Myth of Sisyphus

The myth of No New Taxes both here in Minnesota and around the nation!
by Charlie Leck

The move is on by both the Republican Party and its little brother, The Tea Party, to slash, slash, slash spending in Government. The goal here in Minnesota is to balance the budget, which must be done under state law, without raising anyone’s taxes.

These two political entities will try both to accomplish this and to pull a rabbit out of an empty hat at the same time. It’s all a big myth my friends.

Here in Minnesota, the legislature is cutting aide to cities and communities like crazy. Guess what? Without needing to go into complex economics, which I couldn’t do if I wanted to, this means that the town you live in must now find money to perform needed services someplace else.

As long as we’re playing a guessing game, guess where they’ll turn to find the money. No, they are not going to seek foreign aid from Saudi Arabia! Small towns all across America will now raise property taxes on the people who own the houses and property up and down the streets of these communities. And, without guessing, I’m sure you know that that is YOU.

Welcome to the wonderful world of NO NEW TAXES. What do they take us for? SCHMUCKS?

The Republicans in the House arm-twisted the President of the United States into agreeing to extend tax cuts for the wealthy in return for them agreeing to extend unemployment benefits for the 9 percent of the nation’s potential workers who are unemployed. I personally think the President should have given them the finger and then held them accountable for the disaster that would have smacked millions of families around the country.

The experts are clear about this folks. Taxes in your community and my community are going to rise. If you are a renter, your rent is going up. If you are a home owner, hang on for dear life. The cost of gasoline and food is sky-rocketing while the Republicans dither. The Tea Party is made up, we’re told, of hard-working American home-owners. They’re in for a shock and may soon realize the folly of their ways in entrusting their futures and fortunes to the Republicans.

The wealthy are laughing all the way to the bank.

Big corporations have that grin that is comparable to the one the cat gets – you know, that cat that swallowed the canary.

Ladies and gentlemen, don’t think of American as a democracy any longer! Think of it, in more realistic terms, as an oligarchy.

The Commissioner of Revenue in Minnesota, Dan Salomone, has projected that property taxes in Minnesota will rise by 859 million dollars over the next three years. MinnPost praised Salomone as a “straight-shooter” who has served under governors of different parties for over 20 years.

Here’s a shocking statement by MinnPost [all this is from a column in MinnPost by Wayne Cox, the Executive Director of Minnesota Citizens for Tax Justice]…

“The House tax chair argued his bill would provide low-income with a ’10 percent tax cut.’ The StarTribune article reported the income tax relief ‘would go largely to Minnesota’s wealthiest residents. The poorest 10 percent would get an additional 87 cents a year from their income tax cut, while the wealthiest would receive an average of $415 a year.’ It turned out House Speaker Kurt Zellers, who had said the state was broke, still had enough money for yet another tax cut at the top.”

I hope all the middle class folks who voted for these guys are taking a good, hard look in the mirror right now. You turned our state house over to guys who are in cahoots with the wealthy and the big corporations.

Mr. Salomone’s statement points out that here in Minnesota “half of taxpayers will receive a larger property tax increase than they would an income tax decrease.” [quotation from Cox's MinnPost column]

“Reducing it increases total net state tax revenues by over $100 million. If the House Republican tax legislation becomes law, 300,000 Minnesotans will have less money in the pocket than they would have. The net taxes they pay, taxes of all forms after credits and refunds, will be higher. That is a tax increase. And it would be a tax increase on those with least room in their family budgets in tough times to absorb this hit.”

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The Rich Must Pay their Fair Share III

Why is it that we don’t just do the obvious!
by Charlie Leck

Back in November of the past year, Warren Buffet, of the Berkshire Hathaway Company, told Christiane Amanpour, of the This Week show, that the wealthy should be paying more taxes. [See this Bloomberg News story about the interview and watch a video of Buffet’s discussion with Amanpour.]

"If anything, taxes for the lower and middle class and maybe even the upper middle class should even probably be cut further," Buffett said. "But I think that people at the high end -- people like myself -- should be paying a lot more in taxes. We have it better than we've ever had it."

Buffet doesn’t buy the argument that the economy will suffer if taxes are raised on the wealthy. Amanpour suggested that “they” keep saying that the lower taxes for the wealthy “energizes business and capitalism.” Buffet replied with firmness.

"The rich are always going to say that, you know, just give us more money and we'll go out and spend more and then it will all trickle down to the rest of you. But that has not worked the last 10 years, and I hope the American public is catching on,…"

It’s quite silly that we shall try to solve this debt crisis on the backs of those who can least afford to give or have resources taken from them.

Buffet is a multi-billionaire who is considered one of the wealthiest people in the world. He has pledged to give half of his wealth away.

“If anything,” Buffet said, “taxes for the lower and middle class and maybe even the upper middle class should even probably be cut further… But I think people at the high end – people like myself – should be paying a lot more in taxes. We have it better than we’ve ever had it.”

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The Rich Must Pay their Fair Share II

Don’t look only at entitlements, but take a look at fairly sharing the burden of reducing the nation’s debt!
by Charlie Leck

In an editorial on Tuesday morning, our local newspaper, The Star-Tribune, editorialized rather strongly about the failure of the President or Congress to look seriously at entitlements and defense costs in its effort to grapple with our huge national debt.

I concur in some respects with the sentiments expressed in that editorial and with the side bar comments by former Minnesota Congressman Bill Frenzel, who is now with the Brookings Institute.

"Both the Congress and the president are ... ignoring the entitlements and mostly ignoring the defense cuts that have to be part of a final compromise. What they're doing is dancing a little war dance, but they're doing it with toy weapons.'
[Bill Frenzel]

If you’re interested, you can read the full text of the editorial. That, however, is not the point of what I’m getting at here.

The question I would ask and which I think you should address to your Congressional Representatives and Senators is this: Why are we so hot to go after entitlements, which form the backbone of caring for those with less money and those who have put in a lifetime of work in this nation, and so cold to go after more money from the incredibly rich who are not now paying their fair share in Internal Revenue income taxes?

That is exactly the case that President Obama has to make to the nation. Why entitlements and not higher taxes on those who can easily afford them?

If ever there was an issue that can be clearly identified along political party lines, this is it! And, this is the essential issue that President Obama has to take into his next campaign for reelection.

It is quite easy to show that the wealthy pay far less a percentage of their gross income in taxes than do middle class working people.

The stinging hardship of taxes falls heavily upon those who can least afford it!

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