Poll - Democrat or Republican?

[KariK 0]

The first issue is to vote - period.

IF YOU DO NOT VOTE, YOU LOSE YOUR RIGHT TO CRITICIZE ANY ELECTED OFFICIAL.

Unfortunately, none of us are as educated as we should be about political issues.

Carlene, I disagree with you a little bit on this issue because it contradicts itself. Many people (especially younger generations) do not vote because they don't know how to. Do you know many highschools no longer have civics as part of their curriculum?

I want everyone to voice their oppinions, right, wrong, or indifferant. The more communication there is the better. If people who didn't vote coudln't criticize an elected official well we might miss out on an important point of view.

I think those of us who do vote should really reach out and help younger folks vote too. I think someone should start a grass roots campaign to do soemthing about this issue. I heard on the news that Walmart is doing something with their employees in this regard. Does anyone know what im talking about? lol I don't know the details.

[faybie 0]

The taxes that George wants to lower are the ones that enrich already wealthy people, like ................ inheritance taxes (actually, he wants to eliminate that one entirely).

Actually, I would like to see the inheritance taxes lightened. This really hurts the poor more than it does the rich. The rich have financial advisors that understand how/persuade them to set up estates and have them passed down generation to generation without being taxed 50% at every generation. Where as the little old lady next door dies and leaves her house to her surviving 3 children. The house is worth $120,000. Each surviving child should get $40,000. But they don't, it is taxed at 50% first and each child gets $20,000.

Where does that 50% go? Who does it benefit? 50% is such a harsh number to be taxed for inheritence tax. I actually agree with lowering or getting rid of this tax.

He wants to privatize Social Security, which is just a fancy way of saying he wants to eventually do away with it.

Private social security is another one that I support and it doesn't necessarily benefit the rich as much as you think, it benefits the working middle class. Wealthy people are probably not concerned if they will be guaranteed their montly $800-$1600 social security check when they reach 65. They have money market funds and stock certificates that they have most likely accumulated for their retirement.

The working middle class however, especially someone my age may not have additional money market funds, might have cashed in their 401k to buy a house (which would be an unwise decision) and most likely will count on that guaranteed monthly check at retirement. What if, in 30 years the money is negative and they tell me I can't have my social security benefit that I worked and contributed taxes to for 45 years+? If it was "my private fund" I would know how much is in it and how much I would be getting and it would definitely be there for me.

I understand that it would be a HUGE change and a lot of people would not really understand how to manage their "private social security fund". However, at age 35, I am faced with the reality that the money I have contributed in taxes so far and the money that I will pay in social security taxes for 30+ more years may or may not be there for me when I hit retirement at age 65. As a working middle class citizen that is HUGE, for the rich, it really isn't as important as you think.

Just food for thought.....

[Tired_Old_Man 1]

Faybe:

Let me explain two things to you.

First: When George BuSh became president, the exemption for the inheritance tax was $675,000. That meant that if someone died and left one half million dollars, there was no tax. If someone died and left one million dollars in their estate, the tax would only be on the $325,000 over the exceptional. That would leave about $835,000 to the heirs of the estate.

I do not think that this is an issue for poor people to worry about, except it the rich are exempted from paying taxes, who do think will pay them?

Second: Privatizing Social Security will mean that many will lose money. What people fail to understand is that the stock-market is like a poker game. Except for IPO's, it is a zero sum balance game. When I bought stock in MicroSoft, MicroSoft did not get one penny of the $40,000 that I invested, because I bought it from people, other investors, who were selling their MicroSoft stock. Right now, although MicroSoft has made money for the 3 years that I have owned it and although all the investment literature says it is the company to buy, I am losing $3,000 on paper. If I needed the money or if I had panicked, I might have sold it last year for a $6,000 loss. Rich people can afford to wait. Poor people can't wait and they panic, so they sell and lose money. Their losses are the rich people's gains.

About the poker analogy, Let's say Mr. A, Mr. B, Mr. C and I meet for a game of poker on Friday night. I have $200, A has $400, B has $300 and C has $100 which is a total of $1,000. At the end of the night, there will still be $1,000 in the room where we are playing poker. It may be distributed differently: I may have $135, A may have $600, B may have $150 and C may have $115, but the total is still $1,000.

The market works the same. Today the market is near its all time high. People are buying stock at these high prices. People who are selling the stocks being bought today are making money. The stocks were at this point about a few months ago. Many people bought at those prices, then the stock market dropped a few hundred points. Some people were buying and others were selling during the decline, but the people who bought near the low point now have nice profits, but those that bought at the high point (of a few months ago) and sold on the way down or near the low point lost money.

The government might not let people buy individual stocks, but the value of mutual funds that I have, following the DOW JONES just as the individual stocks did. Many people transferred money from their 401k's interest bearing account into mutual funds when the market was high and many of them got scared seeing their retirement savings losing value and transferred back into their interest bearing account. They lost money as compared to leaving it in their interest bearing account.

If the government passes the Private SS accounts law, the market will skyrocket in anticipation of all the new buying money coming into the market. Buying drives the value up. By the time the SS private funds are ready to buy, the market will be way up. The market will continue up for a few months until the large investors decide to take their huge profits. They will sell at or near a new “highest point in the history of the market”. The huge selling spree will drive the market down. The small SS investors will panic as they see their acounts drop, driving the market down faster. The market will drop about a 1000 points causing most of the SS investors huge losses. The rich will buy back as the market approaches the bottom. The market will eventually get hot with the buying power of the rich at which point when the market is high again, the SS people will be angry for having missed their chance, and will start buying as the market gets high. The rich will be selling making profits...

And the beat goes on. Just remember for every man who made a fortune in the market, there are hundreds of poor people who lost money. They even sell computer programs to help unknowledgeable investors beat the market. One program which works on a “Red-Light, Green-light” system costs $4,000 but works on the principal of buy high, sell low.

People who know how to make money; buy low and sell high.

[lisah25 3]

What about the FIRST bombing of the World Trade Center in 1993? That attack - a car bomb - was courtesy of Arab Islamist terrorists.

How soon we forget.

I forgot nothing. What I said was "We had only had one other one in all the years before". I was referring to the 1993 attack. That's why I said "one other" and "all the years before". I meant before 9/11.

[Tired_Old_Man 1]

I forgot nothing. What I said was "We had only had one other one in all the years before". I was referring to the 1993 attack. That's why I said "one other" and "all the years before". I meant before 9/11.

Did you ever hear of Pearl Harbor?

[lisah25 3]

Did you ever hear of Pearl Harbor?

Yes, but I was thinking in the context of attacks in more recent history. From the middle-east terrorists since that is what we were discussing.

Sorry if I wasn't clear.

[Scribby 0]

I do not think GW has done anything regarding 911 that Al Gore or any other president at the time wouldnt have done except...confuse the situation in Iraq with 911, not go into Saudi who harbor terrorist (umm..most of the 911 hikackers were from Saudi, so why wasnt he putting ANY pressure whatsoever for thier govenrment to investigate..well I guess cause he and daddy have so many investments there), make sure that all his good ol' boys made lots of money from invading Iraq (umm...Dick Cheney aint crying porr mouth any time soon).

I am a young person, did not have any classes in high school about voting yet I seem to know how to do it. Its not about not knowing, its about thinking that your vote will not count so why bother..another thing we can thank Mr. Bush for doing when all of us who voted for Gore were disgusted at the Florida mess....gee, funny how it was in Jeb's state...

The first president I voted for was Clinton. I felt an extreme pride just for voting, regardless of the election outcome. I have gotten involved in my local jurisdition to drive people without transportation to the polls...

I am very greatful we can have this discussion and even that there are people who voted for Bush (yes I said that out loud) because it means we have civil liberties...

[Tired_Old_Man 1]

Yes, but I was thinking in the context of attacks in more recent history. From the middle-east terrorists since that is what we were discussing.

Sorry if I wasn't clear.

Actually, I should apologize for being sarcastic. I should have said, "Are you leaving Pearl Harbor out for a reason?" :embarassed:

[Tired_Old_Man 1]

I do not think GW has done anything regarding 911 that Al Gore or any other president at the time wouldnt have done except...confuse the situation in Iraq with 911, not go into Saudi who harbor terrorist (umm..most of the 911 hikackers were from Saudi, so why wasnt he putting ANY pressure whatsoever for thier govenrment to investigate..well I guess cause he and daddy have so many investments there), make sure that all his good ol' boys made lots of money from invading Iraq (umm...Dick Cheney aint crying porr mouth any time soon).

I am a young person, did not have any classes in high school about voting yet I seem to know how to do it. Its not about not knowing, its about thinking that your vote will not count so why bother..another thing we can thank Mr. Bush for doing when all of us who voted for Gore were disgusted at the Florida mess....gee, funny how it was in Jeb's state...

The first president I voted for was Clinton. I felt an extreme pride just for voting, regardless of the election outcome. I have gotten involved in my local jurisdition to drive people without transportation to the polls...

I am very greatful we can have this discussion and even that there are people who voted for Bush (yes I said that out loud) because it means we have civil liberties...

Let's face facts, well actually they are my opinions, if I asked anyone but the "True Believers" if they would believe that in 2006 America:

Phone calls are being tapped with no court orders or probable cause

People are being arrested without charges

People are being arrested without recourse to legal aid

People are being arrested without their family being notified

Houses are being searched without notification to the dwellers of that house

Torture, not whether, but how much should be allowed is the topic de jour

They would have said that I was reading too much political fiction

[lisah25 3]

Actually, I should apologize for being sarcastic. I should have said, "Are you leaving Pearl Harbor out for a reason?" :embarassed:

LOL - and I would have posted the same reply.

[Carlene 12]

Please define "poor". Inheritance taxes do NOT hurt the poor...they don't even touch the poor, or anyone even close to being poor, per my definition of the word. Google "Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001" and you will see that it completely phases out the federal estate and gift tax by 2010. Between 2006 and 2009, the first $2,000,000 of an individual's estate is excluded from taxation. In 2009, that amount automatically will jump to $3,500,000. In 2010, the tax is completely eliminated. The post-act law, however, will bring it back in 2011, with an exclusion of "only" $1,000,000, unless Mr. Bush is successful in preventing that.

Your next door neighbor's heirs will only be taxed on their mom's bequest if she has another couple of million in the bank. Even then, they will only pay taxes on that portion of the estate that EXCEEDS the exemption, and on a sliding scale. A 50% tax rate would apply to an estate of approximately 5 million dollars. And that's probative assets, of course. Everything sheltered in family trusts, POD/right of survivorship accounts, etc would be exempted from any tax whatsoever.

As for Social Security, you, as a young woman, stand to lose the most by Bush's privitization plan. According to the Congressional Budget Office, "to raise the rate of return for future generations by moving to a funded system, some generations must receive rates of return even lower than they would have gotten under the pay-as-you-go system." It will be your generation, Fay that bears the cost of converting SS. Financial analysts with no political ties believe that benefits for an average wage earner who retires in 2037 at age 67 will be as much as 20 percent lower than they would be under conventional SS, given historical rates of return over a 50 year period.

Social Security, as we know it now, is a much better deal for women than for men. Women work fewer years, earn less, and live longer. Women often receive higher SS benefits as dependents or survivors of their husband's SS account. Under privatization, all that goes away. If your husband dies suddenly at age 27 (as mine did), leaving you with 4 pre-school children (as I was), you will get zilch under Bush's proposed system, except what your spouse managed to contribute during his brief stint as a member of the workforce.

Other minorities would also be more vulnerable under privatization. They not only earn less, but they are less able to accumulate resources than the wealthier, better educated Anglos.

And what about all that "small government" stuff? Private retirement accounts would add enormous administrative burdens, at taxpayer expense. The government would have to establish and track a "savings account" for each worker, or about 150 million accounts - each of them tied to different investments.

Great Britain began to implement privatized retirement years ago and it has been a dismal failure. To quote from the Adair Turner Report: "What looked like a very good idea from a financial perspective in cutting costs has put pensioner poverty, which had been all but eradicated, back on the agenda."

[KariK 0]

I do not think GW has done anything regarding 911 that Al Gore or any other president at the time wouldnt have done except...confuse the situation in Iraq with 911, not go into Saudi who harbor terrorist (umm..most of the 911 hikackers were from Saudi, so why wasnt he putting ANY pressure whatsoever for thier govenrment to investigate..well I guess cause he and daddy have so many investments there), make sure that all his good ol' boys made lots of money from invading Iraq (umm...Dick Cheney aint crying porr mouth any time soon).

I am a young person, did not have any classes in high school about voting yet I seem to know how to do it. Its not about not knowing, its about thinking that your vote will not count so why bother..another thing we can thank Mr. Bush for doing when all of us who voted for Gore were disgusted at the Florida mess....gee, funny how it was in Jeb's state...

The first president I voted for was Clinton. I felt an extreme pride just for voting, regardless of the election outcome. I have gotten involved in my local jurisdition to drive people without transportation to the polls...

I am very greatful we can have this discussion and even that there are people who voted for Bush (yes I said that out loud) because it means we have civil liberties...

Im young too Scribby, 29, and yes I know how to vote. And I have taught my younger siblings how to vote as well as many of their friends. They didn't know how. Shocking isn't it?

If people choose not to vote thats one thing, if they just don't know how and are too embarrassed to admit it.. well thats another. And I think when people make broad statements against people who don't vote, they make people who don't know how to vote due to ignorance, embarrassed to ask for help.

[Carlene 12]

I forgot nothing. What I said was "We had only had one other one in all the years before". I was referring to the 1993 attack. That's why I said "one other" and "all the years before". I meant before 9/11.

I apologize. I assumed that you meant Pearl Harbor. Either way, that makes two attacks on US soil prior to 9/11.

[lisah25 3]

I apologize. I assumed that you meant Pearl Harbor. Either way, that makes two attacks on US soil prior to 9/11.

True enough, and I wasn't being clear, I'm sorry about that. I was only thinking about those more recent, and those attributed to Middle-Eastern groups. I forget most people can't, and probably don't want to, read my mind and know what I meant!

[Carlene 12]

If people choose not to vote thats one thing, if they just don't know how and are too embarrassed to admit it.. well thats another. And I think when people make broad statements against people who don't vote, they make people who don't know how to vote due to ignorance, embarrassed to ask for help.

Karik...

I would never belittle anyone for not knowing how to vote. I have never, however, been to any polling place where there weren't people falling all over themselves wanting to help you. All you have to do is show up....really.

When each of my children turned 18, I made them register to vote. I got the form, filled it out, and made them sign it. Then I mailed it back in myself. I still remind them to vote. The two who are not so good about it will tell you that I nag them, and they would be right.

I would like to amend my previous statement...

IF YOU KNOW HOW TO VOTE BUT CHOOSE NOT TO, YOU FORFEIT YOUR RIGHT TO COMPLAIN ABOUT ANY ELECTED OFFICIAL.

IF YOU DON'T KNOW HOW TO VOTE, PLEASE ASK SOMEONE TO HELP YOU. YOUR RIGHT TO VOTE IS THE ONE ON WHICH ALL OTHER CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS ARE PREDICATED.