I just wanted to revisit all this redistribution talk with some comments around blogland…

Jonathan Chait

Need I point out that literally having every any government at all involves taking somebody’s money and giving it to somebody else? Even the more restrivtive definition of redistribution — using government to create a less unequal distribution of wealth — has been going on for a century. If McCain is really opposed to redistribution, then that means he thinks the rich should get back a dollar in spending for every dollar they pay in taxes.

Hilzoy

Some cities and towns are richer than others. Those cities and towns will be able to provide much better schools for their kids. And this means that kids from poor towns will be likely to have many fewer opportunities than kids from rich towns. If you care about equality of opportunity, you’ll probably think that this is a problem. One natural solution would be for states and the federal government help to fund education: in this way, funding levels for different school districts could be made more equal. But this involves, horror of horrors, redistribution: money from taxpayers who live in richer communities is being given to school districts in poorer communities.

The thing is: that’s what Obama is talking about. He’s not talking about cutting checks for the poor; he’s talking about trying to equalize funding across school districts. And his reason for doing this is specifically to “create equal schools and equal educational opportunity”, not to equalize wealth.

Andrew Sullivan

A simple question. I’m a flat taxer, because I don’t believe the government has any business punishing people for getting richer. But I don’t think that people who support the kind of punitive taxation that Obama does or Cameron does in Britain or Reagan did in 1986 is a “socialist.” Is it now the McCain campaign’s assertion that anyone who isn’t for a flat tax is socialist? I should add that if Obama is a socialist, Richard Nixon must have been a commie.

Sarah Palin

We’re set up, unlike other states in the union, where it’s collectively Alaskans own the resources. So we share in the wealth when the development of these resources occurs.

John McCain

This whole argument is just pure garbage.  Garbage.  And quite frankly, I’m sick and tired of it.  The McCain campaign had a better argument when they were attacking Obama over Ayers.  That’s how stupid this “closing argument” is.  Obama = Socialist is quite possibly the dumbest political argument ever assembled.  I mean, this type of stuff is supposed to be relegated to the Limbaughs and Hannitys of the world.  When did this wingnut crap end up on center stage?

Well, I guess it took a maverick…

Tags: Barack Obama, John McCain, Sarah Palin, wingnuts

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 28th, 2008 at 11:29 pm and is filed under Some Pulp. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.