The Unofficial *Official* Politics Thread

. Give me a voucher that gives me the same rights as Medicare, minus the deductible, plus free drugs and close the money sucking monster that is the VA. We can start balancing the budget.

!


I was wondering this for a long time. I honestly bet that if they closed the med side of VA and let the system go like medicare that it would almost be a wash as far a cost and Vets get better/faster care by people who care.
 
I was wondering this for a long time. I honestly bet that if they closed the med side of VA and let the system go like medicare that it would almost be a wash as far a cost and Vets get better/faster care by people who care.

I doubt it would be a wash. The savings would be Trumpian Huge. The VA is huge. It does a lot of things it should not do. It has nursing schools and teaching hospitals. I does research (Vets are good test subjects). They need to just be in the business of helping Vets. Too much money and too many fingers in the pies. The tow floors above where the doctors are at most VA hospitals are purely admin people. Got to remember they don`t have to bill most patients. They need to cut the federal employee glut (just like all Fed government). I agree with Trumps hiring freeze, with exemptions. The hiring freeze on Vets Affairs was cruel, but it won`t hurt hospitals much because they couldn`t fill the positions anyway. Obama gave VA hospital a ton of new spaces for psychiatric doctors, the problems is there are so few even in the private sector you could offer a million dollars and still not fill all of the open positions. 20 Veterans die every day by suicide! If we could cut that in half it would still be a national shame. For awhile you could call the suicide hotline and just get a prerecorded message. Now they say they are getting 99% of the calls. It`s a start.
 
Thoughts on Trump`s new tax plan? Sounds great to me, but sounds way too good to be true or actually work. Cutting the deficit by lowering taxes and raising defense spending? The money has to come from tariffs and other taxes. I would like to see some real numbers. This will raise Trump`s popularity poll numbers, but if it fails he will have another loss on his record.

For the record my views are that there are too many regressive taxes that disproportionately affect the poor. Examples are taxes on gas and food. Tax luxury items such as private jets and yachts higher so that the poor are not hurt.
 
Thoughts on Trump`s new tax plan? Sounds great to me, but sounds way too good to be true or actually work. Cutting the deficit by lowering taxes and raising defense spending? The money has to come from tariffs and other taxes. I would like to see some real numbers. This will raise Trump`s popularity poll numbers, but if it fails he will have another loss on his record.

For the record my views are that there are too many regressive taxes that disproportionately affect the poor. Examples are taxes on gas and food. Tax luxury items such as private jets and yachts higher so that the poor are not hurt.


Well..... At least you are only tying it to raising military spending. The media is spinning it as "ooohhhhh this is terrible, tax decrease will increase the defecit.."
Instead of realizing the government is so heavily spending. Besides military there are a few other things that need more $$$, but 90% of the government spending could have serious cuts.

If it spurs businesses to come back to the US to do manufacturing, R&D, etc (actually make things) The increased revenue for both business and employess will increase the tax base.
 
"IF" is a small word with big implications. There are many federal programs and jobs that could be cut. He could start with the Post Office. The deficit is one of those thing that is truly so huuuuge that it doesn`t concern me. I had an economics professor, way back, that said the deficit was meaningless and the Fed could control the value of money. It really does not have much effect on our daily lives.

I doubt if if we ever see jobs in manufacturing return like in the 60`s. Our best export is technology. We should sell N. Korea some missle guidance systems.lol. Toshiba will probably steal the technology and sell it anyway.
 
"IF" is a small word with big implications. There are many federal programs and jobs that could be cut. He could start with the Post Office. The deficit is one of those thing that is truly so huuuuge that it doesn`t concern me. I had an economics professor, way back, that said the deficit was meaningless and the Fed could control the value of money. It really does not have much effect on our daily lives.

I doubt if if we ever see jobs in manufacturing return like in the 60`s. Our best export is technology. We should sell N. Korea some missle guidance systems.lol. Toshiba will probably steal the technology and sell it anyway.

Dunno. IF he can make it attractive enough for companies to come back..... We could make stuff again.

Government doesn`t create jobs, just a good business environment, so business can creat jobs.
 
By cutting corporate income tax he would be making it very attractive. Adding tariffs to imported goods also would help. It wouldn`t happen overnight and I dont know if I can afford a washing machine made by Unionized employees. Americans are used to cheap stuff, although I would rather buy quality once than cheap three times.
 
By cutting corporate income tax he would be making it very attractive. Adding tariffs to imported goods also would help. It wouldn`t happen overnight and I dont know if I can afford a washing machine made by Unionized employees. Americans are used to cheap stuff, although I would rather buy quality once than cheap three times.

By cutting the taxes he will at least put us back in competition with other countries.
 
The bigger the Company the more equipped they are to avoid taxes that are higher than other ares in our country or across the globe. Lowering the corporate tax rate may bring in a lot more revenue thats currently being hidden of shore. Yes the tax rate being lowered will mean a tiny bit less revenue from small businesses but really they dont pay corporate profit taxes because if its a private company the owners take the profits home as year end bonuses and pay 30-40 percent income tax rates. The only Company`s that really pay corporate taxes on profits are publicly trade company`s and they are usually large enough to make it worth while to play the game of dodging taxes by having fake headquarters game.

On site at Apple’s famous Irish ‘headquarters’ | Fortune.com

https://www.wired.com/2016/08/apple-rest-silicon-valley-avoids-tax-man/

https://phys.org/news/2016-08-ghost-hq-irish-apple-tax.html

7 Corporate Giants Accused of Evading Billions in Taxes | Fortune.com
 
If there is no spending reduction, the tax cuts will just blow the deficit. If you cut spending you are taking out more of the economy and adding back in another way. In the global economy, corporate tax cuts will not always be better for US workers. They will invest in a new plant in Mexico or China. You cannot get a lot of economics agreeing that tax cuts will pay for themselves... in the last tax cuts (Bush, Obama), the data I saw said they did not.

Look at the Carrier jobs. Some jobs were saved, but many at Carrier and related companies jobs are still going to Mexico. The $17 hr worker is being replaced by a worker making a lot less.

Businesses work on the what have you do done lately meaning they are chasing cost every quarter so there is a decision constantly to reduce costs.

I would get reduce the amount employers to pay social security taxes and put more of the burden on the workers. If we had a different health care system, companies would not foot the bill for that too. These are the less talked about costs that companies pay and what goes into the formula for outsourcing. A company tax rate is still not really a major variable in the decision at companies I have seen when outsourcing jobs unless tied directly. States give tax breaks but many require job requirements. Some of these companies do not pay taxes so how is a cut going to affect them unless the breaks disappear.

It will be a lobbyist heyday.
 
Democrats say they now know exactly why Clinton lost




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Unless I read it wrong, they fired him from one position and moved him to a non-supervisory position??? WTF??? They let the director at my local VA resign and retire instead of being fired for gross negligence and the death of many veterans. I just don`t understand it. Fire them, break their legs, and then hang them. Maybe a little extreme, maybe. Killing Veterans should be a bad thing, but all I see is people getting different jobs within the VA system.

On another note, I had an MRI on my back Saturday. This was a follow up to a visit I had in early January! Almost 5 months to schedule an MRI that the VA had said was Urgent. What a bad joke. Oh, it took a year and a half of screaming to get the first visit to the doctor. So two years and still nothing has been done. I`m through with the VA.
 
Unless I read it wrong, they fired him from one position and moved him to a non-supervisory position??? WTF??? They let the director at my local VA resign and retire instead of being fired for gross negligence and the death of many veterans. I just don`t understand it. Fire them, break their legs, and then hang them. Maybe a little extreme, maybe. Killing Veterans should be a bad thing, but all I see is people getting different jobs within the VA system.

On another note, I had an MRI on my back Saturday. This was a follow up to a visit I had in early January! Almost 5 months to schedule an MRI that the VA had said was Urgent. What a bad joke. Oh, it took a year and a half of screaming to get the first visit to the doctor. So two years and still nothing has been done. I`m through with the VA.

Hopefully the exec order Trump signed will make your life easier.
 
Unless I read it wrong, they fired him from one position and moved him to a non-supervisory position??? WTF??? They let the director at my local VA resign and retire instead of being fired for gross negligence and the death of many veterans. I just don`t understand it. Fire them, break their legs, and then hang them. Maybe a little extreme, maybe. Killing Veterans should be a bad thing, but all I see is people getting different jobs within the VA system.

On another note, I had an MRI on my back Saturday. This was a follow up to a visit I had in early January! Almost 5 months to schedule an MRI that the VA had said was Urgent. What a bad joke. Oh, it took a year and a half of screaming to get the first visit to the doctor. So two years and still nothing has been done. I`m through with the VA.

It really pisses me off that they don`t treat you guys far better than this. Sign your soul over to the defense of this country and then get hung out to dry when you get back home. It`s so wrong.
 
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