Raise Taxes … Or Else!

Somebody help clarify this matter for me. Some Republicans are demanding a balanced budget amendment as a condition for raising the debt limit — why not just vote against the increase? The result would be a future without additional borrowing — hence a balanced budget. How can the left have any demands? The Democrats have no leverage. It is funny to listen to them threaten not to vote for an increase unless half is derived from tax increases (additional revenues in their language). Let them vote against it and make austerity a bipartisan result. Isn’t it this simple — or am I missing something?

Today, I heard this one…

Pelosi Wants Weiner Probe

… and I started thinking of all the creative headlines that could have been!

How about Right Relishes Weiner’s Pickle

Reply with your best one

The United States Postal Service is expected to run out of money in 2011. From 2007 to 2010, the USPS lost $20 billion in revenue. Now, the organization is approaching its congressionally imposed total debt ceiling of $15 billion. Our new congress should be hesitant to increase this. Recently, the Postal Regulatory Commission denied a postage rate increase. Increasing rates with further depress volumes, presenting the USPS with a catch 22.

Meanwhile, the American Postal Workers Union, representing over 200,000 workers, has begun collective bargaining negotiations for a new contract. The union president has stated that his members are “entitled” to pay raises and demands the union get “more control over activities at work, more money, better benefits—we want more.” Including their fringe benefits, postal workers already receive 35% more than comparable private sector employees, according to expert Michael Schuyler.

Will regulation of the internet come to the rescue of the USPS? Don’t rule out this possibility. The internet and electronic alternatives to snail mail are to blame for the troubles of the Postal Service. The federal government has just taken its first bite out of this juicy internet fruit and it will be difficult to stop. I wonder if a small tax on each email message isn’t already under consideration.

I listen to the radio nearly every day — driving to and from work, on errands around town and while walking my dog. I usually am able to tune out the advertising, but lately I’ve noticed an awful lot of public service announcements, presumably funded by taxpayers.

Being mindful of the budget deficit and the need to eliminate wasteful spending, I’m surprised by the growing frequency of these ads. Why is the government spending precious tax dollars creating and broadcasting messages on topics like: the importance of seat belt use; which light bulbs to use; and remembering to get a flu shot?

It seems like the majority of advertisements are brought to us by the Ad Council. I decided to conduct a test. I recorded one-hour of radio programming to measure the amount of State-Run advertising. My choice was WLS Chicago’s Don Wade and Roma Show. The following is a listing of ads occurring at least once during my one-hour experiment.

1. Drunk Driving Prevention (0:30) – Squirrel (68 Kb)
   Two Girls explain their ride home after getting buzzed. One took a cab, which swerved to miss a squirrel and nearly hit a man. The other drove herself, missed the squirrel but hit the man. She wishes she’d taken a cab. Brought to us by US Department of Transportation and the Ad Council.
2. Emergency Preparedness (0:30) – World Upside Down (39 Kb)
   This spot suggests you visit ready.gov to become informed and prepare for a disaster before it happens. Brought to us by Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Ad Council. This ad played twice during the one hour period.
3. Patient Involvement (0:30) – Questioners (72 Kb)
   This one gets a lot of Play. All kinds of people asking everyday questions — but not at the doctors office. We are directed to go to ahrq.gov to learn ten questions to ask our doctor. It played two times during my test. Brought to us by the US Department of Health and Human Services and the Ad Council.
4. Emergency Preparedness (0:30) – World for Granted (60 Kb)
   Very similar to the other ad for ready.gov. This one also repeated during the hour. FEMA must have found some money in their sock drawer!
5. Drunk Driving Prevention (0:30) – RADD (63 Kb)
   Mark Anthony does a wonderful job narrating this ad, but I haven’t a clue who he is. Had they used someone more famous, it might have cost us yet more — so I’m not entirely unhappy with this one.
6. Hands Only CPR (0:30) – Sound of Hands (63 Kb)
   Hands can do incredible things. After calling 911, use your hands to save a life. My hand nearly turned off the radio at this point!
7. Disability Awareness (1:00) Can Do – (120 Kb)
   President Obama’s reads this one … a celebration of 20 years after passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act. He urges everyone to visit disability.gov. This was the only 60 second ad during the hour program. Certainly no one would argue about the importance of this message. (Tongue in cheek)
8. Booster Seat Education (0:30) Bibbidi – (63 Kb)
   Another often played spot from the US Transportation Department for all citizens shorter than 4’9″. You must sit in a booster seat or face severe criminal penalties.
9. Lead Poisoning Prevention (0:30) Rage – (66 Kb)
   If your house was built prior to 1978, there is a good reason your child can’t read. Blame it on lead paint. EPA, HUD and the Ad Council are responsible for this message. Ran twice during my experiment.
10. Men’s Preventive Health (0:30) Real Men Wear Gowns – (65 Kb)
    You’ve probably heard this one before. It has been playing for a year or more. The boxing champ knocks out his opponent wearing an examination gown, because it is important for him to get preventive tests. This spot is from Health and Human Services Department and repeated again later in the hour.
11. Drunk Driving Prevention (0:30) Emergency Room – (64 Kb)
    The boyfriend driver rationalizes to the emergency room doctor that he was just buzzed.
    Its from Ray LaHood and the hard-working people at the Transportation Department.
12. Hands Only CPR (0:30) Hands Symphony – (64 Kb)
    Similar to the above referenced PSA for Hands Only CPR. It begins with a musical number generated entirely by hand sounds. Not a very creative ad, if you ask me — but I’ll bet most people aren’t going to miss mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.

In conclusion, Don and Roma were actually on the air for 37 minutes. News, Traffic and Weather took another 9 minutes. Advertising made up the balance of 14 minutes. Nineteen nanny-state advertisements accounted for 10 minutes of the advertising. Free market advertisements consumed only 4 minutes. It’s Unbelievable!

Here is the entire Program – WLS Dec_17_01.mp3

ShoreBank of Chicago’s mission was …

ShoreBank invests in people and their communities to create economic
equality and a health environment.

No kidding – economic equality.  Who in their right mind would invest in a
bank with this objective? Whoever did is out of luck and out of money — or are
they?

This bank was closed yesterday by the FDIC and the assets will be taken over by Urban
Partnership Bank. (Acorn Bank must have finished second) Urban Partnership Bank
must have the same business plan. In fact, some of the new executives are going
to continue to work at the restructured bank. Sounds kind-of like a Bail Out to
me. According to the press release, the insolvency wasn’t related to sub-prime
lending .

No, they were just busy giving away our insured depositors money — making everybody economically equal, before the FDIC had to come in with another taxpayer bailout.

Promoted from the diaries by Caleb.

Being somewhat of a libertarian, I wasn’t a supporter of ObamaCare. However, a few months after passage, a postcard arrived which led me to believe there may be a benefit coming to my small firm. The mailing from the Treasury Department touted a generous 35% tax credit to firms with less than 25 full-time employees averaging less than $50K per year in wages — that’s us! In fact, we’re right in the sweet spot with 17 full-time employees earning approximately $42,000 per year.

Here is a copy of the postcard.

I did a quick calculation and figured our tax credit should be about $28,000. That is 35% of the $80K we expect to spend this year on employee health care premiums. I phoned our health insurance broker and inquired whether anything special had to be done, not wanting to be excluded by some technicality. He reported there was no special requirements — more good news.

Then, a week ago I received an email from the NFIB with a link to an on-line calculator helpful in determining the tax credit. I plugged in our numbers, the ones described above, and pressed “update” to yield a calculation of ZERO — zip, nadda!

Double-checking, I tried again and again, finally concluding that the 35% tax credit will only be available to firms with ten employees averaging $25K per year. Increasing either measurement, number of employees or average salary, will greatly diminish the magnitude of the tax credit. I created the chart shown below which diagrams the limits of the “generous” tax break.

The pot is calling the kettle black — meanwhile this ad, and many like it, are posted on craigslist… 

Fight the Status Quo! $400-$600 Per Week (Minneapolis, MN)

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Date: 2009-07-27, 12:12PM CDT
Reply to: see below

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New data says the top 1 percent of taxpayers paid 40.42 percent of total federal income taxes in 2007 according to a story printed in the NYT on Thursday. This group now pays more federal income tax than the bottom 95 percent of earners. It also reports that fewer and fewer taxpayers are paying an increasing share of taxes than ever before.

Article Link Here

Things are going to get ugly when the entitlement class outnumbers taxpayers! It is already happening. People are sensing they can just vote themselves more benefits and “rights” at the expense of the rich — we see populist politicians becoming demagogs and filing right into line, appeasing the masses.

The big problem with this approach… it is going to be difficult to get the rich to pay a bigger percentage of the taxes when the top 10% of earners already pay over 70%. I think the administration is realizing this now — as evidenced by comments earlier today by both Treasury Secretary Geithner and National Economic Council President Larry Summers – both declining to rule out the necessity for middle-class tax increases on Sunday morning interviews.

Saw this television Ad yesterday during the golf tournament. Incredible and unbelievable. I thought it was a parody at first. Full of lies — kind of reminds me of the Kerry/Edwards claim that Chris Reeve would be walking today if Kerry was elected.

Right out of the gate, Brocko Bama gives political correctness the kibosh!

He makes fun of Nancy Reagan and then phones her to apologize. The he compares himself to my dog!

‘Our preference is to get a shelter dog, but most shelter dogs are mutts like me.’

My dog is still waiting by the phone for a call from Chicago. I’ll let you know what hapens.

If Sarah Palin reads the Wall Street Journal, she probably saw this article.

WSJ – Their Fair Share

Someone needs to answer (and disprove) Brocko Bama’s claim that 95% of Omericans will receive a tac cut if he is elected president. Using the data published in the Journal’s article, the numbers don’t add-up. Nearly 50% of people pay no income taxes, so how can they recieve a cut?

Barack Obama says he’s going to cut taxes for those at the bottom, but that’s also going to be a challenge because Americans with an income below the median paid a record low 2.9% of all income taxes, while the top 50% paid 97.1%. Perhaps he thinks half the country should pay all the taxes to support the other half.

On Sunday, Sept. 28, ACORN National President Maude Hurd (aka Chief Nut) released the following statement after Congressional leaders announced a $700 bailout plan for Wall Street:

“Members of Congress worked tirelessly over the weekend to rid Wall Street of its toxic assets, which are responsible for the worst financial crisis since the 1930s. Unfortunately, families who fell victim to Wall’s Street’s toxic lending practices and now risk losing their homes were largely left out.

ACORN members are extremely disappointed that the bailout package does little to assist these homeowners, such as providing them relief through the bankruptcy courts. Although weak, there is language in the bailout package authorizing Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson to facilitate more loan modifications. ACORN members plan to hold Secretary Paulson accountable and ensure he uses this authority to make streamlined loan modifications a priority for struggling American families.”

Talk about an entitlement mentality — this organization beats all.

If ACORN disagrees with the final version, it can’t be all bad!

Population of Vermont .... 623,908
Population of Alaska ..... 670,053

It’s funny how their standards are applied differently to rebublicans and democrats.

According Bill O’Reily…

Obama believes that the federal government should be in control of income distribution and, to some extent, should regulate the free marketplace.

That is a classic liberal position and the candidate promotes it well. And…

…the senator also believes that poor Americans have a basic right to free health care and monetary supplements from the government with no strings attached. The American substance abuser, for example, would derive the same benefits as would a hard-working, laid-off worker. Again, classic liberalism. No judgments made regarding entitlements.

Superimposing these beliefs, this reader is wondering whether, one day, Obama and Biden will come to collect one of my good kidneys, arguing it’s for the common good, and giving it to some junky in need of a kidney transplant.