Opinion Page

home > weblog > 2003 > october > blog101503.php

Do I, as a citizen, have the right to come into your house and take 45% of your belongings? Well, Joseph Liebermann (who sounds too much like Snagglepuss,) wants to use the threat of deadly force and the threat of incarceration to do just that. He wants to take up to 45% of the money that YOU earn and give it away according to who HE wants to give it to. That doesn't include another 15% or so of your income that disappears to state and local concerns.

So, I ask you again, do I have the power to take 45% of your belongings? No? Then the Federal Government shouldn't have that power either. Now, a lot of liberals feel that taking 60% of someone's money is ok - unless it is their money. Since only 2% of Americans make $250,000 or more annually, the other 98% are happy to tax them at a rate far above what they'd be comfortable with imposed upon them, in the name of "fairness".

Now, to completely blow this argument out of proportion, let's extrapolate the argument to see if you still support it. Let's suppose that 2% of Americans live in Colorado. I have no idea if that figure is statistically accurate, I'm just picking a state at random. It's a big state, people have heard of it, it serves my purpose. So, let's just go with it. Two percent of Americans reside in one state (that would be a statistical mean). Now, let's say that someone in the Federal Government wants to acquire some money to buy votes in a large state, like California. So, he figures that he can use the police power of the Federal Government to take that money from 2% of Americans, in my example that would be Colorado. He wants to money to give to the people of California, whose short-sightedness led to energy shortages of their own demise. He knows that there are a LOT of voters in California, and if he had other people's money (OPM), he could use that to give to these voters to gain favor with them, and get their vote. So, he changes the tax code to take 45% of all income earned by people living in Colorado for his vote-buying scheme. So, everyone in Colorado bears the burden for the politician's lust for vote-buying power. You, however, don't live in Colorado. You live in your state. So, you don't have to pay 45% in Federal Income Taxes. It doesn't affect you one bit. Does it bother you at all? After all, I could have picked any state, maybe even yours. This time I just picked on Colorado. What if you lived in Colorado? Would you think it fair that I took 45% of your money, but only 0 to 37% from each person in neighboring Wyoming?

So, you hopefully see my point. It's wrong to treat one group of people different than another. That's why I'm opposed to Affirmative Action (AA). It's arbitrary. Most of the people that benefitted from lucrative airport contracts through AA were millionaires - the people who benefitted didn't need the benefit, and only gamed the system to line their fat pockets. Taxing the most productive members of our society doesn't fix the problem. Taking money from one group to give to another does nothing to fix the problem. The lesson of Robin Hood wasn't that he was doing "good" - the lesson is that he can take from one group and give it to another, but it doesn't change who they are. The poor still didn't own land, and couldn't vote. They had more "stuff," but they weren't really better off. The same thing can be said for people in today's America - you can take money from Bill Gates and give it to poor people - but he still owns Microsoft, and those people will still be under-educated and spend the money on lottery tickets and cigarettes.

Am I against helping the poor? No. But I think that it isn't the job of the Federal Government to be in that business. I think that there are adequate resources for charity. Churches, temples, mosques, Goodwill, The Salvation Army... these organizations all have channels for helping others, and these are only some of the better known ones. There are private foundations that go unused each year, because people don't know about them. There are so many resources, that I believe that anyone who truly needs help should be able to find it. Those who are just lazy should be left to their own devices. THAT is fair.

So, will you allow them to punish the people of my metaphorical Colorado? If so, who will stand up for you when they choose your state? If I used race or skin color or sex or sexual preference as a criteria, would that make it any less wrong?

Freedom is like an egg. A great design that hold precious contents. And once punctured, forever lost. Contrary to what Gen. Clark said, the idea of a "progressive system of taxation" was not a founding principle of this country. It was a concept born to the Fathers of Communism. And if you allow it in this country, the result will be the same. Communism hasn't lasted in any country for even a century. Our system, as damaged as its become, has survived for 227 years so far. I'd like it to stay around for years to come.

See what else I have to say Previous day's rant

Go to Top

If you have ideas, comments, or criticisms, .

Home