connecticut media, not Murphy's campaign, which has just gotten started, but I suppose you can't let the facts get in the way of political point scoring. A lesson that will surely be repeated by all three sides involved in this election in the next three months.

http://www.cagesideseats.com/2012/8/26/ ... #storyjump

[Bunk Moreland]

re: DNC

I think Michelle Obama did a great job showing how in touch she is with us common folks, very impressive. Deval Patrick and Martin O'Malley looked good as well.

[Skip McGee]

whether you agree with her politics or not, michelle obama is a force. whether its appearances or speeches she is always on her game

[The Franchise]

re: DNC

I think Michelle Obama did a great job showing how in touch she is with us common folks, very impressive. Deval Patrick and Martin O'Malley looked good as well.

Bunk you only like O'Malley because mayor Carcetti was based on him.

[GA Holsome]

whether you agree with her politics or not, michelle obama is a force. whether its appearances or speeches she is always on her game

she is a good speaker i just think she didnt do a good job connecting to the top 1% in her speech.

[MWS1980]

from pwinsider

MCMAHONS: WE WILL PAY 70s BANKRUPTCY DEBTS
By Mike Johnson on 2012-09-21 03:59:09 After Linda McMahon's political opposition brought up that the McMahon family never paid off their 1970s bankruptcy debts (which were absolved by the courts in 1977) despite the millions made over the course of running WWE, Linda McMahon issued a statement that they have begun to search out the creditors and will pay them....with interest.
The Greenwich Times reports that McMahon issued the following statement:

"Over the past two days, Vince and I have begun attempts to locate and reach out to all individuals on the creditor list. It is our intention to reimburse all private individual creditors that can be located. We feel it is the right thing to do to pay them in full, including an adjustment for inflation at four times the initial amount as shown on the list of creditors."

To read the entire article, including a breakdown of what was owed and comments from one of the debtors, http://www.greenwichtime.com/local/article/McMahon-I-ll-make-good-on-my-debts-3882247.php#ixzz275cFQVOF

oh how amazing that 36 years later they have to be embarrassed into paying their debts.

[Skip McGee]

they arent even being embarrassed into it, they have no shame. they are doing it to squash the response to their hypocritical attack ads on murphy about missing a mortgage payment. he paid when he was late, she didnt. so just like everything they do, they are going back and trying to rewrite history to cover their asses

[Captain Howdy]

A classic example for Linda of "too little, too late." Makes you wonder how many of those debts they owe are to businesses that are actually still active.

[Batistachamp]

the article linked has at least some of those owed. a few towns and banks and one family owned farm where they boarded horses and left them on the hook for 33K,whats that like 120K today?

[Captain Howdy]

That's so laughable. "We were so poor we could no longer afford to board our prize thoroughbreds."

Cry me a fuckin' river.

[summer of George]

hey pal they are just like us,surely youve seen or heard the ads a few hundred times.

[NECW fan]

from pwinsider

The Hartford Courant is reporting that Vince and Linda McMahon were 51 days late in paying their property tax bill on the multimillion-dollar condominium unit they own in Stamford, CT according to city records. They paid yesterday, along with $1,217 in interest. Of course, that is all over the CT media due to Linda's Senate run.

must be Murphy's fault they were late.

[NECW fan]

http://www.politicususa.com/busted-paul ... etted.html

Paul Ryan and his wife inherited between $1-5 million in 2010 and whoopsie daisy, he forgot to disclose it for two years. You’d almost think it was on purpose, well, some people do think that, since Ryan didn’t remember it until he was being vetted by the Romney campaign.

they really just think they are better,smarter than the rest of us. rules and laws are for us little people.

[Skip McGee]

paul ryan lies about anything and everything. hes the one im most looking forward to going down with the ship if romney loses.

[Captain Howdy]

Paul Ryan makes Sarah Palin look educated.

[Ms. TNA]

Towards the end of the interview, Obama sought to assure listeners that he was still confident, alluding to an internet meme that features him: “As some of these emails that go around with my picture on them say, I can’t quote the entire thing, but ‘I got this.’”

i was amused by this.

[Ms. TNA]

[Adam]

Linda McMahon's nasty attack ads did her a lot of good, didn't they?

[summer of George]

they did so well the first time she went that way again. luckily we have four years before our next senate seat is up for grabs.

[The Franchise]

[The Franchise]

If We're Going to Tax the Rich, Then Let's Tax the Rich

Due to the political courageousness of President Obama (there is simply no other way to put it), the folks inside the Beltway are finally having a serious discussion about taxing the rich. Obama is not only strongly fighting for higher tax rates on the higher-income earners, but he was the one who put the subject front and center in the election season -- when he could easily have punted it to a non-election year.

But the "tax the rich" policies so far being discussed (at least the ones that leak out to the public) are laughably timid and tame, when you really examine the big picture. So far, what is making Republicans howl is President Obama's plan to end the Bush tax cuts on the top two marginal income tax rates, which would raise them from 33 percent to 36 percent, and from 35 to 39.6 percent. Seen one way, that's impressive, since tax rates haven't gone up in such a fashion since President Clinton's first year in office. But seen another, it's not all that radical at all.

Consider the fact that nothing Obama is doing is going to "fix" the problem of Warren Buffett paying a lower tax rate than his secretary -- a problem Obama has repeatedly said he'd like to tackle. On "entitlements reform," only a few lonely voices crying in the wilderness are suggesting ending the most regressive federal tax around, by scrapping the cap on income for Social Security payroll taxes. Also seemingly forgotten in this debate is the proposal for a "millionaires' tax" or a "transactions tax." The real measure of whether Democrats and Republicans are both selling smoke and mirrors is whether they permanently fix the Alternative Minimum Tax -- again, a subject which has barely been mentioned.

If we're really going to get serious about taxing the rich, why not... well... tax the rich? Chances for changing the tax code for upper-income folks don't come around all that often (it's been 20 years since the last one, remember), so why not push not only for higher rates, but to fix some of the most glaring ways our tax code favors those with monstrous incomes. Let's take a look at a few of these ideas, one by one.



Scrap the Cap

This one is pathetically easy to understand, and pathetically easy to fix. Many Americans aren't even aware of how the lower 90 percent of paycheck-earning Americans pay higher taxes than the upper ranks.

Social Security taxes are supposed to be a "flat tax" -- everyone pays the same rate. It's so simple that Social Security taxes ("FICA," on your paystub) don't even appear on a normal person's income tax form. It's a straight 6.2 percent of your income that gets taken out, every single paycheck. Except for the wealthiest, of course -- they pay less.

Because only (currently) the first $110,100 you make in income is taxed. Every dollar you earn up to this limit is taxed at a flat 6.2 percent rate. Every dollar you make over this limit is taxed at a zero percent rate. Meaning most Americans don't make it over the cap, and thus pay a full 6.2 percent on their entire income.

[Technical notes: Right now we are in the midst of a temporary "payroll tax holiday" and only 4.2 percent is being taken out of your paycheck -- but this is going to end at some point, and the tax will go back up to the baseline of 6.2 percent. Also, your employer matches this percentage, but self-employed people pay the full 12.4 percent. Neither of these facts are reflected in the charts below, which have been simplified for clarity.]

Here is a chart showing what percentage in Social Security taxes people with modest incomes actually pay, from $10,000 to $150,000 income:



Everyone pays the same 6.2 percent up until that $110,100 limit. From this point on, the percentage drops because once the cap is hit, you're done paying the tax for the year. Someone making $150,000 a year pays only 4.6 percent, as a result. Now let's look at a higher income range -- one which begins to show the massive tax break higher income folks get:



This shows income up to a million dollars a year. The tax rate steeply falls until about $250,000 a year (who pay 2.7 percent), and then falls off more slowly as incomes rise. When you hit $750,000, you are paying less than one percent a year in Social Security taxes. By the time it hits a million bucks a year, it's down to 0.7 percent. Which brings us to the real top earners:



At $5 million a year in income, the tax falls to one-tenth of 1 percent. A firefighter pays 6.2 percent, but if you clear $5 million you pay 0.1 percent. At $75 million a year in income, the figure falls below one one-hundredth of 1 percent -- only 0.009 percent.

Want to "save" Social Security? Scrap the cap. Make everyone pay the same flat percentage rate. Flat taxes are bad enough, but regressive taxes -- defined as "those who have more pay less" -- should be an outrage. Scrap the cap. Social Security could be saved for decades by this one simple step. Make every one of those charts a flat line.



Solve the Buffett Problem

Warren Buffett, as everyone should know by now, pays a lower income tax rate than his secretary, despite the fact that Buffett makes one whale of a lot more income than his secretary does. This, despite the supposed-progressive nature of the income tax system. The reason is the biggest loophole of them all. This mother of all loopholes? Treating income rich people make differently than income normal people make. You see, the way Mitt Romney makes most of his money is taxed at a much lower rate than the way a nurse or teacher makes money. Which is why Romney is able to pay less than 14 percent income tax on an income of $20 million. Astonishingly, if the Paul Ryan budget had been made law, Romney would have paid less than one percent on the same $20 million income. I speak, of course, of "capital gains" (and "dividends" as well, but I'm just going to lump them all together for the sake of conversation).

Of all the thousands of ways an individual can make money (or "create an income"), only one is taxed at less than half the rate of the others. It happens to be "making money on Wall Street and the stock market." What a surprise! The method the already-wealthy use to increase their wealth is treated separately by the tax code. It is taxed less than half of what you earn in a paycheck. This is the "Buffett problem."

The solution to this problem is easy, too. Tax all income the same. Equality of taxation! It doesn't matter how you make that dollar, the government should tax it exactly the same -- anything else is simply not fair. In fact, this should be made progressive, too -- which will instantly neutralize all the howling from the anti-taxers about how this will hurt the middle class.

Make all income made through capital gains up to $250,000 each and every year tax-free. No capital gains taxes whatsoever on any money made up to the $250,000 limit -- you can just write off all profits up to that point on your yearly tax form. Then every dollar made above that limit is treated as income. Period. And taxed at the same rate as every other type of income.

This removes the argument that there are small investors who would be harmed. Very few Americans' retirement plans make $250,000 in income each and every year. In fact, it would be a massive tax break for small investors, which would have a positive impact.

But for the Buffetts and the Romneys of the world, they'd be paying the same (or greater) tax rate as their secretaries. And they, too, get to write off a whopping quarter-million of it each and every year, as an incentive. Problem solved.



Tax Wall Street Speculators

Institute a transactions tax of 0.25 percent on all Wall Street transactions over a certain limit per year. Make all the stock trades you want up to, perhaps, $250,000 per year tax-free. But then on trades over this amount, charge a fraction of one percent as a "speculation tax." This idea isn't original (actually, none of these ideas is original), I should mention. Raise money for the Treasury by putting a very gentle brake on the stock market, to the tune of 25 cents on every $100 traded. Wall Street bears a large portion of responsibility for our fiscal problems, so it's time to make them contribute toward fixing them.



Cap deductions

Right now this is the favorite solution of the Republicans (of course, they want this solution and none of the others, to be clear). Cap what rich people can deduct on their income taxes. The figure I've heard tossed around, however, is way too low. Capping deductions at $50,000 would snare a lot of folks making under $250,000 per year, I would be willing to bet. So raise the limit enormously, but make it a hard cap.

Let upper-income folks have a full quarter-million in deductions each year. They can write off up to $250,000, no matter how they're deducting it and no matter how much their total income (this would be separate from the $250,000 capital gains break described above, I should mention). But that's it. This change could be accomplished by changing a few words on the last box on Schedule A to read "if this amount is over $250,000, then just enter $250,000." That's all it would take. No more writing millions of dollars off each year, sorry. Again, by setting the limit extremely high, this would not ensnare anyone in the middle class at all.



Add Two Tax Brackets

This one's pretty easy, too. One of the things Republicans (stretching back to Ronald Reagan) have been successful at over the years is not just lowering tax rates, but reducing the number of tax brackets that exist. Most of this reduction has happened at the upper end of the scale (which should come as no surprise).

This one is easy to fix, and key Democrats such as Sen. Charles Schumer have been pushing the idea for a while now. Create a millionaires' tax bracket. In fact, I'd go further and create a bracket at $1 million in income, and another one at $10 million in income. This removes the squabbling about the "middle class" versus "the truly wealthy" as anyone pulling down a cool million a year simply cannot be classified as "middle class" by anyone (at least not with a straight face). We had multiple tax brackets for a reason in the past -- to tax the stratosphere of the income levels. Let's get back to this way of targeting the upper ranks once again.



The AMT Big Lie

I've offered up all of these ideas today to show how timid the proposals currently being discussed truly are. I would bet that none of the problems above will even be addressed in the fiscal cliff negotiations, and I don't expect them to be addressed at any time in the next year, either.

There's a quick and easy way to show how the politicians in Washington -- from both sides of the aisle, mind you -- are simply playing games when they talk about any "long-term solutions" to the tax code. They are, indeed, not going to institute a fix on any sort of permanent basis, mostly because then they'd have to tell a certain uncomfortable truth about the budget projections. Which they're just not going to do -- from either side of the political divide.

Here's the test: will the Alternative Minimum Tax be fixed for more than one year in any "deal" which emerges? The answer to that will be: "No. No, there will not be a permanent fix to the AMT."

Which is how you will know that both sides are simply lying about what the budget will look like in the next ten years. Flat-out lying. Both sides.

The Alternative Minimum Tax was created to solve exactly the same problem they're trying to solve now -- making the wealthy pay their fair share. It was created to rein in abuse of deductions and loopholes. It was created to make sure the wealthiest paid at least a minimum of taxes (it's right there, in the label). It is, in short, the perfect solution to the problems they're now trying to hash out.

Instead of upping rates, instead of fixing loopholes or deductions, the politicians could instead just fix the AMT and return it to its original purpose of snaring ultra-wealthy folks who are trying to lower their tax liability on each year's tax form.

The problem with the AMT is that the limit was set so long ago that it is laughably low today (Nixon signed the original AMT into law). But the politicians in Washington play a game with it, each and every year, like clockwork. The game is called "let's pretend it's going to exist for nine years out of ten, because it makes the budget projections look so much better." When figuring a ten-year budget, the next year will show an "AMT fix" where the AMT limit is raised to where it should be, to only apply to the very wealthy. But the nine years after that will show the AMT levels at the old rate, because such smoke and mirrors means nine years of "tax revenue" which is simply never going to appear gets added into the mix. With nine years of such falsehood, to put this another way, it makes it much easier to project smaller budget deficits.

Each year, Congress "fixes" the AMT, right before the end of December. Each year, they only fix it for a single year. Nobody wants to be the one who points out the lack of clothing on the Emperor, because then the other side will accuse them of wanting to "explode the deficit."

So while there is indeed a vehicle for taxing the rich in a way which lays down clear rules and clear targets -- a way which has existed since 1970 -- it will not be used in the fiscal cliff deal. A permanent fix will not even be discussed, I would wager.

If President Obama really wanted to clearly and permanently change the tax structure for the wealthiest Americans, he would be out there pushing for all of his ideas to be wrapped into the one package of a permanent AMT fix. Instead, this will be treated as an afterthought in the whole debate -- it'll barely rate a footnote in the stories which appear about any impending deal. Perhaps in the fifteenth paragraph of an in-depth newspaper story will be the line "...and they've also agreed to the standard one-year fix for the AMT."

If you want to tax the rich -- if you really want to address the problems in our tax code that outrageously favor the wealthiest among us -- there are multiple ways to do so. I understand why Obama has drawn a political line in the sand over raising rates on the top 2 percent of earners. But it has focused the debate only on this one part of an overall solution. There are plenty of other ways to make the tax code more fair, more balanced, and more evenhanded for the middle class.

My guess is none of them will happen soon. Perhaps Obama will claim victory and get rates raised to 39.6 percent, or perhaps John Boehner will talk him down to 37 percent. But because the media and all the politicians have focused on this one battle royale, my guess is that virtually no attention will be paid to any of the other fine ideas out there to tax the rich. Which is a shame. Because these opportunities seem to come along only once in a generation.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/chris-wei ... 73852.html

[Skip McGee]

their argument about social security is a bit one sided and selectively only discusses what gets paid in and not what gets paid out. the reason there is a cap on what people pay into social security is because there is a cap on what social security pays out later. it doesn't really make sense for people to pay more into a benefit they won't be receiving. everyone is paying the same % on the first $110k or $250k etc, after that they receive less so it makes sense they pay less