Remember way back in 2008 when then-candidate Barack Obama told Joe Wurzelbacher (aka "Joe the Plumber") about his desire to "spread the wealth"?
“It’s not that I want to punish your success,” he told Wurzelbacher. “I just want to make sure that everybody who is behind you, that they’ve got a chance for success too. My attitude is that if the economy’s good for folks from the bottom up, it’s gonna be good for everybody … I think when you spread the wealth around, it’s good for everybody.”
Since then, the idea of redistribution of wealth has become a subject of debate in America, with liberals generally supportive of the idea.
While appearing on MSNBC's The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell, former Democratic National Committee Chairman and failed Democratic Presidential candidate Howard Dean explained that one of the reasons government existed was to ensure redistribution of wealth.
"The argument is not whether they should redistribute or not, the question is how much we should redistribute," he told O'Donnell.
According to Dean, government can do nothing unless it redistributes wealth.
But even a cursory read of the Constitution finds no mention of wealth redistribution.
One does find a reference to it in the writings of Karl Marx. In his 1875 Critique of the Gotha Programme, he wrote:
In a higher phase of communist society, after the enslaving subordination of the individual to the division of labor, and therewith also the antithesis between mental and physical labor, has vanished; after labor has become not only a means of life but life's prime want; after the productive forces have also increased with the all-around development of the individual, and all the springs of co-operative wealth flow more abundantly -- only then then can the narrow horizon of bourgeois right be crossed in its entirety and society inscribe on its banners: From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs!
Redistribution of wealth is a central tenet of Marxism. A few years ago, one might think it odd to hear an American politician eagerly embrace a position that historically has led to tyranny.
In 2004, Hillary Clinton paraphrased Marx when she addressed attendees at a fundraiser for Barbara Boxer. According to an article at signonsandiego.com, she said:
"Many of you are well enough off that ... the tax cuts may have helped you. We're saying that for America to get back on track, we're probably going to cut that short and not give it to you. We're going to take things away from you on behalf of the common good."
But since the 2008 election, more and more Democrats have come to openly embrace the idea, if not necessarily mentioning it by name.
The problem is that the system has never worked any time it has been adopted, but liberals seem willing to ignore the history of countries like the former Soviet Union.
With his statement, Howard Dean appears to openly embrace the fundamental idea governing every communist dictatorship in history.
As Ronald Reagan - a staunch anti-Communist - once noted:
"Communists read Marx and Lenin. Anti-Communists understand Marx and Lenin".
Video of the statement can be seen at Real Clear Politics.
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Comments
Didja know that we had an 80% average top marginal tax rate for the entire 50 years prior to Ronald Reagan? And that it created the wealthiest nation, most millionaires and billionaires, and the broadest middle class that the world has ever known?
It was 91-94% for 16 of those years. See, when the tax rate is that high, the rich will do ANYTHING to avoid paying that tax. Like what? Things they can write off: like opening a new factory, buying new equipment, new inventory, HIRING PEOPLE. That creates jobs up and down the supply chain, building a strong consumer base, who buy more products, which means more employees are needed, which means more hiring, which strengthens the consumer base, which (see "Positive Feedback Loop" :)
Anonymous #2 - opening a factory does not create tax breaks, good heavens, man, where do you find the logic in that????? "Opening" as you so eloquently put it, is NOT as easy as opening a mom and pop corner store, it takes MILLIONS of dollars and there are so many taxes involved and worry over union people demanding high pay regardless of work put out that its a wonder more haven't run for the hills!! Talk about hiding your head where things don't smell so good!!!!!
This is just insane, tyranny is birthed from such ideas. How long before our "beloved" leaders try to enforce this way of life upon us. If they do I believe that Americans just might rise up and take to the streets. It's our patriotic right and duty to dissent, in a peaceful manner.
They're already doing it, Joseph. Obamacare was just one part of it.
Lori: I was simply pointing out what we already know is the result of the 80-94% top marginal tax rate that we had for the fifty years prior to Reagan as a matter of history and economics.
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