On the Threat of Democratic Control of Congress and Taxation

It is high time that the 24 hour televised news cycle as well at the media, in general, stop contributing to the hyperbolic, rhetorical question, “Will the newly elected Democratic majority in Congress raise taxes?” The answer is that an increase in taxes it is inevitable. Moreover; the media really needs to stop repeated showing and repeating the erroneous speculations of anti-government business spokespersons, and advocacies such as “Tax Watch” and other would-be, wanna-be pundits and economists of all political stripes.

Get real! Taxation is a fact of life and America needs to get a grip on this reality. Stop buying into such foolish notions that taxes paid to government “is your money.” Taxes to government is no less the costs of government, and once paid is the government’s money; it is not my money—hogwash.

It must be understood that governments provide services, (the effectiveness and efficiency may be justifiably questioned) and just as we pay for television cable and telephone services, we must also pay for the services rendered by government—at all levels. I seriously doubt that there is anyone foolish enough to go down to his/her local television cable service office and claim that the money paid for services rendered belongs to him or her.

It is easy to ignore the realities of taxation and fall victim to such nonsensical notions which are propagated in the name of some would-be newsworthy story or political advantage.

When considering the question of whether a congressional majority will or will not raise taxes, consider this:
It may be consider an article of faith that non-governmental employees expect some sort of annual (cost-of-living) increase in their salaries. It should be understood that federal government employees are not exempt from the exigencies of living in a society where costs of living increases are just as inevitable as the sun rising in the East and setting in the West. Based on this reality, it should come as no surprise that federal government employees, just as their non-governmental counterparts, expect an annual increase in salary?

That said; consider that as of FY 2003, there were 2,428,330 million employees earning a living as federal government employees. If only once during a single two-year congressional cycle every civilian employee is granted a one dollar per hour increase in salary this would result in 2,428,330 million dollars per hour; and this, by the way, does not include Americans serving in the (active) armed forces.

On the 2nd day of the 110th Congress, now Ranking Member of the House Armed Services Committee, Duncan Hunter (R. Calif) speaking from the floor of the House of Representatives noted that under the Republican majority in the109th Congress military salaries were increased by 40%.

There are some 1.4 to 1.9 million (depending on who you might read) Americans serving in the armed services of the United States; how did they pay for this increase??? They didn’t, and while holding to traditional electoral campaign mantra of “no new taxes” this crew put the costs on the deficit credit card. And as history is doomed to repeat itself we have a crew that thinks it is possible to increase spending while cutting taxes. This is reminiscent of addition and subtraction during the Ronald Reagan administration with the same results—“no new taxes.”

It is striking that in each case, claims that tax cuts contribute to economic growth, job increases, and a growing economy occurs with monumental increases in defense spending.
In Reagan’s case, excessive spending was necessary to prevent those godless Soviets from getting ahead in the arms race which would result in their “taking us over.”
In the latter instance, defense-spending increases are directly related to the fiasco in Iraq, and are necessary for victory over the terrorists, lest we will have to “fight them in the streets of America.” Please, America can you see what is going on in Iraq happening in New York City, Chicago, Los Angles, Atlanta, and so on?
Get a grip America, wake up; think and begin to demand that the media play it straight.
The brotherman