taxes

Paul, honey, we pro-choicers could have told you this 30 years ago

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krugman

Paul Krugman’s Monday NYT column is a sharp observation of how the American Right is untethered from evidence on a wide variety of policy issues.

Of course not. Evidence doesn’t matter for the “debate” over climate policy, where I put scare quotes around “debate” because, given the obvious irrelevance of logic and evidence, it’s not really a debate in any normal sense. And this situation is by no means unique. Indeed, at this point it’s hard to think of a major policy dispute where facts actually do matter; it’s unshakable dogma, across the board. And the real question is why.

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Culture war issues FINALLY surface in Arizona Governor’s race

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Crossposted from DemocraticDiva.com

duval duceyPhoto: AZ Republic

I have to say there have been some encouraging developments in the AZ midterms the past few days. First Howie Fischer weighed in, and then the Arizona Republic (finally) ran a piece highlighting the significant differences on so-called “social issues”, that is, a host of things that affect a lot of people’s lives, rights, financial situation, ability to participate fully in society, etc., but do not necessarily fall within the confines of what rich white people consider important.

While Arizona’s most controversial social policies have generally originated in the state Legislature and the courts have had the final say, the governor is the gatekeeper. As the state’s chief executive, the governor holds the veto stamp and has historically used it to push back on legislation deemed too far outside the public interest.

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Budget Battle: Can the Rich Afford to Pay Higher Taxes?

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Toprates_prog2by Pamela Powers Hannley

Since the Tea Party took over the House of Representatives after the disastrous 2010 election, you'd think the most pressing job facing the Congress was to lower taxes on the richest Americans. (Feather-bedding the 1% is right up there with squashing our civil liberties, suppressing voter turnout, grandstanding about cutting "entitlements" (AKA earned benefits), supporting Wall Street banksters, and protecting Citizens United and the obscene campaign finance system we have.

Just look how many marches, blog posts, letters to the editor, calls to representatives, and Occupations it took to overturn the Bush Era Tax Cuts on people who make more than $400,000 a few months ago. (And it still probably wouldn't have happened if it weren't for three percentages that changed public opinion– 99%, 1%, and 47%.) More on taxes and budgets after the jump.