Wow, some people still have a conscience (that hasn't been dragged off by their wallets.) Why should the good of Wall Street be our nation's highest priority?

1. Not increasing tax rates is not a tax cut ("Bush" tax cuts)

2. Reducing taxes from existing levels was foolish

3. Notice how there were ZERO cuts in spending.

Once again the Republi-Crats treat us like the idiots we are for re-electing them year after year. Vote out all incumbents until they get the message that sacrifices have to be made at all levels, the rich, the poor, the middle class, the unions, and the entitled government class.

And for those millionaires who don't feel they pay enough in taxes? Let them make a contribution to the IRS. I'm sure they'll take the money.

The IRS and the Treasury Department takes donations by its citizens. So anyone millionaire or not can write a check for whatever amount they want to "cover the deficit". They need to put their money where their mouth is and stop GRANDSTANDING! Nobody is stopping them. There once was a time when ole Ted wasn't for higher taxes...Specifically, when he was trying to build his CNN empire. Now that he is past his prime and wealthy beyond belief he says it is OK to tax him, LMAO! Easily said for the largest private land owner in the entire US. He owns property that almost stretches from Canada to Mexico. Sure, Ted, you only got a few million left, right...right...right!

Ironic that the people who have built their wealth by being financially responsible are willing to pay more to a business that has no clue what that means. (yes, the government is a business)

I smell a political move... and something else for that matter....

And some of you who are liberals are now liking these guys and the companies they built? That's a far cry from how big companies are evil and owe you a living.... hypocrits

I guess now is the time to argue in favor of a flat tax across the board. a flat tax would be the only way to have fair taxe...http://abrahamsays.blogspot.com/2010/11/should-rich.html

Similar articles have appeared a number of times before and there's always a few people who say "well let them just donate their money to the gov't." The problem is that a few wealthy people volunteering their money to the government isn't nearly the same as raising the taxes for the wealthiest citizens who increasingly control larger portions of the wealth in the country. The rich have grown richer and taxes have not kept up with their incomes.

Agreed

The problem is that a few wealthy people volunteering their money to the government isn't nearly the same as raising the taxes for the wealthiest citizens who increasingly control larger portions of the wealth in the country

Last time I checked we still live in a somewhat resemblance of a republic under democratic principles. Gallop polls and Rasmussen polls have made it clear that almost 80% of Americans don't favor taxes being raised during a recession. That is a pretty huge mandate. Further, not one country in the history of mankind has grown their government coffers by raising taxes. They have done it by lowering them. Russia is the most recent example of this. Check it out and do some research. Remember that 70% of jobs created in this country are done by small business owners. Yeah, those people you drop your laundry off to, pick-up a sandwhich from while on lunch break, or fill your car up with gas on the way home. Practically all file their business's income on their 1040 forms. SO you take money out of their pocket, you lose jobs that would otherwise be available. Social justice doesn't work. Checkout all those people in the streets protesting in the UK, Greece, Ireland, Spain and Portugal. If you need further proof at the inadequacies of government income and wealth redistribution just look at the cash for clunkers program of a year ago. The $5000 tax credit for a new car run by the government costs the American tax payers $36,000 per car. The government would have done better to just hand them $5,000 at the dealerships. This is why we have a deficit and government is never the answer. Government is inefficient.

Ted Turner says he is on the edge of poverty because he only has 1.9 Billion instead of 6.2 Billion. This highlights the absurdity of this issue. Turner and Gates and Buffet , Billionaires all, want individuals who make $ 225,000 a year to be treated the same as them. This is absurd. These Billionaires should be unmasked for the charlatans they are. Their children will be left with millions and millions of dollars and they will be set up for life as the head of foundations funded by their fathers where the kids will earn hundreds of thousands of dollars each year. If these men want to pay more to the government they are completely free to do so. Just write out the check and send it in. Just quit trying to induce government to force others to do so.

Of course 80% of Americans don't favor a tax increase. Last time I checked though, the millionaires and billionaires do not make up 80% of the country. So keep the taxes where they are for the middle and lower class and raise them for the people who would have to work to spend their money before they die.

An individual today with one million dollars would be able to obtain virtually no safe return on that money. This is because the government is destroying the class of people in America that saves and invests. If they were to develop a serious illness it would be very easy to require half or more of that nest egg to fight the illness. Then living on the remainder, again with a virtually zero return, would result in the original million dwindling down to a precious few. It is preposterous to treat these people like Turner and Gates and others with hundreds of millions of dollars.

See Obama, you have done a disservice to middle class Americans.

Last time I checked though, the millionaires and billionaires do not make up 80% of the country

This is the reason we elect idiots like Obama. here this guy above can't compute that 80% of a cross section of American people rich, middle class, poor, old and young say don't raise taxes and this is his or her idiotic response. My goodness, we are not all created equal and therefore should not be paid equally!!!

Although Ted may not have been in favour or higher taxes years ago that doesn't mean he can't change his mind. Everyone does it. Sure it means that when says it there will be some doubters and rightfully so. That said, tax the rich those that benefit the most from the society should contribute the most. The downfall communism is greed and capitalism has the same downfall.

Anyone who advocates flat taxes has a flat head and believes in a flat earth. Everyone pays the same amount of taxes for the dollars they earn, as long as they have a job and don't survive on investment income (15%). A millionaire pays the same amount on his first $50,000 (10%) as I do provided he earns it.

Although Ted may not have been in favour or higher taxes years ago that doesn't mean he can't change his mind.

Well since he has changed his mind he should have no problem handing over to the IRS that amount in which he believes should have been withheld from him all those years. If he has to sell a few properties, that's fine too. Ole Ted sounds like one of these celebrities that was a junky his whole life and suddenly finds God and starts preaching to the world about what you should and shouldn't do! Where I come from we call them hypocrites!

Wall Street is important because, believe it or not liberals, the wealthiest create jobs and expand the economic pie. Don't raise taxes...if these wonderful millionaires want to donate their millions let them, but leave the rest of America's successful to create jobs and help our crippled economy...more and more crippled by our huge, expensive, over reaching government which continuously seeks more and more

RamFla--

Check out the Federal Tax Rates. The more money you make, the higher the rate.

Besides, no one is stopping those millionaires from donating money to the government.

Ram, I'm an Independent who laughs at you liberals who talk this smack about people on the right. Get real! As George Clooney rightfully said on Bill Mahr's show, It's the left who talks the big game, but it's the right that he see's putting their money where their mouth is when he's out involved with humanitarian work. He scolded the left... and, the perception that it's the left doing so much work, when he said in reality he see's so many conservative org's doing unbelievable work. Watch that episode. Both sides in this country aregreat at "giving" around the world, but for some disingenuous reason, people like yourself seem to want to perpetuate that it's only "Libs" who are the compassionate ones. Hogwash!! Just spend a moment and look at what the Mormans do (particularly New Orleans/PBS Doc.) and all otherreligions. I may not personally care about religion, but I give these people their due, which is a helluv-a-lot more than people on the left do.

It's what is needed not what you want. Get a clue republican

anybody who wants to actually help PEOPLE should know that laundering money through the govt gives you the LEAST bang for your buck. I never thought I'd say this, but Ted is actually DOING the right thing; but as usual, the crap coming out of his mouth is just that.

How do we "take" the income?

Ted Turner is one to talk. He receives a quarter million dollars from the government every year in farm subsidies on the land he owns.

If Congress were to do the correct thing for the country considering the debt situation , they would stop the tax cuts for us all. I am not one of the crowd that would be impacted if Democrats got their way and increased taxes on wealthier people, but I don't think its right for the rest of us to try to push off the tax burdens to others and then call them greedy. I realize that it human nature to want others to pay our share of taxes, but we all need to take responsibility for the mess the country is in.

MM, there is a big difference between "selfish" (out for self) and "greedy" (out for self to the detriment of others).

If someone wants to keep what they earned it may be selfish, but for someone like you who and the rest of the Henny Penny's out there you might look in the mirror and ask yourself why you covet what others earned but you aren't willing to personally make the same sacrifices to get what you seek?

Warren Buffett already does just that - but his effective tax rate is STILL only 17.7% while his secretary's is 32.4%.

Did you read his op-ed piece in the NY Times on November 17?

Or happen to read Buffett's challenge to the Forbes 400 back in 2007? You know, the one where he said he'd give any one of them $1 million for their favorite charity if they could show their effective tax rate was higher than their secretary's???? (To date, not ONE of them has claimed that $1 million.)

Tom: You've talked about in your office, for example, you pay a much lower tax rate with all of your wealth than, say, a receptionist does.

Warren: That's exactly right, Tom. And I think the only way to do it is with specifics, and in our office, 15 people cooperated in a survey out of 18. I didn't make anybody do it. And my total taxes paid-- payroll taxes plus income tax-- and the payroll tax is an income tax. It's based on income.

Tom: Yeah.

Warren: Mine came to-- 17.7 percent. That was line 61 I think-- or, no, line 43-- is the percent of taxable income, plus payroll taxes, 17.7 percent. The average for the office was 32.9 percent. There wasn't anybody in the office from the receptionist on that paid as low a tax rate. And I have no tax planning. I don't have an accountant. I don't have tax shelters. I just follow what the U.S. Congress tells me to do.

Tom: Why do you think that there's not more outrage about that?

Warren: I don't think people understand it. For one thing, you'll see a lot of surveys that say the rich, the top one percent pay this much of the income tax. Now I think what people don't realize is that almost one third of the entire budget comes from payroll taxes. And payroll taxes on income, just like income taxes are taxes on income.

And the payroll tax is over $800 billion out of two and a trillion, or something like that. And people don't understand-- that the rich pay practically no payroll tax. I mean, I paid payroll tax last year on $90 odd thousand, whatever the number is. I paid income tax on $66 million. But my double income tax, one of 'em quits at $90,000. And the remaining $66 million does not get taxed with payroll tax. So, the person who makes $60,000 in our office gets taxed in full on the payroll tax, and taxed in full on the income tax. And all the statistics you read, particularly the one don't like taxes, well now, they totally ignore the payroll tax. And it's huge now.

Those screaming that the rich pay most taxes ignore the fact they don't pay pay Social Security or Medicare taxes on ANY unearned income (capital gains, dividends, etc.) They don't pay those taxes on earned income over $106,800, either. And they get all kinds of deductions that us working stiffs can't take off our taxes.

But they don't want to talk about that. Or the fact that over 60% of American corporations pay NO TAX, either. Why do people buy this BS?? Talk about class warfare.

The rich do not pay SS on income over 106 K or on capital gains and dividends. However, they also do not recieve SS payments for any salary over 106 K. If you want to raise the amount of SS taxes paid, it is only fair to raise the maximum payout amount.

But if someone isn't going to draw Social Security why should they pay into it? Everyone wants to scream and moan about the fact that people that make above a certain amount don't pay into Social Security but also seem to conveniently forget that the won't draw it either....because they didn't pay into it. They may get a small amount based on what they paid earlier in their lives; that's just the way it is. At some point in time Warren Buffet probably paid in but I guarantee he didnt on $66 million....and he won't draw anything.

Why should I pay my car insurance bill? I've never used it.

How can these people be smart enough to make so much money then be stupid enough to think giving more to govt is the best way to help people. That's nuts.

The problem isn't that Warren Buffets effective tax rate is 17%, it is that his secretary's is 32%. Like all government programs run by congress, the tax code that allows this is broken. No one should have to pay more than 20% of their income in taxes, but consider this: The minimum cost to feed a family of four is constant, so the percentage of income spent on food may be higher for lower income families. I realize, that this ignores luxury items, meals out etc, but is a strong reason not to add national sales taxes to the existing tax burden we face. To those who want to eliminate capitol gains tax breaks - do you own a house, will you sell it for a profit in your life time? It is not just the wealthy who benefit from capitol gains.

So what is it that you have not?

Congratulations Gary! You are one of the 2%... or wait a minute... You are not? Then why defend the indefensible since your taxes will not be touched either way, unless the taxes for the rich increase, then the GOP will make sure that yours will go up too!

Gary - your party just gave away $700 billion out of the US treasury (the cost of the tax cuts to the top 2% over the next 10 years.) Over the next 75 years, the cost of those cuts exceeds the shortfall in Social Security. And that's okay with you????

Who do you think is going to end up paying for all that?

Thank God for people who care about others -- they are the angels here on earth and they are the people who have made our country great -- the greedy people are just sad footnotes in our history -- the great people are the ones who look at their fellow man and realize that by lifting up those all around us, we lift ourselves up. It's kind of weird that so many of the greedy also tell us all what great Christians they are -- unless you are reading a version of the Bible I've never laid eyes on, then you all don't seem to be able to recognize a Christian value when you see one -- I guess unless the only true "God" you believe in is the all mighty buck (oh wait, now the GOP makes sense when their "God" is actually money---- ahhhhhh, I have seen the light now).

@RamFla: I am not part of the 2%, but I want to be. I don't think it is fair for the rich to pay more. They earned it and should decide what they do with it. If they want to give it to charity, the IRS, or keep it, then great. Why do we keep attacking them? Why should I get their money just because I don't make as much?

In an earlier post by you, you said:

If 2% of the population take 25% o the income, they should foot their fair share of taxes.

What is their fair share? 25%? According to http://www.taxfoundation.org/news/show/250.html, the top 1% receives 20% of total income but pays 38% of the income tax revenue. Is that not their fair share??

Just because a tax wont affect me doesnt make it right. That would be classic class warfare and that's what's split this country apart.

People, a tax cut is not a give away.

Tax credits are a give away.

I don't think it gets any clearer than that.

You know, I would actually pay more in taxes if I could direct what that money goes to....

Are some of the rich just finding a conscience now? Maybe, but Buffet has publicly promised to give 99% of his wealth away. Zuckerberg has promised to donate 50% and he's young. This is a political stunt by Buffet? how so? ALL the rich need to pay more in taxes or how will we close the deficit? Too many rich think only of themselves-- how patriotic!! More taxes on the middle class alone or reducing medicare and social security alone will not do it! Canada has had a balanced budget for 10 or the last 12 years! How do they do it? Are they smarter?

Philip, send it to a charity and you CAN direct it. And it will accomplish more.

Strange Post Beev. Yes they are a lot of loaded Dems, but guess what? They are also asking for the higher tax rates. So what is your point. They are willing to pay their share. Unlike the rich Republicans.

speaking of outsourcing, did you hear that our government is selling one of our uranium mines in wyoming to a russian company ??

This is also the same wacko who suggests we adopt China's one child policy (he himself has five). What a hypocrit.

What the hell are you smoking? You are not going to get anything from any republican for your brown nosing , apple polishing, a$$ kissing comment.