To the casual reader of the primary and caucus results of this past weekend, Obama is just creaming Hillary. This race wonโt be over until the returns are in from Texas and Ohio next month and Pennsylvania in April. After that, the super-delegates will have to make up their minds. But right now, Hillary is just getting whooped. Thatโs the long and short of it. (Plus, she just fired her campaign manager.)
This is disturbing news on the taxation front. The Wall Street Journalโs Steve Moore says Obamaโs tax plan would add up to a 39.6 percent personal income tax, a 52.2 percent combined income and payroll tax, a 28 percent capital-gains tax, a 39.6 percent dividends tax, and a 55 percent estate tax. In other words, Sen. Obama is a very-high-tax candidate. Whether Wall Street has fully discounted this, I have no idea. Probably not yet. But somebody in the investor class ought to be thinking about it, because itโs not good.
Interestingly, at least two of Obamaโs top economic advisors โ Austan Goolsbee and Jeffrey Liebman โ are highly regarded free-market economists. Goolsbee from Chicago, Liebman from Harvard. But somehow their candidate has a very punitive high-tax campaign plan for the economy. I donโt know all the details on Hillaryโs tax plan, but I donโt think she is yet in favor of lifting the payroll tax cap, as Obama is. And I think sheโd keep cap gains at 20 percent. But none of this is any good.






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