Stocks plunged on Monday as the US House of Representatives rejected a $700 billion financial sector bailout plan, renewing fear about frozen world credit markets and the global economy's health. The House vote shocked financial markets, which expected it to approve the Bush administration's rescue plan. The Dow at one point fell more than 700 points, its biggest intraday point decline ever, while the Nasdaq and S&P dropped more than 7 percent.
The Nasdaq was on course for its biggest one-day slide since the market reopened in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001, attacks.
"I can't believe they weren't able to come together and come up with a solution. Complete disaster was predicted if it didn't pass," said Stephen Berte, senior equity trader at Standard Life in Boston. "Everybody was expecting it to pass and it didn't pass. I can't see what the upside is right now."
House Republican leaders blamed what they called a partisan speech by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) for the surprise failure of the financial rescue bill in the House today.
House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) said Mrs. Pelosi's closing speech on the House floor was "partisan" and that it "poisoned" the bill's chances of success. Roughly two-thirds of House Republicans voted "no," as did more than 90 Democrats. Rep. Roy Blunt (Mo.), the second ranking Republican in the House, said the Republicans thought they had a dozen more "yes" votes than were cast on the floor. He said the Republicans would reach out to find a solution to the problem that would pass on the House floor in the next few days.
Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.), chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, said he was "appalled" by the assertion from House Republican leaders that Mrs. Pelosi was to blame for the failure of the bill.
Monday, September 29, 2008
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
The Night of the Living Debt!
A very interesting take on the current debt issue, the goings on in the financial markets and how it relates to you, the taxpayer.
THE NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEBT
This past week, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson (one of an endless number of government functionaries formerly employed by Goldman Sachs, one of the two remaining investment banks in America) announced yet another bailout of Mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, this time to facilitate the increased purchase of mortgages in the near future. How much? "Hundreds of billions of dollars," is all that he would admit. This must be added to the $300 billion bailout announced just two weeks ago (ranging up to $1 trillion, in effect, by some estimates). Paulson’s announcement followed a rare meeting including "WhirlyBen" Bernanke, Federal Reserve chairman, and a large number of government and private financial industry functionaries and leaders. Now, congressional hearings are in progress to rubber stamp Paulson’s demand for $700 billion more to buy any sort of financial "asset," no matter how worthless, from any sort of financial institution, both American and foreign.
Here’s Your Share
Let’s put the figures into perspective. Of approximately 350 million American residents, perhaps 150 million households exist. Of those, less than half pay anything meaningful in taxes. Let’s be generous and say that there are 75 million tax-paying households in America today and that the Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac bailout is limited to only $1 trillion. Yours almost certainly is one of the tax-paying households. Your share of the mortgage giant bailout, therefore, is $13,333. And that doesn’t take consideration of the fact that half the tax-paying households rely upon a government paycheck, either. Of course, you already are on the hook for twice that amount, or nearly $30,000, for the current Iraq war, which was started on a lie told by Bush and Cheney about Saddam Hussein’s "weapons of mass destruction." This pre-emptive Bush doctrine is the same one now so favored by McCain/Palin and which will lead us into WWIII via Iran, most likely. Already, many have forgotten the precedent-setting bailout of Investment Bank Bear Stearns, to the tune of $60 billion. That kept Bear Stearns afloat. Think it won’t be back for more? Your share: $800, so far.
AIG was just rescued by us, too. $85 billion, or $1,133 from you. AIG is part of the cartel that illegally has been shorting silver and costing you big, incidentally. Don’t forget the Bank of America bailout of Merrill Lynch this past week ($50 billion) and, previously, of Countrywide. Those were brokered by the Federal Reserve and, you can bank on it, funded by us. Let’s guess and say your share is $1,333.
What about Lehman Brothers, you might ask? After all, it was allowed to go bankrupt, thereby exposing all its dirty laundry for us to see. That $600 billion mess is being carved up right now by other financial companies and will end up pledged as assets to the Fed and the Treasury for future loans, rest assured. You can count on up to half of the Lehman corpse ending up as a dead loss. Your share: upwards of $40,000.
This doesn’t include the banks already taken over by the FDIC so far this year, a mere hint of things to come. Nor does it include the other financial giants teetering on the edge of financial oblivion.
For those keeping track, just the figures above put you in hock for nearly $100,000. Make that a quarter-million dollars if we consider that your government-employee neighbor gets paid with your tax dollars, too. How do you plan to pay that off, Bunky? Especially since the prices of everything just keep going up and you just lost your job?
But the fat cats are just fine, thank you, and thanks to you. Fannie Mae’s departing CEO took $14 million in severance and Freddie Mac’s ex-honcho walked with $9 million. Henry Paulson’s personal fortune is nearly a half billion dollars. The $700 billion about to be handed over to Treasury Secretary Paulson will carry no oversight and no regulatory authority whatsoever: He gets a blank check. Section 8 of the proposed legislation provides that "(d)ecisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency." How about that, eh? The arrogance of the Bush Administration continues to new heights, surpassing even that which buoyed up the Patriot Act.
The USSA
Some form of this new legislation will pass, rest assured. In the course of just two weeks, America’s entire financial system, banks, S&Ls, insurance companies, brokerages, etc., have become adjuncts to the US government. This is nationalization, pure and simple. Paulson is being given unlimited authority to order these organizations to do whatever he demands and force our children and their children to pay for it. If you don’t see this is as the most significant two weeks in American economic history, a period that transformed our country into a purely-socialistic state, the United Socialistic States of America, then you quite simply have not been paying attention.
What is going on right now goes well beyond anything that FDR dreamed when he set America on the path toward socialism. By the time this is all over, the Federal Reserve Bank will own virtually all of America. Remember that the owners of the Federal Reserve, a private corporation, are almost all foreign central banking families.
What We Can and Cannot Do
We can’t feed and clothe all of America’s children, but we can afford $60 billion to bail out Bear Stearns. We can’t provide decent medical care to America’s seniors, but we can give $85 billion to AIG insurance. We can’t lift one finger to help out Americans losing their homes, but we can hand over up to $1 trillion to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. We haven’t the funds to provide proper care and support to American veterans, but we can afford up to $600 billion to buy pledged Lehman Brothers assets. We can’t do a thing to stanch to flow of jobs offshore and alleviate the suffering of out-of-work Americans, but we can hand $700 billion over to a guy who, until two years ago, ran the main problem creating company: Goldman Sachs. We can’t afford to properly educate our children to fit into a changing America, but we can afford $1 trillion for a war that Cheney and Bush knowingly lied us into.
The Dollar is Dead
WhirlyBen Bernanke recently was quoted as admitting: "We have lost control. We cannot stabilize the dollar." Read that quote again. Consider how much Bernanke has lied to us and then imagine just how bad is the real truth. During the past four years, the Federal Reserve Bank has created $4 trillion out of nothing. Every dollar created in this way dilutes the purchasing power of every already existing dollar.
The recent runup in the dollar index from 71 to 80 was stupidly transparent, an obvious sham and machination of these guys who have created the very problems which they now demand so much more money in order to "solve." The prices of precious metals were hammered down as a consequence, so much so that now there exists a divide between physical metal prices and the artificial "paper metal" prices. And these guys, these outright failures, have the gall to come and tell us to hand over the legacy of our children and their children so they can create more failures and further feather their own nests?
US Out of America!
Are you mad yet? You ought to be fit to be tied. We should all be marching on Washington, DC with firebrands and pitchforks, in fact. Throw them all out on November 4. Vote against every single incumbent for every single office at all levels, local, county, state and federal. Vote against both Obama and Palin … er, McCain. New America. An idea whose time has come.
THE NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEBT
This past week, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson (one of an endless number of government functionaries formerly employed by Goldman Sachs, one of the two remaining investment banks in America) announced yet another bailout of Mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, this time to facilitate the increased purchase of mortgages in the near future. How much? "Hundreds of billions of dollars," is all that he would admit. This must be added to the $300 billion bailout announced just two weeks ago (ranging up to $1 trillion, in effect, by some estimates). Paulson’s announcement followed a rare meeting including "WhirlyBen" Bernanke, Federal Reserve chairman, and a large number of government and private financial industry functionaries and leaders. Now, congressional hearings are in progress to rubber stamp Paulson’s demand for $700 billion more to buy any sort of financial "asset," no matter how worthless, from any sort of financial institution, both American and foreign.
Here’s Your Share
Let’s put the figures into perspective. Of approximately 350 million American residents, perhaps 150 million households exist. Of those, less than half pay anything meaningful in taxes. Let’s be generous and say that there are 75 million tax-paying households in America today and that the Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac bailout is limited to only $1 trillion. Yours almost certainly is one of the tax-paying households. Your share of the mortgage giant bailout, therefore, is $13,333. And that doesn’t take consideration of the fact that half the tax-paying households rely upon a government paycheck, either. Of course, you already are on the hook for twice that amount, or nearly $30,000, for the current Iraq war, which was started on a lie told by Bush and Cheney about Saddam Hussein’s "weapons of mass destruction." This pre-emptive Bush doctrine is the same one now so favored by McCain/Palin and which will lead us into WWIII via Iran, most likely. Already, many have forgotten the precedent-setting bailout of Investment Bank Bear Stearns, to the tune of $60 billion. That kept Bear Stearns afloat. Think it won’t be back for more? Your share: $800, so far.
AIG was just rescued by us, too. $85 billion, or $1,133 from you. AIG is part of the cartel that illegally has been shorting silver and costing you big, incidentally. Don’t forget the Bank of America bailout of Merrill Lynch this past week ($50 billion) and, previously, of Countrywide. Those were brokered by the Federal Reserve and, you can bank on it, funded by us. Let’s guess and say your share is $1,333.
What about Lehman Brothers, you might ask? After all, it was allowed to go bankrupt, thereby exposing all its dirty laundry for us to see. That $600 billion mess is being carved up right now by other financial companies and will end up pledged as assets to the Fed and the Treasury for future loans, rest assured. You can count on up to half of the Lehman corpse ending up as a dead loss. Your share: upwards of $40,000.
This doesn’t include the banks already taken over by the FDIC so far this year, a mere hint of things to come. Nor does it include the other financial giants teetering on the edge of financial oblivion.
For those keeping track, just the figures above put you in hock for nearly $100,000. Make that a quarter-million dollars if we consider that your government-employee neighbor gets paid with your tax dollars, too. How do you plan to pay that off, Bunky? Especially since the prices of everything just keep going up and you just lost your job?
But the fat cats are just fine, thank you, and thanks to you. Fannie Mae’s departing CEO took $14 million in severance and Freddie Mac’s ex-honcho walked with $9 million. Henry Paulson’s personal fortune is nearly a half billion dollars. The $700 billion about to be handed over to Treasury Secretary Paulson will carry no oversight and no regulatory authority whatsoever: He gets a blank check. Section 8 of the proposed legislation provides that "(d)ecisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency." How about that, eh? The arrogance of the Bush Administration continues to new heights, surpassing even that which buoyed up the Patriot Act.
The USSA
Some form of this new legislation will pass, rest assured. In the course of just two weeks, America’s entire financial system, banks, S&Ls, insurance companies, brokerages, etc., have become adjuncts to the US government. This is nationalization, pure and simple. Paulson is being given unlimited authority to order these organizations to do whatever he demands and force our children and their children to pay for it. If you don’t see this is as the most significant two weeks in American economic history, a period that transformed our country into a purely-socialistic state, the United Socialistic States of America, then you quite simply have not been paying attention.
What is going on right now goes well beyond anything that FDR dreamed when he set America on the path toward socialism. By the time this is all over, the Federal Reserve Bank will own virtually all of America. Remember that the owners of the Federal Reserve, a private corporation, are almost all foreign central banking families.
What We Can and Cannot Do
We can’t feed and clothe all of America’s children, but we can afford $60 billion to bail out Bear Stearns. We can’t provide decent medical care to America’s seniors, but we can give $85 billion to AIG insurance. We can’t lift one finger to help out Americans losing their homes, but we can hand over up to $1 trillion to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. We haven’t the funds to provide proper care and support to American veterans, but we can afford up to $600 billion to buy pledged Lehman Brothers assets. We can’t do a thing to stanch to flow of jobs offshore and alleviate the suffering of out-of-work Americans, but we can hand $700 billion over to a guy who, until two years ago, ran the main problem creating company: Goldman Sachs. We can’t afford to properly educate our children to fit into a changing America, but we can afford $1 trillion for a war that Cheney and Bush knowingly lied us into.
The Dollar is Dead
WhirlyBen Bernanke recently was quoted as admitting: "We have lost control. We cannot stabilize the dollar." Read that quote again. Consider how much Bernanke has lied to us and then imagine just how bad is the real truth. During the past four years, the Federal Reserve Bank has created $4 trillion out of nothing. Every dollar created in this way dilutes the purchasing power of every already existing dollar.
The recent runup in the dollar index from 71 to 80 was stupidly transparent, an obvious sham and machination of these guys who have created the very problems which they now demand so much more money in order to "solve." The prices of precious metals were hammered down as a consequence, so much so that now there exists a divide between physical metal prices and the artificial "paper metal" prices. And these guys, these outright failures, have the gall to come and tell us to hand over the legacy of our children and their children so they can create more failures and further feather their own nests?
US Out of America!
Are you mad yet? You ought to be fit to be tied. We should all be marching on Washington, DC with firebrands and pitchforks, in fact. Throw them all out on November 4. Vote against every single incumbent for every single office at all levels, local, county, state and federal. Vote against both Obama and Palin … er, McCain. New America. An idea whose time has come.
Sunday, September 14, 2008
McCain Pulls Ahead in Polls, Why So?
John McCain’s surge in the polls comes even as Barack Obama has inherited the most favorable Democratic environment since the Watergate era, an unpopular Republican president, an unpopular war and a flagging economy. Suddenly, though, Democrats have found themselves in a world turned upside down, where Republicans have the momentum from running on change — and the latest wunderkind of presidential politics. Below are five trends showing up in polling that help explain the change.
1. McCain as a 'change agent'
Eight in ten Americans say they believe the country is on the wrong track. Obama has built his campaign on the perception that he is both the personification of change and the man to enact it. Even though McCain has spent decades in Washington and a member of his party is in the White House, recent polling shows that he has managed to successfully portray himself as a change agent and erode Obama’s brand in the process. The Democratic firm Democracy Corps found that the public prefers Obama to bring “the right kind of change” as president by a 50 to 44%, down from his 16-point edge in midAugust. This week’s ABC News/Washington Post poll asked “who can bring about needed change to Washington.” The public favored Obama by 12 points, down from 32 points in June. CBS News polling this week found that 46% of voters believe McCain can change Washington, up from 28% in July. The Obama campaign has taken notice. His stump speech now rips McCain as a phony reformer, and yesterday he launched a TV ad campaign and website highlighting McCain’s ties to lobbyists.
2. The center shifts: Independents move to McCain
Independent voters, and particularly white independent men, have leaned Republican in presidential races since 1980. But before the Republican convention, Gallup polling showed just 40% of independents favoring McCain. Post-convention, that rose to 52%, and the increase in support was slightly greater among men than among women, which appears to undercut the idea that Sarah Palin has benefited the ticket by drawing women to it. Before the Democratic convention, white women favored McCain by 7 points. After it, they favored him by 6. Following the Republican convention, McCain was winning white women by 11 points, a 4-point gain. Before the Democratic convention, white men favored McCain by 20 points. After it, that margin shrunk to 13 points. Following Denver, white men favored McCain by 25 points, a 5-point gain. A recent CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll found that 62% of men have a favorable view of Palin, while just 53% of women view her favorably. Though no Democrat has won a majority of white voters since Lyndon Johnson in 1964, Obama cannot win unless he pulls back some of these white independent voters.
3. The economic gap narrows
James Carville, who coined the catchphrase “the economy, stupid” in 1992 while working as a strategist for Bill Clinton, frets that Obama is losing his ownership of the issue that has become voters’ foremost concern in recent months. “I noticed the tightening on the economy,” Carville said. “And if it stays that way, I would be damn worried.” When Democracy Corps asked voters last week which candidate would “do a better job” with the economy,” Obama had a 50 to 44 percent advantage—down from a 16-point edge in mid August. Gallup this week shows a 3-point edge for Obama on the question of which candidate “can better handle the economy”—down from 16 points in August. A recent internal Republican poll found that 30% of likely voters shop at WalMart at least once a week. Obama retained a slim 45-42 edge with Wal-Mart women, but 64% of men in the group favored McCain against just 29% who preferred Obama.
4. Palin narrows the enthusiasm gap
The Republican base, once disenchanted, has returned with a vengeance since McCain’s surprise pick of the first-term Alaska governor as his running mate. This week’s CBS News poll found that 53% of Obama voters said they were “enthusiastic” about Obama, up 5 points since before his party’s convention, and still better than the 42% of McCain supports who feel the same way. McCain’s support, though, is up 18 points since selecting Palin. The NBC-Wall Street Journal poll found that only 12% of McCain’s supporters were “excited to be voting” for him in early August. This week 34% said they were excited, nearly a threefold increase. Palin has played no small part in this GOP awakening. CBS found that fully 85% of McCain backers were “pleased” with the selection of Palin, compared to 65% of Obama supporters who said the same about his running mate, Delaware Sen. Joe Biden. And among independents, 46% have a favorable view of Palin while only 31% say the same of Biden. While Democrats have continued to hit at Palin’s inexperience, only 36% of likely voters believe Palin lacks the proper experience while 47% said the same of Obama.
5. Democrats voter ID edge dulls
Democrats have been relying on their newfound advantage in party identification all year. Party ID remains the best single indicator of voter support. Republicans began losing voters prior to the 2006 midterm elections that gave Democrats a functional majority in the Senate. But those voters straying from the fold were mostly becoming independents, not Democrats. Democratic voter enrollment began to grow in 2007, even as the drop in Republican enrollment leveled off. Now, though, the dynamic appears to have shifted. The week before the Republican convention, just 39% of voters said they leaned toward or identified themselves as Republicans. Following the convention, that number rose dramatically to 47%. Meanwhile the percentage of voters leaning toward or identifying themselves as Democrats dropped from 53 to 47%. Gallup notes that party ID shifts are not unusual after a convention. Gallup also reports that the double-digit Democratic lead among voters who are asked which party they’d generically prefer to control Congress has disappeared and that the two parties are now effectively tied.
1. McCain as a 'change agent'
Eight in ten Americans say they believe the country is on the wrong track. Obama has built his campaign on the perception that he is both the personification of change and the man to enact it. Even though McCain has spent decades in Washington and a member of his party is in the White House, recent polling shows that he has managed to successfully portray himself as a change agent and erode Obama’s brand in the process. The Democratic firm Democracy Corps found that the public prefers Obama to bring “the right kind of change” as president by a 50 to 44%, down from his 16-point edge in midAugust. This week’s ABC News/Washington Post poll asked “who can bring about needed change to Washington.” The public favored Obama by 12 points, down from 32 points in June. CBS News polling this week found that 46% of voters believe McCain can change Washington, up from 28% in July. The Obama campaign has taken notice. His stump speech now rips McCain as a phony reformer, and yesterday he launched a TV ad campaign and website highlighting McCain’s ties to lobbyists.
2. The center shifts: Independents move to McCain
Independent voters, and particularly white independent men, have leaned Republican in presidential races since 1980. But before the Republican convention, Gallup polling showed just 40% of independents favoring McCain. Post-convention, that rose to 52%, and the increase in support was slightly greater among men than among women, which appears to undercut the idea that Sarah Palin has benefited the ticket by drawing women to it. Before the Democratic convention, white women favored McCain by 7 points. After it, they favored him by 6. Following the Republican convention, McCain was winning white women by 11 points, a 4-point gain. Before the Democratic convention, white men favored McCain by 20 points. After it, that margin shrunk to 13 points. Following Denver, white men favored McCain by 25 points, a 5-point gain. A recent CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll found that 62% of men have a favorable view of Palin, while just 53% of women view her favorably. Though no Democrat has won a majority of white voters since Lyndon Johnson in 1964, Obama cannot win unless he pulls back some of these white independent voters.
3. The economic gap narrows
James Carville, who coined the catchphrase “the economy, stupid” in 1992 while working as a strategist for Bill Clinton, frets that Obama is losing his ownership of the issue that has become voters’ foremost concern in recent months. “I noticed the tightening on the economy,” Carville said. “And if it stays that way, I would be damn worried.” When Democracy Corps asked voters last week which candidate would “do a better job” with the economy,” Obama had a 50 to 44 percent advantage—down from a 16-point edge in mid August. Gallup this week shows a 3-point edge for Obama on the question of which candidate “can better handle the economy”—down from 16 points in August. A recent internal Republican poll found that 30% of likely voters shop at WalMart at least once a week. Obama retained a slim 45-42 edge with Wal-Mart women, but 64% of men in the group favored McCain against just 29% who preferred Obama.
4. Palin narrows the enthusiasm gap
The Republican base, once disenchanted, has returned with a vengeance since McCain’s surprise pick of the first-term Alaska governor as his running mate. This week’s CBS News poll found that 53% of Obama voters said they were “enthusiastic” about Obama, up 5 points since before his party’s convention, and still better than the 42% of McCain supports who feel the same way. McCain’s support, though, is up 18 points since selecting Palin. The NBC-Wall Street Journal poll found that only 12% of McCain’s supporters were “excited to be voting” for him in early August. This week 34% said they were excited, nearly a threefold increase. Palin has played no small part in this GOP awakening. CBS found that fully 85% of McCain backers were “pleased” with the selection of Palin, compared to 65% of Obama supporters who said the same about his running mate, Delaware Sen. Joe Biden. And among independents, 46% have a favorable view of Palin while only 31% say the same of Biden. While Democrats have continued to hit at Palin’s inexperience, only 36% of likely voters believe Palin lacks the proper experience while 47% said the same of Obama.
5. Democrats voter ID edge dulls
Democrats have been relying on their newfound advantage in party identification all year. Party ID remains the best single indicator of voter support. Republicans began losing voters prior to the 2006 midterm elections that gave Democrats a functional majority in the Senate. But those voters straying from the fold were mostly becoming independents, not Democrats. Democratic voter enrollment began to grow in 2007, even as the drop in Republican enrollment leveled off. Now, though, the dynamic appears to have shifted. The week before the Republican convention, just 39% of voters said they leaned toward or identified themselves as Republicans. Following the convention, that number rose dramatically to 47%. Meanwhile the percentage of voters leaning toward or identifying themselves as Democrats dropped from 53 to 47%. Gallup notes that party ID shifts are not unusual after a convention. Gallup also reports that the double-digit Democratic lead among voters who are asked which party they’d generically prefer to control Congress has disappeared and that the two parties are now effectively tied.
Tuesday, September 9, 2008
Here's a Little Presidential Candidate Comparison I Found Interesting
ISSUE
New drilling offshore US
McCain - Yes
Obama - No
Will appoint judges who interpret the law not make it
McCain - Yes
Obama - No
Served in the US Armed Forces
McCain - Yes
Obama - No
Amount of time served in the US Senate
McCain - 22yrs
Obama - 173 days
Will institute a socialized national health care plan
McCain - No
Obama - Yes
Supports abortion throughout pregnancy
McCain - No
Obama - Yes
Would pull troops out of Iraq immediately
McCain - No
Obama - Yes
Supports gun ownership rights
McCain - Yes
Obama - No
Supports homosexual marriage
McCain - No
Obama - Yes
Proposed programs will mean a huge tax increase
McCain - No
Obama - Yes
Voted against making English the official language of our country
McCain - No
Obama - Yes
Voted to give Social Security benefits to illegals
McCain - No
Obama - Yes
CAPITAL GAINS TAX -
McCain - 0% on home sales up to $500,000 per home (couples). McCain does
not propose any change in existing home sales income tax.
Obama - 28% on profit from ALL home sales. (How does this affect you? If
you sell your home and make a profit, you will pay 28% of your gain on
taxes. If you are heading toward retirement and would like to downsize
your home or move into a retirement community, 28% of the money you make
from your home will go to taxes. This proposal will adversely affect the
elderly who are counting on the income from their homes as part of their
retirement income.)
DIVIDEND TAX
McCain 15% (no change)
Obama 39.6% - (How will this affect you? If you have any money invested
in stock market, IRA, mutual funds, college funds, life insurance,
retirement accounts, or anything that pays or reinvests dividends, you will
now be paying nearly 40% of the money earned on taxes if Obama becomes
president. The experts predict that 'Higher tax rates on dividends and
capital gains would crash the stock market, yet do absolutely nothing to
cut the deficit.')
INCOME TAX
McCain (no changes)
Single making 30K - tax $4,500
Single making 50K - tax $12,500
Single making 75K - tax $18,750
Married making 60K - tax $9,000
Married making 75K - tax $18,750
Married making 125K - tax $31,250
OBAMA (reversion to pre-Bush tax cuts)
Single making 30K - tax $8,400
Single making 50K - tax $14,000
Single making 75K - tax $23,250
Married making 60K - tax $16,800
Married making 75K - tax $21,000
Married making 125K - tax $38,750
INHERITANCE TAX
McCain - 0% (No change)
Obama - Restore the inheritance tax. Many families have lost businesses,
farms, ranches, and homes that have been in their families for generations
because they could not afford the inheritance tax. Those willing their
assets to loved ones will only lose them to these taxes.
NEW TAXES PROPOSED BY OBAMA
New government taxes proposed on homes that are more than 2400 square feet.
New gasoline taxes (as if gas weren't high enough already)
New taxes on natural resources consumption (heating gas, water, electricity)
New taxes on retirement accounts
and last but not least....
New taxes to pay for socialized medicine so we can receive the same level of medical care as other third-world countries
Verify at:
http://money.cnn.com/news/specials/election/2008/index.html
http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/issues/issues.taxes.html
http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/issues/issues.taxes.html
http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/issues/issues.taxes.html
http://elections.foxnews.com/?s=proposed+taxes
http://bulletin.aarp.org/yourworld/politics/articles/mccain_obama_offer_diffeerent_visions_on_taxes.html
http://bulletin.aarp.org/yourworld/politics/articles/mccain_obama_offer_different_visions_on_taxes.html
http://bulletin.aarp.org/yourworld/politics/articles/mccain_obama_offer_different_visions_on_taxes.html
http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/candidates/barack_obama/
http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/candidates/john_mccain/
http://www.capitalonehomeloans.com/
Barack Obama, John McCain, Barack Obama, John McCain, Obama, McCain
New drilling offshore US
McCain - Yes
Obama - No
Will appoint judges who interpret the law not make it
McCain - Yes
Obama - No
Served in the US Armed Forces
McCain - Yes
Obama - No
Amount of time served in the US Senate
McCain - 22yrs
Obama - 173 days
Will institute a socialized national health care plan
McCain - No
Obama - Yes
Supports abortion throughout pregnancy
McCain - No
Obama - Yes
Would pull troops out of Iraq immediately
McCain - No
Obama - Yes
Supports gun ownership rights
McCain - Yes
Obama - No
Supports homosexual marriage
McCain - No
Obama - Yes
Proposed programs will mean a huge tax increase
McCain - No
Obama - Yes
Voted against making English the official language of our country
McCain - No
Obama - Yes
Voted to give Social Security benefits to illegals
McCain - No
Obama - Yes
CAPITAL GAINS TAX -
McCain - 0% on home sales up to $500,000 per home (couples). McCain does
not propose any change in existing home sales income tax.
Obama - 28% on profit from ALL home sales. (How does this affect you? If
you sell your home and make a profit, you will pay 28% of your gain on
taxes. If you are heading toward retirement and would like to downsize
your home or move into a retirement community, 28% of the money you make
from your home will go to taxes. This proposal will adversely affect the
elderly who are counting on the income from their homes as part of their
retirement income.)
DIVIDEND TAX
McCain 15% (no change)
Obama 39.6% - (How will this affect you? If you have any money invested
in stock market, IRA, mutual funds, college funds, life insurance,
retirement accounts, or anything that pays or reinvests dividends, you will
now be paying nearly 40% of the money earned on taxes if Obama becomes
president. The experts predict that 'Higher tax rates on dividends and
capital gains would crash the stock market, yet do absolutely nothing to
cut the deficit.')
INCOME TAX
McCain (no changes)
Single making 30K - tax $4,500
Single making 50K - tax $12,500
Single making 75K - tax $18,750
Married making 60K - tax $9,000
Married making 75K - tax $18,750
Married making 125K - tax $31,250
OBAMA (reversion to pre-Bush tax cuts)
Single making 30K - tax $8,400
Single making 50K - tax $14,000
Single making 75K - tax $23,250
Married making 60K - tax $16,800
Married making 75K - tax $21,000
Married making 125K - tax $38,750
INHERITANCE TAX
McCain - 0% (No change)
Obama - Restore the inheritance tax. Many families have lost businesses,
farms, ranches, and homes that have been in their families for generations
because they could not afford the inheritance tax. Those willing their
assets to loved ones will only lose them to these taxes.
NEW TAXES PROPOSED BY OBAMA
New government taxes proposed on homes that are more than 2400 square feet.
New gasoline taxes (as if gas weren't high enough already)
New taxes on natural resources consumption (heating gas, water, electricity)
New taxes on retirement accounts
and last but not least....
New taxes to pay for socialized medicine so we can receive the same level of medical care as other third-world countries
Verify at:
http://money.cnn.com/news/specials/election/2008/index.html
http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/issues/issues.taxes.html
http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/issues/issues.taxes.html
http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/issues/issues.taxes.html
http://elections.foxnews.com/?s=proposed+taxes
http://bulletin.aarp.org/yourworld/politics/articles/mccain_obama_offer_diffeerent_visions_on_taxes.html
http://bulletin.aarp.org/yourworld/politics/articles/mccain_obama_offer_different_visions_on_taxes.html
http://bulletin.aarp.org/yourworld/politics/articles/mccain_obama_offer_different_visions_on_taxes.html
http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/candidates/barack_obama/
http://blog.washingtonpost.com/fact-checker/candidates/john_mccain/
http://www.capitalonehomeloans.com/
Barack Obama, John McCain, Barack Obama, John McCain, Obama, McCain
Sunday, September 7, 2008
Troubling Statement from Sarah Palin on Global Warming
I have been pretty impressed with Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin I have to say. Most of the public statements she has made have been intelligent and confident. I have no issues with her pregnant daughter. She has more governmental experience than Obama actually. Unfortunately today I heard a Palin statement that bugged me alot.
In an interview earlier this month with the conservative website Newsmax, she said of climate change , “I'm not one who would attribute it to being man-made."
Goodness! Open your eyes. Could it be anymore obvious the effect we are having on our own planet? Crap the biggest structure on the entire east coast of the United States is the New York landfill.
In an interview earlier this month with the conservative website Newsmax, she said of climate change , “I'm not one who would attribute it to being man-made."
Goodness! Open your eyes. Could it be anymore obvious the effect we are having on our own planet? Crap the biggest structure on the entire east coast of the United States is the New York landfill.
Thursday, September 4, 2008
Interesting Quotes from Sarah Palin's Speech
Sarah Palin found Obama's lofty style of rhetoric wanting and devoid of details of where he would take the country if elected although she offered few policy specifics of her own. "Listening to him speak, it's easy to forget that this is a man who has authored two memoirs but not a single major law or reform -- not even in the (Illinois) state senate ... What does he actually seek to accomplish, after he's done turning back the waters and healing the planet?" she asked.
"I might add that in small towns, we don't quite know what to make of a candidate who lavishes praise on working people when they are listening, and then talks about how bitterly they cling to their religion and guns when those people aren't listening," she said.
"I might add that in small towns, we don't quite know what to make of a candidate who lavishes praise on working people when they are listening, and then talks about how bitterly they cling to their religion and guns when those people aren't listening," she said.
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