UT alum

That is a misleading question. Income tax, maybe more in gross dollars, but not proportionately for value added taxes like sales tax or state income taxes. A much more telling statistic is the amount of wealth distributed to the top 1% versus everyone else. Fifty percent of Americans at the bottown of the chart own about 1/10th of one percent of the nations wealth. I don’t have the stat right at hand for the one percent, but I can get it, and it’s high. Over 70%. He who owns the most should pay the most for a system that protects their way of life. I know that billionaire hedge fund managers pay a 10% rate on their earnings. My rate is twice that. That’s not a fair tax system.

Trickle and plenty are mutually exclusive terms. Middle class wages have barely grown for 30 years while accumulations at the top have skyrocketed. The CEO/ line worker’s earnings ratio increase over that period is one example.

How would you use those funds to give actual citizens a better life? Healthcare? Food stamps? Childcare assistance? Just cut us all a check, what? The tax cuts are going to expire for the middle class but continue for the top earners. You’re talking a trillion dollars over ten years that won’t be going to help us out here working in the real world. Haven’t you had enough trickling down on you for 30 years?

Your question is a false equivalence. The White House and Fort Knox are also heavily guarded. If the wall is so effective, why? Are you proposing a guard every hundred yards along a thousand mile fence? And rich folk, their walls are as much for privacy, if not more, than protection. Guarding 50 or 100 acres with a wall is nothing to compare with protecting a thousand miles of open border. Also, why do you presume to know my intentions just because I am a Democrat? That is highly prejudiced. I don’t see immigrants as votes. I see the vast majority as people looking for a better life. I’m proud to live in a country that is a beacon on the hill. Calling an opponent names is not debate.

I try my best to base my opinions on facts, not on other people’s opinions.

August 25th 2015 in Dubuque, Iowa when asked by a reporter how he would build a 1900 mile wall he said “I’m a builder, it’ll be easy...” I think now it’s down to 1000 miles, but that’s the point. His sands shift faster than Village Creek at flood stage.

Eminent domain (thanks for spelling correction) is government taking of private land for public use with compensation. A lot of people in south Texas will have their land and some homes taken for the wall to be built. Most conservatives find emine domain distasteful at best. Guess it depends on whose ox is being gored.

Again, where “out there” is the evidence? Walls do work in some places, but a wall from Brownsville to San Diego is outrageous. It would cost over 50 billion and be a terrible waste of resources. You a big fan of imminent domain? I don’t hate Donald Trump, I just think he’s dangerously unfit for the job.

I gotcha, Law Man. I just piggybacked on you to put my two cents in.

I’m a leftie, I own it, and I ain’t going nowhere.

Definitions of words matter to the courts. What is happening does not meet that definition in my estimation. We need secure borders. The debate should be over what that looks like and how we fund it. Look, you and I are both Americans, we both want what’s best for the country. That debate has been going on since Jefferson and Madison went at it over states rights versus federalism. If the congress had any cojones, and I’m talking both parties here, they’d get the government back open then openly debate, negotiate, compromise, and come up with a plan that realistically addresses the problem. We may need more wall, but I don’t believe it should be the centerpiece. I’d be interested in your sources documenting the tsunami of immigrants you believe is coming at us.

I just don’t think crisis equals invasion. Therefore border control falls under powers granted to the congress under Article 1, section 8. I couldn’t find the word border anywhere in Article 4. I haven’t seen or heard of anyone on the other side of the border using arms against our military. The bad ones don’t get guns until they get here. It’s not an invasion.

Miriam Webster Dictionary: definition of invasion: an act of invading, especially of an army for conquest or plunder That ain’t what’s happening from south of the border.

Expressing a different opinion is trolling?

So, I guess you also think it was shameful when McConnell said, on President Obama’s first day in office that his only objective was to make sure he was a one term president. That was a major certain person committed to keeping the president from doing his job.

Can you tell me where border protection is in the Constitution? Besides, illegal crossings are at a 46 year low. There is no crisis. Trump is a liar.