FCINO = Freaky Costume Is Never Okay

Jesus that's a weird ad. Who knew the Cyberdyne-built sheep was going to make an appearance?

Remember when everyone was making a big deal abot NAFTA? That was fun.

The Nightman Cometh wrote:Remember when everyone was making a big deal abot NAFTA? That was fun.

I'm sure that brand of populism will come back into style at some point.

Werthless wrote:

The Nightman Cometh wrote:Remember when everyone was making a big deal abot NAFTA? That was fun.

I'm sure that brand of populism will come back into style at some point.

I wonder what you'll hear about free trade at the tea party convention.

If my long-standing populist revival prediction is correct, you'll hear a lot of anti-nafta/free trade stuff there.

jerseyhoya wrote:FCINO video



Wow, epic fail on this one

Haha, the part from 2:50 to 2:55 made me laugh out loud (after the buildup from the rest of the video).

I'm strongly in favor of making it easier for states to collect sales tax on internet purchases. Just sayin.

The guy the Democrats nominated Tuesday for LG in Illinois was arrested about four-and-a-half years ago and accused of holding a knife to a former live-in girlfriend's neck. Good times.

Not bad but this guy in Jersey City was actually convicted of federal bank fraud and remains active in City politics and even serves on the City's school board (which is curious because I thought convicted felons were barred from holding elected office). I wish I were running against him in April; at least I'd be able to say I've never been in federal prison.


http://www.politickernj.com/matt-friedm ... ng-sue-him


EDIT: Wait a second, I think I might have changed my mind. Cohen is a pawnbroker who was living with a prostitute? Man, NJ voters have nothing on IL voters.

How many states have the highest taxes in the country?

phdave wrote:How many states have the highest taxes in the country?

correct answer has to be 1 (although I suppose 2 could have exactly the same levies...? Not too likely) but which one I dunno

I'd bet, depending on which taxes you chose to include or not, 10 or 15 states could claim that. Which is, I suppose, your point.

It's not really straight forward--Do you count state taxes only, or state+local taxes (In NJ, for instance, it's the local property taxes that hit most families the hardest, but it varies widely from place to place.) Second, do you look at how much tax is collected per person, or do you look at rates? It's generally misleading to look exclusively at rates. NJ has a relatively high sales tax, but it excludes clothes, which is unusual. (It also excludes groceries, but only a few states collect sales tax on groceries.)

There has to be some site out there with the total average tax take per state, in absolute and relative terms. Try the Brookings Tax Center, which I think has a pretty good bi/non-partisan rep.

According to the Tax Foundation, New Jersey is #1 in state and local tax burden as a percentage of state income.

We're number 1! We're number 1!

(see page 38 of PDF)

VoxOrion wrote:I'd bet, depending on which taxes you chose to include or not, 10 or 15 states could claim that. Which is, I suppose, your point.

yea, sort of, as our subsequent posters have pointed out, which one is # 1 depends on how you define the base, but there's most likely just 1 #1 for each definition

jerseyhoya wrote:According to the Tax Foundation, New Jersey is #1 in state and local tax burden as a percentage of state income.

We're number 1! We're number 1!

(see page 38 of PDF)

What sucks most about that table is that I have to go home tonight and tell the family we are moving to Alaska. My pursuits for the second-half of my life will be shooting moose, drilling for oil and following the exploits of Levi Johnson.

Seriously, it is really striking that NJ and NY are #1 and #2 and no other state is even close.

Takes a lot of money to pay for the over 600 local governments in NJ. We could merge a few, but we are allergic to logic.

The Nightman Cometh wrote:Takes a lot of money to pay for the over 600 local governments in NJ. We could merge a few, but we are allergic to logic.

What, Hackensack cannot possibly administer to all of the needs of South Hackensack, it would be chaos!!!

The Nightman Cometh wrote:Takes a lot of money to pay for the over 600 local governments in NJ. We could merge a few, but we are allergic to logic.

This was the first thought that occurred to me looking through jh's booklet. But is it "allergic to logic," failure to grasp the link between having so many governmental subdivisions and such high taxation, or (probably the least likely) a more or less conscious decision to accept high taxes as a fair price to pay for the thrill of having so many local governments?

dajafi wrote:

The Nightman Cometh wrote:Takes a lot of money to pay for the over 600 local governments in NJ. We could merge a few, but we are allergic to logic.

This was the first thought that occurred to me looking through jh's booklet. But is it "allergic to logic," failure to grasp the link between having so many governmental subdivisions and such high taxation, or (probably the least likely) a more or less conscious decision to accept high taxes as a fair price to pay for the thrill of having so many local governments?

I think it is a combination of three things. First, I think most people believe that consolidation would not create enough savings to justify the up-front costs to complete the consolidation. Second, people are generally in no particular hurry to give up their own little fiefdoms. Finally, I think there have been a few real-life instances of consolidation (perhaps most in the form of school district consolidation) that went wrong very quickly and it has people a bit gun-shy to try when it involves them.

Overall, I would put it 70% to Item #2; 20% to Item #1 and the rest to Item #3.