If Wealth Redistribution Is So Great, Let’s Go All the Way!
To hear the president and his acolytes tell it, redistributing the wealth is such an obvious moral superiority that it needs no justification, no explanation. OK, I’ll run with that for the moment. But why should we stop only with the taking of income from some to give to others? There are so many other things of value that could and should be redistributed as well. Let’s start with the president, obviously wealthier and more privileged than I, and the redistribution we can make of his advantages to me:
Redistribute special favors: I would like to buy an equivalent house as his in Chicago (after all, housing is a “right,” right?), but I need the same special deal he got from Mr. Rezko. I did not have the advantage of a special deal on my own so I had to pay full price for my more modest home.
Redistribute income opportunities: I would like to draw the same salary as Michelle Obama got, along with the increase she received when her husband was elected to the Senate, but I want the same workload, level of responsibility, and vulnerability to termination that she had. I am pretty sure I could do the work on this basis, so aren’t I entitled to the same benefit?
Equal exposure to public scrutiny: The president can bypass the Constitution by appointing unvetted czars, withhold full disclosure on his resume, hire tax cheats, and do about-faces on national issues until he practically screws himself into the ground, and the media sees not a thing. If I were to bring a water balloon to the O’Hare Airport parking lot, my entire life would be public knowledge within a few days. We can call this equal access to ass-covering.
These would all be nice, but still far too limited in scope. If we are to adopt a true redistributionist mindset, then we need to cover all the bases. I would ask that when the president takes my income to give to others, he also require them to sign the same personal guarantees I had to sign to secure financing for my business. I would want them to mortgage their homes to support the business in difficult times. That means right now. I would ask that they both make and share responsibility for the decisions I make that affect 64 employees and their families. There ought to be a redistribution of the stresses that come with running a manufacturing business during a largely government-induced recession, including helping with the layoffs and salary reductions.
After all that, if things do not go well and the business closes, I would like the money taken from me to be redistributed again, this time from the recipients of my confiscated income back to me, as I will have far less than they at that point. I am sure they will accept the social justice in that.
Let’s not get hoarse yelling for the redistribution of red herrings. Consider “Social justice”: Don’t we already have general-purpose justice? Should we feel short-changed because there is no apple butter justice? Quick thinkers are darn lucky than one can break logic without necessarily breaking the law at the same time.
Since we all know the selfless dedication of our politicians, their devotion to serve the nation, & their unbridled altruism, we should give them the opportunity to make a contribution to the people that they represent by taxing their income, their assets, & their ”perks” at a special 90% across the board. I just know they’ll be grateful for this opportunity to demonstrate their lack of self-interest in their service to the nation & the American people.
Let’s start with Obama & work our way down.
Spread the girls around too!
Ah, there it is Dr. Bones, the $64.00 question for all parochial North American wingnutettes and wingnuts: how come the predestined lottery winners — a.k.a. “persons of privilege and wealth” — don’t stick together better _chez nous_?
What kind of a Class are they runnin’ out there towards the starboard fringes of the ever-immortal Herrnstein-Murray Curve (Pat. Pend.) that there are always so many traitors to it?
Healthy days.
The real problem is that the Obamaites are NOT interested in real redistribution of wealth. Who is being hit by new taxes? Those earning more money in SALARY.
Bill Gates does not get a huge salary. Neither do most of the really wealthy. So all the special new taxes don’t hit them.
Nancy Pelosi and Barbara Boxer are multi-millionaires. Since their husband’s wealth is never delineated for the public (the media pays no attention since the two women are Democrats), we have no way of knowing if ANY of the proposed tax increases hits them at all. I would guess not.
I have a better proposal:
First, all of those who demand OTHERS pay higher taxes be forced to use 1040A forms with standard deductions for the next year. That includes legislators, media folk and movie stars.
Second, responsibility should be taken for actions that hurt others. For example, if a serious, objective examination of “anthropomorphic global warming” demonstrates that it does not exist, then the people pushing it (particularly those in the media and in pressure groups) should be the ones to pay for it. NBC says it is “settled science”. If it turns out not to be the case, NBC (AS WELL AS THE JOURNALISTS WHO PUSH THE IDEA) should be forced to pay for the all damages wrought by a “cap and trade” deal. That would, of course, mean that NBC would disappear and the journalists would be ruined. But they would surely ponder the need for accuracy and a new generation of journalists might arise who would believe in accuracy.
Sorry Jeff no can do. For a start 1) you are not Black so no ‘affirmative action’ no qualification, no documentation no BC, no College records. etc etc job and pay for you 2) you are not a Mohammedan like the BOGUS POTUS and therefore not a ‘protected minority’ who are NEVER EVER Terrorists of course 3) You are not a left wing PC,MC green NAZI Socio/Communist with an agenda to ‘Hope and Change’ the USA out of all recognition and take all the money, golfing holidays and endless parties (one every THREE days up to now) so you cannot be a HYPOCRITE like the Obummer is too.
Sorry come back next week we got “FREE” !!!!!!! Stealth Care on offer.
If the wealth redistribution the President is engaged in was for truly needy segments of our society I could support him. However, it is obvious the redistribution benefits political cronies. Wall street and unions being the principle recipients of our tax dollars. Certain large corporations and Democratic political activists groups seem to be high on his list as well. The overt corruption is breathtaking to say the least. Who knows, we probably are only seeing the tip of the iceberg. Reality is a far cry from the way the campaign portrayed him.
At some point, thinking about this issue like so will make leftists/liberals throw up their hands and turn to tryanny because it’ll make them feel better.
Don’t speak evil of dignities.
Hell, I’d settle for a few rides on Air Force One. Dealing with the TSA is such a pain, and I hear that the service on the plane is SWEEEEET!!! It’s not like he uses it every day, so it wouldn’t be much of a sacrifice for him. I’d be willing to go when he doesn’t need it.
And while we are on redistribution why should the Hollywood liberals get paid all that money to made movies? I think they should be consistent and all donate their mansions to be used as homeless shelters.
The fact of the matter is that politicians feel they can continuously raise taxes because all of us suckers pay. If Congress had to face a serious tax revolt by millions of fed-up victims who simply refuse to pay, I think it would get their undivided attention, the message would be impossible to ignore.
President Obama wants to control every aspect of our lives in a centralized government similar to Communism; he’s taken the first steps, but the people have already shot back at Obama & the Democrats’ overreach with special elections in New Jersey & Virginia; likewise, Ted Kennedy’s Senate seat may be won by Republican Scott Brown next Tuesday. Communism & any other centrailized government on a large scale fails & fails totally. Since Obama & many of the Democrats have proven to Socialists, they don’t care. All they want is power. And that’s what it’s really about: Power & control. Statism is antithetical to America & the Democrats know it. Which is why they are trying to rush everything before November 2010.
5. Len Wechsler:
Might want to think about the difference between SALARY and INCOME.
Terry@2, Len@5 and Kevin@7: Bingo.
I had this talk just a couple days ago with our favorite Obambot DS/Peace. I suggested that we create a wealth tax for those people who make over $500 million and make it “progressive” to 15% for those with assets over $1 billion. He said he was against that kind of a tax.
We all know the uber-wealthy are mostly progressives like Soros, Lewis, SKG, Heinz, Hollyweird, et al and they pay no income tax. But idiots like DS does not want them taxed because they fund all the progressive think tanks, and Ford and McArthur foundations and of course the 527s like Moveon, CAP, and MM. Notice that all those in Congress have incomes from government just below the “rich” tax level. How convenient.
So taxation is nothing more than a way to control the American public. And to move money from what producers we have left to those who are basically undeserving. It is a vote buying ponzi scheme.
By the way how much has Soros given to Haiti? Progressives are all frauds just like their ideology.
Don’t even ask!! Obama will lie to you and then do what his pimps tell him to do. Their objective is to destroy the middle class in America. Your wealth will go, less certain fees, bribes and pay-backs to crooked dems, unions and Washington insiders, to those who truly deserve it.
all rich people should have to hand over their money to the castro brothers only kennedy money and elected officials are exempt. the money should go directly to the castro brothers, and the commies in china and n.korea. reich-wing marxists are all fakes.
If they were serious they would redistribute assets, starting with the billions in assets of all those rich liberals who want to take a chunk of my income. When they confiscate and sell off Kerry’s excess houses, cars, and stocks then they can come take some of my income.
Terry @12: The only problem with your plan is that little thing called a payroll tax. Have a look at a pay receipt some time. The reason politicians think the general population is comprised of suckers is, well, because they have good reason to think so.
Democrats? Republicans? Why does everyone act as though the Obama administration ushered in a “new concept” called corruption? The greed-heads in D.C. have been crapping on the Constitution for generations. Dems regard the document as some quaint concept that should be referenced every so often for form sake, while Reps cloak themselves in it only to obscure the fact that their left hand really does know what their right hand is doing. The pimps in the Capitol have been selling off our founding document frr too long now for us to simply regard them as unelectable. A tax revolt would be laughable. Their crimes are nothing short of treason. I say hang one or two of them from the Capitol steps and the rest will snap to, shortly. To label their crimes as simple differences in political opinons is a short-sighted farce.
What is the difference between wealth redistributing and being a thief?
The thief wants what the other has and justifies his undertaking with some excuse for behavior such as “fairness.”
Robin Hood was the arch wealth redistributor as he was trying to bankrupt John’s rule for Richard’s and keeping his cause afloat.
The Democratic-Socialists have an altrustic excuse, mostly with the “fairness docterine”, enforce forced charity, and legally tap the national treasury. The treasury was filled with printed money and the taxes of those who earn money.
What is the difference between wealth redistribution and being a thief? I would guess that it is a matter of scale.
To hear the president and his acolytes tell it, redistributing the wealth is such an obvious moral superiority that it needs no justification, no explanation. OK, I’ll run with that for the moment. But why should we stop only with the taking of income from some to give to others?
I would just note that the “redistribution of wealth” that The Precedent and his useful idiots talk about is NOT a “redistribution of income”. They want to actually work on stealing people’s WEALTH. This is where clawbacks, retro-active obligations, and the list of other insane ideas of theirs come from. These America-hating leftists are not content to just work on income – they want the big pile of WEALTH to be taken and distributed to those who have neither earned it nor deserve it.
This is how communism always ends. In the quest for Perfect Equality, everyone ends up being Perfectly Miserable. No one is allowed to wear better shoes than another, everyone lives in the Same Concrete Box, everyone gets the same food ration, and so on. I have seen in it actual practice in the USSR, before the fall. It is a social pathology that ends with mass graves.
Why don’t we seize the wealth of Warren Buffet, Bill Gates and others. They clearly don’t need one billion dollars and supported Obama. Let them pay up.
#5 Len Wechsler has touched on a key concept and a simple truth that has somehow evaded the attention of the middle class in this country. “Wealth” does not now nor ever will get “spread around” under Obama or anyone else. Once you have wealth and the peace and security that this brings, it cannot be touched. We have an “income” tax. And perversely, we tax the income from labor at a much higher rate that than the income that is generated by a person’s wealth, i.e. interest, dividends and capital gains. And there are hundreds of ways to prevent even those lower taxes from applying. But your wealth never gets touched. Spend some time in the IRS tax code and you will see this clearly.
So if you are already rich, you are set for life and all you really want is to keep the serfs from storming the castle by supporting entitlements for the lower economic strata. This is why Bill Gates, Hollywood and notoriously wealthy people vigorously support left/liberal causes and line up to contribute to the Democratic Party.
The real suckers are the people in the middle who would like to cross over into at least a modest position of “wealth”. This brings economic freedom, expanded life choices, peace of mind and the ability to help others who are important to you. It is this pursuit that drives most of the productive people in this country and arguably this is how it should be – unless you want to go down the slippery slope to Cuba.
But add up all of the taxes you will pay once Barney Pelosibama gets done with you and then add state, local and sales taxes and regulatory fees. You will see that attaining any significant measure of wealth is just not possible. If you want to accumulate $1 million dollars over 20 years, then you must save around $50,000 every year after taxes – which means you have to gross around $100,000 per year over and above what you need to live on. How does that work for most of us? Guess we’ll have to try again in our next lives.
I’ll know that politicians are serious about spreading the wealth when they change the tax system to require that everyone pay somehting like 2 or 3% of their net worth (minus one house and car) every year.
“Spreading the wealth” is cynical code for “spreading government control to every part of every citizen’s life”.
did Stalin change is ways, Hitler, Castro …the list is long.
he is not referring to redistribute his (Obama’s) wealth. but that of conservative minded freedom embracing people.
the unions got sweet deals on all their negotiations and they still have lots of money to spend on political candidates.
Geitner isn’t paying any price for the damage he has done and is doing.
this is beyond socialism for the people this is Stalinist style communism.
“I hope we once again have reminded people that man is not free unless government is limited. There’s a clear cause and effect here that is as neat and predictable as a law of physics: As government expands, liberty contracts.”
–Ronald Reagan
I don’t think you get this, Mr. Pope. You’re one of the redistributors, not one of the redistributees.
#12 Terry! I have been saying this over and over. Our founding father’s would be proud of us! What a message to send-didn’t the US win its freedom over “taxation without representation”? As Thomas Jefferson wisely said “Tyranny is when the people fear the government, freedom is when the government fears the people!”
Lots of money gets redistributed to the rich. I’ve seen this many times in academia. I know an academic from a wealthy background who has three houses who got a big grant to do essentially nothing. Since she’s a leftist, naturally the left doesn’t have any problem with this, but I would have loved to have gotten that grant.
The funny thing is that what poor people want is to become rich, and the idea of taxing their future wealth isn’t very appealing to them. There are better ways to help the poor, like making it as easy as possible to get out of poverty.
You just don’t get it do you? You are just not special enough, only certain elites get to decide what gets shared and what doesn’t. You just don’t have the right bona fides to be included in the deciding class.
“The unwelcome message is that we are not all equally able. We are born unequal in intellectual potential, and these differences portend social inequality in any reasonably free society. We may all be equal before the law and in the eyes of God, but we differ greatly in our abilities to perform well in school, work, and everyday life.”
–Lynn Gottfredson
Left/liberals would wish this were not so.
All are equal, but some are more equal than others.