Posted on 04/15/2010 6:27:29 AM PDT by SonOfDarkSkies
Jean-Baptiste Colbert, the 17th-century French minister of finance, once remarked that "the art of taxation consists in so plucking the goose as to obtain the largest amount of feathers with the smallest possible amount of hissing."
Many Americans are already hissing loudly, but the plucking in earnest is only beginning. Starting in January 2011, "the rich"—defined by President Obama as individuals earning more than $200,000 and families earning more than $250,000 per year—will see their marginal tax rate rise to 39.6% from 35%. Their effective tax rate will increase even more as certain credits and deductions are phased out.
Meanwhile, projections from the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center showed that 38% of Americans were expected to have had zero or negative federal individual income tax liability in 2009, before the stimulus was enacted. After President Obama's budget, stimulus, and other tax changes, this proportion will increase to nearly 46% in 2011, all while the federal government grows in size.
The president's rationale? He wants to create what he calls "a sense of balance and fairness in our tax code," as he said on the campaign trail, and ensure that well-off Americans "pay their fair share." He famously defended his planned tax hikes to "Joe the Plumber" by saying, "I think when you spread the wealth around it's good for everybody."
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
Obama is certainly a communist...but he is at the same time delusional and naive.
This is the reason 2010 will be a good year for tax receipts. Just getting ready for 2011.
(Also, we’ve had alot of folks come in who haven’t filed a return in the past 3-4 years. Maybe it was the hiring of 16,500 IRS agents. Hmmmm..)
Bald Geese?
People who work for a living deserve the benefits of that which they have worked so hard to get.
Those that do not work deserve nothing but derision. Those who are too lazy to get off the couch and do something productive with their life deserve nothing. Those that think they are owed something by everybody else, deserve nothing. Shiftless people deserve nothing. Bums on the street who look for handouts to buy booze or drugs deserve nothing.
So using the force of government (i.e. the ones with the guns) to to someones hard earned money and giving it to someone who did nothing to earn it is "good"? Exactly how is slavery a good thing?
If you transferred all the money from the rich to the poor, the rich would get it all back within a year or too.
That’s why the Communists knew that the only way to avoid that was to shoot the rich.
I am also 63 and the one good thing about living that long is that it allows “some” people to develop insight.
“I’m 63 and I’m Tired”
By Robert A. Hall
I’m 63. Except for one semester in college when jobs were scarce and a six-month period when I was between jobs, but job-hunting every day, I’ve worked, hard, since I was 18. Despite some health challenges, I still put in 50-hour weeks, and haven’t called in sick in seven or eight years. I make a good salary, but I didn’t inherit my job or my income, and I worked to get where I am. Given the economy, there’s no retirement in sight, and I’m tired. Very tired.
I’m tired of being told that I have to “spread the wealth” to people who don’t have my work ethic. I’m tired of being told the government will take the money I earned, by force if necessary, and give it to people too lazy to earn it.
I’m tired of being told that I have to pay more taxes to “keep people in their homes.” Sure, if they lost their jobs or got sick, I’m willing to help. But if they bought McMansions at three times the price of our paid-off, $250,000 condo, on one-third of my salary, then let the left-wing Congress-critters who passed Fannie and Freddie and the Community Reinvestment Act that created the bubble help them with their own money.
I’m tired of being told how bad America is by left-wing millionaires like Michael Moore, George Soros and Hollywood Entertainers who live in luxury because of the opportunities America offers. In thirty years, if they get their way, the United States will have the economy of Zimbabwe , the freedom of the press of China , the crime and violence of Mexico , the tolerance for Christian people of Iran , and the freedom of speech of Venezuela .
I’m tired of being told that Islam is a “Religion of Peace,” when every day I can read dozens of stories of Muslim men killing their sisters, wives and daughters for their family “honor”; of Muslims rioting over some slight offense; of Muslims murdering Christian and Jews because they aren’t “believers”; of Muslims burning schools for girls; of Muslims stoning teenage rape victims to death for “adultery”; of Muslims mutilating the genitals of little girls; all in the name of Allah, because the Qur’an and Shari’a law tells them to.
I’m tired of being told that “race doesn’t matter” in the post-racial world of Obama, when it’s all that matters in affirmative action jobs, lower college admission and graduation standards for minorities (harming them the most), government contract set-asides, tolerance for the ghetto culture of violence and fatherless children that hurts minorities more than anyone, and in the appointment of U.S. Senators from Illinois.
I think it’s very cool that we have a black president and that a black child is doing her homework at the desk where Lincoln wrote the Emancipation Proclamation. I just wish the black president was Condi Rice, or someone who believes more in freedom and the individual and less arrogantly of an all-knowing government.
I’m tired of a news media that thinks Bush’s fundraising and inaugural expenses were obscene, but that think Obama’s, at triple the cost, were wonderful; that thinks Bush exercising daily was a waste of presidential time, but Obama exercising is a great example for the public to control weight and stress; that picked over every line of Bush’s military records, but never demanded that Kerry release his; that slammed Palin, with two years as governor, for being too inexperienced for VP, but touted Obama with three years as senator as potentially the best president ever. Wonder why people are dropping their subscriptions or switching to Fox News? Get a clue. I didn’t vote for Bush in 2000, but the media and Kerry drove me to his camp in 2004.
I’m tired of being told that out of “tolerance for other cultures” we must let Saudi Arabia use our oil money to fund mosques and madrassa Islamic schools to preach hate in America , while no American group is allowed to fund a church, synagogue or religious school in Saudi Arabia to teach love and tolerance.
I’m tired of being told I must lower my living standard to fight global warming, which no one is allowed to debate. My wife and I live in a two-bedroom apartment and carpool together five miles to our jobs. We also own a three-bedroom condo where our daughter and granddaughter live. Our carbon footprint is about 5% of Al Gore’s, and if you’re greener than Gore, you’re green enough.
I’m tired of being told that drug addicts have a disease, and I must help support and treat them, and pay for the damage they do. Did a giant germ rush out of a dark alley, grab them, and stuff white powder up their noses while they tried to fight it off? I don’t think Gay people choose to be Gay, but I damn sure think druggies chose to take drugs. And I’m tired of harassment from cool people treating me like a freak when I tell them I never tried marijuana.
I’m tired of illegal aliens being called “undocumented workers,” especially the ones who aren’t working, but are living on welfare or crime. What’s next? Calling drug dealers, “Undocumented Pharmacists”? And, no, I’m not against Hispanics. Most of them are Catholic, and it’s been a few hundred years since Catholics wanted to kill me for my religion. I’m willing to fast track for citizenship any Hispanic person, who can speak English, doesn’t have a criminal record and who is self-supporting without family on welfare, or who serves honorably for three years in our military.... Those are the citizens we need.
I’m tired of latte liberals and journalists, who would never wear the uniform of the Republic themselves, or let their entitlement-handicapped kids near a recruiting station, trashing our military. They and their kids can sit at home, never having to make split-second decisions under life and death circumstances, and bad mouth better people than themselves. Do bad things happen in war? You bet. Do our troops sometimes misbehave? Sure. Does this compare with the atrocities that were the policy of our enemies for the last fifty years and still are? Not even close. So here’s the deal. I’ll let myself be subjected to all the humiliation and abuse that was heaped on terrorists at Abu Ghraib or Gitmo, and the critics can let themselves be subject to captivity by the Muslims, who tortured and beheaded Daniel Pearl in Pakistan, or the Muslims who tortured and murdered Marine Lt. Col. William Higgins in Lebanon, or the Muslims who ran the blood-spattered Al Qaeda torture rooms our troops found in Iraq, or the Muslims who cut off the heads of schoolgirls in Indonesia, because the girls were Christian. Then we’ll compare notes. British and American soldiers are the only troops in history that civilians came to for help and handouts, instead of hiding from in fear.
I’m tired of people telling me that their party has a corner on virtue and the other party has a corner on corruption. Read the papers; bums are bipartisan. And I’m tired of people telling me we need bipartisanship. I live in Illinois , where the “Illinois Combine” of Democrats has worked to loot the public for years. Not to mention the tax cheats in Obama’s cabinet.
I’m tired of hearing wealthy athletes, entertainers and politicians of both parties talking about innocent mistakes, stupid mistakes or youthful mistakes, when we all know they think their only mistake was getting caught. I’m tired of people with a sense of entitlement, rich or poor.
Speaking of poor, I’m tired of hearing people with air-conditioned homes, color TVs and two cars called poor. The majority of Americans didn’t have that in 1970, but we didn’t know we were “poor.” The poverty pimps have to keep changing the definition of poor to keep the dollars flowing.
I’m real tired of people who don’t take responsibility for their lives and actions. I’m tired of hearing them blame the government, or discrimination or big-whatever for their problems.
Yes, I’m damn tired. But I’m also glad to be 63. Because, mostly, I’m not going to have to see the world these people are making. I’m just sorry for my granddaughter.
Robert A. Hall is a Marine Vietnam veteran who served five terms in the Massachusetts State Senate.
I happen to be reading the John Galt speech from Atlas Shrugged on Tax Day (coincidence?). Couple of quotes:
“Morality ends where the gun begins.”
“Your moral code declares that the productive man sacrifice himself to the thieving loafers...”
“Fair” isn’t in the Constitution, except in connection with legal process. “Fair” is the rant of a juvenile who can’t get her way. “General Welfare” is not the Government picking winners and losers. Its everyone wins. And the takings clause protects the sanctity of private property. We need a Constitutional Amendment to reverse FDR and put Obama and the socialists back in their place.
In the view of the Left if you have any form or level of wealth, whether it is one dollar or a financial empire, you need to be taxed until all of your wealth has been liberated from your cold, greedy, selfish little hands.
Tax the rich, feed the poor / Till there are no rich no more
That pretty much sums it up!
I wonder if some of these tax changes will encourage amicable divorces as a way of lowering lower tax burdens. If Medicare taxes and SS taxes go up on income, we will probably see this.
Let’s face it, he’s tired.
Yep. That’s part and parcel of the ‘Obama plan’. Do whatever you want, just don’t get married!
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