Oh, my, and thanks for the link to add to my ever-growing Texas collection.

Instead of paying taxes to properly fund education, we rely on charity -- bakesales, if you will -- to which everyone, including corporations, can contribute and feel good about themselves, and then take a tax deduction, thereby generating less revenue in taxes, and squeezing education even further.

And look at the results. So many desperate families. What are we coming to?

Whenever you put an extra dollar on your grocery bill or any bill you pay so that the money will be donated to charity, just remember who gets the deduction. You pay, and somewhere a corporation reaps a tax break. And that, in turn, means less money for education and everything else.

Folks, we are doing it to ourselves.

But then, what does it matter when over 100,000 low income people showed up for free school supplies at the convention center

How sad is that Matthew!?!

Talk about some skewed priorities...

So that's Why liberals give so little to charity! They have this whole thing figured out!

So, perhaps you can explain why it is better for government to do the giveaways, rather than individuals and businesses.

Do you feel the same way about local Little League teams? Sponsoring them deep down evil, too?

Food pantry donations bad, too?

How about the Salvation Army and Red Cross? Should we not donate to them on the grounds that it reduces over all tax revenues?

Wow. Who would have believed charitable donations were one of the evils of our society! I guess if liberals had their way, we'd all be too poor to give donations.

Kind of like those proud, happy people standing on bread lines in the U.S.S.R.

And yet so many of them seemed to have cell phones and fancy tennis shoes.

Say AM, you are aware that the fun deductions, like charitable contributions phase out right?

It kinda seems like you do not. Which interesting n light of the point you seek to make, no?

Thanks for the laugh NJNB -- like Warren Buffet who is giving his entire estate to charity, and others who do so much from Linda and Bill Gates to Brad and Angelina--all those big hearted conservatives (NOT). The obvious point (to those with half a brain) is the small turnout to the Prayer Meeting (if that's what you call it) in comparison to people who need help thanks to the Republican's Recession and now the Tea Party Downgrade.

There's no such thing as "starve the beast" because in order to keep order with basic services, the cost is merely shifted. Not only are parents increasingly responsible for school expenses, some places are going to a four-day school week. Some places have contracted out services like fire departments--now you pay a fee to the company or they'll let your house burn down. Sale taxes are skyrocketing everywhere. Just look at the taxes on a utility bill. Now there's a tax on take-out food from restaurants in some cities.

Don't worry about redistribution-of-wealth tax credits, worry about greatly needed tax reforms that Cantor is against--blocking lower tax rates over all. As for the punk, one wonders if he really has an RV and boat or if that's how he refers to his van down by the river. You can go to www.toms.com and get some tennis shoes. For every pair you purchase, Toms will give a pair to a child in need.

TP, the people you have mentioned have figured out a perfectly legal scam to protect their assets from taxes- estate taxes, income taxes, you name it.

See, by locking up their assets in foundations, try have only to distribute a minimum amount of the earnings each year to protect that tax exempt status. The principal never gets touched, but accrues earnings.

It's brilliant, because then they can cover themselves in glory as "charitable", and the gullible fools who don't know any better give them credit for being charitable and wanting higher taxes.

They never pay them voluntarily, you notice, and they shelter their assets from the government, to boot.

Some people really did fall off a turnip truck yesterday.

To quote others, Obama is done... stick a fork in him! I believe that there are many democratic leaders that are now looking at Hillary in 2012! Outrageous you say! Not really... she's done a pretty good job as SOS and has stayed out of the political sniping. She has cultivated powerful friends on both sides of the aisle and until the Republicans come up with a clear candidate, she's in a pretty good position.

It's no secret Obama appointed her as SOS only to keep her out of politics and it worked for a while... but after the Wall Street collapse and now the USA's credit downgrade Obama ain't looking too good anymore!

Is this Hillary's time..... you know she wants it!

Meanwhile contrast this with what they're doing in China.

Every kid that wants to learn gets a free college education.

Is this Hillary's time..... you know she wants it!

Hey. Has anyone else noticed how vigorously the right wing Connies are pumping Hillary? Every day on this board you get them trumping it up.

Kind of like all of us have been praying for a Palin candidacy.

I think the Halcyon days of the Clinton 90's are triggering Pavlovian reflexes in these people. The dream of a return to the days when the press will rehash Bill Clinton's dalliances and tie them to Hillary. Just too much for them I guess.

Kind of like all of us have been praying for a Palin candidacy

You mean shot-gun Granny?

At least she got Trick or Treat & his knocked up bride to the alter, unlike Bristol?

That abstinence only thingy is working out so well for the Wasilla Hillbilly's & her spawn! lmfao!

NJNB wrote: TP, the people you have mentioned have figured out a perfectly legal scam to protect their assets from taxes- estate taxes, income taxes, you name it.

It's perfectly legal, but a scam...okay you mean the very loopholes Dems want to close but Cantor and his Teabag ilk are blocking? Warren Buffet is the first to admit it's wrong that he pays only a 15% tax rate, which is lower than the rate his secretary pays. It is the Republican rich, primarily Big Oil (e.g., Koch brothers, Dick Armey, Bush) -- the masters of the Teabag puppets, who continue to push for things like the Paul Ryan plan.

Some people fell off a turnip truck a long time ago. I suggest you spend some time figuring out where Norquist is getting his money from instead of posting comments in here to people like me who are looking out for your best interests because you're not doing yourself.

Matthew, Houston, TX

So was it 25,000 or 30,000 at the Saturday prayer rally? But then, what does it matter when over 100,000 low income people showed up for free school supplies at the convention center.

I was at the Convention Center and I can tell you that it was not 100,000 kids there. We gave out about 20,000 worth to which is about average. This has been going on since I was a kid through good and bad economic times. There are a lot of underprivledged kids in SHEILA JACKSON LEE's district and AL GREEN's district to which neither has done a damn thing but get in front of any camera they can find.

ThinkProgress got that BS from a third party.

Right now, sheople all over the United States are touting Rick Perry as the "Republican messiah" that is going to come charging in to save America from the presidency of Barack Obama. Many believe that if Rick Perry enters the race, he will instantly become the frontrunner for the Republican presidential nomination in 2012. Perry certainly looks the part and he knows how to give a good speech, but when ordinary Americans all over the country take a hard look at his record, they may not like what they see. The truth is that Rick Perry is a big-time globalist, he has raised taxes and fees in Texas numerous times, he has massively increased the size of government spending and government debt in Texas, he has been trying to ram the Trans-Texas Corridor down the throats of the Texas people and he tried to force young women all over Texas to be injected with the Gardasil vaccine. No, Rick Perry is not going to save America. In fact, he would likely be very, very similar to both Bush and Obama in a lot of ways.

Right now, Rick Perry is trying to portray himself as a "good conservative" so that if he enters the race he will be accepted by Christian conservatives. If Rick Perry did win the Republican nomination, he would have a great chance of winning the general election because he would very much be an "establishment" candidate.

But before Republicans get too excited about Rick Perry, there are a whole lot of things that they should know about him.

The following are 14 reasons why Rick Perry would be a really, really bad president....

#1 Rick Perry is a "big government" politician. When Rick Perry became the governor of Texas in 2000, the total spending by the Texas state government was approximately $49 billion. Ten years later it was approximately $90 billion. That is not exactly reducing the size of government.

#2 The debt of the state of Texas is out of control. According to usdebtclock.org, the debt to GDP ratio in Texas is 22.9% and the debt per citizen is $10,645. In California (a total financial basket case), the debt to GDP ratio is just 18.7% and the debt per citizen is only $9932. If Rick Perry runs for president these are numbers he will want to keep well hidden.

#3 The total debt of the Texas government has more than doubled since Rick Perry became governor. So what would the U.S. national debt look like after four (or eight) years of Rick Perry?

#4 Rick Perry has spearheaded the effort to lease roads in Texas to foreign companies, to turn roads that are already free to drive on into toll roads, and to develop the Trans-Texas Corridor which would be part of the planned NAFTA superhighway system. If you really do deep research on this whole Trans-Texas Corridor nonsense you will see why no American should ever cast a single vote for Rick Perry.

#5 Rick Perry claims that he has a "track record" of not raising taxes. That is a false claim. Rick Perry has repeatedly raised taxes and fees while he has been governor. Today, Texans are faced with significantly higher taxes and fees than they were before Rick Perry was elected.

#6 Even with the oil boom in Texas, 23 states have a lower unemployment rate than Texas does.

#7 Back in 1988, Rick Perry supported Al Gore for president. In fact, Rick Perry actually served as Al Gore's campaign chairman in the state of Texas that year.

#8 Between December 2007 and April 2011, weekly wages in the U.S. increased by about 5 percent. In the state of Texas they increased by just 0.6% over that same time period.

#9 Texas now has one of the worst education systems in the nation. The following is from an opinion piece that was actually authored by Barbara Bush earlier this year....

•  We rank 36th in the nation in high school graduation rates. An estimated 3.8 million Texans do not have a high school diploma.

•  We rank 49th in verbal SAT scores, 47th in literacy and 46th in average math SAT scores.

•  We rank 33rd in the nation on teacher salaries.

#10 Rick Perry attended the Bilderberg Group meetings in 2007. Associating himself with that organization should be a red flag for all American voters.

#11 Texas has the highest percentage of workers making minimum wage out of all 50 states.

#12 Rick Perry often gives speeches about illegal immigration, but when you look at the facts, he has been incredibly soft on the issue. If Rick Perry does not plan to secure the border, then he should not be president because illegal immigration is absolutely devastating many areas of the southwest United States.

#13 In 2007, 221,000 residents of Texas were making minimum wage or less. By 2010, that number had risen to 550,000.

#14 Rick Perry actually issued an executive order in 2007 that would have forced almost every single girl in the state of Texas to receive the Gardasil vaccine before entering the sixth grade. Perry would have put parents in a position where they would have had to fill out an application and beg the government not to inject their child with a highly controversial vaccine. Since then,

Hillary! That's a joke.... but don't for a minute think that the democratic strategist's haven't considered that option! Desperate times call for desperate measures, lol!

First, if you go to the archives, I am on record as protesting vehemently the press fascination with politician's private lives. I have said, over and over, that a politician cheating on his or her spouse is none of my business, and I wish there was not this adamant desire on the part of the press to make it my business.

I do not wish to know, and there was a time in this country when the press refused to cover such matters. The innocent victims of such goings on- the children of the politicians- should never be exposed to such public humiliation, for one thing. And the old "if he or she will lie to his spouse, he or she will lie to anyone" is pure, patent hogwash.

The electorate simply does not have the same relationship with the person as the spouse.

Secondly, I am certain that this country would be in a better place if Hillary had been elected. As it turns out, democrats are sexists- they could not stand the idea of a female president.

So, you opted for Zelig- and now that he cannot conform to whatever background is available, so that every individual gets to see him as he or she chooses, and he has a record of failure- you're stuck with him.

Hillary is not running, which is too bad- because, given the crop of republican candidates, I'd vote for her.

I voted for her husband when he ran for reelection.

You'd better get used to saying President Perry.

It doesn't matter Hillary or President Obama, the GOP/TP doesn't have a candidate and what they do have are all running on Paul Ryan's plan to privatize Medicare to give more tax breaks to the rich. Stick a fork in him, he's done? Really, seriously? Because who's going to beat him?

Doe Dave, given that Texas, like most states, has a balanced budget requirement in it's constitution, your points numbers two and three are false.

Which tells me all I need to know about the rest of your post.

The Bilderbers?!?!

Cover your back windows so the aliens cannot see you in the middle of the night, and take you along in their spaceship.

Doc Dave ~

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Good information Doc. Thank You.

Dave:

Man you are full of shyt......Stop coming in here smearing that man just because you do not like Republicans. The majority of that crap you pasted is a lie or distorted. We will just wait and see what happens. I was such a bad person, why has he lasted for over 10 yrs as a Governor?????

why has he lasted for over 10 yrs as a Governor

Maybe because idiots like you are allowed to vote?

Just a thought... ;o)

Hey AM - care to apply that to Obama? Especially the structural deficit part.

That one is my favorite part, you know the part ALL to politicians ['cept your boy from the mighty Wisc.] want to pretend does not exist.

Sure $20 billion is a lot, but is only five days of what the feds blow through in new debt every DAY.

So Anna Molly, would you say Obama also has a lot of time on his hands, or is he mightily working away on some form of plan, any plan.

Nice softball.

Besides which, AM, you are a little out of the loop.

Both Texas house passed a budget that closed the deficit and left a $6 billion rainy day fund in May.

No more deficit. Gone. Poof.

See? It can be done.

Just not by Obama.

Oh stop with the facts NoJo. Let AM have her fun and her facts.

Gosh I think maybe she didn't like my question - the federal debt is atrocious, yet Obama is out campaigning.

Am wants to poke fun at Perry for a fake $20 billion, yet she has no apparent criticisms of Obama.

Maybe she's out voting?

HoJoBloMo,

[Both Texas house passed a budget that closed the deficit and left a $6 billion rainy day fund in May. No more deficit. Gone. Poof.]

Yeah, and you believe that garbage, right? Perry is the first one with his hand out whenever there's federal dollars to be had.

Between Perry and Bachmann, it't hard to tell who's a bigger flake...

Anna Molly you are so good it take two of them to pick on you. Keep up the good work.

Perry is the first one with his hand out whenever there's federal dollars to be had.

You mean like the $80,000 Perry personally took in farm subsidies? lol

Perry certainly has benefited from the nation’s proclivity toward farm payouts; his 40-acre farm — which he finally sold in 1998 — brought him $72,687 in farm payments between 1987 and 1989 and even made him an additional $9,624 for leaving his land lying fallow. Perry’s father has also received $6,443 from cotton and wheat subsidies in 2002 and 2003

http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2011/08/08/290830/perry-farm-subsidies/

Poor allblow - she's so far off her game even her cat is trying to off himself! lol

So AF - you saying AM like getting tag teamed?

Nice!

I do love how the old gal just couldn't seem to refute what NOJO said. But man, can she cut and paste.

Great job old gal. Makes me wish I owned a farm - getting paid for doing nothing. Ain't the government great? You libbies should be applauding this program. Oh wait, a republican got some cash. Yeah, that sucks.

AM -- We all see who gets the most votes. You're posts always do. Keep up the good work.

Yes TP - cause popularity is very important. You know, just like junior high.

Come to think of it, maybe it's a libbie thing - Obama sure seems to only want to do the popular, not the necessary.

Never mind that this is an MSNBC website. Good golly man the fact that a conservative monkey like me can get any votes at all is super neat.

Cause, I am trying so very hard to lean forward.

But it keeps getting hard Tp, so very very hard.

Besides everybody already knows AM is going to be prom queen. I bet she already picked out her dress.

Americans First and True Patriot:

Thank you both. And right back to you. I very much appreciate what both of you do, as well. It's a pleasure to post side by side with you.

By the way, I needed that. I don't do this for the votes, but somehow I'm not in the mood for no joe or for Spanky's insults and taunts tonight.

Like this:

everybody already knows AM is going to be prom queen. I bet she already picked out her dress.

Suddenly, it just makes me sad.

Anyway. Cross your fingers and toes for Wisconsin, and have a wonderful evening, come what may.

TP,

AM -- We all see who gets the most votes. You're posts always do. Keep up the good work.

I cant believe you just said that, seriously, how old are you? How can anyone take you seriously, its weird.

I know you are, but what am I? Remember grade school.

Anna Molly they do pick on you a lot and I guess that is why I had to point it out. I enjoy your post. Don't let them get you down, especially those two clowns, they don't seem to have Palin's intellect between them.

I just started using the ignore key and one by one as I decide I am wasting my time responding, poof they are gone, it makes this place a lot more enjoyable.

Nice - I sure hope the libbies keep up their making fun of the gun, religion and Nascar clingers.

At this rate, in light of the economy the wars and the 3 point drop last night alone in the ONE's approval ratings, it's looking like it ain't even going to be close.

Noid, could you pass the fancy mustard?

Let's just say we watch Wisconsin and see what happens and if you think the republicans can still lie and get away with it. Republicans were not elected and did not run on busting unions and ending abortions and ending social security, etc.

The jobs, jobs, jobs they did run on, nowhere to be seen.

Poor AF - you must not have gotten the memo. Even the WHite House now admits the government can't create jobs.

Regardless of Wisc. outcome, it's only going to be about debt, deficits and cutting. Not exactly the holy trinity of democratic policy, eh AF?

So, Spanky, what on earth are they going to do if this does not work out for them? Remember the judicial election they were so sure they had in the bag? That they thought was yanked out from under them because some clerk did not add the votes from one town?

AP is doing the reporting again tonight. Think they are smart enough to make sure there are no towns with zero votes?

Let's play "let's pretend"- suppose the republicans keep all their seats tonight, and then pick up two from next week's democratic recalls. What happens then?

Cause, I'm thinking they are going to go off on a toot- and not at an imaginary bar, either.

Well, if that is true what were all the tea partier and now Bachmann running on creating jobs?

The win in Winconsin means the republican propaganda machine is not strong enough to drown out the voice of the people and that's good news for the people.

It could just tone down some of the tea partiers that think they have a mandate to destroy America and recreate it in their image of smaller government for the rich.

And I think America has woken to the real adjenda of the republican party just like Wisconsin awoke.

AF,

Again, the Tea Party Movement is not about destroying America. They are middle class hard working people who want to leave a better life for their children and grandchildren.Nothing wrong with that.

As far as wanting a smaller government for the rich, think about it, does that make any sense to you?

That what I am pointing out, it doesn't make sense and why are we doing it. Why have almost all the republicans in the house and senate signed a pledge with Norquist who had stated he wants to kill the American government. I am not sure that you realize that the American people will go with it.

No meaningful government, no EPA, the rich corporation can rape and plunder and leave a wasteland behind and boy do they love the government finally out of their way. Then no unions, no workers rights, no minimum wage you know just like a third world country.

Think about it if smaller government were for the people why is the route never to raise taxes on the rich again. The Ryan and the Balance bill the tea party wanted the 2/3 majority clause needed to ever raise taxes again and they wanted that in the constitution. The republican tea party was ready to let us default before they would raise taxes on the rich.

If this debt is truly a crisis, why on earth would the republicans keep fighting so hard for the tax cuts for the rich?

Why is it so patriotic for everyone to share the sacrifice except the rich who have more that anybody?

Explain to me why the tax cuts for the richest are more important that America's well being especially since taxes are lower than they have been for the rich in 50 years?

Nice - I sure hope the libbies keep up their making fun of the gun, religion and Nascar clingers.

Dude, feel free to grow a sense of humor.

[Dude, feel free to grow a sense of humor.]

Schpanky's got to grow a set of balls first...

Thank you. Cross fingers and toes.

I'm crazy nervous.

LoL Keep working this. This is invaluable, even if your ultimate conclusion is not exactly what I expected.

Thank you again.