What's your favorite GOP election season disgrace?

Mine would be the “Lipstick on a Pig” remark.

1. The remark was clearly not about Palen
2. They tried to force it to BE about her.
3. When confronted with proof they responded with the rambling version of “nyuh-unh”
4. McCain – the old fart – HAD USED THE PHRASE HIMSELF!!!! As had many others.

My favorite one is when Nancy Pfotenhauer said that the republican part (northern) of Virginia is real Virginia. She’s McCain’s advisor and boy was it funny.

The newscaster she was talking to says something like, “Nancy, I’m going to give you a chance to climb back in off of that ledge you just went out on… what did you say?”

Funny stuff.

The election and serious consideration of Palin as vice president. Perhaps at some point in the future she could be qualified, but not now. No way.

I love the fact that Joe the Plumber is still being talked about by McCain as some kind of hero after he’s been totaly discredited: owes back taxes, not a licensed plumber, and does not know the difference between buying a business for $250,000 and paying taxes on the income you are ablee to draw out of it!
(Sorry for the long sentence, James Joyce look out!)

even more examples of why I am conservative, but won’t claim the republican party. (although to be fair, I think Ashley Todd was screwed up all by herself, no help from the RNC.)

@jholler: that’s why I used the wording “disgrace.” All of these actions are disgraceful, and the party would be right to condemn them. Unfortunately, at this time, they have condemned 0/6 that I noted.

Their whole campaign is my favorite disgrace.

My wife & I just got back from our three-days-a-week morning walk with one of our friends, a die-hard Republican. The subject of the election came up (she knows our views) and without any prompting from us, she said she’s going to vote for Obama.

The final straw for her was when Rush Limbaugh said Colin Powell was endorsing Obama just because he’s black. She’s sick of the Republican mudslinging and off-message attacks.

When John McCain picked Sarah Palin as his running mate it was a disgrace to woman voters because he thought that he could win their support by choosing any woman he could find like choosing a rabbit out of a hat.

Palin disgraced the political process and barraged us with tales of soccer moms and fashion shows good looks and beauty contests. While Wall Street plunged deeper and deeper Americans were forced to read about the cost of Mrs. Palin’s wardrobe. Like a Superbowl malfunction.

Secondly it was a disgrace to the American people by placing someone unqualified in the most important job in the world if something was to happened to McCain while he was in office.

If I were on the McCain campaign I would have quit on the spot not because Sarah Palin is a woman but because she was clearly being used as a pawn to spawn female voters.

The Maverick played his last card and it turned out to be a loosing hand.

@GAMBIT, as much as I’d like to laugh at the repubs for thinking Palin would energize women voters, it certainly seemed to solidify my own mother’s support for the party. It’s really disgusting.

My boyfriend almost dumped a friend of his over the Palin thing. Which is to say, his friend was voting for her purely because she’s a woman.

I’ve just enjoyed the ride. Every time I thought, “could it get any worse…” someone carved a backwards B in their face and sent Drudge over the edge, or someone got convicted of fraud, or someone said we should investigate Congress to make sure none of them held unamerican views, or someone insulted every large population center in America by implying that real America only existed in small towns or someone wandered aimlessly around a stage at a debate, blocking Tom Brokaw’s teleprompter, or someone forgot which former Secretaries of State were endorsing him. It’s been a laugh a minute.

@ EmpressPixie – My father-in-law insists that Palin is the smarter person and more experienced leader, and not a snake oil politician who rose through the ranks of entertainment and charm. Obama was president of Harvard Law.

@Bri: My boyfriend’s friend was insisting that a woman in the white house—even if we have to elect some horrible old guy then pray he dies—is the best possible outcome of this election. A woman, any woman, at any cost.

You know things are horrible when John McCain has to silence his audience because he whipped them into such a bloodlust for Barrack Obama’s head. Calling him a terrorist and proclaiming him an arab? For shame republicans, for shame.

@EmpressPixie – wow. I can’t even wrap my head around that.

On a similar note to empresspixie, I have a friend whose grandmother is a staunch conservative…so much so that she’s voting for Obama solely so “that poor woman will be able to stay home and raise her baby instead of having to go to Washington”.

My favorite GOP disgrace hasn’t happened yet. It will happen next Tuesday at 7:15pm ET when it becomes clear that because of Obama wins in Georgia, Virginia and Indiana, that a McCain win is no longer possible under any conceivable scenario, and will continue until 1:05am when Alaska is called for McCain, and the final results show that Obama won over 400 Electoral votes, including McCain’s own home state of Arizona.

Many of the actions of the Republicans in this election make me think of what was said to Joe McCarthy at the Army-McCarthy hearings by Joe Welsh, “Have you no decency, sir? At long last, have you no decency?”

Do you honestly think the Democrats have not done the same? If so, perhaps you have not been paying attention. Or are so partisan that it does not seem their ‘fair and balanced” statements about McCain’s age and history are not slander.

But how ever it seems to you, this election has seen much too much dirt tossed by both sides. And it is much the same as all the other elections I have seen.

We do need to reform. But I don’t know how.

Actually, the Democrats have not stooped to the level the Republicans have in this race. The Dems have been fighting the smears, but overall communicate a positive message. Obama is consistently on point about the economy and issues that are important to Americans. McCain has been grasping at straws for any kind of distraction, playing fast and loose with the facts, to avoid talking about the real issues.

I haven’t seen any slander from the Obama camp about McCain’s age & history. Although with a 72-year-old seven-time cancer survivor with a 25% chance of dying in the next four years (according to one recent report based on McCain’s incomplete medical history), his condition does affect his capacity to perform his duties as President and Commander in Chief – and is certainly fair game for reasonable discussion. His choice of Vice President amplifies concern regarding this issue.

@gary4books: I defy you to produce even one incident that approaches the egregiousness that was listed in my question. You can’t just use the McCain/Palin trick of leaving a suspicious hole for your listeners to fill it. TERRORIST!

@gary4books- I agree with you to some extent. I look back and find that I look and only want to see for my candidate. When I stop to think about our mistakes I am at a loss. But there were some. Just go to Factcheck.org.

My personal feeling is however, and it was magnified by the robocall from McCain, who denounced robocalls when they were against him, telling me that Obama has been friends for 20 years with a known and convicted terrorist, that McCain and/or his campaign started trying to slander Obama early and never quit to make up for McCains years of supporting Bush.

How about the flyer distributed to traditionally Democratic neighborhoods in Pennsylvania (I think) over the weekend saying because of high voter registration the election would be split over two days – Republicans vote on the 4th, Democrats on the 5th?

dalepetrie is crafting a response… here it comes… :)

Gary – good to see you over here. As for Dems not doing the same…you’re right, both sides have slung mud, both have resorted to unfair personality attacks, and there’s little to distinguish it from other elections.

However it does vary in a few very important points, and as you know I’m a staunch Obama supporter, but I also try to be fair. Obama has not been 100% fair, I’ll freely admit that. But he has not openly questioned McCain’s age or his patriotism or his personality or his associations. McCain and/or Palin have questioned Obama’s patriotism, his associations, his personality, his “American” credentials. Obama has never sought to make his supporters fear McCain. McCain’s entire playbook for the last month has been about accentuating Obama’s “otherness”, not like us, not a regular Joe the Plumber, not from real America, pals around with terrorists. These robocalls and literature I’m receiving and the things Palin in particular is saying at her rallies are leading to shouts of “kill him” and “off with his head” and ATF agents taking down plots to assassinate Obama.

I just heard two snippets this morning, at a McCain rally, McCain made a charge that Obama would raise your taxes, fair enough, that’s par for the course. People BOOED loudly. Then they played a clip of an Obama rally. Obama made the charge that McCain in 21 months of campaigning has not come up with a new economic idea and is just giving us more of the same. His charge was met with cheers.

I separate how the candidates conduct their campaigns from how the supporters conduct themselves.

Now Obama’s ad which criticized McCain for not being able to send an email, how he was stuck in 1982, that towed the line as to ageism, I’ll grant you that. But to consider that McCain is 72 years old and has had cancer 4 times, it’s certainly VALID to consider his age as one factor. My father, a staunch Republican and someone I thought of as racist, a Vietnam vet who is 67 and moves like he’s 87 thinks McCain is too old and he’s voting for Obama. It’s an issue to some people. What Obama didn’t do in that ad, which again may have been a bit beyond the pale, was to lie about McCain’s position or distort his record.

Unlike McCain’s ad, which took a vote Obama cast to teach kids in kindergarten the difference between good touch and bad touch, and portrayed that (with a very bad photo of Obama) as a vote to teach comprehensive sex ed in Kindergarten. Factcheck.org called him on it, and when a reporter from NPR asked him, he said he’d have to respectfully disagree with factcheck.org.

It’s clear to me that Obama has made several attempts to bring this nation together by reaching out to groups and voters that Democrats ignore. And it’s clear that McCain has made a concerted effort to divide the nation between “us” and “them”.

So, I get your point, I too am appalled when someone crosses the line. But you can’t be intellectually honest in any argument that purports the severity and level to be the same among the official campaigns.

@pupntaco, that was the first thing I linked in the question. :)

missed that, I dove into the meat of the conversation ;)

I particularly enjoyed Palin’s fruit fly comments, given the fact that one of her key platforms is helping children with special needs. Fruit fly research, among other things, is primarily being used to study the causes of autism. I KID YOU NOT!

The whole damn deal has been a disgrace. I hope that we, as a country can heal the divide after the election.

Where McCain and Obama have misled voters. A partial tally.

@janbb, interesting you cite that specific example.

You’ve apparently altogether missed the point of “Joe the Plumber” precisely because of the democrat smear campaign to “discredit” him.

The whole point of that entire exchange between Obama and Joe (in front of his own house, btw) was that Obama exposed his socialist stance with that “spread the wealth around” statement.

When you look at his “tax cuts” for the poorest people—the 1/3 of Americans who don’t currently pay income taxes in the first place—they’d be getting money that was taken from others under Obama’s plan. It’s wealth redistribution and it’s really a form of welfare.

Now, if you’re for socialism and Marxist tenets, then great… go vote Obama.

Joe the Plumber didn’t mis-characterize Obama’s position. Obama said what he meant. Joe the Plumber isn’t running for office, or even plugging a business. He just answered the door one day when Obama knocked on it, asked the candidate a couple of questions, and then Obama went to great length to clearly explain his position.

Who the frick-frack cares that Joe goes by his middle name, is employed as an unlicensed plumbing technician, or how much money he makes right now? Why would any of that disqualify him from asking questions about what might be?

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Look at how much time, effort, print, and video has been wasted on discrediting “Joe the Plumber”. All, obviously as a ploy to distract from the real issue: Obama’s socialist agenda.

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Oh, and to save dalepetrie another bajillion electrons in refuting my points, allow me to condense his argument on fair/progressive taxation down to one statement: From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.

Small detail: Obama didn’t knock on his door, he was speaking to some neighbors down the street and Joe approached him.

Olbermann on “socialism”:

So Gov., Obama’s not just a socialist? Not just a re-distributionist re-distributor? Maybe not just a totalitarian? Maybe not just a dictator, he may be a communist?

To paraphrase you in Des Moines, Governor, Obama wants to set up, unlike other candidates, collectively owning the resources. By sharing that wealth and those resources. Collectivist sharing’ the wealth socialist communism, I’d say.

And still none of that sounds familiar to you, Governor?

“And Alaska – we’re set up, unlike other states in the union, where it’s collectively Alaskans own the resources. So we share in the wealth when the development of these resources occurs.”

Who said that, Governor?

Who was the collectivist share-the-wealther, who was boasting to the reporter visiting from “The New Yorker Magazine,“of having been able to send a check for $1,200 to every man, woman and child in the state since, quote “Alaska is sometimes described as America’s socialist state, because of its collective ownership of resources?”

Why, you said that, Governor! You’re a share-the-wealth, collectivist, Almost-Socialist-Governor, Governor!

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My buddy Mike on “socialism”:

This “Spreading the wealth” meme is ridiculous and needs to be called out. Income tax is inherently “spreading the wealth,” that is to say,more accurately, sharing the burden. Progressive tax rates make this fair so that those with the least means are not unduly burdened. Why is it that so many people don’t get this very basic concept? Is McCain proposing eliminating the income tax? No. What is he proposing? Reducing the tax burden of the wealthy and leaving everyone else holding the bag.

Let’s just eliminate all taxes across the board. Sounds like a good idea until your house is burning down and no one is coming to put the fire out.

@pupn, when people who do not pay incomes taxes get “refunds” from the income taxes of others, what else do you call that? It’s certainly not “sharing the burden”. It’s legitimately called “Taking from the rich and giving to the poor.”

Further, I agree 100% that there are many republican candidates who disappoint by capitulating to socialist tenets as a means of compromise, in the spirit of reaching across the aisle. I hold them accountable, too.

@ robmandu – I am asking to be educated here. At a certain level of wealth doesn’t the hand flip over where people can afford investors and accountants to not only make money for them but find tax loopholes that compensate for almost any tax adjustments the government makes?

Or is that level so high it is statistically insignificant.

Also, we all need to pay our share in what we use in this country. I don’t think the rich should pay more than the poor. But I don’t think the poor should go hungry or with out a home to pay for a bridge.

@Bri_L, I ask the same in return then. Please educate me on these magic loopholes for hiding wealth. I hear that a lot, but I don’t know any details.

I mean, as Joe Middle Class here, I can protect my wealth from taxes by exploiting retirement plans like 401Ks and other investment vehicles. If I do not draw that money out, it grows tax free. If I can wait until I’m 60-something, I can pull it all out tax free, too.

I also can employ Flex Spending accounts to set aside money, again tax free, to cover medical expenses in the upcoming year.

Because I have the ability to “hide” my money from the tax man, are you suggesting that I need to pay out even more than I already do?

You see, I have a hard time reconciling this concept that the wealthy in this country don’t pay any taxes because they shelter it all… while at the same time, it’s known that the top 5% of taxpayers pay 50% of all taxes.

robmandu,

I’m no Marxist and neither is Obama. And your simplistic and dismissive pre-emptive rejoinder is both insulting and incorrect. But I’ll try to condense my thoughts to a mere million electrons.

#1 – Federal tax is far from the only taxes we pay. One is not “re-distributing the wealth” by upping the marginal tax rate on money made over and above $250k per year from 36 to 38.5% (any more than Clinton was a Socialist with is 39% top tier bracket). If you look at ALL the taxes we pay, our tax structure is very REGRESSIVE…meaning the less money you make (regardless of how hard you work), the larger percentage of it you pay out in taxes. A tiered progressive tax structure is meant to provide some balance. Furthermore, the more money you make, the more ways you have to shelter your income from taxation. You want to talk about a redistribution of wealth, how bout allowing those with money to burn by investing on the stock market the ability to pay 1/2 what they pay now on taxes for capital gains. Where is the hard work ethic in gambling on stocks? How is that not more socialistic than Obama’s plan? Making the tax system more fair has nothing to do with re-distributing wealth.

As for the argument that some money (via refundable tax credits presumably) goes to x% of people who don’t even pay any taxes, again, they don’t pay FEDERAL INCOME TAXES. They pay taxes, your chosing to ignore that fact doesn’t make it untrue. Obama’s tax plan is not perfect…a perfect system would, in my view allow each of us to make a living if we were willing to work hard, a living that provides for the basic necessities (but not the luxuries) of life. When all taxed paid were add up, no one would pay taxes on the first x dollars in income, the x would be tied to the cost of living said life (basic necessities). After that, our total taxation would come out equal…so if that’s 25% overall on every dollar earned over and above the first 20k, so be it…whatever, that’s fair. Obama’s plan doesn’t do that, but it goes a DAMN SIGHT closer to that than McCain’s plan. The only real difference between Obama’s plan and McCain’s plan in terms of “re-distributing the wealth” (a phrase Palin first used, not Obama) is to whom that wealth is re-distributed. Under McCain’s plan, more of that wealth is concentrated in the hands of the haves, not in the hands of the have nots.

#2 – Calling either candidate a socialist is a grave insult to the Socialist Party. Look up Socialism if you don’t understand why. There is no collectivism about either candidate’s plan…no one is trying to take wealth, concentrate it all in the hands of the government and distribute it according to need (or equally). There is nothing in Obama’s plan that would not reward hard work, there is nothing that caps salaries for highly compensated executives, there is nothing that says you can’t make a trillion dollars if your skill and drive allow you to do so. But it does make you pay a fair share of that income, just like the little guy does.

#3 – As for Joe the Plumber, it wasn’t Obama that lied about what Joe the Plumber was asking…“Joe” pretty much stated that he was worried that HIS taxes would go up or that he was worried about something that was imminent (buying his plumbing business), when it was nothing more than a pipe dream. It was not Obama that looked into the guy’s background, the press did it’s fucking job for once and exposed his hypocrisy. Joe is indeed an outspoken Republican activist, clearly he was trying to wrangle Obama into saying something that they could twist and use against him and viola, they did it.

#4 – The McCain campaign has been complicit in using the overlysimplistic idea of Joe the Plumber (which is really a fabrication in its entirety, which is the entire point) to sell a story that is explicitly untrue and deliberately misleading. The McCain camp has convinced many people that under Obama their taxes will go up, when actually if you look at the tax calculators that economists have put forward, you will see that what Obama says is 100% accurate…your taxes do not go up until you make at least $250,000. But the lie is sold.

#5 – These lies are leading to misconceptions everywhere. If you talk to any people who actually believe that their taxes are going to go up under Obama’s plan, they have not used the tax calculators to say it ain’t so. And if you talk to people who like “Joe” now, say that even if THEY don’t make $250k, they don’t think it’s fair that you’re penalized for working harder, you see that what they don’t understand is that the taxes actually only go up on the income over and above the $250k level. So your $249,999th dollar is not taxed any more under Obama’s plan than it is under McCain’s, but you get to a million in income, McCain’s plan saves you $95k in tax. It’s not as if that entire $750k between $250 and a mil is gone, now is it? No, it’s not. But I’ve actually heard the comment that if I’m making $248k, why should I work hard enough to make that extra $2k, because I’ll bring home less…not true.

#6 – People then bring up the small business issue, but they don’t realize that we’re not talking about raising taxes over and above $250k in revenue, we’re talking about raising taxes on money taken home out of the business, bottom line profits after expenses. If you hire more people, you are actually going to save more in taxes, but the argument is twisted so that people think these small businesses won’t be able to hire as many people. If you really want to know why McCain is making this argument, look at Bob the Boat Builder, the guy who runs a $67 million dollar company who was held out at a McCain rally as a “small businessman” who would “suffer” under Obama’s plan. Or (and he actually made this claim with a straight face), Cindy the Beermeister…his wife who owns Anheuser Busch for Christ’s sake!

#7 – Joe the Plumber did not open the door one day when Obama knocked on it. Get your facts straight. Joe the Plumber went to an Obama rally and while he knew he was being filmed, asked Obama a question whose premise he knew to be dishonest. This poor individual who is just being picked on has a) endorsed McCain (no surprise as he says he always votes for the Republican anyway) and b) is appearing at McCain/Palin rallies (Palin introduced him at a rally today). He is not who he claimed to be, he is a fabrication, always has been, and the public, when being fed faulty information about Obama’s tax plan, has a right to know this and the media has the responsibility to figure this out and report it.

robmandu said: ”@pupn, when people who do not pay incomes taxes get “refunds” from the income taxes of others, what else do you call that?”

Are you talking about disbursement checks from payroll taxes withheld?

@ Robmandu – first you didn’t answer my question. Well, you did with sarcasm. You know damn well there are tax issues that only accountants and wealth management teams know about that people on my level have no idea of. I was honestly asking you. Thanks for the sarcasm.

The difference is, the people to whom I refer can actually afford to do it. It is not a sacrifice of lifestyle to them.

It doesn’t mean their kids might not go to college. Or they wont have enough money to survive if they lose their job. Or if they have a bad health problem (not catastrphic). Or a car goes in the dumpster. Or a kid needs braces.

Why does the Executive branch have a tax plan, when the “power to lay and collect taxes, duties imposts and excises” lays with the Legislative branch?

jholler – that’s the plan they hope Congress will work with them to pass. Otherwise, it’s happy talk.

Ah, I understand. It’s “Elect me!” stuff.

Two words: McCain/Palin

Dalepetrie 2012

@all, my apologies for the “knock on the door” re: Joe the Plumber. I don’t think it matters to my point, though. Obama being in the neighborhood and canvassing residents within walking distance of Joe’s house is close enough in my book.

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@Bri_L, if I was being truly sarcastic, I’d’ve used a tilde. My point is, people keep pointing to these tax shelters, but don’t ever explain them. They take on a mythological aura. I explained that you & I have tax shelter constructs available to us.

One thing I didn’t point out is that the tax shelters I mentioned exist to help grow the economy. Another example, getting tax credit for interest on your primary home.

In the end, where do you draw the line? Anyone over $250K/year, I guess. Next election, will it be $150K?

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@dalepetrie, I agree, none of the major party candidates are full-tilt socialists, marxists, communists. But that doesn’t mean that they don’t espouse many of the same concepts. Check out incrementalism.

Again, remove the person of Joe the Plumber from the equation. Insert Michelle Obama as the person asking the question. My concern is with Obama’s answers to the question. It matters not who asked the question that elicited the answer.

Also, you must’ve misread my quip above, as I clearly mentioned income taxes.’

And how does “progressive tax structure” (where the richer you are, the higher percentage taxes you pay) not jibe with the quote: From each according to his ability…?

@ robmandu – thanks for the tip on your method for noting sarcasm. I was unaware. And I explained to you that that was pointless when most can barely afford to use them. My point was when I have to choose between contributing to the list you made or the issues I listed that does not seem to present me with the same problems as someone who makes $250,000 and can afford to have someone help them, as well as pay someone to assist with their finances.

You still ignored my original question.

At a certain level of wealth doesn’t the hand flip over where people can afford investors and accountants to not only make money for them but find tax loopholes that compensate for almost any tax adjustments the government makes?
Or is that level so high it is statistically insignificant.

You draw the line where a person’s wealth enables them an advantage over the law, means to use and leverage loopholes set up by lobbies they supported by means of wealth they built up on the backs of middle income people, people the heads of AIG and the Credit rating hoping “we will all be old and retired by the time this house of cards falls”. So thanks for the suggestion, lets start at $150,000.

@ Dale – At a certain level of wealth doesn’t the hand flip over where people can afford investors and accountants to not only make money for them but find tax loopholes that compensate for almost any tax adjustments the government makes?
Or is that level so high it is statistically insignificant.

@Bri_L, I’m a little confused by your wording.

Statistical significance doesn’t matter to me. I don’t think people should be targeted by the government to take the wealth that they legally worked hard to acquire so that it can be taken and given away to someone else. That’s not to say I think they shouldn’t pay their fair share of taxes… just that they shouldn’t be singled out.

Again, kinda confused, but you seem to imply that people who make less than $150,000/year are unable to take advantage of 401K, retirement accounts, home mortgages, flex spending, etc. That’s not true. Maybe you meant otherwise, though.

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Today, in Raleigh, Obama claimed that McCain might characterize him as a communist because he shared his toys in kindergarten. Besides being a rather smarmy statement, it’s also wrong in that it illustrates that Obama apparently doesn’t know what communism/socialism is either. Sharing your wealth of your own volition is charity. Government taking a portion of your wealth and handing it out to others is an aspect of socialism.

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All this back and forth. Um, would it be correct to say that all of us here on this board think socialism is a bad thing for the U.S.?

@Robmandu – I agree. I wrote origionaly to you

“Also, we all need to pay our share in what we use in this country. I don’t think the rich should pay more than the poor. But I don’t think the poor should go hungry or with out a home to pay for a bridge.”

What I meant by statistically insignificant was this. Is the number of rich people who abuse the level of their wealth by way of the things I mentioned in my previous post so small that it does not effect the overall tax situation?

I didn’t say that people making under $150,000 couldn’t contribute I said people like me. In todays world it is hard for a family of 4 to make enough money to contribute enough money to adequately contribute to those programs while still being safe from the other concerns I have previously listed.

I only brought that up in response to your post to my original question.

I think that we already have a certain level of socialism. We collect a massive amount of taxes into giant pool and a bunch of people decide how to disperse them for the betterment of everyone involved. At least that is what I would like to think.

A couple thoughts on your response, Rob

#1 – It does matter who asked the question if they had an ulterior motive AND asked it under false pretenses with the express goal of twisting th words to support a predetermined notion, which is what I believe happened here.

#2 – I KNOW you mentioned “income” taxes, and my pint was you mentioned ONLY income taxes, and I don’t think it’s fair or equitable to just look at Federal income taxes. To my way of thinking part of the role of Federal government should be to help level the playing field by smoothing out the inequities in the overall tax structure. If Federal government is NOT going to do this, then it needs to disallow secondary taxation from State, County and City authorities. THIS is why it’s not socialism.

#3 – This does not jive with Marxist philosophy, because it is neither “from each according to his ability,” because ability and financial success certainly do not have a linear relationship. There are indeed many people who through the right combination of skill, luck and connections have made vast fortunes, just as there are many extremely able people whose abilities lie in areas which are not in high enough demand to provide them with even a subsistence living. And it is not “to each according to his needs” because taxation is meant to provide for the good of the society, certainly a wealthy person benefits as much by having roads as does a poor person, even though he does not have as much “need” for the government to subsidize his usage of these roads, it is not as if all Interstate highways are toll roads and you only have to pay a toll if you’re rich.

To be honest, Marxism and Socialism are not as scary to me as they seem to be to you and the others who are buying into these arguments. But OK, I’ll admit, you could interpret that someone (me) saying that our society should ensure that everyone is afforded a need based standard of living, and that is therefore “to each according to his need”, and that taking more money as you make more money is an ability to pay and is therefore “from each according to his ability”, that is a mischaracterization of Marxist and Socialist thought. In Socialism, unlike in our Capitalist society, ownership of the engines of production are controlled by the workers as a collective (or by the government on their behalf).

At it’s broadest, Socialism believes that capitalism unfairly concentrates power and wealth among a small segment of society that controls capital and creates an unequal society. Well, what’s to argue with that, first of all. We live in a capitalist society, and power and wealth have indeed been concentrated among a small segment of society which controls capital, and we do indeed have an unequal society. So, no, I wouldn’t say it would be correct to say that all of us here think Socialism is a bad thing for the US when you look at the core belief of all types of Socialist thought. To distill this further, more accurately, one could say that what Obama advocates is Social Democracy…it is still Democracy, definitely not Communism (which unfortunately most people associate with Socialism based on a misunderstanding of what it is, which is why the term is being used…not out of a sense of trying to be accurate, but out of a need to scare people away from voting for McCain’s opponent). It is however a Capitalist Democracy which respects the needs of a society…same root, different concept altogether. Social Democrats advocate for selected nationalization (i.e government ownership) of key national industries, combined with tax-funded welfare programs.

Damn, son…that’s what we’ve ALWAYS had. Our post offices, schools, our military, certain utilities, libraries, etc….all nationalized/socialized. We have a social security system, a medicare system, a veteran’s administration….all things which are tax-funded welfare programs. To truly say that McCain is not every bit as much of a “socialist” as Obama, he would have to advocate for privatization of every one of these things. To the contrary, he has been one of the first on board with investing $700 billion into our banking system in exchange for partial nationalization.

So, you are correct in that any time you take money in the form of taxation it is one aspect of socialism, but why is that such a bad thing? In a purely capitalist society, we would have no taxes of any kind, everyone would be free to make money however they wanted to with no oversight or regulation.

I would argue that what we have is a capitalist society that is tempered with the fairness concepts of Social Democracy, however I do not feel they are tempered enough. In my opinion, our government does not do enough to keep the destructive forces of greed which are a natural outcropping of capitalism and human nature at bay. Obama’s goal, and I think it is a fair and noble one, is to bring prosperity to all members of society, not just the privileged few who prosper in a Capitalist economy with minimal oversight and regressive OVERALL taxation. He is trying to make things more fair. And as I see it, it is a privilege to live in a society where you can make as much money as your luck, skills, ability and connections will take you, taxation in my mind is the admission price, kind of like a commission on your success…you wouldn’t have this success if we didn’t support your ability to prosper vis a vis a Capitalist economy, and therefore the more success you are met with, the more you “owe” to the system which allows you to have this success. If we were a socialist nation and not a capitalist nation, we would simply take all the fruits of your toil and spread them equally to all members of society. That is clearly not what Obama advocates.

But if you come from a point of view which I know you’ve espoused before in which you do not see the value of a social safety net to keep you from falling through the cracks given extraordinary circumstances beyond your control, then you will be of the mindset that says we should privatize more and tax less. But I have read fairly recently that the vast majority of Americans, and I believe that number was somewhere in the high 70th percentile, BELIEVES we SHOULD have a social safety net…we SHOULD have unemployment insurance, we SHOULD have Social Security, we SHOULD take care of the needs of the old and the sick and those who fall on hard times despite having both a willingness and ability to work hard to provide for themselves. But many of these same people hear the oversimplification of “Socialism” and the association is “Red Menace”, and that of taking their money to give to some lazy ne’erdowell.

Look no further than Obama’s 2004 speech to the DNC, wherein he said,

“People don’t expect government to solve all their problems. But they sense, deep in their bones, that with just a slight change in priorities, we can make sure that every child in America has a decent shot at life, and that the doors of opportunity remain open to all.

They know we can do better. And they want that choice.”

That tears down the veil of the worn out right wing argument that the only people who need help are people who don’t try as hard. That’s a lie. People can and do every day fall through the cracks, and the health of our society is tied to the health of its citizenry. If you have no care for people or our society, and feel that we should live in an unfettered capitalist economy, a sort of Social Darwinism, then you will never get it.

And Bri, to simply answer your question, there is definitely a level of income where you can find ways to shelter your money. You can invest it and defer capital gains until someone like McCain comes along and cuts the rate in half, then you’ve made a ton of money with no actual effort and did not have to pay the taxes on it you would had you earned that money as say a janitor. And then who has to fund the parts of the government we’ve socialized? Well, the poor, the folks who work for a living and barely get by as it is, they have to pay all these taxes that have been pushed down to the local level because the rich people can afford lobbyists to get the laws changed so they pay less in taxes.

There is nothing unfair about asking people to pay their fair share, and as I see it, this is what Obama seeks to do. Will he be 100% successful in bringing about tax equity? No. But he’ll go a damn sight better than McCain. If anything McCain is every bit as much of a socialist, he just wants to rob from the poor to give to the rich.

@ Dale – that is what I thought. thanks.

How many background checks have we run on people asking McCain a question? I would really love to know the answer…..

The lie I see is when people perpetuate the thought that the “right wing” argues “that the only people who need help are people who don’t try as hard.”

The “right wing” I know goes out of their way to charitably contribute their time, money, and talents to help those less fortunate. The “right wing” I know thinks that the government need not do that job… that we, each of us, can do it better.

The people who vote Republican are a different animal altogether than the people who run the Republican party. Yes, a lot of Republicans are very charitable. But it’s not as if we got rid of taxes charitable giving would go up enough to fill the gap and meet the needs of society…that is the lie.

You’re first sentence there deserves recognition…the democrats I know and yes…even vote for occasionally….are also a different animal from the ones in the DNC and moveon.org. Thank you.

The look on John McCain’s face when he handed the microphone to the woman who went on an anti-Muslim racist rant-priceless.

@ cheebdragon I’m not sure I want to wade into these waters again, and I’m glad to see you posting here, but I just want to say that the reason that I think Joe the Plumber got such scrutiny was because McCain cited him so many times in the debate. His question and his issues have been used to raise this whole issue of Obama’s supposed socialism, so I think it is valid to look at who he really is and where is coming from.

On the other hand, your point is well-taken and neither side is pure as the driven snow.

This whole discussion of socialism as totally evil really makes me uncomfortable, because I remember hearing from elders about the McCarthy hearings. I think we have all seen the dangers of total unregulation in lending and Wall Street in the last several years, and all agree that some regulation needs to be done. Why can’t government look at the problems and see what needs to be done to benefit the majority of people who are hurting? If CEOs are making 450 times the average worker in their company shouldn’t they have to pay something of a higher proportion in taxes? Nobody running in this election is talking about making everyone’s incomes equal or anything close to that. If you read the text of Obama’s acceptance speech, you can see that.

I’m not trying to change anyone’s mind who’s voting for McCain, I just resent the labelling and name-calling. (And I know it’s being done on both sides.)

Whoa! I must be channeling Dale!

You didn’t say which election.

In 1912, primary elections were a new thing. Former President Theodore Roosevelt ran against incumbent Republican President William Howard Taft for the Republican nomination. He won an overwhelming majority of the popular vote, but because of party rules at the time, he did not have enough delegates to take the nomination. Do you remember talk of Super Delegates during this year’s primaries? Well, something like this can still happen.

Roosevelt ran as an independent against both Taft and Democratic nominee Woodrow Wilson. He came in second behind Wilson in the Electoral College, having effectively split the Republican party in two. Wilson was elected President with only 42% of the popular vote.

Taft disgraced himself by stealing the nomination. The public paid him back by putting Wilson in the White House – which turned out to be a good thing. Wilson ranks only behind FDR as one of the great reformers of the 20th Century.

And you thought dirty Republican tricks started with Nixon!

I was just musing a bit more on “Joe the Plumber” and why I think he is, was and has been fair game. I understand the thinking that goes, “here’s a regular guy who just asked a question, why should he be so scrutinized.” And I also understand the comment about why shouldn’t he be able to ask a question about something that MAY happen. My problem is dishonesty, and I guess you can say that the dishonesty never would have been revealed had the media not invaded the privacy of this private citizen. But I take exception to that because

#1 – “Joe” put himself in the public eye by asking a Presidential candidate a question in view of reporters and cameras. Anyone who does so puts himself in the spotlight, though usually the 15 minutes of fame end up being more like 15 seconds. But it is a time honored tradition with political candidates to use the stories of regular people they have encountered.

#2 – It was John McCain in fact who began to use “Joe”‘s story by bringing him up in the debate, not once, but several times. McCain was using “Joe”‘s stated story to try to prove a point he wanted to make. This made the story of interest…McCain making a claim about how Obama’s tax plan would impact people like “Joe”. It is only natural and part of the media’s job to take this claim and fact check it. There was no bias in so doing, every claim made by either side was fact checked and the results were waiting on the internet minutes after the debate ended.

#3 – In trying to figure out whether or not the claim McCain was making was accurate, the media needed to ascertain certain details that “Joe” left out. For example, when he stated this business was making between 250 and 280 thousand a year, did Joe know the difference between revenue and profit taken out of the business? Because it’s very plausible if “Joe” was not yet a business owner yet, he could not really be faulted if he did not know this difference.

#4 – The claim that he was about to buy a plumbing business that made this much profit was somewhat unbelievable on its very surface. When the fact is that 95% of “small” businesses don’t make this much money, there’s only a 1 on 20 chance that the business “Joe” was looking at was really at this level. To me, it would be unfair to leave these assumptions vague when there is a demand among voters from BOTH sides for fact checking.

Now step back for a minute. What if “Joe”‘s assertions had been true? What if “Joe” really were a plumber getting ready to buy a business that made between $250 and $280k in profit each year. In that case, the fact checkers would have said, “Indeed, McCain’s claim that ‘Joe the Plumber’ would pay more taxes at a critical time when trying to start his own business is true. Under McCain’s plan, ‘Joe the Plumber’ would actually pay $x per year less in Federal taxes.”

Had that been the outcome of the fact checking, NO ONE, not robmandu, not Sean Hannity, not Rush Limbaugh, not John McCain would be complaining that “the media invaded Joe’s privacy.”

But the argument gets even a bit more silly when you consider the following:

#1 – The day following the debate, one newspaper ran a picture of “Joe the Plumber” sitting at home watching the debate. Now consider, this is before America had heard of “Joe”, it was after the confrontation with Obama, and aparently going to his home to take a picture of him watching the debate before he became a campaign slogan for McCain was newsworthy enough to someone to go to his house on the night of the debate and take that picture.

#2 – It was not as if Joe was being spied on, this was in his living room, he was complicit in allowing the media access to his home and his opinions about the debate.

#3 – Since McCain made “Joe the Plumber” a household name, Joe has agreed to hundreds of interviews, has outright endorsed McCain and is even travelling with the campaign, and allowing them to use “Joe the Plumber” as part of their platform.

So it would seem to me that anyone being upset that “Joe” was investigated by the big bad media does not share the same opinion about it as “Joe” himself.

Now let’s take a look at what the media was looking for, and what they found out. First, let’s look at what Samuel Joseph Wurzebacher actually said. First he called out to Obama, asking him if he believed in the “American Dream”, and when Obama said he did he asked why Obama was making it harder for him personally to achieve it, his actual quote was, “I’m getting ready to buy a company that makes 250 to 280 thousand dollars a year. Your new tax plan’s going to tax me more, isn’t it?”

Let’s deconstruct this statement.

I’m getting ready to buy a business. This was 100% untrue. Now had “Joe” said, “hypothetically, if I were getting ready to buy a business”, fine, that would be fair. But he said he was getting ready to buy a business. That is an outright lie. Several years ago, Joe and his employer discussed that maybe some day Joe would want to take over if it were feasible. Hey, I’d like to own a successful business some day, but I’m not “getting ready to buy one” and if I claimed I were, I’d be a dirty liar. The question “Joe” asked was predicated first on this lie.

He then said, in that same sentence that this business he was getting ready to buy made 250 to 280k a year. Well, no it doesn’t. That statement was suspect to begin with, and sure enough, that was the one key fact that the media was out to discover in the first place. The business makes about $100k, That would be like if I were making $50k a year and told you I was making $130k…it would make me a dirty liar. And the question he was asking was again predicated on this lie. Now, “Joe” could have said, “some day I’d like to buy the plumbing business I work for, and by the time that day comes, I’m hoping it would be bringing in $250k a year…if that happened, wouldn’t my taxes be higher under your plan than under Senator McCain’s?”

Joe concluded with “your new tax plan’s going to tax me more, isn’t it?” Well, Obama’s tax plan would cost someone who was in the imaginary (and unlikely) position Joe laid out more, but it would cost Joe much less. Which would allow Joe to save more money and buy that business and achieve the American dream more quickly.

This is key to why it’s important that the media went after “Joe”, because he made a demonstrably false claim and supported his claim with outright falsifications. It made it more newsworthy to know that each and every single part of Joe’s brief interaction with Obama was completely dishonest.

Now, were I a member of the media, and I were to discover that a newsworthy person had become newsworthy under false pretenses, and that everything the person had said during his brief stint in the spotlight was demonstrably untrue, were I to also uncover other untruths about peripheral things in the course of this discovery, I would find it 100% newsworthy to report on them. So, finding out that “Joe the Plumber” is neither “Joe” nor a licensed plumber means that the entire McCain argument is predicated on what is nothing more than a complete fabrication…a fairy tale. It’s not about taking down Samuel Wurzelbacher at this point any more.

And had McCain done the intelligent and honorable thing when he was confronted with the fact that his new mascot was actually a complete fabrication, he would not have gone all in, moving this fabrication to center stage…he would have rejected this and changed the conversation by saying, “perhaps Mr. Wurzelbacher wasn’t telling the complete truth about his personal situation, but the essence of his question to Senator Obama was true. Why should someone who does fit this description, a person on the verge of purchasing a profitable small business, be penalized in a way that makes it harder for them to purchase this small business?”

Now that argument would be debatable…after all we’re talking about raising the marginal rate on profits over an amount where anyone would actually feel financial pain, but at least it legitimizes arguments like the one robmandu made. If you want to have a debate on whether or not a progressive Federal Income Tax structure is a good thing or a bad thing, that’s great.

But as I see it, this argument can’t happen, because McCain turned “Joe the Plumber” into an everyman, when the strawman that “Joe the Plumber” actually constructed was a fictitious character that may not represent a single person in the United States, or who at very least does not represent the people McCain is trying to reach with his economic message. So it is VERY important that “Joe the Plumber” is a lie, a lie that is embraced by the McCain campaign, because it points to McCain’s lack of integrity.

Let’s create our own hypothetical situation that removes all the prejudices around this issue. Let’s say we had one candidate who wanted to implement a missle defense system and another who didn’t. Serious, intelligent people on both sides of the issue have strong opinions. But if a layman on the street said to the candidate who supported the missle defense system, I own 17 pink flying monkeys, if they fly into the airspace while you’re shooting down a missle, isn’t that going to kill my pink flying monkeys? But if it turns out that not only do I not own a pink flying monkey, but pink flying monkeys aren’t even known to exist, should this candidate’s opponent take up the “save the pink flying monkeys” mantle in hopes of convincing people who would someday like to own a pink flying monkey that his opponent was against pink flying monkeys? Or should he say, “look, we know this guy really doesn’t own pink flying monkeys, but we also know that a missile defense system is a bad idea because of x, y and z.”

So saying who the frick frack cares what Joe’s real name is or if he has a license…well it does reflect on the candidate who sells Joe’s fictitious situation to America as just like them (have you seen the “I’m Joe the Plumber” ads?) Joe is nothing more than a pink flying monkey, McCain knows this, and uses it anyway. And I think it’s more than fair to know whether the centerpiece of a candidate’s campaign is fictional.

Let’s not be too worried about poor Joe’s privacy, He has a publicist and a lawyer trying to get him a book deal (Life as an unlicensed plumber?) and putting together a country music deal. As Jon Stewart said, He has taken off like a rocket. In one month he has gone from a construction worker to just s pas a deux away from Dancing With the Stars