quote:

How Obama's budget proposal affects California (02-27) 04:00 PST Washington - -- California will see a sweeping commitment to addressing climate change, a huge tax hit for its wealthiest taxpayers and a major benefit to Silicon Valley's tech industry in President Obama's first budget proposal. As in all presidents' budget plans, there are winners and losers. California college students could benefit from a proposal to tie increases in Pell Grants to inflation for the first time in the program's history. University of California President Mark Yudof said the plan could raise the maximum Pell Grant, intended to foster educational opportunity, by $200 next year, yielding an extra $10 million in aid for UC undergraduates. He said Obama's budget also would help students and their parents with an expanded $2,500 tax credit for college expenses. The plan "will help ease the economic burden for many students and families in California and across the nation," Yudof said. California's plans for a high-speed rail system could take another leap forward with Obama's pledge to add $5 billion for nationwide super-fast rail programs over five years on top of the $8 billion approved in the stimulus package. The state could get a big share because voters have approved $10 billion in state bonds for bullet trains between San Francisco and Los Angeles and from the Central Valley to the East Bay. Losers in Obama's budget include large-scale California farm operations. Farmers making more than $500,000 a year could face deep cuts in subsidies for rice, cotton and other commodity crops, part of Obama's effort to direct aid to smaller farms. The budget plan, totaling $3.55 trillion for 2010, represents the most detailed blueprint yet of Obama's priorities for the country. And for the most part, his budget implements the agenda that he ran on during last year's campaign. His tax proposal amounts to a reversal of President George W. Bush's policies: Obama's budget would allow the Bush tax cuts for the nation's wealthiest 2 percent to expire in 2011. Couples earning more than $250,000 a year would see their tax rate rise from 36 percent to 39.6 percent. Wealthy tax filers would also face new limits on what they can deduct for mortgage interest, state and local taxes, and charitable donations - which could limit giving to nonprofits. Hedge fund managers and oil and gas firms would see major tax increases. The top capital gains tax rate climbs from 15 percent to 20 percent. Tilting the system Obama would tilt the tax system in favor of lower-paid workers, extending the payroll tax cuts approved in the stimulus bill - $400 for individuals making less than $75,000 a year and $800 for couples earning less than $150,000. Obama's budget also includes a provision dear to Silicon Valley: a proposed 10-year, $74 billion extension of the research and development tax credit. Tech companies say the credit gives them incentives to spend billions on research, creating jobs and motivating new technologies. Betsy Mullins, vice president for government and political affairs at TechNet, a trade group of tech CEOs, said she was also enthused about the president's proposal to triple the number of graduate student fellowships. "Think of all the things that have been done by graduate students - from Google to the work Marc Andreessen (founder of Netscape) did as a graduate student," Mullins said. Obama's budget also makes a firm commitment to fighting global warming, setting the goal of cutting greenhouse gas emissions by 14 percent below 2005 levels by 2020 and 83 percent below by 2050. The president's plan is modeled on California's cap-and-trade program, capping emission levels and allowing power plants and other emitters to buy and sell credits to release carbon dioxide. Obama is counting on revenue, estimated at $645.7 billion over a decade, to fund investments in renewable energy and other programs. Critics call it a tax on energy firms, which could pass the added costs on to consumers. House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio said, "Let's just be honest and call it a carbon tax that will increase taxes on all Americans who drive a car, who have a job, who turn on a light switch." But California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger praised the proposal, saying it would spur economic growth by fostering the development of clean energy technologies. "In California, we know that the environment and the economy go hand in hand," he said. ... full read at: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/artic.../MN19165PCL.DTL

-rolling back bush tax breaks for the wealthiest 2% of america
-raising capital gains tax percentage for the highest bracket
-higher taxes for hedge fund managers and the oil & gas industry
-closing tax deduction loopholes
-cutting farm subsidies for large corporate farms
-promoting agricultural export market
-more federal funds to back california's high-speed rail
-tax incentive for technology reseach & development
-triple funding for state & federal epa/water treatment infrastructure
-more aggressive national carbon-cutting goals
-carbon-trading market to fund clean energy development
-funding graduate-level education
-expanding va health care access to non-disabled veterans

and this doesn't even mention his other seismic shifts in policy such as rescinding bush's anti-abortion rule, red-lighting the war on weed, setting a deadline for withdrawal from iraq, mending us-russia relations as well as us-iran relations, retaking leadership of nato, rethinking the cuban embargo, etc...

i thought only bad news was printed on fridays? this paradigm shift has me all disoriented

___________________