Re: CBO Proejcts Trump Trillion Dollar Deficits to Continue Indefinitely
The giving of stock is taxable. Usually they are given stock options. Then the difference between the option price and the sold price is taxable. The giving of stock does not circumvent taxable income.
Facts don't lie or have an agenda. Facts are just facts
"God did it" is not an argument. It is an excuse for intellectual laziness.
If your viewpoint has merits and facts to back it up why would you have to lie?
Let me guess. This is pure spin. Words like "admitted" and "withholding" and "acknowledgment" and "revelation" in your title as well, are there to insinuate there's something wrong with whatever Trump did, while I'd bet what they actually said was something completely straightforward and innocent. Of course whatever he did was the right thing to do but you'll never get that information from such a description.
JonF quoted from RawStory which was citing the CNN story. A reading of CNN's story (Trump administration reveals it's blocking dozens of emails about Ukraine aid freeze, including President's role - CNNPolitics) makes it appear that RawStory made a couple minor errors. It wasn't Trump lawyers who made the disclosure, unless you interpret "Trump lawyers" very loosely. It was actually Department of Justice lawyers. And CNN didn't use the word "admitted" but "revealed," which perhaps aren't sufficiently close in meaning for your taste. The story opens like this:
quote:Washington (CNN)The Department of Justice revealed in a court filing late Friday that it has two dozen emails related to President Donald Trump's involvement in the withholding of millions in security assistance to Ukraine -- a disclosure that came just hours after the Senate voted against subpoenaing additional documents and witnesses in Trump's impeachment trial, paving the way for his acquittal.
The filing, released near midnight Friday, marks the first official acknowledgment from the Trump administration that emails about the President's thinking related to the aid exist, and that he was directly involved in asking about and deciding on the aid as early as June. The administration is still blocking those emails from the public and has successfully kept them from Congress.
I looked for the text of the DOJ filing but was unable to find it online. If I knew what court maybe I could find it, but the articles don't say. But the Washington Post in https://www.washingtonpost.com/...03-2b077c436617_story.html quotes from the filing:
quote:Heather Walsh, an OMB lawyer, wrote that of the 111 redacted emails in the lawsuit, 24 are protected by presidential privilege.
Specifically, the documents in this category are emails that reflect communications by either the President, the Vice President, or the President’s immediate advisors regarding Presidential decision-making about the scope, duration, and purpose of the hold on military assistance to Ukraine, Walsh wrote.
There you have it, straight from the court filing itself. It says there are 24 emails about the hold on Ukraine security assistance that the DoJ argues should not be made public because of presidential privilege. The emails are from back in June, a month before Trump's July 25th phone call with Zelensky. One has a feeling that if the emails confirmed that Trump was concerned about Ukrainian corruption and not investigations of Democrats and the Bidens that they wouldn't be trying to keep them secret.
... regarding Presidential decision-making about the scope, duration, and purpose of the hold on military assistance to Ukraine, Walsh wrote.
There it is, without the spin, thank you. But now it would be nice if "the scope, cdruation and purpose of the hold" were made known. Whatever the reasons we on the right know it was all perfectly correct and legal, and that only the left, -- a word you may not allow me to use? -- or the Democrats, try to make a criminal offense out of it. Which is all they've done for three years now and will no doubt continue to do for years to come, just making one innocent act after another into something criminal. There ought to be a law against this so we could send all the Democrats to prison or take away their outrageously extravagant salaries.
Re: Heritage Foundation Senior Analyst on the deficit and Natoinal Debt
Prompted by your post to investigate further, I just learned that the national debt is not just the sum of the federal deficits over the years. For instance, the national debt rose from $21.516 trillion at the end of 2018 to $22.719 trillion at the end of 2019, an increase of $1.203 trillion. The natural assumption would be that the federal deficit for 2019 was $1.203 trillion, but one would be wrong. The 2019 deficit was only $0.984 trillion, $0.219 trillion less than the increase in our national debt. What accounts for the difference?
The answer is mandatory spending. Some types of mandatory spending are not included in the annual deficit but are included in the national debt, such as Social Security.
I have no difficulty understanding that. I am not a lawyer.
All credit to you then, and Theodoric, too. I did give it the old college try.
I'm giving it another try now, and I think I may understand (c). The "declarant" is not the person testifying. The person testifying is "a party offers in evidence," though I guess they use that phrasing so that it also includes a lawyer introducing an affidavit or a letter or email or text and such things. If I've got that right then I think I've got it.
But then why does (c.1) say "testifying?" Why shouldn't it exclude not only the declarant's testimony at trial or hearing but also any of their affidavits, letters, emails, texts, etc., that were offered into evidence?
I'm reminded of calling one of our corporate lawyers (back when I was working) about the language in a contract. I explained why the statement was highly ambiguous about the required order of events, and he told me that it didn't matter, that the court was completely familiar with these kinds of situations and knew exactly what the passage meant, even if it was very imprecise.
I despair of ever understanding (d), but if you and Theodoric again assert how easy it is I'll give that part another try, too.
Re: Heritage Foundation Senior Analyst on the deficit and Natoinal Debt
dwise1 writes:
She repeats the same sick and demented pattern over and over and over and f*cking over again. She spouts her liies. Everybody corrects her and she ignores them and just repeats her liies. When she does "engage", she does so by lying about what we tell her, citing sources who are lying, citing valid sources whom she then misrepresents and lies about, and/or by spouting a new set of liies. Then when she finally finds her position untenable, she concocts some lame excuse to run away, including her eyesight (which just conveniently happens to go out at that point), somebody looked at her wrong so now she's too upset, she arbitrarily decides to ignore the facts because of some dreamed up offense, whatever other lie she can dream up as an excuse. Then later she comes back with the same old liies and starts the cycle all over again. And she does it all deliberately!
I mostly endorse this description of Faith's pattern of behavior, which is pretty close to what I would have said myself. These are mostly DWise1's words, just toned down a bit:
quote:She repeats the same fact free pattern over and over and over and over again. Much of what she says has no factual basis. Everybody corrects her and she ignores them and just repeats her misrepresentations and accusations. When she does "engage", she does so by misrepresenting what we tell her, citing sources who have no established record of reliability, citing valid sources whom she then misrepresents, and/or by spouting a new set of misrepresentations and accusations. Then when she finally finds her position untenable, she concocts some lame excuse to run away, including her eyesight (which just conveniently happens to go out at that point), somebody looked at her wrong so now she's too upset, she arbitrarily decides to ignore the facts because of some dreamed up offense, or whatever other excuse she can dream up. Then later she comes back with the same old misrepresentations and accusations and starts the cycle all over again.
Over the course of nearly twenty years the behavior has worsened. Attempts to connect ideas to facts have lessened and lessened to the point of extinction. Through all this moderation has never found approaches that led to sustained improvement, and some attempts at moderation have received strong expressions of disapproval by members. Suffice to say that Faith's style of debate is the antithesis of what I envisioned when I started the site.
Re: Paying down the National Debt, improving society
RAZD writes:
So many corporations used their tax bounty to increase bonuses, pay down debt, buy back stock, upgrade or replace aging equipment, etc. Most did not employ more workers.
Exactly, whereas higher taxes mean they allocate more to lower their taxable value, and THAT creates jobs or increases payroll.
Don't know what it means to "lower their taxable value." Do you mean lower the amount they pay in taxes?
Curiously it seems to me that if the economy depends on some people being unemployed there is something amiss in the system.
0% unemployment isn't achievable because people lose or leave jobs and it takes time to find another, and there is technological change, economic change (decline of steel industry and coal mining), personal situations, etc.
And IF having people unemployed is of value to the economy then they should be compensated.
I've never seen it argued that unemployment is of value to the economy.
There are also other considerations: earning money isn't the end-all be-all of life, where does capitalism provide for arts and crafts? The idea that a pursuit is of no value unless it makes money, especially enough to live on, seems stunted, narrow minded, and drab.
I'm reminded of the joke, "Under a communist system the Detroit Lions would win the Super Bowl every 16 years" (pick your sport and team), but I understand your point.
Not just unemployment but under-employment as well, where jobs worked are insufficient for living and so these workers qualify for assistance. A living wage requirement would eliminate the need for such assistance for most of the people in the system.
Should every job pay a living wage? When you and I were kids there was such a thing as paperboys. There were tons of low paying jobs filled by teenagers.
But I also like Yang's basic income, as it allows artists and musicians, dancers, academicians, scientists, etc to pursue their crafts and in the process brighten the lives of everyone. The return is a more complete population.
Public support of art and culture is important. It was once a higher priority than it is today.
Re: Heritage Foundation Senior Analyst on the deficit and Natoinal Debt
She repeats the same sick and demented pattern over and over and over and f*cking over again. She spouts her liies. Everybody corrects her and she ignores them and just repeats her liies.
I don't know if its a lie in a traditional sense more than it is cognitive dissonance. If anything, she's lying to herself and tries to convince herself more than she is trying to convince you. It is possible to be sincere while also being sincerely wrong (inaccurate). This is also pretty typical behavior for her, which shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone here.
"Reason obeys itself; and ignorance submits to whatever is dictated to it" -- Thomas Paine
This is incorrect, but I'm curious where you found this bit of misinformation.
It appears you are correct. I cannot find anything that substantiates that it was first designed to be an opt-in program. I honestly have no idea where I heard that, but it must have been at least ten years ago and I failed to fact check it. Rookie mistake
"Reason obeys itself; and ignorance submits to whatever is dictated to it" -- Thomas Paine
She repeats the same sick and demented pattern over and over and over
Yes she does. I do the same thing.
No you do not. No one's pattern here except Faith's can be characterized as "sick and demented." I would have chosen other words, like antagonistically passive-aggressive (ignoring most things factual, especially well researched posts that take much time and effort to compose), antagonistically aggressive (explicitly denying most things factual), insulting, misrepresentative, and fact-free.
Some of us are more adaptable in our conversations than are others. I personally see Faith improving in some areas, but I note your reaction.
I see nothing in Faith's posts over the past few years that doesn't reflect a consistent and continuous retreat from fact.
When she does "engage", she does so by lying about what we tell her, citing sources who are lying, citing valid sources whom she then misrepresents and lies about, and/or by spouting a new set of liies.
Again, its all about interpretation. Have you ever heard the advice to "put yourself in the other guys shoes"? Think about what she is trying to defend, whether or not she fully understands it, and how she views her opponents here at the Forum and in conversations. I feel that many of us (myself included) get stuck in patterns and do not critically think about our positions. This leads to repetition.
I see the problem as one side wants to engage with the facts and the other side does not. If you doubt this go back through Faith's last fifty posts and find where she discussed or introduced any facts.
Then when she finally finds her position untenable, she concocts some lame excuse to run away, including her eyesight (which just conveniently happens to go out at that point), somebody looked at her wrong so now she's too upset, she arbitrarily decides to ignore the facts...
See, now this is where you get too personal. It is no lie that her eyesight is bad, and this is a personal attack. Love your enemies and adversaries. Heck, I even prayed for that darn shoplifter who caused my hackles to rise. It's not easy, but is it not basic good advice?
It seems a very accurate description to me, especially the eyesight thing. I have commented consistently over at least the last decade how conveniently timed her attacks of visual impairment and indignation are.
It doesn't seem to bother you, or even occur to you, that you might be expressing a biased partisan point of view against me. I'll spare you. I'm leaving.
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