If Obama Wins, we lose...right away

[Merry]

From Gene Herzog...


This is something you should be
aware of so you don't get blind-sided.
This is really going to catch a lot
of families off guard. It should
make you worry.

Proposed changes in taxes after 2008 General election:


CAPITAL GAINS TAX

MCCAIN
0% on home sales up to $500,000
per home (couples) McCain does not
propose any change in existing
home sales income tax.

OBAMA
28% on profit from ALL home sales

How does this affect you?
If you sell your home and make a profit, you
will pay 28% of your gain on taxes.
If you are heading toward retirement
and would like to down-size your
home or move into a retirement
community, 28% of the money you
make from your home will go to taxes. This
proposal will adversely affect the
e lderly who are counting on the income
from their homes as part of their retirement income.

DIVIDEND TAX

MCCAIN 15% (no change)&nbs p;

OBAMA 39.6%

How will this affect you?
If you have any money invested in stock
market, IRA, mutual funds,
college funds, life insurance, retirement
accounts, or anything that pays
or reinvests dividends, you will now
be paying nearly 4 0% of the money
earned on taxes if Oba ma become president.
The experts predict that 'higher
tax rates on dividends and capital gains
would crash the stock market yet
do absolutely nothing to cut the deficit.

INCOME TAX

MCCAIN (no changes)

Single making 30K - tax $4,500
S ingle making 50K - tax $12,500
Single making 75K - tax $18,750
Married making 60K- tax $9,000
Married making 75K - tax $18,750
Married making 125K - tax $31,250

OBAMA
(reversion to pre-Bush tax cuts)
Single making 30K - tax $8,400
Single making 50K - tax $14,000
Single making 75K - tax $23,250
Married making 60K - tax $16,800
Married making 75K - tax $21,000
Married making 125K - tax $38,750


Under Obama your taxes will
more than double!
How does this affect you? No explanation
needed. This is pretty
straight forward.

INHERITANCE TAX

MCCAIN 0% (No change, Bush repealed this tax)

OBAMA Restore the inheritance tax

How does this affect you? Many families
have lost businesses,
farms and ranches, and homes
that have
been in their families
for generations because they could not
afford the inheritance tax.
Those willing their assets to loved
ones will not only lose them to< BR>these taxes.

NEW TAXES BEING PROPOSED BY OBAMA

* New government taxes proposed on< /SPAN>
homes that are more than
2400 square feet

* New gasoline taxes (as if
gas weren't high enough already)

* New taxes on natural resources
consumption (heating
gas, water, electricity)

* New taxes on retirement accounts
and last but not least....

* New taxes to pay for socialized medicine
so w e can receive the same
level of medical care as other
third-world countries!!!

[Tamera]

Thanks for the update, Merry. I'm not that fond of McCain. But Obama scares me to the core.

[righter1]

The tax issues are one of the reasons I've grudgingly decided to vote for McCain. There's others, other than the fact that my heart won't allow me to go third party.

It might be interesting to note that this little item:

* New gasoline taxes (as if
gas weren't high enough already)

is already being proposed by Democrats in Congress. I heard about it likely on Rush Limbaugh, but possibly Sean Hannity. You should definitely call your local radio stations, write your newspaper, tell your friends after you learn more about it and ask why, when gas prices are at record highs, the Dems want to raise the cost even more instead of going through with a tax holiday as McCain proposed?

Also, while I'm on the topic, I heard recently that there are oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico that are still offline after Hurricane Katrina because the Fed. Gov't (read: Democrats/greeners) won't give the companies the necessary permits to fix their rigs! :eek: Now, this one I'm not certain of the source, and it may be unsubstantiated, but if you're in Texas/Louisiana area and know any oil workers that work out on some of these rigs, you might ask around to see if it's true.

I shall get off my soapbox now.

[ProfessorAlan]

I don't see one party as offering salvation (economic or otherwise), so I can't really see the other one as a disaster. It's not like things are awesome right now .....

[kshsj777]

This doesn't sound good AT ALL.

Maybe I should "hold my nose" and vote for McCain. Still don't like this lesser of two evils thing.

[lynnmosher]

Watch out, Kellie. I got fussed at for saying "lesser of two evils"! Merry, I knew Obama's tax reform plans were outrageous but I had never seen it laid out like this. Thanks!

[Gravity]

On the same subject of good and bad presidential candidates, a friend of mine sent me this. Although long since discharged and processed out, back in the day he was in the Special Forces (101st Airborne Rangers, HHC Bttn, the "Headhunters"), and he still has friends from different branches of the service fighting terrorism around the world. The following is an email he sent me from a buddy, a Marine in Afghanistan. It's harsh, so be forewarned. But it ought to be posted everywhere.

This is from a Reconnaissance Marine currently in Afghanistan. He is worthy of our thoughts and prayers as are all of our military deployed in some God-forsaken place:
*****************
It's freezing here. I'm sitting on hard, cold dirt between rocks and shrubs at the base of the Hindu Kush mountains along the Dar 'yoi Pomir River watching a hole that leads to a tunnel that leads to a cave. It's a stake out, my friend, and no pizza delivery for thousands of miles.

I also glance at the area around my butt every ten to fifteen seconds to avoid another scorpion sting. I've actually given up battling the chiggers and sand fleas, but them scorpions give a jolt like a cattle prod. Hurts like hell. The antidote tastes like transmission fluid but God bless the Marine Corps for the five vials of it in my pack.

The one truth the Taliban cannot escape is that, believe it or not, they are human beings, which means they have to eat food and drink water. That requires couriers and that's where an old bounty hunter like me comes in handy. I track the couriers, locate the tunnel entrances and storage facilities, type the info into the handheld, shoot the coordinates up to the satellite link that tells the air commanders where to drop the hardware, we bash some heads for a while, then I track and record the new movement.

It's all about intelligence. We haven't even brought in the snipers yet. These scurrying rats have no idea what they're in for. We are but days away from cutting off supply lines and allowing the eradication to begin.

I dream of bin Laden waking up to find me standing over him with my boot on his throat as I spit a bloody ear into his face and plunge my Bowie knife through his frontal lobe. But , I'm a romantic. I've said it before and I'll say it again: This country blows, man. It's not even a country. There are no roads, there's no infrastructure, there's no government. This is an inhospitable, rockpit, a toilet ruled by eleventh century warring tribes. There are no jobs here like we know jobs.

Afghanistan offers two ways for a man to support his family: join the opium trade or join the army. That's it. Those are your options. Oh, I forgot, you can also live in a refugee camp and eat plum-sweetened, crushed beetle paste and squirt mud like a goose with stomach flu if that's your idea of a party. But the smell alone of those 'tent cities of the walking dead' is enough to hurl you into the poppy fields to cheerfully scrape bulbs for eighteen hours a day.

I've been living with these Tajiks and Uzbeks and Turkmen and even a couple of Pushtins for over a month and a half now and this much I can say for sure: These guys, all of em, are Huns. Actual, living Huns. They LIVE to fight. Its what they do. Its ALL they do.

They have no respect for anything, not for their families or for each other or for themselves. They claw at one another as a way of life. They play polo with dead calves and force their five-year-old sons into human cockfights to defend the family honor. Huns, roaming packs of savage, heartless beasts who feed on each others barbarism. Cavemen with AK 47's. Then again, maybe I'm just cranky.

I'm freezing my butt off on this stupid hill because my lap warmer is running out of juice and I can't recharge it until the sun comes up in a few hours.

Oh yeah! You like to write letters? Do me a favor, Bizarre. Write a letter to CNN and tell Wolf and Anderson and that awful, sneering, pompous Aaron Brown to stop calling the Taliban 'smart.' They are not smart. I suggest CNN invest in a dictionary because the word they are looking for is 'cunning.' The Taliban are cunning, like jackals and hyenas and wolverines. They are sneaky and ruthless and, when confronted, cowardly. They are hateful, malevolent parasites who create nothing and destroy everything else. Smart. Pfft. Yeah, they're real smart.

They've spent their entire lives reading only one book (and not a very good one, as books go) and consider hygiene and indoor plumbing to be products of the devil. They're still figuring out how to work a Bic lighter. Talking to a Taliban warrior about improving his quality of life is like trying to teach an ape how to hold a pen; eventually he just gets frustrated and sticks you in the eye with it.

OK, enough. Snuffle will be up soon so I have to get back to my hole. Covering my tracks in the snow takes a lot of practice but I'm good at it. Please, I tell you and my fellow Americans to turn off the TV sets and move on with your lives.

The story line you are getting from CNN and other news agencies is utter bull**** and designed not to deliver truth but rather to keep you glued to the screen through the commercials. We've got this one under control. The worst thing you guys can do right now is sit around analyzing what we're doing over here because you have no idea what we're doing and, really, you don't want to know. We are your military and we are doing what you sent us here to do.

You wanna help? Buy Bonds America

Jack

Semper Fidelis

[righter1]

This doesn't sound good AT ALL.

Maybe I should "hold my nose" and vote for McCain. Still don't like this lesser of two evils thing.

I wouldn't say either man is "evil", no matter what. I would prefer to withhold that moniker for those that truly are--child rapists, murderers, dictators like Hitler or Hussein, etc.

I think where we're getting into the lesser of argument is the fact that we've never had two candidates that are closer in ideology, so it seems like you have to choose the ever-so-slightly better of the two to get closer to what you believe--which I think is why we had so many problems on the Republican side of things during the primaries on choosing a candidate. No one candidate--and I was a Thompson, then Romney gal myself--was a "Ronald Reagan" or a "Rush Limbaugh", i.e., a true conservative.

Where McCain is concerned, I think there's enough that I can agree with him on that allows me to support him--the tax thing, the war, looks like the gas/oil crisis thing, to name a few. There's other things where I don't trust him--immigration is the one thing that pops to my mind. But, I also know that things move slowly in Washington. And, the best thing we can do is to get the right people into Congress, which is why I've been trying to urge people to focus on their congressional races and make sure we get good, solid conservative folks into the House and Senate. It really helps if they've got a backbone and are willing to stand up to the people that will remain in there that think things should only be done one way--their way. (For those interested, I really recommend this article from National Review (http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=YzJiN2RhNzk4MGEwYmVjZmY4YzJiOGU0ZGI4OTc5MGE). It's worth your time.)

[kshsj777]

I wasn't using the phrase to indicate they're evil (except of course they are in the Biblical sense, but that's not the point) it's just an expression, that I don't like certain important things about either candidate.

[righter1]

I wasn't using the phrase to indicate they're evil (except of course they are in the Biblical sense, but that's not the point) it's just an expression, that I don't like certain important things about either candidate.

I understand that, and sorry to get on my soapbox. I spend a lot of time with politicians/political activists, so I can't help but have an opinion on most everything. :)

[kshsj777]

That's okay. I just wanted to explain myself.

[righter1]

On the same subject of good and bad presidential candidates, a friend of mine sent me this. Although long since discharged and processed out, back in the day he was in the Special Forces (101st Airborne Rangers, HHC Bttn, the "Headhunters"), and he still has friends from different branches of the service fighting terrorism around the world. The following is an email he sent me from a buddy, a Marine in Afghanistan. It's harsh, so be forewarned. But it ought to be posted everywhere.


Actually, I think it's spot on. I hope you put it on your blog! I love this guy's attitude. Do you know how long ago it was written?

[Gravity]

I believe it's from last winter.

[Merry]

I'm going to post it around.

[Xenia]

I don't see one party as offering salvation (economic or otherwise), so I can't really see the other one as a disaster. It's not like things are awesome right now .....

Hu? http://smileys.on-my-web.com/repository/Confused/sorry.gif

I'm not looking to them for salvation or disaster that's why I won't be voting for Obama!

[Rachel E.]

When my favorite, Mike Huckabee fell through, I decided that I would have to decide between Obama and McCain. I didn't figure Hilary would make it. I've known for a long time now that I would vote for McCain. It doesn't mean I like him or anything, but Obama simply scares the socks off of me, and I like socks on my feet. I hope that McCain gets elected, but like Gravity said in a different thread, I wouldn't be surprised if it didn't happen. God has to get ahold of the Christains in this nation one way or another, and if we make Him, this is what He'll do. I think it's sad that we Christians have fallen away from God so far, that He has to let something as bad as this happen to bring us back. It breaks my heart.

[ProfessorAlan]

Hu? http://smileys.on-my-web.com/repository/Confused/sorry.gif

Just saying that neither party or candidate will destroy the country, in the same way that neither party or candidate will save the country. Part of what turns me off about political discussion is the over-the-top hyperbolic exaggerations that are made about the opponent (enemy).

We are as a nation much much bigger than our politics, certainly much bigger than our president.

[kshsj777]

It's not necessarily that one president or another will destroy/save our country. But rather which president becomes elected is an indicator of the people in this country. A liberal people who forget God are going to elect liberal candidates who forget God. A country that is still hanging on to God will elect a candidate who truly loves God. That's the real issue.

[Rachel E.]

Just remember that in the bible it says that no authority is put there without God's consent. So every poor leader we have ever had "do not carry the sword in vain" they are "God's messenger's to you for good". God has an appointed president for the country all lined out, and it's His will that whichever one we get, is there. We just need to pray for our authorities, no matter who they are, that they will do His will and make the right choices, no matter how scary they are.

[kshsj777]

Amen to that Rachel!

[Xenia]

Part of what turns me off about political discussion is the over-the-top hyperbolic exaggerations that are made about the opponent (enemy)

I agree. I don't like that either. However, so far, I don't see that anyone has done that here.
What turns me off more is when folks feel they can't speak the truth due to political correctness. And I mean the truth, not percieved truth.

[SkeeterFranklin]

Gravity,
Thank you for sharing that very moving letter from your friend Jack. In my aunt's Bible study, we pray for our country's soldiers, in fact, our first prayer. All the more reason to support their efforts and sacrifices by building a strong, moral country, in love with God, obedient to His will, and voting intelligently, which is getting harder. My priest told us that rather than think of voting for the lesser of two evils, to pray, and then vote for the candidate who comes closest to Gospel truth.

[ProfessorAlan]

I agree. I don't like that either. However, so far, I don't see that anyone has done that here.
There we'll agree to disagree.

[Gravity]

I dunno. I've seen a post about the difference in the candidate's positions on taxes. And mine about the Marine in Afghanistan. And in between and around both some people saying they're going to hold their noses and vote for McCain in November. None of that strikes me as particularly over-the-top.

Now if you're referring to my opinion on the other thread, my saying I believe God is setting Obama into place as a way of getting His church to cut our petty bullcrap with each other and get on with the Father's business...well, maybe that's what made you upset. I didn't mean it to, Prof. As I said, it's only an opinion. I have zero scripture to back it, just a feeling, deep in my gut, that God's had a bellyful of our silliness. And for an old Scotsman like me, I'm not normally given to such things.

Anyway, as I said, I apologize.

[ProfessorAlan]

No need to apologize, I wasn't personally upset. And can all have our own opinions, too.

[Mona]

Hello,
I do not sleep in the days and stay up all night, see! This is the second day I've chimed in during the day light hours. Thanks for the tax info that's something to consider; and not only that but foreign policy as well. But...it does good to remember that God will have it His way (it's my only consolation). We've been through bad times and not so swooft presidents before and we are still here to talk about it. I do think however that it is our duty to vote for the candidate nearest to what our Christian values are, in fact. I know that some do not see it as a necessity. I would feel like a two-faced traitor if I voted for someone who thinks its ok to kill the unborn. I know too that once before we mentioned stem-cell research and if that comes from aborted or test tube embryos, I agree that is the same thing. Have I missed out on some new info or isn't it still possible to do stem-cell procedures from umbilical cords? That's a win/win thing.

Mo

[kshsj777]

I've heard of a new procedure where scientists can get normal cells to revert back to stem cells, so essentially, you aren't killing anyone and you have no chance of rejection, b/c you'd use the person's own cells.

I think this is what I'm talking about. I couldn't find the original article I read.

http://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/news/article/9280

[giacooper]

There truly need to be more Christian men and women out there that have the strength and the courage to step into public office.

~Gia

[SkeeterFranklin]

KS, you are right about the stem cells. Adult stem cells and umbilical cord stem cells are showing more promise than embryonic stem cells, and no human life is destroyed.
Gia, I like what you said, but many times I find that people who get involved in politics and run for office start out with good moral values, and then start singing a different song to get elected - they become serpents beneath the wool.

[kshsj777]

Skeeter, sometimes that happens, yes. A conservative christian isn't going to elected without "bending" some rules or at least appearing "tolerant" of other beliefs.

[ProfessorAlan]

A conservative christian isn't going to elected without "bending" some rules or at least appearing "tolerant" of other beliefs.
And this is acceptable?

The ends (political power in "our" hands) justify these means (bending the rules - or worse, as we have seen the last few years)?

[giacooper]

First, I don't think that it is true that a Christian could not be elected without playing fair. Let me explain what I met by Christian men and women. I didn't mean people who play at it and use it for their advantage when God seems the right thing at the moment. I meant real men and women called by God's name to serve in public ways. There are people out there like that--anointed. You may think it a naive thing to say, but God is still in all of this--even the mess that we seem to have now. Don't you think he still has a few things up his sleeve that the enemy isn't aware of?

[kshsj777]

Well I believe that is why Mike Huckabee didn't win the primaries -- because he was willing to stand up for his beliefs and the republicans wanted somebody who had a "better shot" at winning against the democrats. More Americans than not are turning away from God.

I think that conservative Christians have a better chance of getting elected in local politics, but I seriously doubt it's possible to become President without at least shoving under the rug some unpopular beliefs.

If a Christian president mentions he believes in the doctrines of grace and that the only way to go to Heaven is through Jesus, or maybe even that he believes in a literal six day creation -- he's not going to get elected... not in national politics.

[kshsj777]

I believe that is why Mike Huckabee didn't win the primaries. The republicans wanted someone who had a "better shot" of winning against the democrats (i.e. more liberal).

It's still possible to get elected in local elections, but not nationally anymore, not without shoving under the rug unpopular beliefs.

If a Christan mentions he believes in the doctrines of grace, that the only way to Heaven is through believing in Christ alone, that Hell is real and people go there, or even that he believes in a six literal day creation, he's not getting elected, not nationally.

[kshsj777]

Oh I double posted. I thought my post got lost and I had to rewrite it. Oh well you can hear the same thing worded slightly differently.

[giacooper]

I guess we'll just have to see, won't we. Sometimes, things have to get pretty bad before ears are willing to hear. I have a feeling that Obama is meant to be president at the moment, so that next time...God can finally get his way with the American people who can be quite stubborn at times. You must never ever forget that ALL things are possible through God.

[ProfessorAlan]

I believe that is why Mike Huckabee didn't win the primaries. The republicans wanted someone who had a "better shot" of winning against the democrats (i.e. more liberal).
A lot of Christians didn't like him because he wasn't conservative enough on every single issue ... the evangelical establishment (which is a total mess [which is probably a good thing anyway]) were split among all the Republican candidates.