(Source: By Matt Stoller, Naked Capitalism | News Analysis - http://truth-out.org/news/item/13648-eight-corporate-subsidies-in-the-fiscal-cliff-bill-from-goldman-sachs-to-disney-to-nascar) Corporate CEOs expressed to the administration their agreement with modest increases of tax rates on the wealthy to tackle the deficit problem. In exchange for their support, they wanted “tax extenders” amounting to about $205 billion in tax breaks to be included in the fiscal cliff bill. Few political operatives paid attention to this part of the bill. A few hundred billion dollars of tax expenditures is a BIG deal to overlook.
And what about our popular media? Talk about overlooking!
And here are the winners. . .
1) NASCAR - Anyone who builds a racetrack and associated facilities will get tax breaks on it. This is projected to cost $43 million over two years.
2) Railroads - Tax credits will be available to certain railroads for maintaining their tracks. The value of this one, around $165 million a year.
3) Disney - Will be allowed extension of special expensing rules for certain film and television productions. According to the Joint Tax Committee, was projected to cost $150 million for 2010 and 2011.
4) Mining Companies - Will get tax incentives to buy safety equipment and train their employees on mine safety.
5) Goldman Sachs Headquarters – "tax exempt financing for York Liberty Zone,” which rather than going to small businesses affected after 9/11 (originally intended). Michael Bloomberg actually thought the program was excessive at $1.6 billion in tax free financing for its new massive headquarters through Liberty Bonds.
6) $9 billion Off-shore financing loophole for banks –Basically allows American banks and manufacturers to engage in certain lending practices without having to pay taxes on income earned from it. This is well supported by GE, Caterpillar, and JP Morgan.
7) Tax credits for foreign subsidiaries – Extends the “Look-through treatment of payments between related CFCs under foreign personal holding company income rules.” The cost was $1.5 billion from 2010 and 2011, and the US Chamber loves it. It’s a provision that allows US multinationals to not pay taxes on income earned by companies they own abroad.
8) Bonus Depreciation, R&D Tax Credit – Projected to cost $8 billion for 2010 and 2011, and the depreciation provisions were projected to cost about $110 billion for those two years, with some of that made up in later years.
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. . . that should be polarized is the electrical plug on your appliances. . .
Karl Rove, David Koch, Grover Norquist, Mitt Romney, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Ted Nugent, Newt Gingrich, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter, Chris Christie, John Boehner and Rick Santorum please take note.
(from http://articles.businessinsider.com/2011-11-21/news/30424409_1_david-frum-republican-party-tax-cuts) " . . . Republican commentator David Frum, who recently mortified many members of his party by suggesting that Paul Krugman might be right about the US economy, is back with a long essay in New York magazine.
This time, Frum expresses dismay about how the Republican party has lost touch with reality.
In the space of only a decade, Frum observes, the GOP has gone from being a party dominated by reasonable right-of-center pragmatists to being hijacked by right-wing extremists.
A lifelong Republican, Frum sums up his views this way:
I’ve been a Republican all my adult life. I have worked on the editorial page of The Wall Street Journal, at Forbes magazine, at the Manhattan and American Enterprise Institutes, as a speechwriter in the George W. Bush administration. I believe in free markets, low taxes, reasonable regulation, and limited government. I voted for John McCain in 2008, and I have strongly criticized the major policy decisions of the Obama administration.
And then he looks at the views one has to have to be a loyal member of today's Republican party, and he's appalled by what he sees:
America desperately needs a responsible and compassionate alternative to the Obama administration’s path of bigger government at higher cost. And yet: This past summer, the GOP nearly forced America to the verge of default just to score a point in a budget debate. In the throes of the worst economic crisis since the Depression, Republican politicians demand massive budget cuts and shrug off the concerns of the unemployed. In the face of evidence of dwindling upward mobility and long-stagnating middle-class wages, my party’s economic ideas sometimes seem to have shrunk to just one: more tax cuts for the very highest earners. When I entered Republican politics, during an earlier period of malaise, in the late seventies and early eighties, the movement got most of the big questions—crime, inflation, the Cold War—right. This time, the party is getting the big questions disastrously wrong.
Specifically: It was not so long ago that Texas governor Bush denounced attempts to cut the earned-income tax credit as “balancing the budget on the backs of the poor.” By 2011, Republican commentators were noisily complaining that the poorer half of society are “lucky duckies” because the EITC offsets their federal tax obligations—or because the recession had left them with such meager incomes that they had no tax to pay in the first place.
In 2000, candidate Bush routinely invoked “churches, synagogues, and mosques.” By 2010, prominent Republicans were denouncing the construction of a mosque in lower Manhattan as an outrageous insult.
In 2003, President Bush and a Republican majority in Congress enacted a new prescription-drug program in Medicare. By 2011, all but four Republicans in the House and five in the Senate were voting to withdraw the Medicare guarantee from everybody under age 55.
Today, the Fed’s pushing down interest rates in hopes of igniting economic growth is close to treason, according to Governor Rick Perry, coyly seconded by TheWall Street Journal. In 2000, the same policy qualified Alan Greenspan as the “greatest central banker in the history of the world,” according to Perry’s mentor, Senator Phil Gramm.
Today, health reform that combines regulation of private insurance, individual mandates, and subsidies for those who need them is considered unconstitutional and an open invitation to “death panels.” A dozen years ago, a very similar reform was the Senate Republican alternative to Hillarycare.
Today, stimulative fiscal policy that includes tax cuts for almost every American is “socialism.” In 2001, stimulative fiscal policy that included tax cuts for rather fewer Americans was an economic-recovery program.
Frum's observations are far from radical. A couple of weeks ago, we noted that the Great Hero of the Republican party, Ronald Reagan, would not likely be able to get elected today, because of, among other things, his willingness to raise taxes when he needed to.
Frum attributes the GOP's drift to the extremes to the influence of talk radio and FOX News, ethnic competition, and the pain of economic stagnation. He observes that, once he raised his views on FOX News, he was immediately banned as a commentator.
The America championed by the current Republican party would be a brutal country with even more extreme wealth inequality and poverty and an even more powerful and richer ruling class. And, unfortunately, the extreme views of today's party will alienate many of the more moderate Republican ideas --or, worse, cause them to have to get extreme or risk getting excommunicated.
One hopes that, by bravely speaking out on these issues, David Frum will galvanize what might be called the Great Silent Majority of Republicans to take back their party. Because the sooner America returns to having two reasonable alternatives, the better. . . "
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Shareholders of Air France-KLM and Safran voted against big pay-offs for chief executives at the part French state-owned groups as public resistance to lucrative executive pay grows on a continent traumatised by financial turmoil, reported Reuters.
Four-fifths of Air France-KLM shareholders opposed about US$500,000 paid to ex-CEO Pierre-Henri Gourgeon, who also received $1.39 million when he was ousted in October following the airline's poor performance. The stock lost 71 percent last year.
Just over half of shareholders in aerospace group Safran voted against awarding chairman and chief executive Jean-Paul Herteman two years of pay and an extra pension when he steps down. He was paid $1.77 million last year.
The moves, encouraged by the government, are the latest in a series of revolts over pay at annual general meetings as part of the so-called "shareholder spring", which has seen the chief executive of British insurance group Aviva lose his job.
Governments in France and the UK are among those who have promised to get tough on top executive pay as voters grow weary of bank bailouts and the impact of government austerity measures on spending power as the euro zone debt crisis drags on.
France's new Socialist government has said it will flesh out plans to cap the pay of top executives at state-controlled companies by mid-June. President Francois Hollande pledged in his election campaign to limit senior executives' salaries to a maximum of 20 times that of their lowest-paid employee.
In Britain, Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron has promised legislation this year to tackle high executive pay and leaned on bosses to give up bonuses at banks that were partly nationalised in bailouts after the 2008 financial crisis.
Pierre Moscovici, France's new finance minister under Hollande, earlier welcomed the Safran shareholder vote while calling for similar action at Air France-KLM. The state owns 30 percent of Safran and 15.9 percent of Air France-KLM.
"The government is thus again giving a strong signal of its will for change on the question of remuneration," Moscovici said in a statement.
Ex-Air France-KLM CEO Gourgeon was given the additional $500,000 in return for not working for a competitor for three years. He received an annual salary of close to a $1 billion plus a bonus of $324,731.
Current Air France-KLM CEO Jean-Cyril Spinetta told shareholders that Gourgeon had the legal right to keep the money, adding that it was justified because Gourgeon had been approached by several competitors, notably Gulf carriers.
In an interview with France Inter radio earlier on Thursday, however, Moscovici called on Gourgeon to reimburse the payment."Indeed, morally Pierre-Henri Gourgeon should himself pay it back," Moscovici told France Inter. "The bonus has already been paid, but we are saying very clearly that this is not the right thing to do."
Hollande said before his election that several measures were needed to restore fairness in France, a dig at predecessor Nicolas Sarkozy, whose policies Hollande alleged favoured the rich.
The measures included a top income tax rate of 75 percent on income above $1.23 million, in addition to the senior executive pay cap.
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. . . enables us to immediately send messages about matters of interest and importance, to our loved ones instantaneously through the wonder of the internet (and utilizing the internet) and email . . .
". . JANUARY 1, 2013, THE US GOVERNMENT WILL BE REQUIRING EVERYONE TO HAVE DIRECT DEPOSIT FOR SS CHECKS. WONDER WHY? Subject: HR 4646
Watch for this AFTER November elections; remember this BEFORE you VOTE, in case you think Obama is looking out for your best interest. A 1% tax on all bank transactions is what HR 4646 calls for. Do you receive a paycheck, or a retirement check from Social Security or a pension fund and have it direct deposit? Well guess what ... It looks as if Obama wants to tax it 1% !!! This bill was put forth by Rep. Chaka Fattah (D-PA). YES, that is 1% tax on all bank transactions - HR 4646, every time it goes in and every time money goes out. Ask your congressperson to vote NO. FORWARD THIS TO EVERYONE YOU KNOW! 1% tax on all bank transactions ~ HR 4646 - ANOTHER NEW OBAMA TAX SLIPPED IN WHILE WE WERE ASLEEP. Checked this on snopes, it's true! Check it out yourself ~ HR 4646. President Obama's finance team is recommending a one percent (1%) transaction fee (TAX). Obama's plan is to sneak it in after the November elections to keep it under the radar. This is a 1% tax on all transactions at any financial institution - banks, credit unions, savings and loans, etc. Any deposit you make, or even a transfer within your own bank from one account to another, will have a 1% tax charged. If your paycheck or your Social Security or whatever is direct deposit, it will get a 1% tax charged for the transaction. If your paycheck is $1000, then you will pay Obama $10 just for the privilege of depositing your paycheck in your bank. Even if you hand carry your paycheck or any check in to your bank for a deposit, 1% tax will be charged. You receive a $5,000 stock dividend from your broker, Obama takes $50 just to allow you to deposit that check in the bank. If you take $1,000 cash to deposit at your bank, 1% tax will be charged. Mind you, this is from the man who promised that, if you make under $250,000 per year, you will not see one penny of new tax. Keep your eyes and ears open, you will be amazed at what you learn about this guy's under-the-table moves to increase the number of ways you are taxed. Oh, and by the way, if you receive a refund from the IRS next year and you have it direct deposited or you walk in to deposit that check, you guessed it. You will pay a 1% charge of that money just for putting it in your bank. Remember, any money, cash, check or whatever, no matter where it came from, you will pay a 1% fee if you put it in the bank. Some will say, oh well, it's just 1%. Are you kidding me? It's a 1% tax increase across the board. Remember, once the tax is there, they can also raise it at will. And if anyone protests, they will just say, "Oh,that's not really a tax, it's a user fee"! Think this is no big deal? Go back and look at the transactions you made from last year's banking statements. Then add the total of all those transactions and deduct 1%. Still think it's no big deal? . . "
Then the nefarious email goes on to state that ". . . 1. snopes.com: Debt Free America Act���
Is the U.S. government proposing a 1% tax on debit card usage and/or banking transactions? ...It is true. . . "
. . but if you bother to really visit Snopes.com, you'll find they actually say it is FALSE! Go to http://www.snopes.com/politics/taxes/debtfree.asp
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(from MSNBC http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/03/19/10765542-romney-best-thing-i-can-do-for-student-debt-is-get-you-a-good-job) at a 'Town Hall' session at Bradley University recently. . .
"I and my party are also devoted to making sure we don't pass on to
you trillions upon trillions of dollars in debt. We have in the
Democratic party people who are consumed with giving more and more
benefits to me and my generation, and passing on those burdens to you,"
How, Mitt?
"My
party, my vision, is about protecting economic freedom for you," Romney
said. "I've had it for me. I've had economic freedom. I've achieved
beyond my wildest dreams. I want economic freedom for you."
How, Mitt?
"Well
they can go wherever they’d like to go; this is a free society. But
here’s what I’d say, which is the federal government should not tax
these people to pay for Planned Parenthood," Romney said. "The idea of
the federal government funding Planned Parenthood I’m going to say no,
we’re going to stop that."
How and why, Mitt?
"Best
thing I can do for student debt is get you a good job when you come
out," Romney said.
How, Mitt?
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Gingrich goes too far to say Obama has
put more on the rolls than other presidents. We asked the U.S.
Department of Agriculture’s Food and Nutrition service for
month-by-month figures going back to January 2001. And they show that
under President George W. Bush the number of recipients rose by nearly
14.7 million. Nothing before comes close to that. And under Obama, the increase so far has
been 14.2 million. To be exact, the program has so far grown by 444,574 fewer
recipients during Obama’s time in office than during Bush’s.
(from Reuters)
Unlike Americans who rely on a paycheck,
Romney earns most of his income from investment profits, dividends and
interest. The returns for 2010 and estimates for 2011 showed that he
will pay a total of $6.2 million in taxes on income of $42.5 million. Romney and his wife Ann paid an effective
tax rate of 13.9 percent in 2010 and expect to pay a 15.4 percent
effective tax rate when they file their returns for 2011. Those rates are far below the top income tax
rate on wages, which is 35 percent, because the U.S. tax code in recent
years has favored investment income over wage income.
Let's stop folks from FREELOADING on government programs.
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. . . like Mitt Romney, whose family fortune is valued at about $250 million, pays only a 15% effective income tax, surely we whose families have nowhere near that amount of money, and who work hard every day for 30, 35 or 40 years to make but a mere fraction of $22 million annually have absolutely no right to complain about paying over 35% in taxes. Everyone plays on a level field in Mitt's free market and what's stopping you and me from making a $250 million fortune? Laziness, of course.
RIGHT???
Of course if you lean right, you have the "Other" top choice of Gingrich, who paid about 31% and whose proposed changes to the tax code would allow someone in a position comparable to Romney to pay $0 income taxes.
Tough Choice. Mmmmmmm!!
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney owns investments worth
between $7 million and $32 million in offshore-based holdings. These accounts enable wealthy investors to
defer paying U.S. taxes on some assets, according to tax experts. Romney is purported to have
at least six funds set up in the Cayman Islands but he has not identified all or the size of his accounts there. There is no indication Romney uses the accounts to dodge any
U.S. tax obligations. Although the Caymans have often been associated with
individuals and corporations seeking to avoid paying U.S. taxes, there is no evidence that Romney holds such accounts for this purpose.
It is legal for U.S. residents to own investment accounts that
are set up there — if they file the proper forms with the Internal
Revenue Service and pay the appropriate taxes.
Legal? Yes. Ethical?
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