Sponsored political games. The top one hundredth of 1 percent earns five percent of the nation's income whereas the bottom 20% earns 3.5% of the nation's income.

Notice that I said Income, not wealth and I said top .01%. That's one in 10,000.

How much do you propose taxing the bottom 20% who already pay 1.9% of the nation's taxes despite earning only 3.5% of the income in order to keep the Koch's tax rate at the second lowest in the last century after only the period leading into the great depression?

It's not the philanthropy of Buffett and Koch that best serves society, it's their profit making work that best serves society. Bill Gates did far more to improve society through Microsoft than he has through his philanthropic work (which is not to denigrate his philanthropy).

The left has a government-centric view of the world. They only value the services provided by government and ignore the services provided by the private sector. But even if that is one's view, it is still better to leave the money in Buffett's hands. Buffett will invest that money and it will grow, thereby increasing his tax payments in future years. The rich getting richer is a good thing -- even for those with a government-centric view.

Except that the Bros. Koch didn't start anything. Like so many Republican money men they simply inherited all their wealth. The idle rich don't really benefit society in anyway. They become even more useless and entitled than the official aristocracy. Andrew Carnegie knew that, too bad Fred Koch didn't.

Re: "Wealth creation coupled with freedom is the greatest boon to improving the human condition."

Not True!!!!

If we tilt all the way left, then we end up with everybody employed, but nothing to eat. If we tilt all the way to the right, then we end up with corporate operating efficiency going up even as the unemployment rate heads toward 100%.

A healthy economy balances our national dollars between consumption and capital investment so that we keep the buying habit alive and also invest in increasingly efficient production.

If you move too much money out of the consumption cycle and into the capital cycle, then you have more and more dollars chasing fewer and fewer ideas, so the marginal utility of each new investment goes toward zero. Since the demand is shrinking, product runs will shrink as well, so that the negative utility of having fewer customers can very easily outweigh the positive utility of whatever the capital investment was in the first place. Even worse, the consumption cycle shrinks, which causes a deflationary debt spiral.

This is what happened in 1928-1932 following 10 years of tea-party economics brought in by Warren Harding. Shrinkage of the middle class was hidden by a stock market and real-estate boom in the 20's just like it was in the 80's. In 1928 and 2010, the wealth gap between the rich and poor hit the same record levels, so we need to be careful not to have another Hoover Austerity 1930 moment.

I am not a Republican, but I would agree that we should tax the 50% who are currently paying no taxes...

Is it the "Does George Soros Have To Choke A B----?" Fund, by any chance?

Re: "heck, if the wealthy lefties want to pay more, send a check to pay down the debt." This is disingenuous and insulting. Tell me you have never said to yourself "people are destroying the grass by cutting across here" and then cut across because everyone else is, so it wouldn't do any good if just you played the good citizen.

It is better to live in a healthy economy than in one that is crippled by imbalances. I think that if you ask most people whether they would rather live in a first world country with education, public security, laws, and infrastructure, or a third world country with the top 10% buying education and infrastructure for themselves and turning their back on the rest, but with full Ron Paul-style freedom (in other words freedom to retain your education and infrastructure money and spend it only on yourself), then I would suggest that most modern Americans would rather give up a small amount of liberty in order to live in a first world country.

"I believe my business and non-profit investments are much more beneficial to societal well-being than sending more money to Washington."

Lets see Koch business investments have done little more than pollute the environment, and their "non-profit investments" all seem to be self-interested donations almost exclusively given to political puppets, who guard their vast inherited wealth, and enable their continued polluting. So it's hard to see any societal benefit to the Koch brothers activity. Oh but wait, they did give their already filthy rich prep school a huge donation. Finally, every student can now afford their own polo pony.

Unlike Buffet, the Bros. Koch inherited everything they have from their father Fred, a clever, mentally unstable, bigot who financed those Tea Party forerunners the John Birch Society. Isn't part of the WFB lore that he supposedly expelled those racist crackpots in JBS from the conservative movement? Well I guess they bought their way back in.

Interesting trivia note: I'm reading David Horowitz's autobiography, Radical Son. In the early '70s, when he was still affiliated with radical left-wing mag Ramparts, he worked with a left-wing New Yorker who is also something-or-other on Wall Street. The other guy has a very wealthy friend whom he hits up for a donation to the magazine: Warren Buffett. Horowitz, not knowing who Buffett is, appreciates the donation but later realizes that $500 from Buffett was actually sorta chintzy, even in 1973 dollars.

Apparently Buffett's left-leaning is not new.