Redstate

First caveat, while Huckabee has been impressive in the debates, he needs to do himself, the Republican Party, the State of Arkansas, and the U.S. a favor and announce his run for Senate at the debate tonight.

That said, Huckabee remains incredibly popular in Arkansas after his tax reign of terror. The reason? He built support for his largest tax increases before trying to pass them, and the people of Arkansas feel they got their money's worth.

The federal government was behind some of the increases. Arkansas roads no longer resemble those in third world countries. And the Republicans in Georgia, if I'm not mistaken, passed a similar nursing home bed tax. The reason, it's paid by either medicare or medicaid, and was necessary to replace federal funds cut from the program.

All that said, I'm still not willing to vote for Huckabee in a primary, but would love to see him in the Senate, and give him time to vote against unfunded mandates to states. If he could become a voice of fiscal restraint in the Senate, he'd be the hands down front runner in 4 or 8 years.

How much of those increases were even within Huckabee control?

The biggest one I know of was the road repair which was done by referendum, correct? IT had 80% of the vote, correct? Was he supposed to say "No, it might make me look bad later."?

Arkansas really had some of the wors troads in the nation. I used to drive a truck and I can attest to that personally.

Mike Huckabee has my vote.

Jim Tomasik

There is no reasonable equity of distribution under the current INCOME tax system. What's more, the Tax Code has become a "tinkerer's paradise" for 53% of the lobbyists who game it in Washington DC. It's a lucrative business, and the U.S. TAXPAYER pays for ALL of it in higher prices (i.e., a hidden tax which is incomprehensible to the average working person).

Prices after FairTax passage would look similar to prices before FairTax - not "30% higher" as opponents contend - competition would see to it. So, the FairTax rate (figured as an income-tax-rate-non-comparative, sales tax) on new items would be 29.85% (on the new, reduced cost of items because business isn't taxed under FairTax - thus lowering retail prices by 20% to 30%), or 23% of the "tax inclusive" price tag - this is the way INCOME TAX is figured (parts of the total dollar).

The effective tax rate percentages, that different income groups would pay under the FairTax, are calculated by crediting the monthly "prebate" (advance rebate of projected tax on necessities) against total monthly spending of citizen families (1 member and greater, Dept. of HHS poverty-level data; a single person receiving ~$200/mo, a family of four, ~$500/mo, in addition to working earners receiving paychecks with no Federal deductions) Prof.'s Kotlikoff and Rapson (10/06) concluded,

"...the FairTax imposes much lower average taxes on working-age households than does the current system. The FairTax broadens the tax base from what is now primarily a system of labor income taxation to a system that taxes, albeit indirectly, both labor income and existing wealth. By including existing wealth in the effective tax base, much of which is owned by rich and middle-class elderly households, the FairTax is able to tax labor income at a lower effective rate and, thereby, lower the average lifetime tax rates facing working-age Americans.

"Consider, as an example, a single household age 30 earning $50,000. The household’s average tax rate under the current system is 21.1 percent. It’s 13.5 percent under the FairTax. Since the FairTax would preserve the purchasing power of Social Security benefits and also provide a tax rebate, older low-income workers who will live primarily or exclusively on Social Security would be better off. As an example, the average remaining lifetime tax rate for an age 60 married couple with $20,000 of earnings falls from its current value of 7.2 percent to -11.0 percent under the FairTax. As another example, compare the current 24.0 percent remaining lifetime average tax rate of a married age 45 couple with $100,000 in earnings to the 14.7 percent rate that arises under the FairTax."

Further, per Jokischa and Kotlikoff (circa 2006?) ...

"...once one moves to generations postdating the baby boomers there are positive welfare gains for all income groups in each cohort. Under a 23 percent FairTax policy, the poorest members of the generation born in 1990 enjoy a 13.5 percent welfare gain. Their middle-class and rich contemporaries experience 5 and 2 percent welfare gains, respectively. The welfare gains are largest for future generations. Take the cohort born in 2030. The poorest members of this cohort enjoy a huge 26 percent improvement in their well-being. For middle class members of this birth group, there's a 12 percent welfare gain. And for the richest members of the group, the gain is 5 percent."