Right v. Left

I grew up a Southern Baptist conservative. My first presidential vote was for Reagan. Then I voted Libertarian for a couple of cycles. I voted for Ross Perot when he ran, though in hindsight that was probably a bad idea. Then Nader. I voted for Obama twice because his sense of idealism resonated with me. (Had the 2008 race been McCain v Hillary I probably would have voted for McCain.) I voted for Hillary this last cycle only because it was the closest thing to an Obama 3rd term. lol. And of course because I thought Trump would be an unmitigated disaster, which he is proving to be. My political views are civil libertarian, socially liberal, and fiscally moderate. I believe that the free market works, but it has no soul, so government can and must intervene to regulate where it is needed, and to provide help for our citizens who need it. I think government when it is serving the public interest is a force for good, but government can also become an unchecked cancer on the body politic. I believe it is human nature to be self-serving, but that the modern, humanistic, Age of Reason world has given rise to a sense of social justice and empathy that we must not let die because it makes us a better species. I believe in science, the scientific method, and empirical evidence, and anyone who denies these forces is standing against Nature and Reason. I believe the axiom that an eagle requires both a left wing and a right wing to fly. I also believe in the saying “Conservatives draw lines that should never be crossed. Liberals erase lines that should never have been drawn.” I believe there is value in both the left and right, and the tension between them is necessary and productive. The public interest and the private interest are equally valid concerns, and the sacrifice of one to the other can only produce instability and poor results.

BREAD

George W. Bush gave the lowest 20% of tax payers an annual tax cut of $74. That was very kind of him. $74 a year is about $6 more a month, which would buy an extra 4 loaves of bread a month, 1 a week. An extra loaf of bread a week. GWB, you are so compassionate!

At the same time, GWB gave the highest 20% of tax payers an annual reduction of $8,421. That equates to an extra 468 loaves of bread per month, or 117 loaves per week! That’s a lot of bread! So he gave the richest 20% of people 117 times more “relief” than he gave to the poorest, JUST BECAUSE they made more money. What is “fair” about that?

Also, the GWB tax cuts gave to the highest 1% of tax payers an annual reduction of $97,028, which equates to 1,348 extra loaves of bread per week. So, GWB gave to the very richest people in the country 1348 times more “relief” than he gave to the poorest, JUST BECAUSE they were the very richest people in the country. What is “fair” about that? That seems like the opposite of fair to me.

And now GOP lawmakers are fighting tooth and nail against Obama’s efforts to make sure the lower and middle classes are able to to keep their extra bread, so that the sad, struggling rich can continue to afford to put an extra 1348 loaves of bread per week on the table for their starving families. What the GOP has lost in morality it seems to have made up for in insanity.

They want to push the entire nation over the fiscal cliff in order to save that extra bread for the richest of the rich.

http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/numbers/displayatab.cfm?Docid=1860&DocTypeID=2