While Congress and the President wrestled to a deal to keep current tax rates on those earning under $400K, the self-congratulating and patting themselves on the back is unwarranted as, in reality, we’ve gone over the real cliff quite some time ago!
Beginning with Woodrow Wilson in 1913, Progressives have implemented policies, plans and programs which have redefined and reshaped our nation; and not for the better. This year will mark the 100th anniversary of the Federal Reserve – when our government abdicated their constitutional authority and mandate to mint currency to a private corporation which creates money out of nothing, then lends it to our government at interest! The ultimate Ponzi scheme!
We will also mark the 100th anniversary of the progressive income tax, also instituted under Wilson in 1913. (Isn’t it shocking? Prior to 1913 Americans were entitled to the fruits of their own labor, and yet we still built roads and bridges?)
The term “debt ceiling” has no meaning, as every time we approach it, the roof is raised! The $6 trillion debt (which took 44 presidents to amass) that was deemed so intolerable under George Bush in 2006 that we had to strip power from the GOP majority in Congress and turn the reins over to Pelosi and Reid, now pales in comparison with the $10 trillion in additional debt added to it in the 6 years since!
Spending has skyrocketed since that revolution in 2006. While we were spending around $2 trillion annually in 2006, we’ve been running well over $3 trillion a year since 2008 and virtually all of that trillion dollar increase is borrowed money.
With our population somewhere between 300 and 315 million, every billion dollars spent by government represents slightly more than $3 for every man, woman and child who draws a breath in our nation. Perhaps that seems small to you, until you realize how many billions congress deals with. The $87 billion that John Kerry choked on, which ran 2 wars represented approximately $261 for every person or $1044 for a family of 4. (And the $90 billion the President has given to failing green companies represents $1080 for that family!) Obama’s $787 billion stimulus (which actually cost more than twice that, but let’s not quibble!) cost each person $2361. Every trillion costs you $3000. Democrats have increased the debt $10 Trillion since 2006. That’s $30,000 for each person in America.
If you have never heard of the Cloward-Piven strategy, please do yourself a favor and study up on it! In a nutshell, two 1960’s radical college professors devised a strategy whereby a socialist “utopia” could be foisted upon the American People. The central thrust of the strategy was to load up the welfare/entitlement system with so much dependency and so much spending that it would overwhelm and collapse the system and end capitalism – allowing a new system to be instituted from the ashes!
David Horowitz and Discover the Networks describe the strategy thusly:
"The strategy of forcing political change through orchestrated crisis. The “Cloward-Piven Strategy” seeks to hasten the fall of capitalism by overloading the government bureaucracy with a flood of impossible demands, thus pushing society into crisis and economic collapse."
For more on Cloward-Piven, see: http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/11/clowardpiven_government.html
Rahm Emmanuel’s famous quote, “Never let a crisis go to waste”, is lifted straight from the Cloward-Piven playbook. And the massive and seemingly reckless spending of the Obama years has driven us to the brink of the desired collapse.
There is no easy way back. We’re over the cliff. The question is whether there is a parachute to avert a very hard and sudden stop at the bottom!
Extremely hard choices must be made, and significant pain must be endured.
Our problems are not revenue problems, the rhetoric of the Obama Administration notwithstanding. Our problems are spending problems. And soaking the rich is not an option to resolve these problems – it is only a political strategy to gain favor with the underclasses by “sticking it to” the weathy. But doing so has no positive impact on our deficit, let alone the debt. Raising the tax rate by 4.5% on those earning $400K will generate less revenue than Obama gave the green-energy failures! In fact, if we confiscated every dollar earned by everyone earning only $200K we still would be running a deficit larger than Bush’s deficit in 2006! www.examiner.com/article/the-uncomfortable-truth-we-can-t-soak-the-rich-...
Understand that tax rates and tax revenues are not only not synonymous, but frequently they are inversely proportional! Revenues have increased every time tax rates have been lowered! Evidenced by Harding, Coolidge, Kennedy, Reagan and Bush, tax cuts have raised revenues. www.examiner.com/article/should-we-be-talking-tax-rates-when-talking-abo...
Raising rates contracts the economy, so hoped for revenues aren’t achieved… but reducing rates expands the economy resulting in enhanced revenues every time it’s tried. So if the Administration is really serious about enhancing revenues as a facet of a deficit reduction plan… they should be talking rate reductions, not increases!
Austere spending is necessary, and painful. Witness attempts at austerity in Europe. Those with their hand in the government cookie jar don’t like being cut off. There will necessarily be unrest. We have backed ourselves into a corner. We must endure the pain of paring back the spending, or endure the greater pain of a complete economic collapse.
Some easy choices that would begin to reduce our spending might include:
Pass a budget! We can’t have accountability if no budget is passed to keep to! It’s been well over 3 years since the Senate has passed a budget (yes, budgets have passed the House). If I might suggest, how about passing the 2006 budget as the 2013 budget – defunding anything that we weren’t spending on in 2006 when our spending was 2/3 what it is today and starting to cut from there! Can anyone make the case that we weren’t spending enough back then? A time when despite our deficit dropping back down to $120 BILLION (with a B and thanks to the Bush tax cuts) from a high in 2003 of $450 billion; our “ballooning” deficit of 6 trillion was egregious enough to rip power from the GOP and hand it to the Democrats.
Foreign Aid: We currently provide funds to all but 7 of the nations on earth. Why? Other than global redistribution of wealth, what vital interest of the USA is served? Certainly we can assist our friends and allies and strengthen those ties where necessary. But universal aid?
“Grants” to study everything from shrimp on treadmills to the mating habits of obscure species? How about allowing private enterprise to fund such exercises? If it’s worth doing, someone will pony up. If no one does, is it worth doing?
Obamacare: Does anyone still believe Obamacare will make healthcare more affordable? The evidence is to the contrary, and true to most government programs, it costs far more than it delivers. Can we just admit it was ill-conceived and repeal it?
Entitlement reform: At a minimum, how about we start with means testing Social Security and Medicare, and eliminate entitlements for non-citizens? If someone comes into our country, legally or not, they should provide for their own welfare. Once, our immigrant population came to our shores seeking the opportunity to succeed. Today many come for the opportunity to receive government largesse at the expense of the working citizens.
Much more will need to be done. It will hurt. But we no longer have any choice. The ground is coming up fast. If we don’t pull the ripcord and slow our descent, we will hit bottom, hard.
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