Well, as we all know, President Obama is spending more money then America can afford. If you want to argue about that in this topic, then go ahead, but I have a feeling that this is the opinion shared by most Americans. I've never been one to just offer criticisms. I invite all of you (and especially the sternest of the Obama critics, you know who you are) to come out and maybe give some possible solutions. I've got a couple of small ideas here and there. Criticize them, come up with new ones...it's all happening here. 1. Legalize mar1juana and tax it. http://economics.about.com/od/incometaxestaxcuts/a/legalize_pot.htm As for you social conservatives out there, you have your guns, we have our pot, everybody's happy and just shuts the f*** up and has a good time. 2. Sterner penalties for tax evaders Right now, tax evasion carries a maximum fine of $100,000. That isn't good enough. Now, the amnesty program and avoiding jail time sounds great, but these guys are crooks, about a million times worse then the petty thief or drug dealer taking scraps and landing 5-20 year sentences. They're taking your services, your roads and your infrastructures and not paying a cent for it. America wants to get tough on crime? Good. Let's hit both facets; blue collar and white collar crimes. A compromise can and should be made. Fines NEED to be increased; these guys aren't evading taxes to support their families; some have net worths in the hundreds of millions! Increase the maximum fine to either be a certain percentage of net assets or at the very least, make it a cool million or two. This will probably yield an extra billion or two in revenue and certainly curtail tax evasion, saving a large amount of future revenues. 3. Streamline the military for the 21st century. It's time to acknowledge that large conventional armies are no longer the norm in fighting wars. The American military has to adapt to new circumstances; it can do so by streamlining certain aspects of the conventional military while increasing spending on other areas such as special ops etc., which should result in a net gain financially speaking. Gates puts it best... 4. Increase taxes on assault weapons. Haha, Obama really had you there on the whole "will he or will he not ban my high-powered rifles?" shtick. You earnest, second amendment loving citizens truly showed your commitment to owning weapons that are too powerful for anything less then killing the Loch Ness monster. Fair enough, it is your right. I say, instead of a ban, let's just set higher taxes. I admit myself to be nowhere near an expert on guns, but I'm assuming one of these two things will happen. 1-Less assault weapons. 2-More tax revenue. And either one satisfies me. So...interested in seeing what people on this BBS can come up with.
Three out of four idea's are the liberal typical agenda ... more tax. I have four: 1)Accountability 2)Quit wasteful spending 3)Quit spending on things the Fed has no business giving money to 4)Don't spend more than you have and we get lowered taxes
A streamlined military means more $$$ spent per person. The congress has already cut back to the bone on high tech highly successful projects like the F-22 while clamoring for uparmored HMMWV's when more Strykers is the better answer. On the assault weapon thing, just shut up before you say anything else to further expose your stupidity on the subject. Everyone knows you need a single shot big bore rifle for large game like the Loch Ness monster. Plus you idea is about 70 years old. The government only has the ability to regulate firearms because they can tax it as interstate commerce. Similar to the mar1juana stamps, machine guns are regulated with tax stamps.
I actually agree with you on your four points, but at this point, the cat's out of the bag. Bush already made a mockery of your points and Obama is just continuing it, it's at the point where we cannot assume that these guidelines will be respected (and even if they are, it's too late; the ballooning deficit is already here, America can't just stand court and tighten her belt, she have to attack this thing.) As for your qualms about these "raising" taxes...the first idea is about creating an entirely new tax, one that if you have no moral qualms about, logically makes so much sense. And as for the second, the gouvernment wouldn't even be raising taxes, they'd just be getting what is owed and persecuting these criminals as they deserve. Surely, if a petty thief gets jail time for stealing $1000, then people who steal ten or sometimes hundreds more deserve the death penalty or something. Getting a reprieve from the generous offer of five years of jail time should be worth more then $100,000. Are you telling me that you are against raising the MAXIMUM fine for tax evasion (a pittance at $100,000) when the amount of illegal assets out there can be counted in the billions and possibly in the trillions? As for the fourth, that was a whim of mine that I knew conservatives wouldn't like and yes, it is taxation. I still stand behind it though. 5. Legalize prostitution/brothels; regulate and tax it In certain states (Rhode Island and Nevada if memory serves) there already are legal brothels. It's time to acknowledge that prostitution is happening and that there will always be an industry for sex. I kinda have moral problems with this, but logically speaking, it makes sense. More tax revenue, since "illegal" activities that are happening under the table will now be reportable. Regulation would ensure that the worst of pimps would be gone and hopefully, that sex trafficking and minors would be off the table. Why give criminals this revenue stream?
I'm pretty sure that after we implement #1, most of us won't worry about the deficit so much. Keynesian economics during a recession FTW.
I know, that one wasn't so creative. More on a whim really. Though, seeing the amount of money poured into avoiding a ban makes me think that the people buying these guns could certainly afford a bit more. Seeing as how you are the expert on this subject though, could you please enlighten me as to the uses of assault weapons? For me they're the ultimate in discretionary spending and should be taxed as such. If you want to provide me a reason why Mr.Joe would buy an AK other then pure enjoyment, then cool. Tobacco and alcohol are taxed out of this world and for good reason. They're dangerous. They're wholly unnecessary (but very nice to have!). I'm merely supposing the same thing is true of assault weapons.
Tobacco and alcohol kill tens of thousands of people every year. They have no mention in the bill of rights and do not help anyone to defend themselves. I really do not see how you can compare them at all.
Huh. You fail to see how assault weapons are unnecessary and dangerous? Funny how you mention the Bill of Rights on alcohol as well, since it would seem to me that the most famous example of amendments to the Bill coming in wrong and being subject to change was with alcohol. Anyone remember this?
If you want to show deaths caused by assault weapons and then compare them to other tools or objects go ahead.
Before this turns into a gun thread, irrespective of your beliefs on that one subject, I don't believe that you could raise taxes on something very specific like "black guns with large magazines" and have any legitimate effect on the deficit. If you want to raise them for other reasons, like discouraging ownership, that is probably best kept in another thread. My suggestion would be to raise income taxes to Ronald Reagan's levels. That would make a significant dent, and you would get the added bonus of watching conservatives twist themselves into knots explaining how Lord God Ronnie's policies made him a pinko-Socialist. I think its pretty clear we are on the back end of the laffer curve at this point, but dogmatic Republicans just keep running with the "cut taxes" mantra they learned back then.
If you want to buy a gun with more power to hunt game or protect yourself when a lower, less potent gun would've sufficed, then I think you should bear the same burden as those who consume alcohol or tobacco. NOW, I am perfectly aware of the ambiguous nature of what defines an "assault" weapon and how certain guns that are less powerful are put into this category. That doesn't matter to me, it's a question of semantics. I am simply stating, with the observation of a layman, that guns with a higher potential for danger SHOULD be taxed higher. In fact, hell, I would say guns in general, but then I thought it would risk derailing this thread entirely...which this argument nearly has anyways. Going back to your point about the military, I'm talking about large cuts, especially to the Navy. The operational size of the Navy is ridiculous these days, considering the easy targets they pose to terrorists when they're docked and their limited effectiveness in the War on Terror (as compared to other wings of the military). I think the United States could afford enough cuts in that department and still maintain global hegemony while recasting a smaller but quicker navy that is more fit to fight the enemies of today.
Fair enough. I think it would have a healthy impact on the deficit but seeing the replies it has garnered, it's not worth fighting over. That said, I like raising income taxes; it would probably beat the hell out of any of my schemes. Problem is that it just isn't palatable and I highly doubt it would happen.
just meaningless rhetoics. the most popular Republican president of recent times, Reagan, raised taxes, not just once, but twice. what is good enough for Reagan is good enough for any other political party. take away tax loopholes (Corporate welfare) that =>enables conglomerates to declare that they're not subject to US taxationcurrently, these loopholes enable corporations that generate profits in the hundreds of millions of $, such as Accenture, Haliburtion, Tyco, et al, to avoid taxation enitrely. ZERO income taxes paid. adding tens of billions of $ more to the tax base will go a long ways toward chipping away at the budget deficit. =>reward conglomerates to send jobs overseas when these tax breaks stop, many professional jobs w such Corp as Intel, Microsoft, Google would come back to the US. more professional jobs created, more tax revenue collected. laying the tracks for an eqitable / efficient flat-tax system
The total for annual sales for all guns is estimated at about $2 billion annually. Just over half of that total are handguns - imagine $1 billion for rifles. For the sake of discussion, lets say "assault weapons" account for 25% of rifles sold (which I would guess is on the high side). That puts the annual sales at $250 million. Even if you taxed at 100% (and for one moment ignoring the fact that it would cause sales to plummet and reduce the revenue) $250 million as a fraction of the debt of $10.6998 trillion (per Wikipedia) amounts to 0.000023% of the national debt. I would love it if you had a spare $250 million sitting around to give me, but in the terms of the debt it is chump change.
you were supposed to compare assault weapons to other things to show a cause for taxation not a meaningless breakdown of firearm deaths by country. If that is your argument I doubt the USA has the highest deaths from tobacco. Seriously bad bad bad logic.
any ban would include secondary market so your extremely high (on purpose) numbers might actually be closer to the mark than you think. But it is still chump change.
Correlation between gun ownership/death. Can you not see it? Either way, not worth fighting for. I'm thinking about it and it's more partisan then logical so scrap that. $250 million...eh. The sad thing is, I'm looking at spending and I'm realizing the number of areas where America should up spending, not cut it. The country just can't afford it anymore. That said, combing through Medicare and Social Security and Obama's new bills and trimming things down should yield some savings, but I'm trying to think of small ideas that provide very little in terms of negatives, and yet yield some cash.
These are kind of ambiguous and conceptual could you give us some concrete examples? i.e. Wasteful spending - Bailing out overbloated companies that misspend and mismanager [my definition . . but please provide your own] Rocket River
