Politics

[Brent in Az]

Wonder if he gave up any support for Taiwan e.g. weapon sales etc. in return?

I doubt it. Rumor has it that China wants U.S neutrality concerning Taiwan, but I certainly don't see Trump taking that route.

 

[barryk]

If military option is used to open the Strait, what would that entail? I'm assuming we would be putting boots on the ground after naval and air strike bombardment? I've got not problem with patience if it saves American lives, but won't this regime ultimately, at some point, have to be destroyed? It looks to me like we have passed the point of no return.....would like to know what military strategies would work to open Strait and eliminate regime. Also, what are we possibly doing to assist the pitchfork class to over throw a regime with firepower. I'm sure this has been war-gamed many times.....I assume mid-terms are preventing us from going full throttle in addition to the estimated American casualties?

 

[WAB]

So I knew that newer cars were spying on people but not to this extent...and going to get even worse....the info they are sending back to their manufacturers is mind blowing....and they are selling your info to anyone who pays ....

Trillions of miles of data: Your car is spying on you, and it's only just the beginning

From your weight and facial expressions to your destination, cars collect a startling amount of data about you. Some of it may even raise your insurance costs.

www.bbc.com

Just another reason I love driving my ‘69 FJ40!

 

[375 Ruger Fan]

Vice President JD Vance reveals 186,000 dead people getting food stamps​

Read to the end of the article, regarding blockchain technology for identification purposes.

Vice President JD Vance reveals 186,000 dead people getting food stamps

Vice President JD Vance told a crowd at a campaign event for Representative Zach Nunn in Iowa that the U.S. Department of Agriculture had uncovered widespread fraud in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, the federal food assistance program that serves roughly 42 million Americans at a ...

finance.yahoo.com

 

[Tanks]

You're absolutely a savage."...Desperate times call for desperate measures good sir. The alternative is this country goes bankrupt. I'm merely proposing the least bad options, there are no good options left. See my post above yours regarding deficit reduction figures.

Speaking of desperate measures. I think someone mentioned if the government were to confiscate all of billionaires money, it would fund the government only for a few months.

So higher taxes of a select few is not the answer.

Half the country either does not pay taxes and/or gets welfare from the government.

A drastic solution, and only drastic because it would be unpopula as it would hit everyone. Do away with mortgage interest deduction AND implement a national sales tax.

 

[Altitude sickness]

if everyone paid taxes and saw how much the government takes from that pay or welfare check . They wouldn’t be as free spending any longer.

Leftists talk about a flat tax (say 15%) across all economic levels. Which would be great. Every citizen paying the same percentage.

You shouldn’t be punished for being successful and you shouldn’t get a free ride for not being successful.

And the leftist thinks it would be fair. but watch how quickly half of the population screams bloody murder that they now have to give up 15% of their pay and welfare check. And gets no tax refund in April.

The left seems to think a flat tax squares up the rules against the wealthy. They forget that most of the bottom percentage pays nothing and would scream bloody murder if they suddenly had to pay taxes.

 

[275r7x57]

Speaking of desperate measures. I think someone mentioned if the government were to confiscate all of billionaires money, it would fund the government only for a few months.

So higher taxes of a select few is not the answer.

Half the country either does not pay taxes and/or gets welfare from the government.

A drastic solution, and only drastic because it would be unpopula as it would hit everyone. Do away with mortgage interest deduction AND implement a national sales tax.

Agreed.

I would like to see all taxes abolished (income, property and all others).

A flat nation wide sales tax is the only fair tax. Everyone is a consumer, not everyone is a producer.

 

[Spartan5]

All this proves (if it's true) is Pelosi is just as screwy as Trump. I have never disputed that. Some of you Trumplodites need to wake up. I'm not dedicated to blind partisan tailgate party politics (i.e. "My team is better than yours ... no matter what"). I simply have no use for nutty conspiracy theories or the braindead idiots who broadcast them. And less use for the mindless sheep who believe the broadcasters.

 

[Brent in Az]

Good gawd ....gas was $4.89 down at the corner station.

 

[shootist~]

Agreed.

I would like to see all taxes abolished (income, property and all others).

A flat nation wide sales tax is the only fair tax. Everyone is a consumer, not everyone is a producer.

I like the flat tax idea because it taxes foreign made goods that use accounting methods to book income (and taxes) overseas.

 

[Alistair]

I like the flat tax idea because it taxes foreign made goods that use accounting methods to book income (and taxes) overseas.

In principle I like the flat sales tax thing as well. But, it'll never be implemented.

Mostly because it incentivizes financial responsibility and disincentivizes consumerism.

That's fantastic for Americans, but awful for the American economy, and for American businesses.

Those guys have a lot more lobbying power than individuals do, so they'll kill that one real quick.

Of course, if they don't win that battle, we'd still lose because a smaller economy tends to lead to wage stagnation, poor stock market returns, and lay offs.

At least bonds would become more appealing, so it'd help the US with its national debt issue.

 

[Brent in Az]

House defeats war powers resolution for the third time with a 212-212 vote, with Vance breaking the tie.

 

[TheRookie]

The USA has labelled both Canada and the EU as threats to their "National Security" in order to justify new duties declared by their military Commander-in-Chief on the international trade of steel and aluminum. So I suggest that USA made products such as firearms and ammunition should be sold exclusively within the USA so Canada and Europe can help our esteemed neighbour defend themselves and improve their national security. Sadly, I have come to the conclusion that Canadians and Europeans should make do with their own products exclusively. For all our AfricaHunting friends in Canada, Europe, Africa and elsewhere, please don't buy any American made products. Lets's support the USA in their concern. One can never be too careful when there are evil guys to deal with, and it is our duty to help, as always.

I love that this post still comes up first. After watching the last 8 years, still pleased with the performance of the EU and Canadian governments over that of Trump?

 

[TheRookie]

In principle I like the flat sales tax thing as well. But, it'll never be implemented.

Mostly because it incentivizes financial responsibility and disincentivizes consumerism.

That's fantastic for Americans, but awful for the American economy, and for American businesses.

Those guys have a lot more lobbying power than individuals do, so they'll kill that one real quick.

Of course, if they don't win that battle, we'd still lose because a smaller economy tends to lead to wage stagnation, poor stock market returns, and lay offs.

At least bonds would become more appealing, so it'd help the US with its national debt issue.

Just for the sake of argument…what do you think of this idea? Flat tax is actually super destructive to the lower and middle classes who will then pay a much higher portion. The pre-Reagan era tax strategy would be the worst for me, but probably the best for the United States. But now that the genie is out of the bottle, the only real solution is probably guillotines and a new tax structure built on production types (tax Onlyfans at 95%, teachers at 5%), along with some evaluation of assets gained at low tax rates. Of course this would require the complete destruction of the political class through the educating of America, so I feel like it’s not a likely outcome.

 

[Ontario Hunter]

So now Trump is warning Taiwan against declaring independence. And this on the cusp of the 250th anniversary US declaring independence from its oppressive tyrannical mother country. A bit hypocritical don't you think? So what's the alternative implied here: Taiwan better accept reunification with communist China. I see, so one island in Asia should accept transition to communism while another island in the Caribbean is being starved of life sustaining fuel because it won't reject communism. Yeah, that makes so much sense. Xi knew how to get what he wanted from Trump: just blow smoke up his ass. Tell him how great he is and he becomes putty in anyone's hands. The guy is a diplomatic trainwreck.

 

[Ontario Hunter]

Good gawd ....gas was $4.89 down at the corner station.

Yeah, blame it on Obama and Biden. Everything that goes wrong during this administration is their fault. Pffft. But wait I forgot, Trump is Jesus returned to save the world. He is incapable of being wrong ... in his mind anyway.

 

[spike.t]

If I were King for a day and one of the liberal “Eat the Rich” cabal members worked for me. And they asked to steal an additional 30% from all billionaires.

I would say that’s great young Padawan while patting them on the head. Then show them where they can get all the extra money they want.

Your free to go find and retrieve the 100 billion Medicare and Medicaid fraud every year.

and the 3 trillion that has been spent improperly in the last 20 years and use that for your new programs. Or what ever reason you deem worthy of raising my taxes.

GAO Flags $186B in Improper Payments Across 64 Programs in FY 2025

The Government Accountability Office (GAO)’s most recent audit of the U.S. government’s consolidated financial statements revealed $186 billion in improper payments in fiscal year (FY) 2025, an increase of $24 billion from the previous fiscal year.

www.meritalk.com

Your too kind.....I would have been a good socialist and sent them to the salt mines...... ......

 

[Alistair]

Just for the sake of argument…what do you think of this idea? Flat tax is actually super destructive to the lower and middle classes who will then pay a much higher portion. The pre-Reagan era tax strategy would be the worst for me, but probably the best for the United States. But now that the genie is out of the bottle, the only real solution is probably guillotines and a new tax structure built on production types (tax Onlyfans at 95%, teachers at 5%), along with some evaluation of assets gained at low tax rates. Of course this would require the complete destruction of the political class through the educating of America, so I feel like it’s not a likely outcome.

To your points in order:

I'd argue that flat taxes might not actually cause the lower and middle classes to pay more. Mostly because under the current system, if you're rich enough to pay a half decent accountant, you can be pretty tax efficient. Especially as a business owner, or a retiree, or someone who is asset rich, but by comparison income poor. Even more especially for the 'extremely wealthy'.

A flat tax, especially a flat sales based tax probably simplifies the tax code enough (if done well) that a lot of those loop holes close and effective rates for high income earners, whilst lower on paper, are actually a fair bit higher in practice.

On the other hand though, a flat sales tax is quite regressive in that there are some purchases that are essential and some that are discretionary. Poor people spend most of their money on essentials; food, rent, clothes, healthcare, gas. They can't really 'opt out' of that if a sales tax makes those goods more expensive.

By comparison, for the high income earner, most of their money is spent on purchases that are discretionary; fancy homes, nice cars, vacations, etc. Or they just save it, or invest it. The essentials take up only a small part of their budget. They could potentially opt out of the discretionary stuff, and in fact in a world with only sales tax the incentive structure would push them to do so; owning productive assets (stocks, bonds, housing, private equity funds, etc) becomes more profitable, buying discretionary stuff becomes more expensive.

That would probably mean that yes, they have less overall tax exposure, or at least the option to have less tax exposure if they choose to do so. But then... see paragraph one.

It also massively reduces economic consumption, which again, is not going to aid economic growth. America is an economy built on consumer spending. No getting around that.

A tax on production types I can't get on board with. At all. It's just ripe for grift and abuse. More complexity means more loop holes and more potential for special interest groups to mess things up. It also requires more bureaucracy and more cost to administer. It also (again) benefits those wealthy enough to spend the time and resources on tax efficiency a lot more than the poor who can't afford to do so.

In my opinion, if we want an effective tax code it needs to be as simple as possible, with as little room for interpretation as possible and as little administrative overhead as possible..

 

[rookhawk]

I like the flat tax idea because it taxes foreign made goods that use accounting methods to book income (and taxes) overseas.

I too like a flat tax, but I'm not a Nobel Prize winning economist.

It was really hard to wrap my mind around Dr. Friedman's Negative Income Tax plan and it's harder for me to explain it, but it is sound.

In short, everyone above poverty pays tax. Everyone that makes more money is better off than if they were sitting home on the dole. Eventually, you become a producer rather than a consumer.

 

[spike.t]

Starmer and his cretins at it again labelling the British people right wing, and a danger to the peace and diversity of the uk...fkn hell

Eleven 'far-right agitators' banned from UK ahead of rally, PM says

Saturday's rally has been organised by anti-Islam activist Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, better known as Tommy Robinson.

www.bbc.com