Random rant

When the government can force you to buy insurance and penalize you when you don't, what can't it make you do? There are no hard and fast limits any more, our law is no longer founded on any principles, the constitution is meaningless, and government will do what it deems is best for you. Get used to it and get your bribe money handy.

On a brighter note, part of me is happy about all this. Sometimes it can be fun to watch the world burn, especially by its own doing.

In other news...

Democratic ads claim Republican opponents want to raise your taxes. The attacks by Democrat Mark Critz are blatantly false. Yes, his opponent is in favor of raising income taxes, to OFFSET other taxes, leaving on net everything UNCHANGED. To claim his opponent is for raising taxes is a blatant misrepresentation and an outright lie. Not surprisingly, when I was in Texas I saw the exact same attack by a democrat against another republican.

Speaking of liars...

Obama and the liberals' health care plan is the biggest of them all but conservatives ought to be careful in their line of attack. Saying we can't afford another entitlement as the justification for rejecting Obamacare implies that if we could afford it, it would be OK. Here's a better line of attack:

Only charlatans and liars need 2,700 words to tell the truth. Learn how to save your health care at: www.newliberaldemocrat.blogspot.com

Taxes aren't so bad after all?

Here is a fascinating letter to the editor from the Minneapolis Star Tribune:

Tax hike plan reflective of taxable income

As a tax preparer, I am compelled to correct a common misconception held by state politicians, by a May 12 letter writer and now by the Wall Street Journal ("Democrats always want higher taxes," Opinion Exchange, May 13).

The misconception is usually a variation of this thought: "It would be unwise to raise taxes on incomes over $200,000 because that would include most farmers and small businesses. Because small business creates most jobs, to raise their taxes would be a jobs killer."

Taxpayers do not pay taxes on their income. Taxes are paid on taxable income, or income after tax deductions. A small business may have income of $500,000, but taxable income of less than $75,000. By the time a small business arrives at taxable income, it has already taken deductions for all business expenses, which include employee wages and all payroll expenses. If a small business has a taxable income of more than $200,000, that taxable income is no different from that of a wage-earner employee who has a taxable income above $200,000. By the time a small-business taxpayer arrives at taxable income, he or she has already hired (and will receive a tax deduction for) every employee needed. To reduce taxes at this point will neither encourage nor discourage small businesses to hire additional employees.

There is no rational explanation why a small-business owner should pay a lower tax rate on taxable income than a wage earner or investor or any other taxable income earner.

JOHN DEITERING, HOWARD LAKE, MINN.

The letter is completely correct in the technical sense but if you read carefully, you'll realize that what he is really saying doesn't make any common sense. Taxes on small business profits (or as this person calls them - taxable income) is indeed no different than taxes on a wage earner. In fact, a wage earner is nothing more than a very small business owner with 1 employee, selling his product - labor - for a profit. What would happen if you confiscated his profits? He would work less of course.

The assumption in this letter is that employing people is some sort of public service, it is not. The only reason businesses hire anyone is to profit off of their labor, and taxing that profit is a sure fire way to guarantee less job creation.

Your employer wants to pay you more!

There are issues, many of them, which are winners for our side. Not only winners, but no person in good conscience (even liberals) could truly be against them. They are intuitively good and they happen to support our cause. These are the issues we should advocate. These are the issues we should bludgeon our opponents with. And these issues will make a difference.

Payroll taxes. Every day, as loud as we can, we should advocate changing Federal law so that an employer cannot pay taxes on an employees behalf. We are for transparency and we think people should be aware of how much they are actually paying in taxes. Currently, Social Security and Medicare (known as FICA) taxes are withheld from your pay at a rate of 6.2% and 1.45% respectively. This is a lie. Let me repeat, THIS IS A LIE and anyone who doesn't acknowledge this is a liar and should be labeled as such. The real figure everyone pays in taxes (except ironically the very rich) is 12.4% in Social Security and 2.9% in Medicare for a total of 15.3%. This applies to anyone who works for a living no matter how small their paycheck is.

Why the deception? Because if you never see the money taken from you, you won't protest. It's just that simple. Government wants your money and they don't want to ask you, more importantly, they don't want you asking questions. So they have your employer give them your money without your knowledge. This is immoral and no one should support it. If the government wants your money then they should at least have the decency to ask you for it. That's a winning argument for us and every working person in this country.

Liars

Transparency:

• a : free from pretense or deceit : frank


• b : easily detected or seen through : obvious


• c : readily understood


• d : characterized by visibility or accessibility of information especially concerning business practices

I assume it's safe to say that non-transparent is not "free from pretense or deceit", and I would argue that deliberately making things non-transparent, deliberately deceiving is also known as lying.

I am for transparency, I am for the truth, and I oppose anyone, for any purpose who proposes schemes designed to mislead people, to trick them into believing something that isn't true. Liberals are lying to you, plain and simple and we need to call them liars at every opportunity. Exposing hypocrisy is not enough, pointing out logical flaws in their arguments is not enough; these tactics presume your opponents aren't deliberately lying to achieve their aims: they are.

When your opponent fights dirty, you call them out. You tell the truth about what their plan will do and that they KNOW it. You call them the liars they are and let the public decide. They will make the right choice.

We know prosperity

I read somewhere that high unemployment is here to stay and I couldn't help but think just how startling and scary that is. I was born in 1977 and throughout my short life I haven't really seen an economic climate as bad as this one. I know there have been worse, the Great Depression, Stagflation of the 1970's, and I am sure others, but to experience this is surreal. I am lucky that I have a job and I don't do well, but I get by. However, 9.7% unemployment is substantial and all I hear is pessimism coming from all sides. It doesn't have to be that way and I think a moment of optimism is in order.

First, to borrow from Rahm Emanuel, let's not let a crisis go to waste. The simple reality is that limited government conservatives and libertarians know the path to prosperity and it's not difficult. Reduce government spending, simplify and reduce the tax code, and stop f*cking with monetary policy and all will be well. Not only will we be well, we will be even richer than we are today and we will unleash a firestorm of future prosperity. It's that simple, the dynamism of the private sector can overcome anything as long as it is allowed to. Conservatives should not sit idly by and allow liberals to escape their fiscal incompetence. They don't know how to create prosperity, they know how to squander it. We know prosperity and let it be our rallying cry this November.