Two Must-Read Columns in the NYT Today

Nicholas Kristof’s and Linda Greenhouse’s.  They’re on different subjects but, in my opinion, part and parcel of the same thing.

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ADDENDUM: Reader Sandi and I exchanged these comments in the Comments thread here this morning:

Sandi

February 19, 2016 9:03 am

One way Kristoff didn’t mention that amasses huge fortunes is our tax laws, as pertains to inheritance.

It’s beyond obscene that not only are families like the Scaifes and Kochs able to set up trusts to pass the loot to their kids, that, are structured so that after a few years of giving the proceeds of the trust to charity, the kids then get the whole enchilada with no inheritance or gift tax consequences.

The really brilliant bit is using that generated cash to set up 501(c)(3) and 501(c)(4)s to further your political agenda, much of which is to keep the tax laws bent in your direction……………
Power is great, but anonymous power really keeps your enemies on their toes. They never know where you’ll strike from next.

 

Me

February 19, 2016 9:57 am

Sandi, it absolutely dismays me that the news media and the Republican Establishment think Rubio could beat Clinton or Sanders. The two seminal parts of Rubio’s tax plan are to end the capital gains tax and end the estate tax.

The public, of course, doesn’t yet know this, and it does not occur to the media and Republican Establishment folks that once they learn of it Rubio couldn’t defeat a monkey in the general election.

Yet they all—the pundits of all ideological stripes—keep saying that Sanders’ current strength against the Republican candidates in polls pitting them against Sanders and against Clinton don’t mean much this early, yet the polls showing Rubio’s strength do. But the key thing that supposedly makes Sanders unelectable—that he’s a SOCIALIST—is actually the thing that virtually everyone who’s heard of him knows. Yet the key thing that actually would make Rubio unelectable—his tax plan—has yet to break through to most of the public. Literally; it’s extremely likely that almost no one knows of it.

I’ll add here that it is to Paul Krugman’s tremendous credit that he keeps making that point about Rubio.

Added 1/19 at 10:14 a.m.