Half of all Americans favor taxing the richest by 50% or more: New CBS News poll

[Newsjock]

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2009/09/27/entertainment/e170040D44.DTL&tsp=1

Half the respondents of a new poll say taxing the richest Americans by at least 50 percent is a great idea, while more than a third consider Twitter a fad that will likely fade.

Those are among the findings of a new "60 Minutes"-Vanity Fair Poll released Sunday.

Nearly half of the respondents chose Wal-Mart as the institution that best symbolizes America today, leaving in the dust runners-up Google, Microsoft, the NFL, and the banking and securities firm Goldman Sachs.

Poll details here: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/09/25/60minutes/main5339910.shtml?tag=cbsnewsSectionContent.1

[Wilms]

1. Cool! And in a democracy, majority rules.

Right? :shrug:

[stray cat]

3. No - otherwise groups would not have civil rights - the majority can be tyrants!

[anonymous171]

5. So can a president. I would prefer to be tyrannized by my fellow citizens

than by an unelected executive or his cabinet members.

[bluestateguy]

8. tyrannized by your fellow citizens

That's kind of what happened to gay people in all the states that simply voted by referendum to ban gay marriage.

[vadawg]

6. someting about two wolves and a lamb comes to mind and their dinner choice :)

[grok]

9. all the filty rich should get kicked out of this country.

and their blood money too! we don't need it.

Let them try to set up shop elsewhere where taxes are less. they won't have the infrastructure will they?

I just bet they won't succeed. we have the best,hardest-working people here by far.

[paulsby]

12. yet another reflexive "i hate the rich" post

i've lived poor and amongst the poor. i've lived amongst the extremely wealthy. people are people. i'm not going to hate anybody, call them "filthy" anything, merely based on their bankroll.

[Obamanaut]

11. So if you are on a tiny island with seven survivors including yourself,

and five of them - a majority - vote to consume you, you'd be ok with that? Majority rules.

[Wilms]

13. Of course I was kidding. Who am I to deny 1% of the population 80% of the wealth. n/t

[Selatius]

17. That's what happens when you don't have a Bill of Rights or a Declaration of the Rights of Man.

Most nations that claim to be democracies are not pure democracies anyway. There are constraints and limitations and safety valves, such as a right to a fair trial or some other such safety device, in most national constitutions.

[aquart]

2. I'm not sure of the correlation between taxation and Twitter.

[anonymous171]

4. And yet our government won't even touch those proposals

Really shows you who has the power in our "democracy."

[bluestateguy]

7. The tax cuts for the top 1% are expiring next year

I think next October to be exact. I've actually been surprised by how non-controversial this has been so far.

[ProdigalJunkMail]

10. when a group of foxes was given the choice between

the sheep and the grass...

[armyowalgreens]

14. I don't trust internet polls.

[Marr]

15. Too bad it's the half that are completely ignored.

I was reading today about Milton Friedman, and though I'd heard it all before, this point really struck me for the first time. Friedman thought the only two proper functions of government were law enforcement and the military. That is to say, he thought we need peons to protect the assets of the wealthy inside the country, and peons to protect the assets of the wealthy outside the country. But the peons get nothing.

I suppose it never even occurred to him that, in his construct, the wealthy are a purely parasitic class. They take everything and give back nothing. They demand absolute sacrifice and subservience from the rest of the society, and contribute nothing.

Tell me again how this man was considered intelligent? I can't see it.

[slay]

16. Count me as part of that 50% that thinks we should tax the hell out of um

I'm kind of shocked that only 50% think we should tax them that high. Unless someone is part of the top 10% of rich folks, I have no idea why they would be against this. The rich NEVER pay their share. They used to be taxed much higher. This is part of why things have gone to shit - there isn't enough tax money coming in for the stuff we, as a nation, need. The rich, the republicans, and foxnews are to blame IMO. Tax the rich fucks!!! Tax um long and tax um hard! The rich have always fucked us. And the rich will continue to fuck us until we MAKE them stop.