there's a 1 in 5 chance that Palin will be president if McCain is elected

[dc]

He does indeed spend time with a known terrorist.

 

George W?

 

j/k, but seriously.

 

dc

[Dcrasta]

Obama stated himself that $250k and up will see a tax increase.

 

When we paid very close to 30% last year........what'll it be if we saw a tax increase?

 

As single owner company with 10 employees and &1.25M

 

According to the Debates last night this same company would get a 50% tax credit for providing insurance to the employees. With a 1.25mil profit I would think they are providing insurance to employees.. (but I dont know..) > Still interesting perspective to add.

[lmwii]

gross and profit are two different things. they grossed $1.25M, but the net was a $70k loss.

[Edde]

I'd like to concur with Brad here. Someone is eventually going to have to stop telling people you can run a country on no taxes. You can't do it even when times are good so you surely ain't gonna get there when running deficits in the trillions.

 

What has been done to tax fairness in the last 8 years is laughable. Taking back some of what's been done isn't raising taxes, it's reversing bad trickle-down policy.

 

I think McCain is the epitomy of self centered opportunism. My opinion.

 

There's a long article about him over at Rolling Stone if anybody is interested. I haven't finished it yet but it's interesting.

[FlattopMike]

On the subject of the debate......... Obama wants to increase taxes on anyone earning $250k or more per year.

 

I know that seems like a lot of $$ to most people here. But consider this, a very small percentage of "small" businesses earn less than that. That's going to hit the "middle class" very hard.

 

The company my dad works for is considered a small company....they do heating and A/C systems. With 10 employees, they grossed $1.25M last year. they'd get the crap taxed out of them even thought they weren't all that profitable last year.

 

My wife with her own "small" business will earn nearly enough to fall into that more heavily taxed bracket, doing nearly all the work herself.......if she had 2 employees, she'd be right in the thick of it.

 

I don't think that's financially sound tax implementaion for a struggling economy.

 

 

Turborusty

 

You don't get taxed on your gross income, you get taxed on your net. If you and your wife NET (after all the deductions that I'm sure you take) more than $250k then you need a better tax guy or you can afford to pay more. (and buy another StarQuest)

 

I can't think of many businesses you can own that can be profitable with less than $250k GROSS. It has to be net profit.

[chiplee]

You don't get taxed on your gross income, you get taxed on your net. If you and your wife NET (after all the deductions that I'm sure you take) more than $250k then you need a better tax guy or you can afford to pay more. (and buy another StarQuest)

 

I can't think of many businesses you can own that can be profitable with less than $250k GROSS. It has to be net profit.

 

First of all 95% of small businesses earn less than $250k/year

 

Second, you get taxed on your gross, not your net.

 

third, net is not "gross minus deductions". Deductions don't reduce your "gross" to your net or it would be called "net income" on your taxes. It's called "adjusted GROSS income" on your taxes, which is your GROSS income minus any deductions you can legally "or illegally" take.

 

Your net income is what's left over after taxes.

 

Now what can be legally considered a business loss or expense to reduce your adjusted gross income is something I'm not real smart on. I know that for a person with a rental property, a ton of stuff is legally considered a business related expense, and therefore NOT taxable income. If i posted an ad to find tenants and used my home computer then my home computer could be partially depreciated for tax purposes. For tax purposes owning a rental property is a business. I collected less than $10k in rent last year but realized a 100% legal $18k business loss. Mortgage interest is a "business expense" for example when your home is rented out. You can also "depreciate" your home when it's a rental and it was completely legal to take an additional $5k paper loss on the value of my home. It simply adjusts my cost basis down by that amount which means that when I sell it, the IRS will calculate the capital gains I've earned from the depreciated value, vice calculating it from the purchase price like they would have if I hadn't depreciated it. I will depreciate it again this year and I'm almost certain small business owners can do the same thing every year.

 

Same goes for my truck if I drove to the house to conduct repairs. Same goes for ANYTHING I spent fixing the house.

 

Adjusted gross business income is below $250k for 95% of small businesses in this country.

Edited October 8, 2008 by chiplee

[PDX87Starion]

You don't get taxed on your gross income, you get taxed on your net. If you and your wife NET (after all the deductions that I'm sure you take) more than $250k then you need a better tax guy or you can afford to pay more. (and buy another StarQuest)

 

I can't think of many businesses you can own that can be profitable with less than $250k GROSS. It has to be net profit.

 

Not to mention it has to be a sole proprietor which is never the case when you have employees and are bringing in that much.

I believe its under 5% of all small businesses that would be affected by that $250 amount. This is because there is no reason if your making that much not to incorporate into an LLC to protect your assets.

 

Besides the bottom line is if your making $250 G's or more your making $120 an hour, 40 hours a week. You can afford to pay the same rate you were paying with Clinton.

[Shelby]

Rusty i can't beleave you are worry'd about a tax increase for income over the $250k mark,, man if you are i can see why you love you wife what is she a brain surgen lol

[Dcrasta]

http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/images/2008/10/07/thatonesk9_2.jpg

[patra_is_here]

it seems like the people getting upset about obama's tax plan are people who have no idea how the federal income tax system work in regards to personal income tax and small business tax.

[indy_85stariones]

I do not believe Obama is a terrorist or close to being a terrorist. But I was backing up the claim that he has close ties to individuals and groups that are involved in or promote terrorism. He does indeed spend time with a known terrorist.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obama%E2%80%93Ayers_controversy

The Obama–Ayers controversy arose during the 2008 U.S. presidential campaign regarding Democratic Presidential nominee Barack Obama's contact with Bill Ayers... a former leader {co-leader with his wife} of the Weather Underground.[1] He served on two nonprofit boards with Barack Obama. Both Ayers and his wife, Bernardine Dohrn, hosted a meet-and-greet for Obama at their home in 1995,[2] where Alice Palmer introduced Obama as her chosen successor in the Illinois State Senate.[3]...

 

.

.

.

 

Ayers and Dohrn are fixtures of their Chicago neighborhood, "embraced, by and large, in the liberal circles dominating Hyde Park politics", according to Ben Smith, a writer for The Politico.[7] Ayers has been described as "very respected and prominent in Chicago [with] a national reputation as an educator."[1] But they have not been embraced everywhere due to their past leadership of the Weather Underground, a 1960s radical organization that placed bombs at a number of government institutions, causing damage, but no deaths or injuries.[8] Ayers and Dohrn were members of the five-member central committee of the Weathermen in the late 1960s and early 1970s.[9]

 

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.

.

 

Obama and Ayers served together for three years on the board of the Woods Fund of Chicago, an anti-poverty foundation established in 1941. Obama had joined the nine-member board in 1993, and had attended a dozen of the quarterly meetings together with Ayers in the three years up to 2002...

 

Obama served as president of the board of directors for the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, a large education-related nonprofit organization that Ayers was instrumental in starting.[12] The board disbursed grants to schools and raised private matching funds while Ayers worked with the operational arm of the effort. Both attended some board meetings in common starting in 1995, retreats, and at least one news conference together as the education program started. They continued to attend meetings together during the 1995-2001 period when the program was operating. [12]...

 

Ayers and Dohrn hosted a "meet-and-greet" for Obama at their home in the Hyde Park section of Chicago, where the Ayers and the Obamas lived. [12] It was at this meeting that then State Senator Alice Palmer introduced Barack Obama as her {successor} candidate for the 1996 Democratic primary.[12]...

 

In 2008, a spokesman for the Obama campaign said ... "The suggestion that Ayers was a political adviser to Obama or someone who shaped his political views is patently false".[13]...

 

Obama's contacts with Ayers had been open to public knowledge in Chicago for years...

 

At the Democratic Party primary debate in Philadelphia on April 16, 2008, moderator George Stephanopoulos... ask[ed] the candidate: "Can you explain that relationship for the voters, and explain to Democrats why it won't be a problem?"[10] Obama responded as follows:

 

This is a guy who lives in my neighborhood, who's a professor of English in Chicago who I know and who I have not received some official endorsement from. He's not somebody who I exchange ideas from on a regular basis. And the notion that somehow as a consequence of me knowing somebody who engaged in detestable acts 40 years ago, when I was eight years old, somehow reflects on me and my values doesn't make much sense, George.[21][2]

 

Obama's response led to an exchange between him and Clinton, in which Clinton said, "Senator Obama served on a board with Mr. Ayers for a period of time, the Woods Fund, which was a paid directorship position." [10] Obama then referred to President Bill Clinton's pardoning of Linda Sue Evans and Susan Rosenberg,[22] two former Weather Underground members convicted for their actions after joining the splinter group May 19 Communist Organization...

Edited October 8, 2008 by indy_85stariones

[patra_is_here]

from the same article, when asked this question in a debate

 

""Can you explain that relationship for the voters, and explain to Democrats why it won't be a problem?""

 

obama answered:

 

This is a guy who lives in my neighborhood, who's a professor of English in Chicago who I know and who I have not received some official endorsement from. He's not somebody who I exchange ideas from on a regular basis. And the notion that somehow as a consequence of me knowing somebody who engaged in detestable acts 40 years ago, when I was eight years old, somehow reflects on me and my values doesn't make much sense

 

 

which seems completely reasonable.

[Edde]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/08/m...m_n_132954.html

 

On Wednesday morning, John McCain's campaign released a list of 100 former ambassadors endorsing the GOP presidential nominee.

 

Second on the list, though her name is misspelled, is Leonore Annenberg, currently the president and chairman of the Annenberg Foundation and widow of ambassador and philanthropist Walter Annenberg. Ms. Annenberg was herself the "chief of protocol" at the State Department under President Reagan.

 

If the last name sounds familiar, it's because it also graces the name of the Chicago education board where Barack Obama and William Ayers sat in the room six times together.

 

In recent days, the McCain-Palin ticket (and particularly Palin) has faulted Obama for having served on that board with Ayers, who was a founding member of the radical 60's Weather Underground group when Obama was in grade school.

 

Since then, however, Ayers has been rehabilitated in Chicago society, carving out a niche in education circles. As a former Republican representative in Illinois told NPR on Monday, smearing Obama for his board association with Ayers is "nonsensical."

 

"It was never a concern by any of us in the Chicago school reform movement that he had led a fugitive life years earlier ... It's ridiculous," Republican Rep. Diana Nelson said. "There is no reason at all to smear Barack Obama with this association. It's nonsensical, and it just makes me crazy. It's so silly."

 

Separate calls to the Pennsylvania and California offices of the Annenberg Foundation were not immediately returned Wednesday morning.

 

UPDATE: An Annenberg official called the Huffington Post back on Wednesday afternoon. "You wanted to speak to Ms. Annenberg? She's very elderly; she doesn't do press interviews."