Replies to post #81401 on Discover GOP Opprobrium

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THE SMALLEST TAX BURDEN IN GENERATIONS....

If I had to guess, I'd say most Americans think the government collects too much money in taxes. Indeed, despite an enormous deficit they claim to care deeply about, congressional Republicans are nearly unanimous in their belief that raising any taxes on anyone by any amount is entirely unacceptable -- because Americans are "taxed enough already."

With that in mind, today's AP report on tax burdens probably won't be well received on the right, but that doesn't make it wrong. (thanks to reader R.S. for the tip)

Taxes too high?

Actually, as a share of the nation's economy, Uncle Sam's take this year will be the lowest since 1950, when the Korean War was just getting under way.

And for the third straight year, American families and businesses will pay less in federal taxes than they did under former President George W. Bush, thanks to a weak economy and a growing number of tax breaks for the wealthy and poor alike.

Income tax payments this year will be nearly 13 percent lower than they were in 2008, the last full year of the Bush presidency. Corporate taxes will be lower by a third, according to projections by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.



There are multiple factors that contribute to this, including the weak economy that holds down income. But it's also the result of very low tax rates, coupled with, as the AP noted, "a tax code that grows each year with new deductions, credits and exemptions."

The result is an economy with federal tax receipts equal to just 14.8% of the economy -- the lowest level since the Truman era.

Of course, this is only looking at federal taxes, and doesn't reflect state and local taxes, but a USA Today analysis found last year that if we include everything -- federal, state, and local taxes, including income, property, sales, and other taxes -- the percentage of personal income that's paid in taxes is still at its lowest level since 1950.

As Michael Ettlinger, head of economic policy at the Center for American Progress, said at the time, "The idea that taxes are high right now is pretty much nuts."

[teapeebubbles]

Beck Bites Back At Kristol: ‘I Don’t Even Know If You Understand What Conservatives Are Anymore’

After enduring Fox News host Glenn Beck’s finely-tuned delusions about the supposed alliance between Islamic extremism and socialism, fellow conservative Weekly Standard editor Bill Kristol derided Beck for his unhealthy “hysteria.” “When Glenn Beck rants about the caliphate taking over the Middle East…and lists (invents?) the connections between caliphate-promoters and the American left,” he is “marginalizing himself” with the likes of the John Birch Society, Kristol wrote this weekend. Never one to smolder quietly, Beck launched a scathing, sarcastic rant against Kristol on his radio show this morning and accused “Billy” of “betraying conservatism and missing the significance” of his conspiratorial warnings about Egypt. Convinced Kristol can’t “understand what conservatives are anymore,” Beck said that conservatives like him are just doing “anything to keep their little fiefdom together“:

BECK:…I don’t even know if you understand what conservatives are anymore, Billy….People like Bill Kristol, I don’t think they stand for anything any more. All they stand for is power. They’ll do anything to keep their little fiefdom together and they’ll do anything to keep the Republican power entrenched. I’m sorry, the system doesn’t work….I think you’ve confused conservative principles with conservative progressive principles. Times have changed, Bill. Times have changed. It’s time to see the world how it really is.

Listen here:



Beck later feigned apology for his rancor because “I get really testy when I hear people who should get it come after me. It’s like really, have you done a minute of research, Bill?” Offering to “dumb it down,” Beck told Kristol exactly where he could find all the research to prove socialists and Islamists are in “phase 2? of their plot to take over the world — “just watch the show in the next week,” Beck instructed.