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President Obama calls on Congress to pass the Buffett Rule, a principle that ensures that millionaires and billionaires do not pay less in taxes as a share of their income than middle class families pay — as a matter of fairness.
(Source: whitehouse.gov)
Which would you vote for — tax breaks for millionaires or essential funding for schools?
Luther Olsen voted for the millionaires and now he’s one of six Wisconsin Republicans being recalled for his attacks on working families.
…
Last night, the first recall election was a big win for progressives. Republicans tried recalling Democratic State Senator Dave Hansen for standing up to their radical right-wing agenda — and he crushed their Tea Party candidate by a two-to-one margin.
That’s a win for the defense, but we need to recall at least three Republicans next month to take back the State Senate and end the right-wing war on working families.
….
We’re not taking anything for granted. We’re going to keep hitting Republicans for their attacks on middle class Wisconsin families — on the air, on the ground and on the phone — until we win.
Thank you for everything you do.
-Charles
Charles Chamberlain, Political Director
Democracy for America
(Source: secure.actblue.com)
Republican Senator Jeff Sessions: Asking Millionaires To Pay More Is ‘Rather Pathetic’
| Today, the Senate is expected to vote on a “Sense of the Senate” bill that says taxpayers earning $1 million or more each year should “make a more meaningful contribution to the deficit-reduction effort.” I
In response, Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL), the top Republican on the Senate Budget Committee, declared yesterday that it’s “rather pathetic” to ask millionaires to share more of the pain.
A spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) commented, “Apparently, nothing irritates Republicans more than the prospect that millionaires and billionaires might be asked to share in the burden of deficit reduction.”
By Marie Diamond of “Think Progress”
….
According to Rep. Mary Kiffmeyer, the former Secretary of State under Republican Governor Tim Pawlenty, the state really doesn’t need revenue, it just wants to punish rich people. “It’s not about revenue,” Kiffmeyer said. “It’s about a tax increase, because they want to go after those who’ve actually worked hard.”
Those who’ve actually worked hard. For the GOP, the single mother holding down two jobs to try and make enough to pay her rent and still manage to bring home some food for her family doesn’t work hard. The mentally ill man who struggles to stay off the streets because he can’t remember to take his medication every day doesn’t actually work hard. The middle class family who is losing their house because of an unexpected layoff and who found a new job but no longer has health insurance and must pay individual premiums out of pocket doesn’t work hard.
No, for the Republican party, the only proof that you “actually work hard” is if you bring over $1 million a year in earnings. And if you do, you deserve all the protection the party can offer.
Yesterday House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) and Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) may well have doomed negotiations to raise the nation’s debt limit when they walked out over a dispute with Democrats about raising revenues. Their theatrics bring the country closer to the brink of financial collapse, and observers have described the move as a “tamper tantrum” and “political grandstanding.” Today, more details emerged about exactly what Republicans are willing to threaten the global economy over to defend.
Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), a member of the bipartisan debt discussion group led by Vice President Joe Biden, said Republicans chose to “protect taxpayer subsidies for big oil companies, tax breaks for corporate jets, and tax breaks for millionaires” […]
The following is a transcript from part of
ED SCHULTZ: Governor Scott Walker has leveled the largest assault on public education in the history of the state of Wisconsin. Late [on Tuesday] thousands of locked out protesters stood in the cold and chanted while Governor Walker gave his budget address inside the capitol.
“The A.P.” reports Walker‘s budget includes, well, nearly a 9 percent cut in aid to schools which would amount to a reduction of nearly $900 million. The governor also proposed requiring school districts to reduce their property tax authority by an average of $550 per pupil. So much for a commitment.
Here‘s how the governor put it during his speech:
GOV. SCOTT WALKER: Just as we reform our entitlement programs for the 21st century, we must also reform our education system. Clearly, we have to produce graduates who are able to compete not only with their peers from Chicago or Des Moines, but also from Shanghai or Sydney, and we want to do so while we balance a $3.6 billion deficit. That is why even as we reduce school aids, overall, we give schools across the state the tools to make up for those reductions with even greater savings through the budget repair bill. Again, this is why it‘s so vitally important for the Senate Democrats to come back home and do their jobs. If they do not, our schools face massive layoffs of teachers.
SCHULTZ: No threat there. This is a classic Republican logical thinking by the way they see the world.
Walker is going to help Wisconsin school children. He‘s going to help them compete by cutting nearly $1 billion from public education? You think that‘s going to work?
Walker blames 14 Democrats for massive teacher layoffs when he‘s the one that‘s cutting the budget? Democrats don‘t want this.
This isn‘t just about an attack on teacher unions. This is an attack on every taxpayer in the state of Wisconsin and it seems to be contagious.
Cities would get nearly $60 million less in state aid in Walker‘s budget plan, an 8.8 percent cut.
Counties would lose over $36 million. That‘s a 24 percent reduction.
And the legislation—get this—would outlaw local governments‘ ability to increase property taxes except to account for new construction.
Now, think about that. If they have a shortfall of money coming into their district and they say, “Well, you know, let‘s get our community together, our town together and decide what we‘re going to do”—no, can‘t do that. […]
There is a war going on in this country and I am not referring to the wars in Iraq or Afghanistan. I am referring to the war waged by the wealthiest people in America on the disappearing and shrinking middle class of our country. The nation’s billionaires are on the warpath. They want more, more, more. Their greed has no end and they are apparently unconcerned for the future of this country if it gets in the way of their accumulation of power and wealth.
On the floor of the Senate, we discuss a lot of things. But one thing we fail to talk about is who is winning in this economy and who is losing, and what that means for parents struggling to survive while working longer hours with lower wages, and worrying about whether their children will have the same kind of standard of living they have.
Right now, the top 1 percent controls more than 23 percent of all income earned in America. The top 1 percent controls more than the bottom 50 percent. It’s not only that the rich are getting richer. The very, very rich are getting richer. In the last 25 years, we have seen 80 percent of all new income going to the top 1 percent…
In a year that broke all the records for money spent on campaigns, some candidates threw away enough of their own wealth to make even Mayor Bloomberg blush. Take Jeff Greene, the Democratic candidate for Senate in Florida, who spent $23,808,789, with only about $4,000 coming from outside contributions. Each of the 284,948 votes cast in his favor cost $83.55.
Then there are the women.
Meg Whitman, Carly Fiorina, and Linda McMahon were anointed Tea Party favorites by Sarah Palin. And Mama Grizzly has laid down the conservative scenario for women who want to capitalize on their national fame to pose as political revolutionaries, pledging to save the citizens of their states from an unemployment sinkhole and their children from educational dead ends.
Whitman spent $143.6 million of her own billions during her unsuccessful run for governor of California. California Watch tallies her expenditures at more than $160 million, and the group says that number could rise by the time the last month of campaigning is tallied. Using the official expenditure number, each of the 3,748,669 votes cast in the former eBay CEO’s favor cost $38.32.
Fiorina spent $16.7 million during her unsuccessful run for senator of California, according to the most recent official records, including more than $5.5 million of her own money.
McMahon, the wrestling impresario, spent $41.9 million during her unsuccessful run for senator of Connecticut, about $97,000 of which came from outside contributions.
{Click the headline to read the full article.}
