Letters to the Editor
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Hillary, go after tax cheats and end sweet deals first
Before raising rates Hillary should go after the known tax cheats in the system, i.e. jewelry stores, coin dealers, etc. Also Blackstone and others of their ilk should be paying income tax (35%) on their billions of income instead of capital gains tax (15%). Also why are taxpayers taking the hit for Countrywide?
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New Deal Democrat
I'm not convinced that either Andrew or Salon readers understand that "fiscal stimulus" is inherently inflationary
It's not inherently inflationary. The economic distortion created by 'fiscal stimulus' does not necessarily, or 'inherently', have to express itself as inflation. It can be expressed in other detrimental ways.
The reason inflation has been low for the last 25 years is because economic distortions have been expressed largely as debt, rather than as inflation. Not only is that debt now so large that it can never be repaid, it is now so large that it can no longer be controlled. But financial practices can allow for inflation to be kept under control all the way down to national bankruptcy.
Now that the US has reached its limit of feasible debt creation, it's having to resort to other means to maintain solvency. The most destructive of these is asset expropriation: the productive capacity of the US is being sold off to pay for consumption. The country's biggest export is jobs. The size of US debt guarantees that US productive capability must continue to deteriorate until there's nothing left worth selling off.
The corporations that run the US have no interest in the country other than as a corpse to be stripped of its wealth and as a staging ground for military conquest. It's what they've always wanted, and that's what they got:
We have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated Governments in the world - no longer a Government of free opinion, no longer a Government by conviction and vote of the majority, but a Government by the opinion and duress of small groups of dominant men.
- Woodrow Wilson
Is it not so? And if not, why not?
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New Deal Democrat
I'm against any government intervention to bail out homeowners who have take on too much debt.
Translation: "I'm against any government intervention to protect homeowners from con artist financiers."
You should not be arguing for the benefit of the flim-flam guys in the finance industry who gamed the system to rob homeowners. That's what Republicans are for.
You're not actually a "Democrat", are you?
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Malusinka
... a return to those rates is likely to reduce the precentage that the rich pay of total taxes paid.
You're arguing that tax cuts for the rich don't actually result in tax cuts for the rich, and that raising taxes on the rich amounts to a tax cut for the rich.
That's pretty silly.
In short, it is the really tiresome pit the middle class against the rich rhetoric that ignores the fact that the problem is Gov't spending and the amount of tax the Gov't has to levy to pay for the war in Iraq and Gov't pork.
You're mistaken. Nobody is ignoring that fact.
Most of that government spending is for the benefit of corporations. And you're ignoring the fact that the war in Iraq and the federal pork you deplore is also a symptom of the issue of "the middle class against the rich", since it is the rich, or more properly large corporations, which has gamed the system to get that war in Iraq and that federal pork.
These capitalists generally act harmoniously and in concert to fleece the people, and now that they have got into a quarrel with themselves, we are called upon to appropriate the people's money to settle the quarrel.
In short, her populist speech shows ignores economics.
So does yours. You're both evading the real issue, which is corporate control of the economy, the federal fiscal system, and the political system.
You're only allowed to vote for presidential candidates approved by corporations, and most other federal candidates as well. This gives you politicians who act for the benefit of corporations at the expense of the citizenry, which is to say, the rich against the middle class.
Don't you think that's a problem?
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Dear Hillary,
Please think before you speak.
The effect of a 5 year freeze on mortgage rates will be to stop banks from lending money.
A moratorium on foreclosures will stop banks from lending money.
$30 billion to bail out borrowers will reward banks for making stupid decisions.
$25 billion for heat will reward utilities for not investing in alternate energy sources.
Doubling unemployment benefits simply postpones the inevitable.
For each of these "proposals" the effect would be another problem popping up. Back to the drawing board.
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401kBoy
For each of these "proposals" the effect would be another problem popping up.
Try coming up with one that wouldn't.
You can't.
It's unjust to expect others to do what isn't possible. But you do it anyway.
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You mean Hillary would continue big government policies? I'm shocked!
So let me get this straight: she would man-handle the economy by throwing tax payer dollars into a hole that was government created (the sub-prime mortgage crises was created by the Fed with their easy credit policies), stop company's from foreclosing on their property when the buyer doesn't pay, stop banks from making an informed decision about what is a fair interest rate on the loans they give out for the next 5 years, and give tax payer dollars to people who don't know how to conserve energy and lower their own energy bills? Wow, brilliant. It shows a complete lack of economic understanding and a total love of the nanny-state.
How about this: stop deficit spending, end the war in Iraq, bring our troops home from all over the world, and then lower taxes dramatically for the middle and lower class with the savings! Then move this country away from taxes that penalize production and savings, that are progressive rather than regressive, that tax everyone equally, and that help clean up our environment (such as the Land Value Tax and the Carbon Tax).
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If this is substance, have you got any style?
The 30 bln$ fund is a vague proposal, although she mentions 'communities', which means 'new' communities, the homebuilding industry, and retail stores, which are the twin peaks of urban sprawl. These two groups are the bubble stocks of the 2000's. (Wall St 1, Main St 1)
The 90 day moratorium on foreclosure means almost nothing, since an Ohio court set precedent in this matter. Unravelling the legal ownership is going to take some time. (Wall St 2.... Nobody wants to write these loans off, Main St, still 1)
Mortgage rates aren't going up anytime soon. Since the previous stagflation event in the 70's the Central Bankers have accumulated a great deal more clout, and collusion is a matter of policy. Our Chinese masters are considering price controls to curb inflation. Would those controls apply to US exports? (Wall St 3.... We have to keep the China economic miracle going, that means low interest rates. Disingenous Politics 1)
Families with 'skyrocketing' energy bills includes that McMansion down the street, with a pool and 5000 sq feet of empty space. (Wall St 4, Politics 1, Main St 1 1/2.. the gardener and the pool service keep their jobs...)
We always extend unemployment benefits in a recession, nothing new there. (Disingenous politics 2)
Taxing incomes above 250K sounds a bit like rejiggering the AMT to account for inflation. Eventually, with hyperinflation it will start to take a bite out of average Americans, Main St MINUS 1.
Final tally Wall Street 4, Self Serving Political Statements, 2, Main Street 1/2 point)