Timeforreality

Bush was a socialist too? What are you smoking Vernon?

VladimirPee

Another well trained parrot I see. Under Bush everyone got tax cuts not just the wealthy. That's why Obama and Pelosi extended them 100% in 2010.

Medicare Prescription Drugs doesn't help people? How about the Billions spent on Katrina or post 911 rebuilding?

Coos Bay Tom Loc: coos bay oregon

I( believe you are right.

VladimirPee

Bottom line. Deficits are bad and the National Debt is rising rapidly. This is an unsustainable path. Do you agree or disagree?

Hungry Freaks

I agree-onc this economic crisis is passed, we should start cutting deficits and pay down the national debt. Until this crisis is past, and we're very close, to stop government stimulation of the economy would be a disaster. Look at what happened in the EU when Germany forced it austerity measures on other EU members.

As far as who got the tax cuts under Bush, I know I got a little done-about $700 increase in last years taxes with the end of the "payroll tax holiday" as my accountant called it. I'm not sure what tax expired, but our (my wife and I)'s tax bill went up last year. And it wasn't any new tax, according to my accountant, it was the sunsetting of a past tax cut or "tax holiday" (I like that term.) . I'm willing to pay it if it help cut annual deficits.

My problem with the "rich" isn't that they make a lot of money. In the days of unfettered capitalism, true capitalists went out and put their lives and money on the line. Some of them made furtunes, others didn't. Some made two or three fortunes and lost them all.

there was one of the early entrepreneurs in the Middle EAst oil boom was a fellow whose last name was Root. He dragged an oil drilling right across a hundred miles of Iranian desert, all at his own expense, drilled for oil and hit a motherlode. Somehow, he lost this fortune and went out and did the same thing again-all with his own money and all at his own energies.

These people often were not nice people Like the Rockefeller, Mellon and Carnegie, they often did bad things in the pursuit of their fortunes. Some of them even used US troops as security forces to stifle organized labor.

But a great many of the true entrepreneurs of the Gilded AGe worked like the devil, too risks that would be unimaginable today and reaped the rewards or suffered the consequences.

Today's CEO risks little. He/she is a highly paid employee who had little if anything to do with the company's success. Stock opinions give them some incentive to make the company work, but most get paid the long dollars regardless of how the company performs.

Take a look at Bain Capital.Bain is not a bad company-far from it. In the venture capital business, Bain is an exemplar of ethics.

But there's this idea the Bain and Mitt Romney made Stapes. Not so. Staples was an idea that a true entrepreneur came up with. He had some investment money, but not enough. Bain took a risk in that they lent this former grocery store owner to start the business, but had little to do with it's growth. They did help this entrepreneur with management consulting, but little else.

All of the capital Bain invested in Staples was borrowed from investors. Romney put up some money when Bain was started, but Bain rarely, if over, used the principle's cash for investments. Had the Stapes idea failed, they would have written it off as a lost, a deduction for their taxable income from profitable ventures. Nothing illegal about this, nothing even unethical.But the true entrepreneur was the former grocery store owner who sunk everything he owned into the business.

While Bain's business investments were "successful" about 60% of the time, it also had a knack for making money from it's losses.

In the 1980s and 1990s, Bain bought outright a small steel company based in the Carolina's NCS is the name I seem to recall, but it was three letterheads. Bain bought the company, borrowed against it's assets to try and built it up and, when the company filed for bankruptcy some eight years alter, still posted a $50+ million profit. The company's pension and health benefit fund was out $44 million, but Bain got theirs.

I know the commercial the Democrats ran in 2012 about Romney and Bain killing some worker's wife because the worker lost his benefits was bogus, but undoubtedly, some workers suffered severe hardship from the loss of pensions and/or health benefits. But it was OK-Bain made their $50+ million.

As I said, Bain is one of the better examples of "venture capitalists." but they're not real capitalists. They broke no laws and probably didn't do anything unethical in the slim volume of "business ethics in the 21st Century."

They use other people's money to make money and they made sure that Bain made a profit whether the investment succeeded or failed. Although Bain's record of success/failure was about 60/40, they still raked in tons of cash, which made investors rich but also made even more rich guys like Romney. And this is considered "risky" by today's standards.

Most of the 1%ers are nothing but highly paid employees, like CEOs, who take no risk yet are rewarded as if they were a Root dragging his oil rig across the desert. Root took real risks, he paid for everything he did out of his own pocket and made and lost fortunes depending on how his ventures turned out. Today's CEO, or venture capitalist, take minimal risk. "Golden Parachutes" is the term given to CEOs. Tax write-offs is the term losing business ventures are given by venture "capitalists"

Even the stock market is gamed. Financial services sector companies get money from individuals and institutional investors, which the companies invest in an array of stocks. Wether these stocks or other financial "instruments" like mortgage-backed securities, go up or down are of no concern to the company, except for reputation purposes by which to get more investors. The financial service sector gets its share win or lose in the form of transaction fees and by purchasing "options" on stocks that are unlike to succeed.

It's like going to the craps table and putting money on the pass line, hoping the roller will win, and the don't pass line, hoping the house will win. For the savvy company with an inside track, this is a win/win situation. Here's an example. .

In the mid 20000s, CitiBank dealt a ton of what they knew were deeply "distressed" mortgage-backed securities to unwary investors even though CitiBank knew that more than half of the mortgages in these "bundled" securities were in or near default. And to prove they knew these securities were likely to fail, CitiBank then purchased options on what they knew to be deeply flawed financial "instruments." when the securities failed, which they did in a rather spectacular way in 2008, CitiBank said "too bad" and collected fees from investors who lost on the mortgage securities and money from betting against their own securities that they knew were going to fail.

One would think that this was outright fraud. CitiBank did pay a penalty to the SEC while "not admitting or denying wrongdoing." And, had CitiBank been on the verge of failure, they would have had the government there to bail them out. (I'm not sure if CitiBank got a government bail out or not, but I think it took over others that did.)

This is not capitalism. It may not be outright fraud (although it probably fits the definition) is ain't capitalism.

And while this may be an egregious example, most of what we consider free-wheleing capitalism is nothing more than government subsidized corporate welfare. Or, at least, a system where risk is spread among the stockholders while rewards are shared by those who take little, if any risk, the highly-paid employees who are paid pass or fail.

Smal businessmen and women take real risks every day. And when they fail, their companies are shuttered. But Big Business and the multi-nationals, have a fleet of K-Street lobbyists and lower tax rates than these true capitalist.

vernon

both bushes were and clinton and this prick we have now

vernon

time when i went to work you paid out ss 2500

vernon

the middle class will pay more simply because there are more of them.

VladimirPee

Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

Albert Einstein

Coos Bay Tom Loc: coos bay oregon

you don't like anybody very much. who or what do you identify with?

Hungry Freaks

OK Dennis, so the INTEREST on the national debt in 2008 was $451 billion, half of the TOTAL national debt of about $900 billion was in 1981 when Ronald Wilson "deficits don't matter" Reagan took office. Does that make you feel any better? And, yes, I hear the man utter those words himself. He said the annual deficits "would kill entitlements for the next hundred years."

I'm not surprised that those who seek to make the man a myth would want to hide those remarks. But he said them.

Cheney's remarks on no less damning.

It seems deficits and the national debt are only important when Democrat is in the White House. And when there's good news on deficit spending and the debt, it's not the Democrat in the White House who is responsible for the good news, it's the Republican-conrtolled Congress. Or when there's good news on the debt and annual deficits, it's the Republican in the White House and not the Democrat-controlled Congress. Having it both ways.

"Membership in the Grand Old Party means never having to say your wrong."

VladimirPee

Capitalism has always been reliant on 3 things.
Idea's
People willing to invest money into those idea's ( Their own or from investors) and people willing to purchase the product or service.

Henry Ford did not have the money to make cars. He went to a coal dealer named Alexander Y. Malcomson who helped him.
Thomas Edison was funded by JP Morgan.



The first funding for Google as a company was secured in August 1998 in the form of a US$100,000 contribution from Andy Bechtolsheim, co-founder of Sun Microsystems, given to a corporation which did not yet exist.[27]

On June 7, 1999, a round of equity funding totalling $25 million was announced;[28] the major investors being rival venture capital firms Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Sequoia Capital.[27]



No not all Bain investments have turned a profit. In fact one of their current investments is a huge loser.

HD SUPPLY formerly Home Depot Supply purchased with 2 other venture capital firms in 2007 for 8.5 Billion Dollars. Current value 4.2 Billion.

http://www.costar.com/News/Article/Home-Depots-$85B-Sale-of-HD-Supply-Completed/93017

VladimirPee

Reagan never said Deficits don't matter. You are a liar. The man never uttered those words. Why did you post a bogus interest payment amount for the debt service when the actual number is easy enough to find online? You just pull facts and quotes out of your ass.


Cheney's quote is often taken out of context by your left wing parrots. Cheney was speaking in relation to elections. And you know this.

Bottom Line some of the GOP is concerned with deficits and debt and some are not BUT I have yet to see ANY Democrat concerned other than Campaign Rhetoric.

Hungry Freaks

Now, Dennis, going back to "you're a liar" stuff. I heard Reagan utter the words, right from the horse's mouth.

I didn't hear him said say the deficits and debt will kill entitlements for the next hundred years. It was widely reported, with no denials from the White House, at the time. I guess you had to be politically aware at the time.

VladimirPee

Debt and deficits will kill entitlements for 100 years? And you equate this with " deficits don't matter"? are you kidding me? Totally different meanings. And I can find no record of Reagan saying this . Perhaps you have a source you can share? A Link?