Jon Kyl,R-AZ, on Senate floor playing 'class warfare' card. It's the only card they have left!

[flpoljunkie]

Durbin just spoke very eloquently about Obama's tax plan effecting only 3% of small business owners--even when you include doctors, hedge fund managers and Tiger Woods.

Isn't this class warfare card getting a little bit stale, Kyl?

Kyl just made Durbin's case. He whined how 750,000 people who have small business income (sole proprietorships. S-corporations, parterships) would be forced to pay higher taxes. Guess what, Kyl? Even if you use the latest tax figures, from 2007, they show there were 138 million taxpayers, that's a mere one-half percent who taxes would go up!

Cry me a river, Kyl! You are a shill for the greedy!

[flpoljunkie]

1. Now another Republican is speaking. Where are the Dem senators to answer Kyl's bullsh*t lies!

Durbin was great, but he must not be the only Democrat speaking to let the Bush tax cuts for the top 2% expire.

[ProSense]

2. Republicans are getting desperate

McConnell Introducing Legislation To Freeze Tax Rates

Brian Beutler

On the Senate floor this afternoon, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell announced that he's today introducing legislation to freeze tax rates where they are, preserving the Bush tax cuts for high-income Americans.

The legislation, McConnell said, "ensures that no one in this country will pay higher income taxes next year than they are right now."

Republicans want to play a bit of jujitsu. As a GOP leadership aide asked me rhetorically "are there 41 (Democrats) to block a bill that doesn't raise ANY taxes?"

Of course, to truly put Democrats on the spot, they'll need a vote on McConnell's legislation. While they're not guaranteed a vote, Democrats might push for one. Several of them have advocated extending all Bush tax cuts temporarily, and McConnell happily cited Connecticut Independent Joe Lieberman's statement from earlier today in which he said he'd do "everything I can to make sure Congress extends the so-called Bush tax cuts for another year and takes action to prevent the estate tax from rising back to where it was."

:rofl:

[flpoljunkie]

4. The Republican Party slogan: Corporate America: We're working for you!

[ProSense]

5. A reminder for McConnell

Josh Marshall

Sen. McConnell just went on the Senate floor and announced he's introducing a bill to keep all the original Bush tax cuts in place. In other words, cuts that everybody gets up to $250k and the ones that only about 1% of the population gets over $250k.

But here's the key. Maybe not for much longer. But for the moment, Democrats are in the majority. That means that they can bring their bill to a vote. McConnell can't.In other words, it's in the power of the Democrats to shape the legislative debate to their advantage.

This is why, as noted earlier, what happens in the next 24-48 hours is going to have a huge impact going forward over the next seven weeks.

[AtomicKitten]

3. The Rs are on the wrong side of class warefare. The problem is so are some Ds. nt

[Corporate666]

6. Wait a minute.... greedy?

Why is he a shill for the "greedy"?

People who have small businesses who earn over $250k are greedy? They have "too much"? I thought this was America where opportunity and hard work are respected and encouraged. To make a blanket statement that those earning $250k a year or more are greedy is asinine.

[ProSense]

7. Something funny about your response:

"To make a blanket statement that those earning $250k a year or more are greedy is asinine."

The OP didn't mention $250,000. It did mention S-corporations.

Also, the whole small business argument related to the tax cuts is bogus given that Bush had a lousy job-creation record.

Bush created as many jobs during his entire two terms in office as President Obama did in his first year.

[Corporate666]

8. Ummm

The "only affect 3%" refers to S-corps with a net profit of >$250k.

In an S-corp, the end of year profit passes through to the owner and is taxed as personal income.

OK, so is the owner of an S-Corp that has pass-through profits of $250k a year "greedy"? Why?

It sounds like a group of successful people are being demonized and thrown under the bus.

And who said anything about jobs? Let's try to stay on topic. The OP said Kyl was a shill for the greedy. I am asking why are those people Kyl was talking about "greedy"???

[alstephenson]

9. Ummm

Kyl IS a shill for the greedy. Unfortunately he's my Senator. You seem to kind of like the fella...

[Corporate666]

10. So no answer to the question?

Who are "the greedy"????

Please define it. You say he is a shill for them - I know what a shill is, but what constitutes "the greedy"??????

Nobody has the balls to say it?

[ProSense]

11. "Who are "the greedy"????"

Of that amount a full $32.7 billion would flow to 315,000 American families making more than $1 million per year and provide each of these families with an average tax cut of $103,835.

Also, see the red bars here?

Notice how at each level it's higher than the blue bar for up to 95% of Americans?

Yes, people who do nothing but complain while their incomes have been climbing in relation to the majority of Americans are damn greedy.

[Corporate666]

13. Wrong in so many ways...

So in your view it is not possible that they have simply been successful, but rather must be "greedy". Does that apply to everyone who makes more than a given amount? What is that amount? Is it always slightly higher than what you make?

I offer a more intellectual perspective - they are simply successful. They are the people who create jobs and who create wealth. Gawd knows that handouts to those who already don't pay tax isn't going to solve anything. You say "$32.7 billion would flow to 315,000 American families...". No, it would not flow to anyone. The government isn't giving anything to those people. They are simply discussing whether they will take less or more of what those people have already earned.

And make no mistake, yes, they did earn it.

Taxation always slows the speed of money, and the speed of money is what counts. Taxing ANYONE - whether it be the poor or the middle class or the rich will always have a negative impact on the spending and investment habits of those people.

It is a very dangerous path indeed when you start thinking that the wealth of the people belongs to the gov't, and the gov't is "giving" them anything by simply taking less.

[Ikonoklast]

15. "They are the people who create jobs and who create wealth."

Except, that isn't happening. They are NOT creating jobs, they are taking their tax cuts and investing them overseas.

[Corporate666]

18. If true, taking it isn't the solution

If that is the case, and I am not sure it is, then the solution is not to say "ok, we'll just TAKE that money", but rather to look at why that money is going overseas and make it more attractive to keep it here.

[ProSense]

16. "They are the people who create jobs and who create wealth. "

BS.

If they were such great jobs creators, Bush wouldn't have the worst job-creation record ever, which cost taxpayers more than $670 billion on tax cuts for the rich.

They create wealth? For who, themselves? The majority of Americans have seen their income drop severely.

[Corporate666]

19. I don't care...

...about what Bush did anymore than I care about what Clinton did. That is history. What matter is the here and now.

If you do not believe that the profitable small businesses in this country are creating jobs, who do you think are creating them? Lower class or middle class people? Not true. The majority of job growth comes from small businesses. It is detrimental to those businesses to increase their taxes. It is helpful to ease their tax burden. It is an indisputable fact that when you increase taxes and regulations, you slow the speed of money and the speed of transactions, and that is in turn detrimental to our economy.

And again, you say "cost taxpayers more than $670b on tax cuts for the rich". That is not true... a tax cut does not cost anyone anything - you make it sound like that $670b was the property of the gov't. It is not. It is the property of those who earned it. Taking less from someone is a very different thing from giving them something. It is so anti-American to think that taking less of someone's earned income is somehow equal to giving them something. The two could not be more different.

[ProSense]

22. "If you do not believe that the profitable small businesses in this country are creating jobs"

Who is arguing that small businesses don't creat jobs?

The fact is that the top 3 percent of small businesses that this will impact are not going to spend these tax cuts on job creation. They are not, that is a proven fact.

Want job creations stimulus for small businesses: pass the President's small business bill.

[alstephenson]

25. Thanks for sharing your "intellectual perspective"

LOL.

[alstephenson]

24. Thank you, PS.

[Supersedeas]

12. Pubbies will not be happy until the super wealthy are lavished with tax/duty free privileges

just to entice them to keep their money invested here

[Corporate666]

14. No...

You cannot browbeat and penalize and tax people into doing what you want them to do. Money will always find it's path of least resistance. And unless you propose to take over the world, then you cannot stop money from finding a more efficient home overseas.

The correct response is to make it more efficient to keep the money here, not to enact penalties and taxes upon those who would do otherwise. Look at the PIIGS - mountains of rules and regulations and inefficiencies. And where did it get them? To the verge of economic collapse. If money is flowing out of the country, we need to figure out how to make it more attractive for it to stay here.

The wealthy will always have the means to live anywhere they like. The same cannot be said for the middle and lower classes. So again, unless we want to take over the whole world, we need to look at incentives, not penalties.

[ProSense]

17. "Money will always find it's path of least resistance."

No doubt that includes the kind of corporate abuses that led to the crisis.

"The correct response is to make it more efficient to keep the money here, not to enact penalties and taxes upon those who would do otherwise."

Actually, deregulation has been an utter failure, taking the economy to the brink of a depression.

No sale.

[Corporate666]

20. Econ 101

It wasn't deregulation that mandated that companies give loans to people who could not afford them.

If you believe that adding more laws, more bureaucracy, more rules, more taxes, more fees and more restrictions is a valid path to economic growth, you simply do not understand economics. Obama understands this - because he has just done a pretty smart thing - cutting taxes and red tape on businesses looking to spend money. This goes contrary to your stated position that making it easier to spend money here is a bad thing and leads to economic collapse.

You need to understand that you can not, and will NEVER be able to penalize and tax and regulate how money is invested and spent - NOT in a global economy. Every time it is tried, it fails. You cannot say to wealth creators "you WILL do what I want with your wealth or we WILL take it". They will just leave. Look at the business flooding out of California. Look at how taxes and regulation did for the PIIGS. It doesn't work.

[ProSense]

21. Economic Crisis 101:

Deregulation plus Republicans is a recipe for disaster.

"If you believe that adding more laws, more bureaucracy, more rules, more taxes, more fees and more restrictions is a valid path to economic growth, you simply do not understand economics. Obama understands this - because he has just done a pretty smart thing - cutting taxes and red tape on businesses looking to spend money. This goes contrary to your stated position that making it easier to spend money here is a bad thing and leads to economic collapse."

That's really funny. President Obama also understands that deregulation is a fool's errand (see Wall Street Reform).

Does it strike you as ironic that you're here arguing for tax cuts for the rich and invoking President Obama, who opposes them?

[Ikonoklast]

23. Funny thing, however.

When those hated regulations and taxes were in place, we had a booming economy.


Deregulatiuon has been an abysmal failure, and your Libertarian stance on the economy cannot change that fact.

[alstephenson]

26. Yeah, and there's that Oregon thing.

Where the state legislature didn't have the balls to increase taxes, so they put it up to a vote and the PEOPLE passed it. An increase in the top rate for income taxes and increases in business taxes. So that the state could maintain social services and funding for education. And all the businesses left Oregon!!! Oh, wait, no they didn't! There goes that theory.