Modern day debates have devolved into one line zingers and memorable attack lines instead of actual policy discussion. People's attention spans are too small to digest a 90 minute discussion on issues. It was evident that while interesting, the first debate was disappointing due to its lack of memorable lines or a clear winner. Sen. McCain needs to sharpen his attack with short sentences that cut and see through Obama's soaring rhetoric.
Ten points that McCain and Palin might consider using in the next debates and ads:
1. Sen. Obama has a tendency to stay on the sidelines on tough issues. There is an overt effort to avoid ruffling feathers. May it be in the Illinois state Senate where he voted 'Present' on tough issues such as punishment for gang members or may it be in the gang of 14 to resolve the gridlock over judicial nominees or the recent bailout negotiations where he could have easily gotten involved to forge a bipartisan deal. Instead he chose to stay outside the loop and make statements from his teleprompter while McCain was in the midst of things - for better or worse. That is what a President is supposed to do. Take the lead and be in charge.
2. Sen. Obama is in the enviable position of saying whatever he wants with minimal risk of being proven wrong because there is no paper trail or a record to match his words and actions. He has voted to raise taxes 94 times and yet now he says he will cut them and Americans are supposed to take his word for it. There is the slimmest of records of bipartisanship and no record whatsoever of standing up to his party and yet we're supposed to accept his words at face value that he will work with both sides.
His 'bipartisanship' includes a law to 'keep lose nukes out of the hands of terrorists'. What does that even mean? It is as controversial and tough as congratulating Michael Phelps on his Olympic achievement. Who would be against keeping nukes out of the hands of terrorists? Bipartisanship implies working with the other side to do what is best for the country and in that process you invariably alienate people from both parties. It can be safely assumed no feathers were ruffled when this loose nukes bill was forged.
3. On taxes Obama says he will cut taxes for 95% of Americans. This is an interesting concept since 95% of Americans pay little or no income taxes. So his tax 'cut' is essentially a welfare program where he will handout rebate checks to people that don't pay any taxes. This is a clever way to hide yet another spending program.
.jpg?t=20120527181101)
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Cannonshop
Um, need to see your source on Point 3, Krutic, somehow I don't think I'm in that top five percent.
2 - Cannonshop
And on Point 7. I've heard different percentages bandied about- from 80% to 93%, unless you're parroting "talking points", you need a cite here.
3 - Dave Nalle
I think Krutic is a bit off on #3. It's more like the top 50% who pay all the tax. He may have been confused because as I recall the top 5% pays 80% of all taxes.
Dave
4 - Clavos
No matter how you slice it, BHO's pledge to "cut taxes for 95% of Americans" is bullshit, if for no other reason than that he also proposes to raise the capital gains tax rate, which will effectively raise taxes for the more than 50% of Americans who own securities in their 401Ks.
5 - Lisa Solod Warren
Does this orthis and the fact that he lied about the timeline in his book matter to all you McCain supporters? especially those of you so interested in Moral Values?
6 - Cindy D
RE item #3 in the article: Handing out welfare checks to people who don't pay taxes? Please explain what the hell you are talking about. The tax cuts are for tax payers. Making up facts doesn't count Krutic.
and post #4:
OBAMA IS NOT RAISING TAXES FOR THOSE MAKING UNDER $250K...NOT INCOME TAXES, NOT CAPITAL GAINS TAXES.
Obama Clarifies Scope of Capital Gains Tax Hike
Here is a large, colorful chart that spells out the differences between Obama and McCain Tax Income Policy.
Obama's tax cuts for a good deal more than 60% of the population are substantially more than McCain's.
I can't imagine this excludes you Krutic.
Let me add that if you do in fact make more than $2.87 million, Obama isn't going to help your tax situation.
If your income is less than $111,000 you will get a bigger tax cut from Obama.
McCain gives puny cuts to a good deal more than 60% of the population and gives huge cuts to those at about 1/2 million - 2 1/2 million and above.
7 - Cindy D
make that Income Tax Policy
8 - Clavos
Cindy,
Even according to your link, the capital gains tax will go from the current 15% to 20%, regardless of income level.
That means that everyone who holds securities (now more than 50% of Americans) will have their taxes raised. Period.
9 - Cindy D
Obama voting record on taxes
McCain Campaign and RNC distort Obama’s record on taxes
"...by repeating their inflated 94-vote figure, McCain and the GOP falsely imply that Obama has pushed indiscriminately to raise taxes for nearly everybody. A closer look reveals that he’s voted consistently to restore higher tax rates on upper-income taxpayers but not on middle- or low-income workers. That’s consistent with what he’s said he’d do as president, which is to raise taxes only on those making more than $250,000 a year."
Krutic: You can look that up on
realitycheck.orgfactcheck.org10 - Cindy D
Quotes are from my link above Clav.
ABC News' Teddy Davis, Arnab Datta, and Rigel Anderson Report: Sen. Barack Obama's, D-Ill., top economic advisors announced on Thursday that he is seeking to raise the capital gains tax rate from 15 percent to 20 percent for those Americans making more than $250,000 per year.
"The top capital-gains rate for families making more than $250,000 would return to 20%...
11 - Lisa Solod Warren
Cindy, good luck. For some reason, everyone who is voting for McCain believes he is privileged somehow and that he pays too much in taxes, even those who make under 30,000 a year. It is all part of the delusion. Just like middle class in American means anyone making from 20 grand to 150 grand. (they did a study some years ago where people self described themselves as such) That way, we are ALL middle class here in the good old US of A! Yahoooo.
12 - Cindy D
It is all part of the delusion.
Lisa,
It amazes me. I mean if people simply want to vote for Republicans, no matter what the fuck they stand for, then why don't they just admit that.
Instead, they'll twist reality into a pretzel in order to believe that this somehow benefits them.
These people somehow identify with the rich. It's something our culture seems to ingrain in people.
13 - Krutic A
Agreed, # 3 is confusing.
My point was, 95% of Americans do not pay taxes, Tax paying Americans is a lesser percentage than that.
So the ones that do not pay any, still get a 'cut' - which is a spending program since they will receive a rebate check and not see a decrease in their taxes since a certain percentage of working Americans do not pay any Federal income taxes.
14 - jacksmith
Bush, McCain can run. But they cant hide anymore.
What ever congress does to try and fix our stunning economic catastrophe needs to be done very carefully. Congress needs to take their time, and be sure of what they are doing. Whatever is done needs to be sharply focused at helping, and protecting the best interest of the ordinary Americans. In particular the vast American middle class. 700 billion dollars is a lot of the peoples money to spend to bail out a bunch of corrupt Bush loan sharks.
When have you ever known any government plan, or project to only cost what the government said it would. Remember the war in Iraq. Bush and his so-called advisers said it would only cost you about 80 billion dollars. But we now know that the war in Iraq will cost you, and your children, and your grand children over a trillion dollars, and still counting.
So if 80 billion can end up costing you over a trillion dollars. How much could 700 billion end up costing you. Any math wizards out there. I come up with 9 trillion...:-(
My fellow human beings, just as I warned you ahead of this catastrophic economic meltdown, I must now warn you that what is ahead has the potential to be even more catastrophic than what we are going through now. The worlds geopolitical landscape has been booby trapped by the Bush McCain administration and their republican allies in congress. These booby traps are poised to spring at any time.
Fortunately the Worlds Nations have been blessed with many excellent leaders (except the US) who have been careful, wise, strong, and self-restrained in dealing with the provocations, and antagonism's of the Bush, McCain administration.
Barack Obama and the democrats are your best hope now. Tell your family, friends, and everyone you know to support them as best you can, and vote for them like your life, and the lives of your loved ones depends on it. Because it does. You will not survive 4 more years of Bush McCain.
JACK SMITH - WORKING CLASS...
15 - Lisa Solod Warren
I am completely convinced that Tina Fey could debate Biden and no one would know the difference.
16 - Daniel Miller
Lisa,
Although I am far from "completely convinced" of many things, it seems likely (a) that Tina Fey would be given more favorable attention by the media, and (b) that one of the Three Stooges (were any of them still alive) could successfully debate Senator Biden. On further reflection, one of them could still do a pretty good job, by letting Senator Biden debate himself. What would really be fun would be an Obama/Biden debate.
How Governor Palin does against Senator Biden will be very interesting. I look forward to watching.
Dan(Miller)
17 - Clavos
...least of all biden...
18 - Alec
What a tiresome bunch of nonsense about taxes.
Right now, today, this minute, under the tax crap that Bush has pushed, a family of 4 making $250,000 in wages pays about $36,000 more in taxes than the same family of 4 who earns $250,000 in capital gains and qualifying dividends. Rathole conservatives will try to rationalize this by suggesting that a person who earns money from investment income should be rewarded more highly than a person who earns income from wages, but it is the purpose of the market, not the tax system to reward taxpayers.
The imbalance favoring the investor class over ordinary income earners creates a huge incentive for business owners to come up with gimmicks that will let them sell their business and accrue capital gain income as opposed to operating the businesses and hiring people.
I get invitations to tax seminars with strategies for cutting worker salaries and hours to boos the value of a business so that it can be sold at maximum profit.
The current tax system is riddled with other crap that gives large advantages to some wealthy folks over people who work for wages or who have small businesses.
And of course, die-hard conservatives seem to think that the Iraq war and the $700 billion bailout will pay for itself, or worse, that more tax cuts for the wealthy will somehow make the economy zoom. Of course, many of these people think that the world is 6,000 years old.
Look at this another way. Bush promised that if you all passed his tax cuts, the economy would boom, there would be more jobs and higher wages, and unicorns and lollipops.
Didn't happen. What else you got?
By the way, although Reagan did pull a flim flam with his trickle down nonsense, a part of his philosophy about taxes was sound. He advocated reducing the corporate and the individual tax rates and reducing the gap between capital gains and ordinary income rates so that people would make decisions about investments and starting businesses on their merits, and pay less attention to schemes which would convert ordinary income into capital gains income.
Bush and his cronies deeply believe that capital gains should not be taxed at all (in 2008 the first tier of cap gain income will be taxed at 0%) or get strongly preferential treatment over ordinary income.
Also, by the way, I am not in love with some of the tax policy of the Democrats, especially when they blather nonsense about "targeted" tax cuts.
But by every reasonable measure, the Republicans declared class war on the middle class and largely won, mainly by scaring them with lies.
For example, they like to talk about death taxes cheating surviving spouses out of their meager inheritances, but their is an unlimited spousal deduction, so this is impossible. They talk about family farms being lost, but no family farm has been lost because of inheritance taxes, while many thousands of farms have been lost to rapacious commercial farm interests.
The Democrats big problem here is that they need a Ross Perot who can explain simply and clearly (even with a chart if necessary) how Republican policies have hurt the average wage earner and will continue to do so.
Clavos -- to say that people will be taxed on income in their 401K plans is just nonsense. But everything you write about taxes is uninformed.
RE: Even according to your link, the capital gains tax will go from the current 15% to 20%, regardless of income level.
This is not true now, and not true under Obama's plans. You clearly have no understanding of the idea of a MAXIMUM capital gains tax rate.
19 - Clavos
But everything you write about taxes is uninformed.
Thank you alec...
20 - Clavos
to say that people will be taxed on income in their 401K plans is just nonsense.
It certainly is, alec. But I didn't say that. I was talking about capital gains taxes. Apparently you've never had an asset appreciate in value and been charged tax on the gain when you sold it? At some point, when withdrawn, even assets held in a 401K will pay cap gains if they've appreciated. The taxes due on 401Ks are only deferred, not eliminated.
Capital gains taxes are not charged until the cap gains are realized; i.e. the securities are sold. I didn't say anything about income.
21 - Cindy D
RE# 13
Krutic,
Agreed, # 3 is confusing.
My point was, 95% of Americans do not pay taxes, Tax paying Americans is a lesser percentage than that. (and the rest of the post)
I'm afraid that this doesn't clear anything up for me.
22 - bliffle
But Clavos, Alec is correct.
For example, you cite the fact that so many people own stock (if only thru their 401k or some other mutual), but clearly they own so little stock that any cap gains tax change will be insignificant to them.
23 - bliffle
jacksmith says:
"Remember the war in Iraq. Bush and his so-called advisers said it would only cost you about 80 billion dollars. But we now know that the war in Iraq will cost you, and your children, and your grand children over a trillion dollars, and still counting."
It's worse than that. Rumsfeld scoffed vigorously at a reporter who asked if it would cost $30billion or even $50billion.
24 - Joanne Huspek
I guess no one remembers the tax kick back of this spring. That really gave the economy a shot in the arm, didn't it? I don't think we got a check, but if we did, it went straight to next year's taxes.
To me, you could switch the names of the candidates and it will all come down to the same thing. Does it really matter who anyone votes for? The end result will be the same.
25 - bliffle
Jeez, remember when $50billion seemed like REAL money?
That was before the neo-republicans followed their Champion Spender, W, into DC.