All of the actions above plus use the taxation system or other means to direct the wealth to the working classes. There is no reason why any minimum wage should still be $7.25 an hour and so many people should need public help while working 2 plus jobs. It is unconscionable that we are creating a class of the disabled and poorly nourished/poorly developed and calling it God's will. These results are policy choices.
Kay, My concern is that not enough of us recall that in 2021 the Democratically-controlled House had passed mighty impressive progressive legislation that was stalled in the 50R 50D Senate due to the filibuster. Still, Senate Dems managed to cram whichever pieces qualified for reconciliation into a package that, had it received support from all 50 Democratic Senators with the VP casting the tie-breaking vote, would have had a substantial impact on working families. Regrettably, then-Democratic Senators Manchin and Sinema voted with the 50 Republicans who opposed the package. The result was the eventual passage of the vastly edited down Inflation Reduction Act, which I continue to press leadership to frame as a “downpayment.”
Moving on, we desperately need better messaging from our leadership amplifying that we currently have 49 Senate Democrats prepared not only to pass the Reconciliation package but also to pass filibuster reform, allowing increasingly more legislation to move to the floor for debate and an up or down majority vote.
We simply need 1) to hold our 49 Senate seats (excluding Manchin and Sinema), 2) to flip one currently-held Republican Senate seat, 3) to retake the House and 4) to hold the White House—none of which is a given but certainly is attainable.
Barbara Jo Krieger: Manchin may say he is a Democrat. Listen to his words; observe his vote. He is anything but a Democrat. Is this a new tactic of the repubs; to have one of their own run as a Democrat?
Barbara, Because Manchin caucused with Senate Dems, I counted him among the 50. I also would add, at times, he voted with the Democrats, for example, in favor of the Inflation Reduction Act which received zero Republican support.
Still, the more important point is his irrelevance in November, 2024, at least as a Senator.
Peter, I don’t follow your thinking. From 2021 to 23 Senate Dems had only 48 caucus members who would consider a filibuster rule change. I would note, contrary to 2021, by Jan 22 all 48 were receptive to the rule change.
From 2023 to the present, 49 Senate Democrats are receptive to the rule change, one shy of the 50 needed for a Democratic VP to cast the tie-breaking vote.
You're right; there were two Dinos, but Dems technically had 50+1. Could Biden or majority leader muster all those votes? — I don't know; we don't even know if they tried on these issues.
Peter, President Biden and Senate Leader Schumer worked tirelessly to get Manchin and Sinema to sign on to filibuster reform. For example, in January 2022, 48 Senate Dems agreed to a rule change that would have allowed both sides 100 speaking hours before the Freedom to Vote: John R. Lewis Act could move to the floor for an up or down majority vote. Manchin and Sinema joined the 50 Republicans who opposed that exceedingly modest rule change.
All good Barbara Jo but most voters do not and will not remember such things or care much about the filibuster. But sure, Biden can tell people give him a Dem Congress so he can get X done.
Steve, They might care if one recited bills that passed by a simple majority in the Democratically-controlled House, but were blocked in the Democratically-controlled Senate because they didn’t reach the three-fifths-vote threshold required to send the bill to the floor for an up or down majority vote. Here are 3, none of which qualified for budget reconciliation: 1) a $15 hourly minimum wage, 2) the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, 3) the PRO Act, to name a few.
Additionally, you might recall that last August Ohioans were well enough informed to vote “no” on a resolution that would have required 60% to pass future amendments to the Ohio Constitution.
Steve, Good idea, were Dems planning to run on the filibuster, which I expect they don’t. Currently, I’m pressing for Dems to amplify the social infrastructure piece of Biden’s Build Back Better agenda—the legislation in the reconciliation package— that included extension of the child tax credit, affordable, quality childcare, universal pre-k, investments in housing, in eldercare, in climate, and more. I want to see Dems, receipts in hand, making the argument in West Virginia, and also in the red parts of Mississippi and Alabama, and in other states and say, “Who do you want here—somebody who doesn’t want to extend the child tax credit or those who do?” “Somebody who doesn’t want to cut the price of prescription drugs or those who do?” “Doesn’t want to provide affordable, quality childcare and universal Pre-K or those who do?” “Doesn’t want to make investments in paid family and medical leave, in housing, in eldercare, in climate, in universal healthcare or those who do?” My point, and note I haven’t mentioned what Biden and the Party, indeed, have accomplished, is that Democrats have an extraordinarily appealing narrative, if only they would deliver it.
Clinton was a Wolf 🐺 in Sheep’s Clothing , truly a southern landowner mentality. Not to mention giving the Chinese free rein over products and defense technologies surface to Air Missles system that they copied , improved and then made for themselves in their own factories...
Clinton got lots of Chinese money in his non profits funds...
“We have to give China a seat at the economic table make them part of our economic system ...”
I understand that point but sometimes in the World you are the aggressor or the Victim. Can we all get along ? Is not something politicians in other countries.
Every rocket missile or drone attack is a propaganda victory for foreign politicians to rally voters as they give the Great Satanic United States a black eye…
Iran has no ability to have a outright war with the United States but funding various groups that get paid to launch 🚀 Iranian made missiles Drones and Rockets 🧨 against United States, commercial and political interest…
Always follow the money…
Being morally correct in an immoral world will get you killed…
China is not a nice group of people , life is cheap there and they want to dominate the world economy the are not Intrested In being fair or nice it’s about power and money…
I know I will catch flak for saying this but …. The Chinese culture does not value fairness or being civil. Look at how they behave in Vancouver Canada.
That's the truth. As a little test, I suggest people go ask for assistance. Then you'll see it's not actually there or the bar is so low you'll never met the income requirements. And, no BP oil payouts was far from making everything correct for FL
God's will. Just as the slaveowner savagely beat his slave and then went back to reading his bible which says this is ok. Why? Because the bible was written by guys so they could have control over others. There is no Jesus . By the end of this century, religions should be viewed as the hoax they are and have always been so.
I consider religions to be cults because of the 'exclusion' factor, and the 'controlling' factor. It's just some religious cults have more members than others. The use of a belief as truth rankles.
It’s difficult (impossible) to accept orthodox Christian teaching that Jesus is sitting at the right hand of God in heaven, remotely directing activities on earth.
From the research I have seen, when you increase the minimum wage, you immediately see a boost to the economy. The conservatives always scream that if you increase the minimum wage it will lead to job losses and small business failures. What you actually see is happier, healthier workers who have more money to spend and that creates more economic activity and jobs.
$10 million? Unclear. CEOs running large corporations have a lot of responsibility.
$1 million? No! Lots fo professionals (doctors, dentists, lawyers, consultants even university professors with side gigs) can earn this much by working hard enough.
I don’t like the wealth tax as much as the tax on corporations that funnel so much wealth to upper management—people just shouldn’t get that rich in the first place!
Can’t it be written to reach them? We’ve had and even now have other laws controlling foreign companies’ business practices when they’re doing business with us.
The only way to reach them is through a sales tax or VAT tax. In most cases they don't pay income taxes. Products made, say in China, may/may not be subject to import taxes. The profits are made by Chinese companies that are not registered as doing business in the US. Our trade policies promote cheap products and we don't get import tax that equates to income or wealth taxes.
Also, our economy is undermined by foreign monopolies like OPEC which sets oil production and thus prices. Saudis control those prices but control our oil refineries and big companies like Exxon. We do not have authority to sue them for price fixing.
Well the point is certainly true but I don’t see how it’s related to the problem of corporations’ grotesque overpayment of upper management in their US branches.
You miss the forest for the trees. The REAL problem is short term gratification. As Robert said the REAL problem is that extremely wealthy people merely borrow from themselves. Avoid income taxes. They may/may not be CEOs. Management and owners (i.e. shareholders) may have a conflict.
CEOs and directors often want their money to the detriment of the long term life of the company. They take a golden parachute off into the sunset. In some cases that bankrupts the employer and puts the employees out of their jobs.
If you heard what he said about Musk is true of many of them. If they are registered to do business in Delaware, the STATE has a provision that limits the disparity.
I think our national interest should not be to subsidize foreign companies selling here to the detriment of domestic taxpayers.
Wealth Tax For everything above $4 million Dollars, disallow the companies providing the outrageous benefits from deducting it in the companies taxes.
No credits or work arounds in the tax code. All compensation above $4 million dollars taxed at 40% just like the 40% the typical wage slaves pay in taxes on their wages.
Charitable deductions could save us! Should actually be "charitable" and not self serving.
This was written for lawyers:
December 01, 2011 FINANCIAL PLANNING
Social Security—Maybe Charity Should Begin at Home
By Daniel F. Solomon
For most of its history, Social Security was a terrific bargain: our parents and grandparents most probably received significantly more benefits than they paid into the Social Security Trust Fund. The trust fund comprises the Old-Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI) and Disability Insurance (DI) Trust Funds (OASDI, collectively).
In most cases, because our family units could rely on these benefits, they were able to enjoy enough financial independence to send people like us to school so that we could become lawyers—productive and, in some cases, wealthy, members of society. For 75 years, the Social Security Trust Fund has helped enable American soci- ety to achieve far beyond the aspirations of its founders, ultimately providing more than subsistence to retirees by also protecting widows, orphans, and disabled people. The dignity provided to needy beneficiaries surely far outweighs the economic value of the funds.
However, financial experts have long predicted a future insolvency of the funds. A majority of Americans have invested in the funds, recognize their social utility, and do not want to burden their heirs. Although there have been legislative attempts to “fix” the system, there is no consensus how to do it. The Congressional Research Service reported:
For example, for workers who earned average wages and retired in 1980 at age 65, it took 2.8 years to recover the value of the retirement portion of the combined employee and employer shares of their Social Security taxes plus interest. For their counterparts who retired at age 65 in 2002, it will take 16.9 years. For those retiring in 2020, it will take 20.9 years.
Geoffrey Kollmann and Dawn Nuschler, “Social Security Reform” (October 2002).
The National Commission on Social Security Reform (informally known as the “Greenspan Commission” after its chairman) was appointed by the Congress and President Ronald Reagan in 1981 in response to a short-term financing crisis that Social Security faced at that time. Estimates were that the OASI Trust Fund would run out of money possibly as early as August 1983. Congress rendered a compromise that extended the retirement age from 65 to 67, through a deal that raised payroll taxes and trimmed benefits enough to keep Social Security solvent. See Jackie Calmes, “Political Memo: The Bipartisan Panel: Did It Really Work?” New York Times, January 18, 2010. However, the legislation addressed only the immediate problem and did not address the long-term viability of the fund. See also Rudolph G. Penner, “The Greenspan Commission and the Social Security Reforms of 1983,” in Triumphs and Tragedies of the Modern Presidency, David Abshire, Editor. Washington: Center for the Study of the Presidency, pp. 129–31.
The George W. Bush administration commission deliberated on the issue and then called for a transition to a combination of a government-funded program and personal accounts (“individual” or “private accounts”) through partial privatization of the system.
President Barack Obama reportedly strongly opposes privatization or raising the retirement age but supports raising the cap on the payroll tax ($106,800 in 2009) to help fund the program. He has appointed a National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, which is to report and offer another fix.
Current estimates predict that payroll taxes will only cover 78% of the scheduled payout amounts after 2037. This declines to 75% by 2084. 2010 OASDI Trust- ees Report, Figure II.D2, www.ssa.gov/OACT/TR/2010/ trTOC.html.
Although the congressional plan was to ensure solvency through Federal Insurance Contributions Act (FICA) tax, there is a private means to help: to also consider the humanitarian and charitable nature of the Social Security Administration (SSA), which has been possible since a legislative fix in 1972. Before then, bequests naming Social Security or a trust fund as a beneficiary could not be accepted, which caused problems in administration of some estates. Money gifts or bequests may be accepted for deposit by the managing trustee of the OASI and DI funds. Section 170(c)(l) of the Internal Revenue Code lists the U.S. government among the educational or charitable organizations to which donations are acceptable. Gifts must be unconditional, except that the donor may designate to which fund the gift should be donated. If no fund is designated, the gift is credited to the OASI Trust Fund.
However, SSA has not publicized its charitable persona. Although the agency has received some gifts and bequests, they have been insignificant and not given consideration in a possible fix. The concept has been so unimportant to the experts that the Annual Statistical Supplement to the Social Security Bulletin does not specify how much the administration has received in gifts and bequests. Total revenue from gifts to the trust funds has been quite small. From 1974 to 1979 the most received in any one year was $91,949.88. During that period, the average annual amount was only $39,847. In 1980, almost two-thirds of the gifts were less than $100. The median gift size was $50. One person, for example, donated $13.11. She arrived at that amount by applying 5.85% (the employee tax rate then in effect) to her benefit amount and donated it to help “‘shore up’ the sagging, dwindling Social Security fund.” However, the 2010 Social Security Trustees Report lists them as about $98,000 (www.ssa.gov/OACT/TR/2010/III_ cyoper.html#2). Compared to many other charities, this is a paltry amount.
Apparently, SSA has never done a feasibility study nor marketing research to determine how an aggressive campaign could raise funds to support Social Security, or how gifts and bequests could reduce the current estimates of impending doom. According to some estimates total deductions taken for all charities next year would be $413.5 billion. Estimates for fiscal year 2011 are that SSA will spend $730 billion. That amount is already covered through “contributions” (taxes), but it is reasonable that charitable contributions to the trust fund could significantly lessen taxpayer exposure for impending doom, if not return the fund to solvency.
As lawyers, we have the capacity to remind our families, our clients, and the public at large that there is a way to contribute to help endow future generations in the pursuit of the same kind of social stability that Social Security provided to our parents and grandparents.
Daniel F. Solomon is an administrative law judge at the U.S. Department of Labor, member of the ABA House of Delegates, past chair of the National Conference of Administrative Judiciary, Judicial Division, president of the Federal Administrative Law Judges Conference, and author of Breaking Up with Cuba (McFarland, 2011). All opinions expressed are those of the author and not any organization or group.
How many people give away the majority of their money and/or means of making money ?
That’s like a cave man ( person) giving away all their Food Shelter Clothing Weapons. Normally not happening.
I respect bill gates for everything he has done but worshipping him is not in the cards, Warren Buffett also but their foundations do limited good but generate tax breaks/credits for the individuals and companies.
Ray crock (McDonalds) kept down minimum wages to make McDonald’s more profitable.
He also invented/implemented office cubicles to keep the workers focused on their work, and not on socializing.
Treating people as if they were just animals Or things to make only money
Is not good for people. Dehumanizing people is bad.
He created the ray crock foundation to preserve his wealth and polish his public image and that of his company,
When he died his wife changed it from the ray crock foundation to Her first name crock foundation . Often I see the crocks foundation sponsors of PBS TV & Radio programs. Great image while preserving wealth !!!
You want some good news to celebrate? Here it is! Enjoy!
"DEMOCRACY ON TRIAL" is streaming on PBS Frontline.
"FRONTLINE investigates the roots of the criminal cases against former President Trump stemming from his 2020 election loss. With the presidential race for 2024 underway, veteran political filmmaker Michael Kirk and his team examine the House Jan. 6 committee’s evidence, the historic charges against Trump and the threat to democracy."
My father was a Capitol Police Officer when I was child. I remember meeting his boss and co-workers in the Capitol. I was in awe while in the Capitol. "Make no mistake," as my father would say, J6 was a horrific, violent, planned attack on the Capitol Police, "the People's House," and our Democracy.
J6 never should have happened. Intentional lies created one of the worst days in US Capitol history. It can never happen again. We can never forget J6. Please share this program with everyone, regardless of their political party affiliation.
While very disturbing at times, it's a must see. It's very well done. Time to bring back the watch parties.
Judge J. Michael Luttig is one of the leading conservative legal thinkers in the country. He’s served in administrations of President Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush.
ROBERT DRAPER:
Judge Luttig had a kind of moral authority within the conservative community...
(Fast fwd a few secs)
JUDGE MICHAEL LUTTIG:
Mr. Eastman said to the president that there was both legal as well as historical precedent for the vice president to overturn the election. This is Constitutional mischief. I would have laid my body across the road before I would have let the vice president overturn the 2020 election.
I diagrammed his legal analysis, from beginning to end, and concluded that he was wrong at every turn of his analysis, every turn of his thinking.
PETE AGUILAR:
Judge Luttig, you wrote that the efforts by President Trump to overturn the 2020 election were, quote, “the most reckless, insidious and calamitous failures in both legal and political judgment in American history.” What did you mean by that?
Some of them, and Bennie Thompson have civil suits for damages. Why haven't they deposed people like Gym Jordan, Scott Perry, Matt Gaetz, etc who asked for pardons from Trump re Jan 6. What about the Fox employees to determine whether they knew or had reason to know they were inciting harm to the capitol police?
Yes, yes, and yes! More tax on corporations, a wealth tax, and stop stock buy backs.
These monopolies make so much profit they don't need all of these other options for them to make even more. How about giving back some to employees and communities like companies used to before Ronnie and "trickle down".
"If CEO pay is out of control, what should be done?” is the question of the day.
The villain is not Trump, Musk or the Republican party. It is the antiquated capitalistic system that rewards greed and treachery and now pulls the levers of power including Trump and the Republicans by immoral utilization of wealth and power. Rampant out of control capitalism is the demon behind the curtain that is disempowering and now even disemboweling what once was our beloved democracy. Sooner of later we must formulate and activate an economic system not built on the premise that “Greed is good.”
A wealth tax is like the preverbal finger in the dike. That we even need dikes to stay above the water is the root problem. There is no “fixing the capitalistic system.” It is a self-defeating system because it is impoverishing the consumers on which it depends. We do not fix it with a wealth tax, we look to replace it with a system that looks after the welfare of all. Most of us have children and grandchildren; we owe it to them to lay the groundwork for a system that will give them some hope for the future even if we do not live long enough to enjoy the benefits of our far-sighted plans and progress.
As bad as capitalism is, history shows that communism is much worse, because it easily allows autocrats to assume control, and socialism works only if paired with capitalism, the way it's done in the Scandinavian countries. They are not socialistic countries.
After the U.S.S.R. failed, demonstrators there showed carried signs that read, "Workers of the World, We Apologize," playing off Marx's famous last line in "Capital." As well they should!
After getting nowhere with socialism, China opened the capitalistic flood gates "with Chinese characteristics," which, as far as I can tell, includes a police state. However, capitalism is given credit for raising more people out of poverty in China more quickly than any other regime in history. That fact must be acknowledged, not sloughed off.
It seems to me that the problem, no matter the system, is human greed and selfishness, plus we humans are happy to use violence to get what we want. In short, we have met the enemy, and he is us. Even all the utopias failed. Plato admitted in his great and lengthy epic, "The Republic," that we just can't bring heaven down to Earth. Can we make small to moderate improvements? Yes, FDR, my hero, did some good things for the people, but what really got the U.S. out of our Great Depression was World War II, which, if you will, was in large part a government employment program -- everyone had a job. MMT wants to institute a federally supported jobs program. (More on that in a minute)
I also question whether modeling our economy on Scandinavian countries is wise. They are tiny homogeneous countries with highly educated populations satisfied with reasonable incomes, not needing to become multimillionaires, unlike too many Americans.
You promote SPROUT, a new idea to me. New ideas are usually worth considering, because maybe one or two of them will help, and if so, great.
My new push is for Modern Monetary Theory (MMT), which provides a more accurate description of how our federal government budget works. We had it all wrong. They aren't like a household's, a city's, a county's, or a state's, nor like a corporation's. Those entities must either balance their budgets, by law, or make a profit if they want to remain afloat. The federal government is under none of those constraints. The federal government can print money, raise taxes, and set interest rates; it is the only one that can do all that, which makes all the difference. We can spend money on any viable project; funding is never a problem, because we print our own fiat currency. For instance, our space program created many new discoveries, good-paying jobs, and, in short, paid for itself. The government's red ink just shows its amount of investment in us, the people. Without government investment, our GDP would be about a third of what it is now.
MMT is a win-win. For more on that, I recommend "The Deficit Myth" by Stephanie Kelton. It's a game-changer. Plus, in that book, she refers you to other macroeconomists who support MMT. (Bernie Sanders and AOC support MMT; unfortunately, they don't have the courage to tell America that we can fund any worthwhile project, because Americans believe that the federal budget is just like their household's, i.e., you can't spend money you don't have, and you must pay it back relatively quickly or pay exorbitant interest, and that the national debt is not worrisome until it gets much, much larger.)
The remuneration committees of big companies are meant to at arm's length from the boardroom and independent when setting remuneration packages.There is however an unfortunate Venn diagram of overlapping interests whereby rival company pay is inflated by mutual reference points not actual value delivered.Share buy backs can be good for bolstering sagging underperforming sharesfor equity holders some of whom are institutional investors who sit or recommend nominees for remuneration committees.It all becomes a vicious perpetual cycle of mutual gratification.This didn't apparently apply in Musk's case as he set his own rewards package without consultation but if he had sought approval then it would have been rubber stamped Hey ho free enterprise across the globe!
The Republican party reminds me of a Si-Fi movie where the main monster gives birth to an even more menacing creature that enjoys eating people on a scale that glues movie goers to their seats. Sadly, our political monsters are eating our basic freedoms, and we're letting them do it.
I go with the majority so far. Tax the wealthy. Reagan really screwed us over by reducing taxes on the wealthy with his stupid trickle down economics plan. Another reason people fail to learn from history. Trickle down economics didn't work in the 20s either. What's that saying? Those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it. Well, here we are repeating it AGAIN
I don't know where the framing came from for the term "Wealth Tax" but we should do away with it. The term makes is sound like an extra tax on the wealthy, when they are not even paying their fair share. I can't imagine paying 3.4% income tax on my income like the wealthy are paying. "Fair Share" is a better term.
Inequality tax. Wealth gap tax. I am with you. We call it a wealth tax because it is taxing wealth. It only got like that from the lack of tax on income for the wealthy with the as you said 3.4% compared to 25% to 36% that we pay. Tax cheats tax?
It is hard to discuss the control of CEO pay when we refuse to take money out of politics and love that campaigning goes on for a couple of years because it diverts us from the mundaneness of our lives and gives the media something to write about.
In America every citizen has the right to pay as little in taxes as the law will allow. I am sorry, but corporations are NOT voting persons and different tax liability applies no matter what Citizen's United legislation falsely and prejudiciously implies. When a business files an Articles of Incorporation it is a protection that stipulates a non person cannot be sued. A corporation must not be given a guarantee against liability as a non person and then be treated as a person when contributing to popular voting issues. Corporations can't have it both ways. It is incredulous to me that our legislators cannot author legislation that is more consistent. OOPS, my stupidity, they are simply corrupt or incompetent. Are humans so basically crooked that we cannot dispense with payoffs, loopholes, extortion and graft in our government? My belief in a two party system has been shaken by the incompetence and corrupt actions of republicans. By winning in November democrats will have the power to demonstrate to republicans that their partisan false notions of government must represent the majority if they are to have any relevance on a brutally demanding world stage. The eyes of the world are watching America and waiting for America to mature.
We are also being outflanked by our adversaries using the soft underbelly of our democracy "free speech" principles and law which currently allow for unacceptably wide asymmetry between authoritarian regimes and ourselves.
In Oregon, ten Republican incumbents in the state legislature are no longer eligible to run in this year's election. In Oregon, legislators often gum up the legislative process by simply not showing up. Last year, Oregon citizens drafted and passed Measure 113 which cites that any legislator who takes an unexcused absence of more than ten days is ineligible to run in the next election. Ten Republicans staged a six week walkout, and now they're gone.
All of the actions above plus use the taxation system or other means to direct the wealth to the working classes. There is no reason why any minimum wage should still be $7.25 an hour and so many people should need public help while working 2 plus jobs. It is unconscionable that we are creating a class of the disabled and poorly nourished/poorly developed and calling it God's will. These results are policy choices.
Kay, My concern is that not enough of us recall that in 2021 the Democratically-controlled House had passed mighty impressive progressive legislation that was stalled in the 50R 50D Senate due to the filibuster. Still, Senate Dems managed to cram whichever pieces qualified for reconciliation into a package that, had it received support from all 50 Democratic Senators with the VP casting the tie-breaking vote, would have had a substantial impact on working families. Regrettably, then-Democratic Senators Manchin and Sinema voted with the 50 Republicans who opposed the package. The result was the eventual passage of the vastly edited down Inflation Reduction Act, which I continue to press leadership to frame as a “downpayment.”
Moving on, we desperately need better messaging from our leadership amplifying that we currently have 49 Senate Democrats prepared not only to pass the Reconciliation package but also to pass filibuster reform, allowing increasingly more legislation to move to the floor for debate and an up or down majority vote.
We simply need 1) to hold our 49 Senate seats (excluding Manchin and Sinema), 2) to flip one currently-held Republican Senate seat, 3) to retake the House and 4) to hold the White House—none of which is a given but certainly is attainable.
Barbara Jo Krieger: Manchin may say he is a Democrat. Listen to his words; observe his vote. He is anything but a Democrat. Is this a new tactic of the repubs; to have one of their own run as a Democrat?
Barbara, Because Manchin caucused with Senate Dems, I counted him among the 50. I also would add, at times, he voted with the Democrats, for example, in favor of the Inflation Reduction Act which received zero Republican support.
Still, the more important point is his irrelevance in November, 2024, at least as a Senator.
It sure seems like it!
Dens could have changed the rules, since they actually had 51 votes counting the president pro tem.
Peter, I don’t follow your thinking. From 2021 to 23 Senate Dems had only 48 caucus members who would consider a filibuster rule change. I would note, contrary to 2021, by Jan 22 all 48 were receptive to the rule change.
From 2023 to the present, 49 Senate Democrats are receptive to the rule change, one shy of the 50 needed for a Democratic VP to cast the tie-breaking vote.
You're right; there were two Dinos, but Dems technically had 50+1. Could Biden or majority leader muster all those votes? — I don't know; we don't even know if they tried on these issues.
Peter, President Biden and Senate Leader Schumer worked tirelessly to get Manchin and Sinema to sign on to filibuster reform. For example, in January 2022, 48 Senate Dems agreed to a rule change that would have allowed both sides 100 speaking hours before the Freedom to Vote: John R. Lewis Act could move to the floor for an up or down majority vote. Manchin and Sinema joined the 50 Republicans who opposed that exceedingly modest rule change.
Sinema is out coming next election.
Yes, definitely attainable!
All good Barbara Jo but most voters do not and will not remember such things or care much about the filibuster. But sure, Biden can tell people give him a Dem Congress so he can get X done.
Steve, They might care if one recited bills that passed by a simple majority in the Democratically-controlled House, but were blocked in the Democratically-controlled Senate because they didn’t reach the three-fifths-vote threshold required to send the bill to the floor for an up or down majority vote. Here are 3, none of which qualified for budget reconciliation: 1) a $15 hourly minimum wage, 2) the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, 3) the PRO Act, to name a few.
Additionally, you might recall that last August Ohioans were well enough informed to vote “no” on a resolution that would have required 60% to pass future amendments to the Ohio Constitution.
They should be trying it out on audiences now and see how well it works
Steve, Good idea, were Dems planning to run on the filibuster, which I expect they don’t. Currently, I’m pressing for Dems to amplify the social infrastructure piece of Biden’s Build Back Better agenda—the legislation in the reconciliation package— that included extension of the child tax credit, affordable, quality childcare, universal pre-k, investments in housing, in eldercare, in climate, and more. I want to see Dems, receipts in hand, making the argument in West Virginia, and also in the red parts of Mississippi and Alabama, and in other states and say, “Who do you want here—somebody who doesn’t want to extend the child tax credit or those who do?” “Somebody who doesn’t want to cut the price of prescription drugs or those who do?” “Doesn’t want to provide affordable, quality childcare and universal Pre-K or those who do?” “Doesn’t want to make investments in paid family and medical leave, in housing, in eldercare, in climate, in universal healthcare or those who do?” My point, and note I haven’t mentioned what Biden and the Party, indeed, have accomplished, is that Democrats have an extraordinarily appealing narrative, if only they would deliver it.
Disabled. We have a safety net funded in large part by a Social Security disability trust fund. .
We haven't had a safety net since 1996 for others, courtesy of Clinton's elimination of "welfare as you knew it."
However, at age 65 anyone who is destitute is eligible for SSI, which comes from the general funds of the US.
As a general proposition, people in red states get no general assistance.
Clinton was a Wolf 🐺 in Sheep’s Clothing , truly a southern landowner mentality. Not to mention giving the Chinese free rein over products and defense technologies surface to Air Missles system that they copied , improved and then made for themselves in their own factories...
Clinton got lots of Chinese money in his non profits funds...
“We have to give China a seat at the economic table make them part of our economic system ...”
All true — but China is not the international bully, the largest purveyor of violence in the world [MLK] — that's US.
I understand that point but sometimes in the World you are the aggressor or the Victim. Can we all get along ? Is not something politicians in other countries.
Every rocket missile or drone attack is a propaganda victory for foreign politicians to rally voters as they give the Great Satanic United States a black eye…
Iran has no ability to have a outright war with the United States but funding various groups that get paid to launch 🚀 Iranian made missiles Drones and Rockets 🧨 against United States, commercial and political interest…
Always follow the money…
Being morally correct in an immoral world will get you killed…
China is not a nice group of people , life is cheap there and they want to dominate the world economy the are not Intrested In being fair or nice it’s about power and money…
US leaders 'want to dominate the world economy… are not Interested In being fair or nice it’s about power and money…'
I know I will catch flak for saying this but …. The Chinese culture does not value fairness or being civil. Look at how they behave in Vancouver Canada.
That's the truth. As a little test, I suggest people go ask for assistance. Then you'll see it's not actually there or the bar is so low you'll never met the income requirements. And, no BP oil payouts was far from making everything correct for FL
God's will. Just as the slaveowner savagely beat his slave and then went back to reading his bible which says this is ok. Why? Because the bible was written by guys so they could have control over others. There is no Jesus . By the end of this century, religions should be viewed as the hoax they are and have always been so.
I consider religions to be cults because of the 'exclusion' factor, and the 'controlling' factor. It's just some religious cults have more members than others. The use of a belief as truth rankles.
The general rules of almost all religions are:
1. My religion is the true religion .
2. Your religion is a false religion, unless it’s also the same as my religion .
3. Our religion collects money to do gods work here on earth .
As If God has Fiscal Problem…
He made water into wine ; so making gold money out of dust should be no problem ???
The religions were created by men and are used to discriminate against women and those considered as 'less'.
It's all rubbish.
It’s difficult (impossible) to accept orthodox Christian teaching that Jesus is sitting at the right hand of God in heaven, remotely directing activities on earth.
No Jesus ?
That Means No Christmas ???
I’m a Sun Worshipper heathen.
I believe Christmas is needed to remind the Sun to Come Back to warm the earth so seeds can sprout become crops and feed us..,
From the research I have seen, when you increase the minimum wage, you immediately see a boost to the economy. The conservatives always scream that if you increase the minimum wage it will lead to job losses and small business failures. What you actually see is happier, healthier workers who have more money to spend and that creates more economic activity and jobs.
The empirical evidence appears to confirm your statement even though neoclassical economic theory does not.
Robert - so true.
wonderfully said. I also like taxing excessive compensation.
The problem is defining what is excess.
$100 million per year? Absolutely.!
$10 million? Unclear. CEOs running large corporations have a lot of responsibility.
$1 million? No! Lots fo professionals (doctors, dentists, lawyers, consultants even university professors with side gigs) can earn this much by working hard enough.
If we limited CEO pay to 500 x the pay of the lowest paid employee in the company, the minimum wage would skyrocket.
Nothing that hard about a wealth tax.
We already have a wealth tax on the middle class for home ownership. For renters it gets passed through by the landlord. Why not financial assets?
I don’t like the wealth tax as much as the tax on corporations that funnel so much wealth to upper management—people just shouldn’t get that rich in the first place!
@ Mary. Doesn't reach foreign entities doing business in the US.
Can’t it be written to reach them? We’ve had and even now have other laws controlling foreign companies’ business practices when they’re doing business with us.
The only way to reach them is through a sales tax or VAT tax. In most cases they don't pay income taxes. Products made, say in China, may/may not be subject to import taxes. The profits are made by Chinese companies that are not registered as doing business in the US. Our trade policies promote cheap products and we don't get import tax that equates to income or wealth taxes.
Also, our economy is undermined by foreign monopolies like OPEC which sets oil production and thus prices. Saudis control those prices but control our oil refineries and big companies like Exxon. We do not have authority to sue them for price fixing.
How is VAT different than an import duty?
Subject to treaties, which rise to the same level as the Constitution and preempt other laws. https://ustr.gov/trade-agreements/free-trade-agreements
Well the point is certainly true but I don’t see how it’s related to the problem of corporations’ grotesque overpayment of upper management in their US branches.
You miss the forest for the trees. The REAL problem is short term gratification. As Robert said the REAL problem is that extremely wealthy people merely borrow from themselves. Avoid income taxes. They may/may not be CEOs. Management and owners (i.e. shareholders) may have a conflict.
CEOs and directors often want their money to the detriment of the long term life of the company. They take a golden parachute off into the sunset. In some cases that bankrupts the employer and puts the employees out of their jobs.
If you heard what he said about Musk is true of many of them. If they are registered to do business in Delaware, the STATE has a provision that limits the disparity.
I think our national interest should not be to subsidize foreign companies selling here to the detriment of domestic taxpayers.
Wealth Tax For everything above $4 million Dollars, disallow the companies providing the outrageous benefits from deducting it in the companies taxes.
No credits or work arounds in the tax code. All compensation above $4 million dollars taxed at 40% just like the 40% the typical wage slaves pay in taxes on their wages.
Charity deductions cut by 2/3 .
Charitable deductions could save us! Should actually be "charitable" and not self serving.
This was written for lawyers:
December 01, 2011 FINANCIAL PLANNING
Social Security—Maybe Charity Should Begin at Home
By Daniel F. Solomon
For most of its history, Social Security was a terrific bargain: our parents and grandparents most probably received significantly more benefits than they paid into the Social Security Trust Fund. The trust fund comprises the Old-Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI) and Disability Insurance (DI) Trust Funds (OASDI, collectively).
In most cases, because our family units could rely on these benefits, they were able to enjoy enough financial independence to send people like us to school so that we could become lawyers—productive and, in some cases, wealthy, members of society. For 75 years, the Social Security Trust Fund has helped enable American soci- ety to achieve far beyond the aspirations of its founders, ultimately providing more than subsistence to retirees by also protecting widows, orphans, and disabled people. The dignity provided to needy beneficiaries surely far outweighs the economic value of the funds.
However, financial experts have long predicted a future insolvency of the funds. A majority of Americans have invested in the funds, recognize their social utility, and do not want to burden their heirs. Although there have been legislative attempts to “fix” the system, there is no consensus how to do it. The Congressional Research Service reported:
For example, for workers who earned average wages and retired in 1980 at age 65, it took 2.8 years to recover the value of the retirement portion of the combined employee and employer shares of their Social Security taxes plus interest. For their counterparts who retired at age 65 in 2002, it will take 16.9 years. For those retiring in 2020, it will take 20.9 years.
Geoffrey Kollmann and Dawn Nuschler, “Social Security Reform” (October 2002).
The National Commission on Social Security Reform (informally known as the “Greenspan Commission” after its chairman) was appointed by the Congress and President Ronald Reagan in 1981 in response to a short-term financing crisis that Social Security faced at that time. Estimates were that the OASI Trust Fund would run out of money possibly as early as August 1983. Congress rendered a compromise that extended the retirement age from 65 to 67, through a deal that raised payroll taxes and trimmed benefits enough to keep Social Security solvent. See Jackie Calmes, “Political Memo: The Bipartisan Panel: Did It Really Work?” New York Times, January 18, 2010. However, the legislation addressed only the immediate problem and did not address the long-term viability of the fund. See also Rudolph G. Penner, “The Greenspan Commission and the Social Security Reforms of 1983,” in Triumphs and Tragedies of the Modern Presidency, David Abshire, Editor. Washington: Center for the Study of the Presidency, pp. 129–31.
The George W. Bush administration commission deliberated on the issue and then called for a transition to a combination of a government-funded program and personal accounts (“individual” or “private accounts”) through partial privatization of the system.
President Barack Obama reportedly strongly opposes privatization or raising the retirement age but supports raising the cap on the payroll tax ($106,800 in 2009) to help fund the program. He has appointed a National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, which is to report and offer another fix.
Current estimates predict that payroll taxes will only cover 78% of the scheduled payout amounts after 2037. This declines to 75% by 2084. 2010 OASDI Trust- ees Report, Figure II.D2, www.ssa.gov/OACT/TR/2010/ trTOC.html.
Although the congressional plan was to ensure solvency through Federal Insurance Contributions Act (FICA) tax, there is a private means to help: to also consider the humanitarian and charitable nature of the Social Security Administration (SSA), which has been possible since a legislative fix in 1972. Before then, bequests naming Social Security or a trust fund as a beneficiary could not be accepted, which caused problems in administration of some estates. Money gifts or bequests may be accepted for deposit by the managing trustee of the OASI and DI funds. Section 170(c)(l) of the Internal Revenue Code lists the U.S. government among the educational or charitable organizations to which donations are acceptable. Gifts must be unconditional, except that the donor may designate to which fund the gift should be donated. If no fund is designated, the gift is credited to the OASI Trust Fund.
However, SSA has not publicized its charitable persona. Although the agency has received some gifts and bequests, they have been insignificant and not given consideration in a possible fix. The concept has been so unimportant to the experts that the Annual Statistical Supplement to the Social Security Bulletin does not specify how much the administration has received in gifts and bequests. Total revenue from gifts to the trust funds has been quite small. From 1974 to 1979 the most received in any one year was $91,949.88. During that period, the average annual amount was only $39,847. In 1980, almost two-thirds of the gifts were less than $100. The median gift size was $50. One person, for example, donated $13.11. She arrived at that amount by applying 5.85% (the employee tax rate then in effect) to her benefit amount and donated it to help “‘shore up’ the sagging, dwindling Social Security fund.” However, the 2010 Social Security Trustees Report lists them as about $98,000 (www.ssa.gov/OACT/TR/2010/III_ cyoper.html#2). Compared to many other charities, this is a paltry amount.
Apparently, SSA has never done a feasibility study nor marketing research to determine how an aggressive campaign could raise funds to support Social Security, or how gifts and bequests could reduce the current estimates of impending doom. According to some estimates total deductions taken for all charities next year would be $413.5 billion. Estimates for fiscal year 2011 are that SSA will spend $730 billion. That amount is already covered through “contributions” (taxes), but it is reasonable that charitable contributions to the trust fund could significantly lessen taxpayer exposure for impending doom, if not return the fund to solvency.
As lawyers, we have the capacity to remind our families, our clients, and the public at large that there is a way to contribute to help endow future generations in the pursuit of the same kind of social stability that Social Security provided to our parents and grandparents.
Daniel F. Solomon is an administrative law judge at the U.S. Department of Labor, member of the ABA House of Delegates, past chair of the National Conference of Administrative Judiciary, Judicial Division, president of the Federal Administrative Law Judges Conference, and author of Breaking Up with Cuba (McFarland, 2011). All opinions expressed are those of the author and not any organization or group.
Exactly Self Serving Charities like Buffett s and others have boards that are populated by friends and mostly FAMILY...
Buffett is one guy who is righteous. Most of his money goes to the Gates Foundation. He supports charitable causes.
Pick on someone else.
Gates has his family on his foundations.
Maybe even board members .
Usually paid Board positions.
Facts is not picking …
How many people give away the majority of their money and/or means of making money ?
That’s like a cave man ( person) giving away all their Food Shelter Clothing Weapons. Normally not happening.
I respect bill gates for everything he has done but worshipping him is not in the cards, Warren Buffett also but their foundations do limited good but generate tax breaks/credits for the individuals and companies.
Ray crock (McDonalds) kept down minimum wages to make McDonald’s more profitable.
He also invented/implemented office cubicles to keep the workers focused on their work, and not on socializing.
Treating people as if they were just animals Or things to make only money
Is not good for people. Dehumanizing people is bad.
He created the ray crock foundation to preserve his wealth and polish his public image and that of his company,
When he died his wife changed it from the ray crock foundation to Her first name crock foundation . Often I see the crocks foundation sponsors of PBS TV & Radio programs. Great image while preserving wealth !!!
A win win for the crocks and NPR PBS.
Bad analogies. You don't know Jack about Gates and Buffett.
The Giving Pledge is a charitable campaign, founded by Bill Gates and Warren Buffett, to encourage wealthy people to contribute a majority (i.e. at least 50%) of their wealth to philanthropic causes. As of June 2022, the pledge has had 236 signatories from 28 countries.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Giving_Pledge#:~:text=The%20Giving%20Pledge%20is%20a,236%20signatories%20from%2028%20countries.
Why not tax the excess at 100 percent?
You want some good news to celebrate? Here it is! Enjoy!
"DEMOCRACY ON TRIAL" is streaming on PBS Frontline.
"FRONTLINE investigates the roots of the criminal cases against former President Trump stemming from his 2020 election loss. With the presidential race for 2024 underway, veteran political filmmaker Michael Kirk and his team examine the House Jan. 6 committee’s evidence, the historic charges against Trump and the threat to democracy."
My father was a Capitol Police Officer when I was child. I remember meeting his boss and co-workers in the Capitol. I was in awe while in the Capitol. "Make no mistake," as my father would say, J6 was a horrific, violent, planned attack on the Capitol Police, "the People's House," and our Democracy.
J6 never should have happened. Intentional lies created one of the worst days in US Capitol history. It can never happen again. We can never forget J6. Please share this program with everyone, regardless of their political party affiliation.
While very disturbing at times, it's a must see. It's very well done. Time to bring back the watch parties.
From transcript:
BENNIE THOMPSON:
Judge J. Michael Luttig is one of the leading conservative legal thinkers in the country. He’s served in administrations of President Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush.
ROBERT DRAPER:
Judge Luttig had a kind of moral authority within the conservative community...
(Fast fwd a few secs)
JUDGE MICHAEL LUTTIG:
Mr. Eastman said to the president that there was both legal as well as historical precedent for the vice president to overturn the election. This is Constitutional mischief. I would have laid my body across the road before I would have let the vice president overturn the 2020 election.
I diagrammed his legal analysis, from beginning to end, and concluded that he was wrong at every turn of his analysis, every turn of his thinking.
PETE AGUILAR:
Judge Luttig, you wrote that the efforts by President Trump to overturn the 2020 election were, quote, “the most reckless, insidious and calamitous failures in both legal and political judgment in American history.” What did you mean by that?
JUDGE MICHAEL LUTTIG:
Exactly what I said, Congressman.
It's "capitol"
Some of them, and Bennie Thompson have civil suits for damages. Why haven't they deposed people like Gym Jordan, Scott Perry, Matt Gaetz, etc who asked for pardons from Trump re Jan 6. What about the Fox employees to determine whether they knew or had reason to know they were inciting harm to the capitol police?
Good questions. I don't know. And thank you!
Yes, yes, and yes! More tax on corporations, a wealth tax, and stop stock buy backs.
These monopolies make so much profit they don't need all of these other options for them to make even more. How about giving back some to employees and communities like companies used to before Ronnie and "trickle down".
"If CEO pay is out of control, what should be done?” is the question of the day.
The villain is not Trump, Musk or the Republican party. It is the antiquated capitalistic system that rewards greed and treachery and now pulls the levers of power including Trump and the Republicans by immoral utilization of wealth and power. Rampant out of control capitalism is the demon behind the curtain that is disempowering and now even disemboweling what once was our beloved democracy. Sooner of later we must formulate and activate an economic system not built on the premise that “Greed is good.”
A wealth tax is like the preverbal finger in the dike. That we even need dikes to stay above the water is the root problem. There is no “fixing the capitalistic system.” It is a self-defeating system because it is impoverishing the consumers on which it depends. We do not fix it with a wealth tax, we look to replace it with a system that looks after the welfare of all. Most of us have children and grandchildren; we owe it to them to lay the groundwork for a system that will give them some hope for the future even if we do not live long enough to enjoy the benefits of our far-sighted plans and progress.
As bad as capitalism is, history shows that communism is much worse, because it easily allows autocrats to assume control, and socialism works only if paired with capitalism, the way it's done in the Scandinavian countries. They are not socialistic countries.
After the U.S.S.R. failed, demonstrators there showed carried signs that read, "Workers of the World, We Apologize," playing off Marx's famous last line in "Capital." As well they should!
After getting nowhere with socialism, China opened the capitalistic flood gates "with Chinese characteristics," which, as far as I can tell, includes a police state. However, capitalism is given credit for raising more people out of poverty in China more quickly than any other regime in history. That fact must be acknowledged, not sloughed off.
It seems to me that the problem, no matter the system, is human greed and selfishness, plus we humans are happy to use violence to get what we want. In short, we have met the enemy, and he is us. Even all the utopias failed. Plato admitted in his great and lengthy epic, "The Republic," that we just can't bring heaven down to Earth. Can we make small to moderate improvements? Yes, FDR, my hero, did some good things for the people, but what really got the U.S. out of our Great Depression was World War II, which, if you will, was in large part a government employment program -- everyone had a job. MMT wants to institute a federally supported jobs program. (More on that in a minute)
I also question whether modeling our economy on Scandinavian countries is wise. They are tiny homogeneous countries with highly educated populations satisfied with reasonable incomes, not needing to become multimillionaires, unlike too many Americans.
You promote SPROUT, a new idea to me. New ideas are usually worth considering, because maybe one or two of them will help, and if so, great.
My new push is for Modern Monetary Theory (MMT), which provides a more accurate description of how our federal government budget works. We had it all wrong. They aren't like a household's, a city's, a county's, or a state's, nor like a corporation's. Those entities must either balance their budgets, by law, or make a profit if they want to remain afloat. The federal government is under none of those constraints. The federal government can print money, raise taxes, and set interest rates; it is the only one that can do all that, which makes all the difference. We can spend money on any viable project; funding is never a problem, because we print our own fiat currency. For instance, our space program created many new discoveries, good-paying jobs, and, in short, paid for itself. The government's red ink just shows its amount of investment in us, the people. Without government investment, our GDP would be about a third of what it is now.
MMT is a win-win. For more on that, I recommend "The Deficit Myth" by Stephanie Kelton. It's a game-changer. Plus, in that book, she refers you to other macroeconomists who support MMT. (Bernie Sanders and AOC support MMT; unfortunately, they don't have the courage to tell America that we can fund any worthwhile project, because Americans believe that the federal budget is just like their household's, i.e., you can't spend money you don't have, and you must pay it back relatively quickly or pay exorbitant interest, and that the national debt is not worrisome until it gets much, much larger.)
The remuneration committees of big companies are meant to at arm's length from the boardroom and independent when setting remuneration packages.There is however an unfortunate Venn diagram of overlapping interests whereby rival company pay is inflated by mutual reference points not actual value delivered.Share buy backs can be good for bolstering sagging underperforming sharesfor equity holders some of whom are institutional investors who sit or recommend nominees for remuneration committees.It all becomes a vicious perpetual cycle of mutual gratification.This didn't apparently apply in Musk's case as he set his own rewards package without consultation but if he had sought approval then it would have been rubber stamped Hey ho free enterprise across the globe!
The Republican party reminds me of a Si-Fi movie where the main monster gives birth to an even more menacing creature that enjoys eating people on a scale that glues movie goers to their seats. Sadly, our political monsters are eating our basic freedoms, and we're letting them do it.
Donald Hodgins, good analogy.
I go with the majority so far. Tax the wealthy. Reagan really screwed us over by reducing taxes on the wealthy with his stupid trickle down economics plan. Another reason people fail to learn from history. Trickle down economics didn't work in the 20s either. What's that saying? Those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it. Well, here we are repeating it AGAIN
We need Tums treats upset democracy caused by too much wealth in the hands of the few. For fast autocracy relief!
Follow the money, hit them where it hurts, their pockets.
I don't know where the framing came from for the term "Wealth Tax" but we should do away with it. The term makes is sound like an extra tax on the wealthy, when they are not even paying their fair share. I can't imagine paying 3.4% income tax on my income like the wealthy are paying. "Fair Share" is a better term.
Inequality tax. Wealth gap tax. I am with you. We call it a wealth tax because it is taxing wealth. It only got like that from the lack of tax on income for the wealthy with the as you said 3.4% compared to 25% to 36% that we pay. Tax cheats tax?
Fair tax.
It is hard to discuss the control of CEO pay when we refuse to take money out of politics and love that campaigning goes on for a couple of years because it diverts us from the mundaneness of our lives and gives the media something to write about.
All of the above
I enjoy listening to you and Heather. You are the highlight of my Saturdays!
In America every citizen has the right to pay as little in taxes as the law will allow. I am sorry, but corporations are NOT voting persons and different tax liability applies no matter what Citizen's United legislation falsely and prejudiciously implies. When a business files an Articles of Incorporation it is a protection that stipulates a non person cannot be sued. A corporation must not be given a guarantee against liability as a non person and then be treated as a person when contributing to popular voting issues. Corporations can't have it both ways. It is incredulous to me that our legislators cannot author legislation that is more consistent. OOPS, my stupidity, they are simply corrupt or incompetent. Are humans so basically crooked that we cannot dispense with payoffs, loopholes, extortion and graft in our government? My belief in a two party system has been shaken by the incompetence and corrupt actions of republicans. By winning in November democrats will have the power to demonstrate to republicans that their partisan false notions of government must represent the majority if they are to have any relevance on a brutally demanding world stage. The eyes of the world are watching America and waiting for America to mature.
We are also being outflanked by our adversaries using the soft underbelly of our democracy "free speech" principles and law which currently allow for unacceptably wide asymmetry between authoritarian regimes and ourselves.
If trumpet 🎺 or Biden get more mature they’ll be dead…
The tax credit is political nonsense.
It gives nothing to the low income family that pays no income tax. Our politicians on both sides don't understand poverty.
This is simply a grandstand issue.
Forget about tax breaks they need a direct payment no strings attached.
In Oregon, ten Republican incumbents in the state legislature are no longer eligible to run in this year's election. In Oregon, legislators often gum up the legislative process by simply not showing up. Last year, Oregon citizens drafted and passed Measure 113 which cites that any legislator who takes an unexcused absence of more than ten days is ineligible to run in the next election. Ten Republicans staged a six week walkout, and now they're gone.