The Left's Politics of Retribution

The American Thinker ^ | December 18, 2010 | William Sullivan

[Scanian]

Liberal pundits have awakened from the euphoria of nearly two years of successful Democratic initiatives, and they are fuming. Barack Obama decided to side with Republicans on the issue of extending Bush-era tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans in exchange for the extension of unemployment benefits, in a deal consummated Thursday night.

It can be expected that this wouldn't sit well with his base. Disproportionately taxing the wealthy is a critical plank in the ideology of the left, and the reason for that is simple. When liberals think of George Bush, they think of big business destroying society. When they think of big business destroying society, they think of rich, corporate fat cats. And as much as they would love to, they are unable to send George Bush to the poor-house, so settling the score with the rich, corporate fat cats is the next best thing.

That's what it is all about: retribution. But the left can't just be forthright and say, "We want to steal rich people's money to get back at them." So they use rhetorical sleight-of-hand to conceal the fact that tax increases for the rich are about vengeance.

They generally position it as a moral issue or an issue of charity. But while they spend all their time talking about how it is only "right" for the wealthy to pay more in taxes, they completely ignore that a handful of people in Washington deciding on a whim to take more property from a specific group is wrong.

Perhaps that is why when they are out pitching upper-class tax hikes, they have usually been compelled to preface their arguments with an unsolicited disclosure that it's not to punish success.

[steveab]

“Liberal pundits have awakened from the euphoria of nearly two years of successful Democratic initiatives, and they are fuming. Barack Obama decided to side with Republicans on the issue of extending Bush-era tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans in exchange for the extension of unemployment benefits, in a deal consummated Thursday night.”

Somehow I can’t shake this feeling of an illusion being created by Liberal pundits and Obama. Watch the other hand.