Spending is a Democrat's Addiction

"The fact that we are here today to debate raising America’s debt limit is a sign of leadership failure." --Senator Barack Hussein Obama, March, 2006

Political Spendaholics

As The White House and Congress battle the clock to avert what the mainstream media refers to as "a catastrophic default", the lies and the demagoguery fly with wild abandon, never once second-guessed by the media. No, that media takes as gospel the words of Obama and gleefully regurgitates them over "news" broadcasts. The State-run Media is firing on all cylinders, to be sure. (I still wonder why the likes of Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward have as yet become sufficiently enraged at the sullying of their profession.)

 For starters, the President of the United States stating on national television that he can't guarantee that Social Security checks would go out was one of the most outrageous things he could have said. It was a blatant attempt to frighten seniors into accepting his furthering of our destruction through economic collapse. Each month the federal government receipts of tax revenues far outpaces outlays for Social Security, so if those checks don't go out, it's because Obama decided to punish the elderly for not getting his way.

There will be plenty of revenues to "meet our obligations", both in entitlement programs and the interest on our debt. What may be strained is our ability to continue funding for research into the mating habits of Alaskan halibut or construction of turtle tunnels under highways, to name a few examples. We will, however, not default on our obligations, unless the guys conducting the aforementioned activities decide that their grant money was promised and file suit. Good luck with that, boys and girls, but there is no reasonable excuse for Grandma not getting her Social Security check.

Obama continues to portray himself as above the political bickering, claiming to have the interests of the country in mind rather than brinkmanship or personal interest. He also says that he is willing to negotiate with Republicans, and that Speaker Boehner was inflexible in walking away from talks on Friday night.

But as Boehner spokesman Brendan Buck revealed on Saturday in an emailed statement before the meetings that day, the President is clearly interested in the 2012 elections. Buck wrote:

“Last night the president said, ‘the only bottom line that I have is that we have to extend this debt ceiling through the next election'. Now, we do not know what size or shape a final package will take, but it would be terribly unfortunate if the president was willing to veto a debt limit increase simply because the timetable prescribed would not be the ideal one for his reelection campaign.”

Playing for Keeps

Obama has said this on more than one occasion, and not one media pundit has grasped it. One can only imagine the howls of outrage from the media and the Left -- pardon the redundancy -- if a Republican had made any such statement in regard to such a grave issue.

Aside from the political posturing, however, is the fact that Obama and his Democrat cohorts in Congress exhibit an innate inability to curb spending of our money. Not only are they incapable of restraint, they are now demanding more from us, insisting that taxes be raised. Obama said the other night that he's "done well", and can afford higher taxes. That's great for him, but I still don't see him volunteering to pay more. The IRS would certainly not refuse a large check from Barack and Michelle, nor from any other rich Liberal who complains about "low taxes" on the wealthy.

Democrats simply cannot be trusted with our money, and their incessant desire to seize more of it should be alarming to every American -- at least those of us who actually pay them. In his first term as President, Ronald Reagan agreed to raise taxes based on the Democrats' promise to cut spending. Those cuts never came, and Reagan didn't fall for the ruse a second time. Then George H. W. Bush suffered defeat in his second term election because of his famous "read my lips, no new taxes" pledge that he reneged on with the same false promise from Democrats.

Today, the Democrats have been battling to eliminate the "Bush tax cuts", claiming that "they weren't paid for", a phrase all too familiar in Congressional-speak. But Democrats -- who traditionally portray themselves as the fiscally responsible party -- continually attempt to fix that which isn't broken.

In 2003, the headlines were about Bush's "massive" deficit and the harm it would wreak on our grandchildren. But with the passage of the second tax cut that year, the economy began to improve. From the AP in 2007 (notably the second-to-last year that Bush enjoyed a Republican-controlled House):

The federal deficit is running sharply lower through the first eight months of this budget year as growth in revenues continues to outpace the growth in spending. 

The Treasury Department said that the deficit through May totaled $148.5 billion, down 34.6 percent from the same period a year ago. 

For the 2007 budget year, which ends on Sept. 30, the Congressional Budget Office is projecting a federal deficit of $177 billion. That would be down 28.7 percent from last year's imbalance of $248.2 billion, which had been the lowest deficit in four years.

2003 was the worst of the Bush years, with a $455 billion deficit, which both the Democrats and media claimed was catastrophic. Each year of Obama, though, has seen deficits of a trillion dollars more than Bush's, and now they want to raise the debt ceiling by $2.5 trillion more.

And Obama wants it to last until after the 2012 elections so the problem doesn't impede his possible reelection. Since the math indicates that four more years of Obama would equate to at least $60 trillion in more deficits. That, my friends, would be catastrophic.

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Losing My Fear Of Sharks

I used to marvel at the conditions that would cause people to flee a country through shark infested waters on make-shift rafts, but now I am developing a keen understanding for such motivation, courtesy of the democrats in control of everything and also the Obama administration. It has become increasingly evident that the cabal currently in charge has taken its temporary electoral victory to mean that we the people are eager for the type of "care" it intends to inflict upon us. And they are preparing to dole out a heaping helping of it.

Determined to implement socialized medicine - cloaked as the more palatable "health care for all" - our government is preparing to tax everything they can possibly imagine in order to fund the program. If the "Tea Party" endorsers thought they had a just cause before, there are much more draconian measures on the horizon at which to tilt, and the "parties" will no doubt become more frequent and much larger. My hope is that they become proportionately more effective, too.

On Tuesday, the Senate Finance Committee began exploring new tax targets and reexamining some old favorites for enhanced taxation, all for the purpose of paying for the reform they envision regarding the health of the citizenry. While their motivation is ostensibly for the benefit of the commonwealth, I maintain that it is for nothing more than suffocating control of the people.

Cigarettes are being considered for yet another two dollar per pack tax, and alcohol is also in the cross hairs. Big Brother is paving the way for controlling peoples behavior. But that's not enough. The prospect of taxing company health benefits is once again rearing its ugly head in the hallowed halls of congress, possibly removing the pre-tax status of employee deductions. Additionally, congress is eyeing health savings accounts - or "flex spending" accounts - for taxation, complaining that the accounts encourage “excess consumption” of health services. Common sense would dictate that if a person's own funds - wisely set aside to cover the cost of health care - encourage "excess consumption", then the erroneous perception by people that their coverage is "free" will cause even more of a run on services.

The difference is, however, that the democrat, would-be perpetrators of Universal Health Care know that they can't ration services for people who pay or have private coverage. This is why they seek to control that aspect of our lives.

Between the government takeover of corporations, the hiring binge currently under way by the feds, and the specter of having my behavior regulated by the State, I'm beginning to feel that the president's name should be Fidel. I am not ready to live in Cuba or anything like it. When Obama succeeds in "levelling the playing field" by creating equal misery for all, the only benefit is the prospect that I will not have to run uphill toward the shore, where my raft will be waiting. Sharks seem suddenly less frightening, and my understanding of the motivation is complete.

I wonder how long it will take to drift to Australia?

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Is Stress Taxing Your Health

Talk about a snowball effect. Stress is one of the things that causes many health-related problems in people and there is an abundance of it these days, what with the economy running downhill like a spring melt in the Rockies and the democrats using a flame thrower on the snow at the summit. Many people are thankful for the health benefits their employers provide, albeit at a still-substantial cost to the individual. Now, however, the Obama administration and congress are preparing to heap more stress on the people in the form of taxation, once again. Yes, change is in the air.

Despite his campaign rhetoric last fall, Obama is now signaling that he will be "receptive" to a plan being prepared by congress to begin taxing employer-provided health care benefits as income. The first thing that comes to mind, at least to me, is that this is a precursor to socialized medicine or, for the more politically correct thinker, "universal health care". It is a way to smoothly transition the American people into the mindset that government is now providing your health care plans through taxation. Once everyone settles in and gets used to the notion, government can formally seize the reins and we'll be socialized once and for all.

There is a side note to this possibility, however. When John McCain floated this idea during the presidential campaign, the Obama camp trounced it soundly. Obama called McCain's idea “the largest middle-class tax increase in history.” And we all know that Obama is going to cut taxes for ninety-five percent of all working Americans, right? As we're now learning, that was simply the sales pitch for the magic elixir, that which was designed to land Obama in the White House. Mission accomplished, but now we know what snake oil tastes like and that is has none of the benefits and all of the side effects.

It is peculiar how all of the broken campaign promises from this young neophyte - and in such a truncated time frame - have gone all but unnoticed by the press that were once such vociferous watchdogs for the country. Whether they share the same ideology as the president - something which seems a rhetorical point - or not, one would at least expect them to do their jobs and point out the obvious. Whether well meaning or not, a lie is still a lie, a broken promise just that.

Without a strong voice of opposition from that other party in congress, we may as well resign ourselves to the fact that stress will increase and continue to tax our health. Now Government is going to tax it as well.

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