Sunday, December 18, 2005

Why does the national Republican Party insist on tax cuts for wealthy people?

I haven't been engaged with just the latest round of putting out country even deeper into debt through ridiculous tax cuts on wealth that the Republican Party is muscling through the Congress. It gets exhausting and monotonous and ultimately depressing.

Plus, I like most of the good news out of Illinois and Cook County and Chicago.

But the latest is roughly $50 billion in tax breaks for wealthy people and corresponding cuts of $50 billion in health care and education.

Way to invest in the future!

Here's a link from the AFL-CIO that calls on Congress to protect working families and reverse thse fiddle-while-Rome-burns tax cuts for millionaires.

And wouldn't it be nice if the Illinois Republicans who are generally more level-headed than southern Republicans could knock some sense into the national GOP party? Remember George Bush's father who helped pave the way for the prosperity of the 1990s by supporting a tax hike on wealthy people to invest that wealth in education and health care? What happened to Republicans like that?

Now they all look like Enron Republicans. Spend it all now. Enrich the rich. Forget the rest.

6 comments:

IlliniPundit said...

"...putting out country even deeper into debt through ridiculous tax cuts on wealth that the Republican Party is muscling through the Congress."

Tax cuts don't put the country in debt. Excessive spending puts out country in debt.

lazerlou said...

Dan,

Republicans honestly believe in political liberalism, of individuality, self-responsibility, and ultimately a vison of the human being as this radically autonomous creature which must take complete repsonibility for itself and compete in a hostile world. It is a vision of humanity and concomitant social policy that on the one hand requires a rejection of meaningful collective material progress (of the sort that could radically redistribute and redefine labor on this planet), it is a vision that is based on an assumption of unlimited material resources, it requires a certain level of hostility and fear of others (which this administration has so brilliantly manufactured), and it requires a rejection of recognizing all the ways in which human beings are connected and defined by their social relationships (not to mention the role of fiscal and monetary policy in determining who wins and who loses in their competition).

That is how people believe so strongly in individualism, self responsiblity and competetion - fear and this neurotic desire to conceive of themselves in this rustic individualistic way.

Il is more regressive casue IL Constitution fobids progressive income tax, right dan?

Carl Nyberg said...

Tax cuts don't put the country in debt. Excessive spending puts out country in debt.

Nice slogan, shillmeister. How's the GOP doing at curtailing spending?

Why is it GOP shills can overlook GOP deficit spending? Is their conservatism a sham ideology to cover what they really believe?

lazerlou said...

I'm not sure you can argue that Bush's tax cuts are what kept our economy growing. There are plenty of combinations and equilibriums of taxes, government spending and monetary policy that would result in a growing economy, including many combinations with much higher taxes and government spending on domestic issues instead of fighting bogus wars. These other possibilities might even result in growth that is happening in areas other than debt-fueled consumer spending on a bunch of garbage and maybe in industries other than oil and gas and the military.
Again, looking at the kind of growth is far more important than citing growth itself, nd the kind of growth we experience under Bush - growth that results from trickle down kind, kind of sucks in my opinion.

IlliniPundit said...

Nice slogan, shillmeister. How's the GOP doing at curtailing spending?

Why is it GOP shills can overlook GOP deficit spending? Is their conservatism a sham ideology to cover what they really believe?


They're doing a terrible job at restraining spending, and I wish Bush would get out veto pen or demonstrate some leadership to fix it.

But I think it's amusing that some people think Congressional Democrats would do a better job of fixing spending. They might be better at balancing the budget, but only because they'd be willing to raise taxes as high as possible.

Shoot, cutting a measly $40 billion is going to result in a slew of "the GOP wants to starve children and the elderly" stories.

lazerlou said...

Well, CF, you fail to make a distinction between spending on the ridiculous prescription drug "benefit" which is nothing more than a federal payout to drug companies with only the slightest relief to seniors, and cutting medicaid and other direct spending programs on the poor. Further the increases in Federal spending have gone toward privatized educational interests in many situations as oppsed to directly to public schools.

There is spending on the people, and then tehre is governement sponsored corporate welfare and payoffs. That prescription drug benefit is a joke. Political genius, but an actual joke.