Posted on 08/20/2005 11:40:22 AM PDT by Turbopilot
The self-proclaimed High Priest of the Church of the Painful Truth is power-walking through Concourse B at an impressive pace for a man limping on a recuperating knee. He's on a scouting mission: Are shops at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport stocking his latest book?
Is he curious? In need of an ego boost?
"Revenge," he says in a voice Atlantans might recognize as either a jolting cold shower of meanness or an invigorating brew of straight talk on the radio.
Neal Boortz is a New York Times best-selling author. So, as Boortz loves to say on air, "Bite me."
His literary accomplishment, "The FairTax Book," debuted at Numero Uno for nonfiction titles, and it's there for a second week in a row. That puts him ahead of a Pulitzer Prize-winning author and "Confessions of a Video Vixen."
Consider it a satisfying endorsement for Boortz, especially since he did it with a book that doesn't bash liberals — a favorite topic — but instead suggests throwing out the federal income tax and replacing it with a national retail sales tax. He also sees it as sweet revenge because he says his earlier book, "The Terrible Truth About Liberals," wasn't even stocked by many stores.
Boortz, 60 and a fixture on Atlanta radio for more than half his life, is doing all he can to pump up sales of the new book. For weeks he has promoted the book on his nationally syndicated radio show, which airs locally on his home station, WSB-AM. Since the book came out, he's been rushing around the Southeast urging listeners and crowds at book signings to get on board.
His 4 million weekly listeners — 480,000 of them in metro Atlanta — make for a national audience significantly smaller than that of Sean Hannity or Rush Limbaugh. Now Boortz has the kind of book credentials those bigger-name talkers enjoy. He's expecting to get some mileage out of it, winning converts for the tax plan and perhaps persuading more radio stations to carry his show, though he says that's not why he wrote the book.
By the way, a Georgia congressman co-authored "The FairTax Book," but that's in finer print on the cover. In fairness, Boortz often gives credit to the congressman, John Linder (R-Ga.), a longtime friend who for years has unsuccessfully pushed legislation that would switch the federal tax structure to a national sales tax. Boortz says he has backed federal consumption tax ideas for more than 20 years.
As the authors tell it, the idea for the book bubbled up when Linder's wife suggested the two men stop yapping about the tax and start writing.
Boortz put on hold another book he had been working on — "Somebody's Gotta Say It" — which he hints might include an entire chapter about The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, a publication he enjoys skewering. Cox Enterprises, the owner of the Journal-Constitution, also has a controlling stake in Cox Radio, which owns WSB.
Trading places
On "The FairTax Book," Boortz and Linder each wrote sections and then swapped their work for the other to fix.
"Neal's streams of consciousness were not entirely accurate," Linder says. "[And] I would write stuff that was pretty damn boring."
Boortz says he tried to persuade the publisher, ReganBooks, to make his and Linder's names the same size on the cover. But the talk show man in him understands. "More people know me than him," Boortz says. "My name will sell more books than his."
ReganBooks declined to comment on how many copies have sold. The book, which came out Aug. 2, is on its fourth edition, with 300,000 copies in print.
Boortz and Linder decline to rate the tax plan's chances of becoming law.
Bill Ahern, a spokesman for the Tax Foundation, a nonprofit research group whose statistics are quoted by Boortz and Linder, said he hadn't read the book.
"Any fundamental reform is a long shot, but there is no denying that the momentum behind the fair tax concept is building," Ahern said. While consumption taxes, such as the sales levy, have advantages, Ahern said, it can be hugely difficult to enforce a tax on every retail transaction.
While the book has gained some media attention, including time on Fox News and CNN, Boortz acknowledged that national coverage of it had been limited.
Online, it's garnered both praise and criticism. Supporters consider it easy to read and straightforward. Detractors say Boortz and Linder put an overly rosy spin on what the effective tax rate will be and whether it will be sufficient to replace existing federal payroll and income taxes.
Boortz says he had to brush up on some simple tax concepts before writing the book. He assures that he's no dummy. He fell six hours short of getting an undergraduate degree, he says, but he has a law degree. Still, he doesn't do his own taxes. His wife, Donna, handles their banking, and he relies on her to load his wallet with cash, a fact he notes while using a crisp $50 bill to buy a newspaper at Hartsfield-Jackson. "Balancing a checkbook would be a major effort," he admits.
Big crowds
The book tour has been a blur. Fans show up by the hundreds at bookstores, according to Boortz staff estimates. Jacksonville, 800. Fairhope, Ala., 350. Fayetteville, N.C., 600. Boortz zips in and out of airports, his way paid by the publisher and radio stations that air his program.
After finishing a recent radio show at the WSB studio, he doesn't have time to stop by his Buckhead condo — he also has a home in Naples, Fla. — before a limo driver ferries him to Hartsfield-Jackson for another flight, this one to Charleston. As he bustles through the airport, fans call out to him. The praise comes from whites and blacks, though some listeners occasionally accuse Boortz of being a racist.
Boortz's colleagues say his on-air persona isn't far from what he's like off air. Except that he's very shy, says Royal Marshall, one of the show's associate producers. "He's the type of guy who will throw a party and one hour before will wonder, is anybody going to show up? "
Away from the studio, Boortz avoids engaging fans on the kind of issues that incite his radio rants.
"I don't like doing the show off the air," he says. It's a stance he says some people misinterpret as arrogance.
On the trip to Charleston, though, it's as if his face is still buried in a mike. He fires opinions and criticism like a machine gun. Everything gets hit. A young woman's fashions. A traveler's Louis Vuitton bag. The smokers in their own puffing aquariums at Hartsfield-Jackson airport. "Watch this," Boortz says, walking up to stare in at them. "God, what losers," he mutters.
Soon he's on the plane, sitting in his roomy first-class seat. It's not long before he complains — repeatedly — about insufficient air conditioning. "I'm a creature of comfort," he says, using a temperature feature on his fancy wristwatch to prove his point about the heat.
He also stews about the Delta crew's failure to announce why the plane has not pulled back from the gate though it was supposed to depart 40 minutes earlier. "I can guarantee, if we were on AirTran there would have been an announcement," Boortz says. AirTran also happens to be a sponsor of his show. Coincidence?
Hours later, the driver of a stretch limo deposits Boortz at the back door of a Barnes & Noble in Charleston. Store managers and a police officer hustle him into the store and in front of a crowd that eventually grows to about 400 people.
"How'd you like to get the federal government out of your paycheck?" Boortz booms to those in the crowd, some of whom got news of the book-signing via e-mail from a local group supporting the tax. The fans shout approval.
"Make us mad, Neal," a man yells.
"We're smarter than the government thinks we are," one woman calls out.
Using a strategy suggested by fellow talker Sean Hannity, Boortz tries to keep the book-signing line moving by writing only his name, rather than personalized messages.
"We listen to him on the radio every day," says Ridgi Neumayer, beaming at Boortz's signature on a radio he and his wife, Georgia, brought to the event. "Him and O'Reilly, I love them both. He sets the mood for a great day. So entertaining, and right on the mark."
Michael Morgan, a professor of economics at the College of Charleston, also is there for the event.
He often listens to Boortz's show and favors some kind of change in the nation's tax system, but he says, "I wouldn't base any conclusion just on what's in this book."
Still, Morgan says he's not uneasy about potentially far-reaching tax reform being championed by a radio talk show host.
"Why not?"
Though Boortz happily tells radio listeners he will lie to them and urges them to independently verify what he says, off air he says he wouldn't lie about anything substantive.
At the Barnes & Noble, Charleston attorney David Popowski scans the book's jacket. He puts it down after reading Boortz's short bio inside. It mentions Boortz's last book, "The Terrible Truth About Liberals." That's too much for Popowski, a Democrat who's never heard of Boortz before.
"I find it sort of a turnoff," he says. "Right away that's such a far-right-thinking guy."
Selling ideas, too
Boortz describes himself as a Libertarian, favoring less government and more personal responsibility. Linder, Boortz's co-author, says the tax plan needs the support of Republicans and Democrats to become law. But no Democrats have signed on to the latest version of his bill.
Boortz sees hope though, especially if the book keeps ranking high on best seller lists.
"Every week it stays up there in the top two or three, politicians get more and more nervous," he says.
He says he doesn't remember what percentage of the book's take he'll get, but in dollar terms he predicts it will work out to "way less than six figures." He says all his proceeds will go to the Donna Boortz Foundation, which his wife is setting up in part to help people who have recently completed drug rehab.
Boortz has reason to believe that sales are going well. On his reconnaissance at the Atlanta airport, he told a bookstore cashier he was looking for a copy of "The FairTax Book."
Sorry, she said, it sold out and is on back order.
Boortz gave nary a smile as he walked away. "That's what you want to hear," he said. Earlier at WSB, associate producer Royal Marshall considered the book's success.
"I hope it doesn't change him," Marshall said. Then he shook his head as if at the absurdity of his comment.
"Neal Boortz has been Neal Boortz for 35 years," he said, laughing. "He'll still be hanging up on people."
Makes perfect sense to me; you really should pay attention to the way they do things in Wahsington.
Soon as the national sales tax was passed, that'd be the last you ever heard of doing away with the income tax.
And a "resolution" to repeal the 16th Amendment? Does it really say "resolution?"
LOL!
A Congressional Resolution and 5 bucks will get you a latte!
There is no such bill. That's the nonsense.
Godpseed.
This reporter is a real hoot!
They said the Berlin wall would never come down.
If you would like to be added to this ping list let me know.
John Linder in the House(HR25) & Saxby Chambliss Senate(S25) offer a comprehensive bill to kill all income and SS/Medicare payroll taxes outright and replace them with with a national retail sales tax administered by the states.
H.R.25,S.25
A bill to promote freedom, fairness, and economic opportunity by repealing the income tax and other taxes, abolishing the Internal Revenue Service, and enacting a national retail sales tax to be administered primarily by the States.Refer for additional information:
Anyone who thinks we will replace the income tax with a national sales tax is living in an alternate universe.
This is a reason to not support it? How?
Nothing ventured nothing gained.
Allowing the government to even write this legislation simply guarantees that we will have both income and national sales taxes.
Actually government didn't write it:
===>FairTax History
They never give anything back, never ever in a million years will the income tax be removed.
You batting average is rather low for making such predictions, perhaps maybe a new crystal ball is in order.
H.R.25Fair Tax Act of 2005 (Introduced in House)
TITLE I--REPEAL OF THE INCOME TAX, PAYROLL TAXES, AND ESTATE AND GIFT TAXES
TITLE II--SALES TAX ENACTED
TITLE III--OTHER MATTERS
|
No, you don't get it.
The FairTax is a SPECIFIC plan based on SPECIFIC set of provisions.
No other national sales tax is the FairTax.
Besides, your fear of having two tax systems is already in place. They tax your income and take it before you get your hands on it and then you pay tax again at the retail store everytime you purchase anything because of the tax that it imbedded into the price of what you are buying.
The FairTax removes the imbedded costs and eliminated the Income Tax and withholding. You pay tax only when you spend on new RETAIL goods and services. It is not a VAT tax that is paid at every level of production.
Please inform yourself because it is you who is appearing foolish by not understanding the basics that have explained here countless times.
"I like the idea of the fair tax, and find little with the proposal to argue with, and nothing major at that. My only concern is what provisions are there to ensure the tax rate doesn't jump when the fedgov continues to spend like a drunken sailor?"
The FairTax is a tax reeform, not a spending reform proposal. Having said that, it is going to be much harder for the federal government to raise the rate once evryone is paying the same rate and our congress members can't play off one set of voters against another.
In addition, Hamilton said it brilliantly.
"It is a signal advantage of taxes on articles of consumption, that they contain in their own nature a security against excess. They prescribe their own limit; which cannot be exceeded without defeating the end proposed, that is, an extension of the revenue. When applied to this object, the saying is as just as it is witty, that, 'in political arithmetic, two and two do not always make four.' If duties are too high, they lessen the consumption; the collection is eluded; and the product to the treasury is not so great as when they are confined within proper and moderate bounds. This forms a complete barrier against any material oppression of the citizens by taxes of this class, and is itself a natural limitation of the power of imposing them."
Alexander Hamilton in Federalist #21
Because it is tied to the market, it is self regulating. The higher the tax the fewer the taxed purchases, the lower the tax take and the slower the economy. Politicians usually can ignore the reduced revenue by increasing deficit spending but they cannot ignore the political repercussions of the effect on the economy. That provides a brake on their ambitions.
Of course. But the Fair Taxers seem to think that this will be on the Bill in history that isn't completely picked apart by special interests on its way to becoming law.
Supposition. Perhaps based on experience but supposition just the same. Why not give it a try? Worst case it is still better than what we have.
Politicians wouldn't chance what you describe with talk radio and the internet now as the gate keepers.
Some of you guys are so negative I don't see how you get out of the house. Let's go to the ball game! Yeah, that sounds good but it will probably rain. Any way, those bums will likely lose, you know how they are. And parking. What about parking. We'll have to walk a mile. And beer? Five bucks a pop. Who needs it!
"Of course. But the Fair Taxers seem to think that this will be on the Bill in history that isn't completely picked apart by special interests on its way to becoming law."
“I discussed the importance of abolishing the income tax because of its tendency to form a habit of servility in the souls of a people that accept it. Servility of soul is bad not only in itself, it is also an open door through which will soon walk the abuses of ambitious government power. Leaders who find themselves with governmental power over a servile people will be quick to conclude that such a people exist to serve them.”
Alan Keyes “The Power of the Purse”, WorldNet Daily, August 27,1999
Soon as the national sales tax was passed, that'd be the last you ever heard of doing away with the income tax.
The income tax is repealed with the implementation of the retail sales tax under the provisions of the legislation.
At that point the income tax becomes obsolete and repeal of the 16th amendment becomes a proforma act to get votes instead of the uphill battle it has been for the last 92 years since its ratification.
Wonder what's considered "fair"? 25%? 35%? 55%? Once they open this door, every year congress will hike it a 1/4 to 1/2 percent! Until pork is controlled, this is a waste of time!
You might read the bill and spend a bit of th=ime on the FairTax websiet before making such uninformed statements.
Just for starters one of the first things the bill does is repeal both the income tax AND payroll taxes.
Those provisions are called "voters" - and they'll be much more effective at correcting that sort of nonsense with the FairTax.
Actually any money spent under the present system - Money A or B - will be, in effect, taxed in the form of embedded tax costs that raise prices by an amount equal to something like 20-25% in addition to any income tax that may already have been paid.
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