That Donald Trump tax-cut plan we discussed the other day? It's even worse than I thought. Of course it would cut the corporate tax rate from 35% to 15% and eliminate the Estate Tax entirely, when a strong corporate tax rate and a strong Estate Tax would help restrain the power of the rich to run roughshod over the rest of us. But the only two low- and middle-class income brackets that would see a tax decrease are the ones from $9,275 to $37,650 (the rate would fall from 15% to 12%) and $91,150 to $112,500 (28% to 25%). Income between $0 and $9,275 would actually see a tax hike, from 10% to 12%, and income between $112,500 and $190,150 would see an even more substantial tax hike, from 28% to 33%. And now for the part Mr. Trump really doesn't want to highlight: income over $415,050 would see a massive seven-point tax cut, and, as you know, each percentage point represents more money the higher up the income ladder you go, such that a single person with no children making exactly $37,650 would net about $665.75 from Mr. Trump's proposal, whereas a CEO with no children making $10,000,000 would net over $668,000. And while the first person would spend that money in the real economy, and thus stimulate the real economy, the latter would hoard it -- after all, a CEO making over 250 times what you make doesn't need 250 times the food, 250 times the heat, or 250 times the living space, and has no incentive to invest the money to create jobs, since so little bankster investment even has anything to do with job-creation anymore. Now, I approve of cutting taxes for incomes at the low end, but we need to tax millionaire income the way we did during the Eisenhower years (i.e., at about 91%) -- again, to prevent the rich from running roughshod over the rest of us. And Trump supporters know this better than the media would have you believe, since over half of them supported higher taxes for the rich in an October poll, and if a majority of Trump supporters feel that way, you can bet an even bigger majority of the rest of us feel that way, too. By the way, please resist the urge to pipe in that the folks at the higher end "deserve it more" -- I mean, why would you want to be an elitist? Use the tools in the upper left-hand corner to call your Reps and Senators about this matter, and use this email tool provided by Americans for Tax Fairness to contact Mr. Trump directly. He doesn't care what you think, but we should tell him anyway.
Meanwhile, I shouldn't have to spend any time on moronic crap like this, but a Washington state legislator says he's putting together a bill that would crack down on protestors who "obstruct() economic activity," which he calls "economic terrorism." One could interpret that a bit broadly, to say the least, since pretty much anyone can claim that anything impedes their "economic activity." Hell, I could argue that stupid legislators impede my economic activity! As it happens, I don't actually think protests that make folks late getting home from work is a particularly good way to win hearts and minds (though I feel compelled to note that the whole protestors-killed-a-dad-in-an-ambulance story is a big fat lie that seems to get recycled every time people take to the streets), but I'm even less of a fan of morons who call everything they don't like "terrorism." If Mr. Ericksen is really "terrorized" by protests that block up highways at rush hour, he can always see a therapist. Of course he's no dummy, so he also says his bill will go after "the wealthy donors" who fund these protests, by which he presumably does not mean the corporate think-tanks that made the Tea Party possible, or the wealthy donors who routinely ply him with drinks and golf. The punchline? Plenty of laws already make it illegal to put people's lives and property in danger, and creating more of them just to silence protestors sure sounds like big government. So let's all call this idiot's office at (360)786-7682.
Finally, if you've missed previous opportunities to tell Malawi's government to protect folks with albinism from being killed, then Amnesty International still helps you do that. Some background: apparently some folks in Malawi and Mozambique believe that albino bones and organs bring wealth and good luck when used in charms and potions, and some folks even believe albino bones have gold in them. Malawi has about 7,000 albinos, meaning it has around 7,000 people who could disappear at any moment and never return. If you know this is going on, of course, you have a duty as a civilized person to help try to stop it -- I can't imagine even our furthest-right extremist claiming that the right to "religious liberty" includes a "right" to other folks' death and dismemberment. Certainly someone's "right" to use albino body parts in a religious ceremony doesn't trump anyone's right to live and pursue happiness. And good folks should not be made to live in fear of abduction or murder, nor should they be made to move their families around the country out of fear of abduction or murder. That, good folks, is not freedom, and a government that can't protect the rights of all its citizens has failed in its duty to its people. Thankfully, we can employ the Big Stick of Bad PR to induce governments to do the job with which their citizens have tasked them.
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