US Politics: What's a couple hundred billion between friends?

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

Thank you @Mlle. Zabzie for breaking this down for all of us. I think most of us would be lost, especially when it comes to the nuts a bolts of this piece of legislation, without your help. You get to win the interwebs today! 

[Mlle. Zabzie]

3 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

Thank you @Mlle. Zabzie for breaking this down for all of us. I think most of us would be lost, especially when it comes to the nuts a bolts of this piece of legislation, without your help. You get to win the interwebs today! 

You're welcome and any time!  This is a tax lawyer's turn to be Cinderella at a ball   Unfortunately most of us are weirdos and proud of it, so they limit the ball thing to a once a generation type thing.

[Martell Spy]

1 hour ago, Tywin et al. said:

Say it ain't so, Kush:

http://www.cnn.com/2017/12/01/politics/jared-kushner-michael-flynn-russia/index.html

Who will make peace in the Middle East now?

Mitch McConnell’s Making Promises to Pass His Tax Bill That He Needs Democrats to Keep

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/12/mcconnells-making-promises-that-he-needs-democrats-to-keep.html

Why Republicans Will Insist the Trump Tax Cuts ‘Worked,’ No Matter What

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/12/why-trump-will-insist-his-tax-cuts-worked-no-matter-what.html

[OldGimletEye]

23 hours ago, Martell Spy said:

Why Republicans Will Insist the Trump Tax Cuts ‘Worked,’ No Matter What

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/12/why-trump-will-insist-his-tax-cuts-worked-no-matter-what.html

 

Conservatives being idiots again. I guess more than one reads Thomas Sowell.

Quote

Here is a 2001 Journal editorial insisting the Bush tax cuts did too cause revenue to grow: “After the Bush investment tax cuts of 2003, tax revenues were $786 billion higher in 2007 ($2.568 trillion) than they were in 2003 ($1.782 trillion), the biggest four-year increase in U.S. history. So as flawed as it is, the current tax code with a top personal income tax rate of 35% is clearly capable of generating big revenue gains.”

 

[Fragile Bird]

A comment from a NYT story: "Actually, Kushner is Obama's son-in-law and Flynn was just the coffee guy." - Lord Covfefe

[Martell Spy]

Quote

Conservatives being idiots again. I guess more than one reads Thomas Sowell.

 

You'll be pleased to hear I'm sure, but I heard a local conservative radio talk show host today call it the "Trump Bump."

 

Republicans Are Tacking a Last-Minute Gift for Rich Finance Guys Onto Their Tax Bill

https://slate.com/business/2017/12/republicans-are-tacking-a-last-minute-gift-for-rich-finance-guys-onto-their-tax-bill.html

[OldGimletEye]

22 hours ago, Martell Spy said:

 

You'll be pleased to hear I'm sure, but I heard a local conservative radio talk show host call it the "Trump Bump."

LOL. I hope somebody writes a book. I need that in my library along with The Bush Boom and Bullish On Bush. Unfortunately, nobody wrote Bullish On Brownback.

[Mexal]

Regular order.

 

[SpaceChampion]

Secret photo of Michael Flynn meeting with Russian handlers.

[Guest]

Most current version of the proposed Senate bill will apparently retain the AMT.

Details began trickling out Friday afternoon, with Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.) saying lawmakers are dropping plans to repeal the alternative minimum tax. Killing the AMT, a complicated batch of rules designed to prevent people from dodging taxes, had been a key part of Republican plans to radically simplify the code. But Rounds said they needed the money to finance other last-minute changes to the bill.

If that's what ends up passing, doesn't that make it even more difficult for a compromise in the conference committee? I can't imagine many blue state Republican House members (or their high-income constituents) being thrilled that they'll be hit with a repeal of the SALT deduction without a corresponding repeal of the AMT.

[Kalbear]

My understanding from Collins is that SALT and AMT are both staying as they are. Of course, no one knows because the bill is HAND FUCKING WRITTEN and they can't even enter it into the records because they have no idea what it says.

479 added pages. No analysis. No anything. 

It is the single most audacious political process I've ever seen for anything that has no deadline. 

[LongRider]

Belly up to the bar folks, I'm buying all the Moscow Mueller's you can drink.    

Quote

A Washington, D.C., bar is offering $5 “Moscow Mueller” drinks after former national security adviser Michael Flynn pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI on Friday.

The Bird, a restaurant located in Washington’s Shaw neighborhood, offers the special whenever special counsel Robert Mueller unveils a new indictment or guilty plea in his investigation of Russia's meddling in last year's presidential election. 

That's right, it's Mueller Time!   So lift up those glasses and lets hear them go 'klink'!

[LongRider]

Quote

At the hearing where Flynn entered his guilty plea Friday, prosecutor Brandon Van Grack offered additional details that appeared to connect Flynn’s Russian contacts to the highest levels of the Trump transition team. Van Grack said Flynn spoke with Kislyak about sanctions after a phone call on the topic with “a senior official of the transition team at Mar-a-Lago.”

https://www.politico.com/story/2017/12/01/muellers-office-announces-flynn-will-plead-guilty-274349

I'm reading on the Twitter machine speculation and rumor that the 'senior official of the transition team' might be none other than that sweet Christian boy, Mike Pence.  Bless his little heart.  Who knew that such a pious  one, the one who calls his own wifey "Mother"*,  would be doing a little horse tradin' with the Rooskies?   Promising to take away those meanie sanctions that that ole poopey head O'Bummer laid on poor little Pooty Poot!   

tsk, tsk, will it prove to be true?  Ah, but one must wait and see.  

 

*is Mother scolding Pence for soiled small clothes tonight?  hmmm, one wonders.....

[OldGimletEye]

Sorry ass conservatives doing sorry ass conservative stuff.

https://theintercept.com/2017/12/01/gops-list-of-economists-backing-tax-cut-includes-ghosts-office-assistants-ex-felons-and-a-sprinkling-of-real-economists/

Quote

TOUTING SUPPORT FOR their tax cut legislation, House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., the Senate Finance Committee, and Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, released a letter this week signed by 137 economists who say they strongly endorse the Republican legislation before Congress. President Donald Trump on Friday afternoon tweeted a short video featuring the list of 137 economists.

 

Quote

But a review of the economists listed on the letter reveals a number of discrepancies, including economists that are supposedly still academics but are actually retired, and others who have never been employed as economists. One might not even exist.

 

Quote

One of the signatories, Gil Sylvia of the University of Georgia, does not have a biography page or any online trace of employment at the university. A university representative told The Intercept that no one with the name Gil Sylvia is employed there.

 

Quote

Another signatory to the RATE letter, Seth Bied, is not an economist. He is a low-level office assistant at the New York State Tax Department, whose spokesperson said Bied does not remember signing the economists’ letter.

 

Quote

Other names on the economists’ letter may raise eyebrows. John P. Eleazarian is listed as an economist with the American Economic Association. But membership to the AEA is open to anybody who coughs up dues, and membership simply grants access to AEA journals and discounts at AEA events. Eleazarian is a former attorney who lost his law license and the ability to practice law in California after he was convicted and sentenced to six months in prison for forging a judicial signature and falsifying other documents. His current LinkedIn profile lists him as a paralegal at a law firm.

 

Quote

Other signatories are far from independent voices. One is an in-house economist at a financial services firm based in Illinois. Another is an in-house economist with Bank of America.

 

Quote

Others on the list are part of advocacy groups that have made tax cuts their biggest legislative priority. James C. Miller III, one of the signatories, is an official with Americans for Prosperity, the Koch brothers-run advocacy organization hell-bent on passing tax cut legislation. Douglas Holtz-Eakin, another signatory, is head of the American Action Forum, the sister group of the American Action Network, the dark money group aligned with Ryan’s political team.

 

Quote

In 2001, while debating President George W. Bush’s tax cut package, GOP leaders widely distributed a column by economist R. Glenn Hubbard claiming that the legislation “won’t hurt the surplus.” That prediction, of course, turned out to be laughably false.

 

[Kalbear]

The only rational reason to rush the tax bill through with so little oversight or discussion is because they believe that Trump is going down, like, immediately.

I don't think that's the case; I think they're doing it because they're irrational. 

[Dr. Pepper]

11 minutes ago, Nasty LongRider said:

https://www.politico.com/story/2017/12/01/muellers-office-announces-flynn-will-plead-guilty-274349

I'm reading on the Twitter machine speculation and rumor that the 'senior official of the transition team' might be none other than that sweet Christian boy, Mike Pence.  Bless his little heart.  Who knew that such a pious  one, the one who calls his own wifey "Mother"*,  would be doing a little horse tradin' with the Rooskies?   Promising to take away those meanie sanctions that that ole poopey head O'Bummer laid on poor little Pooty Poot!   

tsk, tsk, will it prove to be true?  Ah, but one must wait and see.  

 

*is Mother scolding Pence for soiled small clothes tonight?  hmmm, one wonders.....

Trump picks the best people amirite.

And still, I feel fairly certain none of this will change any Trump voter's mind.  They are pathologically incapable of admitting fault so they'll cry fake news this or but her emails that and probably be perfectly content to allow Trump to form a family dynasty so long as not one of them has to say "yeah, I was sooooo wrong about that dude, my bad."

[DMC]

27 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

The only rational reason to rush the tax bill through with so little oversight or discussion is because they believe that Trump is going down, like, immediately.

The rational reason is to get as many GOP Senators on record as yay votes before they have time to raise any further objections.

[Kalbear]

12 minutes ago, dmc515 said:

The rational reason is to get as many GOP Senators on record as yay votes before they have time to raise any further objections.

But they still have to go through the reconciliation with House and Senate, and they'll have to vote again. And that time the bill will have to actually be entered into the record. It's just very weird. Maybe you're right - and once people agree to something they're more psychologically driven to keep agreeing to it - but it's so bizarre that they don't even have the time to type it up. 

[briantw]

Saw this amazing little video posted on another site:

[DMC]

2 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

But they still have to go through the reconciliation with House and Senate, and they'll have to vote again. And that time the bill will have to actually be entered into the record. It's just very weird. Maybe you're right - and once people agree to something they're more psychologically driven to keep agreeing to it - but it's so bizarre that they don't even have the time to type it up. 

Yeah they'll have to vote again after conference, but politically it's that much harder to flip.  Then everyone hates you, like Heller with healthcare.