Oct 16 2011
David Loses To Cain On Meet The Press
Herman Cain’s debut on MTP was huge success today. His position on the issues was solid and bold, but David Gregory provided a huge bonus. Gregory provided the ultimate liberal-media foil – a clueless, math challenged and arrogant member of the Political Industrial Complex.
When Cain tried to explain that State Taxes were unchanged under his 9-9-9 plan, and that his plan swapped out the current federal tax for a new one which had lots of lowered hidden taxes removed, Gregory couldn’t grasp the concept that if you paid a net less under 9-9-9, then when you combined a static state tax with 9-9-9, you would still be paying less.
It was an exquisite moment showing why math challenged journalists have no business trying to ‘explain’ modern policy decisions.
Gregory also basically misrepresented Cain when he stated Cain would not rely on wise-men, when in fact (and Gregory knew this) Cain said he would not ‘lean’ on wise men and women. In fact, Cain has said many times he plans to build a solidly experienced team of advisers, a team that would operate under his broad guidelines.
The best moment was when David Gregory asked if Cain really wanted an electrified fence at the border that could kill people. Cain just looked him in the eyes as if to say “you poor sap” and then simply said “it was a joke”. One apparently Gregory missed.
Cain slew David on MTP this morning, no doubt about it.
Cain nailed the debut. He was sharp, easy going and communicated well. His positions are perfect. He supports traditional marriage, he will not work to repeal same sex marriage. He is personally against all abortions, even in the case of rape and incest. But when asked what about the health of the mother he followed the obvious libertarian path of leaving those decisions to the family. My guess is he, like me, would work to make abortions of convenience a rare choice, but leave the overall decision in the hands of the people – where it belongs for now.
What caught everyone’s ear is his current fundraising. The last 2 weeks he has seen $2 million in donations, which means he is more than a blip. If his fundraising becomes a steady tier one flow, then he will win the nomination, and be bequeathed all those Romney and Perry organizational resources that always go to the winner.
Cain is right, message trumps money or organization. If he does succeed, it will be the liberal establishment against conservative main street. And we all know which of those have the most voters.
Update: Ann Althouse also thinks Cain nailed his appearance. I don’t think he is going to fade away like the others.
Herman Cain’s plan would absolutely cost me more, but I’m fine with that. I know the current system is going to collapse of it’s own weight, and I also know that it can’t be saved without radical reform. I’m willing to pay more personally to save this country.
what it comes down to, Redteam: If Herman Cain is the nominee, will you vote for him even if it is going to cost you a bit more personally? Or will you vote for Obama no matter what that means for the future? Now this isn’t meant to denigrate other GOP candidates; maybe someone will emerge with a better plan, maybe even Romney will sell himself. But do we have to settle for Romney? The fact that he’s only at 25% support at this late stage of the campaign tells me that 75% of the GOP voters want someone besides him. That can’t be good for his chances, and he’s not doing anything to sell me on him lately.
Taxes – truth is, in any true reform the well off retirees are going to have to pay more than they pay now – there’s no other reliable source of income out there. Taxing business more heavily reduces the amount available to go to private job creation and results in overall less tax revenue, not more, young workers don’t have enough money to tax more, and the idea that you can raise the money from “The Rich” is pure demagoguery, since they collectively don’t have enough money to even touch the real problem. (that can be shown easily, if anyone is interested in real numbers)
And yes, you are quite well off – when an average starting wage for someone with a college education is about $36K – that’s what it is where I live – then anyone with over $100K in retirement income is VERY well off! (minimum wage, btw, is $15K per year for someone working 40 hrs/week, no days off except weekends – that’s what a high school grad only earns today. Someone working 2 full time minimum wage jobs, total 80 hours a week, will make $30K per year and change)
The current system has been set up to reward the old by impoverishing the young, (sad but true, we all need to admit it) while lying to them about their chances for the future. That can either change in an orderly way, or it can change by a complete collapse of the current system with all the ensuing chaos that would bring. Right now we still have a choice between those two outcomes, but the window is closing.
Chaos gets closer every day. And those who benefit from the way things are today aren’t going to like the way it turns out for them if collapse and chaos is the road we take.
and if you really wonder what that will look like, just watch Greece. They’ve already made their choice, and now they have to live with it.
“If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice.”
I’m fine paying more also, knowing that the insane inheritance, estate tax is gone and the double taxation of interest and dividends also are eliminated. The estate tax always has been gone for the very wealthy anyway as they use trusts, life insurance and other investments to avoid the taxation and pass their fortunes on to their heirs. it is only the marginally wealthy and land owners (farmers) and small business owners who get soaked in this scheme.
Also as long as I know EVERYONE has some skin in the game and the sysytem is not used to reward or punish certain classes and individuals i don’t mind paying a little more.
No more hoops to jump through at the tax prepaperers office to then find out next time the rules have changed and new rules or regulations added. Dramaticall cut/gut the IRS.
Anybody hear Obama on the road today. He is such a scuz- bag…….I remember so well why I hate campaigning. He is disgusting, he is little more then a lying thug. Does he really want to reduce the democrat party to be reduced to his level. Class…not this guy.
Tax preparer? never used one. Here’s my plan for Cain’s method.
Everything would have sales tax, no other tax on individuals. Business tax, probably.
Here’s how the sales tax would work. Pick a number, say 9% and it would apply to everything you buy from someone that collects sales taxes, but nothing else. Then, everyone would get a rebate from the government for sales taxes paid up to the first $200,000. The burden would be on the individual to keep a record of taxes paid up to the $18,000. Upon submitting that proof to the government, they would then get the rebate. That way, all the money in circulation would be taxed every time if was spent. If you spend $200,000 or less and you
pay taxes on it and keep a record of it, and file that with the gov. you would pay no sales taxes. If you spend more than that, you’ll pay the full 9%. That way I would not be paying any sales taxes but a lot of people making over 200K would be.
quite a few years ago when Neil Boortz was pushing the flat tax, I looked into it and it looked very good. Cain has talked with Boortz for years and I suspect that is where the plan originated..
Oops, here’s another double post because I forgot one point I wanted to make. The reason for no tax on income, just sales. The only people that would pay on income are those that draw a salary from someone that keeps records. We all know a huge percentage of income is ‘under the table’. All under the table money, if and when spent, would be taxed. If you want to be fair, you can’t tax people on their payroll and not tax the people with ‘under the table’ income. Just saying.
Redteam,
The burden on every individual under your idea would be ridiculous. The amount of paperwork would make the current April 15ths look like a cake walk.
Redteam, you’ve just described a national version of the Texas tax system.
just to remind: no income tax at all in Texas. Businesses pay a franchise tax (actually I would reform how that’s done currently, but that’s off topic and would need a thread of its own), localities and schools rely on property tax, and most state income comes from sales tax, user fees for various services, and royalties from the state’s large mineral holdings. Some sales taxes are tied to specific programs, for example gasoline taxes fund highways.
Yes, you can run an entire state on that, and it works well. The US could easily do the same thing.
oh, and Texas has no long term debts to worry about.
(Perry should have been out front and center selling this plan for months now, but instead he’s off in a corner mumbling about how no one’s being fair to him. He’s just about blown his shot at this thing)
[…] AJ Strata says David Loses To Cain On Meet The Press. […]
DJ, I don’t disagree with what you said, and my proposal was only something to be considered. Tell me how a 9-9-9 could be fair. Say you work for a salary and you have 9% withheld from your pay and say that I work for myself and get cash and make the same amount you do. How will they get my 9%? They won’t, so I’m way ahead right from the beginning.
How do you decide what to charge the 9% sales tax on? Food? Fast Food? House Purchase? House Rent? Electric bill?
So, instead of someone filing to get a rebate on Sales tax, just have a calculation of what the average sales tax paid on a $200K income and rebate that to everyone at the first of the year and charge sales tax on everything.
I’m sure 100 people could come up with 100 different plans, but remember the objective is to simplify, revenue neutral, no increase in taxes for anyone making less than $200K, No taxes on anyone making minimum wage (sales or otherwise) I mean, $15.6K – 9 -9 = about $13K. We sure don’t want to do that. Some way those people have to be exempted from payroll and sales taxes. Let’s hear your plan.
just so we keep it real – a real 999 would never get through Congress without heavy modifications, even a conservative congress. Nobody is doing away with the mortgage deduction, nobody is doing away with the charitable deduction, even though those are two of the biggest. There’s just way too many influential republican voters who support those for Congress to ever let them go. Rather than 9-9-9, Congress will probably end up with something like 15.8, 7.32, and pi times the monthly libor rate. That’s just how Congress rolls.
Still, Cain’s plan is a great start. It’s aspirational. It’s not the final destination, but it’s a step on the path, and that’s more than anyone else is offering right now.
No income tax at all for people earning under 100K/year. The income tax portion would only kick in for people making over 100K, people under 100K would pay the sales tax but no income tax. No withholding, no filing, nothing.
uh, crosspatch, is that 100K over the table or under it? And how do you figure out the difference and how do you get rid of the IRS if someone has to start keeping records on over or under? Nah, just do away with the income tax bit and put it all in sales taxes. And if you assume that those making under 100 now are paying no taxes, how do you add 9% sales tax on the 100K and make them start paying $9000 per year in sales taxes? While I’m for a flat tax, I’m also for no income tax because “income” has way too many definitions, for example just because Buffet is smart enough to not call it ‘income’ he avoids millions of dollars in taxes. So, if he spends it, tax him on it then. I sure don’t have all the answers, but I’m absolutely sure that 9-9-9 is NOT the correct formula.
Update about Althouse:
” Some people will pay more, but most people would pay less is my argument…. Who will pay more? The people who spend more money on new goods. The sales tax only applies to people who buy new goods, not used goods….”
“This discussion got me thinking about the positive side of switching to sales tax. With a progressive income tax, the political process sets different percentages for different income levels, so, for example, the majority can vote jack up the taxes on other people — “the rich” — and those other people can work on extracting various exemptions and credits and so forth in an elaborate, inscrutable government system. With a sales tax, you control what you pay through your shopping decisions. Every time you forgo a purchase or buy used goods — and isn’t that good for the environment? — you pay no tax. And every time you choose smaller amounts or cheaper goods, you pay less tax. Now, you have various needs that you have to meet, but you have far more control, and you aren’t at the mercy of the ever-ongoing machinations of the political process.”
Althouse said this without putting much thought into it.
Some are gonna pay more, some are gonna pay less? really?
let’s explore this. Say you make a huge salary, like 20K. right now you pay no payroll tax (other than SS/medicare) and you pay no 9% national sales tax. So, after this passes, you stop paying the 7.15% medicare/SS but you start paying the 9% income tax so you net out $370 less(a tax increase) and then you start paying 9% on ‘new goods,not used goods’ whichever you buy if you pay ANY sales tax at all, it will be more than you’re paying now.
So, if this whole deal is revenue neutral and you’ve got this little guy making this huge 20K now paying more taxes than before, then who is gonna be paying less?
So to avoid paying ‘any’ sales tax, this poor guy has to seek out ‘used’ goods instead of ‘new’ goods. (I hate wearing used shoes and socks).
I’m sure not a David Gregory fan, in fact, I dislike him and his reporting, but he did have some ‘valid, unanswered’ points. This can’t be ignored. Just being a ‘fan’ of Herman Cain doesn’t answer the questions.