Since I can't respond directly to the Gates Blogger a/k/a Lee Strong, I decided to shadow him on my blog.
Lee jumped right on the D&C's Property Tax Rate bandwagon with his post on Gates property taxes, "Lower Taxes? Not in Gates.". He reiterated the point that the D&C editorialists wanted the public to get; namely that higher tax rates mean higher taxes and inefficient government. One of Lee's respondents, GatesTaxpayer, "put two and two together" and got the point that Lee wanted to make, which is that Gates taxes are among the highest in the county. Of course, that's not really the case.
Tax rates only tell half of the story. A brief example. Assume that there are two towns that both have 10,000 households and both have town governments with the same services and a budget of $5,000,000. The 10,000 houses in Town A have an average value of $100,000. The 10,000 houses in Town B have an average value of $200,000. The tax rate in Town A would have to be $5.00/$1000 in assessed valuation. The tax rate in Town B would be $2.50/$1000 in assessed valuation. The average taxpayer in both towns would pay $500.00. The taxes in Towns A and B are exactly the same even though the tax rates are very different.
So Lee and his respondent, "GatesTaxpayer", got it wrong. You cannot compare the taxes paid by people with the same value home in different towns because in towns with higher property values, the homeowners with higher value houses subsidize the taxes for lower value homeowners. The only way to compare taxes in each town is to look at the tax bill paid by the average taxpayer.
Lee and his Democrat cohorts hope that the average person in Gates is fooled by their simplistic explanation of tax rates. The simple truth is that you cannot take one component of total taxes, such as the tax rate, and look at it in a vacuum. Either Lee is not as smart as he thinks he is, or he is intentionally misleading his readers.
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6 comments:
Dear Repoman:
Since you are having a political love affair with "Rudy", permit me to ask a few questions. Let me premise those with this: as a Democrat I felt at the time that Bill Clinton should have resigned when he admitted to lying to the American people about his affair. While I liked the job he did as President, his personal behavior forever demeaned his administration.
One of Ronald Reagan's appeal to me was his seemingly loving relationship he had with his wife. Not a cheater, his love and loyality to his wife, went hand in hand with his message of integrity and honor. His one divorce many years earlier did not diminish his abiltiy to speak with moral authority.
Would he have had the ability to talk about values, tradition, honor, integrity if he had been married three (3) times?. Not to me - and I am no holy roller.
Does it matter that Rudy divored his ist wife, went on to marry his 2nd, while married to his 2nd, had a mistress, brought that mistress to his home where his wife and children lived and announced his divorce on TV prior to informing his wife that he wanted out.
Yes it does. While I am personally forgiving and understanding of character flaws, I want a President with higer character. Rudy has no ability to speak about integrity, honor, honesty, committment,or conviction. Apparenty your desire to win has you overlooking this man's serious character flaws. You call him a quote liberal as differentiated in some way from a liberal without quotes. Republican or Democrat we need a President who is neither liberal or conservative with our without quotes. We need a person with courage, honor, and personal integrity. In an increaseingly empty and valueless culture of materialism and consumerism, with record levels of depression, alcoholism and drug dependency, we need a person with spirit of honor to lead us back to our core.
Anonymous:
My thought is that we should not reject the good in the search for the perfect.
Clearly, Rudy Giuliani is not perfect. He is twice divorced, and his family life is obviously far from ideal. Having said that, is there someone running for President without flaws? For that matter, how many Presidents and Senators, Congressmen and Governors have met the test you are proposing?
If we go down the road of seeking a certain level of piety in our political leaders, who gets to draw the lines? For you, apparently, one divorce is OK, but two is not. For others, divorce is a sin cutting one off from God. What about having a drink? Is one bourbon OK? Two? Three?
I like Rudy because he is a leader. He doesn't care what his critics say about him. He knows that some people simply can't support him, either because of his positions or background. So be it.
In the dangerous world we live in, we need someone who will protect us. I'll seek moral examples in church, not Washington. Don't misunderstand me, character matters, but I am wary of making assumptions based upon marital problems. We can't know what contributions to the problem came from his spouses. And, finally, I don't think there is a fair comparison to Rudy's "behavior" and Bill Clinton's conduct "with that woman" in the White House. Again, a matter of perspective.
You are right about one thing for sure, I am all in for Rudy!
I'm probably not as smart as some people think I am. My daughters are certainly smarter than I am.
Maybe it's the beard and glasses. Professorial.
By the way, I don't have Democratic cohorts.
Heck, I've only voted for one Democratic Presidential candidate since I registered to vote in 1973 - and I came to regret that 1992 error!
By the way, I think Fred Thompson would be an interesting candidate.
Lee:
I happen to think you're a very smart guy, if a little pedantic, and you're very well written, but, you know the saying, reasonable people can differ.
I give you a lot of credit for leading the Gates Blog. It must be a time consuming endeavor, but you obviously enjoy it. The effort is a great community service.
Having said that, I'm sure you realize that I take issue with some of your points. You may not have Democrat "cohorts", but many of your friends and a great number of your respondents are clearly in the anti-administration ranks. Your opinions often seem to put you in that category.
I have found some of your posts a bit heavy-handed. I particularly object to un-substantiated assertions being presented as facts. I think if you re-read some of your comments, you might realize why I and others (like the Supervisor) think you've been negative and unfairly critical.
But, hey, thank goodness for freedom of expression. You keep doing your thing and I'll keep doing mine. As you noted, I do read your blog rather closely. From time to time, when you rile me up, I'll throw my two cents in.
P.S. I think Fred Thompson would be a great GOP candidate. As you can tell from my blog, I'm a big Rudy fan (I know you don't like him... hey, maybe he reminds you of Ralph! Just kidding!) but if Fred gets in and Rudy slips, I could really go for him. He has a strong and reassuring manner about him. I actually wished he had not left the Senate.
Pedantic? Well, I am a teacher.
As for linking Ralph and Rudy in any way, I think that would be an insult to Ralph.
As I have noted, despite my criticsims of some of his actions and the way he sometimes treats people, I actually have a very high opinion of Ralph. I think Gates has been lucky to have him. I have voted for him before, and would consider doing so again, depending on who is running this fall.
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