There are things I don’t care for in President Trump, but then I could say the same thing about Presidents Obama, GW Bush, Clinton, GH Bush and every other President I’ve served or lived under. It is sadly amusing though to observe the ever-deepening nature of the attacks on his Presidency by those who oppose him and the agenda that carried him into office.
About 18 or so months ago the left became aware Donald Trump posed a threat to the anointing of their queen in waiting and began the vilification of someone they had loved for his money. The propaganda arm of the Democratic Party (also known as Main Stream Media), began an all-out assault on Mr. Trump’s personality as well as attempting to influence the average voter with the fact he had little-to-no chance of being elected. Their strategy proved ineffective, and Mr. Trump was elected through a political process that has sustained our country for about the last 83,823 days. The fact the electoral college was a key to success somehow eluded the Clinton brain trust, but that is another topic.
Subsequent to his election we have seen those with progressive and liberal agendas push their points of view through riot, media propaganda, and ad hominem attack. I find it next to impossible to find a Democrat who can make a reasoned or logical response on why the President’s policies or actions are not beneficial to the country. It is as if a sizeable portion of the nation has swallowed LSD and are living in an alternate reality where emotion is the currency of exchange and cause and effect is the illusion.
Of course, Mr. Trump routinely fuels the media frenzy using its own tools. He has boldly implemented the concept of instant communication with the masses and passed by the pundits who feel compelled to tell the average citizen what the President is really thinking, thus outraging those who seek to control him or the dialogue. This will cause confusion on the world stage as foreign leaders are then forced to figure out what he really means and what he intends to do.
Uncertainty can be a two-edged sword. There are those who argue that uncertainty increases risk, just as others argue it is a useful tool in dealing with hostile foreign powers. With the former President, there was little uncertainty. We and our enemies knew, for the most part, his words and threats were empty. Our foreign policies reflected that, and threats grew and flourished. If we should have learned one thing in the years of President Obama, it is that appeasement of a hostile threat does not work. It is a lesson brought again to the big screen with the movie Churchill. Unfortunately, many on the left are unable to understand that, but that is not the point of this post. Rather, I want to reflect on the increasing hyperbole and rhetoric of those who oppose the President and his agenda.
Today it seems every time counter-Trump messaging fails - the political leadership is compelled to ratchet up the hyperbole. For example, just a couple of days ago Representative Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) called the Republican tax bill “the worst bill to ever come before the House.” You will forgive me if I find this a laughable statement. I would think the laws Congress has passed that remove individual protections[1] are far worse than a law that lowers taxes for a majority of the nation. During her time as Speaker, she helped pass the 2011 Defense Authorization Act that allows the government to indefinitely detain a US citizen on the suspicion he or she may be a terrorist. Then, of course, we have laws like the Fugitive Slave Act that mandated escaped slaves must be returned to their owners. This was pushed through by the democratic party in 1850. My takeaway from those complaining about tax legislation is; safeguarding individual rights are far less important to the party than maintaining a status quo, condemning the opposition, or vilifying an individual while maintaining their hold on a dependent poor and their emotion-driven true believers.
So, let’s talk about the tax bill and what’s in it, or not. Since I can’t seem to find the actual legislation awaiting the President’s signature I will refer back to the original House bill that was changed by the Senate and the conference committee for some points I’m pretty sure didn’t change too much.
The liberal press is making a big deal about things like the mortgage on a 2nd home no longer being deductible, but seem to be leaving out the 2nd home part of the deal. How many people have two homes they are deducting? Will this be a loss to the lower middle class, or people who have summer homes, or RV’s and boats that have a toilet and a kitchen? Maybe, but will this really be a tragic loss for most middle-class America? Probably not.
What I don’t hear the press talking about is the doubling of the individual deduction. While they talk about the loss of this or that deduction, it will be interesting to see if the average person making between $35 & $85,000 has historically had enough deductions to equal the new individual allowance. Somehow that seems to be missed by the big city reporters who eke out a living on their high six and seven-figure salaries.
-- Break, Break --
These observations are interrupted at this time to address a fundamental question. Why do we pay taxes?
You know, the government didn’t always have a personal income tax, right? For the longest time, it managed to get by with the money it received from import taxes and tariffs. It is true that personal taxes were levied from time to time to pay for things like war, but it was not formally institutionalized until the government outgrew its own spending limitations and the 16th Amendment was ratified (1913). Today, personal income tax is the single biggest funding source for the US government.
Therefore, we pay taxes to secure all the things we want the government to do for us. Unfortunately, we have also created a government that does not believe it is necessary to live within its own rules. It budgets and spends more money than we are obligated to give it. We as a society have become increasingly demanding on the things we want from the government while in the meantime decreasing the number of people who actually pay into its funding program.
There is one truth. The more money the government has, the more it will spend. Usually, on stuff, only a small percentage of Americans think we need.
The one question that seems unanswerable is, who has the best idea on how to spend your individual wages? Is it you, or is it the government? This last question is really the heart of the fiscal divide separating the two political ideologies.
-- I return you now to the current discussion --
There are a number of things, in the new tax bill, that I believe are flawed, but I’ve given up the notion we will ever achieve a balanced budget or find a path where the two political parties will again begin to hash out their differences and find reasonable compromise for the benefit of the American middle class.
On one side, we have a party that thrives on separating the various economic classes by singling out those who have achieved wealth through commerce and increasing the economic dependence of the poor on the government. On the other, is a party identified as being made up of zealots and big business lackeys, whose every action is characterized as making the rich – richer.
Since this new law is a unilaterally approved effort with no Democrats voting for it, and we have mid-term elections coming up in about 10-months; those elections will tell us if the average voter finds the lower taxes to be a benefit, or if they buy into the ideas pushed by the DNC, and its media, that the Republicans are out to screw the county.
I’m betting the GOP will lose control of the Senate, and we will again enter the age of rule by fiat we first saw in the Obama administration. I hope I’m wrong.
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