🚀 go-pugleaf

"Merlin Dorfman" <dorfman@netcom17.netcom.com> wrote in message
news:8otu90$lhe$9@nntp9.atl.mindspring.net...
> In ca.general Tracey-Levin <tracey12@hotbot.com> wrote:
>
>
> : This week, Comrade Clinton vetoed the bill that ended Estate Taxes.
> : You spend all your life paying taxes on everything you earn, then
everything you
> : buy, and to the Federal Government.  Then when you some how create a
nice
> : retirement and leave it for your children, the Feds step in and say that
your
> : kids owe 55% on everything you left behind.
>
>      If your estate is over $1.2 million, and you have been too
> stupid to use the many mechanisms available for protecting it,
> then the excess over $1.2 million is indeed subject to a 55%
> tax.
>      Call it a tax on stupidity.

That's cute, maybe but beside the piont.

> : Republicans tried to end this awful taxation that keeps families from
passing
> : along their wealth to the next generation.
>
>      Do you feel all estates should be exempt from all taxes?
> Why?

Yes, absolutely.  Never mind the double taxation and moral aspects of the
tax.  If there were no extate taxes of any kind, frugal families could
firmly extablish themselves among the financialy secure over just a few
generations.  Small farming operations are also adversly affected,
particulary when located close to expanding suburban areas.

> If I earn a million bucks I sure pay taxes on it.  If my
> dad leaves me a million, why is that different?

The obvious difference is that one tax is an income tax and the other an
estate tax.  Your father's million has already been taxed.  The logic behind
your argument is that teh government has a prior claim to all wealth and
that it is only by their good graces that we are allowed to keep anything.
I reject this argument.  I think most Americans do.

>
> : Democrats love taxation, and that is why clnton / gore defeated this
bill.
>
>      Clinton/Gore didn't defeat it.  Clinton vetoed it.  In case
> you hadn't noticed, Bill Clinton isn't running for anything this
> year.
>      It's not that he loves taxation, it's that he hates unfair
> taxation.

Really? See above.  According to you keeping anything is unfair if the
government wants it.

>
> : Keep the lower classes from climbing out of the sandbox!  Tax them on
everything
> : while they are alive, and when they die, take 55%.
>
>      So you will explain why a tax on estates of over $1.2 million
> keeps the lower classes from climbing out of the sandbox?  At what
> point have you left the sandbox?  $2 million?  $5 million?  $10
> million?  A billion?

Again, what difference does it make?  It's not the government's money.  It
has been taxed.  Are you the arbiture of how much is enough?  Let's pose the
question as starkly as you have to Sen. Kennedy.  Mr. Kennedy, why didn't
your family turn over your excess wealth after the death of your father?
Aren't you aware of your societal obligation to financially level yourselves
back down to the middle class and earn your own way?

Steve