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Taxes, and the deficit, and accountability.
We have a two party system. It's flawed. One of the flaws is the way it can be used to capture voters. If, for some reason, I loathe a party, so that I am going to vote for the other one... that party doesn't really have to answer to me. So long as they don't violate my trust on that "single issue" issue, I'll walk into the voting booth and pull the lever for them.
What happens when those elected officials aren't answering to me, but to some "higher authority"?
They stop putting my interests first. Depending on the nature of they person who has stolen them away from me, they may stop putting the interests of the country first. Republicans are doing that. They have been signing pledges. National pledges. Pledges like the inanity that Bachmann and Santorum signed about marriage.
Pledges like Grover Norquist's no tax increases ever. That's one scary pledge. Especially when a temporary tax reduction being allowed to revert to the previous rate is called an increase. Or when a payout from the Government being stopped is called a tax increase. Add the hoopla about the debt ceiling, and you have a whole lot of people who aren't looking after their constituent's interests, rather they are looking to keep a kingmaker happy.
Imagine the flip side. Imagine someone on the liberal side of the political divide, say George Soros, who went to all the Democrats and asked them to sign a pledge to not cut Social Security, or Medicare; no matter what. That to go see to it those programs were never reduced, and kept completely solvent they would cut Defense, and raise such taxes as were needed.
Imagine the wailing, and gnashing of teeth which would ensue if so many as 30 percent of them signed it. Imagine the bloviation from Bill O'Reilly, and Glenn Beck. The foaming at the mouth of Bachmann. The ways in which the Tea Party would bleat about it being unconstitutional to even make such a pledge, but less abide by it.
Norquist has done just that, and the Republicans have bought into it. Never mind that St. Ronnie raised taxes. Never mind that things they want done cost money.
Want to make the nation solvent again? Fixing two things would help a lot. Employment, and wages. Pulling out of Afghanistan wouldn't hurt (We could have sent three Apollo programs to the moon for the present cost of Afghanistan. Even if we lost the same number of astronauts in the process we'd have 2570 fewer dead Americans [and I don't know how many other NATO troops, not to mention Afghanis]).
Letting the Bush Tax Cuts expire would help too. That would add 5 trillion to the revenue stream, in the next ten years. Not an increase in taxes, a reversion to what they were.
Instead we get "The Gang of Six" who are willing to stick it to seniors and the middle class, so they can save that tax cut on the rich.
They don't get the same amount of money... they think they get 4 trillion that way.
How... by cutting veteran's benefits, and Social Security checks. It would raise taxes on the wealthy... by .3 percent. On the middle clases; people making 20,000 per annum, about 14 percent.
This is what Grover Norquist wants. He wants to "starve the beast", make gov't so small it can be "drowned in a bathtub".
We'd lose things like regulatory oversight of Wall Street (can you say "Savings and Loan Failure", how about "Securitized Mortgages, and Credit Default Swaps"? I knew you could)). We'd lose the ability to keep roads in good repair. OSHA... probably has to go. What about police, and prisons? Might need to keep them; so where does the money come from?
If those things aren't being paid for by the Feds (FBI, DEA, US Marshalls, Federal Prisons, US DOT, Centers for Disease Control, OSHA, FDA, FAA, SEC... those are all federal) then the states have to pick up the slack. Some of that slack (FDA, BLM, FCC, Customs, Border Patrol, TSA) aren't things the states are allowed to take over. Those just wither away. Oil Leases on federal land... up for grabs. Grazing rights...? Who will be there to keep ranchers from overgrazing, or shooting bison, and wolves? Not the US Parks Service.
So the states will have to tax, or (if those legislators have also signed Norquist's pledge) not.
I don't want to live in that country. I really suspect most of us don't.
What happens when those elected officials aren't answering to me, but to some "higher authority"?
They stop putting my interests first. Depending on the nature of they person who has stolen them away from me, they may stop putting the interests of the country first. Republicans are doing that. They have been signing pledges. National pledges. Pledges like the inanity that Bachmann and Santorum signed about marriage.
Pledges like Grover Norquist's no tax increases ever. That's one scary pledge. Especially when a temporary tax reduction being allowed to revert to the previous rate is called an increase. Or when a payout from the Government being stopped is called a tax increase. Add the hoopla about the debt ceiling, and you have a whole lot of people who aren't looking after their constituent's interests, rather they are looking to keep a kingmaker happy.
Imagine the flip side. Imagine someone on the liberal side of the political divide, say George Soros, who went to all the Democrats and asked them to sign a pledge to not cut Social Security, or Medicare; no matter what. That to go see to it those programs were never reduced, and kept completely solvent they would cut Defense, and raise such taxes as were needed.
Imagine the wailing, and gnashing of teeth which would ensue if so many as 30 percent of them signed it. Imagine the bloviation from Bill O'Reilly, and Glenn Beck. The foaming at the mouth of Bachmann. The ways in which the Tea Party would bleat about it being unconstitutional to even make such a pledge, but less abide by it.
Norquist has done just that, and the Republicans have bought into it. Never mind that St. Ronnie raised taxes. Never mind that things they want done cost money.
Want to make the nation solvent again? Fixing two things would help a lot. Employment, and wages. Pulling out of Afghanistan wouldn't hurt (We could have sent three Apollo programs to the moon for the present cost of Afghanistan. Even if we lost the same number of astronauts in the process we'd have 2570 fewer dead Americans [and I don't know how many other NATO troops, not to mention Afghanis]).
Letting the Bush Tax Cuts expire would help too. That would add 5 trillion to the revenue stream, in the next ten years. Not an increase in taxes, a reversion to what they were.
Instead we get "The Gang of Six" who are willing to stick it to seniors and the middle class, so they can save that tax cut on the rich.
They don't get the same amount of money... they think they get 4 trillion that way.
How... by cutting veteran's benefits, and Social Security checks. It would raise taxes on the wealthy... by .3 percent. On the middle clases; people making 20,000 per annum, about 14 percent.
This is what Grover Norquist wants. He wants to "starve the beast", make gov't so small it can be "drowned in a bathtub".
We'd lose things like regulatory oversight of Wall Street (can you say "Savings and Loan Failure", how about "Securitized Mortgages, and Credit Default Swaps"? I knew you could)). We'd lose the ability to keep roads in good repair. OSHA... probably has to go. What about police, and prisons? Might need to keep them; so where does the money come from?
If those things aren't being paid for by the Feds (FBI, DEA, US Marshalls, Federal Prisons, US DOT, Centers for Disease Control, OSHA, FDA, FAA, SEC... those are all federal) then the states have to pick up the slack. Some of that slack (FDA, BLM, FCC, Customs, Border Patrol, TSA) aren't things the states are allowed to take over. Those just wither away. Oil Leases on federal land... up for grabs. Grazing rights...? Who will be there to keep ranchers from overgrazing, or shooting bison, and wolves? Not the US Parks Service.
So the states will have to tax, or (if those legislators have also signed Norquist's pledge) not.
I don't want to live in that country. I really suspect most of us don't.