So all of a sudden everybody has finally discovered that Sen. Obama,
with his comment to Joe the Plumber, plans to ". . . spread the wealth
around." We should all be worried.

Months ago, Sen. Obama and the Democratic members of the House and
Senate indicated they would tax the "windfall profits" of the oil
companies. Allow me to translate.

We will confiscate and steal the profits that belong to the
shareholders of the oil companies and distribute them to people who
never risked a single cent or invested in those companies, just
because it is "fair."

Everybody cheers, not realizing that some of those profits belong to
the pension plans of police, firemen, teachers, city, county and state
employees, retired people, and thousands of 401(k)s. I suspect even
some of those plumber and pipefitters unions have money invested in
those companies.

I came from Cuba. I have seen this movie before, and I know how it
ends. I have heard the same lines, spoken by different actors, the
Castro brothers in my case and more recently by Hugo Chávez in
Venezuela. With all his refined education and eloquence, Mr. Obama is
just another socialist who thinks that our American-trained socialists
will make socialism work here, while all those others around the world
have failed. We are so much smarter here.


Luis Vicens
Pembroke Pines, Fla.



In the footsteps of Joe the Plumber, I would also like to publicly
confess that Sen. Obama's tax package will hurt my small business. I
must stress that I have never been given preferential treatment, nor
did I use any resource not available to everyone in this country. I
graduated from a public high school and a state college and merely
chose to use those resources to advance myself.

My family consists of husband and wife plus two children in college
and three still at home. Even though my small business has made me
"rich" and earned over $250,000 last year, I am somehow still not
sitting on a pile of money. Maybe part of the reason is that, as a
result of being declared "rich," we will pay over $174,000 in federal
and state taxes, plus local property taxes. Nonetheless, Sen. Obama
has confessed that I will have my taxes increased, resulting in less
profit for me to put back into the company. This will ultimately lead
to the company having fewer opportunities to grow the business and
provide more work for more people.
Does this sound like a bad plan to anyone else?

Dennis Glaser
Terrace Park, Ohio




Wrench Turns Tighter for Enterprising Joe the Plumber


Regarding your editorial "Senator Government" (Oct. 16): As another
"Joe the Plumber" who is a small business owner and making close to
Barack Obama's target wage, I can tell you what happens when the
"rich" are soaked. Can anyone remember the luxury tax? Who got hurt by
that? The rich? They had to live without their new yachts. The people
who got soaked were the boat builders and their employees who didn't
have any yachts to build. It is not the government's job to "spread
the wealth."


Besides which, small corporations such as mine don't "pay" taxes. We
transfer the money from our customers to the federal government. Think
about that the next time you purchase something from a small business
-- how much of what you are paying is going straight to Uncle Sam.
Just another greedy finger in our pie.

Joe Clark
Master Plumber
Austin, Texas

wrote:
So all of a sudden everybody has finally discovered that Sen. Obama,
with his comment to Joe the Plumber, plans to ". . . spread the wealth
around." We should all be worried.

snerk

"Boater" wrote in message
...
wrote:
So all of a sudden everybody has finally discovered that Sen. Obama,
with his comment to Joe the Plumber, plans to ". . . spread the wealth
around." We should all be worried.

snerk

He is right. People should be concerned. As when the definition of rich
comes down, it is anyone who has more money/assets than the average. It
will cut into the middle class in time. Maybe not in the first cut, but it
will.

Big government costs big and when the rich move out the middle class pays
for it.

"Boater" wrote in message
...
wrote:
So all of a sudden everybody has finally discovered that Sen. Obama,
with his comment to Joe the Plumber, plans to ". . . spread the wealth
around." We should all be worried.

snerk



Snerk yourself.

While the concepts are nice and appealing to many during an election
campaign, the problem is not the specific details of Obama's proposals or
even the income levels over which taxes will be raised.

The problem is in allowing government - and the "leaders" of government to
control it ... period.

Taxes are necessary to provide funding for programs and agencies designed
for the public's benefit, however selective taxing of one group over another
to "spread the wealth" is socialism, regardless of how you want to define
the word for your purposes.

Ironically, without the recent global economic meltdown, McCain, who opposes
selective taxing, would very likely be well ahead in the pre-election polls.
Add the meltdown and much of the public becomes receptive to Obama Socialism
because it serves immediate needs and seems responsive to new, but
temporary, concerns.

But, two months ago, everyone was very happy to be capitalistic, watching
their 401k plans grow in value, etc.

McCain has the right economic ideas at the worst possible time. Once we
give them up to government control under Obama, they will be very difficult
to recover and will probably be lost forever.

People need to think a year or two in the future and not just the next 6
months.

Eisboch

On Tue, 28 Oct 2008 00:04:03 -0400, Eisboch wrote:


While the concepts are nice and appealing to many during an election
campaign, the problem is not the specific details of Obama's proposals
or even the income levels over which taxes will be raised.

The problem is in allowing government - and the "leaders" of government
to control it ... period.

Government has always controlled taxes. I think it's in the definition
of taxes. ;-)

Taxes are necessary to provide funding for programs and agencies
designed for the public's benefit, however selective taxing of one group
over another to "spread the wealth" is socialism, regardless of how you
want to define the word for your purposes.

Taxes have always been selective, be it "sin taxes" on cigarettes and
booze, to deductions for having children. GWB's tax reductions for the
rich were selective. It's a democracy. If you don't believe in Obama's
stated tax policies, don't vote for him.

As for socialism, it is government *ownership* of business, and that is
exactly what is happening now. This bailout, buying into banks, is
socialism, and I believe it was a Republican idea.

On Tue, 28 Oct 2008 00:04:03 -0400, Eisboch wrote:


Taxes are necessary to provide funding for programs and agencies
designed for the public's benefit, however selective taxing of one group
over another to "spread the wealth" is socialism, regardless of how you
want to define the word for your purposes.

This touches on a fundamental difference between Republicans and
Democrats. Republicans, at least from my perspective, believe a healthy
wealthy class, is the economic engine that drives the economy, Reagan's
"trickle down" economy, if you will. Democrats, on the other hand,
believe a vibrant middle class is the engine.

Disregard all the campaign BS. "It's the largest tax increase in
history." "It's the biggest tax cut ever." It's all BS. Since the
'50s, tax revenues, as percentage of GDP, have remained remarkably
constant, at @ 18% GDP +-, with individual income taxes accounting for @
8%.

http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/taxfa....cfm?Docid=205

If you look he

http://www.truthandpolitics.org/top-rates.php

You will see the top marginal tax rate *selectively* cut by Reagan, Bush
I, and Bush II, and increased by Clinton. This is the true "wealth
redistribution" from the middle class to the already wealthy, as
demonstrated by a Gini index of 40 in 1980, and a 46 presently.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gini_coefficient

The final kicker is, contrary to established myth, the economy does
better under Democrats than Republicans.

http://www.coba.unr.edu/econ/wp/pape...CONWP06008.pdf

Eisboch wrote:
"Boater" wrote in message
...
wrote:
So all of a sudden everybody has finally discovered that Sen. Obama,
with his comment to Joe the Plumber, plans to ". . . spread the wealth
around." We should all be worried.
snerk



Snerk yourself.

While the concepts are nice and appealing to many during an election
campaign, the problem is not the specific details of Obama's proposals or
even the income levels over which taxes will be raised.

The problem is in allowing government - and the "leaders" of government to
control it ... period.


We've had income redistribution since the early 20th Century. There's
nothing new about it. I think it perfectly appropriate for those
families above $250,000 in net income to be paying more in taxes by
seeing some of their previously granted tax cuts go by the wayside.

As far as being against "government control," that baby was tossed out
with the bathwater this year when the capitalists greedily accepted
taxpayer bailouts of their failed financial institutions.

Our economy is upside down right now. It needs lots of adjustments and
the financial markets and the corporate world need lots of regulations
to help ensure it doesn't happen again.

It's too bad greed got in the way, eh?

"Boater" wrote in message
...
Eisboch wrote:
"Boater" wrote in message
...
wrote:
So all of a sudden everybody has finally discovered that Sen. Obama,
with his comment to Joe the Plumber, plans to ". . . spread the wealth
around." We should all be worried.
snerk



Snerk yourself.

While the concepts are nice and appealing to many during an election
campaign, the problem is not the specific details of Obama's proposals
or even the income levels over which taxes will be raised.

The problem is in allowing government - and the "leaders" of government
to control it ... period.


We've had income redistribution since the early 20th Century. There's
nothing new about it. I think it perfectly appropriate for those families
above $250,000 in net income to be paying more in taxes by seeing some of
their previously granted tax cuts go by the wayside.

As far as being against "government control," that baby was tossed out
with the bathwater this year when the capitalists greedily accepted
taxpayer bailouts of their failed financial institutions.

Our economy is upside down right now. It needs lots of adjustments and the
financial markets and the corporate world need lots of regulations to help
ensure it doesn't happen again.

It's too bad greed got in the way, eh?


It is. But the greed and subsequent crash was due to a unique sector of the
financial structure, namely sub-prime home mortgages that were bundled and
sold as securities to "average out" the risks. The Democratics were as
responsible, if not more so, for instituting this social welfare program,
which is yet another example of "spreading the wealth". People like Barney
Frank just lie about it now.

To his credit, McCain was raising the alarms back in 2005.

The system isn't perfect, but contrary to thunder's comments and cites, the
US economy has historically recovered from downturns not by raising taxes on
people or businesses, but by lowering them. Even Obama is now beginning to
backpedal a bit from his promises of tax reductions for the middle class by
increasing taxes on those with incomes over 250K (which happens to include
many small businesses that could otherwise use that tax money for
expansion). Obama is beginning to hint that he may have to delay
implementation of some of his economic plan, including the tax provisions,
until the economy improves.

Eisboch

wrote:
On Tue, 28 Oct 2008 00:04:03 -0400, Eisboch wrote:


While the concepts are nice and appealing to many during an election
campaign, the problem is not the specific details of Obama's proposals
or even the income levels over which taxes will be raised.

The problem is in allowing government - and the "leaders" of government
to control it ... period.

Government has always controlled taxes. I think it's in the definition
of taxes. ;-)

Taxes are necessary to provide funding for programs and agencies
designed for the public's benefit, however selective taxing of one group
over another to "spread the wealth" is socialism, regardless of how you
want to define the word for your purposes.

Taxes have always been selective, be it "sin taxes" on cigarettes and
booze, to deductions for having children. GWB's tax reductions for the
rich were selective. It's a democracy. If you don't believe in Obama's
stated tax policies, don't vote for him.

As for socialism, it is government *ownership* of business, and that is
exactly what is happening now. This bailout, buying into banks, is
socialism, and I believe it was a Republican idea.

A history lesson: One of the first crisis in the United States was the
control of the banks. The original banks was owned by the government.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_..._United_States

It is interesting that the democrats of today have not hung Greenspan
for his Mistake in regulating the banking industry. I don't suppose it
had any thing to do with the fact that that mistake was to overestimate
the ethics of the people in the banking industry, who are currently
running the obama's campaign.

Even though my small business has made me "rich" and earned over
$250,000 last year, I am somehow still not sitting on a pile of
money.

HAHAHAHAHA...give me a break. This guy made 250,000 and he cant seem
to live on that? Just goes to show how greedy the rich are. They'll
just say he's " living beyond his means ".

Obama is a curse, and will **** all of you in the USA.....