Reconciliation

No recipe?

By the way, thanks for sharing that Rick Bayless peanut mole a little while back. Very delicious.

If Ben Smith says TARP was boffo, IT WAS!

I have no idea why you linked to the Megan McArdle article. I live in a neighborhood that began "gentrifying" in the late 1970s and old and new residents opposed Fenty. The fact that the vote was fairly evenly divided showed that the electorate was aware of Fenty's accomplishments.

I'm active in the LGBT community and Fenty was clueless about our issues. During the Fenty years city schools were surveyed about GLBT health issues. Chancellor Michelle Rhee refused to release the information that survey uncovered.

The DC police had an award winning unit dealing with crimes against GLBT people. The police department under Fenty essentially disbanded the GLBT police unit with not good results.

"Gentrification" is a real estate phenomenom. To the exetent that it existed, it ceased being a factor in DC politics two years ago when the market cratered.

The meaning of the mayoral vote was this: a majority of the citizens of the District of Columbia said, our voices are not being heard.

Tip O'Neill famously said that all politics is local. The DC mayoral vote was a referendum on the Mayor's relationship with his constituents and wasn't about gentrification, union advertising or any other template that might be cast upon it.

I think the Dems need to be very creative, and play as hard and dirty as the Repugnants. The philosophy of QUANTITY along with QUALITY, when dishing out communiques should be explored. YouTube aftr YouTube of the contradicting and cross-purposed statements all over the place.

Here's how I would debate Vitner :
"Help me out here, Mr. Vitner, one of your policies is unclear to me. Which one wears the diaper, YOU OR THE PROSTITUTE?"
If the diaper fits, make them wear it

I don't know what to think about Tea Party. I quite like Obama but on the other side I really wonder what will happen to the Republican Party.

-François Comeau-Lapointe

"extending the Bush tax cuts would add more to the deficit than everything President Obama has done put together"

The Mid-Session Review from Obama's OMB projects that the President's Proposed Budget would cause $8.5 Trillion in cumulative deficits over the ten years of FY2011-2020 (Table S-4). The Republican’s tax extension proposal would cost only $700 billion more than President Obama’s proposal – less than 10% of what Obama plans to add to the deficit through a variety of spending increases. The $70 billion annual cost of extending the tax cuts for those making over $200/250,000 is neither a cause or solution to Washington’s spending problem.

A cmment by my daughter, who may know what she is talking about, leads me to ask the following question.

As I calculate it, for the Bush Tax Cuts to raise a persons tax burden by $100,000, he would need to be making$3.3 Million or so, ABOVE whatever the lower limit is for the top current marginal rate. I guess that would be in the $4 million range total.

Where that $3.3 million in taxes is business income being reported as Personal income, if the taxpayer were to invest the $3.3 million before reporting it as income, would he owe any taxes at all?

Thus, the claim that raising his tax burden would keep him from reinvesting is in fact quite the opposite. If he invests the whole $3.3 million, he pays no taxes and benefits from the investment.

So the complaints about closing the Bush Tax Breaks for the rich are pure anti fantasy. The taxes, if they encourage anything, encourage MORE investment, not less.

Correction:

an additional 3% in taxes being $100,000 would be the higher tax on a bit more than $33 million, not $3million At that income the income below the tax rate increase break over point is immaterial.

The rest of the post stands.