pjohns
12-07-2012, 08:17 PM
I very seldom agree with the observations of Howard Dean. Still, he was right about one thing recently--well, sorta-kinda, anyway--and that is the fact that the budget cannot be balanced merely by our raising taxes on a handful of Americans.
Where we disagree is on this fundamental point: Dean would raise taxes on all Americans, whereas I would much prefer to cut entitlement spending.
For the record, here is the pertinent quote from the former Governor of Vermont:
The truth is everybody needs to pay more taxes, not just the rich. ...We're not going to get out of this deficit problem unless we raise taxes across the board.
And the link: Howard Dean: 'Everybody Needs to Pay More Taxes, Not Just the Rich' (http://politix.topix.com/homepage/3688-howard-dean-everybody-needs-to-pay-more-taxes-not-just-the-rich)
President Obama is not stupid. He, too, knows that the budget cannot magically be balanced, merely by our raising taxes on "the top two percent" of taxpayers.
But I believe there is a Machiavellian scheme afoot here.
Once it becomes obvious that the budget cannot be balanced by an increase in taxes on just "the top two percent," President Obama will doubtless come back--"reluctantly," as he will surely frame it--and "ask" middle-class taxpayers to pony up a little more also, in order to shore up The Benefactor State.
I certainly would prefer to be mistaken about this. But I just cannot imagine that I might be. After all, President Obama surely knows, just as well as Howard Dean does, that the budget cannot be balanced by just this two percent of taxpayers.
Still, he is happy to use it as a wedge. And once the upper class has been separated from the middle class, it will be easier to go after the latter.
As Martin Niemoller put it, just after WWII:
First they came for the Jews
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for the Communists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for me
and there was no one left
to speak out for me.
I believe this is essentially President Obama's tax strategy, in a nutshell: divide and conquer...
Where we disagree is on this fundamental point: Dean would raise taxes on all Americans, whereas I would much prefer to cut entitlement spending.
For the record, here is the pertinent quote from the former Governor of Vermont:
The truth is everybody needs to pay more taxes, not just the rich. ...We're not going to get out of this deficit problem unless we raise taxes across the board.
And the link: Howard Dean: 'Everybody Needs to Pay More Taxes, Not Just the Rich' (http://politix.topix.com/homepage/3688-howard-dean-everybody-needs-to-pay-more-taxes-not-just-the-rich)
President Obama is not stupid. He, too, knows that the budget cannot magically be balanced, merely by our raising taxes on "the top two percent" of taxpayers.
But I believe there is a Machiavellian scheme afoot here.
Once it becomes obvious that the budget cannot be balanced by an increase in taxes on just "the top two percent," President Obama will doubtless come back--"reluctantly," as he will surely frame it--and "ask" middle-class taxpayers to pony up a little more also, in order to shore up The Benefactor State.
I certainly would prefer to be mistaken about this. But I just cannot imagine that I might be. After all, President Obama surely knows, just as well as Howard Dean does, that the budget cannot be balanced by just this two percent of taxpayers.
Still, he is happy to use it as a wedge. And once the upper class has been separated from the middle class, it will be easier to go after the latter.
As Martin Niemoller put it, just after WWII:
First they came for the Jews
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for the Communists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for me
and there was no one left
to speak out for me.
I believe this is essentially President Obama's tax strategy, in a nutshell: divide and conquer...