As a centrist (or shall we call it a realistic) Republican, I often find myself shaking my head or getting my butt critiqued by people for what I would call the unrealistic sidde of my party. You know them - the ones jumping all over Newt Gingrich's Illegal Immigration stance, and getting nothing done for signing no new tax pledges. While calling it principled may be one thing, it's that refusal to bend that is slowly wrecking our country. Principles are nice, but let me ask you: If you are anti-capita punishment, do you not shoot the guy who broke into your house and has a gun at your wife's head. Just an example...
Back to reality... Watching Fox News Sunday, like I usually do, Chris Wallace all but admitted that the GOP is shootig itself in the foot this week. He's right... Immigration is a tough nut to crack. We can try to keep illegals from crossing the border, but it's a limited effectiveness, along with monitoring businesses who hire them. Michele Bachmann may be trying to rile up the right wing/Tea Party faction of the party, but there are two truths: first the Tea Party DOESN'T run the GOP, or make up the majority of it. Secondly, Bachmann hasn't put forth a single realistic planon any issue since she got in the race... She's grasping at straws, and if she wants to turn the steering wheel as far right as it will go, let her - but don't give her the time of day, because she's hurting the party...
The real killer of issues this week is the upcoming ending of the Payroll Tax Cut. Barack Obama is licking his chops over this one, because he has the Republicans in Congress bent over the trash can. The cut was a $20 per week cut on just about everybody in America. You might remember it a couple years ago. Well, it had a window - and that window ends at year's end. You'd think that a party opposed to raising taxes, which ending a cut does, would have an easy time on this one. Uhhh........ No.
Of course, Republicans want two things: the tax cuts to be paid for, and for it to not hurt upper income earners - those who 'create' jobs. OK, for those of you who haven't gotten this on the first 244 times I explained how jobs are created, I'll do it again.... Here we go.
Much as we'd like to think so, business owners do not just hire new employees because they personally have more money in the bank. Dickens may have forgotten to mention this, but Ebenezer Scrooge dies eventually. he's not around anymore. Business owners hire more people because the demand for products necessitates hiring more people to make those goods and services. If they make more money without having to hire more people, they are entitled and God Bless them... Saying more people will be hired because the upper crust has more available cash is inherently disengenuous. Not a lie, just incorrect.
How do jobs get created then? By giving CONSUMERS more money to spend and buy products, which creates demand. Rich people's extra income basically goes into the bank, middle class extra income goes back into the economy. It's that simple, and it's time the GOP stopped believing the bullshit that their donors tell them. For now, extend the cuts. Long term, end all the tax breaks for everybody, and install a three-tier Flat Tax, so everyone pays taxes, with one standard deduction at the Poverty Line. It's almost too simple....
Wallace had Jon Kyl, fresh off his Stupor Committee victory - OOPS! We mean embarrassment - on the show, and Kyl looked like a MegaRich apologist... Luckily, he's leaving. He could have used this period to do the right thing without re-election worries, but he didn't. We hope the rest of the party isn't going this way... If we become a bunch of 'principled', unrealistic morons, then we will get our asses kicked next year - Obama or not.
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1 comment:
We'll, I did miss the blinky pineapple in the roadway on the second course..... But we'll cover that one next week!
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