Posted on 01/30/2010 7:09:10 AM PST by agondonter
Has anyone heard the results of last nights governor debate in Texas? I watched it and thought Medina did an excellent job. I am curious to know who is considered the winner of last nights debate.
News hounds at DMN tend to support Hutchison, but they’ve been in the tank for her and her Washington friends. Medina’s the truly conservative one. So, we’ve got a Dem in Rep clothes (Perry) a Washington elite (Hutchison) and a conservative (Medina).
I hate 3 way races, so who will Medina steal votes from?
Perry or Hutchison?
The answer had better be Hutchison, because if it is not then Medina should do the right thing and bow of NOW.
Unless she KNOWS she can win, the alternative is Kay Bailey being handed a the great State of Texas on a silver platter
Oh I REALLY like Medina, but we need her to WIN not split the Conservative/GOP vote. That’s all
It will come down to a run-off between Perry and Hutchison. Don’t think either will get a majority, and you have to get 50%+ of the vote.
Do you understand what a primary is?
Medina does not have much money. I would love to see her get more exposure. The more people see her the more they like her. I would like to see her take Texas by storm the way Scott Brown did Massachusetts.
Medina does not have much of anything. What a disaster she would be. What did the Dem’s say about Bush, no gravitas. Medina has zero’s gravitas.
Hutchison
Perry is pro life.
I wanted to like Medina . but she doesn’t do much more than offer platitudes.
She says what she would take away, Property taxes, but then says it would be up to the legislature to find ways to replace the money.
Uh NO Medina you proposed it, you need to plan it
She proposed sales tax so that everyone, not just property owners would pay. That way even the illegals will have to pay for the schools they use.
I still want to know if anyone has heard any results about who won the debate last night.
This is the primary we are talking about. Kay Bailey Hutchison will hand the great state of Texas to democrat Mayor White.
I was referring to when she was asked specifics about that and ashe said it was up to the legislature. She did it twice
. when asked how high the sales tax would have to be and whether other things would have to be taxed she said that would be the legislature’s responsibilty to decide.
second example, when asked whether her plan meant first time home owners would face sales tax and what that tax would be she said that would be up to the legislature.
How nice to be able to offer people something they like to hear ( I would LOVE to not pay property tax) and make no effort to explain how to offset that loss but instead push it off onto th lege
Medina has very limited political experience and some of her proposals seem totally unworkable. My guess is she will pull more votes from Perry. Hutchison gets support from the Rockefeller Republicans, Perry is about 2/3rds towards conservative, but more liberal than some rock ribbed conservatives want. Medina appeals to the Ron Paul crowd and scorched earth conservatives.
I've looked at Medina and like some of her ideas, but I do not believe she has the experience or ability to take care of the job. Perry is the best option.
One nice thing about Texas is that the legislature and the governor seem to understand the idea of "we can't afford to do that." The Texas Constitution requires a balanced budget. A few years ago, the liberals were pushing hard for a new constitution and they got shot down big time. Ben Sargent, cartoonist for the Lost in America Spaceman (Austin American-Statesman) did a cartoon showing the voters hugging an ugly fat chick while the beautiful new (leftist) Texas Constitution stood by. That requirement for a balanced budget is one HUGE reason Texas doesn't have California problems now.
A lot of people on here diss Perry, and I've been very critical of some of his decisions, but this ain't FantasyLand. You have to go with the best candidate, and right now that's Perry.
That is an excellent analysis and informative. You said what I was trying to say.
In many ways the popularity of Medina reminds me of the popularity of Obama. Tired of the old ways ( altho why people should be tired of the current state here, we have fared tons of times better than other states) people gravitate to someone who says things they’d like to hear.
Doing away with property taxes in Hope and Change.
Frankly I want to vote for KBH but she needs to step up why she’d actually b e better.
Agree Perry is the best of the lot. What most people don’t know about Medina is she is a Ron Paulite libertarian. One website says she worked in his presidental campaign. She has never been asked about any of that, hasn’t been asked what her opinion is on war, abortion, making drugs legal in TX and basically she was just given a pass on any tough questions in the debates. All she does is talk about the “constitution” to get the lemmings.
The elites want her to take votes from Perry so Hutchison can be their “go to” girl with her liberal ways.
C’mon you people spreading disinformation about Medina. Her position on the elimination of property taxes is very clear and very simple, especially if you take the time to look at the specifics on her website and even more so if you read through the study she references from her website.
If we eliminate the property tax and DON’T broaden the current sales tax (at all) to include purchases of goods and services not currently taxed then it is true that the current sales tax rate would have to go up some in order to maintain current revenue levels to the state. Furthermore, Debra is correct in asserting that ultimately it would be up to the state legislature to determine the specifics of how much the current sales taxes would be broadened.
Her preferences on the issues, and what she would be using the bully pulpit of the governorship to encourage all the Republicans in the state legislature to approve can be found right on her campaign website.
I’ve summarized Debra’s proposals below:
If we eliminate the property tax and broaden the current sales tax to include most of the goods and services currently taxed in other states - plus currently untaxed purchases like initial real estate purchases - then we could actually have NO PROPERTY TAXES AND A SALES/CONSUMPTION TAX AT ESSENTIALLY THE SAME RATE WE HAVE NOW OR EVEN LOWER THAN WE HAVE NOW WITHOUT SEEING A DECREASE IN REVENUES TO THE STATE.
To give you a sense of what kinds of numbers we’re talking about... according to the Texas Public Policy Foundation study that she cites just adding in a one-time sales tax on the sale of property by itself (as opposed to maintaining the current annual tax on property ownership)... would only necessitate raising the current sales tax rate from 8.25% to 8.8% in order to maintain current revenue levels to the state after the elimination of the property taxes.
In reality, as Governor of Texas Debra Medina would (assuming she could get the Republicans in the state legislature to go along with her of course) call for decreases in state spending and as broad a base of goods and services to be taxed under the new sales (or consumption if you rather) tax, which means we could have under a Medina government no property taxes at all AND a lower sales tax rate than we have now at the same time.
http://www.medinafortexas.com/propertyTax.php
http://www.texaspolicy.com/pdf/2009-04-taxswap-laffer-posting.pdf
I encourage everyone to read through the TPPF report linked above.
The legislature is the only one who could remove property taxes in TX and they are not going to do that. Medina knows that full well.
And do you understand that the GOP candidate will win in the Fall and become the next governor?
A $17,600 tax on a new $200,000 home? That’s going to pretty much shut down new home construction in Texas. Dallas and Houston can end up looking like Atlanta and south Florida.
Of course, it will help resale values of existing homes.
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