Question about Romney's tax plan

[_Jason Bourne]

Kevin

I am acutely aware that the Bush tax cuts had an expiration date. I agree that with rates this is not typical. However, as noted above set expiration dates for a myriad of other tax provisions such as credits, special deductions, accelerated depreciation or bonus depreciation, AMT exemptions, etc.

For the most part I have no issue with the rest of your comments. I long argued, even in the midst of then Bush presidency that we should have had a special war tax. My reasons were two fold. First to pay for the wars. Next to make the public at large feel the pain of the war. I think the general public did not experience the reality of the two Bush wars. We may have been aware through the news but that is it. If the public feels the pain of a war I think they are more likely to hold their leaders accountable for it.

Lastly sorry if I misinterpreted your comment about being ridiculous.

[_Jason Bourne]

One other quick comment. Above Kevin , you note that 65% of the budget is set in stone. Of that 65% interest, SS, Medicare and medicaid make up all of it. Certainly interest is non negotiable. But the others certainly could be modified or at the most egregious end, eliminated. Entitlements must be reviewed and reformed or there will be no money to fund them. Of course taxes can be raised to make good on the obligations. For me personally I am acutely aware this as I qualify for SS in 9 short years if I wanted to take it at 62. And sure I wonder about medicare vs this voucher thing. Part of me really wants my medicate. The other wonders if my kids and grand kids can afford to fund it for me.

[_Kevin Graham]

Jason, medicare/social security are paid for by payroll taxes. So assuming we could just scrap those programs, like so many on the Right would prefer, then we'd also have to scrap the revenues that pay for them. So there is no savings since you're essentially reducing revenues at the same rate of expenditures. I don't see how scraping these programs would in any way help with the deficits. So when social security payments increase due to baby boomers, and medicare costs increase because of the way the free market has caused medical costs to skyrocket, it is completely dishonest for folks on the Right (especially Romney who knows better) to blame increased debt and "government spending" on the President who has absolutely no control over these things. He refuses to identify what it is Obama has actually increased, as do most Right wing critics I encounter. They have no idea. They just know that Romney and FOX assert that he has overseen the greatest rate of government spending in history, which is a flat out lie. Government spending rates have actually decreased under Obama.

In any event, this notion that we're passing on debt to our children is a common misunderstanding.

[_Bob Loblaw]

Uh-oh. Stephanie Cutter acknowledges that Romney's tax cut "won't be near 5 trillion dollars."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0g8COdY ... _embedded#!

Seriously, this woman is a terrible spokesperson, with Axelrod being the only one worse. She has two modes: attack and overly defensive.

[_Kevin Graham]

Uh-oh. Stephanie Cutter acknowledges that Romney's tax cut "won't be near 5 trillion dollars."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0g8COdY ... _embedded#!

Seriously, this woman is a terrible spokesperson, with Axelrod being the only one worse. She has two modes: attack and overly defensive.

Blathering aside, she's essentially correct. If I were one of these spokespersons I'd simply emphasize the fact that claiming you're going to offset $4.8 trillion in revenue loss by removing deductions/loopholes, in a wishful theory without precedent. If you want to be President you have to be transparent, intellectually honest and explain which deductions/loopholes you have in mind. Otherwise you're telling us that you think Americans are just stupid people who like to be told fairy tales, and don't critically assess promises by politicians. It has been pointed out relentlessly that there simply aren't enough deductions/loopholes to make up for a $4.8 trillion in lost revenue. So we're still talking about adding to the deficit, no matter how you slice it. Obama saying he proposes $4.8 trillion in tax cuts isn't a lie, it is a fact. It is the only certainty we have about Romney's plan. The other side of the plan relies on things that are not certain (unidentified deductions, presumed economic growth), so why bother referring to them as things that are certain in his plan?

[_beastie]

Uh-oh. Stephanie Cutter acknowledges that Romney's tax cut "won't be near 5 trillion dollars."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0g8COdY ... _embedded#!

Seriously, this woman is a terrible spokesperson, with Axelrod being the only one worse. She has two modes: attack and overly defensive.

I think this is a semantics issue. Romney is proposing a 5 trillion dollar tax cut. He then proposes he can make up for that lost revenue by closing loopholes and deductions. But that does not mean that the tax cut didn't exist in the first place. Other people seem to be interpreting this as saying that it can't count as a tax cut if it's revenue neutral. But it is still a tax cut. Whether or not the government will lose revenue over it is a different issue. I mean, Romney uses the word "tax cut" himself to describe it, and now he's objecting to those same words?

What he's objecting to his the opposition saying there's no way he can make this revenue neutral without involving the middle class in targeting deductions. So why all the focus on the words "tax cut"?

[_Bob Loblaw]

I think this is a semantics issue. Romney is proposing a 5 trillion dollar tax cut. He then proposes he can make up for that lost revenue by closing loopholes and deductions. But that does not mean that the tax cut didn't exist in the first place. Other people seem to be interpreting this as saying that it can't count as a tax cut if it's revenue neutral. But it is still a tax cut. Whether or not the government will lose revenue over it is a different issue. I mean, Romney uses the word "tax cut" himself to describe it, and now he's objecting to those same words?

What he's objecting to his the opposition saying there's no way he can make this revenue neutral without involving the middle class in targeting deductions. So why all the focus on the words "tax cut"?

I agree that it's a tax cut (I don't think anyone has said it isn't) but it's the $5.1 trillion figure that is being thrown around. From what I've seen, the cut amounts to about 181 billion a year, or less than 2 trillion over ten years. What the CNN person was asking Ms. Cutter about was that CNN and other news organizations had already debunked the $5.1 trillion figure, and she acknowledged that the cuts would not be anywhere near that much. She's already being featured in a Romney ad. Not smart politics. If you're going to accuse the other guy of something, you shouldn't publicly back off from it, even when you've been caught.

[_beastie]

I think this is a semantics issue. Romney is proposing a 5 trillion dollar tax cut. He then proposes he can make up for that lost revenue by closing loopholes and deductions. But that does not mean that the tax cut didn't exist in the first place. Other people seem to be interpreting this as saying that it can't count as a tax cut if it's revenue neutral. But it is still a tax cut. Whether or not the government will lose revenue over it is a different issue. I mean, Romney uses the word "tax cut" himself to describe it, and now he's objecting to those same words?

What he's objecting to his the opposition saying there's no way he can make this revenue neutral without involving the middle class in targeting deductions. So why all the focus on the words "tax cut"?

I agree that it's a tax cut (I don't think anyone has said it isn't) but it's the $5.1 trillion figure that is being thrown around. From what I've seen, the cut amounts to about 181 billion a year, or less than 2 trillion over ten years. What the CNN person was asking Ms. Cutter about was that CNN and other news organizations had already debunked the $5.1 trillion figure, and she acknowledged that the cuts would not be anywhere near that much. She's already being featured in a Romney ad. Not smart politics. If you're going to accuse the other guy of something, you shouldn't publicly back off from it, even when you've been caught.

I was under the impression that the 4.8 trillion figure over ten years was pretty sound. I thought the parsing was over whether or not it was fair to include the continuation of the Bush cuts and the loss of Obamacare in that figure.

My impression was not that Stephanie was saying the 4.8 figure was not correct, but that the loss of tax revenue would not be that high if Romney got rid of some deductions as he claims he is going to. But maybe I misinterpreted her comments, and am too tired right now to listen again.

[_Bob Loblaw]

I was under the impression that the 4.8 trillion figure over ten years was pretty sound. I thought the parsing was over whether or not it was fair to include the continuation of the Bush cuts and the loss of Obamacare in that figure.

My impression was not that Stephanie was saying the 4.8 figure was not correct, but that the loss of tax revenue would not be that high if Romney got rid of some deductions as he claims he is going to. But maybe I misinterpreted her comments, and am too tired right now to listen again.

My point was that, no matter what she meant, her defensiveness, coupled with her "stipulated that" comment gave Republicans a ready-made soundbite that they are exploiting. Like I said, campaign spokespeople are supposed to be good at spinning and turning things the way they want. George Stephanopoulis was a master at it. Axelrod and Cutter are simply awful.

[_beastie]

I was under the impression that the 4.8 trillion figure over ten years was pretty sound. I thought the parsing was over whether or not it was fair to include the continuation of the Bush cuts and the loss of Obamacare in that figure.

My impression was not that Stephanie was saying the 4.8 figure was not correct, but that the loss of tax revenue would not be that high if Romney got rid of some deductions as he claims he is going to. But maybe I misinterpreted her comments, and am too tired right now to listen again.

My point was that, no matter what she meant, her defensiveness, coupled with her "stipulated that" comment gave Republicans a ready-made soundbite that they are exploiting. Like I said, campaign spokespeople are supposed to be good at spinning and turning things the way they want. George Stephanopoulis was a master at it. Axelrod and Cutter are simply awful.

Looks like Chris Wallace admitted the 5 trillion tax cut number was correct. He admitted that while arguing that the main problem with Obama's argument was ignoring the loopholes and deductions which would make it revenue neutral. Like I said, there's a semantics game going on here.

http://www.rawstory.com/Relief Society/2012/10/07/c ... n-tax-cut/

“Both sides since the debate have been saying that the other candidate is lying about his position,” Wallace told Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley (D) on Sunday. “The president keeps saying that Mitt Romney is proposing a $5 trillion tax cut. That’s not true.”

“Wait a minute here,” O’Malley replied. “Former Gov. Romney is proposing a 20 percent cut to income taxes, including income taxes for the wealthiest Americans. And I believe a 30 percent cut for corporate income taxes, including for people like big oil that are socking all of us at the pump right now. Any economist can debate whether that adds up to $4.9 trillion or does it add up to $5 trillion? But the fact of the matter is in this debate, we saw Big Bird meet the big lie.”

Wallace went on to say: "You're right, there's five trillion dollars by lowering the tax rates, but he also talks about cutting loopholes and deductions." You have to listen to the clip to hear that part, it's not transcribed.

This drives me crazy. There is a five trillion dollar tax cut. Whether or not the loopholes and deductions will cover that does not mean that there is not a five trillion dollar tax cut to begin with.