Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

You cannot shame the shameless.

This year has been the longest three days of putin’s life.

… riddled with inexplicable and elementary errors of law and fact

Quote tweet friends, screenshot enemies.

I also would like a pony to improve my balloon juice experience.

This country desperately needs a functioning Fourth Estate.

The problem people have with Biden’s age is the color of the VPs skin.

Red lights blinking on democracy’s dashboard

Speaking of republicans, is there a way for a political party to declare intellectual bankruptcy?

with the Kraken taking a plea, the Cheese stands alone.

I know this must be bad for Joe Biden, I just don’t know how.

“The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits.”

Well, whatever it is, it’s better than being a Republican.

It’s a good piece. click on over. but then come back!!

Narcissists are always shocked to discover other people have agency.

Prediction: the gop will rethink its strategy of boycotting future committees.

Republicans choose power over democracy, every day.

Many life forms that would benefit from greater intelligence, sadly, do not have it.

Glad to see john eastman going through some things.

We’ll be taking my thoughts and prayers to the ballot box.

My right to basic bodily autonomy is not on the table. that’s the new deal.

The Giant Orange Man Baby is having a bad day.

A consequence of cucumbers

Don’t expect peaches from an apple tree.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / News Roundup: Well, Now We Know Part of the Story

News Roundup: Well, Now We Know Part of the Story

by | 118 Comments

This post is in: 

News roundup on an otherwise quiet (!) day.

⭐️

⭐️

Or, as Alison Gill calls it: legal bribery!

I have no idea what the Hunter Biden reference is. Anybody know?

⭐️

Speaking of Fetterman, I think he speaks for all of us.

For most of these tweets, you don’t have to click on a thing to read them.  If someone who doesn’t want to click on twitter wants to find any of these elsewhere and share a link, I’ll add to the post.

⭐️

As an antidote to the news:

I have no idea if that is current or not, but I like to think that it is. Either way, I love seeing Nancy Pelosi giggling and so happy. Nancy SMASH!

⭐️

Open thread!

Reader Interactions

118Comments

  1. 1.

    Alison Rose

    Just FYI, and I don’t know if it’s only me, but most videos in tweets don’t play for me in the embeds. I have to click through to Twitter to watch them. I still have an account (that I haven’t used in years) and am logged in, so it’s not that. But obviously there isn’t a way around that for the posts and I’m not putting that on the FPers. Just wanted to note it.

  4. 4.

    WaterGirl

    @Alison Rose: Is that true if it’s a tweet, not a retweet?

    Nancy SMASH is a tweet.  Fetterman is a tweet.  Last time we tested – awhile ago – you could watch in the post with a tweet, but not with a retweet.

    I make a real effort to go to the original tweet for that reason.  But if it’s no longer true, I won’t bother to do that.

    Can you see if you can view both of those?

  6. 6.

    Martin

    @Alison Rose: I would assume that’s on Twitter. Musk has been fucking with absolutely everything trying to get it so only paying customers can engage with the site. It changes so frequently, there’s really no point even trying to sort out what’s going on.

  8. 8.

    Martin

    I’m old enough to remember that the GOP opposed the estate tax because they saw it as a form of double taxation. It’s not – the dead person isn’t being taxed – they’re dead. The inheritor is being taxed.

    But they’re totally fine double taxing CA and NY residents.

  11. 11.

    Hoodie

    It takes a lot to make Kevin McCarthy look smart, but Jordan is giving it a good try.  At least Scalise was smart enough to bow out when he saw what a clusterfuck was brewing.

    If Jordan promises a SALT deduction increase he’ll probably piss off more Republicans from red states than he will gain from NY.  It’s not surprising that he doesn’t know how to whip votes and when to quit, given that he’s never accomplished anything in his worthless career other than slinging feces and covering up sexual assaults.  His ritual humiliation might be entertaining, but I just as soon see him disappear.

  12. 12.

    David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch

      Jordan told moderate New York holdouts he would support doubling the state-and-local tax deduction cap to $20,000,

    I don’t see how that gets 60 votes in the senate.

  13. 13.

    theturtlemoves

    @WaterGirl: ​ Given I’m an IT person I feel obligated to assist in your troubleshooting. My experience both here and on other sites is exactly what you describe. Original tweets I can view the videos in-line in the embed, re-tweets not so much. Firefox on Windows 11 with AdBlocker Ultimate enabled.

  14. 14.

    dmsilev

    NEWS: Some of Jim Jordan’s opponents tell me they’ve been purposely staggering their “no” votes over multiple ballots — a strategy designed to show Jordan’s speakership opposition is only growing.

    And that’s why they tell me Jordan will bleed even more support on a third ballot
    — Melanie Zanona (@MZanona) October 18, 2023

    This is what happens when you center your political strategy around bullying everyone that you have even a scintilla of disagreement with. You make a lot of enemies, even among those who are ostensibly on your side. And the schadenfreude runs deep.

  15. 15.

    WaterGirl

    @Alison Rose: Thanks for the info.

    Fetterman:  (almost an exact quote)

     Entertainment is not governance.  It’s time to do their job.  Whoever it’s gonna be, they need to get it together and deliver the kind of aid we need in Ukraine, Israel, even at the border.

    Do their job, and let’s get it done.

    edit: I paused the video 3 times so i could tell you what was in it, and now the video doesn’t even show anymore for me.  Interesting.

    edit 2: I had to re-save the post in the backroom before it would show up.

  18. 18.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Martin: From a Republican perspective, all income tax is “double taxation” because the money already got taxed when whoever paid it to you got it. And probably taxed when whoever gave it to them got it, and so on. They get really outraged about that.

  20. 20.

    Hoodie

    @dmsilev: Jordan is just a loudmouth backbencher who has accomplished zero in 16 years in the House.  There’s a reason for that.  He’s an asshole who only cares about himself.  I would bet the only reasons he’s a candidate now is that no one else wants the job and Trump endorsed him so a lot of the GOP caucus are thinking “hey, give it to that asshole, that will keep Trump happy and off our backs.”  Apparently, others want to see him publicly humiliated.

  22. 22.

    What Have The Romans Ever Done for Us?

    Been trying to place who Gym Jordan looks like in the pictures I’m seeing lately and it finally clicked. He’s Steve Martin playing the dimwit Ruprecht in Dirty Rotten Scoundrels! 

  23. 23.

    Chetan Murthy

    @Alison Rose: Huh, both videos (both Nancy and Fetterman) work for me.  I have no Twitter account, and block all twitter cookies.  This is Chromeos, latest build.

  24. 24.

    trnc

    @Martin: It’s not – the dead person isn’t being taxed – they’re dead. The inheritor is being taxed.

    On money for which they had to do the grueling work of being born and figuring out how to not get disowned along the way.

  25. 25.

    WaterGirl

    @Hoodie: I have to disagree with you on one thing.  i think Jordan wants to be speaker, really bad.

    Remember when –maybe 2 or 3 weeks ago – there was talk about taking his bullshit hearings away from him because he was botching them and making everyone look like fools?

    They can’t take that away from him if he’s speaker.

  27. 27.

    Ken

    @Alison Rose: If I recall correctly, I started the upgrade, went to lunch, and it was done when I got back. So about an hour.

    Of course it depends so much on your Internet speed.

  28. 28.

    NWO Joe

    @theturtlemoves: I use Nitter Redirect in FF in Win 11, right now just as installed. I have no difficulty with any of Twitter (short of the ownership and the fash portion of the user base). It did not work right after he started unplugging things but Nitter has been doing fine lately. I have no account and never will.

  30. 30.

    trnc

    @Chetan Murthy:

    @Alison Rose: Huh, both videos (both Nancy and Fetterman) work for me.  I have no Twitter account, and block all twitter cookies.  This is Chromeos, latest build.

    They also work for me, but twit videos that I tried to watch on BJ yesterday whisked me off the twit site, so I have no idea what tomorrow holds.

  31. 31.

    delphinium

    @WaterGirl: ​
    I could also view both videos from the front page (Firefox on Windows 10 with AdBlocker) and usually do not have a problem. No twitter account.

  33. 33.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @WaterGirl:

    i think Jordan wants to be speaker, really bad.

    If what we’ve heard about his outbursts and attitude dealing with fellow Reps is correct, he has a lot of his own ego tied up in this attempt now.  This was going to be his proof that he’s a natural god-king and instead he’s finding out people just aren’t that into him.

  38. 38.

    WaterGirl

    @dmsilev: they wouldn’t even have to threaten MY SPOUSE. If I knew they had threatened somebody else’s spouse. I would still be mad as hell and I would make sure that that guy wasn’t running anything ever.

  39. 39.

    WaterGirl

    @Another Scott: maybe yesterday? Or Friday she said hopefully. :-)

    what time he doesn’t really matter to me I’m just happy to see her giggling like a schoolgirl.

  43. 43.

    wjca

    @WaterGirl: I think Jordan wants to be speaker, really bad.

    Remember when –maybe 2 or 3 weeks ago – there was talk about taking his bullshit hearings away from him because he was botching them and making everyone look like fools?

    They can’t take that away from him if he’s speaker.  [Emphasis added]

    You have achieved the impossible!  You have found an upside if, God forbid, Jordan becomes Speaker.

  44. 44.

    cain

    @Dan B:

    @Alison Rose: Both Fetterman and Nancy work for me.  Mobile, Android.

    Hmm.. an interesting development – so they work for you do they? They must be expensive to maintain being a mobile android an all.

  45. 45.

    WaterGirl

    I read about this earlier, but I hadn’t read the letter.

    Now I wonder if everything Trump’s attorneys have filed in the DC case will need to be re-filed? I also bet that Jack Smith is pissed off that neither he nor his peeps found that first.

  46. 46.

    Josie

    @WaterGirl: ​
     I do not have a twitter account. I can see both the Fetterman and the Pelosi tweet here on our site. When I have to click over to twitter for other tweets, I have no problem viewing them there.

  49. 49.

    cain

    @WaterGirl: Gosh what do you think Cannon’s Chutkan response is going to be  – lol!

    Everyone is probably going to be laughing at her as well.

  52. 52.

    hells littlest angel

    @Matt McIrvin: What, do they think money should just be taxed the one time, when it comes out of the mint?

     

    That was a joke, but I wouldn’t be shocked if they thought that was a brilliant idea.

  53. 53.

    wjca

    @WaterGirl:

    Trump’s attorneys aren’t legally allowed to practice law in the court they’re defending him in. They knew it and tried anyway.

    Maybe I’m just naive.  But if they knowingly did that, seems like the Bar Association ought to be taking official notice.

    Working for Trump: not only do you trash your reputation, you massively increase your chances of being disbarred.  (If you only became a lawyer because your parents insisted, this could actually be a plus.)

  54. 54.

    hueyplong

    @cain: The clerk’s letter says the attys aren’t admitted in “this court,” which might be just the court of appeals.

  55. 55.

    TS

    @WaterGirl:

    Can you see if you can view both of those?

    Not Alison Rose but I can see both of those without going to twitter. Use chrome Windows 10

    Re the picture of Nancy Pelosi – she was wearing orange yesterday so from a past time

  56. 56.

    moops

    This is in the DC case that the lawyers are not members of the bar in DC.  So this is Jack Smith’s case, not the Cannon case in Florida.

     

    Isn’t this kind of thing checked in the first week?

     

    But, likely, no judge will punish Trump for any of this, and Trump will be handed a freebie delay of proceedings while he finds new council.  What a F* up.

  58. 58.

    hueyplong

    @WaterGirl: If the attys make the proper application the court might issue a nunc pro tunc order validating prior filings.

    The situation is embarrassing to serious lawyers, but not necessarily fatal to Trump.

  60. 60.

    sab

    @WaterGirl: IANAL but it used to be that being admitted to practice in Federal courts was separate to just being admitted to the bar in a particular state or the District.

  61. 61.

    raven

    I’m old enough to remember when SALT was the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks. I still have a paper that I wrote on it in 1971!

  62. 62.

    cain

    @hueyplong: they probably fell on their petard so that they can get another delay to Trump but also wash their hands of him.

    But they’ll request another month or so to get a new team.

  63. 63.

    E.

    @hueyplong: That’s right, and getting barred in the Appeals Court is fairly perfunctory assuming you really are a lawyer and are barred in the relevant District Court, but what is so weird about this is that the lawyers for the former President of the United States seem to be filing their very first appeal ever from District Court. That’s a little bit . . . odd.

  64. 64.

    Jackie

    @hueyplong: Here’s more detail:

    “In a letter to Lauro on Wednesday, the clerk of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit said Lauro must first join the court’s bar before any of his filings are accepted,” reported Darren Samuelsohn and Steve Reilly. “Our records reveal that you are not a member of the bar of this court,” said the letter, adding, “It is the policy of the court that all attorneys appearing before it be members of the bar of this court. Our rules do not allow us to accept filings from attorneys who are not members.”

    https://themessenger.com/politics/trump-appeal-bar-dc-court-of-appeals

  65. 65.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    @hueyplong: It’s a simple procedure to get admitted according to my vast legal training (which in this case consists of watching “My Cousin Vinnie”). You just keep giving fake names which take time to check out till you get through with the trial, then have a judge standing by to lie for you.

  66. 66.

    smith

    At least Ol’ Gym made history today — the first time in 100 years that a Speaker candidate from the majority party got less than 200 votes.

  67. 67.

    trnc

    @Matt McIrvin: From a Republican perspective, all income tax is “double taxation” because the money already got taxed when whoever paid it to you got it. And probably taxed when whoever gave it to them got it, and so on. They get really outraged about that.

    Yes, a dollar can change hands hundreds of time and be worth nominally the same amount every one of those times, but it can only be taxed once. The good news is, the outrage is as genuine as their stated reason for being against it. The bad news is, way too freakin’ many people fall for it.

  68. 68.

    sab

    @Martin: The estate of the dead person is being taxed. The inheritor pays nothing because it was taxed before the distribution to heirs, at a progressive tax rate depending on the size of the estate..

    An inheritance tax taxes the receiving heirs not the estate. Lots of states have inheritance tax. The tax rates vary accordimg to how closely related the heirs are to the decedemt.

  69. 69.

    hueyplong

    @E.: Yes, it’s weird how every lawyer working for Trump immediately regresses to Amateur Hour (if they’re not already there, like Habba).

    I don’t see any real delay coming from this. I don’t know whether the gag order is stayed pending appeal. If it’s not, there isn’t any rational strategy here, just a FUBAR.

  70. 70.

    zhena gogolia

    @Jackie: She’s eager to get back to opposing Biden’s “insane policies.” She stood against bullies (censorship during the Covid-19 pandemic). What an ass.

  71. 71.

    bbleh

    Speaker candidate Jim Jordan told moderate New York holdouts he would support doubling the state-and-local tax deduction cap to $20,000, according to Rep. Mike Garcia.

    Translation: JJ knows that’s exactly the sort of promise that might win over enough wealthy voters in what are by national standards pretty wealthy districts that their Reps could get away with voting for JJ, despite the fact that he doesn’t mean a word of it, won’t lift a finger to implement it, and couldn’t pass it even if he did.

    It’s pure performance, which of course is all JJ knows.  And he’s no outlier in the Republican Party: he’s getting nearly 200 votes to be Speaker.

    @David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch: he doesn’t care, nor do any of the other Reps.  He won’t try to do it, if he does it probably wouldn’t pass the House, and if it did it would be DOA in the Senate.  But he doesn’t care.  He’s not interested in governance.

  73. 73.

    hueyplong

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym: In some federal districts it really is easy. I got admitted in the E.D. of Wisc. when trying to get our firm named lead counsel in a class action (didn’t get it). I set foot in a court in that district one time, have never been a member of the Wisc Bar, and am still a member of that fed district more than 20 years later.

    What Trump’s lawyers are thinking is a mystery to me.

  74. 74.

    sab

    @sab: I’m 50 years out of date. Only a handful of states still have inheritance tax. The rate depends on the size of what each heir receives and how closely the heir is related to the decedent, and in some states whether the heir lives in the same state or out of state.

  75. 75.

    smith

    @hueyplong: it’s weird how every lawyer working for Trump immediately regresses to Amateur Hour

    It seems to affect the whole range of lawyers involved in insurrection-related cases. Every motion that Chesebro and Powell have been filing in their desperate attempts to get out of their trial seems to be barely passing the laugh test, according to the analysis I’ve seen.

    Maybe we need a corollary to ETTTD — Everyone who comes in contact with Trump loses 20 IQ points.

  76. 76.

    topclimber

    @trnc: Here’s the scam, which you probably know already.

    Mom and Pop invest in capital assets but defer taking any gain. Over time, the assets grow extra fat because the unrealized gains compound, also at no tax.

    Son and daughter get the big bundle when the parents croak, with ALL deferred capital assets now assigned what is called a stepped up tax basis–that is, their current value. This essentially wipes out any tax on the difference between what the assets cost the parents and the growth over their lifetime.

    Rather then make the priority discussion being about a death tax that raises little revenue, let’s talk about the lifetime no-tax scam that costs much more. It is Ma and Pa ripping off the system from the great beyond.

     

  77. 77.

    Ken

    Maybe Judge Chutkan will appoint a public defender until Trump finds proper counsel, to avoid unnecessary delay.

  79. 79.

    Central Planning

    I can see both the Fetterman video and Pelosi gif as embeds

    Watergirl: site was crashing on the front page when this was the top post. It stopped with John’s post at the top. I sent you email and a video of it happening.

  81. 81.

    Sister Golden Bear

    tl;dr – Some of you trans people may die but that is a sacrifice I am willing eager to make.

    One of the leading fascist hate mongers, who’s been stoking the moral panic over trans people existing:

    Trans activists say … that I’m putting their lives at risk somehow, and if that’s true, well, you know what, it’s a risk worth taking. If speaking the truth puts your life at risk I’ll still speak it.

    For the record, this is more than hypothetical, hospitals and clinics that provide trans healthcare have been having repeated bomb threats, not to mention trans people getting death threats.

    And in other news, 18 Republican AGs filed a friend-of-the-court brief in a Florida case, arguing Dobbs justifies banning trans healthcare for adults.

  82. 82.

    Yarrow

    Twitter videos work for me when embedded in a post, but only when they’re the actual tweet. They don’t work if they’re in a quote tweet. I have found that I have to click exactly on the little arrow in the center of the video to make the video work in the embed. If I click somewhere else on the video it opens the tweet in a new tab.

  83. 83.

    Bill Arnold

    @WaterGirl:

    they wouldn’t even have to threaten MY SPOUSE.

    Haven’t yet seen any evidence identifying who was doing the anonymous vague threats.
    Given no such information, flying MAGA monkeys would be a reasonable bet.

  86. 86.

    Bill Arnold

    @Jackie:

    Now actual GQP House members are being threatened:

    They aren’t used to (what they will have to assume to be, until sources are identified) MAGA death threats. This will bother many of them, a lot.

  89. 89.

    wjca

    @E.: what is so weird about this is that the lawyers for the former President of the United States seem to be filing their very first appeal ever from District Court. That’s a little bit . . . odd.

    When you’re a terrible client (and not just because you tend to stiff your lawyers), it’s hard to get competent and experienced lawyers to work for you.  So TIFG is stuck with lawyers who are the dregs and/or rookies.  Plus the occasional nut case.  Doesn’t matter that he’s an ex-President; by this point, he’s got a solidly established reputation all his own.

  92. 92.

    WaterGirl

    @Another Scott: Just glad to know she was giggling, as recently as yesterday!

    My best friend is very proper and she laughed just like that a week ago when she was telling me a crazy story about what happened when she got a pedicure in a very strange salon.

    It makes me so happy to see Nancy SMASH like that!

  94. 94.

    hueyplong

    @wjca: There are powerful and successful firms that I consider crooked, and the fact that none of them has represented Trump in these cases is heartening. My guess is that it’s the firms that have made this call.

  96. 96.

    catclub

    @Ohio Mom: The claim that estate taxes are double taxation is just a cover story Republicans use.

    IN the old days, all your estates went to the king. So ‘the heirs’ or the legatees, had no right to inherit. Thus the estate is income to them. They did not own that stuff, the estate granted it to them. It should be taxed as ordinary income – with progressive tax rates.

  97. 97.

    wjca

    @hueyplong: There are powerful and successful firms that I consider crooked, and the fact that none of them has represented Trump in these cases is heartening.

    Showing you can be a crooked lawyer without necessarily being bad at lawyering.  And without being dumb enough to take on Trump as a client.

  99. 99.

    catclub

    @sab: An inheritance tax makes more sense to me than estate tax.

    Income received from an estate is income, whether the previous owner was your Dad or was completely unrelated to you.

     

    Too bad it is virtually gone.

  100. 100.

    wjca

    @Jackie: It’s gonna be entertaining (for us!) to see how the GQP handle MAGA threats!

    Put money on accusations of false flag operations.  (Whether by Democrats or by non-MAGAt Republicans is harder to predict.)

  101. 101.

    cmorenc

    @WaterGirl: Usually, attorneys working a case in a jurisdiction where they are not admitted to practice law can fix the issue by associating local counsel who are licensed in that jurisdiction.  But given the history of other Trump attorneys misrepresenting stuff to courts such as to open them to potential disciplinary proceedings, it might possibly be challenging to find local attorneys willing to take responsibility for the actions and representations of his out-of-jurisdiction counsel.  Or perhaps, his Tampa-based attorneys simply arrogantly assumed no one (including the DC Court of Appeals) would check or challenge their qualifications to practice there.

  105. 105.

    Pink Tie

    @cain: A petard is a bomb. I’m imagining that if they threw themselves on one, they’d have difficulty washing their hands afterward.

  106. 106.

    randy khan

    As someone else noted above, it’s unlikely that raising the SALT cap gets 60 votes in the Senate, although it probably could get included in a reconciliation bill.

    While I understand the underlying policy reasons not to raise the cap, and don’t mind it, it might be politically useful for the Dems to raise it at least a bit, as there are a lot of suburban voters who are affected by it in Dem-dominated and purple areas.  (I live in one of them – there are a lot of people in northern Virginia who max out their SALT deduction from property taxes alone, not even considering state income tax.)  And it’s not that much money in the scheme of things to raise it from $10 to $20K.

    But I think it’s hilarious that Jordan was offering that to New York Republicans, since the big point of the cap wasn’t that it was good tax policy, but that it would punish people in higher-tax states like New York and California that vote Democratic.  The man doesn’t even have sufficient principles to keep sticking it the people he thinks are his enemies.

  107. 107.

    randy khan

    @WaterGirl:

    On the point about Jack Smith not finding out before the court, it probably is something that they simply wouldn’t have imagined someone would do, because as the letter suggests it’s pretty stupid.

  109. 109.

    Kent

    @randy khan:But I think it’s hilarious that Jordan was offering that to New York Republicans, since the big point of the cap wasn’t that it was good tax policy, but that it would punish people in higher-tax states like New York and California that vote Democratic.  The man doesn’t even have sufficient principles to keep sticking it the people he thinks are his enemies.

    It also nails everyone who owns an upscale home in Texas.

    For example, here’s a typical $2.5 million home in Highland Park TX (Dallas suburb near SMU) that your generic GOP lawyer or doctor might live.  $30,000/yr property tax bill:  https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/5638-W-Hanover-Ave-Dallas-TX-75209/26760251_zpid

    Or typical similar home in Houston for $2.3 million with a $40,000/year property tax bill:  https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1110-Longmont-Place-Ct-Houston-TX-77056/89636362_zpid

    Eliminate the cap and those GOP homeowners pocket maybe an $8,000 to $9,000 tax break.

  110. 110.

    Geminid

    @Kent: That is good information, but I think labeling these suburbanites as GOP voters might not be accurate. Someone isn’t necessarily a GOP voter just because they live in Texas and have a high income. In 2018, Colin Allred flipped a suburban district near Dallas and Libby Fletcher flipped a suburban district near Houston. That was the the year after Republicans cut back the SALT deduction, and most of the 40 seats Democrats flipped were in suburban areas. Many of these were relatively afffluent.

    Suburbs acrosx the nation are becoming more culturally and politically similar, and people in the Detroit suburban district that Elissa Slotkin flippedin 2018 did not behave that differently than those in the Houston suburban district Libby Fletcher flipped. Same for districts won by Mikie Sherrill (NJ), Abigail Spanberger (VA), Lucy McBath (GA), Sharice Davids (KS), Lauren Underwood (IL), Katie Porter (CA) and other Democrats from those states who flipped seats that year.

  111. 111.

    Martin

    @Matt McIrvin: All money is taxed constantly. Each dollar gets taxed on the way out of your pocket, through sales, corporate, excise, and back again through income and payroll.

    The only thing that ever really mattered was how many times each individual is taxed when that dollar arrives, and even that was a lie because the dead person doesn’t pay the estate tax, it’s the inheritors who have never possessed those dollars, so again, it’s only taxed once.

  112. 112.

    Tenar Arha

    @WaterGirl: I can watch the video in the embedded tweet and the GIF (I’m using Duck Duck Go as browser on IOS).

    I have noticed if you don’t use the rewind button or drag the progress bar back, but just try to click on it again to rewatch it, you will go to Twitter.

  115. 115.

    Paul in KY

    @catclub: In England, that wasn’t necessarily so.  The Dukedoms, Earldoms, etc. were divided into Royal ones (Duchy of Lancaster, Duchy of Cornwall, Duchy of York, etc.) and ‘Inheritable Ones’ (Duchy of Norfolk, Earl of Northumberland, etc.).

    The Royal ones were as you say. The King/Queen completely controlled who had them, who inherited them, etc. The ‘Inheritable Ones’ (for lack of a better term) followed English Common Law on the inheritances and the King had little say in who inherited them.

    King Edward IV hurt his male children (Edward & Richard) when he married Richard (already Duke of York) at age 4 to the Mowbray heir to the Duchy of Norfolk (who was 3). She died soon after and he refused to allow the Duchy of Norfolk to pass to the Howard Family (as it should). The Howards then conspired with the future Richard III to get back the Duchy. The only way they could was if Edward IV’s kids were disinherited for some reason.

  117. 117.

    H-Bob

    @trnc: “On money for which they had to do the grueling work of being born and figuring out how to not get disowned along the way.”

    That ain’t an easy job given the obnoxiousness of many rich people!

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