"I do not deny the allegation, I deny the allegator." – Jesse Jackson
The above video is the Congressional equivalent of haiku. Rarely will you hear a politician make his point in under a minute. I like Kucinich. He seems like one of the more honest politicians we still have in office, not mired in dirty money and partisanship.
For reference, our Defense spending is greater than that of the entire rest of the world combined. Over 650 billion in 2009. We spend more on meddling in other countries than we do looking after our own.
This is only tax comedy in the sense that it is presented as such. I found the below video via Left Coast Rebel, and thought I’d pass it on.
Taxation has become pervasive. When you earn a dollar, it is taxed, when you spend it, it is taxed again. At the same time as you are being taxed for spending it, someone else is being taxed for earning it. These taxes are increasing, and not just by total value, but by percentage, which is unaffected by inflation and thus unjustifiable in a digital age which should be lowering the cost of governing.
When you think of the nature of income and sales taxes, it becomes clear that the government makes a lot of money, not on the saving and responsible use of money, but on its momentum. The next time you hear someone in power speaking of the need to get consumers consuming again, think of what their true motive might be.
“The fellow who says he’ll meet you halfway usually thinks he’s standing on the dividing line.” –Orlando Battista
When you hear the top political candidates speak, one of the more common qualifications you hear them push is their ability to get compromise between democrats and republicans. What does a bipartisan compromise mean in America?
None of these are helpful. The second example, splitting the difference, is what most often appeals to the public. This is like having each party with a hand on the steering wheel. The Democrats wanting to turn left, the republicans right; meanwhile the media is in the back seat rooting for the underdog. Â We will hit the center divider every time.
There are ways to affect compromise that aren’t dirty. An example would be this plan put forth by Bob Ingles. He proposes starting up a carbon tax (democrats want), but offsetting the tax by reducing taxes elsewhere, such as income taxes (republican opposition evaporates). I’m a fan of taxing problems to fund solutions. Pollution is a much bigger problem than income. Â If we give the free market incentive to clean up, they will do so. Since this is as much a behavioral issue as a technological one, I would consider it progress. Imperfect progress (for much the same reason as traffic cameras), but still far better than the business as usual methods of compromise.
If you can solve this brain teaser (click to enlarge) from a 1932 issue of Modern Mechanics, you may just be a step ahead of your average congressman when it comes to fixing the economy. Whenever I hear them talking about “injecting money into the economy”, this is what comes to mind.
“Government does not solve problems; it subsidizes them.” – Ronald Reagan
In the second presidential debate, John McCain proposed that the government buy up people’s mortgages and reevaluate the value of their homes and renegotiate their loan terms to the new value. Obviously the mere concept disturbs fiscal conservatives such as myself, but  a mortgage bailout appeals to many of the moderates who don’t make politics a regular part of their lives. Why did he propose this? Is it just a political gimmick, or does he really believe it would be helpful? Lets take a closer look…
First let’s look at the scale of the plan; We need to know who will it help in order to know how much will it cost us. According to his website, “No taxpayer money should bail out real estate speculators or financial market participants who failed to perform due diligence in assessing credit risks.” “Eligibility: Holders of a sub-prime mortgage taken after 2005 who live in their home (primary residence only); can prove creditworthiness at the time of the original loan; are either delinquent, in arrears on payments, facing a reset or otherwise demonstrate that they will be unable to continue to meet their mortgage obligations; and can meet the terms of a new 30 year fixed-rate mortgage on the existing home.” Well, that pretty much rules out everyone. How many people are there in the country who bought their home in the last three years, are living in it, put down a good down payment, proved they could afford it, then couldn’t afford it, then went delinquent, weren’t kicked out, but could afford it if it were reevaluated to the current cost? I’m calling gimmick on this one, but just for the sake of argument, lets say a good size portion of the country qualify for McCain’s mortgage bailout and decide to take advantage of this. What effect would it have on the rest of us?
Most people when selling a house make some efforts to clean it up and cover any defects in order to get a higher appraisal. In this situation we would see a reversal. People would let their weeds grow, throw some dirt on the wall, point out water stains and rot, and generally try to get the house appraised as low as possible in order to owe less.
This difference in appraisal value comes directly out of our pockets, not in the form of taxes, since politicians no longer have the balls to raise taxes to pay for their programs, but out of devaluation of the money in your pocket. Adding to this, property taxes are calculated based on the value of your home. This would further reduce the income of the government and add to the deficit. The very same homeowners would then clean up their house and sell it at the real value, or they would, if there were anyone to buy it. Potentially even worse, if this plan were put into action, it would send a message to homeowners that if they wanted in on the mortgage bailout, they should just stop paying their mortgage. This has the potential for a catastrophic cascade that would only make things worse. None of this has served to make people more likely to be able to get a home loan and buy a house, so the housing market hasn’t really improved. All we have really accomplished is lower taxes while we  increased spending.