What happened?

[Guest]

None of these taxes existed 100 years ago...
And our nation was the most prosperous in the world:

Building Permit Tax
CDL License Tax
Cigarette Tax
Corporate Income Tax
Dog License Tax
Federal Income Tax (Fed)
Federal Unemployment Tax (FU TA)
Fishing License Tax
Food License Tax
Fuel Permit Tax
Gasoline Tax
Hunting License Tax
Inheritance Tax
Inventory Tax
IRS Interest Charges (tax on top of tax)
IRS Penalties (tax on top of tax)
Liquor Tax
Luxury Tax
Marriage License Tax
Medicare Tax
Property Tax
Real Estate Tax
Service charge Taxes
Social Security Tax
Road Usage Tax (Truckers)
Sales Taxes
Recreational Vehicle Tax
School Tax
State Income Tax
State Unemployment Tax (SUTA)
Telephone Federal Excise Tax
Telephone Federal Universal Service Fee Tax
Telephone Federal, State and Local Surcharge Tax
Telephone Minimum Usage Surcharge Tax
Telephone Recurring and Non-recurring Charges Tax
Telephone State and Local Tax
Telephone Usage Charge Tax
Utility Tax
Vehicle License Registration Tax
Vehicle Sales Tax
Watercraft Registration Tax
Well Permit Tax
Workers Compensation Tax

We had absolutely no national debt...
We had the largest middle class in the world...

What happened?

*'Politicians'!*

[Guest]

None of these taxes existed 100 years ago...
And our nation was the most prosperous in the world:

Building Permit Tax
CDL License Tax
Cigarette Tax
Corporate Income Tax
Dog License Tax
Federal Income Tax (Fed)
Federal Unemployment Tax (FU TA)
Fishing License Tax
Food License Tax
Fuel Permit Tax
Gasoline Tax
Hunting License Tax
Inheritance Tax
Inventory Tax
IRS Interest Charges (tax on top of tax)
IRS Penalties (tax on top of tax)
Liquor Tax
Luxury Tax
Marriage License Tax
Medicare Tax
Property Tax
Real Estate Tax
Service charge Taxes
Social Security Tax
Road Usage Tax (Truckers)
Sales Taxes
Recreational Vehicle Tax
School Tax
State Income Tax
State Unemployment Tax (SUTA)
Telephone Federal Excise Tax
Telephone Federal Universal Service Fee Tax
Telephone Federal, State and Local Surcharge Tax
Telephone Minimum Usage Surcharge Tax
Telephone Recurring and Non-recurring Charges Tax
Telephone State and Local Tax
Telephone Usage Charge Tax
Utility Tax
Vehicle License Registration Tax
Vehicle Sales Tax
Watercraft Registration Tax
Well Permit Tax
Workers Compensation Tax

We had absolutely no national debt...
We had the largest middle class in the world...

What happened?

*'Politicians'!*

I am a conservative, but have to disagree, NOT with the point you are trying to make but with your presentation,

Most of those taxes are collected and exist to pay for some government service and what you should do is investigate the history of each to determine why they are actually there.

In addition, many of the taxes you list have an origin at the state level and that even more complicates your research.

I am not a big believer in generalization as I have said many times and while I support a review of spending and taxes, some taxes do not have a terrible history.

We, the people, want services, and those services cost money and have increasing costs. Adding a specific tax is one way to pay for those things.

Point is, we need to have taxes to pay for services we demand from our local, state and federal government. They DO need to be looked at, but we are the ones asking for certain services.

[Guest]

I am a conservative, but have to disagree, NOT with the point you are trying to make but with your presentation,

Most of those taxes are collected and exist to pay for some government service and what you should do is investigate the history of each to determine why they are actually there.

In addition, many of the taxes you list have an origin at the state level and that even more complicates your research.

I am not a big believer in generalization as I have said many times and while I support a review of spending and taxes, some taxes do not have a terrible history.

We, the people, want services, and those services cost money and have increasing costs. Adding a specific tax is one way to pay for those things.

Point is, we need to have taxes to pay for services we demand from our local, state and federal government. They DO need to be looked at, but we are the ones asking for certain services.

I wrote it, AND I agree with you. I generalized. The point is not that we are paying taxes, but that we are paying a lot of different taxes. Granted, we have to fund services. But, every time a politician wants to add a new service, he/she also decides to invent a new tax or add on to an existing tax. We do need a review of existing services and decide which ones are really necessary. It's about time to start cutting services. How many billions could be saved if we did some cutting of the unnecessary. We could start with Foreign aid, which is just a drop in the bucket, even though it is in the billions. Wouldn't it be nice/interesting if we could have a popular vote on spending? Bet there would be some interesting cuts to spending.

[Guest]

I wrote it, AND I agree with you. I generalized. The point is not that we are paying taxes, but that we are paying a lot of different taxes. Granted, we have to fund services. But, every time a politician wants to add a new service, he/she also decides to invent a new tax or add on to an existing tax. We do need a review of existing services and decide which ones are really necessary. It's about time to start cutting services. How many billions could be saved if we did some cutting of the unnecessary. We could start with Foreign aid, which is just a drop in the bucket, even though it is in the billions. Wouldn't it be nice/interesting if we could have a popular vote on spending? Bet there would be some interesting cuts to spending.

:clap2::clap2: If government agencies would run efficiently we could cut taxes and most likely not have to cut the services they provide. When I was a small business owner the local government agencies I dealt with that were efficient and coming in under budget would always end up on a spending binge at years end to be sure they spent all of their budget so it would not be cut the next year. When I was in the Army Reserve we had a company strength of around 500 but at that time were slightly under 300. Every year we were required to go to the range and practice our M-16 proficiency. They always gave us enough ammunition for 500 which we did not need. After we (the 300 of us) did our required shooting we had quite a bit of ammo left. Would it be returned to the warehouse? Nope. We had 10 of us line up, put the M-16's on auto, and just fire the extra ammo until gone. I could go on and on, and I am sure many of you reading this thread have their own stories to tell. Government and efficiency are rarely together on the same page.

[Guest]

:clap2::clap2: If government agencies would run efficiently we could cut taxes and most likely not have to cut the services they provide. When I was a small business owner the local government agencies I dealt with that were efficient and coming in under budget would always end up on a spending binge at years end to be sure they spent all of their budget so it would not be cut the next year. When I was in the Army Reserve we had a company strength of around 500 but at that time were slightly under 300. Every year we were required to go to the range and practice our M-16 proficiency. They always gave us enough ammunition for 500 which we did not need. After we (the 300 of us) did our required shooting we had quite a bit of ammo left. Would it be returned to the warehouse? Nope. We had 10 of us line up, put the M-16's on auto, and just fire the extra ammo until gone. I could go on and on, and I am sure many of you reading this thread have their own stories to tell. Government and efficiency are rarely together on the same page.
It does not matter if it is a corporation, or local, state or federal government...no one wants to see the budget cut.

[Guest]

There was an idea floating around a few years back called the Penny Plan and basically it was an idea to pull 1 cent from every dollar allocated to each budget of every agency in the government to start to have a balanced budget and eventually start to claw at the national debt. I could not believe the amount of push back on this idea. When you think about it, if I were to give an agency 99 cents instead of a dollar and the head of that agency said he/she could not provide services with this cut well, I say we don't need that person controlling our tax dollars anymore!

[Guest]

I wrote it, AND I agree with you. I generalized. The point is not that we are paying taxes, but that we are paying a lot of different taxes. Granted, we have to fund services. But, every time a politician wants to add a new service, he/she also decides to invent a new tax or add on to an existing tax. We do need a review of existing services and decide which ones are really necessary. It's about time to start cutting services. How many billions could be saved if we did some cutting of the unnecessary. We could start with Foreign aid, which is just a drop in the bucket, even though it is in the billions. Wouldn't it be nice/interesting if we could have a popular vote on spending? Bet there would be some interesting cuts to spending.






We could save TRILLIONS - yes TRILLIONS - and by the way, those are trillions we didn't have - by not starting wars in the guise of looking for non existent WMD's.

Wanna take a guess how much interest we have to pay on those trillions we borrowed?

[Guest]

There was an idea floating around a few years back called the Penny Plan and basically it was an idea to pull 1 cent from every dollar allocated to each budget of every agency in the government to start to have a balanced budget and eventually start to claw at the national debt. I could not believe the amount of push back on this idea. When you think about it, if I were to give an agency 99 cents instead of a dollar and the head of that agency said he/she could not provide services with this cut well, I say we don't need that person controlling our tax dollars anymore!

:agree:

[Guest]

We could save TRILLIONS - yes TRILLIONS - and by the way, those are trillions we didn't have - by not starting wars in the guise of looking for non existent WMD's.

Wanna take a guess how much interest we have to pay on those trillions we borrowed?

Hard to believe that someone actually posted this !!

[Guest]

We could save TRILLIONS - yes TRILLIONS - and by the way, those are trillions we didn't have - by not starting wars in the guise of looking for non existent WMD's.

Wanna take a guess how much interest we have to pay on those trillions we borrowed?

Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!

And if we had a time machine we could perhaps do something about it.
Since we don't....HOW ABOUT STAYING ON THE POINT OF THE THREAD? (For once).

[Guest]

We could save TRILLIONS - yes TRILLIONS - and by the way, those are trillions we didn't have - by not starting wars in the guise of looking for non existent WMD's.

Wanna take a guess how much interest we have to pay on those trillions we borrowed?

Sorry to disagree with you, but it wasn't trillions that went into the Iraq war. It was billions. Not even close the money spent on entitlements. As far as the WMD's are concerned, since you weren't there, I guess the liberals got to you regarding the lack of them. I was there when almost half a million bodies were dug up in a mass grave. People that were killed by WMD in the form of poisonous gas. Sadaam moved his WMDs by the time we got there. Anyone guess where they went? Haven't you been reading/listening to the news lately?

But, getting back to the war cost. Even rounding it off in years, it is still less than a trillion. When the total defense budget was 3 trillion, those billions were not as much as some are portraying it. Funny how the ones that are screaming in congress about the cost, are the same ones that voted to go to war in the first place. I think it's time to drop the myth that there were no WMD's in Iraq. Just because they weren't found by the time we got there, does not make them non-existant. Kind of like how Iran will have hidden their nukes by the time they can be inspected. We have to give them 24 days notice before inspection. Although, they also get to inspect themselves in some circumstances.

[Guest]

It does not matter if it is a corporation, or local, state or federal government...no one wants to see the budget cut.

I think what you mean is, no one wants the budget cut where it pertains to them.

[Guest]

I still maintain the majority has no idea what the budgeting process is and how it either works or does not.

Budgets do not work from the bottom or anywhere along the way to the top.
Budgets can only be constructed when the guidelines are DICTATED by the very top management of an entity. In the case of governement that would be for now Obama.

And he is a good example of why we have not had a budget since he has been in office.

Budgets are easy to make. They do not happen when the rank and file are allowed to do anything they want without someone saying no.

It is sort of like a fire hose. If the lead guy is on the hose at the nozzle the hose is controlled and the water reaches it's target.

Obama has a grip on the hose about 15 feet back from the nozzle and it is whipping about out of control......and he either refuses to move toward the nozzle to get control. Or he just has no idea what to do to gain control. Or lastly there is benefit for him to not excercise any control.

[Guest]

Sorry to disagree with you, but it wasn't trillions that went into the Iraq war. It was billions. Not even close the money spent on entitlements. As far as the WMD's are concerned, since you weren't there, I guess the liberals got to you regarding the lack of them. I was there when almost half a million bodies were dug up in a mass grave. People that were killed by WMD in the form of poisonous gas. Sadaam moved his WMDs by the time we got there. Anyone guess where they went? Haven't you been reading/listening to the news lately?

.

Iraq war costs U.S. more than $2 trillion: study | Reuters (http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/03/14/us-iraq-war-anniversary-idUSBRE92D0PG20130314)
War in Iraq cost 2.4 trillion as of 2013 and going up with ongoing medical care expenses and interest expenses.

As to your claim that You were there in Iraq as 1/2 million bodies were found. You are lying. No such event has ever occurred. Fewer than 10 thousand mass grave bodies have been found. There certainly are more undiscovered. So please if you are going to post at least try not to make such outrageous statements that can be so easily debunked.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_graves_in_Iraq

Revisionist history to justify the war, still? There was no atomic bomb about to explode on us, moving around on mobile tankers. Even Colin Powell admits he was wrong. Time for you to admit it also.

[Guest]

From Wikipedia:
According to The New York Times, "he [Saddam] murdered as many as a million of his people, many with poison gas. He tortured, maimed and imprisoned countless more. His unprovoked invasion of Iran is estimated to have left another million people dead. His seizure of Kuwait threw the Middle East into crisis. More insidious, arguably, was the psychological damage he inflicted on his own land. Hussein created a nation of informants — friends on friends, circles within circles — making an entire population complicit in his rule".[9] Other estimates as to the number of Iraqis killed by Saddam's regime vary from roughly a quarter to half a million,[10][11] including 50,000 to 182,000 Kurds and 25,000 to 280,000 killed during the repression of the 1991 rebellion.[12][13] Estimates for the number of dead in the Iran-Iraq war range upwards from 300,000.[14]

WMD's do not have to be nukes. You do know that, right? Poison gas is also WMD.

When I was in Iraq, a mass grave was discovered. At that time, they estimated over 200,000 bodies. Some say there were more than 400,000. I didn't count them.

The CBO figures show the total cost of Iraq operations in 2008 was $140 billion. In 2007, the cost of Iraq operations was $124 billion.
According to the CBO, Estimated funding for the war in Iraq totals $709 billion from 2003 to 2010. Bear in mind that this is not the total defense budget. Just the funding for the war in Iraq. Not Afghanistan.
According to nationalpriorities.org the current cost of the Iraq war from 2003 to today is $818 billion.

But this is totally off track. The subject of this thread was regarding the multitude of taxes, not a diversion from the left to Bush's war. You can quote long term costs of war, after the war if you wish. If you want to, you can count the long term (still being paid) costs of the Vietnam war.