A Question for Teabaggers

Post Reply New Topic

The name it and claim it theology is what has poisoned many conservatives of an evangelical religious bent against the poor, while allowing them to justify social inequities.
As for taxing the poor - again, tax what? Poor people hardly have enough to tax.

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer

As far as tea party relationship - my parents both are and lots of people in my family are. I've also donated as well before when people were getting tread on and I wanted to pitch in.

My biggest gripe with how those left of center are dealing with this and portraying 'teabaggers', their oversimplifying things ad hominem. People try so hard to dumb down the arguments and act as if free market solutions or legal rubrics rather than heavy bureaucracies don't exist and can't, it seems like a really big attempt at obfuscating any meaningful conversation on the issues and solutions. Fair enough that some people on the right are that emotive, I suppose both sides will have that, but what's really at stake here is the ability of our country to sustain itself and avoid going the way Greece is. It seems like its really become a culture war rather than an economic one, kids are getting heavily indoctrinated into all kinds of pseudo-marxist ideologies in grade school, college, its loaded in the movies, the trouble with that is the obvious, they get the wrong idea about reality and come at it from the notion that - since its all they've heard - that one side is so overbearingly correct that there's nothing the other side says that's worth listening to. If conservatives were to do that successfully the results would be just as psychologically stunting. It turns today's economic and cultural issues from issues that can be tackled to issues of religious fanaticism.

This notion that wealthy people should pay the same amount of taxes as those who are dirt poor is backwards. It is NOT fair or moral unless you falsely believe that capitalism is a system that rewards precisely on merit. The nature of capitalism is that people become wealthy by benefitting more off the work of less wealthy people. Really, just take a hard look at it and THINK. People who reap more benefits from the economic setup SHOULD pay a larger share of taxes.

I checked with Herself - she frankly knows more people and more about people than I do. She also says she knows no Chaitossers.

As for taxing:

I could quote the NT at you, but why be divisive that way? I will be differently divisivde and toss you an anecdote.

No, I do not think acecdores prove anything except I can relate an anecdote. But then hardly anything advanced on PPR proves more than that.

Anecdote: In my department, pay steps were allotted to those who could get others to like them [it is called "merit increases"]. Leave was granted - even when we were left shorthanded - to anyone who might vote against someone else's leave next year.

Suggested point:

People who have the power to tax will be inclined NOT to tax their friends or the people [not necessarily friends] who put them in power.

I favour consumption taxation as the means to fund government. Ideally, I would see income taxes (both personal and corporate) reduced to 0, and a value-added sales tax replace it.

The basic principle is that people who earn more money, spend more money--and the more that they consume, the larger the share of tax that they will contribute.

The other attractive element is that it gives government an incentive to maintain consumer confidence.

However, within this framework I would build two factors to reduce its impact on low income earners:

1) Zero rating certain basic goods and services: groceries (but not convenience food or restaurants), rent, previously owned residential property, insurance, medical and dental goods and services and education goods and services.

2) Rebates for low income earners to transfer some of the tax burden.

Canadian readers will find none of this to be novel (other than the reducing income tax to 0 part).