Promises mean nothing
to liberals
Matthew Caster
Since the beginning of time, mankind has
contemplated two inevitable truths: death and taxes. Thanks to advances
in
modern medicine, we are now often able
to cheat the former, at least for a while. Thanks to ignorant politicians
in
Washington, we may soon be paying a lot
more of the latter.
I don't know about you, but I don't particularly
care for paying taxes. Maybe I'm just weird. There's just something about
knowing that at least 15 percent of every
dollar I earn on the job goes to that money-munching machine in Washington,
D.C.
When I spend the money I actually do get
out of my paycheck, I pay even more taxes. Every gallon of gasoline I buy
includes
nearly 40 cents of tax. Every purchase
I make is accompanied by that horrible 8.25 percent sales tax. When all's
said and
done, I'm lucky if I see 60 cents of every
dollar I earn.
That is why I was so jubilant when, last
March, President Bush's $1.3 trillion tax cut exploded through Congress.
I say it
exploded because the bill had no trouble
sliding through the House, and squeaked through an evenly divided Senate
with 12
votes to spare.
The best part about this tax legislation
is that everybody got something out of it. Every tax bracket was slashed,
even mine,
way down at the bottom. I was giddy when
I thought about how much more money my meager paychecks would bring home.
But those were different times. This is
now.
Now we're in a recession for the first
time in a decade. Unemployment is higher than it's been for many years.
The dark
economic clouds now cast over this great
nation seem darker still as we are reminded of the smoldering symbols of
American
capitalism, now a heap of rubble at the
south end of Manhattan.
The Democrats in Congress, with an eye
toward the coming midterm elections, have attempted to fault the Bush tax
cut for
this economic slowdown. Indeed, Senator
Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.) and House Minority Leader Richard Gephardt (D-Mo.)
are
now leading an effort that would postpone
the tax cut until the government deficit is restored to a government surplus.
But the tax cut is not the cause of this
recession, nor should it be postponed. First of all, the most recent economic
data
indicates that the recession began around
the same time the Bush plan got through Congress, i.e., before he signed
it into
law.
Second, any economist knows that fiscal
policy takes eight to 12 years before its effects really take hold. That
indicates that
tax policy by George H. W. Bush or Bill
Clinton probably had more of an effect on the onset of this recession.
There's no way
liberals can blame the elder Bush ...
They already blamed him for the last recession.
My guess is that the massive tax hike Clinton
signed in 1993 sucked enough money out of our pockets to finally have an
effect.
A tax cut is the shot in the arm this country
needs to move down the road to economic recovery. The greatest contributor
to
our economic production is consumer spending;
what better way to get Americans to spend money than to give them more
of
it to spend?
These plans by Congressional Democrats
to postpone the tax cut are unwarranted, and in fact nothing more than
an outright
lie to the American people. You and I
both were promised tax relief last March.
The instant Bush signed that bill into
law, a contract was signed with the American people. That contract says
that over the
next decade, all our tax rates are going
down. The liberals in Washington want to break that contract.
There is no other way to put it, friends.
Anyone who thinks this tax break should be postponed or eliminated has
but one goal
in mind: to take away hard-earned money
promised to you.
You want to pay higher taxes? Do it, and
just tear up your refund check when it arrives — but leave me out of it.
I've got better
ways to spend my earnings.
God bless America.
