I watched President Obama give his speech the other night about his plan for reducing the debt. Seems the community organizer has decided that our deficit and debt are indeed a problem and now he wants to fix it. Nevermind that just two months ago he proposed a budget that completely ignored the deficit. The important thing is that he is at least acknowledging there is a problem. That's progress. During his speech, he called for "shared sacrifice" to end our deficit problems. Even better!
Since the government already seizes 4 months of my labor every year, not including what is taken by state and local authorities along with licenses and fees, I'm all for sharing the sacrifice in this country to get back to our economic glory days. So I figure those who don't pay will now be asked to make a few sacrifices. Nope.
Apparently, Obama's idea of "shared sacrifice" is to tax people like me even more. Keep in mind, half of all Americans don't pay income taxes. We are facing a debt crisis unmatched in our history. Our currency is on the brink of collapse. Yet, shared sacrifice means that we who pay must now pay more.
Let me tell you about my sacrifice. Obama and his friends like to refer to people like me as "fortunate", as though my position in life was a roll of the dice and I hit seven. It was just luck, a twist of fate. No. I have been sacrificing for decades. I'm not special. I wasn't born into money. My road wasn't paved for me. I'm no different than any other American. We all have the same opportunity, but who succeeds at it depends on who works for and earns it.
Beginning in high school I devoted myself to my future. This carried into college and medical school. It was a constant string of one sacrifice after another. While those around me goofed off and pissed away their future, I buckled down and sacrificed for mine. I gave up a lot of things to get where I am now, and I took on a lot of debt. I took risks. I sacrificed my time, my money, and my personal life. It wasn't luck. It was hard work and dedication. That paid off and now I am reaping the rewards. That's how it's supposed to be. Sacrifice and work hard, take risks, and you will be rewarded.
Not in Obama's world. In his mind I am "fortunate", as if it just happened to me. And those who didn't work hard, didn't take risks, didn't dedicate themselves, pissed away their future and opportunity, well they're "less fortunate". So it is up to me to surrender my luck to the less fortunate in order to make America more just. What a twisted interpretation of the American dream.
The point is that I already sacrifice and have been for decades. I surrender a large percentage of my hard labor to the government so they can waste it as they please. I surrender my labor so it can be redistributed to those who haven't earned it and don't appreciate it. I've been sacrificing my entire life, they haven't. So I'm supposed to surrender more? This is Obama's idea of shared sacrifice.
I surrender money to my local school district and they mismanage it just as bad as the Feds. The public schools are a joke and the "education" they provide is worse. So, despite the money I surrender to them, they are useless to me. I have to pay substantially more for private schools just so my kids will be able to read and write before high school. That requires sacrifice. I don't mind doing it. Their education is my responsibility. But paying for my kids' education and paying for someone else's education takes its toll.
And retirement? Well, I have to save for that. The ponzi scheme we call social security takes a lot of my money but is on the verge of bankruptcy. Soon people like me will not be able to draw from it, if there's any money left to be drawn. So, knowing the incompetence of Washington, I'm planning ahead. I'm putting money away for retirement so I won't be destitute in those times. This requires sacrifice. I don't mind doing it. My retirement is my responsibility. But paying for my retirement as well as someone's else's via social security is hard to do and takes a lot of money.
And my kids will need money for college. The government feels that since I'm "rich" they shouldn't be given federal student aid. This means I have to save for their college education. That requires even more sacrifice. I don't mind doing it. That's how it's supposed to be. But paying for my kids college is a lot more difficult with a government gorilla on my back and in my pockets nonstop.
And healthcare? I pay for it monthly. That requires sacrifice. I'm fine with paying for my healthcare, that's how it's supposed to be. But it's hard to pay for my healthcare AND the healthcare of others.
Meanwhile, the parasites and looters get all of this provided for them, at my cost. They contribute nothing. They own no part of it. They don't work for it, they do nothing to earn it. They haven't sacrificed anything to get this stuff and they give me nothing in return. It's just given to them because they are "less fortunate" than me. Obama has asked for no sacrifice from these people, only from me. And this is how he describes "shared sacrifice".
I'm not talking about those who need help. There's a difference between people truly in need and people with no desire to work for a living and support themselves. I give money to those in need every month and the tax breaks for charity helps me do so. But sadly Mr Obama has decided that what I give should no longer by credited on my taxes making my donations even that much more difficult. Apparently, he wishes to continue subsidizing the lazy while taking measures to cut off genuine charity for those truly in need. That's more than just politics. It's diabolical.
Unlike many Americans, I pay my mortgage. Sure, it would be easy not to. It's a tough economy and many have defaulted. Not me. I pay it on time, and the tax benefits help me afford some of the things above. Unfortunately, Mr Obama now wants to stop people like me - the responsible class - from deducting our mortgage interest from our taxes. This is shared sacrifice.
It's disgusting.
He says I'm rich. He says millionaires shouldn't get tax breaks at the expense of the elderly. Well, I'm no millionaire and I'm certainly not rich. I drive a '93 Toyota with 250,000 miles and in need of a new paint job. We buy off brand food on a very strict grocery budget. We don't take vacations, we don't own fancy jewelry or designer clothes. Often, we live paycheck to paycheck just to meet the needs I speak of. Something I call sacrificing. We pay our bills. We give to charity. We sacrifice for our children. I work a second job so we can save for retirement and college. But he thinks I'm rich and should therefore pay more.
And speaking of that second job, as an example of how high taxes ultimately hurts an economy, I'll detail my situation further. I've already crunched the numbers. My second job is working as a medical consultant for a local behavioral and drug rehab facility. Basically, I am there to treat patients' blood pressure and diabetes and other health problems while they're getting drug treatment. I get paid for it and this is the money I use to save for our future. However, if the community organizer gets his way I've determined that I will actually end up making LESS money. Yes, I'll be working two jobs but - because of tax brackets and soaking the "rich" - I will bring home less money. I will actually have to PAY to work my second job. Obviously, I won't do that. So that will be less money in the economy, less money spent, less money saved or invested. And it will mean that there will be people who need a physician and won't have one. Think my situation is unique? Think I'm the only one who would have to reduce his production of goods and services to save on taxes? Think again.
This is why higher taxes doesn't work. It is an idea that has failed time and again. High taxes mean less revenue for the government. It means economic slowdown. It means people have less access to goods and services. It doesn't work. It never has. But Obama doesn't care. He wants more. He wants shared sacrifice. He wants envy. He wants class warfare. We wants people to think that us "rich" are rolling in dough and have plenty to fork over for their "less fortunate" situation.
What a ridiculous and foolish man he is.
6 comments:
exellent piece truly..and so telling of how this terrorist sympathizer in the WH cares not one iota about the average hard working American..God bless you and thanks for the words at WHT!
Thanks for the visit. Excellent rant and I agree wholeheartedly. I think Barry Soetoro is a Marxist who's out to level the playing field to the point that we all look like interchangeable drones. "Shared sacrifice" is just another way of saying "Share the wealth".
John,
Nice commentary here on your blog.
The following is my response to your post at my site.
In terms of education, our first mistake to approach public schooling as thought every student is a potential college graduate.
Second, and possibly more important, is the hiring process for teachers. To make a long a story short, prospective junior-high and high-school teachers who want to teach math, physics, chemistry and biology must present college transcripts that show they've taken classes in a foreign language.
No other orgnanization in the country would make a similar demand. What connection exists between teaching math or science and college-level language studies?
What happens? An artificial labor shortage is created. That's what happens. People with B.S. degrees (no language requirement) in engineering and science cannot become teachers of math and science in public schools, thereby eliminating a huge pool of job seekers.
The next mistake is to throw new teachers directly into the classroom. The one skill no college can teach is classroom management. Throwing a new teacher into the deep end of the pool is no way to learn it.
Schools should adopt a progression plan. New teachers should start as assistant teachers, grading homework, tutoring and filling the role of substitute teacher, and aftera year, they should move up to the role of full teacher.
Our current system is okay for about two-thirds of our students. But it fails too many who slip toward the bottom or would otherwise fly to the top.
Thanks WHT and Black Sheep for stopping by. We all have to stand united in this thing because lord knows the marxists are.
Slappz, I like your ideas on education. I think the teachers unions and educrats have ravaged our public education system and these are just more examples of how. Personally, I think it is beyond repair. I think education should be decentralized and returned back to the local communities as our Founders intended.
It is foolish for DC to think they know how to educate children in all of America's unique communities. It's foolish to think it can happen at the state level.
Let the local communities handle it. Do away with the Dept of Education and with federal education regulations. Let parent-teacher counsels manage the schools, NOT overpaid superintendents and govt bureaucrats.
It does show those making more than $250,000 and those earning more than $2 million paying a lower effective tax rate in 2008 than in 1960.
I am surprised that nobody mentions the increased expense using ryans plan:
Obama claimed that 10 years from now, 65-year-olds would “have to pay nearly $6,400 more” for Medicare coverage. That’s an accurate reflection of what CBO estimated.
Been taking notes from MSNBC? Sure, federal tax rates are lower now but does that include cap gains, state and local taxes? Have you seen what the Chamber of Commerce estimates US businesses spend to comply with federal regulations? What percentage of Fed revenues do the wealthy pay compared to then?
It's all about tax the rich, tax the rich, eat the rich. As if that will fix anything. It kills me how Obama feeds you guys this tax the rich line and you eat it up. It's a false choice.
He tells you the choice is to cut benefits for the elderly or tax the rich to keep those benefits. That's nowhere near reality.
The true choice is cut benefits for the elderly or LOSE THE BENEFITS COMPLETELY when America goes bankrupt. But we don't want to make that choice because it's too scary.
S&P gave us a negative budget projection yesterday, which means a downgrade of our credit rating is just around the corner. When we lose credit, debt becomes more expensive. Servicing the debt becomes more expensive. Soon, it consumes all federal revenue, and we don't have money to pay for Grandpa's colonoscopy. Medicare GOES BANKRUPT. That's the choice you face. You want to cut benefits now to save the program or say "damn the torpedos" and keep going until it all collapses?
Tax the rich? It won't come close to fixing this.
WAKE UP!!!
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