In the August 23, 2010, New York Times, Paul Krugman decries that if we don’t let the Bush Tax cuts expire and thus have a massive tax increase in the midst of a weak Obama recovery, it will be so unfair, so evil… 

First let’s look at how twisted the logic of the left has become.  Mr. Krugman says, “These same politicians are eager to cut checks averaging $3 million each to the richest 120,000 people in the country.” Er, not really, Paul, unless the richest 120,000 people are stupid enough, with all their financial advisors, to have that much tax withheld from their incomes.  You see, Paul, the only reason the government would have to cut them checks is if they paid too much in taxes during the year, and since the current rates are already in place it is unlikely that they would change their behavior to suddenly have an extra $3 million sent to Washington.  Here’s the problem with your thinking, Paul.  It is not your money, it is not my money, it is not the government’s money to begin with.  It belongs to the people who have earned it.  It is the people to provide revenue to the government.  It is not the government who gives money to those who produce.  Got it?

Like most on the left Mr. Krugman always associates tax cuts with a loss of revenue and tax increases with a gain in revenue, and ignores how people change their behavior with regard to these changes.

As this chart shows, at the end of the Clinton administration and the dot.com bubble the economy fell into recession.  The Bush tax cuts were implemented in 2001 and they were across the board tax cuts, not just for the wealthy.  A second set of tax cuts came in 2003.  As you can see revenues started to fall before the tax cuts, but bounced back sharply after the cuts in 2001 and 2003.  But Mr. Krugman would have you believe that if you cut taxes, revenues fall and if you leave them along or increase them, revenues increase.  You can also see that Clinton’s tax increase in 1993, didn’t have much effect in changing the rate of revenue growth, but when the Republicans took over Congress in 1994 and instituted tax cuts in 1997 you can see the slope of the curve bend upwards and it is even steeper with the Bush tax cuts.  So in the absence of the 2001 recession, revenues collected increased with tax cuts, not tax increases.

Let’s look at who is paying what share of the taxes.  The follow chart shows what percentage of the tax burden was paid by what percentile of the income earners by Adjusted Gross Income.

So even as the Bush tax cuts reduced tax rates across the board, the “evil” rich still ended up carrying a larger share of the overall tax burden than they did before the cuts.  So just what is Mr. Krugman’s beef? 

I argue that were are nearing a dangerous threshold politically, where the majority of voters may soon find they pay no taxes and the minority pays all.  If that tipping point is reached, what is to prevent this majority from voting for massive tax increases that will only affect the minority?  All Americans should carry some share of the cost of government.  It should not be a free ride for some and a minority pays the tab. 

To further emphasize the fairness issue look at the following chart from the IRS in 2004.  The brown bars show the share of the income that the percentile on the vertical axis earns.  The blue bar shows the share of the total income tax bill they pay. 

The problem folks is spending.  As the first chart makes pretty clear, we have not been suffering from a revenue problem, we have been suffering from a spending problem.  This administration and their instigators, like Mr. Krugman, have been urging reckless spending upon reckless spending and even decrying that the administration has not spent nearly enough.  Krugman is sloppy in making his case and tries to convince his readers that we will be carrying buckets of money to the wealthy when the truth is that he wants to open the spigot wider from those who produce in this country to the profligate government who can then spend it on more turtle crossings in Florida, and to prop up the unions, and bankrupt states.  Stop spending, cut taxes, shrink the federal beast, and we will be in good shape in short order.

As many people have said, “I never got a job from a poor man.”  In looking back at my own career, I have worked for several companies that were started by entrepreneurs and who became wealthy. Do I care if they were wealthy?  No.  Do I wish they were taxed to the eyeballs?  No.   If they were, those are jobs I would probably wouldn’t have had.  Opportunity is what made America the country where people around the world fight to get into, not bashing the successful.  All who stive to come here want to become those wealthy successful people and give the same opportunity to their children.

An article in today’s New York Times is just one more, “Don’t let a crisis go to waste,” move from this administration.  The article, titled “As Oil Industry Fights a Tax, It Reaps Billions From Subsidies,” uses the same tired talking points to justify another tax increase that will ultimately be passed along to consumers.

The article talks about how the oil companies take advantage of tax credits and breaks and then it also talks about how many oil based companies re-incorporate in countries like Panama, the Marshall Islands, the Cayman Islands, and Switzerland because it will lower their taxes.  When with the Statists get it?  If you raise taxes both corporations and people will change their behavior to lower their taxes.  Impose a millionaire’s tax in Maryland and Maryland discovers they have one-third fewer millionaires a year later and hundreds of thousands of dollars in less revenue.  Impose among the highest tax rates in the developed world on businesses and businesses will move to where the taxes are lower.  Create tax breaks and then somehow the Progressives are surprised that companies took advantage of them.

The initial thrust of the article was that the tax on oil companies was necessary to pay for the cleanup of the oil spill in the Gulf.  Pardon my confusion, but didn’t the government just get BP to pony up $20 billion into an escrow fund for this purpose?  Hasn’t BP said from day one that they will pay the cost for the clean up?  So why are the Progressives in Congress rushing to put a new tax in place other than to take advantage of a crisis to reach into your wallet?

Another unintended consequence of our onerous tax policy is that when companies incorporate in other countries, those countries often have lower engineering and environmental standards.

I am no fan of corporate welfare so why don’t we take the IRS code and run it through a shredder?  Get rid of the tax breaks across the board.  Lower the tax rate to a fixed number that is on par with other developed countries.  According to the Heritage Foundation, the freest economy in the world is Hong Kong, which oddly enough is located in Communist China.  The Chicoms were smart enough to leave well enough alone when Hong Kong reverted to their control from Britain in 1997.  Their individual tax rate is progressive ranging from 2% to 17% or an option for a 15% flat rate depending on which liability is lower.  The top corporate tax rate is 16.5%.  Their five-year compound annual GDP growth rate is 5.7%; unemployment is 3.5%; and their inflation is 4.3%.  By comparison, our top corporate tax rate is 35%, more than double that of Hong Kong; our five year compound annual GDP growth rate is 2.2%; unemployment is 9.4% (at the time of this study); and inflation is 3.8%.

If we could implement real tax reform it would not only simplify our lives, save several hundred billion dollars in compliance costs, reduce uncertainty for business, create jobs, and grow the economy.  With a larger pie, overall tax revenues will also increase. 

In that Heritage study the United States has the eighth freest economy in the world, down one place from the year before; not the direction we should be going.  Imagine if we set a goal to become the freest economy in the world.  Americans like a challenge so let’s set our sights on becoming number one.  The first three to concentrate on passing are those directly in front of us: Canada, Switzerland and Ireland.  On this Fourth of July, let’s plant our flag and get to work.

Did anyone not see this coming?  An article in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal reports that new home sales plunged.  Why?  The government’s meddling tax credit for first time home buyers expired and gee, the trend didn’t continue?  What a surprise.  Meanwhile the government has another program, Making Home Affordable, to help homeowners refinance their home mortgages that they can no longer afford.  Instead of letting the chips fall where they may and have prices find a bottom and adjust, we have the drip-drip-drip torture of these programs and the recession drags on.

New home sales fell 32.7% from April to a record low seasonally adjusted annual rate of 300,000.  Compared to last year the sales fell 18.3%.  In addition the previously reported sales numbers for March and April were adjusted downward.

Here is what we have.  Our government is taking our tax dollars and giving them to people to help them buy a house.  You may be struggling to pay your own mortgage and instead of the government letting you keep more of your own money and perhaps make an extra payment on your own mortgage to lower your outstanding debt or increase spending which would help grow the economy, you are paying for your mortgage and your neighbor’s.  Instead of letting those who can’t afford their mortgage face that reality, the government steps in and drags out the process.  If government got out of the way, then the banks would have the incentive to negotiate in good faith rather than looking for a government bailout.  If a mortgage is salvageable, they should renegotiate with the homeowner and take a small loss rather than a big one.  If the mortgage is not salvageable, then foreclose or short sell it and be done with it.  The housing overhang on the economy would get quickly sorted out and we could return to a more stable housing market.  Get the government out of the way and let us keep our tax dollars.

In 1920-21 there was a steep and serious recession.  This was before the age of government intervention of Hoover, FDR and all who followed.  Businesses were able to cut wages and react to the circumstances in that freer market.  Unemployment peaked at 11.7%, almost 2% higher than we have now, but by the following year it was down to 6.7% and they year after it fell further to 2.4%.  We are a year and a half into the current mess and the current administration seems intent on matching FDR’s record of stretching this out for eight years.  We have a robust economy that can rebound sharply, if the government gets out of the way.  But this government keeps tinkering and the economy keeps bouncing along the bottom.  And let’s not forget fraud.

The Treasury’s Inspector General for Tax Administration, J. Russell George, reported that 19,000 filers for the first time home buyers credit hadn’t purchased a home and there were 74,000 filers had purchased a home but it was not their first.  In additiona there were 53 cases where IRS employees filed “illegal or inappropriate” claims for the credit and today we learn that $9 million was stolen by prisoners who were incarcerated when they filed for the credit.  So don’t worry folks your tax dollars are not only prolonging the recession, but they are being stolen as well.  Feel better about your benevolent government?  Aren’t you glad we live in a country where your government can forcefully take the fruit of your labor and throw it to the wind?

Government that governs least governs best.  Let’s cut the beast down to size.

In an article titled, “An Article of Faith,” Charles M. Blow of the New York Times explains about Obama and Health Care.  I am glad he took the time to set down the statist’s case.  It much easier to expose them when they step into the sunlight.

“The Apostles of Anger {that’s us} in their echo chamber of fallacies have branded him the enemy. This has now become an article of faith. Obama isn’t just the enemy of small government and national solvency. He’s the enemy of liberty.”

Enemy, noun, persons that are hostile to one another.

Sounds like Mr. Blow is onto something there.  Let’s see poll after poll has the American people opposed to ObamaCare by around 55% to 60%.  President Obama shows his hostility to the American people by saying he doesn’t care what they think, he, President Obama, knows what’s best for them and will ram this thing through by gimmicks such as reconciliation rather than the normal approval process.  Yes, I guess that makes him an enemy, but it was accomplished through his own actions, not by talk radio or Fox News.

Liberty, noun, freedom from arbitrary or despotic government or control.

Again, it looks like Mr. Blow nails it.  We have the government under ObamaCare telling us we have to buy insurance or pay a tax or go to jail for non-payment of taxes.  Sounds pretty arbitrary and despotic to me.  So President Obama has decided to act in a way that makes us his enemy.  I guess Mr. Blow is trying to say we are to be faulted for recognizing it?

“This underscores the current fight for the soul of this country. It’s not just a tug of war between left and right. It’s a struggle between the mind and the heart, between evidence and emotions, between reason and anger, between what we know and what we believe.”

Uh-oh, here it comes folks the statist is about to point out how stupid we are for not going along like sheep to slaughter.  Notice the word order first it’s left then right.  If you follow that order Mr. Blow is trying to say that the left stands for the mind, the evidence, reason and what we know, while the right stands for heart, emotions, anger, and beliefs.  I am sure Mr. Blow will now use his superior intellect to explain this all to us knuckle dragging troglodytes.

“This conflict was captured in a tit-for-tat between Obama and Rush Limbaugh. In an interview with CBS this week, Obama complained about the “vitriol” coming from the likes of Limbaugh: ‘I think the vast majority of Americans know that we’re trying hard, that I want what’s best for the country.’

“Limbaugh shot back on Friday, “I and most Americans do not believe President Obama is trying to do what’s best for the country.”

That’s pretty weak.  So despite 55% to 60% of the American people, for months on end, saying or should I say screaming NO! this is not what we want, Mr. Obama is saying as if to a small child, “There, there now, take your medicine, I know what’s best for you.”  Where Mr. Limbaugh is humble  enough not to claim god-like omniscience that he knows what people think, just that based on his observations of the polls, what he believes they think.  It sounds like Mr. Blow is making a case for Mr. Obama being the most arrogant president in our history.  Please continue.

“And there it was. Obama’s language focused on what people “know,” or should know. He seems to find comfort in the empirical nature of knowledge. It’s logical. Limbaugh’s language focused on what he thinks people “believe.” Beliefs are a more complicated blend of facts, or lies, and faith. And, they can exist beyond the realm of the rational.”

Really?  Is Mr. Blow serious?  Does he believe this or does he know this?  Of what knowledge are you speaking Mr. Blow, in which President Obama takes warm comfort?  Is it the empirical knowledge that estimates of what Medicare would cost when it was passed turned out to be understated by 700%?  Is it the empirical knowledge that the model for ObamaCare up in Massachusetts has not stopped costs from increasing and health care is being rationed?  Of course, when Mr. Blow speaks of the right and their beliefs he has to work “lies” into the formula of the “complicated blend of facts, lies and faith.”

“According to another Quinnipiac poll released last week, Republicans were far more likely than Democrats to say that they follow public affairs most of the time. But how? They listen to people like Limbaugh, and they’re more likely than others to watch Fox News.”

Let me call your Quinnipiac poll and raise you one.  In its daily poll on the president Rasmussen finds that while 53% of likely voters disapprove of the job President Obama is doing, 55% of the media write favorable articles about him and that is on a downward trend!  So if people want the truth, who should they turn to for their news, the New York Times perhaps?  I think your article just answered that question.

“But invectives are not information. For example, a poll released on Wednesday by the Pew Research Center found that most Republicans say that they still don’t understand how the new health care reform will affect them and their family.”

Republicans still don’t understand???  Nobody understands it, Mr. Blow, because nobody read it before it passed Congress.  At over 2,500 pages, if you did nothing else but read the bill in the seventy two hours it was posted in the internet, it is not likely you could have read it.  No sleeping, no eating, no lavatory breaks, just three straight days of reading it and you would be hard pressed to get all the way through.  Since you are such a fan of empirical evidence, when major companies announced billions in write-offs because of the bill and the legal requirement to so report, Congressman Henry Waxman appeared shocked and called for hearings.  When Congressman Anthony Weiner said the IRS would not be checking on whether or not you had health insurance, he couldn’t explain why the law funds 16,000 more IRS agents.  This circus is only starting my friend.

And so, my fellow imbeciles, Mr. Blow has spoken with a scathingly inept defense of all things Obama, making the case for a strong turnout at the Tea Parties on April 15 at the very same time. If you want to know the news watch Fox, if you believe you want to house train your dog, get the New York Times.

That was the famous “Pottery Barn” analogy that Colin Powell used regarding the war in Iraq.  Now that ObamaCare + Reconciliation is done, all the ugly details that come crawling out of the health care bill like cockroaches when you turn the lights on, will all come to you courtesy of the Democrats. 

Because they chose to go the reconciliation route, the Senate could not dare change a word in the House bill of “fixes” so they could approve what the House sent them with less than 60 votes.  Here’s a sampling of what the genius of government brings you, wrapped in arrogance, with a bow of disdain for the people, as reported by Kimberly Strassel in the Wall Street Journal:

“Tom Coburn (R., Okla.) offered language to bar the government from subsidizing erectile dysfunction drugs for convicted pedophiles and rapists. Democrats voted . . . No! Orrin Hatch (R., Utah) proposed exempting wounded soldiers from the new tax on medical devices. Democrats: No way! Pat Roberts (R., Kan.) wanted to exempt critical access rural hospitals from funding cuts. Senate Democrats: Forget it! This was Republicans’ opportunity to lay out every ugly provision and consequence of ObamaCare, and Democrats—because of the process they’d chosen—had to defend it all.

And so it went, into the wee Thursday hours. All Democrats in favor of taxing pacemakers? Aye! All Democrats in favor of keeping those seedy vote buyoffs? Aye! All Democrats in favor of raising taxes on middle-income families? Aye! All Democrats in favor of exempting themselves from elements of ObamaCare? Aye!”

Now doesn’t that just make you warm and fuzzy inside? 

Bill O’Reilly and Congressman Anthony Weiner had a debate on O’Reilly ‘s show that was jaw-dropping to listen to.  Weiner said that O’Reilly and others were blatantly misstating the facts about the health care bill.  O’Reilly questioned Weiner about the IRS learning details about people such as whether or not they had health insurance.  Weiner said that was untrue and that if you wanted to get a tax credit for health care, you had to say on your tax return that you had health insurance.  He said it is just like if you claimed a tax credit as a first time homebuyer (I won’t get into all the fraud taking place on the homebuyer credit, even by IRS employees). So according to Weiner it’s all voluntary reporting, just as takes place every year when we file our taxes.  How can Weiner stand there and make such a statement?  A key requirement is that everyone has to be covered by health insurance according to the law and the law provides for hiring 16,000 more IRS agents!  Well what are those agents going to be doing if not following up with you if you don’t say you are covered?  Weiner danced and dodged and at one point stood silently pouting when O’Reilly tried to pin him down.

This is ugly and it is going to get uglier as we learn what is in this cancer on our economy.  But Nancy Pelosi warned us.  “We have to pass the bill to find out what’s in it.”  Well, they passed it, now we get all the bad news.

In the midst of the financial meltdown the government and financial pundits argued that they had to rescue the big banks because they were too big to fail.  If we don’t save them, they could bring down the entire U.S. economy and in  turn the economy of the entire world.  Ignoring the history and responsibility for how they got there, that could be a true statement that the government had to do something to avoid a worldwide panic.

The panic averted, many banks paid the money back with interest, are in the process of paying out massive bonuses and the Obama administration is twisting itself in self-righteous knots to tax them into humility.  Good luck with that.  While they target the banks, they are hands off on Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, GM and Chrysler because to tax those basket cases would just be taking money from the left taxpayer pocket and moving it to the right taxpayer pocket.  If you look to the root of the problems of the fiscal meltdown you will find the government’s hand in almost every corner, but don’t expect this administration to try to get to the bottom of it.

Back Up, Go Ahead

There was an old Abbot and Costello routine where Abbot was guiding Costello in parking a car.

Costello asked what he should do and Abbot said, “Back up.”

Costello confirmed, “Back Up?”

To which Abbot replied, “Yeah, go ahead.”

“Go ahead?”

“No. back up.”

“Back up?”

“Yeah, go ahead.”

I don’t know if the Obama administration is Abbot or Costello, but they are telling banks, “Lend more money.”  Then they tell the banks, we are going to raise taxes and take your money away.  Then they ask the bank, “Why aren’t you lending more money?”

Programs You Can Believe In

Medicare

It is estimated that Medicare loses about $60 Billion ANNUALLY in fraud.  That’s right about $60 billion of your tax dollars are stolen every year from this program.

“If you want to find Medicare fraud, the first place you should look is South Florida, where 60 Minutes and correspondent Steve Kroft were told it has pushed aside cocaine as the major criminal enterprise.” – 60 Minutes – Medicare Fraud: A $60 Billion Crime

While the Obama Administration pushes their health care program one of the ways of funding the program is through savings in Medicare fraud.  However, no one has been able to stop it.  Not Republicans.  Not Democrats.

First Time Home Buyer Credit

This wonderful new program was designed to help first time home buyers achieve the American Dream.  Unfortunately, it doesn’t take a genius to also achieve that criminal American Dream, fleecing the government.

It’s hard not to laugh when viewing the results of the federal first-time home-buyer tax credit. The credit, worth up to $8,000 for the purchase of a home, has only been available since April of last year. Yet news of the latest taxpayer-funded mortgage scam has traveled fast. The Treasury’s inspector general for tax administration, J. Russell George, recently told Congress that at least 19,000 filers hadn’t purchased a home when they claimed the credit. For another 74,000 filers, claiming a total of $500 million in credits, evidence suggests that they weren’t first-time buyers. – WSJ – First Time Fraudsters, 10/29/2009

The  IRS even had to admit that in an investigation they found 53 cases where IRS employees filed “illegal or inappropriate” claims for the credit.

Too Big To Govern

A new president is elected once every four years, but the vast government bureaucracy remains.  It is said that a president will only be able to address 3-4 top priorities in their term.  By the time they appoint executive department heads and the Senate approves them and they set about to figure out the departments they are in charge of, it is an enormous undertaking to try to make significant changes.  To try to curb fraud, to overcome the inertia of the entrenched bureaucrats who know they will outlast the appointee, and their friends in Congress who will probably be there as long, is just too tall an order to accomplish in a four year cycle.  Every time a new liberal takes over, their first order of business is to make the bureaucracy larger.  It does not work.  It will not work.

The Only Solution

The only solution is to make the federal government smaller.  It must be bold.  It must be dramatic.  Tweaking it at the margins will fail.  Entire departments must be shut down.  The Constitution should be the blueprint for this.  If the power is not explicit in the Constitution, shut it down and allow the states or local governments to take it up if they choose.  Then drastically cut taxes accordingly.  Let people keep their money and decide at the local level if they want that service or not.  Let every state try their own solution and each state can learn what works and what doesn’t from each other.  But this idea of pushing every solution up to the federal and let one size fits all be forced on everyone is, quite simply, madness.  We need less government and more liberty.

We have had several bubbles before, but if the Obama administration has their way, “you ain’t seen nothin’ yet.”  Currently the budget for the federal government is $4 trillion dollars.  That’s right, your federal government will spend approximately (which means probably more) $4 trillion in one year.  Of that amount $202 billion is interest on the national debt.  In an article in the New York Times today by 2019, a mere ten years from now, the portion of the budget directed to interest payments will be over $700 billion, or three and a half times what it is today.  Many people have trouble grasping how much a trillion dollars are, and within ten years we will be paying three-quarters of a trillion dollars just to cover the interest without paying off any of the principle.

Family Budget Analogy

We all understand the dramatic effects of too much debt, as the point has been driven home every day throughout this financial crisis.  Bankruptcy filings, home foreclosures, bailouts, all resulting from more debt than we can pay the interest on, let alone pay back the principle.  You see commercials on television every day for companies that will help you renegotiate your credit card debt, your mortgage, intervene on your behalf with the IRS.  None of those programs are available to the federal government as a debtor. 

Obama’s Out of Control Spending

The Obama administration seems oblivious to the problem.  As bad as it is they just keep on spending or want to spend more:

• Stimulus package — $787 billion.  Despite evidence that it is not working and widespread opposition from the American people, the Obama administration is simply declaring that it is working and we need to do it again with a second stimulus
• Cap and Trade — this is a program that will drive energy costs through the roof for no real benefit.  After all if, as is becoming more and more apparent, global warming is not man made then it cannot be stopped by man either.  Higher costs will lead to businesses closing down, laying off people, and generating less tax revenue from both the businesses and the individuals it laid off.  Result — an increase in the deficit.
• Health Care — another $1 trillion of IOUs piled on our children’s back and if Medicare’s history is any guide, these numbers are well below what will really happen.

The Truth About Government

The truth is that government doesn’t create anything.  They don’t generate income.  Everything that government has to spend comes from you and me.  The government takes it from us (or throws us in jail for tax evasion) and then spends it.  If they can’t get enough from us, they borrow the difference.  But somewhere down the line, that money has to get paid back.  A news report today said we have the opportunity to just write a check to the Treasury if we are concerned about the deficit and want to help pay it down!  Let’s see how many of Obama’s wealthy supporters sign up for that program.

Runaway Train

Our federal government is a runaway train and if we don’t stop it very soon and pare it back to the functions enumerated in the Constitution, we will get hit with a bubble so big, that there is no Hollywood screenwriter that could even begin to conceive of how to portray it.  $700 billion folks, that’s $2,059 in INTEREST for every man, woman and child in America.  Ask yourself this, if you are a family of four are you prepared to write a check for $8,235 to the federal government for interest alone?  You don’t get anything for your money, it just keeps your government from defaulting on what they already borrowed. This will be on top of your regular tax bill. And the next year you will have to pay it again and probably more.  It’s time to stop the madness.  It’s time to stop the spending.  It’s time to stop the expansion of government and start shutting down departments.  It’s what you would do at home in a financial crisis, it’s what a small business would do in a crisis.  This is a crisis that we can still get under control, but if the debt continues to grow to the point where we can no longer afford to pay even the interest, America will be a footnote in history.

Do I have your attention now?

I’ll bet you thought I would be writing about Roland Burris, the senator appointed by Governor Rod Blagojevich under dubious circumstances.  No, Senator Mary Landreau of Louisiana just sold her vote on the senate health care bill to Harry Reid for $100 million.

Here is what was reported by ABC News.

On page 432 of the Reid bill, there is a section increasing federal Medicaid subsidies for “certain states recovering from a major disaster.”

The section spends two pages defining which “states” would qualify, saying, among other things, that it would be states that “during the preceding 7 fiscal years” have been declared a “major disaster area.”

I am told the section applies to exactly one state:  Louisiana, the home of moderate Democrat Mary Landrieu, who has been playing hard to get on the health care bill.

In other words, the bill spends two pages describing would could be written with a single world:  Louisiana.  (This may also help explain why the bill is long.)

Senator Harry Reid, who drafted the bill, cannot pass it without the support of Louisiana’s Mary Landrieu.

How much does it cost?  According to the Congressional Budget Office: $100 million.

But don’t worry, the talking heads in the lame stream media will soon be circling the wagons saying that Senator Landreau didn’t personally get any money, she got it for her state.  But where did the money come from?  Your pocket, my pocket, and your children’s and your grandchildren’s pocket.  In short, Harry Reid is using the coercive power of the IRS to take your property and give it to Louisiana so that a deeply flawed health care bill will get passed and Mary Landreau can get re-elected.  Seems fair to me.  Does it seem fair to you?  Isn’t that what makes you proud to be an American?  The arrogance of this Congress and administration are incomprehensible.  They see Tea Parties across the country rising up to protest their out of control spending.  They get blasted when then go home for their summer recess.  Poll after poll says the country is opposed to the stimulus package, cap and trade, the health care bills, but they just keep rolling on.

Let me quote from the Declaration of Independence:

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness — That to secure these Rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed, that whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these Ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its Foundation on such Principles, and organizing its Powers in such Form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”

“But when a long Train of Abuses and Usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object, evinces a Design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their Right, it is their Duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their Future Security.”

These are troubling times.  We cannot allow these abuses to continue without speaking out loudly and strongly.  Our government has gotten far too big and out of control.  It’s time to shrink it back to where the Founding Fathers envisioned it: limited and unobtrusive.

Just when you thought this administration had gone about as far as it could go in turning America into the old Soviet Union another subtle clue is revealed.  When you craft legislation that is over a thousand pages long and you try to slam it through before anyone can read it, all kinds of creepy things come crawling out when you turn the lights on.  This is from the White House’s blog:

“There is a lot of disinformation about health insurance reform out there, spanning from control of personal finances to end of life care.  These rumors often travel just below the surface via chain emails or through casual conversation.  Since we can’t keep track of all of them here at the White House, we’re asking for your help. If you get an email or see something on the web about health insurance reform that seems fishy, send it to flag@whitehouse.gov.”

Turn in your neighbor?  Does this not sound like Cuban block watchers in Castro’s worker’s paradise?  Is your name in their database?  If you apply for a government job, do you think you might run into a “problem”?  Will the IRS come knocking on your door to audit you?  If this doesn’t send chills up your spine, you are made of sterner stuff than me.

What’s really Fishy?

To be fair, everything this administration has said about health care, or is it health insurance, seems fishy?  So should all Americans be writing to the White House to complain?  Be careful, I am sure they are taking the names on both sides of the e-mail.  This Administration wants the First Amendment only to apply to the titan of the teleprompter.  But if you criticize the state, you are Astroturf, an unruly mob, crazed right-wing plants.  When do they send the goons in to break up the crowd and beat a few participants to send them a lesson.

Be Careful Before You Take a Bite Out of that Apple

The administration is touting the Cash for Clunkers program as a great success.  But as the auto dealers file for the rebates they are faced with this {emphasis added}:

“This application provides access to the DoT CARS system. When logged on to the CARS system, your computer is considered a Federal computer system and is the property of the U.S. Government. Any or all uses of this system and all files on this system may be intercepted, monitored, recorded, copied, audited, inspected, and disclosed to authorized CARS, Dot, and law enforcement personnel, as well as authorized officials of other agencies, both domestic and foreign.”

This was widely reported by Glenn Beck and immediately the statists came forth to attack him as a right wing fanatic.  I also saw some insipid posts saying, “well how are they going to be able to do that?  I’ll smack anyone who tries to touch my laptop; that web site is only for the dealers, not for consumers, etc., etc.”  To that I say, read it for yourself and decide.  Perhaps, as some suggest, it was some overly aggressive government lawyer who was trying to protect…  Protect what?  Rebates?

The pattern is shocking and the pattern is clear.  If the government gives you TARP money, the government sets your salary.  If the government bails out and then takes over the car companies, the government will decide what kind of cars it will build and if it loses money for years (Amtrak, the Postal Service), the government can decide to keep them afloat to achieve their agenda.  Keeping all those UAW members on the government teat, will keep their votes in the Democratic column.  Now if you want a rebate, the government owns your computer.  Let’s see, is there any disparaging information about the Obama administration on there?  No rebates for your dealership and we’ll fire off an e-mail to flag@whitehouse.gov to boot.  And what about that reference to foreign agencies?

Barack Obama is a disciple of Saul Alinsky and he knows a thing or two organizing and defeating his opponents, not by logic or reason, but by attack and disinformation.  That is how dictators grab power.  Will we be able to do as our Founding Fathers did and stop the spread of this tyranny?  The recent town hall meetings with our legislators give me reason to hope that Americans are paying close attention and do not like what they see.

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people — Amendment X, United States Constitution

“I’m Mad as Hell and I’m Not Going To Take It Any More”

That quote from the movie “Network” popped into my head as I read about a legislator in Oklahoma, calling for legislative support for the 10th Amendment to the Constitution.  It passed the state assembly unanimously.  So what does this mean?  The sponsor of the bill, State Senator Randy Brogdan, explains:

The “federal government has been putting the screws on (the states) a little tighter and tighter each year” along with unfunded mandates of varying sorts.

And each time this happens, Brogdon explained, “We lose a little bit of our freedom and liberty.”

The federal government has been growing enormously and taking on more and more things that used to be handled locally, such as education, and welfare.  Other programs have not changed as the economy has, for example, as the percentage of the population that farms has decreased dramatically has the Department of Agriculture shrunk accordingly?

You Must Obey!

The way the federal government works around this is by saying, okay, you don’t have to do what we tell you, but you will get no federal funding if you don’t.  It seems like a Catch-22, no?  Since the 16th Amendment, which authorized the income tax, the federal government can decide how much to tax incomes and there is little that the states can do about it.  They take money from your pocket under threat of imprisonment, and will give it back to you only if you comply with their rules.

How Do We Fix This One?

It may require a constitutional amendment to fix as the 16th Amendment says:

The Congress shall have the power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration. — 16th Amendment to the Constitution

I’ll leave the legal mechanics to those better qualified, but I would propose the following.  That the federal budget shall include a breakdown of projected revenues derived from income taxes, broken down by source: individual, corporate, etc.  A state should then be allowed to refuse mandates and programs from, say, the Department of Education, and withhold from the IRS that proportion of tax dollars destined for the Department of Education from that state.

Certain departments should be deemed mandatory, such as Defense, State, Treasure, to name a few as these departments serve all citizens.

The legislation under consideration in Oklahoma will have little effect if the federal government can suck up as much money as it wants to from the states, via their citizens and then just keep the money if the states refuse to participate in the programs.  How do you determine which programs should be subject to the states discretion?  No money should flow from a state, to Washington, and then back to the state.  That is just plain stupid and wasteful, or a distribution of wealth, none of which is a government function. Paying for roads and infrastructure that does not cross state lines should be funded locally.  It is ridiculous that the federal government pays 90% of the cost of a highway that lies entirely within a city.  Look at the scandalous “Big Dig” in Boston.  Billions of dollars spent and parts of it are falling down.  Why should any of this be paid for by the people of Kansas, Oklahoma, Alaska, New York, Florida, et al.?

But the real answer is following the 10th Amendment.  It clearly states that the role of the federal government is spelled out in the Constitution.  If it’s not in the Constitution then that responsibility is left to the states or the people.  Show me where in the Constitution it says that the federal government is responsible for education.  It’s not in there and that department should be shut down tomorrow.

It’s Time to Rein the Monster In

The anger in the country is growing.  Those who acted responsibly are being told they have to bail out the irresponsible.  They are being told by “Buck a Day Biden” that it is their patriotic duty to pay higher taxes to help out.  Meanwhile half a dozen Obama appointees haven’t paid the taxes they owe, let alone paying more.  I give Biden the “Buck a Day Biden” moniker because that is how much this millionaire gives to charity.  He doesn’t want to spend his own money on charity, he wants the government to take your money to fund government programs to do that.

If you don’t think the anger is growing take a look at this.  Rick Santelli