YOUNG WOMAN: Are we getting closer and closer to, like, socialism and stuff?. . .
CANDIDATE: Here’s what I really believe: That when you reach a certain level of comfort, there’s nothing wrong with paying somewhat more.
Quick… which candidate was that?
Yes, that’s right… John McCain, before he sold his soul to Rove and Co. (source ()
The Republican argument of the moment seems to be that the difference between capitalism and socialism corresponds to the difference between a top marginal income-tax rate of 35 per cent and a top marginal income-tax rate of 39.6 per cent. The latter is what it would be under Obama’s proposal, what it was under President Clinton, and, for that matter, what it will be after 2010 if President Bush’s tax cuts expire on schedule. Obama would use some of the added revenue to give a break to pretty much everybody who nets less than a quarter of a million dollars a year. The total tax burden on the private economy would be somewhat lighter than it is now—a bit of elementary Keynesianism that renders doubly untrue the Republican claim that Obama “will raise your taxes.”(same source)
