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Sending out the message that any who oppose him are bought and paid for operatives of big business also wasn't very bright.
Here's one reason:
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Its been the summer of BO's discontent.
Obama? you mean Jimmy Carter V 2.0
Actually I was paraphrasing a line from 'Richard III'Its been the summer of BO's discontent.
I don't know if you are refering to the Ajami op-ed, "Obama's Summer of Discontent," but for folks who missed it, here is part:
"The Obama devotees were the victims of their own belief in political magic. The devotees could not make up their minds. In a newly minted U.S. senator from Illinois, they saw the embodiment of Abraham Lincoln, Franklin Delano Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy. Like Lincoln, Mr. Obama was tall and thin and from Illinois, and the historic campaign was launched out of Springfield. The oath of office was taken on the Lincoln Bible. Like FDR, he had a huge economic challenge, and he better get it done, repair and streamline the economy in his "first hundred days." Like JFK, he was young and stylish, with a young family.
All this hero-worship before Mr. Obama met his first test of leadership. In reality, he was who he was, a Chicago politician who had done well by his opposition to the Iraq war. He had run a skillful campaign, and had met a Clinton machine that had run out of tricks and a McCain campaign that never understood the nature of the contest of 2008.
He was no FDR, and besides the history of the depressionthe real historybears little resemblance to the received narrative of the nation instantly rescued, in the course of 100 days or 200 days, by an interventionist state. The economic distress had been so deep and relentless that FDR began his second term, in 1937, with the economy still in the grip of recession.
At no time had Ronald Reagan believed that the American covenant had failed, that America should apologize for itself in the world beyond its shores. There was no narcissism in Reagan. It was stirring that the man who headed into the sunset of his life would bid his country farewell by reminding it that its best days were yet to come.
In contrast, there is joylessness in Mr. Obama. He is a scold, the "Yes we can!" mantra is shallow, and at any rate, it is about the coming to power of a man, and a political class, invested in its own sense of smarts and wisdom, and its right to alter the social contract of the land. In this view, the country had lost its way and the new leader and the political class arrayed around him will bring it back to the right path.
Thus the moment of crisis would become an opportunity to push through a political economy of redistribution and a foreign policy of American penance. The independent voters were the first to break ranks. They hadn't underwritten this fundamental change in the American polity when they cast their votes for Mr. Obama.
Those protesters in those town-hall meetings have served notice that Mr. Obama's charismatic moment has passed. Once again, the belief in that American exception that set this nation apart from other lands is re-emerging. Health care is the tip of the iceberg. Beneath it is an unease with the way the verdict of the 2008 election was read by those who prevailed. It shall be seen whether the man swept into office in the moment of national panic will adjust to the nation's recovery of its self-confidence."
Fouad Ajami: Obamas Summer of Discontent - WSJ.com
Obama? you mean Jimmy Carter V 2.0
Thank you for putting your limited right wing thinking skills on display for everyone to see. Say HI to Sean for me, will ya?
While the taxes on the top earners (always hate to use that word, does anyone ever really earn $102,000 an hour?) used to be 91 percent, pre 1964, they are now at 35 percent, and set to be raised back to 39.6 percent. That's a pretty sweet deal.
More, those who make money from investments, only have to pay fifteen percent, a really sweet deal, for people who can work all their lives without paying income taxes, only this capital gains tax. Another sweet deal for the richest.
Employees pay the full amount in FICA/SS/Medicare/Medicaid up to about $100,000, but for all income over that amount, the roughly 7 percent is no longer deducted.
Sales, gas, property, alcohol, cigarette, and utility taxes, as well as many, many fees and license taxes levied on everyone, affect the poor and middle class far more dispropotionately, as a larger share of income.
David Kaye Johnston in his book Perfectly Legal, points out that when all taxes are taken into account, rather than singling out the Income tax, the top 20 percent of earners (pre2000) paid about 18 percent as a share of income. The lower 20 percent, paid 19 percent, as a share of income.
As far as Obama goes, I'd like to hear more about rolling back the idiot republican policies that brought us to the point we are at now, but he's stuck in Hoover mode, not wanting to rock the boat yet. Like Hoover, I suspect the boat is going to have to sink more before someone realizes we are on the brink of anarchy, and reallocates all that money we are wasting on the DOD/Pentagon, to producing jobs, here in America, jobs that actually result in productivity gains, instead of ending the lives of people in foreign lands, where we need to take the oil, or find a pipeline route.
Obama? you mean Jimmy Carter V 2.0
Thank you for putting your limited right wing thinking skills on display for everyone to see. Say HI to Sean for me, will ya?