Will,

Would you please quite messing up a perfectly good class-warfare meme? I mean, really! Next thing you're going to try to tell us is that tax cuts are actually a good thing for the poor.

Interesting statistics. Do you happen to have similar information on the AMOUNT? Because it seems quite possible that these are cherry-picked statistics hiding the fact the vast majority of the tax breaks on dividends and capital gains go to the very wealthy.

Will,

Why don't we reward forward thinking and independence? For instance, I save my money and buy stocks and invest and save, yet at the end of the day when I get closer to retirement, I get punished with Capital Gains taxes and Dividends taxes on money that I already paid income taxes on when I earned. But if I live off of Social Security and depend on robbing from the mouths of every productive worker who gets 15% of their income (counting the 7.5% the employers have to contribute) stolen from them, no one plays class warfare with me.

The folks that pay dividends and capital gains taxes demonstrated responsible investing and saving habits. Whether they are the CEO's of companies and the "rich" or they are a retiree that didn't depend on social security, this seems to be the behavior we want to reward.

And Dan, if by very wealthy you mean households earing in the top 5% of incomes, that means pretty much every household earning over $125k per year or thereabouts. Is that the very wealthy? Because we are the group that gets screwed. And $100k per year barely pays the bills. Can't send your kids to college on that while the "poor" get Pell Grants and free handout this and welfare that. The government isn't trying to help folks like me. Because making $100k or so per year is "wealthy".

So, Justin B, I suppose that you acknowledge that the vast majority of those taxes are paid by people with over $125k. I'm close, but not quite in that category, and I have two kids in private colleges, so I definitely understand the squeeze. But I don't think the proper way to handle tax policy is to cherry-pick statistics and act like poor elderly people are paying a significant portion of these taxes. It's simply not true.

Dan is right. Willisms seems to be very good at poaching some cheap shots with some cherry-picked statistics. It's reminiscent of the "tax cuts for small businesses" shibboleth trotted out by the administration in 2003....

"robbing from the mouths of every productive worker...."

Honestly, if you are this ignorant about the structure of social security, who pays in, who receives benefits, and how the system is intended to function as a social insurance program and supplemental retirement income source, then please, just go back to listening to Rush Limbaugh and save the debate for the grownups.