Without a sustained recovery in national output to 3% growth or more and without putting millions more Americans back to work, there is no politically feasible spending reduction or tax increase that could balance the budget even if Ron Paul ran Congress. Tax revenues have remained below 16% of GDP for the last four years because the economy is in a slow growth rut. The growth deficit, not the budget deficit, is the great issue of our time.

The Reagan years offer an instructive history, because the economy's troubles in the 1970s and the steep drop in real middle-class incomes (some $4,000 per household since 2009) were so similar to today's. Reagan put pro-growth tax cuts and a rebuilt military ahead of his ambitions to balance the budget, and he was right.

After his tax cuts fully kicked in on January 1, 1983, annual growth averaged some 4% over five years, while employment gains were swift and long-lasting. The deficit fell in half from a peak of 6% of GDP in 1983 to under 3% in 1989.

EVERYONE CHIP IN, EVERYONE

Jim I don't know how long it will take for you to truly understand my position. I will again make it as clear as I can. I am NOT for taxing the rich only. I don't believe the rich are job creators any more; you are living in a different world today. Markets make jobs. Demand makes jobs.
Trickle down is OFFENSIVE to me.
 I got a job because their was a NEED. We need a middle class.
My vote is simple number ONE which candidate is the MOST LIKELY to get us in another WAR, Which candidate will cut DEFENSE? We spend so much money on defense, we have a NAVY that is 16 times larger than any civilized country on the planet. Cut defense is only part of the solution but a good start! Stop starting wars, stop foreign aid. Get rid of tax loopholes for companies that don't deserve it.

 We are over reacting in fear. We have not over promised the poor, we simply have spent the money in fear. To blame the economy on a 30 year school teacher/ fireman  pension is idiotic Jim! Jim I have made a living working for wealthy people in their pursuit of leisure time, so I am for people being rich.
 Please Please stop the madness and claiming I blame " rich folks", never once have I said that.
The way you make up deficits in a family or in a government is simply find more income, and save more expenses.
 I am for a tax increase on everyone.
Did you hear that I am willing to pay more taxes, and I am middle class.
My one personal gripe is the taxes are never LOW ENOUGH for conservatives.
 Let me ask you when your house is on fire and the firemen arrive and put it out do they send you a bill?
 No we need government.

OBAMA - RYAN TICKET !! GET ABOARD

A Obama Ryan ticket don't laugh! Here are Five reasons for a split ticket:

1. They are both smart.

2. Sends Congress a message we the people want you to work together.

3. Can speak to Congress and the people sharing the bully pulpit.

4. Yes there is one President but just over his shoulder could be another.

5. Biden is an idiot.

Interesting Pick

Ryan is the anti-Palin in that he is very substantive. He is a policy wonk - a rarity in the GOP. He puts Wisconsin clearly in play, should help a little in Michigan and could tip Iowa into the red column. But his Ryan Budget is used as cudgel against GOP House and Senate candidates, usually with success. Remember - his "courageous" plan permanently cuts taxes (especially on the top end), ends Medicare as we know it, and balances the budget in 27 years (!?). I have to think this will put Florida in Obama's column, which brings more electoral votes than Michigan and Wisconsin combined. The Catholic Church said his budget plan was immoral for the cuts to basic social programs. There will always be the poor, but we must help them or something like that. This move doesn't help bring along practicing Catholics into the GOP - a group that that has steadily moved to the right (along with white blue collar men). Democrats had been hoping Ryan would be the pick, but thought it was too risky for the ever cautious Romney. It will help Dems nationalize the Ryan Budget/Medicare cuts. Word was that both Boehner and McConnell did not want Ryan on the ticket for fear of what it would do to their members. This was the one VP pick who could "win" the House for the Democrats. You will soon and often hear, "Vote Democratic - Save Medicare". What are some non-partisan observations? There are plenty: He will make his race more serious. So much has been personal and petty ("Romney Hood", "Obamaloney"). Ryan will be all about economics and he knows his subject. He is socially conservative, but generally rejects social issue questions. He does not want to talk about Abortion, Planned Parenthood, Immigration or Climate Change. The GOP will have a chance to hand the baton to the next generation. Romney is old - compared to Obama, so Ryan can be the face of the GOP future. Ryan's elevated position as Veep or more likely his return to the House after a November loss, positions him well to move legislation. He is already the GOP's top economic dog, but he will be able to flex his muscles over the next two to four years. Grover Norquist will not be be able to tie his hands when Ryan might quarterback Simpson Bowles or an even larger compromise. After a win or loss at the VP level, he will be free to broker deals with the Democrats because he will have the confidence and trust of his caucus that he got the best deal possible. He will be able to deliver deals that Boehner couldn't and Eric Cantor rejected. Win or lose, obstructionism will not be a viable option in the next Congress. The conservatives love Ryan, but I like him too. He is not a Birther or a Truther and rejects that crazy wing of the party. The Tea Party likes him, but he is uncomfortable around them. He is a very establishment guy, much more concerned with policy than politics. If they can get him to concede to needing of 20%/GDP in federal revenues, you will see a lot of new taxes (VAT, Carbon/Energy), cuts to top income tax rates, elimination of loopholes and deductions. Perhaps even the whole elimination of corporate income taxes (effectively paid at the dividend level). Tax reform could increase revenues by 33% relatively quickly. That, along with some entitlement reforms (initially, just raising the ages on a phased in basis) will balance our budget and bring back surplus in 4 - 5 years. Paul Ryan is one guy on the right who just might be able make this happen. Lastly - he is no fan of Obamacare, but his knowledge of Washington and policy could grease the skids for effective implementation of our health care changes. If he is not proscribed from cooperating, he could effectively work with Obama much as Gingrich did with Clinton. We will see. Interesting pick. Interesting times!

Gosh...I think it is your fault.

So are our woes due to over promising or under taxing?   Terry....you can get mad over Capitol Gains taxes, you can get mad at anything you want...however, what got us into this mess, what is destroying our country, is over promising (for political benefit...do you get this?), government largess..local, state, federal.  

Our problems keep repeating themselves on a local, state and national level (Greece) and your ilk keep trying to blame the "rich".  So Terry...now don't obfuscate, don't not answer, try this one (call Beedie and Gorman if you must).  Are our problems because we have under taxed the rich or because we have over promised to the elderly, pensions, welfare and unions?

And if you are really vigorous and really want to answer a question, try this one....which political party, Liberal or Conservatives (Socialist or Capitalist) benefits most by promising (over promising) to those groups.  Now Terry...don't run away...answer this question.   Why are we in this mess?
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Budget crunches already have prompted Michigan lawmakers to authorize emergency fiscal managers, and led the mayor of Scranton, Pa., to temporarily cut the pay of all city workers to the minimum wage.
In a majority of the nation's 19,000 municipalities—urban and rural, big and small—stagnant property tax revenues, less aid from states and rising costs are forcing less dramatic but still difficult steps.
Moody's Investors Service recently said that while municipal bankruptcies are likely to remain rare, it warned of a "a small but growing trend in fiscally troubled cities unwilling to pay their debt obligations."
"We need help right now," said William Schirf, the mayor of Altoona, Pa. Crime in the city of 46,000 rose 11% last year, while the number of police officers fell 8% over three years because of budget constraints. The city has reduced the number of streets it is repaving and clearing of snow, and cut down on leaf pickups and removing dead animals, trash and bicycles from roadways.
Altoona officials projected a $3 million deficit for fiscal 2012. Under state law, the city can't raise property taxes—its greatest source of revenue—any higher. In April, Altoona was declared fiscally distressed under a state law, enabling it to restructure its finances. "We just don't have the income to match our expenses," said Mr. Schirf.
A study by the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College found that annual pension payments for state and local plans more than doubled to 15.7% of payrolls in 2011 from 6.4% a decade earlier.
The Nelson A. Rockefeller Institute of Government said local governments made roughly $50 billion in pension contributions in 2010, but their unfunded pension liabilities still total $3 trillion and unfunded health benefit liabilities are more than $1 trillion.
Local government cuts are one factor slowing the broader economic recovery, offsetting stronger private-sector growth. State and local government spending and investment fell at a rate of 2.1% in the second quarter, according to the Commerce Department, the 11th consecutive quarterly drop. Local governments also have cut 66,000 jobs in the past year, mostly teachers and other school employees.

"Cities are still going to be facing very rough waters for the next couple of years," said Michael Pagano, dean of the college of Urban Planning and Public Affairs at the University of Illinois at Chicago.
There also was a backlash in Michigan after Gov. Rick Snyder won legislative approval of a measure that allowed him to appoint emergency managers for troubled cities and school systems—allowing collective-bargaining agreements to be tossed. Voters will decide in November whether to repeal the law.
To boost revenues, cities are increasing fees and property taxes—where they can. In Chicago, private investors are investing in public infrastructure projects. El Monte and Richmond, Calif., want to tax soda.
Towns and cities in energy-rich regions likewise are faring well. Just 100 miles north of Altoona, five hotels have been built in the past four years in downtown Williamsport, Pa., where natural gas companies have flocked to develop the Marcellus Shale. A new civic arena, residential housing and an airport terminal to provide direct flights to Houston are being planned. "Most citizens you talk to, they're very excited," said Williamsport Mayor Gabriel Campana, who refuels his natural-gas powered car at home.
But in far more cities, the outlook is darker. Although some suffer from specific problems—a bloated incinerator project in Harrisburg, Pa., and a bad real estate bet in Mammoth Lakes, California—most cities face falling revenues and rising costs.
Indeed, while housing is showing signs of improvement, real estate assessed values remain depressed, eroding property tax receipts, which provide 29% of revenue for municipalities, according to a Moody's analysis of census data. State aid, the biggest source of revenue for local governments at 34%, is falling and the growth of receipts from wage, sales and other taxes, which provide 10% of local budgets, is slowing.
At the same time, pension and health-care costs are rising despite efforts to restructure those benefits. The most vulnerable cities are ones that experienced drastic reductions in property values or are in states like California that limit municipal options to increase revenues. In addition, nearly a third of California cities require collective bargaining and prohibit outsourcing of administrative and maintenance services.
Since 2008, four California municipalities have filed for bankruptcy protection—Vallejo, Stockton, Mammoth Lakes, and most recently, San Bernardino, which declared bankruptcy Aug. 1, in large part because sales and property taxes fell after the real estate bust. The assessed value of homes in San Bernardino dropped to $10.3 billion in 2011 from $12.2 billion in 2008.
On top of a declining property tax base, the city has faced a significant drop in sales tax collections since 2005. Economist John Husing said San Bernardino's retail sales fell 30% during that period. Likewise, a decline in construction means less revenue from things like building permits and development fees.
While many municipalities nationwide have offset property-tax declines by raising tax rates, California's 1978 law dubbed Proposition 13 caps property taxes at about 1% of a home's value and forbids major tax increases unless a home is sold or rebuilt, though it permits taxes to fall if a home's value drops.
Residents in El Monte, Calif., 15 miles east of Los Angeles, will vote in November on a soda tax that could raise about $10 million annually. The city, which lost four major car dealerships that generated a large share of the city's sales tax revenue, cut nearly 30% of its workforce to help close a $3 million budget deficit but still faces $2 million deficit for the current year.
Local merchants oppose the measure. "I'm struggling to stay open and here they want to tax me even more. It's crazy," said Arthur Meier Jr., who owns Arts World Famous Burgers in El Monte.
Elsewhere, the cost of shoring up underfunded pension plans for public workers is going slowly. In many states, benefits are guaranteed and difficult to modify unless a city is declared "fiscally distressed." "Because of the guaranteed nature of benefits, there's no quick fix," said Thomas Fitzpatrick, an economist with the Federal Reserve Bank in Cleveland.
Steven Kreisberg, collective bargaining director at the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, the nation's biggest public-sector union, said pension problems were caused by investment losses that can be gradually recovered, rather than due to overly rich benefits. "When you lose 20% of your assets in a single year that's what created the problem," he said.

Let's start talking

Opine on this my Liberal brethren.

I ask...what would you want if there was a sudden increase in crime by white, suit wearing men, in your neighborhood?  And you were one of them.  Would you support increased policing?
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Crime in New York City has dropped 80% since the early 1990s, a decline unmatched anywhere in the country. The change has yielded an explosion of commerce in once forlorn neighborhoods, a boom in tourism, and a sharp rise in property values. Nowhere were the effects more dramatic than in the city's poorest areas.
When the bullets stopped flying, entrepreneurs snapped up the vacant lots that had served as breeding grounds of crime. Senior citizens were able to visit friends without fear of getting mugged. Children could sleep in their own beds rather than in bathtubs, no longer needing shelter from stray gunfire. Target, Home Depot and other national chains moved into thoroughfares long ruled by drug gangs, providing jobs for local workers and giving residents retail choices taken for granted in middle-class neighborhoods.
Most significant, more than 10,000 black and Hispanic males avoided the premature death that would have been their fate had New York's homicide rate remained at its early-1990s apex. Blacks and Hispanics have made up 79% of the decline in homicide victims since 1993.
New York's previously unimaginable status as America's safest big city is now in jeopardy thanks to a rising campaign against its proactive style of policing. In 1994 the New York Police Department, led then by Commissioner William Bratton, embraced the revolutionary concept that the police could actually prevent crime, not just respond to it after the fact.
The department began analyzing victim reports daily to target resources to where crime patterns were emerging. Top brass held commanders accountable for the safety of their precincts. And officers were expected to intervene when they observed someone acting suspiciously—maybe asking the person a few questions, perhaps frisking him if legally justified. In so doing, they sent the message in violence-plagued areas that law and order was still in effect.

Such proactive stops (or "stop-and-frisks") have averted countless crimes. But a chorus of critics, led by the New York Times, charges that the NYPD's policy is racist because the majority of those stopped are black and Hispanic. Every declared Democratic candidate for mayor in 2013 has vowed to eliminate stop-and-frisks or significantly reduce them. A federal judge overseeing a class-action lawsuit against the NYPD has already announced her conviction that the department's stop practices are unconstitutional, the prelude to putting the department under judicial control.
Omitted from these critics' complaints is any recognition of the demographics of crime. Blacks were 62% of the city's murder victims in 2011, even though they are only 23% of the population. They also made up a disproportionate share of criminals, committing 80% of all shootings, nearly 70% of all robberies and 66% of all violent crime, according to crime reports filed with the NYPD by victims and witnesses, usually minorities themselves.
Whites, by contrast, committed a little over 1% of all shootings, less than 5% of all robberies, and 5% of all violent crime in 2011, even though they are 35% of New York City's population. Given where crime is happening, the police cannot target their resources where they're needed without producing racially disparate stops and arrests.
Critics also contend, among other charges, that the absolute number of stops—680,000—is too high and demonstrates illegality. But there were nearly 900,000 arrests and summons last year under the far more exacting standard of probable cause. It is not surprising that a police force of 35,000 witnessed 680,000 instances of reasonably suspicious behavior among New York's 8.5 million residents. If 25,000 officers in enforcement commands made just one stop a week, there would be over a million stops a year.
Violence continues to afflict minority communities. A rash of shootings during outdoor basketball games this summer should remind New Yorkers of what is at stake in the stop-and-frisk debate. The victims include a 4-year-old boy killed last month in the Bronx when two thugs started shooting at each other across a playground, and a 25-year-old member of the Harlem Youth Marines, an anti-gang group, killed during a shootout in June.

LIKEABILITY

• Likeability can be measured and is important in election. Remember who would you rather have a beer with Bush or Kerry, or Bush and Gore? The answer was Bush. I realize that being a leader is still about being competent and maybe Buffett would not be my favorite guy to have a beer with, I might still invest my money with a guy who is competent.  BUT
•  Let's try the likeabilty test:

      One says I will pay more taxes,................ one says "not a penny more"
      One says I should pay more, ....................one says I pay enough.
      One says middle class need a break, .........one says 'trickle down"
      One says WE did it, .................................one says I did it.

I like the Big O.

I'M MAD

The good Doctor and I met the other day for golf, and rather than spoil our day talking politics we agreed to just play golf. But of course it's hard not to discuss the " state of the union". Assumptions about each other's positions always come up because we have become a country of labels. You are non caring- rich loving because you are a republican and I am socialist because I am a democrat, it's all so easy then listening stops.
 The same I am sure in Washington. The fact is we are much more complicated than labels.
 I don't for instance care that Romney is wealthy, great in fact!
 I'm mad at the "game of taxes" which allows him breaks other Americans don't get!
I'm mad 40% of Americans have no skin in the game.
 I'm mad we need ID's to vote, if your choosing that simply to keep blacks from voting under the guide of voter fraud.
I'm mad both sides don't find common ground and do what they were voted in to do keep America working.
 I'm mad there is gerrymandering so congressmen don't have to work together.

• I'm just mad!!! We are better than this! Who will be the first to lay down the sword?

“If you agree with the approach I just described, if you want to give the policies of the last decade another try, then you should vote for Mr. Romney,” Obama declared in his June 14 speech in Cleveland.Romney hasn’t helped matters. When asked by NBC’s Brian Williams to explain how his plan differs from Bush’s policies, Romney offered up familiar talking points that could have come from Bush himself. Now, I agree with those points — exploit domestic energy, promote trade, keep taxes low, etc. And you could easily find banal throwaway lines from Obama that at least make it sound like he does, too.
But Obama has the distinct advantage of being branded as the anti-Bush candidate in the race.
Romney needs to explain to voters why he’s not Bush 2.0. Republican politics have been off-kilter for several years now because a large segment of the conservative base does not look back fondly on the Bush presidency. The mainstream media’s various narratives about the Tea Party ignore a vastly more significant and powerful motivation than the various bigotries and conspiracy theories typically ascribed to them. The Tea Party feels the GOP under Bush’s “compassionate conservatism” gave up the store to big government.
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Can we finally all agree that Keynesian economics is a flop? The politicians in Washington flushed about $800 billion down the toilet and we got nothing in exchange except for anemic growth and lots of people out of work.
Indeed, we’re getting to the point where the monthly employment reports from the Labor Departmentt must be akin to Chinese water torture for the Obama administration. Even when the unemployment rate falls, it gives critics an opportunity to show how bad the economy is doing compared to what the White House said would happen if the so-called stimulus was enacted.
But for the past few months, the joblessness rate has been rising, making the chart look even worse.
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Three years after our worst recession since the Great Depression officially ended, the U.S. economy is still very weak. The people most hurt by this weakness are the unemployed and the poor, and of course the two problems are related. We have 23 million people who are unemployed, involuntarily working part-time, or given up looking for work — nearly 15 percent of the labor force. And poverty has reached 15.1 percent of the population — amazingly, a level that it was at in the mid-1960s. The first priority of the U.S. government should therefore be restoring full employment. This is a relatively easy thing to do. As Nobel laureate economist Paul Krugman aptly put it: "It's like having a dead battery in a car, and while there may be a lot wrong with the car, you can get the car going remarkably easily, if you're willing to accept that's what the problem really is."
Most economists are well aware of what the problem really is, since it is so simple and basic. The economy lost about $1.3 trillion in private annual spending when the real estate bubble burst in 2007, and much of that has not recovered. State and local governments continue to tighten their budgets and lay off workers.
If the federal government had simply funded these governments' shortfalls, we would have an additional 2 million jobs today.
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Romney's Middle Class Tax Hike

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker/post/a-tough-new-obama-ad-that----surprise----is-accurate/2012/08/02/gJQAuigQSX_blog.html?hpid=z4

I DON'T NEED TO SEE ROMNEY'S TAX RETURN

He has probably taken advantage of all the loop holes and dodges in the tax code and piling trust funds on top of trust funds for all the unborn Romney's, he has done nothing illegal, I am sure of that. The rich have many ways to shelter their income, which are unavailable to the working class. I am sure that is legal also.
By and large the tax filings of Mr. Romney will show nothing more than he is wealthy and pays less % than a middle class worker does. What bothers me the most is the man who has flipped on everything from gun control, abortion, health care, and is firm on " I followed the law"
That is like saying I observed the speed limit while driving by an accident in which people are injured laying on the pavement needing help.  I followed the law. Yes you did George! ignoring the big problem people are hurting and you are observing the speeding law.
George you worked in an industry that had terminals, and computers and manipulation of numbers for shareholders benefits, not factories or mines or small business with real payrolls and real customers, a business so few know about and those that do don't much want to talk about it. You were  loyal to no industry, no companies, just  to your investors, just to investors, people like him.
 It isn't about being anti-rich, I know many hard working wealthy people who have met payrolls, sacrificed for their employees, and made lot's of money which they are entitled to because they risked it mightly. This is about not just always looking  inward, it's about looking outward.
I made it great but you had help also,teachers who educated your workers, roads which got your product to market. The mantra " I followed the law" just doesn't cut it with me.

The Economic Debate is a Sham

The U.S. Economic Policy Debate Is a Sham By Betsey Stevenson & Justin Wolfers - Jul 23, 2012 Watching Democrats and Republicans hash out their differences in the public arena, it’s easy to get the impression that there’s a deep disagreement among reasonable people about how to manage the U.S. economy. Nothing could be further from the truth. In reality, there’s remarkable consensus among mainstream economists, including those from the left and right, on most major macroeconomic issues. The debate in Washington about economic policy is phony. It’s manufactured. And it’s entirely political. Let’s start with Obama’s stimulus. The standard Republican talking point is that it failed, meaning it didn’t reduce unemployment. Yet in a survey of leading economists conducted by the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business, 92 percent agreed that the stimulus succeeded in reducing the jobless rate. On the harder question of whether the benefit exceeded the cost, more than half thought it did, one in three was uncertain, and fewer than one in six disagreed. Or consider the widely despised bank bailouts. Populist politicians on both sides have taken to pounding the table against them (in many cases, only after voting for them). But while the public may not like them, there’s a striking consensus that they helped: The same survey found no economists willing to dispute the idea that the bailouts lowered unemployment. No Support Do you remember the Republican concern that Obama had somehow caused gas prices to rise, a development that Newt Gingrich promised to reverse? There’s simply no support among economists for this view. They unanimously agreed that “market factors,” rather than energy policy, have driven changes in gas prices. How about the oft-cited Republican claim that tax cuts will boost the economy so much that they will pay for themselves? It’s an idea born as a sketch on a restaurant napkin by conservative economist Art Laffer. Perhaps when the top tax rate was 91 percent, the idea was plausible. Today, it’s a fantasy. The Booth poll couldn’t find a single economist who believed that cutting taxes today will lead to higher government revenue -- even if we lower only the top tax rate. The consensus isn’t the result of a faux poll of left-wing ideologues. Rather, the findings come from the Economic Experts Panel run by Booth’s Initiative on Global Markets. It’s a recurring survey of about 40 economists from around the U.S. It includes Democrats, Republicans and independent academics from the top economics departments in the country. The only things that unite them are their first-rate credentials and their interest in public policy. Let’s be clear about what the economists’ remarkable consensus means. They aren’t purporting to know all the right answers. Rather, they agree on the best reading of murky evidence. The folks running the survey understand this uncertainty, and have asked the economists to rate their confidence in their answers on a scale of 1 to 10. Strikingly, the consensus looks even stronger when the responses are weighted according to confidence. The debate in Washington has become completely unmoored from this consensus, and in a particular direction: Angry Republicans have pushed their representatives to adopt positions that are at odds with the best of modern economic thinking. That may be good politics, but it’s terrible policy. The disjunction between the state of economic knowledge and our current political debate has important consequences. Right now, millions of people are suffering due to high unemployment. Our textbooks are filled with possible solutions. Instead of debating them seriously, congressional Republicans are blocking even those policy proposals that strike most economists as uncontroversial. Raw Politics This inaction has no basis in economics. Instead, it’s raw politics -- a cynical attempt to score points in a phony rhetorical war or a way of preventing their opponents from scoring a policy win. The debate about the long-run challenge posed by the federal budget deficit has also become divorced from economic reality. The same panel of economists was almost unanimous in agreeing that “long run fiscal sustainability in the U.S. will require cuts in currently promised Medicare and Medicaid benefits and/or tax increases that include higher taxes on households with incomes below $250,000.” Only one in 10 was uncertain. None objected. Likewise, popular tax deductions such as that for mortgage interest didn’t fare well in the surveys and would be on almost any economist’s list of targets for reform. Yet neither party is willing to propose such policies. The consensus, of course, can be wrong. On the probable consequences of economic reforms, though, leading economists are more likely to be right than politicians running for re- election. Their solidarity needs to be taken seriously. Too much of what passes for economic debate in Washington is the product of faith, not evidence. It’s time to put economics back into the economic debate.

Do The Right Thing All The Time

No one I know is against wealthy people. What we are against is favoritism. Someone paying 18% tax, while a regular working stiff pays a higher percentage. (Ala the Buffett argument) ! Forget all the HOO HA just have a tax system that is fair.
To blame the unions and pensions of people who passed on wage increases for more pension money is wrong. To blame a  mother who taught school for 30 years that she is the problem is beyond understanding!
 Right now the biggest corporations in the United States pay a smaller percentage of income tax than the average American Family and that is a fact JACK. Wall Street spends a million dollars a DAY lobbying in Washington for tax breaks and special interests.
 Ending oil subsidies alone would save two Billion a year to tax payers.
 A great start would be term limits, no gerrymandering, and a promise to work with whoever is elected. Or in plain simple language we can all understand " do the right thing all the time" for the American people, not for your ideology.

You Liberals are going to have a hard time with this, but think, ponder then...think.

What you want, redistribution, will hurt the poor the most.  Trickle AROUND from the most successful always works...always has, always will.

Stated again,  having Buffet keep his money will be more productive than sending it to the government. 

What does Michael Jordan tell us about income inequality in the United States? The U.S. has greater income inequality than nearly all other developed nations, and the former basketball star earned far more in most years than the typical American earns in a lifetime. So is our system unfair and stacked against the middle class? First, some historical perspective.

"From the time of Pericles until the end of the 18th century in London—2,300 years," notes Harvard Prof. Lawrence Summers, "standards of living on Earth increased perhaps 100%." In the U.S. since 1790, by contrast, real per capita gross domestic product has increased nearly 4,000%. Quality of life, in other words, increased 40 times more in 220 years of American history than it had globally over two millennia. In 2012, a typical American in the bottom fifth of the income distribution has a far higher quality of life—and life expectancy—than the average member of the top 1% in 1790.

Critics today often point to the 1950s as the last years before American society became so divided between haves and have-nots. At the end of that decade, America's "Gini coefficient"—the most common measure of income inequality, running from 0 (least unequal) to 1 (most unequal)—was 0.37. Today it is 0.45.

But in 1959, more than 20% of families fell below the poverty line. In 2010 that figure was just over 13%. Real per capita GDP today is 270% higher than it was in 1959. A family in the bottom fifth of the income distribution today makes the same amount in real terms as a family earning the median income in 1950. So inequality might have increased, but so too—dramatically—has quality of life.

Even over the last two decades, while real income has essentially stagnated for the bottom fifth of earners, basic conveniences have become far more affordable. In 1992, only 20% of American families below the poverty line had a dishwasher—50% had air conditioning and 60% owned a microwave. When the Census Bureau last surveyed these figures in 2005, those figures were 37%, 79% and 91%, respectively. Critics who minimize the importance of these conveniences likely have never had to do without them.

And that brings us to Michael Jordan, who starred for the Chicago Bulls from 1984 to 1998. In 1986, the Bulls' median player salary was $300,000. The team's lowest-paid player made $135,000, and its highest-paid player made $806,000. The team's Gini coefficient was 0.36. But Jordan's superstardom increased the team's popularity and revenues, and by 1998 salaries looked different. The median income was $2.3 million, the lowest was $500,000, and the highest (Jordan's) was $33 million. The Gini coefficient had nearly doubled, to 0.67.

Jordan's salary of $33 million consumed over half the payroll, but everyone was better off. The median player in 1998 made more than seven times what the median player made in 1986, while the income of the lowest-paid player in 1998 quadrupled that of his 1986 peer.

Detractors would suggest that this situation is anomalous to sports, that many of today's wealthy inherited their money or acquired it without adding commensurate value to society. But consider another basketball player, Rashard Lewis of the Washington Wizards.

Lewis was the second-highest paid player in the National Basketball Association in 2012, making $22.1 million—even though he appeared in fewer than half of his team's games and performed poorly when he did. Is it fair that Lewis was compensated so handsomely? More pertinently, if his team could repossess a portion of his salary and redistribute it more "fairly" to deserving players following the season, would it benefit the franchise?

Perhaps it would in the short term, as the team could reward players and temporarily strengthen morale. But top players would be disincentivized to play for the team in the future, knowing that such repossession could also happen to them. And without an objective measure of overall player performance, the team could one day decide that even a high-performing player was overcompensated and therefore should see some of his proceeds redistributed to his teammates. The team would quickly become uncompetitive.

Certainly there are reasons for concern if lower-income Americans aren't able to save or acquire sufficient capital to pursue innovative ideas, or to see their children attend decent schools. They will suffer, and the country will lose out on significant intellectual capital and growth opportunities. But this should not be confused with inequality.

Equality is not a good in itself and shouldn't be analyzed in a vacuum. If we remember that, perhaps a century from now low-income Americans will pity the living standards of today's 1%.

Obama V. Clinton On Taxes. Dick Morris

President Obama is trying to re-write history when he says that his tax program is the same as Bill Clinton supported "when 23 million jobs were created."

It's not that way at all. Clinton's 1993 increase of personal income taxes on the top bracket to 39.6% had a very negative effect on the economy. It was only after Clinton's 1997 cut the capital gains tax - the opposite of what Obama proposes - that job growth really piled up.

When Clinton took office he did all the wrong things. He raised taxes sharply, hiking the top bracket from 35% to 39.6% and raised taxes on gasoline. The result was that the economy, which had been recovering, staggered. GDP growth dropped to 0.7% in Clinton's first quarter (down from 4.3% in Bush's last quarter) and stayed around 2% for the rest of 1993. Personal income rose 6.3% in 1992 under Bush but slowed to 4.1% under Clinton in 1993.

The tax increases Clinton passed failed to generate the revenue he had expected. The tax paradox set in. Martin Feldstein, former Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors, summed it up in his Wall Street Journal article, "What the '93 Tax Increase Really Did," published on October 26, 1995. He said taxpayers reduced their incomes when they saw the tax hikes coming. Feldstein writes that "the Treasury lost two-thirds of the extra revenue that would have been collected if taxpayers had not changed their behavior." Because of Clinton's tax hikes, real personal income fell by $25 billion. High income taxpayers, facing the prospect of a tax increase reported 8.5% less taxable income in 1993 than they would have if their tax rates had not changed. The tax paradox!

Then Clinton got wiped out in the Congressional elections of 1994, losing control of the Senate and the House - the first time the Republicans had run the House in forty years!

Clinton suddenly saw the error of his ways and began to hold down spending and push for a tax cut. In 1997, he and the Republican Congress combined to cut capital gains taxes from 28% (the rate to which Bush had increased it) to 20%. The result was electrifying! Real wage growth was 6.5% in the four years after the tax cut compared to minuscule wage growth of 0.8% over the four years after Clinton's tax increase!

And the tax paradox was again evident: lower rates produced higher revenues! In 1996, the year before the capital gains cut, the tax collected revenues of only $66 billion. In the four years after the cut, they averaged $100 billion a year. But, what was more important was the surge in economic activity that the capital gains tax cut generated. In 1996, before the tax cut, there were $261 billion in capital gains in America. In the three years after the cut, capital gains rose to an average of $440 billion. The increased tax collections and the greater economic activity were such that they pushed the budget into a surplus for the first time since the 1950s.

These facts may be "inconvenient truths" for Obama to face but they are the facts!