Democrat O'Rourke Proposes War Tax on Affluent U.S. Families Without Military members
une 24 (Reuters) - Democratic presidential candidate Beto O'Rourke on Monday proposed taxing affluent American families who do not have members in the U.S. military as a way to fund healthcare for veterans.
The former congressman from Texas unveiled a plan for military veterans that includes a "war tax," in which taxpayers who earn over $200,000 a year would pay $1,000 in a new tax for each war embarked on by the United States.
O'Rourke, who did not serve in the military but sat on the House of Representatives Armed Services and Veterans' Affairs committees, said the tax would be levied on households without current members of the U.S. military or military veterans. He did not specify what types of war, or the scale and origins of the wars, on which the tax would be levied.
The money raised from the war tax would be deposited into a newly created Veterans Health Care Trust Fund, which would be created at the start of each new war and be used to support veterans' healthcare, disability and other medical needs when they return from conflict, O'Rourke said.
The proposal was part of a broader plan by O'Rourke, who has struggled to gain traction in opinion polls among Democratic contenders, to improve services for military veterans. He also urged an end to "wars in Iraq and Afghanistan," and reinvestment of the savings in veterans programs.
The military has about 1.36 million active-duty members out of a total U.S. population of some 327 million people. The country's armed forces have been all-volunteer since the military draft ended in 1973 as the United States wound down its involvement in the Vietnam War.
In language borrowed from former Democratic President John F. Kennedy, O'Rourke said Americans must be "willing to pay any price, and bear any burden" to provide care, support and resources to all veterans. He called for ending the "blank check for endless war" waged by the United States and to invest spending on the care of those who had served in armed conflicts.
O'Rourke, 46, launched his presidential bid in March after rising to national prominence last year when he narrowly lost his bid to defeat Republican U.S. Senator Ted Cruz in Texas. His national support among likely Democratic primary voters is currently around 4 percent.
(Reporting by Tim Reid in South Bend, Indiana; Editing by Peter Cooney)
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Time for O'Rourke to join Buttigieg on the sidelines.
If Democrats get their way, we will have a shortage of "rich" people to pay for all of what they want.
This is just going to get better and better.
A clown car full of clowns, each trying to outdo each other.
Not enough popcorn in the world .....
His campaign has been a disaster, this won’t help
The Democratic clown are of candidates national give away of tax payer money continues unabated. I am sure one of the other candidates will pickup on this plan once he drops out.
The extremely wealthy should be taxed more on general principle, not because they do or dont have family members in the military.
That isn't what the article is about.
Please stay on topic.
Who gets to decide what is considered, "extremely wealthy"? Taking into to consideration the vast difference in cost of living across the US.
So they already pay 40% of the entire tax burden which is more than double the share they paid when the top rate was 71%.
The left will never be satisfied with how much it can steal from what others earn
Hey "Beto"! How about we start with you. You are rich. You never served your country in the military. You have zero family in the military. Yep, you're the perfect candidate. How about you be the first to one to fork your tax over money for vets! Oh that's right, you're a politician in DC so it would not apply to you would it?
Wow! Just never going to happen.
It certainly could if enough fools vote for this clown.
Firstly, I highly doubt O'Rourke can win. Secondly, it would have to pass both houses of Congress which is even more unlikely.
I doubt he can win, either, but that doesn't mean it can't happen if enough idiots vote for him.
It could pass Congress exactly that way, too.
It's also possible O'Rourke could get hit by a meteor next week, but I'd rather deal with the probable than the possible. It's probable that ideas like this will reduce those likely to support his campaign.
Motor or macho power?
No, that's Ted Cruz.
Can anyone understand why potential candidates have this impulsive need to commit political suicide?
The lunatics are running the asylum ....
I believe that the serious Democratic contenders are all trying to run with Bernie.
Seems you just can't be too far left for some of the Democratic base--especially when it comes to taking money away from Americans!
It's not just Bernie. It seems as if the extreme left has taken power in the D party and everybody trying to win the party vote continues to see who can out-do each other in the next leftward lurch. Don't know how much of this we will see in the general election, but it sure is crazy watching the extremes run the party.
This isn't to say the R party doesn't have it's own issues, but it shouldn't see any of this crazy this go around.
Talking about spending money - Bernie is promising to cancel 1.6 Trillion Dollars in student debt. I wonder how the lending banks feel about that - and if the government pays them, where THAT money is coming from.
Yeah, but all presidential candidates make all sorts of promises. If he were to win the election would he actually go about to cancel that debt or would it become just another campaign promise forgotten. I think it's rather easy to promise the moon when that far away from a goal, especially when the standard for many many years has been to promise the moon and the stars only to ignore such words after the election is won.
Bernie is a flaming idiot.
And he is the Democrats' problem!
Hee hee!
Other than taxing everyone to death, giving reparations to people who were never slaves, and offering "free stuff" (even to illegal aliens) ... what the hell is the Dem platform?
Robert Francis is toast.
Yeah Toast!
Speaking of toast-- anyone remember this one (After Dark Screensaver from..the 1990's!):
Here are the "lyrics" (they show on the bottom of screen but in rather small letters):
The smell of toast is in the air
When there's a job to be done
The Flying Toasters will be there!
And it's flap! Flap! Flap
Now help is on the way
A victory song they si-ing
We pop up to save the day
On flying toaster wings!
In brightest day or after dark
When times of trouble are at hand
The flying toasters set a spark
And hope is blazing 'cross the land!
And it's flap! Flap! Flap!
Salvation from above
A precious gift they bri-ing
Gleaming angels of love
On flying toaster wings!
Probably most NT users are to young to remember "AD" (as it was affectionately known).
Here's more from Wikipedia:
After Dark is a series of computer screensaver software introduced by Berkeley Systems in 1989 for the Apple Macintosh , and in 1991 for Microsoft Windows . [3] [4]
[...]
The most famous of the included screensaver modules is the iconic Flying Toasters which featured 1940s-style chrome toasters sporting bird-like wings, flying across the screen with pieces of toast. Engineer Jack Eastman came up with the display after seeing a toaster in the kitchen during a late night programming session and imagining the addition of wings. [6] A slider in the Flying Toasters module enabled users to adjust the toast's darkness and an updated Flying Toasters Pro module added a choice of music—Richard Wagner's Ride of the Valkyries or a flying toaster anthem with optional karaoke lyrics. [7] Yet another version called Flying Toasters! added bagels and pastries, baby toasters, and more elaborate toaster animation. The Flying Toasters were one of the key reasons that After Dark became popular, and Berkeley began to produce other merchandising products such as T-shirts, with the Flying Toaster image and slogans such as "The 51st Flying Toaster Squadron: On a mission to save your screen!"
The toasters were the subject of two lawsuits (Read it All)
And on another note--IMNSHO, both O'Rourke and Buttagieg are indeed "toast"..... even if Biden continues to make his famous "gaffes", Biden's got the nomination.
And he is not electable.
Hey, I remember the flying toasters.
Lol .... i guess i missed that one.
Nice!
That is a mystery, even to the Democrats.
LOL!
Does the average American Joe realize how "pie in the sky" the Democratic platform is?
Promise the voters the moon and it will hit them in the eye like a big pizza pie.
Actually that brings up an interestiong question.
Why aren't the Dems capable of setting forth clear, consistant plans-- and sticking to them (like Trump always does?).
Even if, God help us, one of these liberals was ever able to win the White House & Congress and pass such a tax on the wealthy, history has shown us what happens to countries that have tried it.
The "Iron Maiden" said it best: "It (the taxed group or generation) will either demand that past promises are broken, or it will not work, or it will not pay taxes, or the most talented people will leave. Socialist governments which have tried to tax "till the pips squeak" have ample experience of that."
So went Socialist Britain.
Actually, historically, when we had the draft, the rich did have a way to get their kids out of service.
Think the civil war. If you had $300 you didn't have to serve. (btw, that policy didn't pan out well in NYC). My own grandfather stepped off the boat and was enlisted (he wasn't literate in English when he made his mark, coming from Austria) There were loopholes all the way into Vietnam to get out of service.
But now we have a voluntary armed force, so I am not sure where this is coming from.
The rich are proficient at dodging the rules
Here's why:
Political contests aren't rational.
And, BTW-- they don't have to be...in order to win.
All a candidate must do is to figure out what the deepest prejudices are of a few demographic groups he/she/it can put together to win, then pander to them.
In the recent discussion here re: opposition to Amazon's moving to NY I saw an interesting phenomenon-- both those of the right as well as those on the left opposed it.
And rather emotionally.
Why?
The lefties because their current Weltanschauung is to hate success-- and anyone who is highly successful. (In this case Jeff Bezos).
But what about those on the right? Well, Bezos owns WAPO, WAPO regularly bashes Trump-- so the righties also hate Bezos.
(Bezos, of course, can laugh at those fools, both on the left and the right. As the saying goes-- he's laughing all the way to the bank).
The losers in all of this? The people of NYC who were deprived of an opportunity to have greatly lowered taxes, more jobs,and a much improved transportation system.
But it serves them right-- stupidity can and must be punished!
But then, the "true believers', regardless of political strip, have always been what's f*cked up this country.
Ok-- now its time for the personal attacks..ROFL!
As an objective observer, I simply shook my head in wonderment at the stupidity of New Yorkers for opposing the Amazon proposal. Even though, as you pointed out, it would cost them NOTHING and would be a HUGE benefit they opposed it.
OK....I'm going to buck the trend here....
This is actually not the worst idea among Democrats today.
It's a relatively small tax for a good cause.
The normal criticism of Democrats is that they're just wackadoodle, and their ideas are just completely insane fantasies. Compared to socializing healthcare, forgiving 1.6 trillion dollars in student loans, or giving people money simply because they're black, this just seems pretty tame.
If the threshold were higher, I think I would agree. $200K a year isn't exactly "the rich" depending on how many mouths you're feeding and where you live.
The threshold goes to the bottom.
For families under $30k, they owe like $25, and then it increases as AGI goes up.
Personally, I have zero interest in these leftist bullshit ideas where only a few people pay because they had the gall to actually make some money. If we think something is worth doing, then it ought to be important enough to make everybody kick in something.
Believe it or not, the last time Congress actually declared war was 1942, so he might have to carefully define what he means by "war."