Label help needed from the teabaggers

That must have been the fault of all those Reds under the bed.
I always find it rather touching to hear right-wingers hearkening back to the Golden Age of the 1950s — you know the time when segregation was the norm and marginal tax rates were in the low… er… 90 percents.
I applaud the teabaggers for actively using their free speech rights, but when all the keynote teabagging speakers (that I saw) are either right-wing pundits or Republican politicians, it’s kind of hard to keep up the pretense that this is somehow a grass roots, non-partisan movement.

Griffin. duh

Please note the following:
-the top rates rose that high during the FDR & Truman years, and were called socialism at the time.
-they got dropped below today’s top rate during the reign of St. Ronald of Bel Air
-they were allowed to rise to today’s top rate during the time of a guy who falsely promised “Read my lips- no new taxes”, and was limited to a single term based mainly on his failure to live up to that promise.
I will agree that there are a lot of ignorant “right-wingers” out there that don’t know history, but can you point out specific right-wingers that are harkening back to the glory years of the ’50s, other than the reactionary in your head (i.e. strawman)? The ’50s were a nightmare for the cause of liberty, with confiscatory taxation, the rise of the national-security state, and abysmal human-rights for non-WASP Americans.

I’ll play if you do- I asked for examples, instead of spout strawman BS talking about “most of those guys”. We can both agree that your imaginary conservative is a complete moron.
Just because the reactionary in your head thinks the ’50s were all “Leave it to Beaver” and no “Good Night and Good Luck” doesn’t mean that anyone is actually calling for a return to the Eisenhower administration.
BTW, I wouldn’t lump myself in with the right-populist tools and the Republicans that co-opted them yesterday. Most of them seem to like government plenty when it’s putting a boot to the neck of a dirty fence-jumper or keeping dirty commies and sodomites from polluting their precious bodily fluids.

m’kay. You’ve found one guy that titles his essay “Why I Am a Conservative” and has one line about growing up in the ’50s and mentioning the “traditional values” of that time, but also describes the confusion of the labeling of values as “liberal” and “conservative”. It also ends saying “I am a liberal. I guess.” I’m not sure if your find supports your argument.
Speaking of “common internet tactics”, it’s also pretty common to claim unsupportable BS is “common knowledge”; this is often combined with complaints about someone “assigning homework” or even “expecting a logically supportable argument” when someone expects back-up.
Of course, it’s also common for two people to argue around each other without any effect, especially when dealing with terms that the two define differently. Oh well, c’est la vie.

Two simple reasons why I say conservatives hearken back to the 50s:
1) The sexual revolution
2) Taking prayer out of schools.
Now when did these events occur? Why yes, the early 1960s, of course.
I don’t know how many times since coming to the US 15 years ago I have heard the religious right bewailing these two events and calling for a return to “traditional” family values. Ask any of them when they thought America’s decline and demise began, and they will point to the early 1960s just about every time. (That’s extremely easy to check through Google.)
So yes, they certainly do look longingly back at the 1950s as a better time, the last time when family values “counted for something” and God was still given due deference.
Sure there are probably a few libertarians out there who understand the idiocy of such things, but I didn’t see too many of them in amongst the teabaggers yesterday.

The data don’t support your thesis; the ‘big jump’ is from 18.0 to 18.8, which is still well within the range of the Clinton years. You know, when our nation was collapsing all around us with millions unemployed and people getting foreclosed upon left and right.

I certainly agree that Americans will have to make a choice eventually–between higher taxes or a weak social safety net. So far they have chosen the latter, whereas almost all other modern industrialized nations have chosen the former.
Having lived in both for long periods of time, I can see the strengths and weaknesses in both systems.
I’ve always said that America is a great place to live if you have money and your health. Trouble is, if you lose one or the other then there’s a much greater risk of losing everything.
But the choice isn’t really between socialism and capitalism. It’s between a little more socialism vs. a little less socialism — or a little more capitalism vs. a little less capitalism if you like. America will always have a system that is a compromise between the two. The argument is really about which side of the half-way line we should be.

school prayer? sexual revolution? Now I see the problem- you were talking about social conservatives. I’m not sure what their opinions on the ’50s have to do with marginal income tax rates or economic systems in general.
In my experience, social cons are just as likely as their godless heathen counterparts to have ass backward economic & fiscal views- see Richard Nixon if you need an example (wage & price controls, screwy monetary policy, etc.) or Mike Huckabee for a non-dead example.
If those are the conservatives you are talking about, then sure- I won’t argue against the premise that they loves them some ’50s. I thought that you were talking about fiscal conservatives, seeing that you were talking about fiscal/economic issues.
Oh, and since you asked- I’d call the fed gov’t, going back at least as far as 1933, the worst kind of socialist- the kind that only socializes the losses of cronies, subsidizing their business from the public fisc.

Actually I don’t recall Clinton ever having a ‘surplus’. We temporarily decreased borrowing but certainly didn’t pay down debt. I think it is safe to say that our politicians (on both sides) are completely incapable of saving. If there is a surplus they’ll spend it.

It’s a matter of degree. Your (new) question is like asking “you say 100 is a number; what does that make 1000? A supernumber? A hypernumber?”
Your little chart is just a bit too simplistic, using the single data point of the marginal rate of the top income bracket, without considering even other income tax parameters (such as deductions from taxable income, which was extremely different before the 1986 reforms), or other non-tax related issues such as increased centralized meddling with private economic affairs, spending far in excess of revenues and the associated borrowing which increases costs for private borrowing, a wide open tap at the Fed which will devalue the currency and further distort pricing signals, and now nationalization of major segments of the economy (banking and durable goods manufacturing for now, health care and energy to come).
Does a 10% increase in the top marginal income tax rate alone equal “socialism”? No. Is that the sole action taken and/or planned by Congress & the executive branch? No.

That’s really really wimpy.
As a matter of fact, the main change being made to the tax code IS the change to the top marginal rate. There’s no other change which is going to affect very many people, other than the CUTS, of course.
As for “supernumber”, “hypernumber”; it’s your buddies who have claimed that 33-36% is capitalism and 36-39% is socialism; not me. If you want to disavow them, please feel free to do so; otherwise, the question still stands: if we’ve just made a big leap into socialism, what the hell do we call the 1930s-1980s?

Just pointing out that for a guy who argued so aggressively, you sure did clam up when it came time to give a strong label for 90% marginal tax rates.
And, yes, for the second time, they are relevant: the only major change in the tax code that will result in higher taxes for anybody is the rise in the top marginal rate.
Your buddies refers to the teabaggers.
Finally, anybody who would call 33-36% “bad enough before” is a retard, given the history clearly evident in this graph. Idiocracy enough fro you?