Over 450 posts later, there's bound to be some thread drift. In this case, IIRC, it began with the fact there are 14th Amendment issues with denying gays the ability to be "married" because there are over 1138 Federal rights and benefits associated with marriage such as rights of survivorship, health problems/situations and children.
This is one reason I have begun voting Libertarian. There does seem to be a sweet spot in between 100% taxation and 0% taxation, a spot that pays for essential military and debt spending but without crashing the economy. What that spot is I have no idea, but we elect and re-elect spineless hypocrites who apparently care only about their power and their pensions.
Agreed. That "sweet spot" is the Laffer Curve, as I'm sure you already know. The Laffer Curve was highly touted by the Republicans during the Bush administration and highly ridiculed by the Democrats, but both were flawed in their praise and condemnation. The Republicans forgot there was a downside on the curve and the Democrats can't accept that capitalism is better than socialism. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laffer_curve In economics, the Laffer curve illustrates a theoretical relationship between rates of taxation and the resulting levels of government revenue. It illustrates the concept of taxable income elasticity—i.e., taxable income changes in response to changes in the rate of taxation. The Laffer curve assumes that no tax revenue is raised at the extreme tax rates of 0% and 100%, and that there is a rate between 0% and 100% that maximizes government taxation revenue. The Laffer curve is typically represented as a graph that starts at 0% tax with zero revenue, rises to a maximum rate of revenue at an intermediate rate of taxation, and then falls again to zero revenue at a 100% tax rate. As the article notes, it's a controversial since establishing optimal tax rates presents a few problems. Off hand, all I can say for certain is that cutting taxes and increasing spending is doomed to failure.
It is too soon to say what Trump is doing will increase the debt, wait and see. As far as our choices last election there were basically only 2. Either go with the criminal we know or go with someone who is not a politician, I believe we chose to go with the latter and many of you just won't accept it.
Nice post. In general, the annual deficits have kept going up, more under republican presidents than demos. But both like to find ways to increase the national debt. In general, wars and tax cuts have always been the big issues. Economic history is always ignored. The Reagan experience is not understood. So, reagan had a good economy in the end, but his tax cuts in 1981 set up the second deepest recession in recent US history, with only the 1929 Great Recession being deeper. Reagan tripled the national debt, saw the unemployment rate got to 10.8% 16 months after the 1981 Reagan Tax Cut, and we saw a huge increase in the size of the national debt. Reagan controlled the recession by changing from cutting taxes, to raising taxes and spending (more than all presidents in the us before him in us history combined). So, Reagan, to rational people who look at his actual actions, saw that he was forced to use stimulus spending to get past and to repair his great recession of 1982
So I got me ba in economics 50 plus years ago, and have studied the subject for the past 50 years. But I have never figured out the interest in Libertarianism. Used to say I was a libertarian until, like most, I gave it up when I reached puberty. The problem is, in my humble but correct opinion, that it was invented by a person with no economic understanding, never had a chance to work, and has never, in fact, worked. Libertarian economies start out with great fanfare, but then always fail after a few years. Today, there is only one country with a libertarian economy. A new country with the size of about 2 city blocks, and less than 3 years since it was founded.That country is today a non issue having no citizens or commerce. So, no one can explain why I should support and economic system that has never existed as a successful entity. Perhaps looking for successful economies would be more useful. Looking at an economic system that has never worked seems totally nonproductive to me.
Sorry, but 1) I disagree on your reading of the powers of American Presidents and 2) while I like Reagan and his influence on world events, he wasn't God nor the main reason for those eventualities.
I did not comment on my understanding of the powers of the american presidents, only on the result of his policies. Which were good and bad. And while no president is the main reason for world events, they and their people ARE responsible for much of national events. Really, I dislike being misquoted. I try not to misquote others for that reason.
Lol...he’s giving billions to farmers because he screwed up and you’re paying for it.There goes your huge tax cut..the biggest ever! Lol
I disagree giving multimillion dollar agribusiness a bailout is the “right thing to do”. What happened to the free market? Corporate welfare is not the answer.
No one likes the idea of corporate welfare, but I don't really know what "multimillion dollar" means exactly: revenues? profits? Who specifically are you talking about?
Most of the farms in the country are owned by large corporations generating millions in profits. Gone are the days of small family own farms.
Agreed on the past. A big deal was made about "too big to fail" then neither Obama nor Congress fixed the problem. In fact, they made it worse by allowing large companies to merge until they too were too big to fail. Example: US airlines. Now we have the agribusiness, which is mostly corporations, not small 100 acre farm families. Think of what other countries in the past allowed large corporations to do as they please and then bailed them out when necessary.
ummm....there’s no such thing as “free money”. If we’re giving farmers money, you’re still paying for it one way or another. Strategically, it’s important that the US be able to provide enough food to feed itself. This might mean encouraging more chicken and goat ranchers than cattle ranchers.
It's interesting how so many people who favored only heterosexual marriage just 15-20 years ago are for it now. What changed? They suddenly became un-bigoted? I think wha happened was a few influential people in media, the arts and politics came out in favor and millions followed, not wanting to go again the flow.
