American Politics during the Bush Presidency

[QUOTE=Rock Harders]Obama will meet and make agreements of peaceful co-existance and cooperation with former foes North Korea, Iran and Cuba.[/QUOTE]Rock,

That's a great plan! Let's live in "peaceful co-existence and cooperation" while North Korea and Iran develop nuclear weapons. What pray tell are we going to do at that point, given that your strategy will have left us with a decimated military?

Wait, I just figured it out: You believe that all countries should have nuclear weapons so that no one country could dominate others, right?

Rock, everybody is into "peace and co-existence" when they're in their 20's. However, after you've lived and observed the real world for a couple of decades, you begin to realize a few things, like that rabid dogs exist and need to be put down, that repeatedly violent human beings exist and need to be imprisoned for life, and that psychopathic leaders exist and need to be confronted and defeated.

But you're a smart guy, so I know that one day you'll get it, and that's a complement.

Thanks,

Jackson

[QUOTE=Alan23]Number of Americans Paying [b]Zero[/b] Federal Income Tax Grows to 43.4 Million - or [b]41 percent of the U.S. population were completely outside the federal income tax system in 2006[/b]. This total includes those who pay no tax, and those who pay some tax upfront and are later refunded the full amount of the tax paid or more.

Guess this accounts for 2/3 of the 2/3 that want higher taxes - wonder who the other 1/3 are (of course accounting for Warren Buffet)[/QUOTE]Many people fail to realize (because the media is rooting for Obama and won't point this out) is that Obama's plan for a "tax cut for 95% of Americans" includes sending a check to the 40% of American citizens (we can't call the taxpayers) that don't even pay taxes in the first place.

Talk about buying votes!

Thanks,

Jackson

Poster child for the Republican right.

[QUOTE=Sidney]Many great questions and better solutions are offered by very bright Senators, with many ideas to protect the taxpayers! But Pauley+Bernie seem determined to keep their really stupid ''Plan'' as unchanged! Hopefully, the Senators will prevail![/QUOTE]The large majority of 'em ain't interested in prevailing. They are interested in shoring up their reputation with their constituents as best they can before they end up supporting the bailout. Ask those tough questions! Express that outrage!

[QUOTE=Sidney]Many great questions and better solutions are offered by very bright Senators, with many ideas to protect the taxpayers! But Pauley+Bernie seem determined to keep their really stupid ''Plan'' as unchanged! Hopefully, the Senators will prevail![/QUOTE] I know what should have been done to avoid this, and I ’m certainly not in favor of just throwing money at the problem, but now that we ’re here what's your solution?

I don't think giving Treasury authority to buy up $700 billion in "loans" is the way to go, but a knee jerk reaction to save "Wall Street" by a Treasury Secretary from Wall Street who just wants to save his friends.

We are not going to know the value of our financial institutions or the housing market until they are allowed to bottom out at their true value, which is going to be expensive and painful. Attempting to shore it up by the Treasury with our tax dollars will only delay the bitter pill all American's are going to have to swallow at some point and probably make it worse.

I also don't think CEO's should be walking away with tens of millions of dollars in golden parachutes after crashing their companies. There is just something basically wrong in lavishly rewarding failure. I think the guys who ran these firms should be stripped of their wealth and sent to prison; their families thrown out on the streets broke. A few of them swinging from ropes from the lamp posts along Wall Street as an example would be better, but I doubt anyone has the stomach for it. It would not help the situation now but it would set the example for future CEO's thinking of taking the same path in the future that there is responsibility at the end of the road and Uncle Sugar will not come save the day with my money!

I fully believe in the free market, but what we have gotten under both Democrats and Republicans beginning with Clinton is corruption, greed, and theft, not free market. I doubt McCain or Obama have either the brains or the balls to do what it will take to clean it up since no one is going to want to really face up to what this is going to do to the country.

The DJIA Equities selloff over the past two days is just a hint at what's next to come. Paulson's $700B bailout program is NOT the answer. Yes? Should we let the government step in and rescue those banks that purchased traunched debt at costs that weren't commensurate with their risk?

As several of you have iterated here, yes the free markets should force these financial instruments and institutions holding them to "fess up" and pay for their mistakes. Let them all take the heat as D. Fuld at Lehman has done.

(I only wish they could pierce the personal veils of the high paid bank executives that walk away with $MM "unearned".

JAGGAR

McCain doing the only thing that still gives him pleasure. Taking a shit without removing his suit.

[QUOTE=Sidney]Does anyone know?[/QUOTE]If I remember right, he was able to sell them tax free, because he was taking on a federal job, which could conflict with his shares. He had huge gains, and paid 0 tax. Capital gains where waved.

[QUOTE=Tessan]If I remember right, he was able to sell them tax free, because he was taking on a federal job, which could conflict with his shares. He had huge gains, and paid 0 tax. Capital gains where waved.[/QUOTE]Do you have any support for this statement? [b]Who[/b] "waved" [i][sic][/i] the tax? If someone other than the trustees knows what's in the trust, wouldn't that mean it couldn't possibly be a "blind" trust? I'm old enough to remember when the United States was a country and not a Nigerian e-mail scam.

[QUOTE=Dickhead]Do you have any support for this statement? [b]Who[/b] "waved" [I][sic][/i] the tax? If someone other than the trustees knows what's in the trust, wouldn't that mean it couldn't possibly be a "blind" trust? I'm old enough to remember when the United States was a country and not a Nigerian e-mail scam.[/QUOTE]I remember hearing it on cnbc, while it was happening. I do not remember all the detales. Thats why I wrote "If I remember right" because I had no plan to look it up. You could have found it as easy as me. Anyway I looked it up.

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June 22, 2006, 8:33 am.

Hank Paulson Will Be a Very Liquid Treasury Secretary.

Posted by Peter Lattman.

So much for Daniel Gross's modest proposal that Hank Paulson should be allowed to hang on to his Goldman Sachs stock.

The White House said yesterday that Hank the Hammer will dump his GS holdings to conform with federal conflict-of-interest rules. Paulson's 3.23 million shares of Goldman stock are currently valued at more than $480 million, and he is estimated overall to be worth some $700 million. (Here's the WSJ story.

He is also planning to take advantage of Section 1043 of the Internal Revenue Code, which allows White House employees who are forced to sell stock for conflict-of-interest reasons to defer paying capital gains tax, so long as the proceeds are reinvested in government bonds, index funds or other similar instruments. The provision, passed during the Bush I administration, is intended to "minimize the burden of government service" resulting from required stock sales.

Here's a question: Assuming he trades through his old firm, how much will Goldman Sachs charge Paulson to sell his shares?

[url]http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2006/06/22/hank-paulson-will-be-a-very-liquid-treasury-secretary/[/url]

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Treasuries he brought are worth more today then, then. Interest rates are down. And he did not have to pay big capital gain to buying them. Goldman stock is down since then. He is way ahead.

"[b]defer[/b] paying capital gains tax": That's what I figured happened.

Deferral is not [b]waiving[/b] the tax; it's taxing it upon the sale of the government bonds. Look at the contradiction. If he'd held the GS stock, he'd have no gain since it's in the toilet. In fact he'd have a loss he could (partially) write off against his salary. Now you say he has gains on the bonds (which I certainly don't doubt for the moment). So, from a tax collection standpoint, the final result is not known but as of right now there is more potential tax revenue from him having government bonds in a blind trust than from him having been allowed to hold the GS stock (which I certainly would have been against). It is true that right now it looks like he is in a better situation than if he had been forced to sell but it could have gone the other way. Certainly anyone holding government bonds is going to have some worries about this plan to "borrow" $700 billion. That's clearly inflationary and not good for fixed income holders (bondholders)

Having said that, it looks like there was an amendment to Section 1043(b) in 2006 that changed the definition of who was eligible for this tax break. I'm sure someone will find a way to blame the Democrats for that but that would be some pretty magical thinking even for neocons. Read the amendment but it doesn't seem to be designed for Paulson since the amendment expands the eligibility to the judiciary. Looks to me like it always applied to the executive branch so every other treasury secretary since the Code section was enacted would have enjoyed the same privilege and I'm sure many of them had substantial stock holdings.

Here's a link:

[url]http://www.taxalmanac.org/index.php/Internal_Revenue_Code:Sec._1043._Sale_of_property_to_comply_with_conflict-of-interest_requirements[/url]