I'm sorta with you and sorta not

Yeah, the messiah aka Obama is putting the socialist pedal to the metal and trying to do too much as evidently the plan. Agreed.

Buchanon is nevertheless full of himself and he shows where his old guard stale bread is buttered Agreed. when he laments an increase in taxes for the poor 2% who already supposedly pay 40% of the taxes.They do pay 40% and there is discussion of making the top 2% (I think this is anyone making over $250K but this is only my perception) pay even higher taxes.  Considering that the gap between the wealthy and the rest of society has grown by leaps and bounds ever since the 70's and the top 1% of the wealthy now own about 50% of the wealth I have a hard time sympathizing.This I don't understand. In my dream world, a man or woman should have the freedom (notice I didn't say "be allowed") to make as much money as they want till the cows come home, AS LONG AS they come by it honestly. As a true conservative, I don't think it's fair for ANYBODY to be paying 40% taxes, and I really don't think it's fair for any one group to be singled out and discriminated against as a minority. In my dream world, successful businessmen and women would be taxed, with everyone else, at about a 2-3% personal federal income tax rate (if at all, insert 16th amendment ratification argument here). I would privitize just about everything. You want this economy to turn around? Reduce the federal income tax rate or even completely abolish personal income taxes completely, yet still make the federal government listen to We the People. Watch what would happen if USG, Inc cut their spending to match THAT income, and the wealthy 1-2% along with the rest of us suddenly had an additional 38% of their personal income with which to invest in new business ventures. 

If it were up to me, we would never have had the bailout or the stimulus and we would abolish the Fed and the IRS, stop fighting wars of mass deception for the enrichment of the elite, have our government only spend as much money as they have, and ALL pay less taxes. Here, here. But since they did not ask me, but rather rushed through the bailouts and porks and signed a check for tens of thousands of dollars debt for me and every other man, woman and child in the country, I have no sympathy to spare for those who already most of the wealth and property. But here again, DQ, most of the country's financial successful men and women are ethical, hard working individuals. I'm just as upset as you are with the crooks who just made off with not only my nest egg, but the potential nest eggs of my children, granddaughter, and future grandchildren. But I don't agree with the "stick it to the rich" mentality.

The "poor" mistreated top 2% of the population own half of the wealth and the top 5% own over 60% of the wealth - well more than the other 95% of us own collectively.  Now I don't know about the rest of you - maybe you somehow are sold on the idea of 1 or 2 percent of the country being better and deserving But, DQ, we're not talking about "deserving." We're talking about "earning." You and I are just as "deserving" because our Creator loves us both. The only thing the wealthy might be better at is doing business. They probably got a lucky break somewhere. They probably were willing to take risks that we weren't willing to take. That's really all I can see between me and my "comfortable" friends. many times more wealth and privilege than the rest of us, but personally I am fed up with being a servant of the elite class. You have your own business, so do you mean by paying crazy taxes and just having had half your savings stolen? Need I point out that it was by and large their greed which put us in this mess to begin with while they siphoned off more and more wealth for themselves? Select numbers of unscrupulous men, not all of them. Or that it is the super elite who plan to widen the gap even further and control the entire planet in a one world order of the elite?

While Pat is giving us a history lesson, maybe he should note that the last time we had such a gap in wealth between the wealthy and the middle class and rest of the population was in the years leading to the Great Depression.  Coincidence?  I think not.  From 1929 up until the 70's the gap actually narrowed but then began to grow again during those "wonderful" twenty out of twenty-four years of Republican leadership poor hand Pat looks back on with wistful eyes. It could have been Democrats as much as Republicans. You and I understand about the color purple and I think it was you who had a major hand in explaining all that to me. And now that the gap has returned to pre-Depression era dimensions what do we have?  Why, I do believe it is another depression!

One can argue all they want about the differences in parties, which today is pretty much a charade anyway, Agreed but any country that has that big of a disparity is not the country envisioned by our forefathers where all men were created equal - it is instead a despotic class system comprised of the greedy haves and the have-nots. I just don't understand the whole class envy thing, DQ. We are now reaping the rewards for allowing that to happen - the reward being that the upper to lower middle class is moving more towards the poor servant class while being saddled with a bailout that rewards those who stold and gambled our money away to begin with.I'm definitely with you there.

I do not favor wealth redistribution in the sense of taking from those who are willing to work and giving to those who aren'tAs in Robin Hood? Totally with you. , but neither do I favor allowing an entire nation of supposedly free men and women with God given unalienable rights having to serve an elite class for generation after generation while our standards of living and freedoms are eroded. Standing with you in complete accord. Just wish you wouldn't rope all wealthy people together. -Donna

DQ