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Obama’s Victory Speech Nov 4th

Presidential Victory
YES WE CAN!

Hello, Chicago

If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible, who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time, who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer.

It’s the answer told by lines that stretched around schools and churches in numbers this nation has never seen, by people who waited three hours and four hours, many for the first time in their lives, because they believed that this time must be different, that their voices could be that difference.

It’s the answer spoken by young and old, rich and poor, Democrat and Republican, black, white, Hispanic, Asian, Native American, gay, straight, disabled and not disabled. Americans who sent a message to the world that we have never been just a collection of individuals or a collection of red states and blue states.

We are, and always will be, the United States of America.

It’s the answer that led those who’ve been told for so long by so many to be cynical and fearful and doubtful about what we can achieve to put their hands on the arc of history and bend it once more toward the hope of a better day.

It’s been a long time coming, but tonight, because of what we did on this date in this election at this defining moment change has come to America.

A little bit earlier this evening, I received an extraordinarily gracious call from Sen. McCain.

Sen. McCain fought long and hard in this campaign. And he’s fought even longer and harder for the country that he loves. He has endured sacrifices for America that most of us cannot begin to imagine. We are better off for the service rendered by this brave and selfless leader.

I congratulate him; I congratulate Gov. Palin for all that they’ve achieved. And I look forward to working with them to renew this nation’s promise in the months ahead.

I want to thank my partner in this journey, a man who campaigned from his heart, and spoke for the men and women he grew up with on the streets of Scranton and rode with on the train home to Delaware, the vice president-elect of the United States, Joe Biden.

And I would not be standing here tonight without the unyielding support of my best friend for the last 16 years the rock of our family, the love of my life, the nation’s next first lady Michelle Obama.

Sasha and Malia I love you both more than you can imagine. And you have earned the new puppy that’s coming with us to the new White House.

And while she’s no longer with us, I know my grandmother’s watching, along with the family that made me who I am. I miss them tonight. I know that my debt to them is beyond measure.

To my sister Maya, my sister Alma, all my other brothers and sisters, thank you so much for all the support that you’ve given me. I am grateful to them.

And to my campaign manager, David Plouffe, the unsung hero of this campaign, who built the best — the best political campaign, I think, in the history of the United States of America.

To my chief strategist David Axelrod who’s been a partner with me every step of the way.

To the best campaign team ever assembled in the history of politics you made this happen, and I am forever grateful for what you’ve sacrificed to get it done.

But above all, I will never forget who this victory truly belongs to. It belongs to you. It belongs to you.

I was never the likeliest candidate for this office. We didn’t start with much money or many endorsements. Our campaign was not hatched in the halls of Washington. It began in the backyards of Des Moines and the living rooms of Concord and the front porches of Charleston. It was built by working men and women who dug into what little savings they had to give $5 and $10 and $20 to the cause.

It grew strength from the young people who rejected the myth of their generation’s apathy who left their homes and their families for jobs that offered little pay and less sleep.

It drew strength from the not-so-young people who braved the bitter cold and scorching heat to knock on doors of perfect strangers, and from the millions of Americans who volunteered and organized and proved that more than two centuries later a government of the people, by the people, and for the people has not perished from the Earth.

This is your victory.

And I know you didn’t do this just to win an election. And I know you didn’t do it for me.

You did it because you understand the enormity of the task that lies ahead. For even as we celebrate tonight, we know the challenges that tomorrow will bring are the greatest of our lifetime — two wars, a planet in peril, the worst financial crisis in a century.

Even as we stand here tonight, we know there are brave Americans waking up in the deserts of Iraq and the mountains of Afghanistan to risk their lives for us.

There are mothers and fathers who will lie awake after the children fall asleep and wonder how they’ll make the mortgage or pay their doctors’ bills or save enough for their child’s college education.

There’s new energy to harness, new jobs to be created, new schools to build, and threats to meet, alliances to repair.

The road ahead will be long. Our climb will be steep. We may not get there in one year or even in one term. But, America, I have never been more hopeful than I am tonight that we will get there.

I promise you, we as a people will get there.

There will be setbacks and false starts. There are many who won’t agree with every decision or policy I make as president. And we know the government can’t solve every problem.

But I will always be honest with you about the challenges we face. I will listen to you, especially when we disagree. And, above all, I will ask you to join in the work of remaking this nation, the only way it’s been done in America for 221 years — block by block, brick by brick, calloused hand by calloused hand.

What began 21 months ago in the depths of winter cannot end on this autumn night.

This victory alone is not the change we seek. It is only the chance for us to make that change. And that cannot happen if we go back to the way things were.

It can’t happen without you, without a new spirit of service, a new spirit of sacrifice.

So let us summon a new spirit of patriotism, of responsibility, where each of us resolves to pitch in and work harder and look after not only ourselves but each other.

Let us remember that, if this financial crisis taught us anything, it’s that we cannot have a thriving Wall Street while Main Street suffers.

In this country, we rise or fall as one nation, as one people. Let’s resist the temptation to fall back on the same partisanship and pettiness and immaturity that has poisoned our politics for so long.

Let’s remember that it was a man from this state who first carried the banner of the Republican Party to the White House, a party founded on the values of self-reliance and individual liberty and national unity.

Those are values that we all share. And while the Democratic Party has won a great victory tonight, we do so with a measure of humility and determination to heal the divides that have held back our progress.

As Lincoln said to a nation far more divided than ours, we are not enemies but friends. Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection.

And to those Americans whose support I have yet to earn, I may not have won your vote tonight, but I hear your voices. I need your help. And I will be your president, too.

And to all those watching tonight from beyond our shores, from parliaments and palaces, to those who are huddled around radios in the forgotten corners of the world, our stories are singular, but our destiny is shared, and a new dawn of American leadership is at hand.

To those — to those who would tear the world down: We will defeat you. To those who seek peace and security: We support you. And to all those who have wondered if America’s beacon still burns as bright: Tonight we proved once more that the true strength of our nation comes not from the might of our arms or the scale of our wealth, but from the enduring power of our ideals: democracy, liberty, opportunity and unyielding hope.

That’s the true genius of America: that America can change. Our union can be perfected. What we’ve already achieved gives us hope for what we can and must achieve tomorrow.

This election had many firsts and many stories that will be told for generations. But one that’s on my mind tonight’s about a woman who cast her ballot in Atlanta. She’s a lot like the millions of others who stood in line to make their voice heard in this election except for one thing: Ann Nixon Cooper is 106 years old.

She was born just a generation past slavery; a time when there were no cars on the road or planes in the sky; when someone like her couldn’t vote for two reasons — because she was a woman and because of the color of her skin.

And tonight, I think about all that she’s seen throughout her century in America — the heartache and the hope; the struggle and the progress; the times we were told that we can’t, and the people who pressed on with that American creed: Yes we can.

At a time when women’s voices were silenced and their hopes dismissed, she lived to see them stand up and speak out and reach for the ballot. Yes we can.

When there was despair in the dust bowl and depression across the land, she saw a nation conquer fear itself with a New Deal, new jobs, a new sense of common purpose. Yes we can.

When the bombs fell on our harbor and tyranny threatened the world, she was there to witness a generation rise to greatness and a democracy was saved. Yes we can.

She was there for the buses in Montgomery, the hoses in Birmingham, a bridge in Selma, and a preacher from Atlanta who told a people that “We Shall Overcome.” Yes we can.

A man touched down on the moon, a wall came down in Berlin, a world was connected by our own science and imagination.

And this year, in this election, she touched her finger to a screen, and cast her vote, because after 106 years in America, through the best of times and the darkest of hours, she knows how America can change.

Yes we can.

America, we have come so far. We have seen so much. But there is so much more to do. So tonight, let us ask ourselves — if our children should live to see the next century; if my daughters should be so lucky to live as long as Ann Nixon Cooper, what change will they see? What progress will we have made?

This is our chance to answer that call. This is our moment.
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This is our time, to put our people back to work and open doors of opportunity for our kids; to restore prosperity and promote the cause of peace; to reclaim the American dream and reaffirm that fundamental truth, that, out of many, we are one; that while we breathe, we hope. And where we are met with cynicism and doubts and those who tell us that we can’t, we will respond with that timeless creed that sums up the spirit of a people: Yes, we can.

Thank you. God bless you. And may God bless the United States of America.

Tax Plan

Tax Plan

Please read Obama’s tax plan, you will know what he is doing:

Barack Obama’s tax plan is the opposite of supply-side economics. He proposes to raise marginal rates for just about every federal tax. He also proposes a raft of tax credits that taxpayers can receive if they engage in various government-specified activities.

Moreover, the tax credits would mostly go to those who pay little or nothing in federal income taxes. His trick is to make the tax credits “refundable.” Thus, if the tax credit is for $1,000, but the taxpayer would otherwise only pay $200 in taxes, the government would write a check to the taxpayer for $800. If the taxpayer pays nothing in federal income taxes, the government would pay him the whole $1,000.

Such credits are not tax cuts. Indeed, they should be called The New Tax Welfare. In effect, Mr. Obama is proposing to create or expand a slew of government spending programs that are disguised as tax credits. The spending on these programs is then subtracted from the total tax burden, in order to make the claim that his tax plan is a net tax cut overall.

On the tax side of the ledger, the details released by his campaign last week confirm what a President Obama has in mind for our most productive citizens. The top individual income tax rate, for example, would be increased by 13%, to 39.6%; the next-highest rate would be raised to 36%. The top rates on capital gains and dividends would rise by a third, to 20%

The Social Security payroll tax would be raised between 16% to 32% for families making over $250,000 a year. This means that the real returns these people get from their lifetime payments into the retirement program will be driven below 0%, according to my own previous research, which was published by the Cato Institute and elsewhere.

Mr. Obama also wants a permanent federal estate tax, with a top rate of 45%; his health-insurance plan includes a new payroll tax on employers; and he also contemplates several increases in the corporate income tax, including a new so-called windfall profits tax on oil companies.

Then there is the spending side of the ledger. Mr. Obama proposes a fully refundable Making Work Pay Tax Credit, which would have the government pay out $500 to each worker and $1,000 to couples — reminiscent of George McGovern’s 1972 election proposal for the government to send a $1,000 check to everyone.

His American Opportunity Tax Credit would provide a $4,000, fully refundable tax credit for college tuition expenses. His Mortgage Interest Tax Credit would provide a 10% credit — refundable — to offset mortgage interest payments for lower- and middle-income families. His Health Care Tax Credits, which the campaign says “will ensure that health insurance is available and affordable for all families,” include “a new refundable 50 percent health tax credit on employee premiums paid by employers.”

Currently existing tax credits would also become spending programs in the Obama tax program. The Savers Credit would be made fully refundable, and would be expanded, according to the campaign, “to match 50% of the first $1,000 of savings for families that earn under $75,000.” The Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit would be made refundable and expanded to allow “low-income families to receive up to a 50 percent credit on the first $6,000 of child care expenses.”

The Earned Income Tax Credit is already refundable. Mr. Obama would expand it to “increase the number of working parents eligible for EITC benefits, increase the benefits available to noncustodial parents who fulfill their child support obligations, increase benefits for families with three or more children, and reduce the EITC marriage penalty, which hurts low-income families.” In short, welfare spending is to be increased by paying more money out to low-income income tax filers.

The latest Congressional Budget Office data shows the bottom 40% of income earners already pays no income taxes. Indeed, they receive a net payment from the federal income tax system — meaning from the taxpayers — equal to 3.8% of all federal income taxes, because of the refundable tax credits under current law. The middle 20% of income earners, the true middle class, pays 4.4% of federal income taxes.

Overall, the bottom 60% of income earners pay less than 1% of federal income taxes on net. When “tax credits” primarily go to this group in the form of checks from the government (rather than a reduction in their tax burden) it is simply an abuse of the language to call the spending a tax cut.

Consequently, to say, as the campaign does say, that the candidate’s tax plan is a tax cut on net — and that it would limit taxes to 18.2% of GDP — is grossly misleading. The Obama tax plan would sharply increase real taxes. It also would come nowhere near to paying for the massive increases in federal spending he has proposed, including the spending that is disguised in the form of refundable tax credits.

This relief would be a down payment on the Obama-Biden long-term plan to provide middle-class families with at least $1000 per year in permanent tax relief…

The Obama tax plan is a net tax cut – his tax relief for middle class …

The bottom line with the “Joe the Plumber” story

Obama’s tax message has a Reagan resonance

Rescue Plan

Obama’s Rescue Plan for the Middle Class

Barack Obama and Joe Biden’s Rescue Plan for the Middle Class

Republican or Democrat?

The Downfall of the Republican party

What happened to the Republican party?

A great nation requires great leaders and great leaders are nourished on great thoughts. The smallness of the McCain campaign, give real Americans good reason not to vote Republican.

Sad emails sent by some McCain followers show the Republican Party has so degenerated it now has to rely on empty headed gobbledygook to get voters who can’t see through it to vote against their own best interests.

America is basically a conservative nation; but apart from the campaign trail, the Republican Party no longer represents what real conservatism is about. At election time, Republicans babble on about fiscal responsibility, strong national defense, and respect for the US constitution; but when do they deliver?

That Emperor has no clothes.

The last time the Republicans had a balanced budget was in the 1950s under Dwight D. Eisenhower. The last time the Democrats had a balanced budget was under Bill Clinton’s last year in office.

They are dangerous to national security.

Between January 2001 and 9//11, Richard Clark, the White House counterterrorism czar, sent George W. Bush 51 different memos trying to get him to wake up to the dangers of bin Laden and al-Qaeda. W, who spent more than 40 percent of his first 8 months on vacation, simply ignored them and the other serious warnings he was given. Though there was plenty of information available concerning the danger approaching this country, those who were working on it could not get Bush to wake up and respond. If he had simply been doing his job, there would have been no need to so monstrously increase the size of government as the Republicans have during Bush’s two terms. The socialist expansion of big government under Bush has not made America any safer. A terrorist can still stroll in through our southern border most any day they want.

Anyone who has studied Afghanistan’s 2001 Battle of Tora Bora knows that it looks suspiciously like Bush’s Republican administration let bin Laden escape so they would have reason to continue a phony ‘War on Terror’.

Bush’s Republican administration also ignored the large number of terrorism experts and other patriotic Americans who tried to keep them from wasting American lives, treasure, and resources in Iraq; only to leave our position in the world worse off. Worse than ignore; they actually created a ‘Special Projects’ department within the DOD whose job it was to manufacture preposterous nonsense about Iraq for Congress and the gullible, mostly Republican, public to swallow. The reputation of the Presidents office has been greatly damaged in the eyes of our allies and the rest of the world by the Bush administrations lack of integrity.

Real conservatives love this country. They would never waste America military resources and credibility on a war like Iraq, where our president choose to attack a nation that had absolutely nothing to do with September 11 because he thought an easy war would make him more popular.

Just what is it America is supposed to gain by ‘winning’ in Iraq? You want to believe we did it for ‘democracy’! Right now, the Sunnis are preparing a 200,000 man army in order to fight the Shia for control once we decide we have ‘won’ and leave their country. The Iraqi Shia, however, outnumber the Iraqi Sunni 3 to 1 and will ally with Iran and turn the region over to the ayatollahs as soon as we are out of the picture.

If our genius Republican leadership was so determined to help the Iranian fundamentalists take over the entire Shia region, was it necessary that to use up as much money as America spent on World War II to accomplish that handover? Or if so, why didn’t our Republican screw-up-in-chief just burrow the $3 trillion from China and give it directly to Amadinajad? That way he would have saved 4,000+ patriotic American military lives along with the arms, legs and skulls of some 30,000+ good soldiers and marines, and would not have been directly responsible for the deaths of 100,000 Iraqi’s, the indirect deaths of 1,000,000 more Iraqis and the destroyed homes and displaced lives of an additional 4,000,000 Iraqi civilians.

Suppose that one of those good responsible American kids that died for Bush’s cluelessness was your own son. Horrible as the consequences of War are, wouldn’t you want to know that a loved one who paid its ultimate price did it for good reason, not just part of a failed attempt on the part of a Republican president to make himself more popular that will end up working almost entirely to Iran’s advantage?

Unfortunately, I don’t have to make up phoney material like the writers of the desperate emails you have received. W Bush and the Republican leadership have supplied volumes of shameful, un-American activity to comment on.

Bush and the Republicans ran our country deeply into debt, failed to take care of business in Afghanistan, and promoted a useless war in Iraq because they thought it would be an easy quick win that would make the president more popular.

Some Republicans are now considering voting for more of this nonsense! What are they thinking?

Remember that John McCain voted for 90 percent of Bush’s nonsense and now runs for president by discrediting the mistakes of the Bush years.

Real leadership would not be so slow to finally wake up to what the majority of Americans figured out years ago.

Bush’s big government warmongering to promote democracy and American hegemony in places far from our shores and national interests has nothing to do with real conservatism. Real Americans know that our Founding Fathers warned us against such international entanglements and advised this country to be involved with the world while striving, as far as possible, to be on good terms with all other nations.

The Founding Fathers also wrote a good constitution that clearly limits the Federal government to the job of looking after the welfare of the American people, not burning through their resources in a deluded and unconstitutional attempt to manage the whole world’s affairs.

The mindlessness of the Republican Party under its current president and current candidates can only be sustained by an equivalent mindlessness on the part of uninformed voters and so we have this mindless campaign of email gobbledygook. The poor souls who find meaning in such empty nonsense are little better than the trailer trash that gets its trills from the Jerry Springer Show.

Jerry Springer branch of the Republican party that sent people emails are not real conservatives, whose ability to take responsibility for themselves, comes out of an informed ability to think for themselves.

Real Americans know that the greatness of this nation is derived from the strength and intelligence of its citizens in concert with the loftiness of the ideals they hold high.

The corrupt Bush/Rove years saw too much advantage taken, both of good people and the empty headed. It led to the displacement of honorable civic discourse by the focus on vile monologue and intent for too many good Americans.

Now the ignorance of foreign policy displayed by McCain/Palin, the ignorance of economics displayed by McCain/Palin and the ignorance of the Anglo-American system of law displayed by Sarah Palin leaves it virtually certain that ignorance will rule supreme should Americans be ignorant enough to reelect the Republicans this year.

The ignorance exhibited in these emails only certifies that perspective.

The sad writer of certain emails clearly lacks the intelligence to understand the big government deficits Republicans have inflicted on America over the past 8 years will reduce our nation’s security and burden the children and grandchildren of our generation with the consequences of this generation’s irresponsibility.

Shame on anyone who votes for this Republican shackling of America’s future to more and more debt. Shame on any presumed adult who shackles the next generation to more and more Republican debt and mismanagement long before most of those young Americans are able to have any say in the matter. There is not much difference between anyone who indulges in such shameful conduct and that of any other form of negligent parenting that sell its own children into an indentured future.

No wonder the terrorist enemies of America did what they could to get George W. Bush re-elected in 2004 and, as indicated on their websites, would do the same to keep Republicans in charge of this country after this election. A vote for McCain/Palin is a vote against America’s well-being and the terrorists and enemies of America know that.

The writers of those emails continue to provide more evidence that the Republican Party no longer has reason to be reinstated at the helm of this great nation. They now have to resort to arguing for ignorance and small-mindedness to try to win votes from people influenced by such drivel. Sad, little attempts to manipulate people by the use of misinformation and appeals to the lowest common denominator are unworthy of a great nation, and for that reason such Republicans should be driven from its offices.

There have been times, and more than once, when the Republican Party was able to produce great and good leaders. Such has been its shameful conduct under Bush/Rove, that now is not one of those times. If you genuinely care about the Republican Party, than the best thing you can do to help it regain the character worthy of this great nation is to vote out of office the current flock of parasites and idiots that took control and ruined that once great organization. They have worked hard to deserve to a couple years in the woodshed. If you deprive them of that, you only encourage more low-life behavior and consequent self-destruction.

If American people give them the banishment they have so richly earned, there’s a chance that after some reflection, some purging, and some healing, some grownups might be able to regain control of what was once a great and responsible American political organization.

Charles Edmund Coyote

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Good Riddance Bush, the end of an error!