This New York Times story says President Trump is discussing with his advisors whether to skip the general election debates. Thanks to Political Wire for the link.
This New York Times story says President Trump is discussing with his advisors whether to skip the general election debates. Thanks to Political Wire for the link.
I would like to see a law that says that any candidate who refuses to debate the other candidates is automatically taken off the ballot and is barred from receiving any write in votes.
If Trump dodges national debates perhaps the Dem candidate will still want the coverage bad enough that he/she debates the Lib & Green candidates. :>)
Andy — one more ANTI-Democracy person — regarding ballot access.
How much added other stuff – a videotaped life history — including ALL sex stuff ???
ALL test scores ???
ALL rumors ???
All part of the FATAL monarch/tyrant disease in the USA — since 1929 esp.
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PR
NONPARTISAN AppV
TOTSOP
@ ken: Love it. If the Democrats want a debate they will be compelled to invite other parties. I hope Trump follows through with his threat.
@ Andy: Conversely, should all the candidates who DO get on the ballot be included in the debates?
Any
um…no
I seriously doubt the Democratic Party candidate will debate anyone other than the Republican (Trump).
Funny thing here is that I don’t think Trump has much to worry about when it comes to the Demicratic Party nominee. A minor party or independent candidate could potentially give him problems in a debate, but even here, it woukd depend on who the minor party or independent candidate is.
Let’s think about this now. Trump has gotten away with not revealing his tax returns. It would be true to form if he just blew off the debates as well.
Why should any candidate have to reveal their tax returns? The income tax is a big sham that is not even properly applied in most cases, as in most Americans do not even legally owe any income taxes, nor are they legally required to file returns, or use or even have, Social Security Numbers. Most of the public has been duped into believing things that run contrary to the Constitution.
Where is it written in the Constitution that presidential candadites, or candidates for any other office, must reveal tax records?
ANY body note the recent Trump tax return – ballot access cases ???
Anyone who think that the 16th amendment (of which there is ample evidence was never properly ratified) authorized the government to tax the earnings of every American citizen is uninformed. The Supreme Court ruled that the income tax has limited application. The 16th amendment did NOT repeal the section of the Constitution which mandated that direct taxes MUST be apportioned among the states, with each state paying in ratio to the number of US House members it has, which is determined via the US Census. The income tax was meant for foreigners working within the 50 states, and for people engaging in international commerce. The income tax does not apply to most American citizens.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sixteenth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution
Good luck for Judge Andy.
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Is a loan *income* to the debtor ???
Is a repaid loan *income* to the creditor ???
ECONOMY *income* vs NON-ECONOMY money flows.
How STUPID are SCOTUS hacks ???
SEE OBAMACARE MORON OP.
The public funding scheme in New York has a requirement that participating candidates participate in one debate.
A better scheme would have candidates qualify by participating in a debate. There would be a series of debate opportunities. Candidates could debate, and thereby qualify to receive votes at that venue; and voters would qualify to vote by attending the debate.
Candidates could demonstrate minimal support among attendees (say 10 voters). If more than 10 qulaify to debate, the 10 with the most support would debate. After listening to the debate, the voters in attendance would immediately vote.
Check out the US Supreme Court cases Brushaber v Pacific Railroad and Stanton v Baltic Mining. The court ruled that the 16th amendment conferred no new power of taxation, and that the income tax, as properly applied, is a foreign revenue tariff.
Also, the US Supreme Court ruled in the 1895 Pollock v Farmer’s Loan and Trust case, that that the 1894 income tax was unconstitutional.
So if the federal government did not have the power to lay a direct tax on American citizens (as in an income tax, or a tax on earnings), and post the alleged ratification of the 16th amendment (which is quite dubious if you ever look into how it was supposedly ratified), that the 16th amendment conferred no new power of taxation, and is a foreign revenue tariff, then this means that the government has no lawful authority to collect taxes on the earnings of most American citizens. They get away with it via mass deception and propaganda and intimidation.
Why should Trump debate? With the recent UK vote it is clear the Democrats even with the help of the Lamestrean Media are doomed!
SCOTUS MORONS HAVE NOT DETECTED BASIC DIFFERENCE BETWEEN USA TAXES ON
ASSETS – LEVELS — DIRECT TAXES
VERSUS
ECON MONEY FLOWS — INDIRECT TAXES
B-O-T-H THE 1795 CARRIAGE TAX AND 1895 LAND RENT OPS WERE UNCON.
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WHOLE LEGAL SUBJECTS TOTALLY SCREWED UP BY THE APPOINTED PARTY HACK SCOTUS MORONS.
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NONPARTISAN APPV FOR ALL JUDGES.
Trump could decide to participate in an open debate instead of the CPD debates, and blame the Democrat for not debating; or as @ken suggests, the Democrat could participate in an open debate to increase the blowback for Trump not debating. Either scenario is good for alternative candidates.
Trump shoulf debate because every candidate should be willing to put their ideas up against the other candidates for that office. Anyone who is not willing to debate should not be a candidate.
The Democratic candidate would only debate a 3rd party candidate if they were sure of two things:
1. The 3rd party candidate would take votes away from Trump. Which means they won’t debate the Green candidate.
2. They are sure the Democratic candidate won’t be made to look stupid by either;
2A. Standing on stage with a candidate who lacks seriousness in the public’s mind (Vermin Supreme or an ancap)
2B. Debating a candidate who was willing and able to launch effective verbal attacks against the Democrat, rather than Trump.
They might be willing to debate the Constitution Party candidate if they thought the Constitution candidate was kind of dumb and would out-Trump Trump and draw votes away from him. If the Constitution Party puts up a candidate that campaigns on Trump not being pro-life or pro-gun enough, and that the impeachment is just a witch hunt based on a conspiracy theory, that might get them a debate invite.
But there are more variables with an LP candidate. The survey of Amash as the Libertarian nominee actually hurt Biden more than Trump, because Amash became an outlet for Never-Trump Republicans.
Andy “Check out the US Supreme Court cases Brushaber v Pacific Railroad…”
I just read the wikipedia page on that. It does not support your claims.
@Andy Any candidate running is in a broad “debate” in the general public forum(s). Any particular debate event has multiple criteria to be negotiated, including: who sponsors debate, who moderates, who is invited, what dates, how much advanced notice, how is it broadcast (radio, TV airwaves, cable, internet, pay-per-view). What if a candidate attends many local debates, but non sponsored (and broadcast) by major corporate networks? What if they participate in two out of twenty invited debates? What if they precondition participation on all candidates on the ballot anywhere being invited, or will only debate unimpeached candidates, or only leftists, or only major parties?
Anyway, I hope Trump does it. It’s another example of how he dares to think outside the political box (FYI, I did NOT vote for Trump in 2016, and don’t expect to in 2020 either). If anything else, he would smash the whole mystique of the “debates”, which in my opinion deserves it for their exclusiveness.
Jim, you need to do a lot more homework than that. Glancing over cliff notes of one small part of a large subject does not constitute having researched an issue.
How many seconds until DJT claims to be a god ???
See olde Japan Empire or even earlier Roman Empire.
ANY body opposing god in/out of *debates* must be purged.
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13 Dec 2019 — SCOTUS will be hearing the 3 Trump tax cases
Andy –
OK, I read the first half of the Supreme Court’s Brushaber v Union Pacific decision (the second half deals with arguments you aren’t making, like 5th amendment due process claims.) It said that direct taxes are head taxes and taxes on property, like real estate. Those are subject to apportionment rule between the states. All other taxes, including income taxes, are indirect and subject to the uniformity rule. The 16th amendment conferred no new power of taxation because the federal government already had the power to collect indirect taxes.
The 1894 Pollock case was also discussed in the decision. It said that taxes on income from rents, interest, and dividends were direct taxes, as that amounted to a direct tax on property. Taxation on the income from labor was an indirect tax and only subject to uniformity. And so, not being subject to apportionment, the court ruled that an income tax on rents, interest, and dividends was unconstitutional. And because a tax only on the income from labor was not the intent of Congress, it struck down the entire law.
That 1894 Pollock case is what the 16th amendment addressed. It gave Congress the power to tax incomes “from whatever source derived, without apportionment”, meaning it allowed for an income tax on rents, interest, and dividends. Again, the court had ruled that Congress already had the power to tax incomes from labor.
I also looked into the claim that the 16th amendment was not properly ratified. There seem to be 2 arguments. One relies on extremely minor differences in the text that was ratified in each state – commas instead of a semi-colon, differences in which letters are capitalized, simply saying “Congress shall have” instead of “The Congress shall have”, and so forth. None of them change the meaning of the text. The other argument is that Ohio was not a state because Congress did not set an official date for its acceptance. Congress did, of course, pass a law, signed by Jefferson in 1802, that Ohio “has become one of the United States of America.” It just didn’t list an official date for when that had happened. And, in any case, more than enough other states ratified the 16th.
The libertarian argument is not that the income tax is in any way illegal. Government can make anything it wants legal. The libertarian argument is that the income tax, like all other taxation, is immoral.
Jim, did you read Stanton v Baltic Mining, where the Supreme Court ruled that the 16th amendment “conferred no new power of taxation”?
What is the legal definition of the word “income”?
Who is legally a “withholding agent”?
What is a “US person” and how does that definition differ from an American citizen?
Is the income tax as applied today in most cases a direct tax or an indirect tax, and if it is a direct tax, is it apportioned among the states, as is mandated by the Constitution, or, if it is an indirect tax, can you explain how it is indirect?
Can you show me a copy of the law that says that it is mandatory for American citizens to have or use Social Security Numbers?
Why is it that Social Security cards used to say that the numbers were not to be used for tracking purposes, and why did they stop printing that on the cards?
I never said that the Libertarian philosophical argument against the income tax, or any other tax, was wrong. Taxation is theft, no matter how it manifests itself, amd theft is wrong.
I am pointing out that the income tax is applied illegally in most cases, from a constitutional standpoint, and that it was never properly ratified. The fact that the government has been lying and covering this up for many years should further undermine the credibility of the state. The income tax/Federal Reserve System/Social Security scam is perhaps the biggest example of financial fraud in history, and it has led to wars, mass infringements of civil liberties, and a less properous society. If the people in government lie about this, which they do, one must ask what else do they lie to us about? The answer is a lot.
Why is it that when people pay “their” “income tax” tax extortion they are directed to send the payment to the Federal Reserve System and not the US Treasury? How is this constitutional?
Who are the stockholders of the Federal Reserve System? Why is the Federal Reserve System listed in the private section of the phone book, and not under the government listings in the phone book?
The Federal Reserve System is a private banking cartel that operates as a counterfeiting operation which has been (unconstitutionally) granted governmental powers. It enriches the banksters and their political cronies and has led to wild expansions of the state. The IRS and the so called “income tax” is their collection racket to pay the interest on the massive debts they rack up. Social Security Numbers are used to track their slaves, and the Social Security welfare Ponzi style scheme and other welfare programs are used to breed dependency on the state to keep a large percentage of the slaves pacified so they do not revolt against their bankster and politician masters.
Andy – You’re flailing wildly. I told you the Supreme Court decision that I read. I explained why there was no new power of taxation – the court ruled that Congress already had that power. As in, it could have imposed a tax on income from labor in 1795, if it wanted. The court ruled it is an indirect tax for reasons I have already explained. Direct taxes are head taxes and taxes applied to property, either directly or to the income generated by property. All other taxes are indirect. That is what the court said. You can disagree if you want, but the Supreme Court has the final say and you are making a legal argument. The wikipedia page on Stanton v Baltic Mining says Stanton lost on everything he was arguing. I have little doubt that it said that the 16th conferred no new power of taxation for the same reason described in Brushaber v Union Pacific.
I have absolutely no doubt that YOU have not read any of these decisions. You are just repeating the arguments of someone else who claimed to have read them and took some quotes out of context. If you had read them yourself, you would see those claims for the nonsense they are.
Your questions about defining income, who is a withholding agent, and the definition of a us person are minutia which I am sure are defined somewhere. It took 30 seconds to find the definition of income. It’s right here:
https://irc.bloombergtax.com/public/uscode/doc/irc/section_61
I don’t care enough to look the others up. You are not scoring any points that way. Whether or not some process of the law is defined to your satisfaction has no bearing on the courts ruling of its legality.
Go ahead and explain why you think the 16th was never properly ratified, if what you believe is any different from the debunked claims that I have already outlined.
I have no idea what you are talking about with the sending of tax checks to the Federal Reserve. You are supposed to make the check payable to the US Treasury.