Those small town values can add up. After quitting her job as Alaska Governor before the end of her term, Sarah Palin has raked in an estimated $12 million since July. Between speaking fees and her new reality show, Palin is becoming one of the wealthiest political figures in the country. In the meantime, questions are being raised about one organization that paid a speaking fee for Palin in California.
Pundits can debate the political costs and benefits of Sarah Palin’s decision to step down as Alaska governor, but the monetary advantages of leaving her $125,000-a-year public service post are beyond dispute.
This amounted includes $7 million deal for her first book and will earn $250,000 per episode for her new reality show.
For that story, click here.
California Attorney General Jerry Brown has ordered an investigation into the shredding of documents related to a Palin speech by the Cal State Stanislaus foundation, here. A state legislator had demanded documents on the speech, which may have come with a hefty $100,000 speaking fee.
Fantastic. I wish her well. This will surely help with a special needs child in the family.
Slarti:
Capitalists may be greedy pigs but we aren’t stupid. By the way you do know that a pigs skin has a pink tinge don’t you? 🙂
Byron,
Cut it out, this agreeing with each other thing has got to stop! 😉
Slarti:
I agree you would have to take it slowly, like detox you could go cold turkey but it might really suck and end up killing the addict.
So your Rx is the correct one. Try to do it in about 10 years with the ultimate goal an amendment to do away with deficit spending.
Byron,
You wont get any argument from me about ending corporate welfare although I might argue for winding some of them down rather than cutting them off abruptly (I think that cutting off any sort of funding should only be done after looking at what the effects of that act will be – we want to avoid unintended consequences…). I would also argue that the deficit should be treated the same way. I believe (as do most liberal and conservative economists that I know of) that if the 2010 budget was balanced then we would be in a depression right now. Quick changes, even if they are ultimately in the right direction can have severe unwanted effects.
Slarti:
That would be a good start to reduce the budget in terms of this years budget by 5% a year. Not decrease the increase but take 2010 as year 0 and reduce that amount by 5% per year.
That is a good idea. I would also want to get rid of what I call corporate welfare, you know the stuff – 400 million to promote orange juice consumption. Also let farmers actually sell to the market and not be reimbursed for not growing a crop or for growing too much of another crop. This is a ridiculous subsidy. If a farmer cant make it selling the market then so long.
Why should you and I and others subsidize corporations and farmers?
Byron,
If the deficit were turned into a surplus and the debt below, say, $5 trillion I might agree with you, but until then money going to pay off debt frees up money for investment. The rich have benefited disproportionately (as demonstrated by a wide range of statistics showing the concentration of wealth) by our current system – they should bear a correspondingly larger part of the burden of fixing the problem. We can’t just implement the ‘ideal’ system, we also have to fix the problems that we’ve created since President Reagan. Would you support legislation (or an amendment) that required congress to reduce the debt by, say, 5% each year as long as it was above a certain percentage of GDP (I’m well aware that a certain level of debt is fine) except during a congressionally declared war or other suitably defined emergency? I wont presume to comment on your business as I don’t know the particulars (nor am I asking). When the deficit is in the past, the debt is at reasonable levels, social security is fixed, medicare is fully funded (and the age of eligibility is lowered to birth, by my preference), I’ll be more than happy to discuss the role of government and whether or not it should be smaller (and I’ll be willing to discuss trimming or eliminating other programs on their merits), but until Washington has cleaned up the mess it’s made I don’t think that is reasonable. Someone has to pay off the debt – why shouldn’t it be those who benefited from the spending that created it?
There needs to be a Fair Tax Plan and do away with our current tax system.
What is the FairTax plan?
The FairTax plan is a comprehensive proposal that replaces all federal income and payroll based taxes with an integrated approach including a progressive national retail sales tax, a prebate to ensure no American pays federal taxes on spending up to the poverty level, dollar-for-dollar federal revenue neutrality, and, through companion legislation, the repeal of the 16th Amendment.
The FairTax Act (HR 25, S 296) is nonpartisan legislation. It abolishes all federal personal and corporate income taxes, gift, estate, capital gains, alternative minimum, Social Security, Medicare, and self-employment taxes and replaces them with one simple, visible, federal retail sales tax administered primarily by existing state sales tax authorities.
The FairTax taxes us only on what we choose to spend on new goods or services, not on what we earn. The FairTax is a fair, efficient, transparent, and intelligent solution to the frustration and inequity of our current tax system.
The FairTax:
* Enables workers to keep their entire paychecks
* Enables retirees to keep their entire pensions
* Refunds in advance the tax on purchases of basic necessities
* Allows American products to compete fairly
* Brings transparency and accountability to tax policy
* Ensures Social Security and Medicare funding
* Closes all loopholes and brings fairness to taxation
* Abolishes the IRS
We offer a library of information throughout this Web site about the features and benefits of the FairTax plan. Please explore!
http://www.fairtax.org/site/PageServer?pagename=about_main
Slarti:
the people making that kind of money are the ones that drive the economy. they invest in building projects, buy stocks, buy franchises, develop land, etc. They put people to work.
Just in my little business if I was able to pay less tax I could hire another person or buy some additional equipment or buy a piece of property and develop it, but the government is preventing that because of the money I need to pay in taxes.