United Liberty

Recently, the TEA Party movement celebrated its first anniversary. At first the TEA (Taxed Enough Already) Party activists were dismissed as a few grumpy right-wingers upset that America elected a black president. They were given little credence beyond being an amusing political side show. That soon changed. On April 15th hundreds of thousands of average Americans showed up at protest rallies across the nation, outraged at the “stimulus” package of goodies doled out to special interests, liberal activism organizations and Democrat pet projects. CNN reported that a few thousand people showed up at the rally in Atlanta, but I was there and can assure you that it was close to ten-fold that amount. It was shoulder-to-shoulder for about four blocks in one direction, not counting the people on the side streets.

Once they could no longer be dismissed as a fringe element, TEA Party activists were labeled as “Astro-turf” (fake grass roots), accused of being flunkies of Big Corporate America, mindlessly doing the bidding of their masters. They were accused of being a fabrication of FOX News and the Republican Party. They were accused of being everything except what they are…average Americans, generally with traditional conservative values, who were fed up over 20 years of Bush-Clinton-Bush politics, two political parties who paid only lip service to the people they claimed to serve while engaging in a bacchanalian orgy of political perks, who had finally been pushed over the edge by a pork-laden spending bill of almost $800 billion. They were saying “Enough is enough!”, and they were going to make their voices be heard.

The Wall Street Journal reports that when lawmakers receive per-diem money for official travel, it’s typical for them to pocket the leftover cash instead of returning it to the Treasury—that, or they spend it on gifts and souvenirs:

When lawmakers travel overseas on official business they are given up to $250 a day in taxpayer funds to cover meals and expenses. Congressional rules say they must return any leftover cash to the government.

They usually don’t.

…”There’s a tacit understanding that if lawmakers don’t spend the money, they get to keep it,” said Rep. Sue Kelly, a New York Republican who was defeated in 2006.

…Rep. Joe Wilson (R., S.C.) said he once bought marble goblets in the Kabul airport as gifts for constituents. Rep. Mark Souder (R., Ind.) said he dipped into his funds to buy a $200 painting of an estuary in Turkey, which hung in his office for a while and was now in his house.

This is not a lot of money when you consider the trillions of dollars that make up the federal budget. But the concept that it might be innapropriate to spend taxpayer money for personal reasons seems to be completely lost on our elected officials.

And here’s the real kicker: When asked about taxpayer money he uses for non-official purposes, Rep. Alcee Hastings (D-Fla) replied, “I’m a generous spirit and a courteous spirit. I stand accused.”

Yes, Mr. Hastings, it certainly is easy to be generous when you’re spending other people’s money.

We live in weird times, and in these weird times, the truth cannot be relied on from predictable sources. Take for instance New York’s Democratic Governor David Paterson, who said:

But the candidates are couching their support in economic terms. Gov. Paterson, who is facing an uphill battle against likely rival Andrew M. Cuomo, told a group of bankers recently: “In New York, Wall Street is Main Street. … You don’t hear anybody in New England complaining about clam chowder. If you say anything about oil in Texas, they’ll string you up near the nearest tree. We need to stand behind the engine of our economy in New York, and that engine of economy is Wall Street.”

Paterson’s comments bring to my mind my experience growing up in Seattle, in which the public school system was effectively modernized with computers by Bill Gates and new stadiums and buildings, which brought in a host of new jobs and replaced the dangerous eyesore that was the Kingdome, were put into place by Gates’ fellow tech pioneer Paul Allen. Allen also turned radio station KCMU into the powerhouse that is today KEXP, a move that brought alot of early criticism, alleging that KEXP would be just another bland, commercial radio station.

Despite modernizing Seattle during the 1990s and 2000s, to the benefit of everyone living and working in the area, envy can be heard by many (but not all, of course) Seattleites simply because Gates and Allen have done well for themselves.

On Thursday, the US Senate voted to restore pay go rules on a party line vote. President Obama praised the restoration of the PAYGO rule. Obama supporter Andrew Sullivan used the vote as a club to attack Republicans. Republicans opposed the restoration of pay go calling it a backdoor attempt to raise taxes. However, the PAYGO rule is at best a dual edged sword. While PAYGO is an excellent for controlling and limiting deficit spending, it does very little to limit the size and growth of the Federal government.

The PAYGO or “pay as you go” rule simply calls for any increase of mandatory spending or reduction in revenue (ie. taxes) must be offset by decreases in discretionary spending or increases in revenue (taxes). Mandatory spending is things like Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security, pay for Federal employees, paying debt, and other welfare programs such as Food Stamps and Veterans benefits. Mandatory spending is nearly 60% of the Federal budget. Discretionary spending is everything that Congress has to pass legislation to authorize.

How PAYGO Is Fiscally Responsible:

Interestingly, government intervention in the 1960s introduced a third party (insurance co/HMO/PPO, etc) into the one-on-one relationship between doctor and patient. Prior to that, people paid premiums for medical insurance policies designed to cover catastrophic medical events like cancer, serious accidents and the like, NOT for physicals, check ups or routine visits. Instead, the DOCTOR and the PATIENT negotiated a rate for services based on the patient’s ability to pay on an individual case by case basis. The introduction of a third party shorts the doctor AND raises the costs for the the patient, as the third party must also be paid. Yes, health costs have soared, but further government intervention - especially a government takeover of a free market healthcare system - is NOT the answer.

Yes, it was indeed 100 years ago yesterday that the House passed a resolution to send the 16th Amendment to the states for ratification, thereby establishing the federal income tax.

Since then, teenage socialists everywhere quickly realized the sins of their ways the day they received their first paycheck….or, the percentage they were allowed to take home at least.  (Oh, I’m sorry, did you think you were getting the full amount?)

The tax system in the United States is terribly complicated, and when all of the rules, regulations and instructions are written out, it fills more than 70,000 pages. The darn thing is so confusing that Americans spend about $300 billion per year to hire professionals to pay their taxes for them.

Texas Governor Rick Perry raised a few eyebrows recently when he used the “S” word in public. Secession, he said, was always an option on the political table as far as Texas was concerned.

President Barack Obama held his first cabinet meeting today. He “made clear that relentlessly cutting out waste was part and parcel of their mission to make the investments necessary for recovery and long-term stability.” The ruthless fiscal disciplinarian called for his cabinet to cut a collective 100 million dollars in the next 90 days. The White House blog has the story here and the fact sheet can be found here.

Now, Obama has admitted already that this is a drop in the bucket. However, he did say, “cumulatively they would make an extraordinary difference… $100 million there, $100 million here, pretty soon, even in Washington, it adds up to real money.” How long would it take to add up to real money?

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.” - Margaret Mead

The left leaning media outlets made much of the numbers at Wednesday’s Tea Parties. Keith Olbermann especially mocked some Tea Parties attended by less than recent sporting events. Understanding that Olbermann’s primary objective is not to inform (but rather to sell advertising), his observations (as well as those of his fellow travelers) avoid the important point.

Dissent is “unhealthy”:

A top adviser to President Barack Obama takes a dim view of last week’s anti-tax “tea parties,” promoted by organizers in the spirit of the Boston Tea Party.

“The thing that bewilders me is this president just cut taxes for 95 percent of the American people. So I think the tea bags should be directed elsewhere because he certainly understands the burden that people face,” David Axelrod said Sunday.

The rallies coincided with the deadline to file income taxes, and gave people a chance also to voice frustrations about government spending and corporate bailouts.
[…]
Axelrod was asked on CBS’ “Face the Nation” for his opinion on what the show’s host described as “this spreading and very public disaffection with not only the government, but especially the Obama administration.”