Death Tax Relief for America's Farmers. All 50 of them. The rest? Bonus!
 

Ditto. Thank God and his son the Christ for the second amendment which is the ultimate earthly protector and enforcer of those rights.

Death Tax Relief for America's Farmers. All 50 of them. The rest? Bonus!
 

That's not a justification for it, but it does respond to one of the objections to it.

Of all the sorts of things you can tax to run a government, I think the estate tax is one of the fairest, because the money is going to people who have such a weak claim to it, relative to other taxes.

Death Tax Relief for America's Farmers. All 50 of them. The rest? Bonus!
 

Think of it as paying tax to acquire property. Yeah, it's not quite accurate, since the recipient doesn't necessarily actually pay the tax (e.g., someone can get the house free and clear if there are other assets in the estate to pay the taxes -- then whoever gets the residual is getting kind of screwed). Hey, I know, think of some of the recipients as getting grossed up at the expense of the person who gets the residual.

So, see, if the decedent only has, say, real property, it's as if they have pledged it partially to pay the tax on passing it on. If they gave the whole property to the gov't, there wouldn't be the issue, but since they want to give it to someone else, there is a tax on the transfer. By not keeping enough relatively liquid assets around to pay the tax that they know is coming (and they could sell the property, buy something 2/3 as expensive, and keep the remainder in a diversified portfolio to pay taxes with, or whatever), they are forcing the recipients of their largesse to go through the painful process.

It's like if you went to go buy me 1 carat tw diamond earrings in platinum settings, but only brought the list price. You'd have to get white gold or something so that you'd have enough to pay the sales tax. No, you aren't buying online. Yes, you are going to the store.

This transcript of an exchange between Jonathan Bolton and Bill O'Reilly from a few years back shows that Bolton is completely unfit to serve in this administration. Bolton clearly wouldn't have invaded Iraq to save a few lives.

• BOLTON: I think that the United States is now involved in a conflict where it has no tangible national interest, where it has no clear objectives in mind, and where the ultimate outcome could be very risky for what our real interests are, as evidenced by the fact that we've already severely strained relations with Russia.
  
  I think this is a mistake. I think it continues a series of mistakes that the Clinton administration has made in former Yugoslavia. And I'm very uneasy about the situation tonight.
  
  O'REILLY: All right. Now let's say you and I were walking down the street in Washington, DC. And across the road we saw a gang beating up a woman and hurting a woman. We didn't know that woman at all. And it wasn't in our interests personally to stop the beating.
  
  But I think you and I would cross the street. Don't you, Mr. Bolton?
  
  BOLTON: Well, maybe. Or we might call the police. Or we might do something else. But I think it's very misleading...
  
  O'REILLY: I'll tell you what. I would cross the street right there.
  
  BOLTON: ... Good for you.
  
  O'REILLY: OK.
  
  BOLTON: I think it's very misleading to try to analogize what's going on in the Balkans with a street crime in the United States. What the Kosovar-Albanians and the Serbs are fighting about has deep historical roots, where the United States basically has no interest in whatever the outcome is. The Serbian...
  
  O'REILLY: Well, I would agree that we don't have an immediate interest. But on a humanitarian basis, both you and I know the Serbian army can go into Kosovo and crush those people and do pretty much what they want to do to them. And they will, based upon what they've done in Bosnia, based upon what they tried to do in Slovenia.
  
  These are brutal, brutal people. They are not a civilized, disciplined army.
  
  And I find it difficult to stand by and watch another Cambodia, another Rwanda, unfold. And I believe the United States has a responsibility here.
  
  BOLTON: Let me ask you this, Mr. O'Reilly. How many dead Americans is it worth to you to stop the brutality?
  
  O'REILLY: I don't think I would quantify that because...
  
  BOLTON: I think you have to quantify it. I think if you don't answer that question...
  
  O'REILLY: ... I think if you're going to be a superpower...
  
  BOLTON: ... you're ducking the key point that the commander in chief has to decide upon before putting American troops into a combat situation. We are now at war with Serbia. And the president has to be able to justify to himself and to the American people that Americans are about to die, or may well die, for a certain specific American interest.
  
  O'REILLY: And I think the American military people over there understand that because of the status of America as the superpower policeman of the world, which we are whether we like it or not, there are some situations where we will have to put ourselves at risk for a long-term objective. And that long-term objective is basically not letting butchers like Milosevic run around and do what they want with impunity while we have the power to stop it.

via War and Piece

Who Cares Who Runs the UN? Can we have a "No Tax" day?
 

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.j...toryID=8157194

Put aside the Iraq decision which of course the current UN couldn't act on, put aside the widespread rape by "peacekeepers," put aside the Annan family college fund that killed millions of Iraqi babies- WTF is the point of the UN? Is it simply for Islamic countries to work out grudges against us and Israel?

• U.N. Calls for Combating 'Defamation' of Islam
  
  GENEVA (Reuters) - The United Nations Commission on Human Rights called on Tuesday for combating defamation of religions, especially Islam, and condemned discrimination against Muslims in the West's war on terrorism.
  
  The 53-member state forum adopted a resolution, presented by Pakistan on behalf of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), deploring the intensification of a "campaign of defamation" against Muslims following the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States.
  
  Western countries, including the United States and European Union (EU), voted against the text, calling it unbalanced for failing to address problems suffered by other religious groups.

So okay, some resolution that doesn't mean much- but part of the basis is:

• In a recent report, the U.N. special investigator on racism, Doudou Diene, cited examples including "Islamophobic violence" after the murder last November of Dutch film director Theo Van Gogh,

How can an organization that we and the rest of the world are supposed to rely upon look at that incident as anything other than a dramatic indictment against radical Islam?

A guy makes a movie about mistreatment of women under Islam and he gets death threats then is killed- a MP critic of Islam must be basically in hiding under guard 24/7- do they think the Dutch incident isn't at the edge of the divide?

Sure the great bulk of Islamic people in the netherlands are probably good Dutch, but a chunk of them ain't behaving like the people who'll sell you hash at the laundrymat- its not understandable that there is some backlash?

Want to cure the backlash- then root out the hate messengers from your mosques/ expose those who threaten and kill, but don't be surprised if some people react when people speaking "for" Islam kill people for making a movie.

I really don't get the reason the UN exists- and I don't mean that in a neo-con way. Are the charity parts that much more effective than private charities?

I know- peacekeepers- and they've done good and we shouldn't let what they did in Africa ruin that- but so much of what the UN does as reported seems like we could have done just as well w/o it.

Death Tax Relief for America's Farmers. All 50 of them. The rest? Bonus!
 

That may be true as a general matter, but hardly as it's currently structured. If you want to make the current estate tax "fairer" you would eliminate the exemption for the first $1m+ dollars. Everyone pays it--at the same rate.

Death Tax Relief for America's Farmers. All 50 of them. The rest? Bonus!
 

I swear if anyone posts another Tax post I'm done here- Ty can you please start a tax thread?

Death Tax Relief for America's Farmers. All 50 of them. The rest? Bonus!
 

BTW, repeal is on today's calendar in the House (WaPo article). Incidentally, it's motivated by a desire to save a family business--the Mars family's business.

confidential to Hank--see you on the FB.

Death Tax Relief for America's Farmers. All 50 of them. The rest? Bonus!
 

Burger- the old PB was way fun, and maybe that was due to people who aren't here now- and maybe it was to to the periodic BT cut and paste that led to days of fucking with him- but the tax crap is dry and of interest to the people to whom it is of interest, and I really think it pushes other people away. maybe it doesn't matter anymore and maybe a tax thread isn't needed because the PB is dead except for tax- but go back and read some old PB and tell me you don't miss that- c'mon b you know you do

Death Tax Relief for America's Farmers. All 50 of them. The rest? Bonus!
 

i'd say the same thing about the iraq war. Anything's boring after 100 posts.

Are the arcana of tax issues interesting? No--Club should just go learn how the estate tax actually functions before wonk has to explain it all. But personally, it seems to me there's a legitimate, and highly important policy/politics question of how we go about raising revenue to keep supporting all of the dems' social programs.

Maybe I didn't spend enough time there, but the old PB always struck me like one of those call-in shows, with al franken and rush limbaugh both responding.

Death Tax Relief for America's Farmers. All 50 of them. The rest? Bonus!
 

• "Show me the tribute money." And they brought unto him the money. And he saith unto them, "Whose is this image and superscription?" They saith unto him "Caesar's." Then saith he unto them, "Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's; and unto God the things that are God's."

Matthew (a tax collector, btw), 22: 19-21

Death Tax Relief for America's Farmers. All 50 of them. The rest? Bonus!
 

But nothing goes "BOOM!!!" in this discussion, so why on earth would we care about it?

Dem's social programs like Medicare prescription drugs? I'm thinking you threw that in there in an attempt to instigate. INSTIGATOR. That's not nice first thing in the morning . . .

Damn. I hate it when Bill O'Reilly makes sense.

WWJD About The Estate Tax?
 

"Jesus said to him, "If you wish to be complete, go and sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me." But when the young man heard this statement, he went away grieving; for he was one who owned much property. And Jesus said to His disciples, "Truly I say to you, it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. "Again I say to you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God."

Matthew 19:21-24

Death Tax Relief for America's Farmers. All 50 of them. The rest? Bonus!
 

After listening to Ty for the last two years, I'm pretty sure nothing goes boom in iraq, despite all of Saddam's efforts to make us think otherwise.

North Korea, on the other hand, we ought to invade now.