[CNBC] S&P contacts White House to notify about a downgrade coming

I am just curious why so many people want to keep the top 1%'s tax rate so low when they will never even come close to sniffing the top 1% themselves?

 

Mind boggling, they should pay their share.....but what is worse, is the corporations, GE making 4+ billion in profit and getting a rebate.....that is just piss poor.

DD

 

This is capitalism at its best, the ones with the money always wins.

 

I like to compare it to the Whites in the South that fought for slavery (many fought for state's rights and not slavery... I'm not talking about them), but couldn't afford slaves (they were amazingly expensive), yet put themselves on the line for slavery. Millions of Republicans, and some independents, are fighting for the rich and don't even realize it. Hell, in a way, they are working for the rich and not getting paid to do it. How stupid is that? There are middle class Americans "fighting" to keep the tax rates at record lows for the wealthiest Americans, who are paying taxes at a higher rate. How stupid is that? The fantasy that all that wealth being accumulated by the wealthy, and the big corporations (who are largely swimming in profits), is somehow going to "trickle down" to them. Nevermind that decades of trying that hasn't worked. Their brains, suitably brainwashed, refuse to believe it. That's definitely bizarre.

I have another comment. Folks keep blaming the "tea party" for this, a group largely made up of radicals that are a subset of the Republican Party, when they should be blaming another group. Who, you might ask? The leadership of the Republican Party. They are allowing a small minority to lead them by the nose, thinking all the while that they are using them. The main reason so much of the "tea party" agenda, such as it is, keeps getting pushed by the GOP leadership is because of the stinking Republican primaries. The "tea party" is small in numbers, but deluded as they are, they are still motivated and they vote. Yes, folks, the GOP leadership is driving this country off a cliff because of fear over some ****ing primary elections.

Boner is afraid for his speakership, and The Nose thinks he can ride this "tea party" crap to a higher position. Perhaps Boner's. Perhaps he has higher ambitions. So what if they know the actions they've been taking are wrong and terrible for the country? They're both fearful and ambitious, and totally ****ing the rest of us over. It's incredible and incredibly stupid. You see similar stupidity on display here.

 

Obama has to get it right now.

He has to realize that the Republicans don't care about the rating, the default, or the economy. They said they don't care.

In fact, the only thing they have said is to make Obama a one-term president - that has been their mission all along - despite the country needing compromise to move forward.

Obama should just stop negotiating with these guys. Boehner said he got 98% of what he wanted...basically by telling Obama you do what I want or the country defaults and goes into crisis. So Boehner should man up and take responsibility for the markets being unhappy too, right? But he won't.

I hope America see what has been done here, that the Tea Party used default as bargaining chip to create a mess of a deal. They do deserve most of the credit for the downgrade.

Obama should just stand tough and refuse to work with these guys. Find another way. If they care only about politics vs. our future, screw them and let's just move forward without them.

 

They fought because the Yankees invaded. A big difference between that and fighting for slavery.

If the situation were reversed somehow and Jeff Davis had to raise an army to invade the north to protect slavery, there is no way he would have been able to raise viable armies.

Yes there were some isolated incursions (namely Antietam, Gettysburg, and Kentucky), but the Confederacy was never considered the aggressor nation.

 

The nation that attacked first (Fort Sumter) wasn't the one responsible for starting the civil war?

 

I don't think we should turn this whole thing into some sort of class-warfare, capitalism sucks, we should all be socialists thing.

As a registered Republican who actually sided with Obama on this, I suggest that you can all be more convincing by being sane and reasonable.

From some of you, it would seem like we don't have progressive tax rates, social security, medicare, food stamps, etc. A lot of Republicans may prefer a "flatter" income tax rate or higher entitlement ages, but I don't think that quite warrants class warfare.

I would hazard a guess that our poor have it pretty good when compared to most of the world. I don't see poor Americans trying to sneak into Mexico so give the country some credit will ya?

 

oh gawd. please be real here. do you really consider the South as the invading force in that war? And from the South Carolinian point of view, Fort Sumter was their property. Right or wrong, that is at least arguable.

McClellan or Grant invading Richmond is a far different matter.

Let's put it this way. The North would not have stopped until their invading armies forced the South into capitulation. Terms of victory for the South were far different.

 

When we are talking about having to get to 4 trillion in cuts to ensure more viable monetary levers, I think it's worth it.

And it is called compromise. I would much rather have preferred that deal than what we have now.

 

I'd like to make the comment that my wife and I are brushing up against the definition of what is considered "wealthy" in this country due to the fact that we are highly educated professionals that both work full time and have saved/invested in income generating assets and taken the risk to do so.

I am, in my opinion, not wealthy. I do not have millions of dollars. A few thousand extra in taxes actually affects my lifestyle, it is less I can spend on myself, my family, save, pay for college, etc.

I am tired of being lumped in with a group of people and told that I need to pay "my fair share." I pay more than my fair share, in my opinion.

The reason we get mad is I personally am being demonized by the President as "the rich".

My wife and I are highly educated, highly trained, and specialize in careers that deliver rewards based on that education, training and experience. Just because we are married, we are penalized into the group that is "rich". It gets tiring to work 60-80 hours a week, take little vacation, work hard at our careers, sacrifice to go the extra mile, and make the necessary choices and sacrifices to make a high income, only to be told that the massive amount of sales tax, property tax, income tax, payroll tax, cap gains tax, medicare tax, social security tax, that adds up to about 40% of our income is not paying "our fair share". My wife and I are the epitome of HENRYs (High Earners, Not Rich Yet) that get lumped into the rich category.

What would make me happy? Start with defining "rich" as maybe $200K for individuals and $400K as married? Or how about 300K, only a 50% penalty for being married?

With all of that being said, I personally would volunteer to pay MORE taxes (pre Bush cuts maybe) if a couple things changed.

1. Still cut spending. Don't assume more revenue means the gov't gets to spend more.
2. Make EVERYONE pay SOMETHING. I pay lots and lots and lots of taxes. I feel I pay "my fair share." But you know what? I'll chip in an extra 3-5% if EVERYBODY chips in SOMETHING in federal taxes. I'm tired of HALF the country paying nothing. Pay 1% and I'll throw in 3%.
3. Take away the earned income credit and make it a deduction. You should not get a tax refund if you paid no taxes.
4. Add a new bracket to those whom are TRULY rich. Make it big, something like over $10 million or something. Then chop off another 10% or something. If you really want to make rich people pay, make sure it is RICH people that are paying.
5. Adjust all of these definitions of rich for inflation. $250K a year sounds like a heck of a lot of money per year, but what about in 5 years, or 10?

 

Most people who critique the high degree of influence that the wealthy have in our society are not talking about you. And, in terms of tax brackets, neither is Obama.

You don't even come close to the top of the wealth scale.

 

Then you don't understand capitalism.

The richest 1% spend more of their time working to pay off the government then you do. If you don't like tax loopholes then simplify the tax code, which Republicans have been pushing for years.

 

Oh I understand it well enough, I wasn't 100% serious of course, but the rich and powerful does play by a different set of rules then the average person (this is true pretty much every where).

 

If you're paying a few thousand extra per year under the expiration of the Bush tax cuts (exclusive of any AMT patch), that puts your income around the $500,000 dollar mark. You probably shoud have millions (or at least a million) dollars or so saved up.

 

I am not sure what you mean by 'rules', but if you want freedom from the restrictive forces that burden us all (money, power, etc) then socialism, communism might be for you. But then you would just be heavily restricted by some arbitrary strangers.

 

First, socialism like SS, Medicare, unemployment is practiced in this country as well, if you don't like it, you might want to move to Africa and enjoy the anarchy and your libertarian ideas.

 

One minor change to fix that for you...

 

deckard compared the situation of poor people voting for tea partiers akin to poor whites fighting for the south.

i'd like to expand. these people have been taught their taxes go to support a welfare state of poor minorites.

 

Africa is full of war lords with absolute control over every market. That would be the opposite of a free market system and thus not libertarianism.