No Representation Without Taxation!

I have a feeling this is going to be long, and I don't have a lot of time. So I am just going to type, spell-check, and let it rip. I apologize in advance for any errors.

The election is upon us. We live in, without a doubt, the greatest nation on the earth. I have become, however, very troubled by the trend I am witnessing both prior to and during this most recent campaign. I have often reflected on the following quote:


"A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship. The average age of the world's greatest civilizations has been 200 years.


Great nations rise and fall. The people go from bondage to spiritual truth, to great courage, from courage to liberty, from liberty to abundance, from abundance to selfishness, from selfishness to complacency, from complacency to apathy, from apathy to dependence, from dependence back again to bondage."

The author of this quote, to my knowledge is unknown. It is often attributed to Alexander Tytler, a Scottish lawyer and writer. Frankly, I don't care who wrote it. I'm not sure I can agree precisely with the process described, but I can say that I agree with the general principle. I ask you, at what stage in this process do we find our beloved nation? The words complement a thought that I have often had, and that I may have expressed to more than one of you on occasion. Many years ago, the founders of this nation rose up against the concept that they could be taxed arbitrarily without having for themselves a voice in the government. I submit that the pendulum has nearly swung to the opposite end of its path, an equally dangerous proposition --that of representation without taxation.

What do I mean? I mean that as soon as we reach a critical mass of voters in this country who carry little or no liability to pay for the function of government, yet who realize their collective power to lay claim to its seemingly infinite benefits, we will once again have tyranny.

This reminds me of another quote. Winston Churchill once said, "The best argument against democracy is a five minute discussion with the average voter." I don't blame the voter completely in this age. I blame partly a ridiculous system in which candidates have been campaigning for over 2 years, and all we've heard from them are soundbites. I blame a media who has abandoned all pretense of objectivity, and simply signed on as the media wing of the Obama campaign. But the voter is not blameless. In today's culture of celebrity worship, too many prefer to spend their time reading Hollywood gossip magazines and watching the endless drivel broadcast on MTV or E, as if an update on who is in rehab now is far more important than getting to really know the person who will become our next President. Sadly, it is also these voters who likely embrace the political speeches made by their favorite actors about the important political issues of our day, as if that in some perverse way satisfies their civic duty.

America appears ready to elect a man it does not know as President. For those of you reading this blog who will cast your vote for John McCain, I thank you. Even if, like me, there are many others for whom you would prefer to cast your vote besides McCain, we must play the hand we have been dealt. A lack of the best choice must not preclude us from making the better choice.


To those of you who may be reading this blog who intend to cast your vote for Barack Obama, I ask you to consider the following.


Do you know him? Can you trust him? Is his ideology consistent with the Constitution? Does his view of America truly align with your own? In my opinion, Obama is a dishonest and deceitful man. He has consistently changed his positions based on his audience. And I don't just mean the subtle wordsmithing that (unfortunately) accompanies every political campaign. I mean blatantly conflicting statements. In short, I believe the man shamelessly lies in order to sway the hearts of voters.


As an example, over the last week Obama has slowly been changing one of his most prominent lines. Did you believe Obama when he said that only those making above $250,000 a year would see their taxes go up? What about his plan to let the Bush tax cuts expire? Doesn't that automatically increase everyone's taxes? Indeed it does. But somehow Obama has gotten away with the lie. Even worse, now Obama's commercials set the threshold at $200,000. Joe Biden sets it at $150,000. Some day in the near future, a great many Americans are going to wake up and suddenly realize that they are officially "rich." Oh, they won't feel rich. They'll wonder how they became so rich while they are still just getting by on their income. But they will feel the consequences in the form of paying more of their "fair share."



Speaking of fair share, do you really feel comfortable electing a man who bases his tax policies on his own idea of what he believes is fair for the wealthy to pay? Shouldn't the government be concerned only with collecting adequate revenue to carry out its legitimate functions? Yet when Obama was asked why he would want to raise taxes, when the historical data shows an increase in federal revenue when taxes are lowered, Obama rested on fairness. Sure, revenue may be greater if we cut taxes on the rich, but that just isn't fair. The average voter may be shocked to know just how fair the rich's share is. The top 1% of taxpayers collect approximately 19% of income, but carry 39% of the tax burden. Is that fair? The top 10% of income earners pay over 70% of the taxes.

Do you feel comfortable electing a man who wants to punish businesses and the "rich" with higher taxes during a devastating financial crisis? If so, please explain to me how that will help. What we need is successful businesses and more jobs. Obama says he will create jobs. The problem is that Obama doesn't know how to create a job. It is businesses that create jobs, and when businesses are taxed more they spend less creating jobs. Thus, McCain's yet unanswered question to Obama during the final debate, why would you want to raise anyone's taxes in this economy? Obama argues that it is the middle-class and the poor who need these "tax cuts." I will leave aside for now the lie that is the Obama "tax cut" for the poor. As a man named Neal Boortz often says, when was the last time you got a job from a poor person? You don't. Do you want the government to pinch your employer more so that your employer has to figure out how to cut costs to protect his business? Those cost cuts will eventually cost someone his or her job -- maybe mine, maybe yours. Obama wants more money to carry out his spending programs, because he thinks he has the solutions, through government, for our problems. But government handouts don't create jobs. When has the government been effective at solving problems best handled by competition and the free market?

Do you feel comfortable electing a man with so many questionable ties, and so many radical ideologies? I will not go into each association that I find troubling, but here is a quick list:

- William Ayers
- Bernedine Dorn
- Reverand J. Wright
- Father M. Pfleger
- Khalid al-Monsour
- Tony Rezko
- ACORN


These are Obama's friends. If you don't know who they are, and you plan to vote, you better find out before tomorrow. Obama has been able to get by saying that these people aren't advisers, and aren't part of his campaign. I don't care if they aren't your advisers! If John McCain was friends with the grand-master of the KKK, do you think it would matter to people that he didn't list them as advisers?

Perhaps most importantly, Obama's ideology is, to be blunt, un-American. Obama lamented, on tape in 2001, that during the civil rights movement the Supreme Court did not act create redistributive change. Meaning, he wished the Supreme Court had used its power to put in place the type of wealth redistribution that Obama wants to enact legislatively. I want you to, for just a moment, imagine what the reaction would have been of the founding fathers had they been presented with the concept of taking money from Joe in order to pass it on to John in the form of a "tax cut," or "refundable tax credit." That is not freedom. That is not liberty. It is tyranny. In basic terms, it is called theft. America may be at a point where it doesn't like to hear this, but you simply do not have the right to someone else's property. You do not have the right to the fruits of someone else's labor. The constitution was meant to protect your right to your property. Why do you believe it is any politician's right to take it just to give it to you?


Are you comfortable electing a man who has stated that he will put policies in place that will essentially bankrupt the coal industry? Obama wants to make the cost of doing business, in the form of taxes on carbon emissions, so onerous that a very large industry in America will suffer greatly and perhaps collapse. Keep in mind that 49% of our electricity comes from coal. Keep in mind that hundreds of thousands of people are employed by or otherwise have a job because of the coal industry. Does Obama factor in those lost jobs when he talks about the ones he is going to "create"? When discussing the great benefit of his "tax cuts" for the middle class did Obama factor in the huge increase in cost we will see for our electricity when he puts a stranglehold on the coal industry and opposes any more nuclear power? I think not.

Lastly, I want you to ask yourself one simple question as you examine the qualifications of the Presidential candidates. What has Obama ever accomplished? What has the man ever done that makes you think he is qualified for the highest office in this country? Perhaps when you are done criticizing Sarah Palin -- a successful governor -- for her lack of experience, you can turn your intellectual focus on Obama. Are you really willing to roll the dice on a candidate whose experience and abilities we know next to nothing about? When the now infamous "3am phone call" comes, the President of the United States doesn't have the luxury of "voting present." I value this country and my liberty far too much to cast a vote for the type of change Barack Obama promises.