SOAKING THE RICH? WHO CARES?

"Who cares if the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans expire? I'm not one of them, so as long as MY tax cut remains in place, why should I care? It's nothing to me." This, understandably, is the attitude of most middle-class Americans. I get it. But what is the attitude of the 43% of American wage-earners who pay no federal income taxes at all?
Do they care if the rich get soaked? Nope. (See the above.) Would they care if the tax rates for middle-class tax-payers went up? Nope. If they're not paying, they don't care who does. And since they're not paying, why should they care how tax money is being spent? They have no skin in the game.
Do you think that it is desirable that so many Americans should be disincentivized from caring about how tax money is spent? Let's recall the advice of Deep Throat: Follow The Money. That's how you know where the Federal Government is going. Unless the government is spending YOUR money, you don't care where it comes from, and you don't care where it goes.
This is why all Americans need to pay income taxes, even if just a little bit: It makes you care, it makes you pay attention.

BERNANKE ON THE NATION'S ECONOMIC FUTURE

Today, Fed Chairman Bernanke explained that by the year 2020, the federal debt ratio to GDP could exceed 100%. The debt could be larger than the entire U.S. economy at that time, unless there existed the political will to do things necessary to avoid this result.
Don't worry, though. Treasury Secretary Geithner said that President Obama's budgetary measures will prevent that outcome. The Congressional Budget Office agrees with the secretary. They say that if things go as well as President Obama predicts, the debt to GDP ratio will only go to 90% by 2020.

WHEW! That was a close one.

PAUL KRUGMAN DISTORTS HISTORY

Liberal economists like Paul Krugman have always tried to sell the story that conservative politicians have a very sinister agenda: to intentionally erode the government's fiscal position to such an extent that social welfare/entitlement programs would have to be eliminated in order to reconcile the national budget. Most recently, Krugman claims that President Reagan's tax-cutting program was the mechanism through which which he attempted to accomplish this evil goal. That's not how Krugman and others portrayed Reagan's reputed "strategy" at the time. Back then, liberal economists insisted that Reagan's spending on military and national security initiatives (remember the Star Wars debate?) was secretly designed to take so much money out of the budget that there would be no choice but to eliminate welfare and other entitlements.
A couple funny things happened, though. Instead of the arms race bankrupting the U.S. economy, it bankrupted the Soviet economy. It was their government that was "fundamentally transformed" by Reagan's military spending, not ours. Also, if it had been Reagan's intention to ruin the nation's balance sheet by cutting taxes, he failed miserably. Revenues went up. Does anyone, even Krugman, really believe that President Reagan was disappointed in that result?

OBAMA'S ADMINISTRATIVE FIAT

Several days ago, a bill was defeated in Congress by a bi-partisan majority which would have allowed President Obama to appoint a commission that would recommend specific spending cuts and tax measures that bring the budget down, and help control long-term government debt. The bill was offered as a solution to these problems because of Congress' demonstrated unwillingness to confront them.
But the bill was defeated. There were a couple reasons. First, the Congress was unwilling to convey their constitutional responsibilities to a presidential commission, although some Republicans, in the past had favored the idea. Secondly, legislators were unsure if the the commission would truly be a bi-partisan group. In the end, the bill was defeated, and even co-sponsors of the bill (Democrats and Republicans) voted against it, even though congress would have had to approve its recommendations in an all-or-nothing, up-or-down vote.
What was President Obama's response to the congressional rejection of the commission? He said that he would appoint one anyway by executive order.
When it became clear that Obama's Cap-and-Trade legislation was dead in the water, how did the president respond? He said that he would just have the EPA regulate CO2 emissions and achieve his energy policy in this way.
President Bush was widely (and rightly) criticized after 9-11 for trying to unconstitutionally consolidate governmental power within the executive branch. Now where are the critics when President Obama does the same thing?

SKEPTICS AND DENIERS

I'm not big on conspiracy theories. I believe, for example, that the U.S. really landed a man on the moon. I don't think that the film of the landing was shot in the Arizona desert. I think that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone. I don't think that FDR allowed Pearl Harbor to be attacked, just to get into WWII. I don't think that Bush stole the election from Gore. (However, everyone knows that Mayor Daley stole the election for JFK in 1960.) I don't believe that the U.S. government was complicit in the 9-11 attacks, or that the Jews were behind it. I believe that the Rosenbergs were guilty as sin. The Holocast is not a hoax. There was no UFO at Roswell.
There is only one thing in history I'm not sure about. "Shoeless" Joe Jackson might have actively tried to throw the 1919 World Series. I hope it ain't so, but I don't know.
Conspiracy theories abound. For every true believer you can name, there is a skeptic or denier. I am always among them. This goes for global warming being a "man-caused" phenomenon. It also goes for the claim that President Obama's stimulus package created a single, solitary job. Or "saved" one. Nor do I believe for a second that the stimulus package prevented a national economic melt-down or prevented a second Great Depression as the president asserted yesterday.
I'm skeptical about any numbers released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. I have no faith in the numbers released by the Obama administration regarding the U.S. GDP. I find it odd that our economy can be growing while energy consumption and gasoline prices are not increasing. Shell and Chevron have both reduced personnel, citing low demand as the reason. That make any sense to you?
What really bothers me, as a denier and a skeptic, is that the true believers think that I am stupid or crazy. President Obama has no patience for those that think the stimulus package has been an overall bust, or that Cash For Clunkers was idiotic. Now we go on to his "Jobs" bill, which is nothing more than another stimulus bill we can't afford. Does anyone think an employer will be motivated to hire an employee for $40,000 a year just to get a $5000 tax credit? Not lately.
I just don't believe a word of it.

"PAY-AS-YOU-GO" BROKE

The Democrats are all giddy about their new dedication to a "pay-as-you-go" strategy to control the deficit. Basically, this means that for every dollar of new government spending, there has to be an equal reduction somewhere else in the budget. Alternatively, a new source of revenue may be found to fund the new expenditure. Either way, the new spending is off-set, and the deficit is not increased. Good idea. It worked before when Clinton was president, and Congress was led by Republicans.
Now the picture is a little different. President Obama, as a candidate, assured us that taxes on persons making less than $250,000 per year would not see their taxes increased. Now he is an "agnostic" about tax increases on the middle class. It's not hard to foresee that any new expenditures will result in higher taxes, and that they will be rationalized as deficit-neutral under the "pay-as-you-go" program.

IT'S THE ENTITLEMENTS, STUPID!

President Obama wants to reduce federal discretionary spending to save $10 billion a year. OK, fine. That makes the president look like budget hawk? Not so much...
The big entitlements (social security, medicare, medicaid) are non-discretionary, and account for 59% of the budget. Everyone knows these programs are on the road to insolvency. The benefits these programs provide are unsustainable. Until spending on these programs is managed, the federal budget is in trouble. Nibbling around the edges of discretionary spending is almost meaningless.
But does anyone think that the House Democrats will be into reducing federal spending? They think more spending is needed to further "stimulate" the economy.

THE PARTY OF "KNOW BETTER"

The Democrats have portrayed the Republicans as "The party of 'no'". They have blamed Republicans for the failure, so far, to pass a health care bill. This, even though they have the presidency, a majority in the House, and (until today) a fillibuster-proof majority in the Senate. The Dems could have passed any bill they wanted. The problem is, they couldn't write a bill they wanted. They could only write bills nobody wants. And I mean nobody.
But even though the American people don't want the House or Senate bills passed, the Democrats think they know better. They really think that when the full provisions of a health care bill kick in (three or four years from now), the American people will love them. Because everybody loves an entitlement. People love Social Security, Medicare/Medicaid, unemployment insurance, etc., even though they were too stupid to understand them when they were first proposed. Of course. The Dems think they know better what is best for the nation than the nation itself. They don't understand why anyone would decline health care as a "right", as Senator Harkin believes it is.

TIMING IS EVERYTHING

Know what the secret is to telling a good joke? Timing.
Remember when the $787 billion stimulus bill was passed? We were told that there were many important municipal, state, and federal projects that were "shovel-ready", lacking only financing to upgrade our infrastructure and to create jobs. We were told that the money would go out the door quickly, providing a jump-start to our economy. Really?
Now, it turns out, only a small percentage of the money has been spent. The money will be spent on a schedule that is in sync, strangely enough, with the federal election cycle. More money will be spent as the mid-term elections approach, but most of it will be released in advance of the 2012 presidential election. Timing is everything.
Same is true with the health care reform bill(s) that the democrats are advancing. The taxes on businesses and individuals to pay for the expansion of health care coverage will begin immediately. However, the implementation of most of the "reforms" will be delayed until 2016! How come? Two reasons. First, this allows the "first ten years" of the program to appear inexpensive, because the money being spent in four years (2016-2020) will be spread out over ten (2010-2020). That's government accounting for you. Secondly, President Obama will be able to point to future "benefits" of his health care reforms during his campaign since there will be no evidence at that time - pro or con - that real reform has been achieved. There will be evidence of its expense of the program, but none that the expense has been worth it.
Timing is the secret of telling a good joke. But I don't see any humor in this.