Hi char,

iowan15: "So it's your opinion that the Bush tax cuts are responsible for the mess we're in."

char: "No. It's great when you can just make up an opponent's position, and you do it frequently."

Here's what you posted: "And if tax cuts were the key to prosperity we would not be in this mess, now would we?"

Implicit in your post is that tax cuts are, at least in part, responsible for the 'mess we're in'.I'm content to let other draw their own conclusions about whether or not I made up your position.

char: "The tax cuts are responsible for about half the deficits we encountered, the rest being due to the wars Bush decided were good ideas and domestic spending that he signed into law."

I quite agree with you that Bush didn't control domestic spending and I complained about it at the time. Completely absent from your analysis is that annual deficits were declining from 2004 to 2007, despite tax cuts, spending on both wars (one of which you thought was a bad idea and the other which you supported, even if only rhetorically), and expansion of government entitlements (which were supported by Dems with exuberance).

char: "But the meltdown was the result of some really bad decisions made on a bipartisan basis to deregulate the financial sector, combined with lax enforcement of the remaining safeguards, and the usual untrammeled greed that is always waiting to take control when government is not doing its job."

What good reason is there to think that new regulations will be enforced any more stringently then old ones? What unique virtues do politicians possess the business owners do not? Chris Dodd, among others, was quite happy to take sweetheart mortgage deals. And he was the Dem point-man on financial regulation. Clamping down on businesses, imposing new mandates on employers, adding trillions in deficit spending to an already out-of-control federal government, and raising taxes doesn't seem to me the solution to a weak economy.

Now, please spell out what YOU think will reduce unemployment, reverse the increase in the numbers of Americans living in poverty, reverse the increases in home forclosures, and produce economic growth in the range that occurred after the recession in Reagan's first term. What tax rates do you favor? How will raising taxes as Obama proposes address any of the problems listed above?

char: "Raising taxes doesn't increase employment unless those taxes are spent, but raising taxes does reduce the deficit, which is something that you say you're for."

Raising tax RATES works only to the extent that those higher tax rates don't squelch economic activity and investment (or, as you characterize it below, 'speculation'). To the extent that higher tax rates do squelch economic activity and investment, raising tax rates not only won't increase employment, but will very likely decrease employment.

char: "Eventually we'll have to start working on that, and raising taxes on the wealthy back to the levels of the very prosperous late 90's seems like the best way. I would also phase out the favorable treatment for capital gains, both to raise money and to reduce speculation.

Raising captial gains tax rates will raise very little revenue and is the most effective way to stifle investment.

char: "The unemployment rate is dropping; it will continue to do so. You can thank the stimulus for that."

There's not the slightest reason to think that's true, beyond wishful thinking. Not only is the unemployment rate NOT dropping, 'most economists' believe it will be stuck right or very near where it is presently for quite a long time to come.

char: "But pumping a trillion dollars of borrowed money into the economy year after year is obviously unsustainable."

That's right because the trillions of dollars of borrowed money that the government 'pumps into the economy' must first be siphoned out of the very economy into which it is later 'pumped into', along with additional money to cover the bureaucratic expenses.

I'll also note that your solution contained nary a word about controlling spending.

char: "We are going to have to pay our own way some day; why are you against that?"

I'm not. What I am against is the liberal notion that we can tax our way to prosperity.

On another subject, have the new uniforms for Individual Mandate Enforcement Squad arrived?

later. iowan15