Why would Reuters pull this story?

Backdoor Taxes to Hit Middle Class

Earlier today, Reuters ran a story with the preceding headline. Then, suddenly, it was gone.

Poof!

Imagine that. A story that confirms yet another broken promise by President Barack Hussein Obama removed from public view.

Is this censorship? Did the propaganda ministry in the White House black list the story? No explanation from the news agency certainly leads the mind to wonder.

Fortunately, the folks at ShowbizGossips posted the story before the censors decided bad press for Obama isn’t allowed. We’ll repost it here in case they feel the Propaganda Ministry pinch too. Here’s the post Reuters (and the Obama administration?) didn’t want you to see!

The Obama administration’s plan to cut more than $1 trillion from the deficit over the next decade relies heavily on so-called backdoor tax increases that will result in a bigger tax bill for middle-class families. In the 2010 budget tabled by President Barack Obama on Monday, the White House wants to let billions of dollars in tax breaks expire by the end of the year — effectively a tax hike by stealth. While the administration is focusing its proposal on eliminating tax breaks for individuals who earn $250,000 a year or more, middle-class families will face a slew of these backdoor increases. The targeted tax provisions were enacted under the Bush administration’s Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001. Among other things, the law lowered individual tax rates, slashed taxes on capital gains and dividends, and steadily scaled back the estate tax to zero in 2010. If the provisions are allowed to expire on December 31, the top-tier personal income tax rate will rise to 39.6 percent from 35 percent. But lower-income families will pay more as well: the 25 percent tax bracket will revert back to 28 percent; the 28 percent bracket will increase to 31 percent; and the 33 percent bracket will increase to 36 percent. The special 10 percent bracket is eliminated. Investors will pay more on their earnings next year as well, with the tax on dividends jumping to 39.6 percent from 15 percent and the capital-gains tax increasing to 20 percent from 15 percent. The estate tax is eliminated this year, but it will return in 2011 — though there has been talk about reinstating the death tax sooner. Millions of middle-class households already may be facing higher taxes in 2010 because Congress has failed to extend tax breaks that expired on January 1, most notably a “patch” that limited the impact of the alternative minimum tax. The AMT, initially designed to prevent the very rich from avoiding income taxes, was never indexed for inflation. Now the tax is affecting millions of middle-income households, but lawmakers have been reluctant to repeal it because it has become a key source of revenue. Without annual legislation to renew the patch this year, the AMT could affect an estimated 25 million taxpayers with incomes as low as $33,750 (or $45,000 for joint filers). Even if the patch is extended to last year’s levels,the tax will hit American families that can hardly be considered wealthy — the AMT exemption for 2009 was $46,700 for singles and $70,950 for married couples filing jointly. Middle-class families also will find fewer tax breaks available to them in 2010 if other popular tax provisions are allowed to expire. Among them: Taxpayers who itemize will lose the option to deduct state sales-tax payments instead of state and local income taxes; The $250 teacher tax credit for classroom supplies; The tax deduction for up to $4,000 of college tuition and expenses; Individuals who don’t itemize will no longer be able to increase their standard deduction by up to $1,000 for property taxes paid; The first $2,400 of unemployment benefits are taxable, in 2009 that amount was tax-free

Congressmen vacation on your dime!

Twenty Congressmen and Congresswomen, under the watchful eye of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), took so many staff and family members with them to the Global Warming Climate Change conference in Copenhagen last month.  The delegation, which included Democrats and Republicans, was chosen by Pelosi.

Though she promised to “drain the swamp” in the US House, Pelosi refuses to answer any questions regarding the costs of the trip.  Costs that you, the American taxpayer, will bear.

Jack Cafferty on CNN condemns Pelosi on the liberal network, referring to her as a “horrible woman”.

Obamacare To Hike State Taxes

by Dick Morris and Eileen McGann at Townhall.com

While Obama has been at great pains to make a show of avoiding taxes on the middle class to pay for his health care changes, his proposed increase in Medicaid eligibility will have a huge impact on the 39 states whose income cutoffs for the program are below those required in the new federal legislation.

All states except for Connecticut, Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, Tennessee, Vermont and Wisconsin (plus the District of Colombia) will have to raise their eligibility for Medicaid under the Senate health care bill. And they will have to pay for part of the cost. Under the House bill, with a higher Medicaid eligibility standard, Massachusetts and Vermont would also have to pay more.

The magnitude of the new Medicaid spending required by Obamacare is such as to transform the nature of state finances. A large part of the reason that some states, particularly in the South, have been able to avoid higher taxes is because they have chosen to keep down the Medicaid eligibility level.

The hardest hit states would be Texas ($2.8 billion in extra state spending), Pennsylvania ($1.5 billion), California ($1.4 billion) and Florida ($909 million). Who knows if Florida could avoid imposing an income tax if it has to meet so high an unfunded mandate?

In many of the states represented by swing senators in the health care debate, the required increases in state spending are likely to be quite high. In Arkansas, where swing Sens. Mark Pryor and Blanche Lincoln live, the increased state spending required under the Obamacare bill would come to $402 million (not counting the federal share), about a 10 percent increase in state spending. In Louisiana, where Marie Landrieu has sold her vote in return for more Medicaid funding, the increase would come to $432 million (a 5 percent hike in state spending), more than wiping out the extra funds she got in return for her vote. In Indiana, where moderate Evan Bayh is senator, spending would go up by $586 million, a hike of 4 percent. In Ben Nelson’s Nebraska, the additional state spending required under the bill would be $81 million, a 2 percent increase. The Obamacare bill would cost North Dakota, home of Sens. Kent Conrad and Byron Dorgan, $14 million, and in South Dakota, represented by moderate Democrat Tim Johnson, Medicaid spending would have to rise by $33 million.

The Medicaid expansion provisions of the Senate bill are complex. In the first year of the program (2013), states must enroll anyone who earns less than 133 percent of the poverty level in their programs. For a family of four, the national average poverty level in 2009 is $22,000 a year. So any family that size that makes less than $29,000 would be eligible for Medicaid. Many states, particularly in the South, actually have Medicaid cutoffs that are below the poverty level. Arkansas, for example, cuts off its Medicaid eligibility at only 17 percent of the poverty level, and in Louisiana, it goes up to only 26 percent. For these states, the spending increase required by the new bill is huge.

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Majority Realizes Our Only Hope is to Stop the Change!

Hope and Change.

That’s what President Obama promised on the campaign trail last year and voters lapped it up.  Our President, who had less executive experience than most hot dog vendors at the time of his election, has pressed hard to fulfill the second half of his slogan but obviously missed the mark on the first part.  Since January, he’s fed American citizens a steady diet of radical Change that’s left them feeling more Despair than Hope.

Maybe that’s why his poll numbers are consistently bottoming out.  Gallup, Rasmussen, and Zogby are all showing the President’s approval ratings at or near their low points for his presidency–below 50%.  But Obama refuses to believe his policies are to blame, and even continues to push his Democratic allies in Congress toward political suicide by twisting their arms to coerce them to support his Socialist agenda.

Most Americans have figured out that Obamanomics isn’t working, but the President believes he’s persuasive enough that he can feed them s**t and make them believe it’s chocolate.  Though not one element of his radical Change can be viewed as successful, he continues to press forward with the most radical element of his planned Change–a government takeover of the US health care system–and tries to convince us we’ll be better off with bureaucrats deciding what doctors we can see, what treatments we receive, and what medicines we’re prescribed.

His record thus far demonstrates why a majority of Americans think there’s a better way than Obama’s way.

His stimulus was supposed to keep unemployment from reaching 9% (what the administration predicted it would reach without his stimulus package).  We were told his trillion dollar stimulus package would create economic growth that would cause the unemployment rate to peak at 8% this past summer and spur job growth that would have already begun offering Hope to those looking for work.

But his stimulus package didn’t turn the tide, didn’t stimulate the economy, and didn’t create jobs.  The President’s stimulus actually stimulated the unemployment rate, which spiked to 10.2% last month–13% higher than he predicted it would have reached without the stimulus, and 27% higher than we were promised it would reach if we allowed him to squander another trillion of our hard earned dollars.

He promised time and again throughout the campaign he’d never raise taxes on middle class families, but he’s supported the Cap & Trade bill in the house that promises to raise the average American family’s utility bill by $1700 per year through increased taxes that will certainly be passed on to consumers.  Even his number one priority–creating a government run health care system–promises tons of new taxes that middle class families will be saddled with.

Obama thought he’d finally found a feather for his cap when he blew $3 billion on the Cash-4-Clunkers program this summer.  Though the administration touted it as a success, others recognized that whatever benefit the program provided the economy was temporary at best and short-changing future auto sales at worst.  Later we learned each vehicle sold through the program cost the American taxpayer $24,000.   Unsustainable and too costly, this program can also be chalked up as one of the President’s failures.

His foreign policy failures are as glaring as his domestic failures.  Campaigning on a promise to sit down with America’s enemies, he sold citizens on the idea that our differences were of our own making and the hearts of our enemies would soften, tyrants would become amiable, and the lamb would lie down with the lion in all corners of the globe.

But our enemies didn’t lie down, they didn’t become amiable, and Obama’s naivete only served to harden their hearts and strengthen their resolve to challenge us all the more.  Iran’s bloody crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators, North Korea’s barrage of missiles, and the failure to act in the face of a rapidly growing Taliban resurgence in Afghanistan have proven the President completely incompetent in matters of foreign affairs.

And now, in a resounding slap to the face of all survivors of the victims on 9/11, against the will of a majority of Americans, the administration has announced the Guantanamo Bay terrorists will be tried in civilian courts in New York City!  Including admitted 9/11 mastermind, Khalid Sheik Mohammed.

Naivete that can only be present in one who has never worn the uniform, who has never served in the combat arms, who has never put his life on the line for his country is the only thing that can explain this insane decision.

Along with trial in our civilian courts come all the accompanying protections of our bill of rights.  Miranda, rules of evidence, and every other technicality used to protect criminals from punishment for their crimes will now be at the disposal of lawyers for terrorists captured on a foreign battlefield by the US military.

Every pencil pushing bureaucrat who argued in favor of this insanity should be issued boots and a rifle and dropped into a hot LZ along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border tomorrow!  Then let’s see how many of them favor assigning our constitutional protections to the bloodthirsty lunatics they’ll meet there.

But Americans are rapidly regaining consciousness and recognizing their error in voting for this naive and inexperienced President.  While Obama’s approval numbers have often remained under 50% in Rasmussen’s poll of likely voters, today marks the first day a majority disapprove in the Gallup poll of all American adults.

Maybe a few Democrats will begin to wake up and realize our only Hope is to stop the Change!

Contact your Senators tomorrow and tell them to vote no on Cloture for Reid’s health care bill!

How Much Obamacare Costs the Average Family

by Dick Morris and Eileen McGann at Townhall.com

Whether or not you now have health insurance, Obama’s health care bill will cost you dearly.

If you don’t have insurance, you will be required to buy it. The legislation specifies how much you will have to pay for the coverage before any subsidy kicks in. All during the campaign, Obama kept speaking about affordable coverage. Now it appears that his definition of “affordable” might be a bit elastic.

If your household income is $66,000 a year, slightly above the national average, Obama’s health care bill will require you to spend 12 percent of your income — about $8,000 a year or almost $700 a month — to buy health insurance before you get any federal subsidy.

Even those making less will have to reach deep into their meager resources to satisfy Obama’s statutory requirement. Families scraping by on only $44,0000 a year will have to pay 7 percent of their income (about $3,000) on insurance. Even those making just $33,000 will have to ante up 4.5 percent of their income (about $1,500) for health insurance. The required payments reach so far down the scale that those who are living at the federal poverty level of $22,000 will have to shell out 2 percent of their totally inadequate incomes ($440) for insurance.

That Obama is charging premiums to those living at or on the border of poverty is absolutely incredible! And this from a candidate who pledged that he would not tax the middle class!

If you have insurance, you will get hit by his proposed 40 percent tax on insurance premiums.

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Rangel’s Dishonesty Demands Removal from Chair of Committee

For Immediate Release: September 30, 2009
From the office of Representative John R. Carter (R-TX)

(WASHINGTON, DC) – A month after House Ways and Means Chairman Charlie Rangel (D-NY) admitted failure to report nearly a million dollars in assets on federal disclosure forms, the lack of any action by the House Democratic Caucus on the new ethics violations or the continuing 15-month investigation of multiple ethics and tax violation charges against the man who oversees the Internal Revenue Service demands Rangel be removed.

Republican Conference Secretary John R. Carter (R-TX) says he will give Chairman Rangel until next week to voluntarily resign the chairmanship of Ways and Means, or he will introduce a Privileged Resolution to force his removal. “To allow Mr. Rangel to continue to serve as Chairman is the same as allowing a confessed bank robber to serve as Chairman of the Banking Committee during the trial.”

Carter, a former judge, says the lack of new enforcement action by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) or the Democratic Caucus demands Rangel relinquish the Chairmanship of the House Committee that oversees the IRS and the nation’s tax code. “The reputation and integrity of this body has suffered serious damage by the actions of the Chairman, and the inaction of the Speaker to meet her promise to make this the most honest and ethical House in history,” says Carter. “Mr. Rangel must step down as Chairman until these issues are resolved. If he refuses, the House must remove him by a recorded vote.”

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) has blocked previous votes on Rangel’s chairmanship. Carter offered a privileged resolution to remove Rangel as Chairman in February, but Democrats under Pelosi voted to block consideration of the bill.

The Ethics Committee began investigation of Rangel on July 31, 2008. Pelosi publicly stated that the investigation would be complete before the end of 2008, but with the probe now well into its second year, the investigation has already been expanded twice to include new charges of tax and ethics violations by the Chairman.

“There remains the question of whether these latest disclosure violations may be coupled with similar tax reporting violations,” says Carter. “If so this case could bring further discredit to the House for its failure to act for months, and soon to be years on end.”

The New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Buffalo News and numerous other publications have also called for Rangel to step down as Chairman of Ways and Means.

Details on the newest health care bill

Received via email from Senator John Thune (R-SD)

I [Senator Thune] am writing today to update you on the latest health care news in the U.S. Senate.  Despite President Obama’s promised desire to work with Republicans on a bi-partisan reform bill, Democrats in the Senate Finance Committee are voting down common sense Republican amendments on a mostly partisan basis.

Yesterday Democrats on the Senate Finance Committee blocked proposals by Republicans to:

• Require that before the committee can vote on final passage of the health care bill the legislative language must be publicly available on the committee’s website for at least 72 hours
• Preserve the Medicare Advantage plans and benefits that millions of seniors currently enjoy and would lose under the Democrats’ plan
• Prohibit the establishment of a federal health care rationing board
• Include medical malpractice liability reform measures in the bill to reduce costs caused by the practice of defensive medicine

And that’s not all.  In Wednesday’s hearing we learned that the cost of increased taxes on businesses in the bill will be passed on to consumers.

“… we have analyzed this as largely falling on the consumer and it could happen in a couple of different ways.” – Thomas Barthold, Joint Committee on Taxation Chief of Staff.

We also learned that this legislation will raise insurance premiums.

“… our judgment is that that piece of the legislation would raise insurance premiums by roughly the amount of the money collected.”  — Congressional Budget Office Director Douglas Elmendorf

Read more coverage of the Congressional health care debate and learn more details about action in the Senate Finance Committee at my Health Freedom Blog.  Share your views, and sign my petition opposing government-run health care.

We should not spend a trillion dollars of taxpayer money on a health care bill that is not going to lower costs for consumers.

Thanks for your support.

ObamaCare: The Death Story

A parody of the consequences of ObamaCare presented by FortHardKnox.com.

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ARRA News Service

Will Vic Snyder Support Nancy Pelosi’s Government-Run Healthcare?

Will Vic Snyder Support Nancy Pelosi’s Government-Run Healthcare [i.e, Obamacare]? He voted for Nancy Pelosi’s TRILLION DOLLAR Simulus, her wasteful budget, even her wasteful National Energy Tax. Time to call Vic Snyder and ask him if he will now support Nancy Pelois’s Government-Run Healthcare?

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ARRA News Service

Help Grade Obama’s First 6 Months!

I received an email from Michael Steele and the RNC with an opportunity to help let the world know just how much Americans hate Obama’s Socialist movement. Rate the President on his performance over the past six months on:

Economy

National Security

Transparency & Ethics

Media Spin

Rewarding Special Interests

Taxes & Spending

Here’s the email from Michael Steele:

Dear John, It’s now been six months in office for our learn-on-the-job Chief Executive. And this is your opportunity to give Barack Obama a six-month report card. How is he doing on the economy? How about national security, health care, and the other crucial issues that America faces? You can assign your own grades to President Obama here, and check out the results from fellow Republicans across the country. Let Barack Obama and his Democrat allies know how YOU rate their handling of the difficult challenges we face. Do it today! Sincerely, Michael Steele Chairman, Republican National Committee P.S. John, you and the Republican Party are all that stand between the Obama Democrats and further erosion of our liberty and security. That’s why I hope you’ll take this opportunity after grading Barack Obama to help support principled, commonsense Republican candidates who will offer America’s voters a better way forward by making an online contribution of $25, $50, $100, $500 or $1,000 to the RNC today. Thank you.

Take the opportunity to give Obama his grade today!