<p>Cut waste, fraud and overgrown government first before asking for more taxes.</p>
<p>Amom2, when you consider that most representatives of congress are highly educated professionals (most are lawyers & business executives) they are not nearly as rich as their private sector counterparts. The median net worth of Congress representatives is $675,000. And twenty one representatives, two of them senators (traditionally the richest sector) are in the red. Again, please do not misunderstand. These people aren’t poor. But many of them are not nearly as well off as their private-sector colleagues. And don’t forget, Washington isn’t exactly a cheap place to live. Which is why so many new congressmen bunker up together in communal apartments like college students.</p>
<p>AMom2 is a broken record. skip, skip, skip</p>
<p>I know this won’t dent the quasi-religious beliefs of the hard-core ideologues among us, but a little reality check for the still-rational:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Federal Government spending has been remarkably consistent at about 20% of the gross domestic product for over 50 years. Total federal spending relative to the economy has neither increased nor decreased significantly over that time period. Generally the federal government spends more during Republican Administrations than Democratic ones (yes, you read that right) but not by much. <a href=“http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy09/pdf/hist.pdf[/url]”>http://www.gpoaccess.gov/usbudget/fy09/pdf/hist.pdf</a> - pages 24-25</p></li>
<li><p>The variable is federal government income. And we ran up a huge debt during the Reagan, Bush and Bush Administrations - particularly the current Bush Administration - by collecting less in tax revenue relative to the overall economy than we spent. (See the budget history chart again, same pages.) And the reason we collected less revenue is that the taxes paid by the wealthy have been slashed to the lowest levels in modern history - an average of less than 23% for the top 1% of taxpayers, who account for 22% of the nation’s income and enjoy average incomes of over a million dollars per year. That’s a significant drop from historic tax levels on the top 1% of around 30%.</p></li>
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<p>So that’s how we shot ourselves in the foot. And all of the cutesy-pie stories about splitting the dinner tab, giving welfare money to crack-whores, etc. won’t change that. Mini is exactly right - we borrowed money from foreign countries and gave it to the wealthy - and we expect our children to pay off that debt. It’s shameful - plain and simple - shameful. And all of the voting adults who allowed themselves to be conned into supporting the politicians who pulled the scam off owe it to their children to investigate beyond the platitudes and sneers encouraged by the viral marketing behind the “starve the Beast” campaign and ask yourselves if you’re really doing the right thing by your kids and their generation by ignoring the hard cold truth of the basic economics of operating a modern nation.</p>
<p>I just hate it when kluge and mini ruin a perfectly fun tiff with… you know… facts.</p>
<p>Thank you, kluge. Ideology has led the right wing to shoot us all in the foot.</p>
<p>It’s really simple: </p>
<p>Those who want to continue the policies that result in the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer vote Republican; those who don’t vote Democrat.</p>
<p>What’s there to argue about?</p>
<p>I like how you think it will change because one party or another is in office. It will never be that simplistic. If you think the Dem give a carp about the poor and under-privileged then you are a sap. Perhaps you and all of your Democratic friends do but by the time you reach Washington they are nothing but a puppet to be mastered. Call me cynical but the main difference between Republicans and Democrats in Washington is which PAC they take their money from…</p>
<p>I guess close to a trillion dollars in giveaways of borrowed money to the super rich isn’t a “main” difference. Just a little item, nothing to be too concerned about.</p>
<p>rich get richer, poor get poorer . . . yada yada, blah blah</p>
<p>Come on, people - no one is actually “poor” in this country. And why? Because of capitalism. Because of our model. That’s why immigrants fight to get in here.</p>
<p>Absurd to characterize anyone in America as poor when we adopt (fav lib term here) a “global perspective.”</p>
<p>What we do have is resentment of those lower on the income ladder for those higher on the income (or more aptly wealth) ladder. Nothing new about that. But to solve the problem of envy, the solution is not to do away with the system that keeps all of us eating every day and using indoor plumbing.</p>
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<p>Can you give us some policies enacted by the Democratic party that have allowed the poor to move up?</p>
<p>“But to solve the problem of envy, the solution is not to do away with the system that keeps all of us eating every day and using indoor plumbing.”</p>
<p>Whose arguing for that? What is (was) new was the giant giveaway of borrowed money. </p>
<p>2000 was hardly the Stone Age.</p>
<p>^ if you mean fannie and freddie, I’m with you.</p>
<p>“I like how you think it will change because one party or another is in office.”</p>
<p>How I think? Thanks, but I never said it would change anything. 
It’s just how people vote!</p>
<p>"Can you give us some policies enacted by the Democratic party that have allowed the poor to move up?</p>
<p>No, the bums haven’t enacted anything like that in the last 7 1/2 years.</p>
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<p>And I just hate it when people find “facts” to support their arguments while leaving out little details that don’t.</p>
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<p>You didn’t mention Johnson or Carter in there did you, but that wouldn’t support your supposition that Republicans are EVIL and Democrats are our saviors.</p>
<p>I’ll see your charts and raise you the ones in this article.</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.cato.org/pubs/tbb/tbb-0510-26.pdf[/url]”>http://www.cato.org/pubs/tbb/tbb-0510-26.pdf</a></p>
<p>I’ll agree that Bush has sucked, but your guys aren’t so swiftie either.</p>
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<p>Da*n that right winger - LBJ!</p>
<p>“I’ll agree that Bush has sucked, but your guys aren’t so swiftie either.”</p>
<p>The question is not who ran up the deficit (about which I could care less - our owners don’t seem to mind), but what they ran up the deficit for.</p>
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<p>Those corrupt republicans - they are terrible, just awful!</p>
<p>Now let me see: $7 million divided by $900 billion is, put the decimal point in, carry the 3, how many zeroes is that to the right of the decimal point…</p>
<p>hmmmm.</p>
<p>Oh, wait, one was a LOAN from a private company, the other was a GIVEAWAY from the federal government!</p>
<p>Nevermind.</p>