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coboardhead
Joined: 26 Oct 2009
Posts: 4303
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 Posted: Fri Sep 24, 2010 9:28 pm Post subject: |
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Profile: Gray hair, graduate degree engineering, rural west (conservative county). I will be pretty old in 20 years.
Guess you were wrong.
My views regarding taxes are that the system needs to be fair and straightforward. It needs to cover expenses, foster industry, provide education and defend our country. Do it wisely.
I believe our energy policy is screwed up. No new nukes, buy 2/3 of our oil from overseas - wtf are we thinking!
I have worked for oil, nuclear energy and utilities. I have worked for greenies, trustfunders and school systems.
Deficit spending is not my personal style and don't expect that the government should.
I don't generally get involved in public discourse and discussions such as these. But, I think hearing and expressing opinions may be important at this time of serious division in this country.
Yeah, I support Obama. I would have supported McCain. |
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boggsman1
Joined: 24 Jun 2002
Posts: 9120
Location: at a computer
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| Posted: Fri Sep 24, 2010 10:18 pm Post subject: |
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| isobars wrote: | I would love to respond to the errors in your presumed facts and the foundations of your implied opinions, but it would take pages I haven't the time to type and, if you're anything like the guys and gal I had to killfile, facts wouldn't matter. So I pass. Suffice it to say that it sounds like you fairly recently went to a very liberal university (even though at your age, it's unlikely) and/or live in a very liberal city. I'd be very curious to revisit your thinking in 20 years to see whether/how it has changed. (I'm guessing some of your thinking will change very rapidly as an entrepreneur under the Obama administration.)
Mike |
Mike the 6200+ posts, all of length and detail would indicate you do have the time to respond to the fair minded poster who was sharing his grounded views on America. Funny how righties like you always blame "liberal universities", there are hundreds of great schools in this country. Why doesnt Rupert murdoch start his own university network? he could have Ann Coulter teach history, newt Poli Sci, Pastor Ted-religion, Olly North -Military Affairs, and Sean Hannity could teach English, and the pastor in Gainesville could teach Middle Eastern affairs, Science? some anti Stem Cell freak?Tax policy-Grover Norquist, Economics? how bout W? |
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windoggi
Joined: 22 Feb 2002
Posts: 2743
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| Posted: Fri Sep 24, 2010 10:22 pm Post subject: |
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Careful, coboardhead. If you challenge isobars, he may take your ball and go home.
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/w\ |
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mogunn
Joined: 03 Apr 2006
Posts: 1307
Location: SF Bay
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| Posted: Fri Sep 24, 2010 10:44 pm Post subject: |
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The more things change, the more they stay the same...
| isobars wrote: | | ...if you're anything like the guys and gal I had to killfile, facts wouldn't matter. |
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mo |
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swchandler
Joined: 08 Nov 1993
Posts: 10588
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| Posted: Fri Sep 24, 2010 11:41 pm Post subject: |
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"Add to that a tax on alcohol, corn syrup etc. But not tobacco - smokers die younger and I want to make sure of my SS income."
Having once been an addicted cigarette smoker for way too many years, I found your comment quite humorous. The thing I keep telling myself over and over when quiting was the thought that "there's no future in smoking". Fortunately, I bought the concept. |
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insh8bl
Joined: 08 Aug 2005
Posts: 181
Location: San Francisco, CA & Coconut Cove, Maui HI
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| Posted: Fri Sep 24, 2010 11:55 pm Post subject: |
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"I would love to respond to the errors in your presumed facts and the foundations of your implied opinions, but it would take pages I haven't the time to type and, if you're anything like the guys and gal I had to killfile, facts wouldn't matter. So I pass. Suffice it to say that it sounds like you fairly recently went to a very liberal university (even though at your age, it's unlikely) and/or live in a very liberal city. I'd be very curious to revisit your thinking in 20 years to see whether/how it has changed. (I'm guessing some of your thinking will change very rapidly as an entrepreneur under the Obama administration.)
Mike"
Just when I thought the iso unit had learned to play nice with others, the omnipotent, delusional, neurotic, condescending, narcissistic, and repugnant Mr. Fick rears his ugly head, yet again. Mike we missed you. He must not have found anything to copy and paste on his right-wing-nut web sites.  |
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coboardhead
Joined: 26 Oct 2009
Posts: 4303
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| Posted: Sat Sep 25, 2010 12:19 am Post subject: |
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"The thing I keep telling myself over and over when quiting was the thought that "there's no future in smoking". Fortunately, I bought the concept."
I keep saying the same thing about commenting on Forums.
In all seriousness, the killing has got to stop (tobacco). |
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DanWeiss
Joined: 24 Jun 2008
Posts: 2296
Location: Connecticut, USA
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| Posted: Sat Sep 25, 2010 7:26 am Post subject: |
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| isobars wrote: | | The Fair Tax would immediately eliminate altogether the tax filing time and effort of every taxpayer from Coboardhead to Walmart by 100%, plus reduce the government's size by 100,000 IRS workers, reduce the size of federal income tax laws by 70,000 pages, solve most of the problems and inequities associated with the federal tax system, and bring jobs flooding back into the U.S. by the millions. |
What? What about the huge increase in the burden upon service providers, all of whom would be required to collect the tax? I work very hard to keep my expenses down in order to offer clients a very competitive hourly rate. I've not raised my rates in four years. Adding an additional 30% will not only increase the complexity of my accounting and tax filing but serve as an impediment to potential clients from engaging my or anyone else's legal services.
I'm not so sure I want my refrigerator repairman to calculate the amount of tax owed when he comes to fix the Maytag. Why should the neighborhood kid be forced to calculate and file taxes for his summer yard work? |
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isobars
Joined: 12 Dec 1999
Posts: 20935
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| Posted: Sat Sep 25, 2010 8:21 am Post subject: |
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| coboardhead wrote: | | Guess you were wrong. |
No, dead on. You do sound like ...
But you don't behave like ... , and that's very much to your credit.
Reasons I care about your stated views (and only because you vote) include:
• The Fair Tax is quite progressive (e.g., among two books full of considerations, the poor get fat checks in the mail to more than cover their sales taxes on essentials. The FT is a very impressive system across the board when one actually studies it first hand rather than listening to the liberal media's spin on it.)
• This carbon tax/Cap & Trade BS is exactly that; global wealth redistribution. Nothing more, nothing less. It's about as related to our environment as it is to the price of tea on Alpha Centauri.
• Our defense budget runs about 4% of our GNP. That's dirt cheap and may prove insufficient.
• Some aspects of our nuclear weapons policy, such as letting its technology stagnate and decay, are alarming. Disarmament would be immediate national suicide.
Beyond that ...
• Isn't tobacco more like suicide than killing? The latter implies irresistible external forces to me. I consider it a (bad) choice like any other recreational drug, and support sin taxes for two obvious reasons: a) they probably reduce the impact of those sins on the public and b) that's tax money I don't have to pay.
• One argument for deficit spending is that it allows a person, a corporation, or a nation to take advantage of better deals. Back when I could invest at 10%, paying off a 5% mortgage cut my returns by half, details notwithstanding. With investment returns at a percent like now, paying off my mortgage was smart. But if Bernanke is successful in his goal of creating huge inflation to monetize our debt, I'll be sorry I paid off my mortgage in 2005 dollars, because 2020 dollars will be worth two cents.
Mike |
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coboardhead
Joined: 26 Oct 2009
Posts: 4303
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| Posted: Sat Sep 25, 2010 9:33 am Post subject: |
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I am not against some of the aspects of the "Fair Tax". An earlier point I was trying to make (maybe not clearly), is that I feel the current taxing system has got to be overhauled and simplified. As everything in a diverse society; one size does not fit all.
I feel an aspect of this new taxing system would be to include a national sales tax as one PART of a system to make taxes more directly relate to the expenses incurred by our government.
This system needs to be phased in. Completely rearranging how people are taxed overnight could result in increased mortgage defaults for one and possibly change the way people spend and save money. The fragile economy is not ready for that.
Defense spending may need to be cut. Everything needs to be on the budget table right now. Or we have to generate more taxes. Nobody makes smart decisions about how to budget, unless there is a motivation. Maybe the cuts are 5% maybe .5%.
My wife has treated smokers. Believe me, they are no more suicidal than folks who eat too much, drink too much, post on forums or drive minivans at well over 100 mph on 2 lane winding roads. |
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