Flap’s Links and Comments for September 12th on 15:03

These are my links for September 12th from 15:03 to 15:21:

• Obama Seeks to End Tax Breaks to Pay for Jobs Plan – President Barack Obama would pay for his $447 billion jobs plan by ending a series of tax breaks for oil and gas companies, hedge-fund managers and people making more than $200,000, the White House said Monday.

  In total, Mr. Obama's plan would end about $467 billion of tax breaks over 10 years, said White House Office of Management and Budget Director Jack Lew. The president has previously proposed ending the tax breaks, but has faced stiff resistance from Republicans.

  By choosing to end the tax breaks, the White House is likely setting itself up for a fight with Republicans. Over the summer, Republicans said they wouldn't end tax breaks amid concerns doing so as the U.S. is coming out of a recession would hamper the recovery.

  Mr. Obama said he expects an uphill battle. "There's going to be enormous resistance," the president said during a surprise visit to a briefing White House officials were hosting with people from minority news websites.

  The president said he needed everyone's help to get the jobs package passed. "I want you guys to pump this up," Mr. Obama said. "Either Congress gets it done, or if Congress doesn't get it done, people know exactly what's holding it up," he said later. The president's remarks at the event weren't on his public schedule to reporters.

  "It would be fair to say this tax increase on job creators is the kind of proposal both parties have opposed in the past," said Brendan Buck, a spokesman for House Speaker John Boehner (R., Ohio). He continued, "We remain eager to work together on ways to support job growth, but this proposal doesn't appear to have been offered in that bipartisan spirit."
  The White House disputed the notion that raising taxes on the wealthy would hurt growth. The measures to pay for spending "are spread out so that there aren't negative impacts," said White House press secretary Jay Carney.he

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• Obama Plans to End Tax Breaks to Pay for Jobs Program – White House budget director Jack Lew outlined Obama's proposals for paying for the plan, targeting the rich and corporations as the president has in the past to no avail. A limit on itemized deductions and certain exemptions on individuals who earn over $200,000 and families who earn over $250,000, which would raise roughly $400 billion over 10 years.

  Lew said the "tax provisions" that Obama was proposing included:

  A limit on itemized deductions and certain exemptions on individuals who earn over $200,000 and families who earn over $250,000, which would raise roughly $400 billion over 10 years.
  A proposal to treat carried interest earned by investment fund managers as ordinary income rather than taxing it at capital gains rates, which would raise $18 billion.
  Eliminating certain oil and gas industry tax breaks that would raise $40 billion.
  A change in corporate jet depreciation rules that would raise $3 billion.

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  Read it all.

  Note:Being rich to Obama just went down to $200K a year from $250K a year income.

  Will it be $150K next?

• EPA Regulation forces closure of Texas energy Facilities, eliminates 500 Jobs – Texas energy company Luminant announced on Monday new burdensome Environmental Protection Agency regulations are forcing it to close several facilities, which will result in about 500 job losses.

  The company will be idling — stopping the usage of — two energy generating units. It will also cease extracting lignite from three different Texas mines.

  The EPA regulation Luminant cites as too burdensome is the new Cross-State Air Pollution rule, which requires Texas power generators to make “dramatic reductions” in emissions beginning on January 1, 2012.

  “We have hundreds of employees who have spent their entire professional careers at Luminant and its predecessor companies,” Luminant CEO David Campbell said in a statement. “At every step of this process, we have tried to minimize these impacts, and it truly saddens me that we are being compelled to take the actions we’ve announced today. We have filed suit to try to avoid these consequences.”

  The company said it has been trying to meet the new standards, but won’t be able to do so without closing down several facilities and eliminating 500 jobs.

  “As always, Luminant is committed to complying fully with EPA regulations,” Campbell said. “We have spent the last two months identifying all possible options to meet the requirements of this new rule, and we are launching a significant investment program to reduce emissions across our facilities.”

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  More jobs bite the dust because of the Obama Administration