By, Nancy Tengler
www.wiseandfrugalgovernment.blogspot.com
The extension of the Bush tax rates (what the media is now calling Obama’s tax cuts) is a victory for Conservatives that should not be squandered. The Obama tax cuts are neither Obama’s–they are Bush’s–nor are they tax cuts–they are an extension of the current rates that were set to expire on 12/31/10. But the claim of the Democrats that these extensions had to be made because raising taxes on Americans in this economy would be disastrous is a true victory for Conservatives. It is also sound fiscal policy and should be capitalized on.
An editorial in today’s Wall Street Journal points out: “As Milton Friedman taught us with his “permanent income hypothesis,” consumers base their consumption on their longer-term income expectations, not merely on current income.” Temporary tax rates return money to its rightful owner, the earner, but without the certainty of knowing what future tax rates are increased consumption will be muted by the lack of clarity. The Republican majority in the House has a golden opportunity to revisit the tax question while they have the Democrats on their heels and push for further, permanent cuts in 2011.
After passage of the bill Senator Dick Durbin (D) claimed: “The president has a big victory here. It’s big because it means there won’t be a tax increase at the first of the year, which could have hurt our economy.”
Suddenly, though not un-coincidentally (recall the landslide November elections), the Democrats have found lower tax religion. If, as the Senator says higher taxes “hurt” our economy, why has it taken two years for the Democrats to support this extension of the Bush tax rates in an economy they call the worst since the Great Depression? Additionally, why didn’t they propose lower and permanent rates to further stimulate demand?
President Obama, too, is a an enthusiastic member of the lower tax club. Only a week ago he was complaining that the House Republicans were holding unemployment benefits hostage to the tax rate extensions, then upon signing the bill declared: “This is real money that’s going to make a real difference in people’s lives. That’s how we’re going to spark demand, spur hiring, and strengthen our economy in the new year” (Reuters)
Ronald Reagan move over and meet the new supply-sider in the White House. His claim that “lower taxes spark demand, spur hiring and strengthen our economy” should be rung from every mountain top from now until 2012. He is right, of course, but has strayed so far from the soak the rich tax policies he has espoused as recently as last week. But the ever changing, ever evolving, Chameleon-in-Chief is claiming the tax cut mantle of Kennedy and Reagan and Bush II for now.
We will have to hope the Republicans are savvy enough to remind him–and the rest of the nation–when he changes his tune again leading up to 2012.
By, Nancy Tengler
Much has been made in the press regarding Mr. Obama having to postpone his Christmas vacation because of a recalcitrant Congress wrangling over “his” tax bill. A little has been made about Congress having to stay in Washington; potentially working through Christmas because the Democrat leadership left all of the heavy lifting until after the November election when they could–how to say this politely?–uh, stick it to the electorate during their lame duck session. With the passage of the extension of the Bush tax rates by Congress and scrapping of the $1.1 TRILLION budget in the Senate last night, perhaps our ruling class friends will get to go home after all and the President will get to don his Oakley’s and board shorts and body surf for the cameras in the Oahu surf. Sigh of relief.
Yet, not once in the breathless press reports regarding Mr. Obama’s Christmas vacation have I ever heard commentary or sympathy or even appreciation for the members of our military who will be working right through Christmas. Away from their homes and families. In a far away and hostile land. Not once.
So, I would like to thank them, each and every one, and their families. I would like to thank them for their courage and their self-sacrifice and their dedication to the preservation of this great Republic. I think about our military often, I think about their quiet discipline and constancy, their devotion to liberty, and their self-effacing humility.
I think of none of those qualities, by the way, when I think of Congress. But I digress.
As impressed as I am by the members of our military, I am equally as impressed with the naivete of many of our citizens. Can anyone tell me what that mysterious Coexist bumper sticker means? Tell me please why someone would slap an End this Endless War sticker on their back window? Do these people think that our country, and particularly those that serve, like war? That it never occurred to the average person to “coexist” peacefully with our neighbors? Is their smug moral superiority so veneered onto their brains that they think the rest of us have lost our way? That we enjoy seeing our military men and women sacrifice and suffer and die simply for the sake of mindless aggression? Did they not study the history of the Revolutionary War that launched this nation? Can you imagine a Revolutionary patriot slapping a Coexist sticker to the rump of his horse? Or a Revolutionary farmer planting an End this Endless War sign in their front garden while their neighbor marched shoeless through the bitter snow of New England trying to defeat the most powerful army the world had ever known?
Justice Stephen Breyer in an interview on Fox News Sunday last week argued that the Founder’s couldn’t possibly have understood what the future would hold for this nation when they penned the Constitution and the Federalist Papers: “That being the case, and particularly since the Founding Fathers did not foresee how modern day would change individual behavior, government bodies can impose regulations on guns, Breyer concluded.” (emphasis mine)
(http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/12/12/breyer-founding-fathers-allowed-restrictions-guns/#ixzz18NrY5pkU)
It is exactly Justice Breyer’s kind of arrogance that inspires our fellow citizens to explain to the rest of us the way the world works. It is what motivates City Council’s to ban McDonald’s toys, or the First Lady to dictate nutritional standards to our children; that arrogance emboldens the hapless Prius owner to paste a Coexist sticker on their bumper–to remind us all that peace is the answer. In case we didn’t know.
So Justice Breyer in all his sophistication doesn’t believe the Founder’s exercised foresight? Allow me to quote from Federalist 34 where Hamilton is arguing for (among other things) a strong defense: “A cloud has been for some time hanging over the European world. If it should break forth into a storm, who can insure us that in its progress a part of its fury would not be spent upon us? …Let us recollect that peace or war will not always be left to our option; that however moderate or unambitious we may be, we cannot count upon the moderation, or hope to extinguish the ambition of others. …To judge from the history of mankind, we shall be compelled to conclude that the fiery and destructive passions of war reign in the human breast with much more powerful sway than the mild and beneficent sentiments of peace; and that to model our political systems upon speculations of lasting tranquillity, is to calculate on the weaker springs of the human character.
Those prescient statements seem to me to anticipate wars and attacks, jealousies and aggression and most importantly, to clearly understand the true nature of man. So, until the rest of us are civilized enough to Coexist, let’s offer support and prayer to the real hero’s–the ones who will quietly serve far from home during Christmas and the New Year, Easter and children’s birthday’s and wedding anniversaries. With deep humility and sacrifice.
An inadequately heartfelt Thank You members of our Military. May God Bless you and your families this Christmas Season especially.
Oh yes, and: Go Navy! Beat Army!
By, Nancy Tengler
http://www.wiseandfrugalgovernment.blogspot.com
In Federalist 21, Alexander Hamilton writes: “The natural cure for an ill-administration, in a popular or representative constitution, is a change of men.”
In November the country overwhelmingly demanded a change of men. A change of direction. A return to Conservative, Constitutional principles. The election was a repudiation of the reckless disregard of Nancy Pelosi‘s House, and Harry Reid‘s Senate for the Constitution so carefully and courageously crafted by our Founders. The Founder’s understood as Hamilton wrote in Federalist 22 that “The fabric of American empire ought to rest on the solid basis of THE CONSENT OF THE PEOPLE. The streams of national power ought to flow immediately from that pure, original fountain of all legitimate authority. “
In other words, the Founders respected the will of the people.
How far we’ve sunk.
Since the decisive election in November, instead of heeding the voice of the people, the left-leaning, Democratic majority continues the path they blazed with the unconventional hijinks employed to ram through Obamacare. They are rejecting the mandate of the election and the limitations of the Constitution. They do so arrogantly and without remorse. And their popularity has reached an historic low.
We might be able to suffer through Congress’s treachery if we were blessed with a courageous leader in the White House. Instead our President continues to whine about his legacy. The Hill reports: “In urging lawmakers to vote for his tax deal, President Obama is using one of his go-to lines from the healthcare debate, according to a Democratic lawmaker.
Obama is telling members of Congress that failure to pass the tax-cut legislation could result in the end of his presidency, Rep. Peter DeFazio (Ore.) said
“The White House is putting on tremendous pressure, making phone calls, the president is making phone calls saying this is the end of his presidency if he doesn’t get this bad deal,” he told CNN’s Eliot Spitzer” (Fabian).
The people spoke in November and the current ruling class has chosen to continue to ignore the very people they serve. They treat our governing framework with disdain and the President, instead of advocating for his constituents and protecting the Constitution, worries instead about his legacy. Hamilton had it right when he suggested the cure for an ill-administration is a “change of men” and that the “original fountain of all legitimate authority” is indeed the CONSENT OF THE PEOPLE.
Our current ruling class is imposing their will against the consent of those they serve. This is a dangerous and capricious precedent. Yet our president is focused merely on saving his presidency while the deficit quadruples and this cabal of self-serving bandits squanders our children’s future.
We need a change of men. And we need it fast.
Come January. Quick.
