Definition of a Maryland Democratic Party Press Release: Bollocks

Have you seen this whopper from the Maryland Democratic Party? Democrats: Good for Maryland

If you love dark comedy than this piece of agitprop is a howler.

Since it takes a thousand reasoned words to refute the fallacious blurbs of and MDP press release, bear with my annotations.

Maryland Democrats: Good for Tax Reform

• Under the Obama/O’Malley tax reforms 92% of Marylanders will pay the same or less in income taxes.

Umm… no. As many predicted most Marylanders ended up paying more, (especially low income families) and are under O’Malley’s billion dollar tax increases in 2007 special session (the largest in Maryland history) and indirect regulatory taxes. As for the Obama part of the equation this is an obvious reference to the campaign pledge that 95% of Americans would get a tax cut. Of course, this is nonsense on stilts. You can’t give 95% of Americans a tax cut if only one third of Americans actually pay federal income taxes. These people already receive transfer payments from the government. In fact, under Obama/O’Malley plan these payments will increase, meaning that those of us who pay taxes will see our burden increased.

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• Under the Obama/O’Malley tax reforms 89% of Marylanders will pay the same or less in income and sales taxes.

Only a Maryland Democrat could say that a person would pay less in sales taxes after a 20% increase in the sales tax, which disproportionately affects the poor. Can you say O’Malleynomics.

• The average Maryland family (assuming the 2007 Maryland median family income of $68,080) should see their taxes reduced by $884 compared to the tax policies under Bush Administration.

Pure fantasy. The hack who wrote this piece should consult an economics text book or at least calculator. Analysis of O’Malley’s tax increases showed:

A family with $40,000 in household income would pay $87 more. At $75,000, a family would pay $166 more. At $150,000, it would pay $332 more. And those earning $750,000 a year would pay $2,253 more.

Furthermore, government revenues increased and entire spectrum of the income scale saw growth under the Bush tax cuts. Contrast that with the 20% decline in state tax receipts predicted deficit reported by the comptroller. To be fair the economic downturn has a great deal to do with this. However, O’Malley and the Democrats’ taxes increases in the face of the gathering economic storm played a significant role in the drop in receipts, i.e., the law of diminishing returns.
It’s quite cheeky that a party, which dismissed—with utter contempt—the Tea Party movement, now needs to tout its “record” on tax reform.

Maryland Democrats: Good for Working Families

Just three weeks into his term, President Barack Obama signed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act into law to create or save over 3.5 million jobs in our nation, provide tax cuts for working families in Maryland and throughout our nation, and invest in America’s public education system, and roads, bridges, tunnels, and the green technologies of tomorrow.

Maryland stands to receive over $4 billion in federal stimulus dollars, including $1.4 billion for Medicaid, $1.1 billion in K-12 education funds, $813 million to update our aging infrastructure, and $50 million for public safety.

The O’Malley-Brown Administration is moving quickly to put federal funds under the Recovery and Reinvestment program to work for working families. Less than 24 hours after President Obama signed the legislation, Governor O’Malley announced the first wave of ‘shovel-ready’ transportation projects, and within 20 days Maryland became the first state in the nation to have its first round of transportation projects certified by the U.S. Department of Transportation, creating jobs for more Maryland families in every region of our State.

Since then, Governor O’Malley has announced 95 proposed Maryland water quality and drinking water projects totaling $119.2 million to receive low interest loans and/or grants under President Barack Obama’s American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

The Department of Legislative Services and Marta Mossburg threw cold water on all of that.
The bulk of the “stimulus” money goes to shore up entitlement, teacher pension spending. Of course, the Dems won’t tell you about the federal mandate, which requires the state to permanently expand the program as a prerequisite to accepting the funds. They also won’t tell you that the federal funds run out next year, creating an artificially inflated budget baseline the the state cannot meet without a tax increase. As Mossburg writes, the DLS report shows:

…that less than 20 percent of the money is directed to building “shovel-ready” projects like roads and bridges and to ensuring adequate and clean water supplies in the state. The report reveals no money targeted to inventing new technologies—not even the green ones much hyped by President Barack Obama and Gov. Martin O’Malley. Neither did it show money directed toward creating a lower taxed, pro business environment that makes the state a top destination for those seeking to start businesses—the long-term key to Maryland’s health.

Furthermore, the jobs created by those “shovel ready” projects are temporary.

I looked for something on electricity rates but I couldn’t find anything. Oh wait O’Malley and the Democrats have increased electricity rates over the last three years.

Maryland: Good for Business and Jobs
• Maryland’s unemployment rate remains almost 20% lower than the national average.
• While all but three states have lost jobs in the last 12 months, Maryland’s rate of job loss remains almost 40% lower than the national average.

Let me get this straight, failure is good for Maryland because the state didn’t lose as many jobs as it could have. Pay no attention to those special session tax increases, which exacerbated the job loss beyond what economic downturn wrought. Forget for a moment that there is no way to measure jobs saved, the stimulus isn’t stimulating either as the job loss is higher than the Obama administration claimed it would be with the trillion dollar stimulus plan.

• Maryland continues to gain jobs in key sectors last year including bio-tech and life sciences.

This is true, but the bio-tech industry subsidized by taxpayer dollars, throw in Johns Hopkins and you’re talking billions of tax payer money (federal and state) flowing to the biotech industry.

•Maryland has one of the most highly educated work forces in the country and
ranks second among the states in the percentage of professional and technical
workers in the workforce.

Also true, but only because of the proximity to Washington DC, government jobs, contracts and the federal spigot, not necessarily from any natural economic growth.

• Maryland’s K-12 public school system is the best in the nation according to Education Week.

Yes, but don’t ask about the black hole that is the Baltimore City Public School System, for which Maryland tax payers pony-up 70% of its budget to not educate children, while serving as a jobs program for O’Malley/Democrat cronies.

• Maryland’s corporate income tax is very competitive, job growth continues, and Maryland businesses have significant cost advantages compared to other states like California, Massachusetts and New Jersey.

What this really means is we’re not as bad as the worst. In reality though, The Tax Foundation ranked Maryland 45th in business tax climate, and dead last in personal income taxes.

Say what you will about that bologna sandwich David Paulson, but at least he was a more artful liar than the hack, who typed up this release. Then again, this is to be expected from Democrats, who when it comes to economics are the kid sitting in the corner of the classroom wearing the dunce cap.

Democrats…good for laughs—you bet! Good for Maryland? Not so much.
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