Conservative thinkers tout three innovative and controversial proposals

[RamboLiberal]

Source: Washington Post

Billboards advertising the importance of marriage. Shifting coverage of the elderly from Medicare to private insurance companies. Big tax cuts specifically for parents.

Conservative thinkers are touting those bold ideas and others in journals, op-ed pages and blogs. While the "tea party" movement has dominated public attention, small blocs of Republicans have quietly spent the past year crafting policies on a wide range of issues, looking to build support if the GOP regains control of Congress or the presidency.

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Stein would replace this system with a $4,000-per-child tax credit. That parental tax credit would be funded in part through Stein's other big idea: Simplify the personal income tax to two brackets -- one that taxes 15 percent of income and the other 35 percent. He estimates that few people now in the 10 percent bracket would pay more if they move to 15 percent, because of the child exemption.

But he acknowledges that some people would be bumped up to the 35 percent tax rate, mainly upper-middle-class taxpayers who either didn't raise children or whose children have already left home.





Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/14/AR2010051401307.html?hpid=topnews

[Ian David]

1. "Conservative Thinkers" is an oxymoron. n/t

[laborinvain]

6. And the WaPo isn't "news"

Breaking or otherwise.

Seriously. Do people cite Fox News here too?

[rampart]

7. "oxymoron" was my first thought

but these may be 3 of the worst ideas i've ever heard.

1. billboards are unsafe, unsightly menaces.

2. just what we need. more regressive taxes.

3. more encouragement to procreate.

[BolivarianHero]

2. lol..."Thinkers"?

"Billboards advertising the importance of marriage."

Yeah...Because NOBODY has ever created a gay-bashing billboard touting "the sanctity of marriage"?

Sounds like they dug up a napkin from an AFA garbage bin and used that as their "thinking" pad.

[truthisfreedom]

3. *yawn*

[Hello_Kitty]

4. FUUUUUUUUUUUCK NOOOOOOOOO!!!!

:argh:

[Mark D.]

18. Advertise

BY ALL MEANS! Please, get the word out, possibly millions of people in the middle class would face massive tax increases under this plan. Let's face it, those unscathed by it would be the top 1% and up. I like simplicity, but never at the expense of tax fairness. This is a GOP TAX INCREASE. Every means you have to counter this in that way, please do. When you'll hear some dingbat proclaim how great the idea is, let them know. This punishes people who don't have kids, who are not in the top 1%. Period. Millions of Americans. I hope so badly they try to roll this shit out before November, and Democratic strategists do exactly what I have just described. Take the fight to them and win.

[wial]

5. how is bringing more non-renewable resource consumers into the world

a good thing?

Without easy oil the world can support about 2 billion people according to widely reported estimates.

Thankfully, at current rates the world will peak at 9 billion people.

Anyone have any good ideas how to support the 7 billion we won't be able to afford in about 2 years?

Yes, removing a lot of conservatives like those silly idiots mentioned in the article would help, and it may come to that not least because they'll probably try to attack us first, but let's at least try to think of alternatives in the meantime. It would be really great if we could get through this without total civilization collapse.

[drm604]

8. I can see where they might think that they can gain some votes from the marriage and tax things.

I don't agree with either of those, mind you, but such things might motivate some segment of their base. But how the hell can they think they'll come out ahead votewise by threatening to replace Medicare with private insurance? That seems like political suicide. Even most of the teabaggers want Medicare left alone.

[housewolf]

9. Talk about a discriminatory policy!

Taxing people for NOT having children....

I can see where they're coming from - it's the epitome of "tax what you don't want" kind of policy and they obviously want to build grown through new generations of children - but really now, there's something wrong with this. Higher taxes for people who have spent years raising the children. Higher taxes for people who are infertile. Higher taxes for people who aren't fit to raise children and know it. Higher taxes for people who are unlucky in love. Higher taxes for anyone who doesn't fit in with their idea of so-called traditional marriage and family.

There's just something wrong with this.

'Course it will be popular with the majority of the folks who will benefit from a $4,000 per child per year tax credit.

So... conservatives think that it's okay to use the tax code to sway social behavior but not the courts. I just think it's wrong.

[SkyDaddy7]

20. America must have as many...

Conservative Christian Children born each year to first & foremost CONSUME CONSUME CONSUME! They know no other economic strategy other than breading! All the while they we eat at our Secular Laws until we are truly a Christian Nation and the most important document in the world at one time will be nothing but JOKE!

What the hell is important about "marriage" to overall society? Other than it should be a right we all enjoy as equals! ...Most marriages in the USA end in divorce ANYWAY! Sorry, but I have been with the love of my life for 20 yrs...We were married after dating for 3yrs and were "legally married" up until 5yrs ago when we had to get legally divorced after I had spinal cord injury and my insurance was canceled! So, I could manage my enormous bills while getting basic care. SO, I say TO HELL with marriage until we can marry who we want for as long as we want regardless of who we are or where we sit on the economic ladder...Until then "marriage" is just a word like "FREEDOM"...Rings HOLLOW!

[sandnsea]

10. Olympia Snowe fought for the 10% bracket

in the Bush tax cuts, along with some Democrats. And why in the world do parents need an even larger child tax credit?

These people really don't have any other platform besides tax cuts, even if they have to redo tax cuts they already did.

[PSPS]

11. "While the 'tea party' movement has dominated public attention..."

While the "tea party" movement has dominated public attention, small blocs of Republicans have quietly spent the past year crafting policies on a wide range of issues, looking to build support if the GOP regains control of Congress or the presidency.

I stopped reading as soon as I read this. The fact is that the teabaggers have only dominated "the media's attention," not "the public attention." This very article is just another example of that.

[depakid]

12. Pravda touting these as "bold" Republican ideas?

:rofl:

That paper really has gotten to be pathetic.

[alp227]

13. Aw c'mon, what were they thinking considering privatization?

It doesn't take much thinking to say "screw the government, let the private sector handle this function". It takes much more thinking to consider what can happen if the government just lets things go.

And the importance of marriage? Hmm, I wonder if anyone actually clicked "printer friendly" to read the entire article. Apparently someone thinks that there are great economic benefits to it:

Conservatives have long touted the importance of marriage. Bush even established a "Healthy Marriage Initiative" that created small federal grants for pilot programs to help couples strengthen their marriages. (That funding expires next year, and President Obama created a pilot program focused on fatherhood to replace it.)

Much of the energy from conservatives went to promoting marriage as a cultural virtue. But Bradford Wilcox, a professor of sociology at the University of Virginia, argues that it is important to highlight the economic benefits of marriage.

The divorce rate among college-educated Americans has dropped since the 1980s, but the rate has increased among people without college degrees. This creates what he calls a "marriage gap" that denies lower-income people the advantages of marriage if they, for example, get laid off from their jobs.

Well, it seems that the more educated one is, the more socially well off one will be. And yet the same conservatives who constantly bemoan today's lack of seriousness in marriage turn around and demand defunding of public education! But do consider "correlation does not imply causation". Also, how does Wilcox wish to discourage divorce?

And to discourage divorce, he says, states should change marriage laws so spouses who are being divorced against their will and have not engaged in abuse or adultery would be given preferential treatment by family courts in determining alimony, child support and custody of children.

[pattmarty]

14. Privatize Medicare? All that needs to be done as far as SS goes.................

...........is to raise the fucking cap, problem solved. This horseshit healthcare bill is starting to cause problems already and it really hasn't even started yet and the privatization of Medicare is just one very big problem.

[caseymoz]

15. Great . . .

First one is forgettable and irrelevant, second one will lose them the senior vote, and the third one was, in practice, Obama's tax cut.

GOP has nowhere to go but down.

[jxnmsdemguy65]

16. The importance of marriage?

Republican economic policies of the last 30 years have made family formation virtually impossible, except among the wealthy (doctors, etc.) and very poor (those who qualify for aid). Slave wages paid in today's 'jobs' don't support middle class families.

[rasputin1952]

17. 3 Losing Propositions...

1. Most people don't care about marriage anymore, that's why there is a 51% divorce rate.

2. Privatize Medicare...Why? I thought they wanted to do away with "gov't handouts"; Medicare, other than the fraud and abuse by providers, is one of the few government programs that can be considered efficient, they want to put this in the hands of desk jockeys looking to save every dime...talk about "Death Panels"!

3. Tax cuts...same old crap...and they cuts will be for the wealthy...they are trying to coerce people to stay married, so as to bolster their first "idea", by buying them off with a few dollars in their pockets.


Say goodbye to the GOP...same old crap with new fishwrap...x(

[customerserviceguy]

19. That 15 to 35 percent jump is what struck me

That's one hell of a step up.