Thursday, February 19, 2009

Wrong Way Walker Strikes Again

On Monday, Walker gave us a campaign speech full of nonsense regarding taking the stimulus money, which he didn't want in the first place, and using it for a sales tax holiday, which he can't do anyway, instead of creating jobs and repairing the infrastructure that he has let go to hell over the past seven years.

Today, he continued his gubernatorial campaign with the same stump speech, this time in front of a captive audience at the retailers seminar. He was so proud of himself, he had to take the time to email Charlie Sykes and tell him all about it.

SIDE NOTE: I wonder if this was on County time and using County property.

SIDE NOTE II: I wonder if Dan Bice is going to look into that.

A regular reader and friend of Cog Dis pointed out this passage in Walker's missive:
Heads nodded when I mentioned the positive impact for retail sales in Minnesota each year when they do their sales tax holiday just before the start of school. People from northwestern Wisconsin go over the river to the Twin Cities and other places to buy shoes, clothes and school supplies. It is an amazing incentive for people to buy in their state.

Said reader also pointed out that Minnesota doesn't have a tax holiday. You know what? They are absolutely correct.

Minnesota does not have a tax holiday (pdf, top of page 2). They do have an sales tax exemption (Minn. Stat. 297A.67, Subd. 8 (a) & (b)) for clothing, however. But that lasts all year. At least for now it does. Minnesota, like the rest of the nation, is having money problems. One of their solutions include raising the sales tax and removing the clothing exemption.

On the other hand, Iowa does have a sales tax holiday. But I can't imagine why people in northwestern Wisconsin would drive all the way to Iowa to save a couple, three bucks on some school clothes and supplies.

I know many of the Walker apologists will say he simply misspoke. But I find that a little hard to swallow since he specifically mentioned northwest Wisconsin, Minnesota and the Twin Cities. He had deliberately misled those fine people he was speaking to.

It is one thing to have a political talking point. That can be debated, and usually is here in the Cheddarsphere. I can also appreciate the exaggerations that professional politicians put into their job. After all they are trying to sell a product, themselves, and so want to paint themselves in the best light possible.

But it is a whole different thing to tell deliberate lies. That means that either the idea stinks to high heaven, the candidate does, or both stink.

I guess we shouldn't be too shocked by the whole thing, though. And to be fair, Walker could be geographically-impaired.

After all, Walker has been taken the County in the wrong direction for seven years now.

5 comments:

  1. You know, you might actually convince more moderates that you were right if you didn't have such a sarcastic tone in your writings. You offer some facts, but you tie them together with such blatant liberal propaganda that it drives away the independent thinker.

    A sales tax cut, albeit temporary, will entice buyers from other counties to buy products in Milwaukee County, not to mention it will give struggling businesses a way to preserve those jobs that are hanging in the balances.

    You couldn't argue, if you tried, that this position is faulty. Right now, we are in a recession because the consumer won't buy. They are keeping their money and therefore contributing to a lower GDP. Removing the sales tax stimulates consumer activity and helps local businesses.

    The problem with you liberals is that you need the sales tax to fund your ridiculously expensive programs that caused our record-breaking state deficit.

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  2. Doyle's entire budget proposal is to tax businesses more to compensate for his fiscally irresponsible spending. Somebody should tell him that businesses are the ones that push us out of a recession.

    Here's an idea, lower the capital gains and sales taxes, encourage consumers to buy and invest in our local economy, and Doyle will get more tax revenue from a broader tax base of energized buyers. It worked for Kennedy and Reagan, so why are we not learning from history?

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  3. Anony 2:34

    Walker's tried the sales tax line before and was proven false. MKE County already has a higher sales tax than any other surrounding county, yet no one is flocking over county lines to go shopping in Waukesha or Racine.

    Anony 3:41

    No one will be doing a lot of shopping if they don't have jobs. The key is to get people working. In the meantime, the cost to maintain people that are unemployed or underemployed has to be covered.

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  4. You don't get it. If you keep taxing businesses to pay off the deficit, you will have MORE unemployed people, which means a smaller tax base of which to collect taxes!!!

    Second, suspending a sales tax is better for business survival during a recession and better for consumers who STILL HAVE jobs.

    Don't pretend like Walker's idea is a bad one because it comes from Walker. As a responsible blogger, you ought to admit when Walker has a good idea. In fact, it's a damn good idea.

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  5. Really now.

    I debunked that noise over a year and a half ago.

    Not only that, but do recall that just this past November, the people in MKE County were finally allowed a voice and approved the sales tax in a referendum.

    Thirdly, as I've already pointed out, other states are realizing that they also need to raise their sales taxes.

    People are not going to drive hundreds of miles to save $10 in taxes. The thought is ludicrous. If Walker's theory had any substance, places like Chicago and San Fran would have fallen apart years ago. Instead, they are thriving.

    To top it off, Walker's plan is unachievable. The feds wouldn't approve it and the state wouldn't approve it. They would rather stimulate the economy and get people back to work. Benefiting only a few people, which Walker's pipe dream would do, got us into this mess.

    Not only that, Walker's plan does absolutely nothing to resolve the other problems the county is facing, like the deteriorating infrastructure or failing services.

    We need someone with a grasp of reality and not someone who offers sound bites that will never happen and wouldn't help us even if they did.

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