An Open Letter to Obama

I think his point was that people with higher incomes or businesses of any size don't pay any taxes. If you raise their tax by 25%, they simply pass on that cost to the consumer of whatever product or service they provide. The consumer (some of them very poor) pay that tax. It's worse with international corporations since they must also compete with other nations and high tax rates make them uncompetitive with nations with lower tax rates. They either move production overseas or go out of business.

The Obamacare tax is probably the most regressive and unfair tax ever imposed in the US. Those who pay for their insurance (usually shared with an employer) will have to pay twice as much in order to cover those who have simply refused to buy insurance. The truly poor, those who can't afford insurance, are already covered through Medicaid/Medicare. My son and his wife, healthy young nonsmokers, paid about $200 a month (each) for a good health plan. Now they will pay $800 a month, each.

 

Cant really say that the US is high taxed, While on paper the tax rate (federal, state, locale) is 39.1%, In reality based upon GDP the US collects (2010 figures) 24.8%, The third lowest in the OECD. What set's the US apart from most other nations is that the system is broken up into so many many many various groups rather then a single group. Most nations have a universal tax rate while in the US it doesn't just change from state to state but town to town, Makes for a VERY inefficient system. Such a system would be wasting billions upon billions upon billions.

The US need's to adopt singular systems, Get over the out of date want for your own state to have it's own system and adopt one that is best for the nation as a whole. Scrap Obamacare, Medicare and Medicaid and make a Single system. Rip the tax system up and make a single tax system, A flat corporate tax, A flat tax across all states (In Australia we have GST, 10% flat rate), I shudder to think of the tens of billions that have been and continue to be wasted just so the same systems can exist many many times over...

Just my view..

 

If only...The politicians talk about restructuring the tax system, but, more often than not, that is all it is...talk.

I can't say that we will ever have a single tax system. Too many fingers in the pie. Federal tax, state tax, local tax, school tax, property tax, etc.

 

It seems that people in other countries has a better way to run the US than when they have more than enough of their own problems to tend to where they come from.

 

Im Aussie, Our biggest problem right now is we have a PM (Abbott) that is talking down the local economy at a time when it is still one of the best in the Western world (Talking something down creates negativity, Lowers consumer spending hurting business.. Idiot he is).. Yes we have our issues but to be frank they are a fraction of those that the US has but even Ill concede that we need to look outside of Australia to fix our faults, They have been with us for so long we have gotten tunnel vision so we should take lessons from other nations on how best to do something in an area we are lacking (Military acquisition and Infrastructure spending, Our genius government will order naval ships at random times at random numbers even though our navy is large enough that we could sustain a slightly lower but consistent build rate which would save more then it would cost, As to infrastructure on major projects we simply spend WAY too much.. less then 50km regional rail link, Costing in excess of $4 billion and construction taking from 2009 through 2016, That and most never listen to the numbers guy in which one provides the best return for your buck hence we have $58 billion in extra infrastructure in the works of which none has had a completed cost benefit analysis, $58 billion being greater then the loss the budget will run this year... )

 

Ah, the reason this dog was dug up is because I found OP's points to mostly be incredibly prescient. A lot of points are fairly undeniable today, even to the dems... Jon Stewart is not a fan of Obama. Was surprised at what he and O'Reilly talked about recently.

The golliwog bank also was a large reason to repost as I found the coincidence pleasing.

And lastly, the evolution of WW2F is apparent -regarding how mods now keep a good reign. (or an iron fist lol).

Now the thread is moving along, there is some more entertaining reading...I'd like to ask Victor to continue the way he's always taken. Passionate responses are always good reading. Yin and Yang https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yin_and_yang

 

Maybe some of these wayward children who feel that they have a better way to run the US should just take a long rest and STFU. They have much to benefit from the US standing up to the the bad guys of the old days (to the USSR and the Chicoms) so that they can sit at home and are able to pitch a bitch and whine about how bad Uncle Sam has been in relative safety. Not saying that we didn't have allies during the cold war that stood with us shoulder to shoulder to face the red menace, and I do acknowledge their presence on the wall with me, but those who grew up after the tough times were done seem to conveniently forget what was accomplished in the old days.

Several years ago while I was enjoying a ski vacation at the Lake Louise Ski area (near Banff, Canada) I happened upon a fellow (in the Kokannee Cabin) who bought me a beer when he recognized my southern American accent. He started out saying that he did not approve or liked our current president (Bush 43), but severely stressed that he more than appreciated being so geographically located to the US that the USSR or anyone else would not contemplate invading without getting fried in the process. He went on to say that W was an idiot and deserved to be whacked. While I was drinking the beer that he bought me, I was politically honorable enough to hear him out before answering his statement. I said that it was in his opinion that W was an idiot and free to blaspheme as such, but that he (W) graduated from Princeton (or wherever in the Ivy League he finished from), so that made him an educated idiot and leader of the strongest country in free world that kept his piss ant country from being overrun with Rooskies and Chinamen to begin with. He tipped his glass to me and bought me another stout Canadian beer while we talked about the Korean War where both out fathers fought in the old days.

As I always feel that a free man in the free world is free to state his position and feelings, most, if not all of them and should remember where and why they are able to do so before shooting their godd@m mouths off to begin with. We have our problems. Go fix yours before hopping on your high horse and telling us what we should do here.

Yeah I been drinking beer tonight at choir practice so so what.

 

Considering Australia has been the only nation on earth to fight side by side with the US in every major conflict I do believe we get a bit more leeway then others. Ill also concede I grew up after the cold war (born 1989) so have no actual experience of it but to be frank what may have applied then is not necessarily what is best for now, Times change so we should learn to change with them. Not useful using a system decades old when we have gone from a big world to a small world.

Yes Im able to speak my mind freely without repercussion (Except maybe a few older 'gentleman' whacking me with their walking sticks ) and while the US did play a part in that for Australia it should not be over inflated (Just my view), Our biggest defense was quiet literally the distance between us and others, The same thing that saved us in WWII protected us in the Cold War and continues to do so today. Those that are close enough to threaten us are not strong enough in aerial and naval assets and t hose that are strong aerial/naval wise (Russia, China, US etc) are all too far away (And the US is an ally).

Just my view but more then happy to let it rest there if you wish, Both stated what is on our minds which to me is better then being some pansy sitting back in corner shutting up lol.

As to that mention of beer.. I might go have 1 or 2.. dozen =D

 

You mean the British and the French weren't on the U.S. side ? (WW1 , WW2 , Corea ) . And I supose you mean 20 century conflicts, not EVERY major conflict.

 

I did mean the 20th century and yes the British and French where at some of the biggest ones (WWI, WWII, Korea etc) but not in Vietnam (Those four tend to be the biggest conflicts of 20th century).

 

Actually the French were in vietnam, except it was called Indochina until 1954. The British were also there in 1945-46 .

The War in Vietnam, codenamed Operation Masterdom[1] by the British, and also known as Nam Bộ kháng chiến (English: Southern Resistance War)[2] by the Vietnamese, was a post–World War II armed conflict involving a largely British-Indian and French task force and Japanese troops from the Southern Expeditionary Army Group, versus the Vietnamese communist movement, the Viet Minh, for control of the country, after the unconditional Japanese surrender.
The wars in Indochina, for about 45 years, had caught the world's attention during the last part of the 20th century. France's unsuccessful nine-year conflict (1945–1954), America's equally unsuccessful involvement, ending in 1973 to the conflict in Cambodia, sparked by the Vietnamese invasion in 1978 have been often referred to, respectively, as the First, Second and Third Indochina Wars. Historically, they are misnumbered by one, for the first war in Vietnam after World War II was a brief but important conflict that grew out of the British occupation of Saigon from 1945–46.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_in_Vietnam_(1945%E2%80%9346)

 

I knew France and the British had at points been in Vietnam but I view them as separate conflicts personally, While interconnected and at times having some minor support from one another (Material or just public support) neither the French or the British thought side by side in Vietnam with the US.

As to the invasion of Cambodia by Vietnam, My only issue with that is that we did not assist them.. The Khmer rouge quiet simply was a monster and out of all people to do the right thing it was the 'Evil communist VC'..

 

Having state and local tax systems may actually be best for the nation as a whole. Allowing people at the local level to decide how much they will pay for what is a significant source of individual freedom and for that matter economic flexability. There's also a very serious question to the effect of anyone much less federal ellected officials to determine what's "best" for the country. Indeed most just hope for what's reasonable. Micro experiments such as state and local taxes and budgets are useful in that regard as well.