Kerry's Massachusetts tour

[Mass]

In Lawrence, first

http://www.bostonherald.com/news/politics/view/20100909sen_kerry_meets_with_lawrence_officials_on_budget_woes/srvc=home&position=recent

Sen. Kerry meets with Lawrence officials on budget woes

By Associated Press
Thursday, September 9, 2010 - Added 7 hours ago
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LAWRENCE - U.S. Sen. John Kerry has met with Lawrence officials to go over various ways to get the financially troubled city out of its ongoing budget problems.

The Massachusetts Democrat met Wednesday with Mayor William Lantigua and several of his top aides to discuss how federal grants and stimulus money can be tapped to revitalize the city’s empty mills and rebuild its police and fire departments.
...

Fall River

http://www.heraldnews.com/features/x861589294/Kerry-Flanagan-sit-down-for-first-official-meeting

Kerry, Flanagan sit down for first official meeting




By Will Richmond
Herald News Staff Reporter
FALL RIVER —
In his first formal meeting with Mayor Will Flanagan since the 2009 election, U.S. Sen. John Kerry said he’s ready to keep fighting when it comes to bringing jobs and financial support to the city.

Following a 45-minute, one-on-one meeting between the two, Kerry said he is working to secure $750,000 in federal funding that would ease the city’s burden of paying for the combined sewer overflow project. Money could also find its way to Fall River to help return the police department to pre-recession staffing levels and construct the South Coast Rail.

While there was no shortage of ideas for how to spend funds locally, Kerry admitted the work will need to take place in Washington, D.C., to secure funding for city projects.

Even the Globe talks about him.

http://www.boston.com/yourtown/news/braintree/2010/09/senator_kerry_dispels_untruths.html

Kerry addresses health care 'untruth' with Braintree seniors
By Jessica Bartlett, Town Correspondent


Senator John Kerry came to the Braintree Council on Aging Thursday to talk about health care reform and Medicare with more than two dozen Braintree seniors.
The discussion was to highlight key points of the health care reform, and most important, Kerry said, to dispel any myths.

“I know there is a lot on people's minds...and I will tell you candidly, there is an awful lot of untruth out there, there's an awful lot of distortion, and there's an awful lot of fear mongering,” the Massachusetts Democrat said. “That's why I wanted to come here today to talk to you about the truth of health care reform.”

A survivor of cancer himself, and a recent recipient of his own Medicare card last year, Kerry said he spoke from the same point of view as the others in the room – someone who wanted fair health coverage without the fear of being dropped for certain conditions.

“What do you have insurance for? To cover you when you get sick. You get sick, they cut you off. That's what they were doing. No longer,” he said.
...

http://www.boston.com/news/politics/politicalintelligence/2010/09/kerry_says_bush.html

Republicans say hiking taxes will hurt the already wobbly economy and that many small business owners fall within the targeted tax brackets -- individuals earning more than $200,000 annually and families with income totaling more than $250,000. They appear poised to block any measure extending the cuts unless it includes higher wage-earners.

Democrats have dismissed such assertions and Obama yesterday accused Republicans of holding middle-class cuts "hostage" in exchange for cuts for the rich.

Kerry, whose income puts him squarely in that category, said "under no circumstances do I believe we should give a blanket extension to the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans."

"It won't fix our economy and it will add billions to the long-term structural deficit," he said.

On the other hand, he said, "It makes perfect sense to protect tax cuts for the middle class Americans who bore the brunt of the Wall Street meltdown and are still digging their way out from under the recession."

His view puts Kerry in direct opposition with the state's other senator, Scott Brown, a Wrentham Republican whose spokeswoman said yesterday that he intends to fight for cuts for the wealthy, too, alongside his GOP colleagues.

"Raising taxes will kill jobs and slow down an economic recovery," the spokeswoman, Gail Gitcho, said.

The Globe reported today that for middle-class families in Massachusetts, keeping the cuts could mean $1,831 in their pockets each year. If Congress doesn't pass an extension, they can expect to pay that much more.

Seems to me that Kerry is in a fighting mood.

[Luftmensch067]

1. Yay!

Thanks for posting!

[ProSense]

2. Cool.

Touching on a few issues. Brown of course is going to stand with the GOP.

[karynnj]

5. Agreed - and hopefully almost all Democrats (it should be all) should be speaking

of the tax cuts to the wealthy this way. In addition, the Democrats NEED to not cave to get a passed bill before the election. The taxes expire at the end of the year. No matter how the election goes, there might be some genuine conservatives, who will agree that those tax cuts are unaffordable.

As to the idea that it could slow the recovery, that is nonsense. Here is comparison of the tables for 2009 vs 2001, which people making above $250,000 would likely be subject to.

2009 tax tables -
Single:
# 10% on income between $0 and $8,350
# 15% on the income between $8,350 and $33,950; plus $835
# 25% on the income between $33,950 and $82,250; plus $4,675
# 28% on the income between $82,250 and $171,550; plus $16,750
# 33% on the income between $171,550 and $372,950; plus $41,754
# 35% on the income over $372,950; plus $108,216
http://taxes.about.com/od/2009taxes/qt/2009_tax_rates.htm

The comparable 2001 single rates, that we would return to are:

15% on income between $0 and $27,050
27.5% on income between $27,050 and $65,550, plus $4,057.50
30.5% on income between $65,550 and $136,750, plus $14,645
35.5% on income between $136,750 and $297,350, plus $36,361
39% on income over $297,350
http://www.unclefed.com/TaxHelpArchives/2001/Pub17/taxrateschedule.html

I assume the actual way this would be handled is to have a phase in starting at $250,000 - just to get rid of the fact that there WOULD be a disincentive for people very near $250,000. (tax in 2009 for an income of $249,999 would be $ 41,754 + .33 * (249,999 - 171,550) which is $67,642.17 ; tax in 2001 for an income of $249,999 would be $ 36,361 + .355 * (249,999 - 136,750) which is $76,564.40. )

These calculations show that everyone above $250,000 will pay at least $8922.23 more. That is a lot of money for the treasury, but it is hard to believe that it would be sufficient to make them stop working as hard as some RW people have implied. In addition, it was not high enough in 2001 to keep them from striving.

It also shows why the law will likely be more complicated than above $250,000 - the 2001 rates; below the 2009 rates. It is weird that making $1 more than the $249,999 here would have the consequence of increasing taxes by $8922. Likely the brackets on the current 2009 schedule will be redefined so that a new bracket starts at $250,000 using the 35.5 rate and adding the top 2001 bracket. This would actually result in taxes LESS than 2001 for everyone - as everyone would have the lower rates through $250,000. This obviously would get rid of the discontinuity.

[Mass]

7. It is more likely that the threshold would be reevaluated. The $136,000 is already 9 years old.

I am not sure what it 2010 value would be, but my guess is that it is probably close to $170,000.

[karynnj]

8. Good point

[wisteria]

3. Thanks for all the information. n/t

[MBS]

4. Go get 'em, JK! n/t

[karynnj]

6. Thanks for all of this - it looks like someone is ready for the coming fight!

It is not surprising that Brown is siding with the Republicans on this. At some point, I wonder if people will see that a barn coat and a truck are as much costume as Bush's flight suit and reports of him "landing the plane" - though he lost flying privileges in the 1970s and never flew since.

Voting to save those above $250,000 from paying the taxes paid in 2001 is not being a "common man".

[beachmom]

9. This is something else:

His view puts Kerry in direct opposition with the state's other senator, Scott Brown, a Wrentham Republican whose spokeswoman said yesterday that he intends to fight for cuts for the wealthy, too, alongside his GOP colleagues.

"Raising taxes will kill jobs and slow down an economic recovery," the spokeswoman, Gail Gitcho, said.

Precisely how is allowing the superrich to keep more money going to create more jobs? Those folks are going to largely put that money in the bank. The middle class, on the other hand, already stretched will be more likely to spend the money.

I am so sick and tired of the Ayn Rand BS that the wealthy are all wonderful job creators. The truth is a lot of them are job killers if they end up in the hedge fund business.

[wisteria]

11. The wealthy have had the advantage of this tax break for a while now-so where was the job creation?

Where are the jobs? The economy started to really tank in the last year and a half Bush was in office. They media use to comment on the low job creation numbers back then. It is as you said, they pocket the money or reinvest it to make more money for themselves.

[Mass]

10. It is days like that that the Globe drives me crazy.

I could not find any of these two articles on the print version of the paper (there was a snippet about Lawrence), but they had space to tell us about Scott Brown's twitter account. Come on!