I'm glad Dr. Dean made his Tax Position clear......"we can't do it all"

[cthrumatrix]

Howard Dean: (Overlap) Well, let's … let's … let's remember again, let's correct the urban (?) legend (?) here. That story that I was planning a middle class tax reform, so we could have a (Inaudible), was not given by us. That was leaked to an enterprising Boston Globe reporter who did a great job ferreting out from our advisers, who should've kept their mouths shut, what our plan was. Um, the reason that I believe the first tax structure is wrong is because it doesn't help the middle class at all. Fifty percent of the people in this country get $304. Their tuition has gone up (Inaudible) $304, their property taxes (Inaudible) their health care premiums, because of the service cuts, the president has passed onto middle class people. The people who benefit from the tax cuts make more than a million dollars a year or our very large corporations. So my idea is to get rid of all the Bush tax cuts then redo the tax code after you balance the budget and get real …

Diane Sawyer: (Overlap) But however it leaked, should it have been said in the beginning? Do you wish that you had said it…

Howard Dean: (Overlap) No. No, I believe we ought to balance the budget and until we can show how to balance the budget, we can't promise people tax cuts. The biggest difference between me and everybody else in this race, including President Bush, who is in some ways acting like the most liberal Democrat you could have because of the borrow and spend, borrow and spend, spend, spend, spend, charge it (Inaudible) credit card the administration. And but those (Inaudible) everybody else is running, they'll promise you tax cuts, they'll promise you health care, they'll promise you education, they'll promise you help with your college. Now, everybody knows that that's not true and you can't do it. I think the reason 50 percent of the people don't vote in this country is because they know darn well not only is there not much difference between a Republican and a Democrat, but everybody in Washington says one thing at election time and goes back and do something … does something else. The reason I was so successful in (Inaudible) is because I didn't mind giving people bad news. And when they … they'll respect you a lot more as a political leader if you give them bad news straight to their face.

http://blog.deanforamerica.com/archives/003332.html#more

If you want more "smoke and mirrors" keep on electing a "politican". If you want change and want to take this country back ...Dean is right. You can't do everything thanks to the "bush presidency carnage of tax cuts".

For those of you that read Paul O'Neill's book on Bush...you know that cuts were all "politics".... and now look at the choices we have to make with medicare and social security.

If you feel pro/con....please share.

[mopinko]

1. this is why i am for dean

but the history of people electing grown-ups that tell the truth is pretty short.

[cthrumatrix]

7. you have to educate america...just as he said above...people can

see the increase in the cost of other taxes.

How this translates into policy and holding down other costs...is huge guess with our fiscal situation.

I think this should be discussed at length...let the people decide.

[mopinko]

14. yeah, but

"I think this should be discussed at length...let the people decide."

the sheeple don't want to discuss at length, they follow the soundbites. "we can't do it all" is a lot better that pandering to the gimme gimme crowd.

[ramapo]

2. Refreshing Yes but is America Ready for Reality?

At some point America will get a strong dose of reality.

Dr. Dean was 100% correct. You can't have it all. Politicians have sold tax cuts for years. Citizens want current level of services and more. That's why there is the invisible debt crisis.

The last politician to seriously address this was Ross Perot. McCain touched on it.

Yet I doubt that this is a winning campaign strategy. The Republicans will paint this as negative and unamerican. Tax cuts are the path to economic vigor. Cutting wasteful spending (the other guy's programs) will solve the budget problems.

There is a basic immaturity in the electorate. I fear that only when the house of cards collapses will Americans face up to the shell game that our economic system has become.

[bowens43]

3. Compare this statement to Clark's so called 'tax plan'

which doesn't have a snowballs chance in hell of getting through a Republican or evenly divided congress. Dean isn't making impossible promises. Clark on the other hand tells us what he thinks we want to hear , knowing perfectly well that his promises are hollow.

[boxster]

10. Oh, please. Do you really think Dean's plan to roll back the tax cuts has

a chance in "a Republican or evenly divided congress"?

Perhaps we should consider the ramifications for our own candidate's positions before applying blanket statements to the opposition.

[mopinko]

12. this is what bugs me about clark

that seems to be his position on everything. what we want to hear. seems paper thin to me.

[AP]

4. What an ass. This infuriates me:

"President Bush ... is in some ways acting like the most liberal Democrat you could have because of the borrow and spend, borrow and spend, spend, spend, spend."

If he meant this as a smear on "liberal Democrats" he's an ass. If he didn't, he's worse than Bush in terms of garbling words and meaning.

The other candidates are working their asses off trying not to allow Republicans to frame Democrats as exactly this, and Dean is throwing out Republican word associations on Dianne Sawyer. Is he a saboteur or an idiot?

[cthrumatrix]

5. Forget the messenger...is the "reality of his message" on track

can we continue bush's policies ..?

[AP]

6. Want to talk policy? The issue with taxes is allocation of the burden, but

Dean doesn't want to allocate the burden in a way that gives the middle class more relief and the rich a little more burden.

There's nothing contradictory about talking about allocating the burden fairly and reducing the deficit. In fact, Keynes would tell you that if you give the middle class a little more wealth (which you can do through lowering their tax burden) you'll see the economy generate more revenue, which creates more tax revenue, which narrows the deficit.

So allocating the tax burden more fairly can be a first step in narrowing the deficit.

And it is unbelievable that Dean tries to convince Americans otherwise (while casting aspersions on liberal Democrats!). That might play at the CATO Institute, but...

[cthrumatrix]

8. I think he wants a "stronger middle class" and he is sharing that

they "did not recieve what they thought".... it really doesn't give the "x & o's" of his tax position which one would really need to say pro/con...BUT since the "top tier" received the largest tax cut...this is how we can "re-coup" the revenues for other programs (health, education etc..).

I see nothing wrong with what you are sharing...

[AP]

11. Dean, 4 mil in net worth -- it killed him to buy an 800 dollar suit..

...accoriding to People Magazine, and he's telling people with NO net worth (who go deeper adn deeper in debt) that 300 bucks is nothing?

Ok, set that aside.

Dean has told the middle class not to expect any tax relief until he balances the budget in the 6th or 7th year of his administration.

Have you seen charts of the shift in the tax burden? People in the top quintile got 150% wealthier in the 90s but their tax burden (their effective rate of federal taxation) DECREASED by 50%!!! (Since all states tax regressively, this disparity could only get worse when you include state and local taxes and fees, including care registration fees, hunting licenses etc). The effective rate on the other quintiles has either gone up or stayed the same.

The only way we're going to get a stronger middle class is address that huge dispartity -- that huge shift in the tax burden.

Why do you think the middle class has less and less cultural and political power? It's because they can't compete with the economic power of the top quintile.

Dean says "you have the power" but he's only willing to go back to 2000 in terms of how we tax the rich. That's letting them keep their economic, political, and cultural power. He needs to go farther.

He is totally lame on this issue. It amazes me that people are willing to put the cart of loving Dean before the horse of good policy.

This isn't good policy.

[mopinko]

23. what is middle class to you??

"he's telling people with NO net worth (who go deeper adn deeper in debt) that 300 bucks is nothing?"

to me, no net worth makes you poor, not middle class. if $300 is a GIANT pile of money to you, you are poor.

[mopinko]

13. dude, i am middle class

and i had no problem paying my taxes under clinton. i did not need the cut. i am proud to be an american, and proud to tote my weight.

[AP]

15. You did need a cut. How do you think Bush got elected? Rich people with

too much power relative to people like you and me, and 30 years of bad tax policy that helped them get so far ahead.

You've been paying more than you have to so that rich corporations and individuals don't have to.

You may think you did great, dude. But say you had another 4 thousand dollars. Wouldn't YOU like to have that money to, say, donate to a few more politicians you like (so that they could look after your interests, rather than the interests of huge coporations whose PACs donate way more)?

What if you paid down a few loans with that money. 4 thousand in principle is the equivalent to what? 20 thousand in interest profit on your home mortgage?

Because you didn't have that money to pay down your mortgage in the Clinton years, that's basically a huge shift in your wealth to a big, already powerful, wall st bank, and they didn't have to work that hard to earn that money, and they didn't have to pay so much tax on that money when the got it.

Dean doesn't care about shit like that. He wants the middle class to think they have to bear the same burdens as those big Wall St banks, and he wants you to pay for the health plan he promises. If you feel the pinch, he'll say, look I gave you something worth the pinch. But the middle class doesn't NEED to feel the pinch. We've worked our asses off for 30 years with less vacation time, more hours, and NOTHING to show for it. Where'd that wealth go? To wall st. So, Dr Dean, you worked there. You know where all the wealth went. Tax it.

Get it? Wise up.

[mopinko]

18. hey i think i know my own budget

and what i get for my tax dollars. and he wants to repeal the tax cuts, so what is your problem? i agree 100% with his assertion that whatever the middle class got in one hand got taken out of the other, and then some, and then some debt for your kids.
do it think we ought to stop offshore tax cheats and other corporate shuffles, hell yeah. duh.
what do i think about people who decide who to vote for based on how much they are gonna give them? not much. do i care if those people are rich or poor? no.

[cthrumatrix]

21. In reading the above...Dean says "he would redo"...he does not

mention "tax hike".

It does not say what the tax allocation burden would be...be he is implying that "the rich" are receiving a benefit the middle class is not...becuase of all the other tax hikes.

My takeaway is higher taxes for upper income and corporations...do you see the same?

[Fleshdancer]

16. same here

I didn't feel like I was paying an enourmous amount of taxes under Clinton either. And if paying the same amount of taxes I paid back in the 90's means my children and grandchildren don't have to pay off a massive Bush deficit, then I'm all for it.

Nothing disgusts me more than the "me me me" attitude. Heaven forbid we should attempt to leave this country a better place than when we arrived.

[AP]

17. Republicans would hug you. "I don't need a tax break. I'm doing great!"

Read my reply to this post. Tell me where I'm wrong?

Why is it OK for the people who benefitted enormously in the 90s to say 'me, me, me' and get everything they want, but when the middle class say, wait, this is fucked up, it isn't right?

[mopinko]

19. no, rethug would hug you

why aren't you one? or are you? me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me.

"people who benefitted enormously in the 90s " are who got the tax cut that dean wants to repeal.
how much did bush give you for your support??

[isbister]

9. liberal Democrats

tax and spend, according to republicans.

republicans borrow, tax and spend.

Dr. Dean should be aware of the difference

[Paulie]

20. Dean said he wont cut the Pentagon budget

It's 50% of the budget, if he won't touch it, nothing else will fall in place without MASSIVE cuts to social programs. PERIOD.

I beg you, go to Chuck Spinney's website (this guy was on the cover of TIME back in the 80s), he an old time budget analyst of the DOD, and accolyte of Col. John Boyd:

http://www.d-n-i.net/charts_data/evolution_of_the_fy_2004_supplemental.htm

[bread_and_roses]

22. Dean's talks as if inequality just appeared

with Bush's tax cuts. It is the long trend toward grossly unequal tax burden and wealth accumulation that are at issue.

"Almost all Americans are paying more than their fair share of taxes because huge targeted tax giveaways allow corporations and a small minority of very rich people to pay less than their fair share.

The share of federal taxes paid by corporations dropped 69 percent from 1945 to 1995 while the share paid by individuals increased 67 percent.

The effective tax rate of the richest 1 percent dropped 57 percent from 1948 to 1999 while the tax rate of median-income Americans almost quadrupled. "

from
http://www.faireconomy.org/econ/state/Talking_Taxes/short%20answers%20only.html#PartI

Look also at data on wealth inequality:
http://www.ranknfile-ue.org/polact_rich.htm

Low and middle income people have been paying more than their fair share for a long time. To pretend otherwise, to pretend that "we're all in this together" in some equitable fashon and so ALL must sacrifice is to ignore the tax policy trends of the last half century.

Leave the middle and lower tax reductions alone while you look at the overall tax structure and burden. For many, those paltry sums make some difference, if only a paid off utility bill.