On the campaign trail with Alan Keyes.
Posted on 08/17/2004 5:58:48 AM PDT by Aquinasfan
One day after their first meeting, U.S. Senate hopefuls Barack Obama and Alan Keyes were back on the campaign trail again Monday.
Speaking at a news conference at the Hotel InterContinental in Chicago, Republican Keyes added to his now familiar talking points his stance on slavery reparations.
Prompted by a reporter's question, Keyes gave a brief tutorial on Roman history and said that in regard to reparations for slavery, the U.S. should do what the Romans did: "When a city had been devastated [in the Roman empire], for a certain length of time--a generation or two--they exempted the damaged city from taxation."
Keyes proposed that for a generation or two, African-Americans of slave heritage should be exempted from federal taxes--federal because slavery "was an egregious failure on the part of the federal establishment." In calling for the tax relief, Keyes appeared to be reaching out to capture the black vote, something that may prove difficult to do, particularly after his unwelcome reception at the Bud Billiken Day Parade Saturday...
(Excerpt) Read more at chicagotribune.com ...
You can make the case, but I don't see the argument. We could always ship people back to their land of origin, where they were ripped from and brought here. /sarcasm
I don't think you have anything to worry about. You called her a "bitter old hag", and she got reprimanded right along with you. If I were you, I'd call that a win.
Don't get greedy.
On the campaign trail with Alan Keyes.
Don't start on the IRS/IRC and its byzantine ghoulishness...Alan calls for the elimination of the illegitimate IRS/IRC and I stand with that policy...
ROTFL
I think I've explained myself quite well - I believe that allowing select classes of people to be exempt from Income Taxes, while everyone else must still pay, to be unconstitutional - What I want to know is, what gives the government the power to say "That group over there doesn't have to pay, but that group over there does, and those over there, too."
I thought we were a nation of laws, which guaranteed equality of opportunity (not of outcomes, mind you) and equal protection under the law.
Seems to me that you want some to be more equal than others, and that is wrong. Period.
Did you post that on another thread? I thought I saw it on my Comments page, but I can't find it now......
Would you like me to pull up a he said she said list and compare notes? I do believe that some people here are here but only for their anti-Conservative agenda, and you know I'm right, whether you admit it or not.
I have a pro-Conservative agenda and I freely admit what and who and why I am...
And, those that have no agenda but just hang out here making mindless, illogical and assinine arguments, they need to get a life and produce something positive for this world...
Yeah but right now in NY, people can go to indian reservations and buy tax free cigarettes. There'd be war I tell you WAR! if people can't go to Foxwoods and gamble and smoke tax free.
If you're so intent on getting reparations for descendants of slaves, contact those Africans who SOLD them into slavery.
I do apologize Howlin for the bitter old hag crack...that was uncalled for.
There is nothing at all unconstitutional about this plan.
Well, I don't think you can honestly say that it would be obviously constitutional. For openers, I think there would be some obvious constitutional problems with imposing a tax only on descendants of slaves. Don't you?
And, if a tax based upon that distinction between descendants and non-descendants invites some level of scrutiny, isn't that another way of saying that it raises some constitutional questions?
Well, seems to me that, based on this latest flip-flop of his, that he now finds the IRS to be a legitimate tool for government to use in righting long-ago wrongs.
Maybe we had better ask Dr. Keyes what his CURRENT position on the IRS is, hmmmm?
No thanks. I've been on the threads. I know who the name-caller is.
Oh, oh. I knew he was too good to be true.
The power to impose a Federal Income Tax is assured in the USC by way of the 16th Amendment, which states ""The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several states, and without regard to any census or enumeration."
That is patently the authority that makes it "allowable for the government to decide which classes of people do or do not have to pay any income tax," as you put it. There is nothing controversial about that legal authority (except for some folks who insist the amendment was not ratified properly, which is both a minority and a losing position as a practical matter).
So the legal authority to tax is in place - and naturally, with that power to tax is the power to not tax.
That's the legal authority to impose a Federal Tax.
The power is exercised by law, via the US Tax Code. Our legislature writes the tax code - that's their job, passing laws.
The tax code ALREADY taxes different people differently, based on the amount of their income, adjusted by their behavior (deductions, for example).
The US Congress can legally make it part of the tax code that descendants of slaves are in the 0% Federal Tax Bracket.
The trait that determines the class of people in this subset of the US population that gets the tax amnesty isn't race (which might - but probably wouldn't anyway - run afoul of a USSC Equal Protection challenge).
The class that benefits is a discrete set of people not defined by race - they are defined by their ancestor's membership in a class. Blacks who can't trace their lineage don't get the benefit, because they flatly don't deserve reparations as a descandant of slaves.
That's the legal authority. Why is this a mystery to you?
Good idea. I too want this all fleshed out...
Oh, now that you got called on it?
Take a hike.
The deal with Indians and Cigarette Taxes is constitutionally sound - Only congress can levy taxes on the Indians (with regards to activities on indian land), and they do - we all pay the same taxes everyone else does... Income Taxes, state taxes, etc...
Not even close to a valid comparison with one class of people being "tax-free". No such class currently exists, and one never should.
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