Posted on 12/17/2002 12:02:32 AM PST by JohnHuang2
There's a dark little corner of the Internet where a gruesome assortment of leftists and socialists gather to post what passes for their "thoughts" on political issues. The site is called DemocraticUnderground.com, and it's certainly worth a quick stop the next time you go cruising. Several of my listeners keep a constant watch on this site and alert me to particularly interesting discussion threads.
I catch a lot of flak for my constant references to the Democratic Party as the Democratic Socialist Party. Maybe I can quell some of the dissension by telling you some of the postings I have read on Democratic Underground recently.
Last Thursday, a comment appeared with the title, "It's official, I'm a socialist at heart." This writer had visited a neighborhood of "multi-million dollars homes" that for the most part have only "two people (rich, old white couples) living in them." She wrote, "I really cannot stand rich, selfish people. I do believe in redistribution of wealth. Rich people do not get that way by themselves, they do it on the backs of others." Other Democratic Underground members chimed in with their responses. Among them:
That, my friends, is scary stuff, but it's nothing I haven't heard in 33 years of hosting talk-radio shows. There is burning envy – an envy that borders on outright hatred of the rich in this country. This envy is intense enough to consume the hearts and minds of many who call themselves "Democrats."
Where does this hatred come from? Why is it so important to so many people to believe that the evil rich got their money through anything but hard work?
To understand this, you need to imagine yourself struggling to make ends meet. You're renting an apartment and driving every day to a dead-end job that 's going nowhere. You work your 40-hour week, and have nothing to show for it but rent receipts and credit card bills. You hear about all of these people getting sick on cruise ships, and grouse that you don't have enough money to even get on the ship, let alone throw up on the poop deck.
So, just why aren't you rich? Why don't you have a fancy car? Why aren't you tossing your lunch on Caribbean cruises? Why do you make rent payments instead of mortgage payments?
The last thing you want to do is to admit that this all may be your fault. Your poverty couldn't possibly have anything to do with your decision to forego college for that great job at the mall. You're also convinced that your decision to hang out with your friends at night instead of getting some more education at the local community college was the right one. Hey! You work hard and deserve your fun, right?
And just why should you have to work more than 40 hours a week? That's what you're supposed to work, right? Forty hours, no more. After all, you're not a slave, are you? What about your huge car payments? Sure, you could be putting that money into an investment account, but you need that fancy car, right? And the rims? Hey! A guy's gotta be cool, you know what I'm saying?
So ? those rich people? Did they get that way doing the things you won't do? Working the 60-hour week, continuing with their education, buying cheap cars with ordinary wheels and investing the rest? Do they have the nice homes and the fancy cars because they make good choices and aren't afraid of taking a risk now and then?
No way! If a person could really get rich that way you would have done it already, right? No, that's now how they got their money. These people are rich because they exploited people. They got their money by climbing on the backs of working people like you! They were lucky! They inherited it! They didn't earn it. If it could be earned, you would have done it, right?
You have to protect yourself here, don't you? If you accept that the vast majority of those you call "rich" got there through hard work, then don't you have to ask yourself why you're not one of them? It's just so much easier to cast them as callous, selfish monsters and evil exploiters of the working class while preserving the mantle of goodness and righteousness for yourself. Hey, you may be poor, but at least you're a nice person, right?
EXACTLY. Many rich would like to purify society and make it equal.
Your contribution to the American economy is appreciated, your debt to society is paid in full, and your personal rewards are earned.
Please help to do everything within your means to teach young people the lessons you have learned, and spend time every day helping to fight the immoral Socialism creeping its way into the fabric of America.
You are a living testament to the power of the individual.
But working your butt off is a hard habit to lose-- I learned to paint a few years ago, and this year started selling my oil paintings on Ebay, so I'm probably back up to 60 hours per week, but at least the hours are of my choosing and I'm always home and available to my kids. :)
This is the fault of capitalism and is cured by socialism [which you are determined to defend]?? The weight of the chip on your shoulder must be overbearing.
I would be happy to share my collection of Thomas Sowell books with you. I won't "give" them to you 'cuz I worked hard to pay for them but you can borrow them since I'm compassionate.
As a kid, I cleaned out their stables for pocket change and played with their golden retrievers and admired their sailboats. Horses, dogs, boats. Horses, dogs, boats. To a one, these were the passions of Old Money. They drove shaky old cars around their beautiful Middleburg estates, and seemed curiously without energy except for I horses/dogs/boats. Being strictly bourgeous, couldn't quite understand why such rich folks had such dark musty houses with such ratty faded oriental carpets. Had to be an adult for a while to appreciate such a cultural statement...(g)
Maybe you should write a sequel to David Brook's "Bobos in Paradise"!
I wish these pro-capitalist peasants would just get out of the way. We in the political vanguard can impose a system on them that would make them happy. We know best. Our track record may not be much, but we deserve another chance ...
My sense is that Boorz has a problem with those who waste time complaining about the success of others instead of at least trying to make things better for themselves. There is no guarantee that hard work will result in accumulation of material wealth, but it at least gives you a chance to better yourself. Being envious of others certainly is a receipe for personal and societal failure.
My father worked himself to death at a relatively early age trying to build a better life for his family. He always told me not to waste time complaining, but to be good enough to get into the group I wanted to be in. That meant hard work for me and my siblings getting an education and then working our way up the career ladder. Are we "rich" today? The DUers and Hillary (a very rich person in the material sense) and Gephardt probably would say so, but I don't think so. I drive an '88 Nissan with regular wheels and have a 3-bedroom tract home in the burbs. So not rich in a material sense, but we do alright. But I consider myself rich in a spiritual sense, because my folks taught me the value of honesty and effort and the desire to better oneself and build a future for my children. That is more valuable to me than worrying about how well others may be doing.
You don't get rich by doing what most people can do. Remember what Mark Twain said; "The reason most people don't have any money is they are too busy working for a living." - Tom
How many people do you know who have gone to graduate school and received an advanced degree or two, worked 60-80 hours a week and are poor? They may not be "rich", depending on your defintion. But unless they choose a career and lifeswork that regardless of education and work will provide minimal income, they will not be poor.
Peoples decisions in life dictate their future.
Some people will buy a $2,000 car and then put $5,000 rims on it. Having those rims is more important to them than investing that money in an education, advancement of their skills and improving their marketability in the job market, or putting the money in one or more investments for future use.
My uncle, who earns a good living is a prime example. While he is not rich, he makes very good money. He has little assets, drives beater cars, and doesnt have a large retirement nest egg to look forward to. Why? He spends about $300 a week in the bar down the street and gambles many hundreds of dollars on football every weekend. Instead of investing in his retirement security he goes for the instant gratification of beer and gambling.
Who has noticed the new plasma display televisions selling for $5,000 to $15,000. Quite an outstanding picture wouldn't you say? Will you own one now at the current prices? How many of you reading this know what the mechanism is that will one day allow you to afford this new technology in your home?
I was having lunch with a friend last week and the conversation turned to the government's recent round of tax cuts.
"I'm opposed to those tax cuts," the retired college professor declared, "because they benefit the rich. The rich get much more money back than ordinary taxpayers like you and me, and that's not fair."
"But the rich pay more in the first place," I argued, "so it stands to reason that they'd get more money back."
I could tell that my friend was unimpressed by this meager argument. Even college professors are prisoners of the myth that the "rich" somehow get a free ride. Nothing could be further from the truth. Let's put tax cuts in terms everyone can understand.
Suppose that every day 10 men go to dinner. The bill for the group comes to $100. If it were paid the way we pay our taxes, the first four men would pay nothing; the fifth would pay $1; the sixth would pay $3; the seventh $7; the eighth $12; the ninth $18. The tenth man (the richest) would pay $59.
The 10 men ate dinner in the restaurant everyday and seemed quite happy with the arrangement until the owner threw them a curve.
"Since you are all such good customers”, he said”, I’m going to reduce the cost of your group's daily meal by $20." Now dinner for the 10 only costs $80.
The first four are unaffected. They still eat for free.
Can you figure out how to divvy up the $20 savings between the remaining six so that everyone gets his fair share?
The men realize that $20 divided by 6 is $3.33, but if they subtract that from everybody's share, then the fifth man and the sixth man would end up being paid to eat their meal.
The restaurant owner suggested that it would be fair to reduce each man's bill by roughly the same amount and he proceeded to work out the amounts each should pay.
And so the fifth man paid nothing, the sixth pitched in $2, the seventh paid $5, the eighth paid $9, the ninth paid $12, leaving the tenth man with a bill of $52 instead of $59.
Outside the restaurant, the men began to compare their savings. "I only got a dollar out the $20," declared the sixth man pointing to the tenth, " and he got $7!"
"Yeah, that's right”, exclaimed the fifth man. I only saved a dollar, too. It's unfair that he got seven times more than me!"
"That's true," shouted the seventh man. "Why should he get $7 back when I got only $2? The wealthy get all the breaks."
"Wait a minute," yelled the first four men in unison. "We didn't get anything at all. The system exploits the poor."
The nine men surrounded the tenth and beat him up. The next night he didn't show up for dinner, so the nine sat down and ate without him. But when it came time to pay the bill, they discovered something important -- they were $52 short!
And that, boys and girls and college instructors, is how the tax system works. The people who pay the highest taxes get the most benefit from a tax reduction. Tax them too much, attack them for being wealthy, and they just may not show up at the table anymore.
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