McGovern (D-Mass.) suggests new tax to pay for war

[babylonsister]

McGovern suggests new tax to pay for war
By Mike Soraghan
July 31, 2007

Rep. James McGovern (D-Mass.) is proposing an “Iraq tax” that would drive home the cost of the unpopular war to all Americans as it helps to pay for it.

“It would make everybody sacrifice,” said McGovern. “So far, the only ones who have felt the impact of this war is a small sliver of the citizenry.”

McGovern would exempt service members and their families. Beyond that, he says many of the details, such as whether it would be an income or other kind of tax, have not yet been worked out. But he expects to introduce it before Congress leaves for its August break.

The measure would carry forward the Democratic talking point that the only sacrifice the general public has made for the Iraq war is President Bush’s tax cuts. It also comes as some anti-war protesters are taking their protest fights to American’s wallets.

In a dozen U.S. cities, the American Friends Service Committee, a Quaker pacifist group, is displaying seven-foot banners that stress the cost of the war and what else the money could be spent on.

more...

http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/mcgovern-suggests-new-tax-to-pay-for-war-2007-07-31.html

[endarkenment]

1. I have a better idea.

Get The Fuck Out Of Iraq Now

[bdamomma]

4. ..........

:thumbsup:

[unhappycamper]

9. ..

:thumbsup: :thumbsup:

[mod mom]

14. But perhaps a large tax especially on those who can afford it would deliver

the message and push the cause to end this ILLEGAL IMMORAL bu$h WAR, plus help pay for our debt.

[cascadiance]

19. Classify it as the reversal of the tax cut they had earlier...

Or perhaps make it part of a big increment of a new top marginal tax rate for the wealthy...

At some point when we have a new president, I think going to a 70% top marginal tax rate is what will be needed anyway to balance out the wealth gap that has been building to pre-depression levels once again. Perhaps make this 70% a 75% with an "Iraq tax 5% premium" on top. Once the war is stopped, then that extra 5% tax premium would go away, so it would be an incentive for the wealth class in this country to make sure we avoid getting in wars where not needed, as they will wind up paying for the war that their war profiteer friends and themselves seek to profit from in the stock market.

[endarkenment]

20. I categorize that sort of convoluted thinking as 'duplicitous'.

What a war tax does is enable war. This kind of thinking McGovern exhibits is quite similar to the chain of thought that supports restarting the draft 'to end the war'. The way to end the war is to cut off funding for the war.

[mod mom]

21. They already enabled a war placing the debt on the entire American people, while those

responsible have benefitted greatly. The reason many are supporting it is they don't see it as effecting them. If it touches their pocket book (which it already does but most folks don't realize it-as the form of national debt) they will think twice over their support.

I agree with cutting off funding for this war, but looking forward I think the thought of a tx-again especially on the very wealthy will really make people think twice.

[fed-up]

32. tax the F*CKING war profiteers-they shouldn's see a penny of that blood money nt

[Tom Joad]

35. Every US congressperson who voted for the IWR has to give up at least half

their real estate. Say 4 homes or 50%, whichever is less (because i'm nice).

[IronLionZion]

22. Good idea. Why didn't anyone else think of that?

Seriously, how can we get Americans to even want to get out of Iraq when they are not feeling like we're at war? I want them to feel some sort of sacrifice and monetary pains are the only things Americans are conditioned to understand. So lets make them feel it in their pocketbooks.

I support this tax. Raise my taxes. Please, raise them so we can get the fuck out of Iraq now and hopefully someday get universal healthcare.

[NeedleCast]

2. If there were a away to tax only the "supporters"

I'd be totally for this.

Support the war? Not willing to join the military? Enjoy your new tax.

[porphyrian]

3. Sure, why should the poor and middle class pay only with their children? - n/t

[NYVet]

5. I'm against new taxes in general

I work hard to make my money and I would like to keep as much of it as I can.

Besides, isn't the government bringing in more tax revenue now than they did 6 years ago?

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

10. No, it isn't.

Our revenues plummeted after the Bush tax cuts were put into place, and we will continue running deficits until they expire (IF they are allowed to expire.)

[HootieMcBoob]

13. How do you propose we pay for this mess?

Somebody's gotta pay. It's either us or our children and grandchildren.

[mitchum]

26. We could check the gop voter registrations for 2000 and 2004 and make the idiots...

and enablers pay for that bloodsoaked clusterfuck

There shouldn't be any "we" paying for this mess

[bvar22]

31. When the Republicans ran the budget into deficit,

*When the Republicans ran the budget into deficit, they RAISED our taxes.

*When the Republicans cut the Capital Gains Tax, lowered the top brackets on the Rich, and cut the Inheritance Tax, they RAISED taxes on the Middle Class by shifting a large percentage of the tax liability from the RICH to the shoulders of Working Americans.

*When the Republicans deferred payment on the deficit, they RAISED our traxes by including the intrest payments on the loans from China.

*When the Republicans decided to put the Iraq War on the nations credit card, they gave your childrens' future earnings to their RICH friends today.

The Republicans have simply lowered your monthly payment by extending the payments to your children and their children.


Make no mistake, the Republicans have RAISED TAXES on Working Americans.

The tax proposal in the OP simply states that we should pay for the WAR now instead of making our children pay.

[AndyA]

6. Well this should fall right in to the Republican talking points about Dems raising taxes.

I think those who benefited most from the war should pay the tax. Let's start with Halliburton, for instance. And then all the rich Republicans who have supported the war and watched their stocks go up due to those no-bid contracts, and guaranteed profits built in.

If that's the case, I'm all for it, but I don't think it would be good to stick it to everyone, many have more than enough on their plate right now.

[karlrschneider]

16. Yep, that's exactly the problem. They'll bitch and moan about "the Tax and Spend

Democrats", and the M$M will dutifully echo the charges...nobody will mention where all the "spend" is ending up; with Bushco cronies. :grr:

[IronLionZion]

24. Oh, they are saying that anyway

Republicans will say what they want. They don't care if it's true. In fact they prefer pure bullshit because it brings about the desired effect. They do it because it works and their target audience has a short attention span and believe what they are told.

And so what? You're damn right the Dems raise taxes and spend it on the people. Republicans spend it on their corporate cronies who finance their campaigns.

[Hydra]

27. Yup

A profiteering tax

I don't need to give more to this war- I never supported it in the first place. Tax the hell out of the oil companies, Halliburton, Lockhead-Martin and everyone else who is profiting from this war.

They want it, they can pay for it.

[MADem]

7. It should be a progressive tax, too

Say, ten cents a thousand for the first fifty thousand earned, twenty cents a thousand for the next twenty thousand, thirty cents a thousand for the next hundred thousand, and once you're in millionaire territory, make it fifty bucks a thousand!

That'll stop this war faster than ten million pink-clad personages circling Capitol Hill! Those rich bastards think taxes are just for us little people!

[Nickster]

8. I'd suggest that we are already paying the "Iraq Tax" in various way, higher gas, higher cost of

products and services because of higher oil prices. Increasing debt burden for future generations due to the skyrocketing national debt from Iraq. Etc, etc, etc.

[jdlh8894]

11. Not to mention

Congressonal PAY RAISES!!!

[renate]

17. I think that's McGovern's point

Right now the average citizen without a family member in Iraq isn't sacrificing anything (or isn't aware they're sacrificing anything, in terms of $$) and don't have any sense of exactly how much the war is costing each man, woman, and child in tax dollars and added costs. Separating the costs from our regular tasxes would make that clear to even the dumbest FOX viewer.

[HootieMcBoob]

12. Very good idea

Hopefully the people who have been generating huge profit from this tragedy will be targeted.

[dkofos]

Instead of a tax, go after the war PROFITEERS!!

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

15. "The war will end when enough bodys come home and the average citizen has to pay for the war."

Words from a sympathetic professor whose class we were disrupting during the Vietnam debacle.

[Az_lefty]

18. how about a war profiteer's tax?

just tax the fu@k out of the military industrial complex, contractors, etc to pay for this shit.

[Beelzebud]

23. An income tax to pay for this war? Aren't the middle class paying for it all as it is already?

[bvar22]

33. No. The Republicans put the WAR on the nation's credit card.

We are still paying for Reagan's S&L bailout.
Until the Iraq War, the S&L bailout was the biggest Smash & Grab theft in World History.

Your children and grandchildren will get the bill for the Iraq War. The MIC/Oil Cos/Halliburton will take their money today.
Talk about taxation without representation!

[unpossibles]

25. hmm. May be the only way to get the "no tax" Republitarians behind the anti-war movement n/t

[FormerDittoHead]

28. How about "flattening" taxes to raise dividend taxes to the level of EARNED income?

Mr. McGovern, everyone IS sacrificing. The PROBLEM is that the BURDEN paying for the war has been SHIFTED TO THE MIDDLE CLASS by lowering taxes on the wealthy, and is being indirectly paid for by the LOWER CLASS by reduction of services....

Tax the rich, god damn it.

[radfringe]

29. double sales tax

on goods sold through and by and for republic candidates

tax republic campaigns for the donations

sur tax on vehicles still sporting bush/cheney stickers

[jmowreader]

30. Rove is in charge. You know better than to suggest this.

He'll first get the Bloviating Class to work their fans into a lather about how the Democrats don't have any ideas other than Tax And Spend. (Never mind the fact that Bush is the spendingest president in the history of the republic.)

Then all the Repukes in Congress, except for a few, will rail on and on about how the Democrats want to double your taxes.

The Republicans in Congress will bring in a line of beautiful Wal-Mart Associates with their beautiful children to talk about how the children only get milk twice a week now, and if the Democrats' tax and spend plan goes through the children will only get milk once a week. Six weeks after the plan is finally killed, we'll find out the "beautiful Wal-Mart Associates" are actually actresses who don't even shop at Wal-Mart much less work there, but by then all will be forgotten.

And finally, when the few Republicans who've volunteered to turn in their seats in exchange for jobs at the Carlyle Group help the Democrats pass this plan through Congress, Bush will veto it on national television and tell America he's saved the Family Farmer and Small Businessman.

If you want to end this war, don't fuck with things Bush can spin.

[Jack Rabbit]

34. How about a confiscatory war profits tax?

Make Halliburton and Cheney pay their fair share.

[Tom Joad]

36. make every congressperson who voted for it pay their share.

Kerry would not be able to afford as many ski trips, and ted stevens might have less real estate, but it seems fair.

[bobbolink]

37. Riiiiiiggghhhttt... Notice he doesn't exempt poor folk.

How many of us need to go extinct?????

Liberals will jump on this the same way they go after gas taxes.... ignoring who is most hurt.

Then, stand up and say how much better Democrats are for poor folk than the republics.

When will poverty actually be considered in Dem decision making?????

[Forkboy]

38. Color me reactionary,but why don't we just END THE FUCKING THING?

That is all. :)

[Tom Joad]

40. McGovern has been one of the handful of congresspeople working to do just

that. Not just "redeploy" the troops, but bring them all home and close the bases. within months, not years. (or in the case of bush/Clinton, maybe decades)

i think this is just a way to get the repukes to defend the war yet again.

[pitohui]

39. what the hell is wrong with him? sorry, i live in new orleans

i should think the "tax" of having lost our city whilst not being provided any significant aid in time to make a damn difference should be "tax" enough

bring the national guard home and protect this damn city, and then talk to me about more taxes

i have nothing left in my pocket to be picked

i don't understand the need of certain people to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, the war is already hated resented and unpopular among the common people...so the answer is to pick OUR pockets?

if you are against this war, congressman, bring forward the articles of impeachment

sheesh i seriously wonder about people sometimes, how can they be THIS stupid?