Posted on 10/16/2011 5:42:57 PM PDT by Polybius
There’s one message from the 2010 elections that many so-called policy makers, political elites and analysts did not hear. Namely, the American people are not as uninformed and stupid as they think we are.
President Obama’s Debt Commission and the Bipartisan Policy Center’s Debt Reduction Task Force have both floated its ideas for reducing our nation’s runaway national debt. .....
The worst idea is a proposed national sales tax, which is a disguised VAT (value added tax) on top of everything we already pay in federal taxes.
Here are three of the biggest reasons the national retail sales tax is the worst idea on the table.
First, we have a spending problem in Washington, D.C. not a revenue problem. ......
Even worse is reason number two: In every country that has established a VAT with the promise of reducing their national debt, the VAT has eventually gone up or expanded on top of the existing tax structure. ....
For the liberal naysayers who say that would not happen, you lose! Just look at the Social Security system, Medicare and Medicaid. Over the years since their inception, taxes have gone up, benefits have gone down and they are still on a path of insolvency.
Giving the administration and Congress another tool to tax us and confuse us is like giving an alcoholic a key to the liquor store with no supervision, only to discover that he locks the door after he is safely inside.
A national retail sales tax on top of all the confusing and unfair taxes we have today is insane! It gives the out-of-control bureaucrats and politicians in denial one more tool to lie, deceive, manipulate and destroy this country.
People are not stupid. Maybe they will hear us in 2012.
(Excerpt) Read more at economicfreedomcoalition.com ...
Have you ever read the Communist Manifesto? There are no class differences in communism - no ruling elite at all. It's just that to get to that ideal state of perfect communism, some temporary leaders are needed to lead the country in the correct direction, and do what it takes to get the job done. And when that job is done, they'll step down.
That's no exaggeration - Neither China nor the Soviet Union ever clamed to be the final form of their communist ideal. By their own admittance, they are just a "transition" phase.
Now go ahead, tell me all about why we need a "transition" phase to get to the Fair Tax - and how, in the mean time, once we vote in the national sales tax on top of everything else we have, we won't have to worry about being screwed over by D.C. politicians.
Go ahead.
Cain has been saying his 9% only goes on the product once, where a VAT and income tax goes on multiple times.
I still say that Obama-care proves that they can make up any type of tax they want new, it is not a reason to not reform the tax system.
I heard one valid sounding critique of Cain's idea. That products/materials made here sold to other companies would get a tax deduction, put imported products (like imported steel, computer chips) would not. The argument against that is that would be in violation of US-international trade laws much like Trump's promises. I want to know how these guys will make us more competitive on exports vs imports.
I am also getting the impression that Cain is not serious about cutting spending, unfortunately I dont see much of that in the others either.
Cains Plan ELIMINATES,ELIMINATES,ELIMINATES payroll taxes,the Federal Income Tax,Capital Gains Taxes,Social Security tax!!!!!! Get it straight for crying out loud
>> Cogent argument number two.
Gee, I’m sorry... and what was YOUR cogent argument? “Steenking varlet”?
You got what you asked for, and better than you deserve.
>> a.) will it lower the tax burden
the answer is “no”. It’s revenue neutral.
It is a RETAIL. Tax. Retail. Just like other sales taxes we pay today on the state and local level.
OK Polybius....I always considered you one of the more intelligent FReepers floating around here. You PROVED that Palin could not beat Obama, for example. If not Cain, who have we got? If you think for one nanosecond I will vote for that whore Perry you got another thing coming. Romney I won’t even bother to comment on.
His plan isn’t a VAT. Those quotes address a VAT.
I am aware of that. I am defending his plan here. Wow. I was simply correcting the original poster that Cain was against any national sales tax.
>> That’s what 999 does.
Yes... in theory.
In practice, if I have three apples, and you *say* you’re going to take them away and give me one, but then after that you vote to give me three bigger ones back, now I have four bigger apples.
"Why would anyone spend their own personal money and take all this time to run for President?"
Money, rwfromkansas. BIG Money.
Here, let's allow Newt Gingrich to explain it:
"You can get higher speaking fees if you pretend you are running for President." .... Newt Gingrich
For Sarah Palin, that reached $100,000 per speech PLUS book sales PLUS TV contracts.
How much can that add up to in, say, two years?
April 15, 2010: Sarah Palin income 12 million dollars since leaving office
Even somebody like Mike Huckabee is pulling down $500,000 per year on the FOX News TV show he got after being a failed Presidential candidate.
So, rwfromkansas, you are in charge of finding a speaker for your corporation's big annual meeting and your boss gave you a $100,000 budget.
Would you spend $100,000 on a radio talk show host from Georgia?
Not unless you want to be fired.
Would you spend $100,000 on this guy?
You betcha!
So, THAT is why anyone "would spend their own personal money and take all this time to run for president".
Money. Big Money. VERY Big Money.
One hundred thousand dollars for talking for a couple of hours Money. Millions of dollars per year Money.
April 15, 2010: Sarah Palin income 12 million dollars since leaving office
Look at how Cain is spending the month of October. He is not building up a war chest to actually compete in the coming Primaries. Cain is focused on establishing his "Brand" on a national book tour.
Michael Steele to Herman Cain: Get Off the Book Tour
That leaves somebody else to be the GOP nominee. Romney just happens to be Cain's favorite, now and in the past.
First, to evaluate the plan, first evaluate the plan! Not all the ways in which the PROCESS after the plan is enacted could go wrong.
IOW, it’s not reasonable to use potential process objections to claim the plan fails on the merits.
Once the plan has been evaluated and understood as proposed, THEN we can talk about potential process problems and whether they are surmountable or insurmountable.
But claiming the plan “adds on a new tax” when it certainly does not — and the only basis for that claim is some potential in the future — is not an intellectually honest way to evaluate the plan itself.
This is the fundamental analytical mistake you are making. The plan does not "add" a NST "on top of everything else we have."
It eliminates everything else we have and restructures a revenue stream that is 999.
999 is a REPLACEMENT plan, not something "added on top of everything else we have."
And I certainly never said "we won't have to worry about being screwed over by D.C. politicians." That's ridiculous, and please don't put words in my mouth.
We always have to be on guard about being screwed by Washington -- how does anything think we got to this horrendous fork in the road? By not paying attention.
But the 999 plan actually gives us MORE POWER to keep Washington from dorking with us and continuing to rob the producers to give to the parasites!
999 broadens the tax base and makes the tax rate flat. That means that everyone will pay taxes and everyone will pay the same rate.
What that means in practice is that we would have vastly superior political accountability with our congresscritters. Right now, with 49% of Congress' constituents paying no tax at all, many, many congresscritters can get away with constantly voting to rob "the other guy" so as to give more and more free stuff to their voters.
Under 999, think about it: anytime someone tried to raise the income or NST rate, 100% of 100% of congresscritters' constituents would be effected!
The ONLY reaons these cretins get away with raising and raising taxes now is that most of their voters are not affected. In fact, most of their voters push them to punish the "rich" so as to give the so-called "poor" more free stuff. That old playbook will not work under 999.
If we don't get a major reform such as this one, that broadens the tax base so that everyone has skin in the game and makes it a matter of fairness that everyone pays the same rate, pretty soon that 49% of parasites is going to go over 50%. Then it will be GAME OVER, my FRiend.
If you're worried about getting screwed by Washington, just let that happen. Keep the present system or something like it with the edges tinkered around -- and let it's inherent machinery for class warfare continue to allow politicians to punish producers more and more and more as they run out of money to give free stuff to their voters and keep themselves flush in personal power.
You can be sure that tax rates would go up to 90%, as they were under FDR -- and the producers will NEVER have the votes to stop anything.
It's the present tax system that is going to usher in a form of Communism -- the tyranny of the parasite majority -- if we don't change it.
Tell Cain himself.
It was CAIN that called a National Sales Tax a “disguised VAT” in this article.
”The worst idea is a proposed national sales tax, which is a disguised VAT” ….. Herman Cain’s own words in this article
Cain did that in order to be able to use a cute, rhyming pun as his article headline:
“Don’t be VAT stupid!” = “Don’t be THAT stupid!”
In the article, Cain warns that a National Sales Tax is just “one more tool to lie, deceive, manipulate and destroy this country”.
When it comes to politics, Cain is not a “Detail Guy” or a “Results Guy” or even a “Real World Guy”. Cain is merely a “Catchy Sound Bite Guy” because that is all a radio talk show host needs to be.
Cain wrote this particular article last Fall in November. Yet, it turns out that Cain’s “economic advisor”, Rich Lowrie, a man with only a bachelor's degree in accountancy from Case Western Reserve University, came up with the 9-9-9 Plan last Summer when Cain asked Rich Lowrie to dream up a “BOLD” plan, the bolder the better.
=======================
From fan to The Man: How Cleveland's Rich Lowrie claimed a place in Herman Cain's inner circle
That's how Lowrie found himself this summer on a New Hampshire-bound flight with Cain, sketching the tax-reform plan that in recent weeks has become a household name and helped Cain surge to the head of the Republican field.
"I had one question for him," Lowrie said of the chat. "How bold do you want to be?"
Cain, "with his signature smile and booming voice," leaned in and replied: "Bold."
And so, "9-9-9" was born -- a proposal to replace the federal tax code with a flat 9 percent tax on personal income and businesses and a 9 percent national sales tax.
=======================
While Cain was writing an article in November, Cain warned that “The worst idea is a proposed national sales tax, which is a disguised VAT” because it would be “one more tool to lie, deceive, manipulate and destroy this country”. As Cain points out in the article, “In every country that has established a VAT with the promise of reducing their national debt, the VAT has eventually gone up or expanded on top of the existing tax structure. .... For the liberal naysayers who say that would not happen, you lose! Just look at the Social Security system, Medicare and Medicaid. Over the years since their inception, taxes have gone up, …”
Yet, the 9-9-9 Plan had already been cooked up by Rich Lowrie the Summer before after Cain simply instructed him to be “Bold”.
In short, in order to be a “Shock Jock”, Cain asked a guy with only a bachelor's degree in accountancy from Case Western Reserve University to come up with something “Bold” and, after plugging in the most gimmicky numbers know to sales marketing, “9.99”, that Plan is being pushed by Cain even though the lynchpin of that Plan was soundly trashed by Cain in this article that he wrote last November.
Cain is a snake oil salesman.
Cain’s ultimate goal is to sell books, increase his “Brand”, compete for speaking fees with Sarah Palin and maybe get a FOX News TV contract like Huckabee has.
Cain has paid no attention to what it will take to wage electoral wars during the Primaries, has tag-teamed with Romney to clear away Romney’s conservative opposition to leave his past and present favorite, Mitt Romney, as the GOP nominee.
Some good points. It is true that running for POTUS could bring in a lot of money.
Eisenhower wasn’t hired because he was a general per se. The country needed someone who could manage the nation’s transition from wartime to peacetime. Ike was the man for the times.
And I agree with you that generally generals have not made the best presidents. However, they have been hired because of unique situations the country was in, where their experience bridging the military and civilians “worlds” — not some political governing experience — was exactly what was needed.
Likewise, today, we may find ourselves in a time when we need one of those presidents who has a unique qualification — precisely because the nation, as with Ike after WWII, is in a period of unique transition that could go good, okay or horribly wrong.
On that basis, I’m more than open to considering hiring Mr. Cain at this point in history. Maybe political experience is irrelevant, as it was with Ike, because what we need is a POTUS who can manage a historical transition. This transition is not from war to peace, for which Ike was perfectly suited, by from economic destruction to economic rebuilding.
Cain may be perfectly suited to manage that transition. Which, again, is a unique fork-in-the-road for our nation.
Would Cain or Eisenhower be the “man for the times” had the times not been what they were when they ran for President?
I doubt it.
Just like in our personal lives, there comes a time when we know a particular problem has become such that we need to hire a specialist.
Bottom line: I don’t think it’s useful to hold the next President to a resume that is “the way we’ve always done things.” Times are simply too unique to box ourselves in to the way we’ve always done things in hiring a President.
What is "added on", for the first time in U.S. History, is a National Sales Tax on top of an Income Tax on top of a Capital Gains Tax.
As Cain himself states, if anybody argues that the tax rates will stay low, "You lose!"
"The worst idea is a proposed national sales tax, which is a disguised VAT (value added tax) .... Here are three of the biggest reasons the national retail sales tax is the worst idea on the table. .... In every country that has established a VAT with the promise of reducing their national debt, the VAT has eventually gone up or expanded on top of the existing tax structure. .... For the liberal naysayers who say that would not happen, you lose! Just look at the Social Security system, Medicare and Medicaid. Over the years since their inception, taxes have gone up," ....... Herman Cain
There are a lot of things that remain rather vague as how any of them would be able to carry out their suggestions with any degree of success. Over simplified statements often lead to more confusion then remaining quiet, and letting the voter assume they are for or against something on a ideological level.
You've proven your point to yourself - now let the rest of the adults discuss the candidates while you vote for Romney.
Cain is leading Obama 43:41 while Mitt is lagging 41:43
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