When we have a huge national debt, it devalues the dollar and creates a hidden tax on us all. So, a balanced budget and paying off the national debt is critically important.
Social Security and Medicare is a regressive tax. It should apply to everyone and all income levels, but instead of just removing or revising the tax cap, lower the tax to 3% and apply it to all income. In doing so you could give a HUGE tax break to both businesses and most people. Wealthier people will not be hit with a huge tax increase if the rate is lower, and the additional revenue will bring solvency to social security and make it much more fair.
An additional social responsibility tax of 5% should apply to all those with incomes above $1 million a year. On average most Americans pay 46% of their gross income in total taxes. The very wealthy, on average, pay only 23% of their gross income in total taxes. The tax code needs to be revised so that middle America is NOT shouldering the bulk of the tax burden.
What few Americans realize is that republicans have passed the largets tax increases in history - but they use so-called user fees, gas taxes, and social security taxes to apply those tax increases unfairly to the poor and middle class. John McCain is aopposed to raising or removing the social security income tax cap, but does plan to raise the tax rate on those Americans subject to the tax. It's hardly fair.
Republicans are also responsible for the explsoive growth of goevernment. While the Republican growth in government does little to serve peopel, it does make for plum positions ofr the sons daughtersand wives of major contributors. So called provatization is also a Republican shame, where government has issued no-bid contracts to incompetnt subcontractors like Halliburton for 10 times what the work should cost to perform.
McCain has run several ads saying Obama has too many followers. Obama's a celebrity with millions willing to follow him anywhere, no questions asked. He implies Obama is leading a cult of some kind, portraying himself as a messiah. Does McCain really think Obamas followers are that dumb? Does he think they are following him because he is young or because he represents a new kind of politics McCain just doesn't get?
Isn't the real question, McCain's real challenge: how to declare yourself a leader when no one is following you? McCain suggests that his opponent has too many followers to be a leader. It's an interesting challenge, but where's the beef McCain. Why should anyone follow a cranky old man in a RV who opposes equality for women, blacks, hispanics and gays? Why should we follow someone who makes a half-million a year and yet still lives in a house paid for by his wife, travels in planes and limos paid for by his wife? Why should we follow a man who flies around the country in his wife's plane for free, because the campaign finance reform bill McCain wrote exempts planes belonging to candidates wives?
McCain voted against rasing the minimum wage for 12 years, but never voted against a pay raise for himself - eight to be exact during the same twelve years. McCain voted against equal pay for equal work, the Equal Rights Amendment, children's health care. How is McCain, who has lived out of someone else's pocket his entire life, going to speak honestly about personal responsibility? If you think about it, McCain is a phony all the way through!
Passage of the FISA Bill has taken a lot of the wind out of my sails. I just am so disappointed in Democrats in general and Barack Obama in particular. This was a chance for him to show some real leadership on a very important issue and he clearly ducked it. Democrats would have rallied behind him if he had taken a stand, but he did not.
There is no way I will vote for John McCain in the fall. Barack Obama will still have my vote. However, I thought for the first time I would actually be voting for someone I believed in and not just the lesser of two evils. I guess I was wrong.
Senator Obama, how could you? I gave you my heart and you handed it back to me in pieces.
Obama supports the FISA compromise bill but says he will work in the Senate to strip a retroactive immunity provision. This is an issue that Obama must put all of his efforts behind - stripping the FISA Bill of the Teelecommunications immunity clause. Failure to do this will be an enormous slap in the face of all Americans who voted to give Democrats a majority in the House and Senate and who are now supporting Obama for President.
If the Senate Democrats cave on this legislation and give telecoms retroactive immunity for illegally wiretapping us all, then they will be saying freedom and civil liberties mean very little to them. It will make them no better than the neocon Republicans and could cost them dearly in the fall. In many ways it makes them worse.
There is only one thing worse than a corrupt and immoral Republican - that is a spineless Democrat who enables them. No one likes a coward - are you listening Pelosi, Hoyer and Reid???
I cannot stress this enough. The rape of our constitution by the neoconservatives who continually ask us to surrender our freedoms in exchange for our security is destroying what our men in uniform are so valiantly fighting for. If Amerrica does not respect its own constitution anymore, the terrorists have already won. They have made us more like them and less American.
Giving retrocactive immunity to people who willfully violated the law is never a good idea. It encourages more of the same in the future. Barack - this is the most important challenge you have faced to date. DO NOT LET US DOWN!!
Sitting on the sidelines, I have come to the conclusion that Obama must choose someone as VP who shares his vision for America and forget the strategy. He needs someone who truly thinks as he does and will bring a voice of unity to the ticket to reinforce his agenda. To me that person is Senator Claire McCaskill.
Senator Claire McCaskill has been a brilliant defender of Obama on the cable news talk shows and would also help with the women and working class vote. More importantly, she is a straight shooter looking to change Washington in the same ways Obama is. Forget conventional wisdom. This ticket would keep the change message clear and strong. An early announcement of Biden as Secretary of State and Hagel as Secretary of Defense would put the desired gravitas in the places it is most needed.
http://www.cafepress.com/phat_ts/5480910
All profits will go to the Obama Campaign!
Barack Obama could have a friend and ally in Ricky Martin, perhaps the most beloved Citizen of Puerto Rico. He should contact Martin and see if he would endorse and possibly campaign with him there.
The Obama campaign should not give up on Puerto Rico simply because Clinton is in the lead there. He needs to go to Puerto Rico and have splashy presence there! Puerto Ricans will love Obama whne they get to know him!
In 1980, 23% of working Americans made at least $20 or more an hour in their jobs. In 2000, only 16% made $20 or more an hour. In 2008, that number is about 13.5%. While minimum wage remained the same for 6 years of the Clinton administration and 5 years of the Bush administration, costs continued to rise. Today, two people working full time minimum wage are living impoverished lives.
Republicans, and complicit democrats keep saying, give the wealth a little time to trickle down. It's not trickling down, its gushing up to the top 10%. In 1980, the bottom 90% of Americans received 60% of the wealth, and the top 10% received 40% of the wealth. TODAY, the bottom 90% receive less than 15% of the wealth, while the top 10% receives over 85% of the wealth. And the gap continues to widen every year.
FDR said a concentration of wealth in the hand sof the few threatens democracy, because people with money and power will continue to strip those with neither of their assets until they have nothing. Changes in tax laws, and who pays the taxes have been underway since the Reagan years to shift the tax burden onto the middle class - those making between $30,000- 100,000.
A huge inequality is in Social Security and Medicare taxes. Though the wealthiest Americans receive the largest benefist from social security, they pay the smallest percentage of their income in SS taxes. Currently, all earnings up to $90,000 are taxed at 12.4% to fund Social Security. Each dollar earned over and above this cap is completely exempt from Social Security taxes. So Bill Gates pays the same SS taxes on his billion dollars of income that someone making $90,000 a year pays. If we take the cap off, and have everyone pay the tax on all earnings, we could lower social security taxes to about 3% of income, increase revenues and save social security for ever. This would be a huge tax cut for businesses and 90% of taxpayers. More on this later....
Clearly, the Reverend Wright Issue is not going away - so maybe it's time for the Obama Campaign to produce a few spots showing the good things Rev. Wright and His Church have done, what Obama found appealing about the church and why Obama considers Rev. Wright a friend.
It would also be a good idea to show the most inflamatory clips - The Chickens have come home to roost - and juxtapose them to statements from the NIE, the NSA, The CIA, the 9-11 commission and The Iraq Study Group that confirm those statements. We have been doing bad things around the world - killing people, overthrowing democratically elected governments and propping up dictators for Corporate interests, not national security interests. The CIA does not protect the interests of Americanpeople - it is a military arm of Corporate America and has done a lot of shameful things to improve their bottom lines.
We invaded Iraq and Afghanistan not because of 9-11. These invasions were planned BEFORE 9-11 (Read Bush Admins former Terrorist Czar, Richard Clark's book) to gain control over oil and natural gas supply pipelines to China for UNocal, Exxon and other Oil Giants who are now screwing average americans with grossly inflated oil and gas prices.
This situation cannot be brushed off, but it could be used to truly bosst the OBAMA campaign. Neither Hillary or McCain care that we are at war for reasons other than our national security interests. THEY MUST BE CALLED ON THIS!
Someone in the campaign needs to go to work on this NOW!
