Sir Xsarus wrote:
Still, you're not being fair, the actual tax numbers show that 95% or working Americans paid less taxes.
Again though, that's only "technically" true. A negative number is less than a positive one, so technically receiving a "tax credit" that exceeds the amount of total taxes you pay is "paying less taxes". But that's not a "tax cut" in the traditional sense.
And it's certainly not what conservatives want. That's the point here. You're trying to pretend that because you can twist around the math and the language to label welfare as a "tax cut" that conservatives have no reason to complain about it. That's just plain absurd. We're asking for green beans and you're giving us brussel sprouts and wondering why we're not happy with it. It's a vegetable, right?
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That's what the statement was about, and it's true.
Only in the most literal and meaningless sense.
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That money will likely go directly into the consumer market. You're also saying that spending is being claimed as taxes, I understand the point you're making, however I haven't seen it. That tax cuts I've heard them trumpeting are actually tax cuts and not some hidden social program.
Lol. Because they aren't trumpeting that part? It's the conservatives who are pointing out the inaccuracy of the claim, but you dismiss their position because if it was true the Obama administration would have told you? Really? That's your reasoning? I see a great big gaping hole in your logic there...
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1) I don't really understand your point here. Are you saying if I really want A to pass, but am willing to compromise with C because I feel B still captures my essential goals, that I never supported A to begin with?
No. I'm saying that you can't claim you were supporting C all the time. As in, you can't claim that since Obama is willing to compromise on his economic agenda by promising to freeze spending that this represents an honest desire by him to want to stop spending. He's only willing to do it if he gets what he wants. Get it? Yet it appears as though many people want to use his proposed spending freeze as some sort of proof that he's not about big government spending.
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2) Not entirely sure what you mean by this, but If you're saying that A wants to compromise with C and randomly picks 5, then it's isn't a compromise, sure. It also then has no bearing on the case at hand.
Of course it has bearing! The statement which I originally responded to was on in which conservatives were criticized for not supporting Obama on this because we should be happy with his proposed spending freeze. Get it? If the thing you are offering as a compromises isn't what the other person wants, it's not a compromise. You don't get to stand there and blame the other guy for not wanting to take the deal. Yet that's exactly what is going on.
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3) This is really the foundation of your position, and while I see your point, I don't think it's justified in this case. Here's how it can play out. Either Obama is not being disingenuous, at which point it is a compromise, (or in fact just part of his balanced plan), or as you insist he's misleading everyone, at which point the backlash hits him really hard and the GOP will gain a lot anyway. Now I prefer actual compromise rather then the political games, but neither scenario is a loss.
Not getting it. His proposed compromise isn't acceptable because it does not balance out the spending he's doing. It's like you asking me to spend $50 on lunch for you today, on the promise that you'll bring a bologna sandwich in for me to eat tomorrow. One does not balance the other.
But even beyond that, there is the potential that the proposed spending freeze wont even happen. And while you can sit here talking about how if he doesn't deliver on his promise, he'll be held to account for it, I'm quite sure that when that day comes, the same people insisting that we shouldn't worry because he'll be held to account will be making excuses for why he shouldn't be. I'm sure they'll come up with all sorts of reasons why things happened which made said spending freeze impossible, but it will happen just the same.
Do you really think any of the liberals on this board will condemn Obama if in a year the proposed freeze doesn't happen? Really? Do you think the pissed off conservatives will be any less derided and called names like "teabaggers" when they point to yet another broken promise by the Obama administration?
He sold the stimulus to us on the argument that if we didn't do it, unemployment would rise above 8%. Well, we did do it, and unemployment is now over 10%. So... Did he lie? Or was he mistaken? It's really irrelevant. What matters is that he sold the people a promise and didn't meet it. He spent trillions of our tax dollars and didn't get the results he said we'd get. Does that stop the liberals on this board from tossing excuse after excuse for this failing? No. It doesn't.
Why should I expect anything else when this plan doesn't work and the freeze never materializes?
And even that isn't the biggest issue. You claim that there's no loss, but there is. Regardless of public opinion, some of us know that there is a very real economic harm being wrought on us all by the spending alone. If we spend that money on the promise of some future economic benefit (freeze or not), and it doesn't happen, we've lost quite a bit. The government has stolen from the people and given nothing in return. So yeah, that's relevant.
How about we *not* spend more money? How about instead of using a spending freeze as a bargaining chip to spend more money today, we instead insist on spending cuts. Not next year. Not after we've increased spending. Right now. Today. Government is not the solution. Government is the problem.
Edited, Feb 1st 2010 7:14pm by gbaji
