Despite the Obama campaign’s and media’s attempt to discredit ‘Joe the Plumber’, a fellow who simply asked Senator Obama a question at a campaign event, his question remains valid, and Obama’s response proves insightful. Obama’s $250,000 a year tax increase provides a barrier to success for the middle class, particularly for entrepreneurs and small business owners. For these people on the bubble there is a penalty for growth. Consequently, this puts the brakes on the growth of many small businesses, which are responsible for a large percentage of new jobs. Raising taxes in a struggling economy on any economic bracket is a terrible idea. Tax increases slow economic growth, and that hurts people across the board. If jobs dry up, it’s not the $250,000 plus crowd that will be hurt the most, it will be the middle class.
Senator Obama’s response to Joe is interesting. ‘Spreading the wealth’ is a principle of socialism. This combined with Senator Obama’s plan to reduce taxes for 95% of the people, when 30-40% of the people don’t pay federal income tax has all the hallmarks of a socialist policy. Senator Obama has never addressed whether people who don’t pay taxes would receive a government check. Either his numbers are off or he is creating a welfare class is his plan. Subsidizing low income is the perfect way of encouraging people not to achieve. Why work harder if the government will pay you not to. Why start a new business if the government will penalize you for your success. This is the perfect plan to deaden the economy; penalize success, reward mediocrity, and limit the growth of new/small businesses.
Filed under: Economy, Obama | Tagged: economic growth, joe the plumber, obama taxes, spread the wealth, tax increase, tax policy
It would be better if you put up the whole video of the conversation that Obama and Joe/ Samuel had instead of the Fox edited video. They actually had a pretty long conversation on the issue almost 6 minutes worth.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFC9jv9jfoA
I think the people that is criticizing Joe is mad because of the things he said about Obama. Like when Joe said that Obama tap danced around the issue like Sammy Davis Jr.
WTF! Sammy Davis Jr?
But anyways if you watch the REAL whole video of them talking to each other you notice that is far from the truth.
Also Joe represented himself falsely to Obama (which is funny because some people are saying that Obama is not telling the truth about himself *roll eyes*). Another funny thing is that Joe would actually benefit under Obama’s economy plan more than McCain’s plan (from info that is coming from experts in economy).
Also I would like to point out that Joe said during an interview that HE was the one to walk up to Obama and ask his question because he felt that his neighbors’ questions weren’t tough enough.
A video where Joe agrees that he WILL receive a tax cuts under Obama’s plan.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aejhxaNzMKM
How many people would be happy if their child had a teacher who lowered their child’s grade for no reason and gave their points to another student so they could pass? Let’s say they have a teacher named Mr. Obama who lowered their child’s A+ to a B- and then raised another child’s grade from a D- to a C+. Would that be fair even if the D- child worked harder than the A+ child?
http://preservetherepublic.wordpress.com/
It doesn’t matter even if Joe turned out to be a McCain plant, Heavenly. The point was the question and the answer. Joe exposed Obama’s agenda as Marxist.
First of all I didn’t say that Joe was a McCain plant. Don’t try to associate those words with me.
Maybe you should take that advise also when trying to compare Obama economy plan with school grading (which that type of grading doesn’t exist).
The thing that does matter is that people are so stuck on Obama saying “Spreading the wealth” than actually looking at his plan or listening to what he said to Joe (and I mean the whole conversation not just a snipped that Fox put together).
Also look at the last 7 to 8 years and tell me that middle class are better nowadays. I think NOT!
The method that McCain want’s to follow is not working. The rich is getting richer and the middle class is getting poorer.
What Joe said is immaterial…….Obama screwed up and announced his real intent….SPREADING THE WEALTH is the key words in the conversations…..This means taking money from people who work 70 hrs a week and give it too people who work 20 hrs or don’t work at all……You could call it a form or reparation.
Heavenly, I did not say that you said he was a plant. I didn’t say that there was that type of grading system existed either. I used it as an analogy. I heard the entire conversation and Obama lied to Joe about the Fair Tax figures as well. I used the grading analogy to show how ridiculous Obama’s plan was. Now, according to the IRS the middle class getting poorer is a myth too. Actually the top tier lost income and so did the second. The bottom two tiers actually gained income. Even if they were losing income and getting “poorer”, it would not justify stealing. I have a radical idea of my own. Instead of villifying the rich, maybe we should try to inspire them to share their knowledge with people (as many of them are willing to do) instead of taking their wealth.
Joe could be Rush Limbaugh in a mask. It doesn’t matter. What matters is that SOMEONE asked Obama about his plan and Obama said it is to “spread the wealth around”.
Obama’s plan is socialism.
No matter which way Obama supporters try to spin it or to attack the guy who asked the question, the ANSWER was purely Obama’s and there is no way to cover it up.
The Obama campaign can smear Joe to high heaven, and every one of us who were wondering the same thing about Obama’s plan will feel it just like he is attacking us personally. Because he IS.
I love the comparison to grades. What if your child struggles to bring home good grades. What if he or she spends every night doing homework and is very proud of his or her accomplishments. Another child in the class doesn’t spend much time on homework, but prefer to watch TV and play PS3. So, when the grades are handed out, your child actually has an A and the other child gets a D. But, the teacher, being a good Obama follower, decides that these children should “share the wealth”-or grades in this situation. So, the treacher gives both children a C (after all, being average is okay). So parents, how many of you would expect your child to continue working so hard to get good grades? And, how many of you would encourage your child to keep doing his or her best to get good grades? BE HONEST WITH YOURSELF! What incentive does either child have to work for anything? The child who works hard is penalized and the child who does not work is rewarded. This is a very important election and everyone should walk into that voting booth with eyes wide open.
Thanks KGDN. I actually went into a lot of detail on my blog with this analogy. I elaborated more on how “Mr. Obama’s” class all failed in the end and how he promised only to take points from the A students in the beginning, but had to go after the points of the B and C students eventually. Anyway, I would love for you to read the post and comment on it at http://preservetherepublic.wordpress.com/2008/10/18/an-analogy-to-why-obamas-plan-to-spread-the-wealth-is-wrong/.
The Grade comparison is outstanding. Someone should right the RNC and suggest it as a commercial.
“Either his (Obama’s) numbers are off or he is creating a welfare class is his plan.”
The consensus is that Obama is going to write checks to lower income citizens. How else is he going to “reduce taxes” for the 40% of people who do not pay taxes?
But wait! We have already done that. LBJ’s War on Poverty wrote $6 trillion in checks over a thirty year period, and it was an unmitigated disaster, substantially destroying poor families and family values, particularly Black families. $6 trillion is roughly $100,000 for all people in poverty. Does anyone now claim they got $100,000 worth of benefit from the WoP? Naaa, the money was just wasted, and it is a substantial chunk of the national debt.
I don’t give much credit to Bill Clinton for anything, but he called for, and got, an end to LBJ’s WoP with the help of Republicans and over the opposition of many Democrats.
Now Obama wants to reintroduce the failed program, and wants all us Joes to pay for it. Never hatchee, MF.
preservetherepublic, your statement that the top tier lost money is completely false; wages for the top 1% have been growing exponentially larger each year. to say that they have been losing money is just rediculous - it’s been so long since we’ve seen this type of wage disparity between the classes. Wages are growing yes, but they aren’t keeping up with inflation! But it’s not only blue collar workers who are feeling the squeeze, it’s the middle class too. Right now, especially in the northeast, it’s tough to get by even if you’re making 110K, 120K a year, which is why Obama wants to change the tax code - to help alleviate the squeeze on the middle class. If you’re making 500K a year, you can afford to have you taxes raised back to the level they were when Clinton was in office. The economy was booming then, and you’re an idiot if you think you’re being penalized for making more money, because you would still be netting more than you would be if you were in the other tax bracket. This idea about ushering in an era of Socialism is just ridiculous - the market has failed reward the middle class for their hard work and something needs to be done.
Of course redistributing wealth is socialism. If Obama is interested in doing this why does he not right off the bat tell his buddies Warren Buffet, Soros, and Oprah, hey guys you have way too much so I am going to half of your billions and give it to those making less than $20K a year; then he can turn to those multi-millionaire buddies of his in San Fran and Hollywood and tell them he is going to take (say one-third of their multi millions) and give it to those making under $25K a year; and then he can turn to those lesser multi-millionaire pundit friends of his in the media and tell them hey guys you have too much I am going to take one-fourth of what you have and give it to those making under $30k a year, and so on down the line until all of us under $250K a year are raised to that level and all those over that level are brought down to that level? In addition, using such a plan would allow for him to get rid of the tax code totally.
Frankly since I do not begrudge anyone succeeding as long as they have done it honestly without screwing everyone else over, I think if he were really courageous and really wanted to change Washington he should tell our elected officials (including himself) beginning now you will all be taxed on the perks you receive from lobbyists and you will no longer be receiving such large and outrageous pensions from the taxpayers of this country.
Oh well I guess it doesn’t make one heck of a lot of difference what we call his redistributing of wealth, he government run health insurance program fits right in with the socialized medicine programs of many other industrialized countries (but let’s not refer to it as socialism).
I wonder just how many doctors and small business owners will be downsizing/retiring/going out of business after Nov. 4th? And how many additional corporations and larger business will be moving their operations to another country?
I have only read of a couple doctors planning on hanging it up and following other pursuits and heard of a few small business owners saying they will start planning to downsize by cutting an employee or two or three after Nov. 4 if Obama wins. Has anyone seen any information relating to this at all? I would certainly be interested in knowing if there actually is a significant pattern developing.
CRL -
“The economy was booming then, …”
Bullshit. The economy was in the middle of the high-tech NASDAQ Bubba Bubble, and like all bubbles it crashed leaving disaster in its wake. The value of the NASDAQ was $5 trillion at the start of year 2000 and one year later at the end of Clinton’s administration the value had fallen to $2.5 trillion. It continued falling like a rock and a few months later it was down to $1 trillion.
Fortunately President Bush took the proper corrective action, minimized job losses, and quickly restored jobs, productivity, and growth.
We are now experiencing the collapse of the mortgage bubble. As many bubbles as the Democrats have created recently, you should be able to recognize the phenomenon, and you might even give some consideration to figuring out why we go through these repeated social and financial calamities.
The Bubba Bubble was just ignorance; history is replete with financial bubbles (Dutch Tulip, Mississippi, South Sea, Japan 1991) and there was no excuse for Clinton to be blindsided by the Bubba Bubble.
The mortgage bubble is different. It was deliberately created by the Democrats by foolishly requiring, by law, that mortgages be given to people who could not afford them. How stupid is that?
It would have been far simpler and cheaper to just buy everyone an apartment or a bungalow and write the costs off. But no, the Dims had to jeopardize the economy , and now they pretend they had nothing to do with it.
Fortunately, we can come out of this problem as we have come out of other problem. But all bets are off if Zero is elected. Zero says he is going to raise taxes and restrict trade, the same things that prolonged the Great Depression for eleven goddam miserable heartsick years. God help us.
I do not want to be put on welfare by Obama.
Under Welfare you are a slave to the government.
Obama wants to put all American’s back on the plantation where everyone works for the master (government) and the master gives you only what you need to survive.
You will NEVER get rich, because once you do, the government will take your money and make you middle class again.
The only rich people will be Government Officials who will still take kickbacks from financial institutions who will pay so they get exempt from tax programs.
Obama took over 100k from Fannie Mae kickbacks.
So if you think he’s going to suffer with the rest of us.. forget it.
CRL, I have my facts straight my friend. The National Center for Policy Analysis reported that the tax burden on the rich has increased more than their income. That wasn’t so for everyone else with the Bush tax cuts.
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=prnw.20080121.DC12012&show_article=1&catnum=3