Category: Taxes

Whats at Stake?

IMPORTANT: This information should not be downloaded using government equipment, read during duty time or sent to others using government equipment, because it suggests action to be taken in support of and/or against legislation. Do not list your government email or government address in filling out this message, and do not use a government provided phone for this action.

I applaud everyone’s great work in reelecting President Obama.  You helped make the difference.

And we need to celebrate our great victories in tough Senate races across the country: Sherrod Brown (OH), Elizabeth Warren (MA), Tammy Baldwin (WI),  Tim Kaine (VA), Claire McCaskill (MO), Joe Donnelly (IN), Chris Murphy (CT), Martin Heinrich (NM), Jon Tester (MT) Mazie Hirono (HI), and Heidi Heitkamp (ND).

Celebrate today!  Then we need you to roll up your sleeves and call your lawmakers tomorrow! The Lame Duck Session of Congress begins next Tuesday and there’s a lot at stake for federal employees.

Watch this short video we just made about the Lame Duck session.


Then use your personal cell phone or home phone to call both your Senators and your Representative toll free at 1-888-659-9401. Tell your three lawmakers:

•    End the Bush Tax Cuts for the richest 2%
•    Oppose any more cuts to critical services
•    Oppose any more cuts to federal pay and pensions
•    Oppose any changes to Social Security and Medicare

You and voters across the country soundly rejected the Romney/Ryan plan yesterday.  Our country needs tax fairness – not tax breaks for the very rich.  We need to continue rebuilding America.  And we start tomorrow. Your calls will get us in the fight, brothers and sisters.

Call your three lawmakers right now, toll free at: 1-888-659-9401.

Again, I applaud all of your hard work and look forward to all that we will do together in the weeks ahead.

In Solidarity,
J. David Cox, Sr.
AFGE National President

 

Conservatives’ Tax Strategy: Use Economic Fears to Cut Taxes for the Wealthy

Conservatives’ Tax Strategy: Use Economic Fears to Cut Taxes for the Wealthy

Posted on October 23, 2012

 

Congressional conservatives have revealed their negotiating strategy for dealing with the fiscal cliff slope: scare the public and congressional Democrats into a deal that reduces the deficit through spending cuts alone. These fears have been blown out of proportion. A fiscal Armageddon will not happen on Jan. 1, 2013.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) tipped their strategy when they responded to a speech by Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY), who called on Democrats to fight to retain Clinton-era income tax levels for upper-income households. Schumer urged Democrats to allow the top two income tax brackets to revert back to 36 and 39.6 percent (from their current levels – 33 and 35 percent) and to increase the capital gains tax rate to some level below 40 percent (from today’s 15 percent). Continue reading “Conservatives’ Tax Strategy: Use Economic Fears to Cut Taxes for the Wealthy”

Romney can’t have it both ways on defense spending, tax cuts

Dana Milbank
Dana Milbank
Opinion Writer

Romney can’t have it both ways on defense spending, tax cuts

By , Published: July 25

There have been many mendacious moments in this presidential campaign, but it will be hard to top what Mitt Romney told the Veterans of Foreign Wars conference this week.

President Obama is seeking “an arbitrary, across-the-board budget reduction that would saddle the military with $1 trillion in cuts,” the Republican said. “Strategy is not driving the president’s massive defense cuts. In fact, his own secretary of defense warned that these reductions would be devastating, and he’s right. . . . This is no time for the president’s radical cuts in our military.”

Come again?

Romney is referring to the automatic spending cuts, or “sequestration,” required by the Budget Control Act of 2011. For those suffering memory loss of the sort afflicting Romney, that legislation came about when Republicans threatened to throw the country into default unless Democrats agreed to automatic budget cuts if a “supercommittee” couldn’t reach a bipartisan agreement (which it couldn’t, naturally). Continue reading “Romney can’t have it both ways on defense spending, tax cuts”

Mitt Romney exited Bain Capital with rare tax benefits in retirement

Mitt Romney exited Bain Capital with rare tax benefits in retirement

By , Published: September 2

Before Mitt Romney retired from Bain Capital, the enormously profitable investment firm he founded, he made sure to lock in his gains, both realized and expected, for years to come.

He did so, in part, the way millions of other Americans do — with the tax benefits of an individual retirement account. But he was able to turbocharge the impact of those advantages and other tax breaks in his severance package from Bain in a way that few but the country’s super-rich can ever hope to do.

Ryan wows crowd, GOP leaders

By Molly K. Hooper and Erik Wasson – 08/30/12 09:20 AM ET

TAMPA, Fla. — House GOP leaders say Rep. Paul Ryan “hit it out of the state” in his maiden speech as the official vice presidential nominee.

The leadership team sat together in a sky box facing the stage, and House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) told The Hill that “it was all good.”

Ryan is getting raves Thursday morning for a speech that lacerated President Obama while touting Mitt Romney’s candidacy. Romney will accept the GOP presidential nomination tonight.

Lawmakers sitting close to Boehner say the Speaker, who is known for choking up, became teary as he watched the wonky Ryan receive thunderous applause from delegates gathered in the Tampa Bay Times Forum. Continue reading “Ryan wows crowd, GOP leaders”

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