I feel downhearted baby..
I’m extremely discouraged with the path our country is taking.
I heard this morning on NPR that the President’s tax code reform commission is looking at making major changes. “Nothing is off the table”; home mortgage interest, charitable deductions, the deduction for payment of local taxes, closing “loopholes”, etc. They’re claiming that the changes will be revenue neutral. Many of the items discussed in the interview were those that average, middle class taxpayers count on to help keep their tax burden reasonable.
Private social security accounts didn’t work in England after Margaret Thatcher got them enacted. Many Britons lost 20% to 30% of their fund’s value prior to retirement. Parliament has had to enact special retirement welfare programs to help the folks who lost money in the private accounts. Fees and charges benefited the fund managers and further weakened the value of individual accounts.
We’re on an international crusade to bring democracy to the world. We’ve spent billions of dollars and hundreds of lives bringing a semblance democracy to Afghanistan and Iraq. What are we going to do to democratize North Korea, Zimbabwe, Togo, and other nations? More billions? More lives, more shattered families?
The Federalist Society wants to revert constitutional interpretation to pre-1937 views. That was a time when the constitution was viewed as a tool to protect the ability of wealthy businessmen (remember the robber barons?) to create and maintain massive monopolies. Who is the Federalist Society? Antonin Scalia, Supreme Court Judge, Robert Bork, unsuccessful Supreme Court nominee, John Ashcroft, past Attorney General who draped a veil over the statue of nude Liberty in the foyer of the Justice Department Building, Orin Hatch, Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, many top attorneys of cabinet-level agencies, and 20,000 to 30,000 other attorneys across the country among others. Their plan is to imbed like-thinking judges on federal benches at all levels.
Zealots want to narrow our interpretation of marriage to “their” interpretation of marriage. They claim cartoon characters are homosexual. They want do away with a woman’s ability, and to-date constitutional right, to control her reproductive decisions. They want to teach “intelligent design” in schools as opposed to evolution. They want to legislate morality to reflect their personal beliefs.
Members of Congress and the President are doing all they can to increase the federal deficit in an attempt to eventually reduce the size and control of government. Their plan is to drastically cut government programs to lower the deficit. They’ll starve those programs out of existence. Another tool they’re using to achieve their goal islowering taxes to help hasten the starvation.
I ask, no beg, these people to read and take to heart the following quote.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the consent of the governed, -- That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new guards for their future security.
I heard this morning on NPR that the President’s tax code reform commission is looking at making major changes. “Nothing is off the table”; home mortgage interest, charitable deductions, the deduction for payment of local taxes, closing “loopholes”, etc. They’re claiming that the changes will be revenue neutral. Many of the items discussed in the interview were those that average, middle class taxpayers count on to help keep their tax burden reasonable.
Private social security accounts didn’t work in England after Margaret Thatcher got them enacted. Many Britons lost 20% to 30% of their fund’s value prior to retirement. Parliament has had to enact special retirement welfare programs to help the folks who lost money in the private accounts. Fees and charges benefited the fund managers and further weakened the value of individual accounts.
We’re on an international crusade to bring democracy to the world. We’ve spent billions of dollars and hundreds of lives bringing a semblance democracy to Afghanistan and Iraq. What are we going to do to democratize North Korea, Zimbabwe, Togo, and other nations? More billions? More lives, more shattered families?
The Federalist Society wants to revert constitutional interpretation to pre-1937 views. That was a time when the constitution was viewed as a tool to protect the ability of wealthy businessmen (remember the robber barons?) to create and maintain massive monopolies. Who is the Federalist Society? Antonin Scalia, Supreme Court Judge, Robert Bork, unsuccessful Supreme Court nominee, John Ashcroft, past Attorney General who draped a veil over the statue of nude Liberty in the foyer of the Justice Department Building, Orin Hatch, Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, many top attorneys of cabinet-level agencies, and 20,000 to 30,000 other attorneys across the country among others. Their plan is to imbed like-thinking judges on federal benches at all levels.
Zealots want to narrow our interpretation of marriage to “their” interpretation of marriage. They claim cartoon characters are homosexual. They want do away with a woman’s ability, and to-date constitutional right, to control her reproductive decisions. They want to teach “intelligent design” in schools as opposed to evolution. They want to legislate morality to reflect their personal beliefs.
Members of Congress and the President are doing all they can to increase the federal deficit in an attempt to eventually reduce the size and control of government. Their plan is to drastically cut government programs to lower the deficit. They’ll starve those programs out of existence. Another tool they’re using to achieve their goal islowering taxes to help hasten the starvation.
I ask, no beg, these people to read and take to heart the following quote.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the consent of the governed, -- That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new guards for their future security.
posted by steve | 10:35 AM
1 Comments:
I'm all for 'throwing off' this government. I keep wondering why more people aren't just absolutely freaking out. There isn't a day that goes by recently that something isn't happening in this country that is antidemocratic, autocratic, and unjust. How in the hell are we going to hand this mess to our children?
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