EFFORT TO SLASH RICH PEOPLE’S TAXES MARCHES ON: A new analysis released this week finds that a full THIRD of middle-class families would see their taxes INCREASE under the House GOP’s tax cut proposal. The Senate GOP’s version, released on Thursday, hardly improves matters. It “would raise taxes on millions of middle-class families, according to a preliminary New York Times analysis. The plan would also disproportionately benefit high earners and corporations.” Mitch McConnell was forced to acknowledge that, yes, the GOP’s “middle-class tax cut” will actually raise taxes on some middle-class families. What’s more, the Senate bill does not solve the fundamental problem that it is not passable under the Senate’s budget reconciliation rules, which seems sort of like a big problem.
So why is the GOP pressing forward with such a political shit sandwich? Perhaps because the proposals are designed to directly benefit Trump and his family -- and many thousands of other billionaires -- through at least five specific measures. Let’s start with the two obvious ones: The plan eliminates the estate tax, which right now only applies to the top 0.1% of the population (individuals with $5.5 million or couples with $11 million). “If [Trump] were really worth the $10 billion-plus that he claimed during the campaign, which I’m sure he’s not, it would save his heirs more than $4 billion.” FOUR BILLION DOLLARS. Second, we have the elimination of the Alternative Minimum Tax, which ensures that rich people pay at least some taxes. The only tax return we have of Trump’s, from 2005, shows that he would have saved $31 million (and paid only $7 million) if the AMT were eliminated. Third is the cut on income from pass-through entities, like LLCs, which is how the Trump Organization is structured. “[G]iven that [Trump] seems to have stakes in at least 500 pass-through entities, it looks like reducing his rate to 25 percent from 39.6 percent would save him a ton of money.” The final two are smaller but revealing in their brazen commitment to carve out special benefits for Trump. First, the plan preserves a current “conservation easement” subsidy that allows golf club owners to rake in millions just for keeping their golf courses. The Obama administration sought to eliminate this subsidy, but apparently the GOP couldn’t find space -- among the elimination of tax benefits for adoptive families, for veterans, and for those with rare diseases among others -- to cut this specific subsidy in their “reform” package. And then there’s this: “The Republican plan bars most businesses from deducting interest payments from their tax bills — but preserves that privilege for commercial real estate.” So golf club owners and commercial real estate developers get special tax benefits -- because this is a middle-class tax cut, obvi. But you have to credit the GOP: They are not even trying to conceal their reasons for pushing this bill: Lindsey Graham told a reporter that, among other bad consequences of failing to pass the tax cut bill, “financial contributions will stop.” And Rep. Chris Collins told reporters, "My donors are basically saying, 'Get it done or don't ever call me again.’” White House economic advisor Gary Cohn was just as blunt: “The most excited group out there are big CEOs, about our tax plan.”
TRUMP’S SUCCESSFUL ASSAULT ON THE JUDICIARY: The Times reports: “Republicans are systematically filling appellate seats they held open during President Barack Obama’s final two years in office with a particularly conservative group of judges with life tenure.” This is the kind of story (like any story about climate change) that fills me with such fear and dread that I would rather just ignore it -- and that’s why I’m quoting from only the first two paragraphs. Trump has already appointed 8 appellate judges, “the most this early in a presidency since Richard M. Nixon.” What’s more, “[o]f Mr. Trump’s 18 appellate nominees so far, 14 are men and 16 are white.” So that’s just awesome. Even more awesome is soon-to-be-judge Brett Talley, a guy who has been practicing law for THREE YEARS, whose claim to fame is as a right-wing blogger, and who has never argued a motion, let alone tried a case, in federal court. He has been nominated to be a district court judge -- i.e., a trial court judge -- and his nomination was unanimously approved by every Republican on the Senate judiciary committee. If he has no actual relevant experience, they must have been drawn to his incisive judicial mind, right? “In 2013, he wrote on his blog that armed revolution was an important defense against tyrannical government. . . . In 2013, about a month after a gunman killed 20 children at an elementary school in Newtown, Conn., Mr. Talley on his blog pledged his total support to the National Rifle Association, ‘financially, politically and intellectually.’” So how did Talley possibly get on the list to be a nominee? Well, his current job is at the DOJ -- in the office that selects Trump’s judicial candidates.
ROY MOORE WAS AN AWFUL MAN BEFORE THIS WEEK: This week, the Washington Post published an extensive report, with 30 sources and four women speaking on the record, alleging that Alabama Senate candidate and all around cretin Roy Moore sexually assaulted a 14-year-old and “dated” other teenagers when he was a District Attorney in his 30s. Following the story, a former colleague of Moore’s, who worked with him in the DA’s office, said, “It was common knowledge that Roy dated high school girls, everyone we knew thought it was weird. We wondered why someone his age would hang out at high school football games and the mall.” Predictably, Moore’s Republican colleagues have been slow to fully denounce him. Most of them have said that he should step aside from the race “if the allegations are true.” It is unclear what proof these people are looking for, if the word of four women who do not know each other and have literally nothing to gain by coming forward is insufficient. And this comes after Fox News and its allies spent weeks not only rightfully covering the Weinstein story but insisting that it was somehow a Democratic scandal because he had giving money to Democrats. The Washington Post’s Amy Argetsinger asks: “Here's what I don't get: Even if your logic is purely partisan and your politics purely tribal, denouncing Weinstein while defending Roy Moore means you're basically taking the word of the famous Hollywood women but not the small-town Republican women.” Jamelle Bouie exposes the “if true” dodge for what it is: “[I]f true defers the issue to Moore himself. Either he makes it true by acknowledging and affirming the allegations, or he doesn’t, in which case those Republicans won’t have to act. If true renders the question inert. If true is moral cowardice.”
It’s true that some Republicans have backed away from Moore in the wake of these revelations this week. But let’s remember that Moore was a truly despicable man supremely unqualified for the Senate well before this week. First, he made his name by defying court orders as a judge, contravening court orders to put up a statute of the 10 Commandments outside his office and, later, refusing to allow same-sex marriage in Alabama even after the Supreme Court had ruled that such refusals violate the Constitution. He is an anti-Muslim bigot: He declared that Muslims should not be permitted to serve in the U.S. Congress; he called Islam a “false religion;” and he falsely claimed that parts of the United States are ruled by sharia law. He said that homosexuality is an “inherent evil” and argued that it should be illegal. He has suggested that 9/11 was a result of God’s anger at homosexuality and abortion. That the GOP embraced this man at all is unbelievable; that so many are standing by him now (including this truly deranged woman on Fox) is disgusting.
MUELLER UPDATE: Robert Mueller is now investigating whether the United States national security advisor was secretly plotting to kidnap an American resident and render him to a foreign government in exchange for millions of dollars. Yep. From the WSJ: “Under the alleged proposal, Mr. Flynn and his son, Michael Flynn Jr., were to be paid as much as $15 million for delivering Fethullah Gulen to the Turkish government, according to people with knowledge of discussions Mr. Flynn had with Turkish representatives.” Flynn met with Turkish government officials in December 2016, after he had been publicly named as the incoming national security advisor, to discuss the kidnapping. Perhaps this has something to do with reports that Mueller already has enough evidence to indict Flynn?
GOOD NEWS: “A government report from last week showed that 601,462 people had enrolled in the Affordable Care Act’s individual marketplaces during the first four days of open enrollment, up 79 percent from the same period a year ago. 23 percent of those customers are new to the marketplace.”
GOOD POINT: This weekend, while overseas, Trump appeared to take Russia’s side over the “political hacks” in the American intelligence agencies who say that Russia intentionally interfered in the 2016 election, insisting sympathetically that Putin is “insulted” by the claim. After the intelligence community restated its conclusion that, of course, Russia did interfere in the election, Trump tried to back off slightly -- but he still refused to admit Russia’s role in the election, and then argued in favor of removing sanctions from Russia (he still has not imposed the Congressionally-mandated sanctions from this fall, I believe) in the hope of being better friends with the Kremlin. Watching all of this, Josh Marshall reacted on Twitter: “The country has been in a sort of fog for a year. Proving collusion 18 months ago is kind of beside the point. We’re watching it in real time. President Putin has a tight hold over the President. He is actively working to block an understanding of what happened in 2016 and prevent what will happen in 2018. This isn’t hyperbole. Have you even seen a business man asked about the mobster who owns him? It’s very similar. A foreign adversary actively worked to elect a candidate. He got elected and has consistently done everything possible to support and defend the foreign adversary. He takes the foreign adversary’s side against his own govt. There’s no other explanation for what we see beside the bad explanation. It’s like an active crime scene.”
Endorsements:
- Another must-read from Lindy West. Her ability to craft sentences that I want to shout out an open window continues to amaze me.
- Jia Tolentino revisits the story of the SIXTEEN women (I didn’t even remember it was that many) accusing Trump ON THE RECORD of sexual misconduct, harassment, and rape -- and our shameful failure to listen to them.
- My colleague Ilann Maazel’s idea of a Save America Act, which should include barring outside presidential income, mandating disclosure of tax returns, and, oh, you know, just a small thing barring a president from launching a nuclear first strike on his own.
No comments:
Post a Comment