Avatar2go wrote:

MTG and Trump have now confirmed, on Fox News, that Trump put forward the idea of changing all the McCarthy objectors to vote Present, to allow him to be elected Speaker, with no additional support.

So McCarthy will continue to be beholden to Trump, and the MAGA rebels, unfortunately.

Trump put it forward ?
Every media outlet and pundit put it forward from the start.

casinterest wrote:

Avatar2go wrote:

MTG and Trump have now confirmed, on Fox News, that Trump put forward the idea of changing all the McCarthy objectors to vote Present, to allow him to be elected Speaker, with no additional support.

So McCarthy will continue to be beholden to Trump, and the MAGA rebels, unfortunately.

Trump put it forward ?
Every media outlet and pundit put it forward from the start.

Well, Trump convinced them, or so they claim. That's why he was on the phone with MTG. He claimed that these people are his friends, and he was able persuade them when others couldn't. It's Trump, so take with a grain a salt, but it seems plausible.

Avatar2go wrote:

casinterest wrote:

Avatar2go wrote:

MTG and Trump have now confirmed, on Fox News, that Trump put forward the idea of changing all the McCarthy objectors to vote Present, to allow him to be elected Speaker, with no additional support.

So McCarthy will continue to be beholden to Trump, and the MAGA rebels, unfortunately.

Trump put it forward ?
Every media outlet and pundit put it forward from the start.

Well, Trump convinced them, or so they claim. That's why he was on the phone with MTG. He claimed that these people are his friends, and he was able persuade them when others couldn't. It's Trump, so take with a grain a salt, but it seems plausible.

Trump would claim credit for the sun rising in the morning...

vrbarreto wrote:

Trump would claim credit for the sun rising in the morning...

When he bends over.... presumably?

Avatar2go wrote:

casinterest wrote:

Avatar2go wrote:

MTG and Trump have now confirmed, on Fox News, that Trump put forward the idea of changing all the McCarthy objectors to vote Present, to allow him to be elected Speaker, with no additional support.

So McCarthy will continue to be beholden to Trump, and the MAGA rebels, unfortunately.

Trump put it forward ?
Every media outlet and pundit put it forward from the start.

Well, Trump convinced them, or so they claim. That's why he was on the phone with MTG. He claimed that these people are his friends, and he was able persuade them when others couldn't. It's Trump, so take with a grain a salt, but it seems plausible.

oh how I weep for the GOP when they wake up from this bender.

I wonder how long we’ll have to wait for the first GOPs explosive snafu, and then watch McCarthy start kissing everyone’s asses all over again…

hh65man wrote:

I wonder how long we’ll have to wait for the first GOPs explosive snafu, and then watch McCarthy start kissing everyone’s asses all over again…

https://news.yahoo.com/republicans-sign ... 27429.html
https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/3 ... hts-ahead/

About that long. MAGA Republicans in the House are hell bent on defaulting our nation's credit just to not pay for Social Security and Medicare. All these years of us paying into these two systems only to not receive one penny and a credit default to boot! MAGAs need to go!

I don’t often agree with Ezra Klein, but he did write an interesting Op-Ed today. (Paywall)

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/15/opin ... apart.html

Paying into SS and Medicare is just a tax and a political promise—there’s no ownership of the money paid in and that’s the problem with the programs. No one owns their money—you can’t take it as a lump sum, you can’t invest it as you please, you cannot bequeath it to heirs. In about 12 years the so-called trust evaporates and we all take 25%-ish haircut in benefits.

I look at it as restitution for all the thievery committed by Congress since LBJ unified the budget, pooling all taxes into one pot.

https://www.nber.org/system/files/worki ... w10953.pdf

Aren't a good chunk of GOP voters relying on these programs ?

Newark727 wrote:

DocLightning wrote:

So I have a concern: the GOP House has stated that they will, under no circumstances, allow the debt ceiling to go up without cuts to SS and Medicare. Obviously, the Democrats will consider no such thing.

Proof that "fiscal conservatives" are absolutely gutless. What was stopping them doing these cuts in 2016-2018 when they had the presidency and both houses of Congress? Only the fact that they'd have to own up to the results in front of their voters. But when there's someone else around to pass the buck to? Yeah, suddenly we don't have the money for SS and Medicare anymore (but did have the money for a huge vote-buying scheme, I mean tax cut, in 2017?)

Yeah the hypocrisy is mind boggling and journalists should ask any GOP politician about this again and again until there is a satisfactory answer.

seb146 wrote:

GalaxyFlyer wrote:

seb146 wrote:

Actually, Democrats want to raise taxes on the morbidly wealthy to pay for things like the MAGA tax cuts for the morbidly wealthy and helping out seniors and veterans. Which, for some reason are all bad things?

WHEN moderate Republicans in the House find out how paralyzed MAGA Republicans have made things, they will switch parties and bring Democrats back into the majority to get things done.

What’s “morbidly wealthy.”? I didn’t know money was a killer. Second, the elderly are among tone most well-off in America. The top 50% pay 97% of the US income taxes, how much more do you want?

The top 1% hold over 30% of the nation's wealth while the bottom 50% hold about 2%. Looking at a certain former president's tax returns, he paid zero in taxes. Just because the morbidly wealthy pay taxes, you must also include the fact they get more than they pay back while the rest of us pay and get nothing back. The top tax rate is 20% anyway, so where do you get your 97% rate from?

And, yes, "morbidly wealthy" because these people can afford to self-fund space flights and multiple yachts and multiple mansions and multiple cars and sports teams while those of us at the bottom can not afford to eat. But, let's give everything to the wealthy so they can trickle it down to the rest of us and we won't have to rely on the government....

Here is the IRS breakdown,

Data from IRS breaks down taxpayers into two groups: the top 50% of earners and the bottom 50%. In 2019, the top 50% accounted for more than 96% of the income taxes paid while the lower 50% demographic contributed 3.06% of taxes paid that year.

The bottom half of taxpayers paid an effective tax rate of 3.54%. These were taxpayers with with an AGI less than $44,269.7

Wealthy individuals do pay more in taxes than low-income or even middle-income individuals. In 2019, the top 1% income earners paid 38.77% of total income taxes paid that year.8

According to the IRS, those with AGIs between $2 million and $5 million paid a 27.5% effective tax rate in 2019, although the effective rate dropped to 24.9% for the super-wealthy with AGIs of $10 million or more.9

Source,

https://www.thebalancemoney.com/breakdo ... es-4178924

GalaxyFlyer wrote:

Here is the IRS breakdown,

Data from IRS breaks down taxpayers into two groups: the top 50% of earners and the bottom 50%. In 2019, the top 50% accounted for more than 96% of the income taxes paid while the lower 50% demographic contributed 3.06% of taxes paid that year.

The bottom half of taxpayers paid an effective tax rate of 3.54%. These were taxpayers with with an AGI less than $44,269.7

Wealthy individuals do pay more in taxes than low-income or even middle-income individuals. In 2019, the top 1% income earners paid 38.77% of total income taxes paid that year.8

According to the IRS, those with AGIs between $2 million and $5 million paid a 27.5% effective tax rate in 2019, although the effective rate dropped to 24.9% for the super-wealthy with AGIs of $10 million or more.9

Source,

https://www.thebalancemoney.com/breakdo ... es-4178924

This is a misrepresentation of the statistical data by intentionally creating the dividing line at 50%, and then not accounting for the standard deductions, which are the same for everyone, but are a larger percentage of income for the lower brackets.

People who earn less than $45,000 certainly pay more than 4% tax. I have several people in my family who can attest to this, I help them do their taxes. I also have written accounting & payroll software packages that incorporate tax law.

The truth is that the higher tax brackets pay the least tax as a percentage of their income, and that is mostly because they have access to investment tax shelters and deductions that aren't feasible for lower brackets.

The basic reality in the US is that the highest earners end up paying a smaller percentage, as do the lowest earners, but for different reasons. If you plot the percentage paid (after deductions) as a function of gross income, and then weight it by the numbers of individuals in each income bracket, the bell profile that emerges shows that the tax burden falls on the middle earners (who are the largest group) to pay the highest percentage of their income in taxes.

That is the simple truth, and is clearly evident from the aggregate math, when it isn't manipulated by the selection of statistics.

It’s is NOT a 4% rate, it’s that those in lower 50% of the income distribution, in total,pay 4%. Also, if you account for all government transfers, cash and in-kind grants, the bottom 2 quintiles actually have negative effective tax rates, but face steep marginal rate as the trade government transfers for earned income, often higher than 80%.

It’s a matter of who’s forking over the revenue to the USG, and it is overwhelmingly the top of the income distribution

GalaxyFlyer wrote:

It’s is NOT a 4% rate, it’s that those in lower 50% of the income distribution, in total,pay 4%. Also, if you account for all government transfers, cash and in-kind grants, the bottom 2 quintiles actually have negative effective tax rates, but face steep marginal rate as the trade government transfers for earned income, often higher than 80%.

It's not a 4% effective tax rate at $45,000. That's a misleading statistic. It may be 4% effective at the bottom brackets, but that's because of the standard deductions, as I noted. This is why selecting 50% as the dividing line doesn't give an accurate picture.

I have never done taxes for anyone who received the earned income credit. Doubtless many of those people exist, but the claim that this is undermining our tax system, is another conservative bogeyman to create fear and anger.

The graphical method I gave in the preceding post, is the only fair way to consider the issue. That method shows that the percentage of income paid as taxes, declines at both ends of the income scale, as I explained, for different reasons.

The problem is that both ends of the income scale have their defenders. Progressives defend the lower scale reduction as an essential survival & quality of life issue. Conservatives defend the higher scale reduction as essential for them to build and protect their wealth, stimulate investment and business, and pass it along to succeeding generations.

The middle class is caught between this battle, and ultimately carries the burden for it. This is certainly no secret, it's been obvious for many decades. What's needed is an honest discussion of what it means for each end of the scale to pay a higher percentage, that is more similar to the percentage paid by the middle class. And the fairness of that distribution.

As this thread is getting off topic, please keep it on topic and continue the other discussion in a separate thread, thanks.

Returning to topic, this article highlights some of the consequences of the concessions McCarthy made to the Freedom Caucus. It's notable that all the people who were meeting with Trump to strategize on overturning the 2020 election, are now being appointed to leadership positions within the party. These are the same people who refused Congressional subpoenas on Jan 6, and requested pardons from Trump before he left office.

Overall, it highlights the general loss of integrity within the Republican party. Those concessions, and these people, should have been stopped in their tracks by the mainstream party regulars. But the party has rotted from the inside out, to the point that it can no longer govern itself.

These people are rapidly trending toward a second McCarthy era, which is ironic given the name is the same. They will conduct the witch hunts that they claim are conducted against conservatives. Which follows their general trend of accusing others of what they are actually doing.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/202 ... dom-caucus

The MAGA caucus is hell bent on gutting Social Security and Medicare but I wonder if Democrats put their own budget forward and sensible Republicans help pass it, what then? The government and Social Security and Medicare will be funded but what becomes of our democracy? Provisions are in place by the MAGA caucus to control McCarthy. He would be stripped of his leadership but then what?

seb146 wrote:

The MAGA caucus is hell bent on gutting Social Security and Medicare but I wonder if Democrats put their own budget forward and sensible Republicans help pass it, what then? The government and Social Security and Medicare will be funded but what becomes of our democracy? Provisions are in place by the MAGA caucus to control McCarthy. He would be stripped of his leadership but then what?

Yes, McCarthy made a deal with the devil, which is why he has such a slim majority and is under the thumb of the Freedom Caucus, such as it is. Perhaps, enough Ds will cross the aisle and vote budgets and, more importantly, appropriations bills to passage.

Congress’ for 30 years have gutted SS by failing to pass reasonable reforms, providing partial privatization that would grow real assets for old age, continuing to SS taxes to fill the budget holes. Why? Like gun control. Immigration reforms, it is better to have a hammer to beat the other side with than pass fixes.

https://www.ssa.gov/oact/TRSUM/index.html

GalaxyFlyer wrote:

seb146 wrote:

The MAGA caucus is hell bent on gutting Social Security and Medicare but I wonder if Democrats put their own budget forward and sensible Republicans help pass it, what then? The government and Social Security and Medicare will be funded but what becomes of our democracy? Provisions are in place by the MAGA caucus to control McCarthy. He would be stripped of his leadership but then what?

Yes, McCarthy made a deal with the devil, which is why he has such a slim majority and is under the thumb of the Freedom Caucus, such as it is. Perhaps, enough Ds will cross the aisle and vote budgets and, more importantly, appropriations bills to passage.

Congress’ for 30 years have gutted SS by failing to pass reasonable reforms, providing partial privatization that would grow real assets for old age, continuing to SS taxes to fill the budget holes. Why? Like gun control. Immigration reforms, it is better to have a hammer to beat the other side with than pass fixes.

https://www.ssa.gov/oact/TRSUM/index.html

Ahh the let's negotiate with 20 terrorists routine? Nah. I think I would rather see some honorable GOP members work with the democrats to get honest work done that the Majority of people value. Rather than giving into some gerrymandered psychpaths that have control of one chamber of congress.


Partial privatization of Social Security is the opposite of what Social Security is for.

GalaxyFlyer wrote:

seb146 wrote:

The MAGA caucus is hell bent on gutting Social Security and Medicare but I wonder if Democrats put their own budget forward and sensible Republicans help pass it, what then? The government and Social Security and Medicare will be funded but what becomes of our democracy? Provisions are in place by the MAGA caucus to control McCarthy. He would be stripped of his leadership but then what?

Yes, McCarthy made a deal with the devil, which is why he has such a slim majority and is under the thumb of the Freedom Caucus, such as it is. Perhaps, enough Ds will cross the aisle and vote budgets and, more importantly, appropriations bills to passage.

Congress’ for 30 years have gutted SS by failing to pass reasonable reforms, providing partial privatization that would grow real assets for old age, continuing to SS taxes to fill the budget holes. Why? Like gun control. Immigration reforms, it is better to have a hammer to beat the other side with than pass fixes.

https://www.ssa.gov/oact/TRSUM/index.html

"Reasonable reforms" is not privatization, which is what MAGAs want. Chain CPI is not what the majority of Americans want, either. The only reasonable thing to do with Social Security is to let it be. Because that is what the majority of Americans want. Of course, We The People don't matter to the MAGA caucus. The only thing that matters is unfettered power. I see no solution to out of control costs of things like gas and food and rent from the MAGAs. All I see are "we need investigations" and "we need to cut funding for everything". The opposite of what they promised if given the majority.

I just don't get how people who defied a subpoena from their own membership body, are now appointed to those same judiciary and investigative committees.

How does that even happen? How could anyone expect them to obey the rules, apply them fairly, or act in good faith?

This is becoming a recurring theme with Republicans, put the crooks in charge. In Texas as well, with the Attorney General. He fled a subpoena issued by his own court system. How could he be re-elected in that capacity? Yet he was.

Something has happened to basic reasoning and thinking skills. I remember in the Watergate scandal, Nixon had his defenders, but it was widely agreed that all those who participated, could not serve again.

Now, at least within the Republican party, breaking the rules seems to be a badge of honor, to be rewarded. These people would bring back Trump, if they could. The evidence that should work against them, works for them within their ranks.

And even more puzzling, is that the rest of the party stands by and does nothing to stop it. David Brooks, a conservative columnist, has described this as a loss of moral knowledge. I think that's being charitable.

I keep thinking about the Fall of the Roman Empire. Basically corruption took hold, to the point that people found it more profitable to join it, than to oppose it. Without realizing they were undermining the principles which upheld their society.

The society can coast for a long time on prior accomplishments & accumulated wealth, but the end result is inevitable. We have many examples of third world nations that have similar corruption within their government. We know exactly what the outcome is.

The US has never been free of corruption, and never will be, but the defining characteristic has been that we don't tolerate it, once exposed & identified. So I'm wondering what the trigger event will have to be here, for that to happen.

I thought Jan 6 would be it, but with the resurgence of the same group in the House, I'm not so sure. Maybe their last hurrah before they implode?

Avatar2go wrote:

I keep thinking about the Fall of the Roman Empire. Basically corruption took hold, to the point that people found it more profitable to join it, than to oppose it. Without realizing they were undermining the principles which upheld their society.

The society can coast for a long time on prior accomplishments & accumulated wealth, but the end result is inevitable. We have many examples of third world nations that have similar corruption within their government. We know exactly what the outcome is.

The US has never been free of corruption, and never will be, but the defining characteristic has been that we don't tolerate it, once exposed & identified. So I'm wondering what the trigger event will have to be here, for that to happen.

I thought Jan 6 would be it, but with the resurgence of the same group in the House, I'm not so sure. Maybe their last hurrah before they implode?

Or the last hurrah before the last hurrah.
There is a sinister amount of issues with people that are actually being appointed to lead committees that they hate.

McCarthy is not leading. He is succumbing. He is abandoning democracy for corruption and facism.

GalaxyFlyer wrote:

It’s is NOT a 4% rate, it’s that those in lower 50% of the income distribution, in total,pay 4%. Also, if you account for all government transfers, cash and in-kind grants, the bottom 2 quintiles actually have negative effective tax rates, but face steep marginal rate as the trade government transfers for earned income, often higher than 80%.

It’s a matter of who’s forking over the revenue to the USG, and it is overwhelmingly the top of the income distribution

Slight point here as it relaes to income tax cuts and the federal deficit. It is always the wealthy that are going to pay the most. They earn the most.

However if you look at the first 45K of their income and see the tax rate on it, you will find out that it pretty much matches what the bottom 50% pay. We all get that standard deduction. Many of the really wealthy will also have charitable donations far above the threshold and will pay less as in income on that rate, or have other tax holes through which they escape.

Don't be surprised that the people that earn more,. pay more. It is how it always was, and always will be. However you can only pay more taxes by effectively working harder and making capitalistic choices. So the incentive to work is still there and must be there.

McCarthy and his GOP don't want to pay for anything, and they are starting to sound a lot like Louis and Marie Antoinette right before they told every one to eat cake.

McCarthy needs to lead, and not follow the worst elements in his chamber.

Avatar2go wrote:

I keep thinking about the Fall of the Roman Empire. Basically corruption took hold, to the point that people found it more profitable to join it, than to oppose it. Without realizing they were undermining the principles which upheld their society.

The society can coast for a long time on prior accomplishments & accumulated wealth, but the end result is inevitable. We have many examples of third world nations that have similar corruption within their government. We know exactly what the outcome is.

The US has never been free of corruption, and never will be, but the defining characteristic has been that we don't tolerate it, once exposed & identified. So I'm wondering what the trigger event will have to be here, for that to happen.

I thought Jan 6 would be it, but with the resurgence of the same group in the House, I'm not so sure. Maybe their last hurrah before they implode?

We always assumed that the USA would be the Superpower of the 21st Century.

Beginning to wonder how long for.

Rome came and went.

It appears McCarthy is going to make good on his efforts to destroy the US Government by appointing people that denied American Democracy to Judiciary and oversight comittees.

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congre ... -rcna66152

Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona, who flipped to McCarthy on the 12th ballot, was reinstated by Republicans on two committees —Oversight and Natural Resources panels — after Democrats removed him two years ago for posting threats to lawmakers on social media.

casinterest wrote:

It appears McCarthy is going to make good on his efforts to destroy the US Government…

The only things McCarthy is going to destroy are his own political career and Republicans’ chances of holding the House longer than the current term.

Rather than learn the lesson of why the expected Red Wave dwindled to a tiny pink ripple he’s setting up the wackos in his caucus to cause as much chaos and disruption as possible, thereby generating mountains of negative news coverage and turning even more voters against the Repubs.

QF7 wrote:

casinterest wrote:

It appears McCarthy is going to make good on his efforts to destroy the US Government…

The only things McCarthy is going to destroy are his own political career and Republicans’ chances of holding the House longer than the current term.

Rather than learn the lesson of why the expected Red Wave dwindled to a tiny pink ripple he’s setting up the wackos in his caucus to cause as much chaos and disruption as possible, thereby generating mountains of negative news coverage and turning even more voters against the Repubs.

No, he has enough power and ignroance to hand the reigns to people who have no idea how this country , debt, or taxes work. So we are in for a long haul.