America's richest man isn't going to make President Obama, the folks in the Occupy Wall Street movement, or their respective supporters in the media happy.
Appearing on ABC's This Week Sunday, Bill Gates laughed when asked about the Buffett Rule saying, "You can't raise the taxes we need just by going after that one percent...to really deal with the deficit gap we're talking about, that alone just numerically is not going to be enough" (video follows with transcript):
For the second time this month, MSNBC's Joe Scarborough has taken on the extreme liberal bias of Washington Post columnist E.J. Dionne.
On Thursday's "Morning Joe," after Mika Brzezinski read part of Dionne's pathetic "Why Conservatives Hate Warren Buffett," her co-host replied, "I like E.J., but he changes every couple of years depending on who’s in the White House" (video follows with transcript and commentary):
Following his high-profile speech to the United Nations Wednesday concerning the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, it appears Barack Obama has Jews on the brain.
Speaking at the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation gala Saturday evening, the President had a little slip of the tongue saying, "If asking a billionaire to pay the same tax rate as a Jew -- as a janitor makes me a warrior for the working class, I wear that with a badge of honor" (video follows with transcript):
Republicans have suggested that if billionaire Warren Buffett is going to be the basis of a "Buffett rule" of taxation, then it would seem obvious that perhaps Buffett should be asked to display his tax returns. If he's going to be the exemplar of class inequities, he should lay his taxes on the table. On Thursday night, MSNBC had a mysterious new term for this demand: "Buffett birther."
It has nothing to do with Buffett's birth certificate, but with his tax returns, but don't bother radical-left Georgetown professor Michael Eric Dyson with demands for precision. He guest-hosted the Ed Show on MSNBC Thursday night, and launched his lame new term:
The lengths Paul Krugman will go to further the lie that the rich don't pay their "fair share" of taxes knows no bounds.
In his New York Times column Friday, the Nobel laureate in economics claimed, "[T]he federal tax burden has fallen for all income classes":
While most of the media continue to obsess about millionaires supposedly not paying their "fair share" of taxes, the liberal Brookings Institution has let the cat out of the bag concerning just how absurd this whole thing is.
According to the Washington Post's Dana Milbank, he discussed this issue with Brookings' William Gale, and disclosed his findings to Chris Matthews on MSNBC's "Hardball" Wednesday (video follows with transcript and commentary):
As NewsBusters reported yesterday, Warren Buffett has spent years campaigning with the liberal media to raise taxes on the rich. Buffett has found an ally in President Obama to implement the "Buffett rule," a complicated and misinformed proposal that would raise taxes even more on the wealthy. As explained by the Tax Foundation:
During his Rose Garden speech [Monday], President Obama once again fueled the general misperception that people who pay the 15 percent tax rate on their capital gains and dividend income are paying a lower rate than salaried workers who pay at the individual rate (which ranges from 10 percent to 35 percent).
The reality is that capital gains and dividends are taxed at a lower rate at the individual level because this income has already been taxed at 35 percent at the corporate level before it was distributed to shareholders. Both Mr. Obama and his tax advisor Warren Buffett seem unaware that the U.S. has the 4th highest overall tax rate on dividend income among the largest industrialized countries in the OECD at 52.1 percent. Only Denmark (56.5 percent), France (57.8 percent) and the United Kingdom (54 percent) tax dividends at a higher rate.
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It’s good to see the editorial board at the Times Union isn’t even bothering to mask their liberal bias these days. Via a blog known as The Observation Deck, which boasts some of the more prominent members of the newspapers staff, including editor and vice-president, Rex Smith, editor-at-large, Harry Rosenfeld, and publisher George R. Hearst III, the Union has been printing some of the most biased editorials in New York media in recent weeks. Yesterday’s entry was no different - completely lacking in substantiating facts, and holding a unique disdain for economic reality.
The title of the editorial in question parrots the Obama stance on taxes in a nutshell – Class Warfare? No, Fairness. And the opening statement leaves little question as to whether or not the newspaper will be offering valuable criticisms and analysis, or whether they will remain loyal liberal lapdogs:
British-born MSNBC afternoon anchor Martin Bashir devoted his September 20 "Clear the Air" commentary to clouding the issue of raising taxes by citing the clause in Article I, Section 9 of the U.S. Constitution's that bans Congress from granting titles of nobility (video follows page break):
President Barack Obama's nicknaming his new tax increases on the wealthy the "Warren Buffett rule" is fitting since the billionaire has spent a decade campaigning for a tax hike, a campaign his friends in the liberal media have been more than willing to join. For over 10 years the media promoted Buffett's complaint that the wealthy in America don't pay enough in taxes, spurred on by a Buffett's anecdote that he pays less in taxes than his receptionist.
But even the AP has pointed out, the idea that secretaries pay more in taxes than their bosses is inaccurate. A review of IRS 2009 tax tables (Link to Excel spreadsheet) shows that those making under $100,000/year pay an average of no more than 12.3% of their income in taxes, while those making above $500,000 pay an average of no less than 26.3% of their income in taxes. However, this fact hasn't stopped the liberal media from happily advancing Buffett's call to soak his fellow rich.
Hours after NewsBusters debunked the myth about the rich paying less taxes as a percent of income than lower earners, and minutes before the Associated Press confirmed our figures, Joe Scarborough said Tuesday, "The average millionaire-billionaire pays eighteen percent in taxes in America."
Going completely contrary to actual Internal Revenue Service data released weeks ago, the "Morning Joe" host added, "If we can get the millionaires and billionaires to even pay 25 percent, there’d be a massive, that would be a massive influx of money" (video follows with transcript and commentary):
Sunday’s lead New York Times story by White House correspondent Jackie Calmes pushed the president’s new plan to raise taxes on “the wealthy.” The president, in what the Times seems to think is a bright idea, is calling his proposal the “Buffett rule,” after the billionaire who made waves with his complaint, printed in the Times, that uber-wealthy investors like him were not being taxed enough. Here is the stack of headlines: “Obama Tax Plan Would Ask More Of Millionaires – Called ‘Buffett Rule’ – Populist Sales Pitch to Press the G.O.P. in Budget Talks.”
Why write “Ask More of Millionaires”? Are these tax increases going to be voluntary?