It's Your Taxes Stupid.

Oh. Well I remember pretty well. Guess it wasn't that long ago though. Plus I come into contact with people all the time who don't make very much money and I have friends I see or talk to almost every day who have either been there or are still there. I guess I'm just not very insulated.

 

I see my relatives and my wife's on a regular basis and a number of them are quite poor compared to myself. My daughter is currently over at a friend's house and their family is quite poor compared to us. I live in a rural area of the state so poor is everywhere. I guess I am just not arrogant enough to think that I really 'feel their pain' since I am not in their situation.

Of course, slumming with me would be some people's definition of poor on this board. So I guess insulation is all relative.

 

I not even totally sure who Teddy is. Joe? I don't know much about anyone here period much less how they started out. And why would you ask me anyway? Even if I did know I wouldn't tell you. You want to know, you can ask him yourself.

 

So empathizing with others who are in situations different from yours especially when you have been there yourself is simply arrogance? What a sick world you live in

 

Oh, I am aware of and am sensitive to their situation. I just don't go around thinking I really know the types of financial hardships they are experiencing in their lives or pretend I can vicariously (even re-) experience them.

It's the whole 'I feel your pain' thing. It might somehow make the person saying it feel better about themselves but I call BS on it. You don't feel it unless you are experiencing it. A 'time heals all wounds' kinda thing. Even if I experienced it, I am now well healed from it and it is but a memory, not a reality.

Sorry if that offends you. I guess I am pretty insulated from the 5%ers. They don't live where I live, work where I work and their kids typically don't typically go to the schools mine go to.

 

Why would it offend me? I don't offend easily anyway. I get angry, but that's a different thing. Not angry either though. I'm not saying that when someone else cuts his finger I bleed. Or that when someone else is hungry the pangs show up in my stomach. Or when someone else is up late worrying about the medical bills I don't sleep either.

But certainly to the extent that I'm directly exposed to it, that's it's part of my personal world, I do feel it and it does affect me. Maybe you compartmentalize better than I do. If that's what it is I hope it's a skill I never acquire.

 

It's probably been 20 years since I got punched in the face. I remember it hurt. But I bet that if I got punched in the face right now, it would hurt a lot more than I remember it did.

And if I saw someone else getting punched in the face right now, I bet it would also hurt them more than I remember it hurting me from my memory of 20 years ago. Time has a way of doing that. Maybe not to you. But I think it does to most people.

I think it would take a real special type of person to see someone getting punched in the face and say (or even think) "I can really empathize with that. I got punched in the face 20 years ago." If I was the person who had just got punched in the face, I'd probably not think as highly of the person saying (or thinking) that as the person saying (or thinking) it probably does of themself.

And, since I am getting the impression that you are one of the 5%ers and I am not even close to being so, you can probably guess what I think about what you are saying.

And then, if the person had never been punched in the face...it would be even worse.

 

No! He is 1305. i.e. he changes his alias, but his name is still Teddy.
Secondly, Joe said;

referring to Teddy, but I think it is above that. To which you replied;

suggesting the Teddy earned less once upon a time. Now I know Romney started out with nada, but I have no idea what Teddy started with and I was wondering just how you might know.

 

Oh Dicky. I would call Richard but I like the fact that you behave so much like a Dick and that is exactly how you should be known.

 

Our time reference points are probably different. Give me 15 or 20 years or so and depending on what happens who knows? I could be more inclined to agree with you.

 

Sweetie I was speaking generally about people in general not walking into $200,000/year jobs right out of the gate. Whatever you and "Teddy" have going doesn't involve me. Have you always had trouble with this speaking generally concept or is your current difficulty specific to this situation?

 

Sorry, honeybunch. Never had problems speaking of generalities except when people have specifics they are referring to or when it involves Teddy's logic.

 

Well if you've never had problems then you might want to try to figure out why you're having them now. Although it's all academic because I told you that even if I knew Teddy's story I wouldn't tell you what it was. I guess that part didn't register with you the first time around.

 

Why doesn't the left just be honest when it comes to tax policy?
Their strategy is to giveaway enough to make sure they get 50.1% of the votes...if that means turning citizen on citizen or creating villians, well, that's just the way it has to be in order to shore up a solid voting bloc.
At least Paul Ryan has been stand-up enough to offer a plan that is in the best (long term) interest of the country even though it wasn't politically popular.

 

It's easy. You have less money, so you buy less stuff. You either get good at being thrifty or you run out of things like toilet paper lol

 

Are you saying that the Democrats are trying to cater to the majority of the country? You're right. Now turn that around and ask yourself who the Right is trying to give enough away to in order to make sure that they keep the cash flowing into their elections. More like the 1%. So it comes down to the 50.1 % vs. the 1%.

 

The problem with that is that the 1% have the where-with-all to go where they please and I don't mean NYC to Yonkers. The 50.1% are now only capable of accepting handout from the government. i.e. the 1% are paying to maintain the 50.1%. When they get tired of paying for other's Follies and either quit or move, the 50.1% are going to have to do or die. Presently, my vote is for the latter.

 

Nope, I'm saying the dims are trying to exploit 50.1% of the voters by offering freebies & turning citizen against citizen.

 

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September 21, 2012​

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Mitt Romney's campaign, in its latest attempt to respond to calls to release more years of tax returns, announced Friday that the Republican candidate averaged a 20 percent effective tax rate for the previous 20 years and never paid less than 13.66 percent.​

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But the campaign is sticking by the candidate's vow not to release more than his last two tax returns, which critics have made into a potent campaign issue.​

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Romney also released his final tax return for 2011 on Friday. That document shows the Romneys paid $1.9 million in taxes on nearly $14 million in income, mostly from investments, giving them an effective tax rate of 14.1 percent.​

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The Romneys donated about $4 million to charity in 2011, or about 30 percent of their income, the document shows. Romney previously released his 2010 tax return but no others.​

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Democrats have called on Romney to release previous years' tax returns, as other candidates have in past elections, and some have suggested Romney is trying to cover up years when he may not have owed or paid any taxes.​

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But the campaign affirmed Friday in a blog post that "in each year" from 1990 to 2009, "the Romneys owed both state and federal income taxes," with the federal effective rate averaging 20.2 percent. Annual charity giving averaged 13.5 percent during that period, the campaign said.​

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The country's highest federal tax rate is 35 percent, though the Romneys and most Americans end up paying smaller percentages of their income in taxes after deductions and tax credits. Also, capital gains are taxed at only 15 percent.​

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Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/09/21/campaign-says-romney-paid-average-effective-tax-rate-20-percent-over-2-decades/#ixzz278dsQGvE​

 

Freebies? For example?