SSsssooo what would you cut.???????

[Sailor Steve]

I cut my hair.





Hey, it's a start!

[Onkel Neal]

Originally Posted by mookiemookie

• cut foreign aid in half
• eliminate farm subsidies
• reduce the military to pre-Iraq size, bring all combat forces home from Iraq & Afghanistan
• give the Army 5 years to close half of all foreign bases
• cap Medicare growth
• reduce Social Security benefits for high income earners
• re-institute the Estate tax, but exempt the first 3 million of any estate

I agree with all but the last. I can't stand estate taxes, it's just not right that the govt can come in & grab property just because someone dies and leaves it to an heir. Much of it was already taxed.

But hey, we agree on the first few, that's a start!

[mookiemookie]

The estate tax was created way back when to prevent the rise of a landed gentry. The founding fathers had just left a country where the system was set up "only to raise the wealth and importance of particular families and individuals, giving them an unequal and undue influence in a republic" according to North Carolina's 1784 law that abolished entailed estates. A similar law in Virginia in 1776 said that "the perpetuation of property in certain families, by means of gifts made to them in fee taille, is contrary to good policy." The idea of an estate tax was advocated by folks like Thomas Paine, Adam Smith (the father of capitalism, lest you call me a damn dirty socialist) and Thomas Jefferson. It revolves around the idea that your place in society should be earned by your own works and contributions to it, rather than by your last name.

I think it makes sense.

[Platapus]

I never understood the concept of an inheritance of money. I want my father to die in the process of spending his last dollar on himself. He earned it, I didn't.

Inheriting houses, businesses, cars, etc, I can understand, but expecting to get money from someone and not pay taxes on it is unreasonable. An inheritance is just income without doing any work to earn it.

Now I also think the inheritances should be taxed at the same rate as the inheritor's income tax. Having a separate and higher rate just for inheritances is wrong in my opinion.

If my father leaves me any "free money" like an inheritance, I will be more than happy to pay an inheritance tax. I am not losing anything, just getting a little less money I did not earn.

[Anthony W.]

Cut everything that has been done in the past 3 and a half years.

Our debt will be under 1 trillion.

[TorpX]

First eliminate the Depts. of Education, and Energy. They are worse that useless. Greatly reduce the EPA. Thin out the Federal bureaucrats. No grants for loony tunes, democrat front groups.

Freeze entitlements, cut entitlements for all illegal aliens entirely. States would not get anything for them. If they want to be sanctuary for illegals, they would have to do it on their own dime. Eliminate farm subsidies and corporate welfare (such as ethanol and "green energy" projects).

Bring back the troops in Europe and some of the other outposts and close the bases.

Inheriting houses, businesses, cars, etc, I can understand, but expecting to get money from someone and not pay taxes on it is unreasonable. An inheritance is just income without doing any work to earn it.

Property is property. It was all earned, or purchased with earnings. Why should one be protected and the other not? It is, in fact, the accumulated earnings of a lifetime of labor.

If the Gov't was really concerned about the morality of income going to people who do not "earn" it, there would be no welfare, corporate subsidies, foreign aid, gambling or lotteries.

I never understood the concept of an inheritance of money. I want my father to die in the process of spending his last dollar on himself. He earned it, I didn't.

I agree, since he earned it he should be able to do what he wants with it. He can donate it to charity, he can will it to you, he can spend it on himself, or he can give it to the Gov't (but who would want to do that). He earned it, the Government didn't earn it. He already paid taxes on it, so why should it be taxed again?


Furthermore, the estate tax is hostile to family businesses. People used to operate family establishments that would be passed from generation to generation. Now we have large corporations which lobby for favors and get special breaks. (After all their too big to fail, you know!) People die and get robbed by the Government, but corporations don't die and never pay the tax. It is inherently unfair.

[nikimcbee]

Originally Posted by mookiemookie

• cut foreign aid in half
• eliminate farm subsidies
• reduce the military to pre-Iraq size, bring all combat forces home from Iraq & Afghanistan
• give the Army 5 years to close half of all foreign bases
• cap Medicare growth
• reduce Social Security benefits for high income earners
• re-institute the Estate tax, but exempt the first 3 million of any estate

Good choices. But on a side note, you are obviosly not from a farm state, the mid-West demmicrates aren't going to roll over for that one. (Don't cut my benefits bro !)

I'll add to your list:

• Anything to do with the arts. (This is just fluff, go pay for your own hobby) (auf weidersehen PBS)
• maybe mothball a good portion of the armo(u)red forces. I'd close all the foreign bases except for Korea.
• I'd come up with some sort of hollywood tax
• I'd cut all congressional perks. (no more million dollar pensions) Limit trips to congress member and one staffer.
• I'd send Nancy pelosi the bill for her travels.

[Takeda Shingen]

Cutting funding for the arts is fine, but I take great exception to your labeling it as fluff, McBee. I would attempt to explain to you the great relevance that the arts are to society and history, but given your stated views on the matter it would be a futile endeavor.

Art is my business and it is my passion in life. It is not fluff. Somebody's stock just lost a lot of it's value in my book.

[Betonov]

Originally Posted by Takeda Shingen

Cutting funding for the arts is fine, but I take great exception to your labeling it as fluff, McBee. I would attempt to explain to you the great relevance that the arts are to society and history, but given your stated views on the matter it would be a futile endeavor.

Art is my business and it is my passion in life. It is not fluff. Somebody's stock just lost a lot of it's value in my book.

Cut funding of arts but have tax breaks for patrionage ??

[Sailor Steve]

Originally Posted by Platapus

I never understood the concept of an inheritance of money. I want my father to die in the process of spending his last dollar on himself. He earned it, I didn't.

Inheriting houses, businesses, cars, etc, I can understand, but expecting to get money from someone and not pay taxes on it is unreasonable. An inheritance is just income without doing any work to earn it.

But the family has more right to it than any government. In this case Government is a group of people who claim that everything you do belongs to them.

[Sailor Steve]

Originally Posted by Anthony W.

Cut everything that has been done in the past 3 and a half years.

Our debt will be under 1 trillion.

While Barak Obama has seen the largest increase as a percentage of the GDP, and the National Debt is higher now than it has ever been, you might want to rethink your last statement. The National Debt has been over a trillion dollars since the 1980s. In January 2008 the Debt was over 9 trillion dollars.

[nikimcbee]

Originally Posted by Takeda Shingen

Cutting funding for the arts is fine, but I take great exception to your labeling it as fluff, McBee. I would attempt to explain to you the great relevance that the arts are to society and history, but given your stated views on the matter it would be a futile endeavor.

Art is my business and it is my passion in life. It is not fluff. Somebody's stock just lost a lot of it's value in my book.

When we have no money, it's fluff! I have minimum issue with it when the money is a-flowin. If I must choose between (example) po-lice or art on the metro, Which one is more important? I do value it, but not on someone else's nickel, especially when there's no money to begin with.

[Takeda Shingen]

Originally Posted by nikimcbee

When we have no money, it's fluff! I have minimum issue with it when the money is a-flowin. If I must choose between (example) po-lice or art on the metro, Which one is more important? I do value it, but not on someone else's nickel, especially when there's no money to begin with.

Reading comprehension, sir. I said that it is fine to cut the funding to the arts. I also said that I resent your characterization of art as fluff.

[Anthony W.]

TorpX and Nikimcbee...

What those 2 said. Every bit of it.

But don't totally kill farm spending - actually go ahead. All of my neighbors are struggling farmers - they aren't getting anything. In fact, there was a recent study that showed people in my state are getting money under farm subsidies that in fact don't own farms.

And drill baby drill. Get the gas prices down - it'll stimulate both new high performance (expensive) and used car sales. Bring back cars people can be proud to drive.

[nikimcbee]

I went home for lunch and caught a little bit of John Stossel's show "The money hole." (?)
He went around asking people (like Jay(Leno)-walking) whether or not certain grants were real gubmint grants or fake. (They were all real) Such as a program to pay hookers to drink responsibly.

So I'll add to my list: gubmint grants (see shimp on a treadmill, cowboy poetry)