France plans to implement 75% tax bracket on the rich

[CBWx2]

Why does defense spending fall in line with a belief in limited government?
Because defense is one of the few enumerated powers of the federal goverernment ( try reading the constitution sometime ) , and spending in that area will tend to skyrocket in a war-time situation, unfortunately.

And so do revenues, at least they should, otherwise one might be found in a situation where they are accumulating massive amounts of debt. But I'm still trying to wrap my brain around the notion that tripling military spending isn't increasing the federal government. There were, of course, things other than the Cold War that Reagan spent money on, so this is really just banter for me at this point, but an increase in enumerated federal powers is still an increase in the federal government, is it not? What am I missing here?

It's both. Reagan should bear some of the blame, although he had a Democratic Congress for the majority of his presidency , and nothing came easy .  Obama's bonehead spending policies have all had enough Democratic and RINO support to pass ; Obama care , the joke of a stimulis plan , you name it.  It's a lot easier to increase the size of government than to try and drastically cut it . The resistance to cutting is always greater , because governement by it's very nature always wants to increase it's size and importance.

Cop out argument. Reagan had a Republican lead Senate for 6 of the 8 years he was in office. Also, things have come just as hard for Obama as they did for Reagan, actually harder, because there is no Republican equivalent to Tip O'Neill in the current House for Obama to negotiate with.

[spartan]

Negotiate? Obama hasn't even spoken to Paul Ryan in 12 months and twice with Boehner this year! How you supposed to negotiate?

[Dolorous Jason]

Why does defense spending fall in line with a belief in limited government?
Because defense is one of the few enumerated powers of the federal goverernment ( try reading the constitution sometime ) , and spending in that area will tend to skyrocket in a war-time situation, unfortunately.

And so do revenues, at least they should, otherwise one might be found in a situation where they are accumulating massive amounts of debt.

It's true , if a war is important enough to spend tons of money on , the people of that country should be willing to have thier taxes raised during that time. HOWEVER ,if we weren't wasting revenue on so many other ridiculous endeavors , we'd most likely already be running at a big enough surplus to cover things like this.

There were, of course, things other than the Cold War that Reagan spent money on, so this is really just banter for me at this point, but an increase in enumerated federal powers is still an increase in the federal government, is it not? What am I missing here?

Of course there were , which is why I said Reagan gets some of the blame also. What you are missing is that Reagan didn't always practice what he preached , so to blame the debt on a belief in limited government is ridiculous on your part.

It's both. Reagan should bear some of the blame, although he had a Democratic Congress for the majority of his presidency , and nothing came easy .  Obama's bonehead spending policies have all had enough Democratic and RINO support to pass ; Obama care , the joke of a stimulis plan , you name it.  It's a lot easier to increase the size of government than to try and drastically cut it . The resistance to cutting is always greater , because governement by it's very nature always wants to increase it's size and importance.

Cop out argument. Reagan had a Republican lead Senate for 6 of the 8 years he was in office. Also, things have come just as hard for Obama as they did for Reagan, actually harder, because there is no Republican equivalent to Tip O'Neill in the current House for Obama to negotiate with.

Reagan had a slight majority in Senate for 6 years,  but was a huge minority in the House of Represenatives for all of the 8 years. Hardly the kind of numbers that allow for a free pass.  Not to mention , as I already said , it's much harder to cut than it is to increase. Republican senators have thier special interests and kickbacks they need funded also in order to secure re-election.

Not sure why you are so confused by any of this.

[CBWx2]

Why does defense spending fall in line with a belief in limited government?
Because defense is one of the few enumerated powers of the federal goverernment ( try reading the constitution sometime ) , and spending in that area will tend to skyrocket in a war-time situation, unfortunately.

And so do revenues, at least they should, otherwise one might be found in a situation where they are accumulating massive amounts of debt.

It's true , if a war is important enough to spend tons of money on , the people of that country should be willing to have thier taxes raised during that time. HOWEVER ,if we weren't wasting revenue on so many other ridiculous endeavors , we'd most likely already be running at a big enough surplus to cover things like this.

Let's put it this way, Neither the Vietnam War or the Korean War, or even the Cold War in it's 1947-1980 manifestation, bankrupted the US in the way that the Cold War did in the 80's, and we still had the same big budgetary obligations during that time as we did in the 1980's. So how is it that Reagan's Cold War managed to increase the debt at so much faster a rate than either of those two actual wars or the Cold War under previous presidents did?

There were, of course, things other than the Cold War that Reagan spent money on, so this is really just banter for me at this point, but an increase in enumerated federal powers is still an increase in the federal government, is it not? What am I missing here?

Of course there were , which is why I said Reagan gets some of the blame also. What you are missing is that Reagan didn't always practice what he preached , so to blame the debt on a belief in limited government is ridiculous on your part.

I didn't blame the debt on the belief in limited government. I blamed it on Reaganomics.

Reagan had a slight majority in Senate for 6 years,  but was a huge minority in the House of Represenatives for all of the 8 years. Hardly the kind of numbers that allow for a free pass.  Not to mention , as I already said , it's much harder to cut than it is to increase. Republican senators have thier special interests and kickbacks they need funded also in order to secure re-election.

Not sure why you are so confused by any of this.

So what cuts did Reagan request that got blocked? I'm not asking you what he campaigned on, mind you. I am asking what did he specifically propose that was blocked by the Democratic-led House? I think there is quite a bit of revisionism going on here, for example, the revisionism that congress forced Reagan to spend more than he wanted. The fact is that the opposite was actually true.

[Dolorous Jason]

I didn't blame the debt on the belief in limited government. I blamed it on Reaganomics.

It's what you implied . We were arguing the benefits of a limited government over the huge nanny-state you seem to support , and your counter-argument for our not being able to afford this nanny-state was that , "well look what happened under Reagan , that's when the out-of-control spending started."

Don't forget the premise of what brought us to this point in the the argument to begin with. If you are now arguing that Reagan really didn't decrease the size of government at all , then all you are doing is proving my point. Congrats.

[dbucfan]

An answer about 1982 and Reagan's plan - some of which went forward - http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa013.html

And a comparison between then and now http://www.forbes.com/sites/peterferrara/2011/05/05/reaganomics-vs-obamanomics-facts-and-figures/2/

[Dolorous Jason]

And a comparison between then and now http://www.forbes.com/sites/peterferrara/2011/05/05/reaganomics-vs-obamanomics-facts-and-figures/2/

That second link is a great article. It shows Reagan had the right idea as far as economics and stimulating the economy. He just dropped the ball by not cutting out enough of the other ridiculous government spending like he campaigned for orignially.

[CBWx2]

I didn't blame the debt on the belief in limited government. I blamed it on Reaganomics.

It's what you implied . We were arguing the benefits of a limited government over the huge nanny-state you seem to support , and your counter-argument for our not being able to afford this nanny-state was that , "well look what happened under Reagan , that's when the out-of-control spending started."

Don't forget the premise of what brought us to this point in the the argument to begin with. If you are now arguing that Reagan really didn't decrease the size of government at all , then all you are doing is proving my point. Congrats.

Actually, we weren't arguing the benefits of anything over anything. I was arguing against your premise that it was the nanny state that was to blame for our current national debt. I pointed out that in the 30+ years after the New Deal, the national debt was actually shrinking steadily, and in the 30+ years since the Reagan Revolution, it has grown rapidly. Now if you are asserting that it was the nanny state that caused public debt to balloon out of control, how do you reconcile the fact that it didn't until the Reagan presidency?

[CBWx2]

And a comparison between then and now http://www.forbes.com/sites/peterferrara/2011/05/05/reaganomics-vs-obamanomics-facts-and-figures/2/

That second link is a great article. It shows Reagan had the right idea as far as economics and stimulating the economy. He just dropped the ball by not cutting out enough of the other ridiculous government spending like he campaigned for orignially.

Except the Reagan tax cuts didn't stimulate the economy. Shortly after his initial cuts, the economy actually didn't see improvement, it worsened. When are you going to learn that Peter Ferrara is a Reagan crony who is apt to telling half truths about the Reagan era economy.

[dbucfan]

Yep.  Though there is almost an endless supply of folks who think there might be a flaw or two in those thoughts http://www.fsmitha.com/h2/ch37-reagan2.htm

[John Galt?]

Back to the original post...


First there is a HUGE difference between raising taxes on those making over $1.23 million/yr and those making over $125k/yr.

Second, there is no way that taxing those dozen odd people making over $1.23 mill will have the slightest impact on the French debt. France's debt is near $2 trillion so even if there are 1,000 people earning over $1.23 mill and you get an average of $2 mill in added taxes from them, that is still only $2 billion or 1/10th of 1% of the debt.

I have no problem with congress raising the top rate on those making over $1 mill/yr but you are only talking about 236,883.

I have a HUGE problem with raising rates on the 17,446,538 that make over $125k/yr ($250k if filing jointly) like BHO keeps insisting on. That group includes all the potential job creators like restauranteurs, building contractors, bar owners, auto repair, AC repair, etc...


....oh wait I forgot...those people didn't build their businesses, the govt. did so how could they build them bigger to create more jobs...D'uh

[Dolorous Jason]

I didn't blame the debt on the belief in limited government. I blamed it on Reaganomics.

It's what you implied . We were arguing the benefits of a limited government over the huge nanny-state you seem to support , and your counter-argument for our not being able to afford this nanny-state was that , "well look what happened under Reagan , that's when the out-of-control spending started."

Don't forget the premise of what brought us to this point in the the argument to begin with. If you are now arguing that Reagan really didn't decrease the size of government at all , then all you are doing is proving my point. Congrats.

Actually, we weren't arguing the benefits of anything over anything. I was arguing against your premise that it was the nanny state that was to blame for our current national debt. I pointed out that in the 30+ years after the New Deal, the national debt was actually shrinking steadily, and in the 30+ years since the Reagan Revolution, it has grown rapidly. Now if you are asserting that it was the nanny state that caused public debt to balloon out of control, how do you reconcile the fact that it didn't until the Reagan presidency?

You do the math , dumb ass:



Get it yet ?

[CBWx2]

I didn't blame the debt on the belief in limited government. I blamed it on Reaganomics.

It's what you implied . We were arguing the benefits of a limited government over the huge nanny-state you seem to support , and your counter-argument for our not being able to afford this nanny-state was that , "well look what happened under Reagan , that's when the out-of-control spending started."

Don't forget the premise of what brought us to this point in the the argument to begin with. If you are now arguing that Reagan really didn't decrease the size of government at all , then all you are doing is proving my point. Congrats.

Actually, we weren't arguing the benefits of anything over anything. I was arguing against your premise that it was the nanny state that was to blame for our current national debt. I pointed out that in the 30+ years after the New Deal, the national debt was actually shrinking steadily, and in the 30+ years since the Reagan Revolution, it has grown rapidly. Now if you are asserting that it was the nanny state that caused public debt to balloon out of control, how do you reconcile the fact that it didn't until the Reagan presidency?

You do the math , dumb ass:



Get it yet ?

No legitimate response to the question asked. Surrender noted.

[CBWx2]

Back to the original post...


First there is a HUGE difference between raising taxes on those making over $1.23 million/yr and those making over $125k/yr.

Second, there is no way that taxing those dozen odd people making over $1.23 mill will have the slightest impact on the French debt. France's debt is near $2 trillion so even if there are 1,000 people earning over $1.23 mill and you get an average of $2 mill in added taxes from them, that is still only $2 billion or 1/10th of 1% of the debt.

I have no problem with congress raising the top rate on those making over $1 mill/yr but you are only talking about 236,883.

I have a HUGE problem with raising rates on the 17,446,538 that make over $125k/yr ($250k if filing jointly) like BHO keeps insisting on. That group includes all the potential job creators like restauranteurs, building contractors, bar owners, auto repair, AC repair, etc...


....oh wait I forgot...those people didn't build their businesses, the govt. did so how could they build them bigger to create more jobs...D'uh

Only 2-3% of all small businesses would be affected by the tax increases that BHO is promoting.

[Dolorous Jason]

I didn't blame the debt on the belief in limited government. I blamed it on Reaganomics.

It's what you implied . We were arguing the benefits of a limited government over the huge nanny-state you seem to support , and your counter-argument for our not being able to afford this nanny-state was that , "well look what happened under Reagan , that's when the out-of-control spending started."

Don't forget the premise of what brought us to this point in the the argument to begin with. If you are now arguing that Reagan really didn't decrease the size of government at all , then all you are doing is proving my point. Congrats.

Actually, we weren't arguing the benefits of anything over anything. I was arguing against your premise that it was the nanny state that was to blame for our current national debt. I pointed out that in the 30+ years after the New Deal, the national debt was actually shrinking steadily, and in the 30+ years since the Reagan Revolution, it has grown rapidly. Now if you are asserting that it was the nanny state that caused public debt to balloon out of control, how do you reconcile the fact that it didn't until the Reagan presidency?

You do the math , dumb ass:



Get it yet ?

No legitimate response to the question asked. Surrender noted.

 Was this not your response ?

I was arguing against your premise that it was the nanny state that was to blame for our current national debt.

Surrender noted.