Submitted by ctyankee, Dec 19, 2007 10:13

Idle: "You call that an argument?
Cleese: "Yes"
Idle: "Contradiction is not argument."
Cleese: "Yes it is."

1) The income tax has brackets which have varying rates according to income level. As you grow mature you're _supposed_ to increase your earning power and pay more tax. *Inflation* has an effect known as "bracket creep" causing you to pay more taxes on essentially constant buying power. A single rate FairTax does not suffer from this mathematical flaw.

2) Did you ever live in a owned home? 'nuf said.

3) the only part of the cc bill that's taxable is the annual service fee, over limit fees, and the various other fees. The principal & interest are just that. Next.

4) "In my opinion, it's very unfair to tax someone for something which is for some people of a life-or-death nature" ... Food is life or death, so is water... air is still free! Cost of living! Bad things happen to good people; get used to it. You say human decency & common sense, I see the nanny state. Life is hard. But without the economic engine of the "fortunate healthy" the "worthy poor, the ill and the sickly" would just die faster.

4.1) As long as you keep making false assumptions, there's nothing I can say that will correct your mistakes. Until you accept that the market is the ultimate arbiter of what can be bought & sold and for how much, you're walking around with blinders on.

Perhaps you can't afford a $700/mo apartment? You've got no real property and you have debt, in other words a negative net worth. That makes you typical, not intelligent. You're poor face it. And the surprise it that you're arguing against your best interest. Because it might force you to change your lifestyle. How old are you? No, don't answer that. Do you have a goal for the future? Again, rhetorical. Do you want to save for your future? Perhaps you plan to die young and leave a good lookin' corpse, I dunno, your choices.

5) The Bush Tax Advisory Panel, was a joke. That's common knowledge. What you call flaws in the FairTax are strawman arguments constantly put forward by opponents to hide their true agenda. The only people harmed by the FairTax are the accountants, the tax attorneys, and the lobbyists. Most have skills that could be far better applied. The winners are the American people who would get to call their government to task.

6) Huckabee, Clinton, Arkansas, and let's toss in Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana, New Mexico, et. al. In the horse race of economics you should concerned about the leaders. You're focusing on the back of the field, the 'also rans'.

I said I agree that gummint spending is a problem. Fortunately you're not arguing about the FairTax being revenue neutral too. I'm glad that at least some of the points are getting through.

I'm also glad that you pointed out that the issue is strongly partisan! The fact that it can be so polarizing is a testament to the quality of the bill. The powers that be don't want the FairTax to happen. Not because it's bad legislation, but because it would limit their ability to do political favors for special interest groups.

If you take nothing else away from this debate, take this assertion alone:

The FairTax takes power from the politicians and gives it back to the people!

Note: Comments are screened, and in some cases edited, before posting. We reserve the right to reject anything we find objectionable.