Dakota Beacon

The other day I ran into an acquaintance at the grocery store checkout.  Kari asked me what I thought of a current debate over the building of a new public library.  I freely gave her my opinion (that we don’t need to spend one @#$%&&&* dollar on one more @#$&%$&& public project right now, with more people out of work and higher taxes, etc.).  We have two fine, functioning libraries here in addition to the university library.  Everyone has his own computer.  Kari agreed, then opened the spigot on a gusher of vitriol.  Her point was that property taxes are now no longer bearable by the working person.

Excellent point. What did she think of our president? Her expression softened immediately.  “I like him,” she confided.  When I asked how she thought we could afford him I got the usual.  “Don’t tell me how great George Bush was,” she said through clenched teeth.  “He gave everything to the rich and got us into this mess!”  And with a stern look of warning, “I’m a Democrat, we’re Democrats.”

There was no opportunity to pursue the discussion as we had reached the door.  What I should like to have asked her is which rich Americans we should take everything away from to get our country back on track.  On Wednesday President Obama delivered a speech regarding our national debt and his "plan" to bring it under control.  Basically, it is to take everything that's not nailed down from the rich.  And what's nailed down, in terms of home mortgage deductions would go too, including the nails themselves.  Well, leaving aside the utter destruction this last item is sure to have on our housing market and the many, many workers who depend upon it, it doesn't seem like this kind of measure will do the trick anyway.  Can the "rich" pull the entire weight of our debt? 

I did a little research.  Let’s start with our cost of living.  Every time the sun comes up we find we’ve spent another $4 billion – that is, after we’ve accounted for taxes taken in.  In other words, we are “overdrawing our account" by $4 billion every single day – not every week or every month or every year, but every single day.  So now we know what we have to raise through the confiscation of private wealth “for the common good”.   We need a “plan B” for when, any day, the Chinese decide to quit loaning us money.

Let’s suppose we had the power – just suspend the Constitution – to take away all of the wealth from America’s richest people, you know, those capitalists to whom George Bush “gave” all of our money and tax breaks.  Forbes lists the wealthiest Americans.  First on the list is Bill Gates.  Let’s just take away his company, his patents, seize his cash, bank accounts and all the rest of his assets.  He is believed by reliable sources to have $40.7 billion.  Today is April 14.  This would see us through until April 25.  Then we need to scare up the next guy.  That would be Warren Buffet.  He has $30.5 billion.  Okay, now we’re good for another 7-1/2 days.  Paul Allen has $20.1 billion.  Another 5 days.  Paul Ellison can buy us a little over 4 days, with $16.6 billion.  The Walton family could see us a little further.  Of course at some point we will have gotten down to those who can only get us one day: Philip Knight (Nike), with $4.2 billion, Michael Bloomberg, $4.8 billion (that would be worth one day and a little over 5 hours). Facebook genius Mark Zuckerberg could be robbed and get us one day.  Donald Trump’s $1.6 billion would buy us less than half a day.  Soon we’re down to the “little guys” – people who earn the small bucks like Glenn Beck, who only earned $30 million last year, and small potatoes like George Lucas or Stephen Spielberg or the heirs of Charles Schultz.  That would be only a few more minutes on our debt clock.  And, of course, all of this would be a "one-shot deal".  We could not go back and do it again.  Firstly, it would now be gone and secondly, no more will be generated, because anyone smart enough to create this kind of wealth will leave our shores for a healthier business climate.

When we’ve run through all of our millionaires we could go after the endowments of Harvard and Yale.  Harvard’s is worth between $27 and $28 billion and Yale’s is catching up.  The two would come close to getting us 10 days put together.  Well, you smart folks get it.  You know where this goes.  Millionaires could be stripped of their very underwear and keep us going for only a few minutes. Taking it away from the rich will never solve our problem.

And that is if we take away every penny they own and all their other assets.  How many jobs would this cost us?  How many “little people” would suffer whose livelihoods depend upon the “big guys” being able to keep them working?  And who would pay their taxes? Does anyone think that if we destroy the business climate any further that these people will not leave?

The hard truth is that we are not in trouble because we haven’t been thieving from the “rich” fast enough.  We are in deep, deep trouble because we spend too much.  Our federal government is spending money at an ever faster rate.  We cannot sustain it.  We cannot feed this monster any more.  Kari was right about it being George Bush’s fault.  He spent like a whole Russian navy on a binge.  The current administration is just a continuation, speeding ever faster, of the same irresponsible spending in which Bush engaged.

The only way out of this is not to nibble around the edges.  It is good to get rid of Planned Parenthood support and the National Endowment for the Arts, but The Republican Establishment is much too timid.  We are facing a deluge – an enormous tidal wave of red ink. We need to get in the black within the next few years, less than a decade.  This can be done.  It can be done by honestly looking at our history and our current picture.  We have a Cabinet level Department of Education we never needed before Jimmy Carter.  Education was better then than it is now.  It was far cheaper and more responsive to the needs of communities.  Think what this department costs us every day.  With a current annual budget of $72 billion, we need to cut this before we dip into Bill Gates’ fortune.  At least Gates employs quite a few Americans, directly and indirectly, and continues to contribute to our daily lives, not drain them.  The Ed Department does not.

The Energy Department, currently run by Secretary Chu, has helped us into massive overspending.  It’s own spending is not enough.  It’s tentacles reach down into our industries and businesses to strangle them, even our own homes, costing us our money at the same time it steals our freedom. The EPA is quickly becoming a dictatorship all on its own and costing us every minute.

Congress and the Senate must repeal entirely Obamacare.  Not only can we not afford it at either the state or federal level, but it is completely outside the Constitution.

We could cut massive waste of money if we bring our armed forces home and conserve our strength for battles that actually have something to do with our national interest.  We can cut our spending on the UN and its counterintuitive programs.  We are struggling under the mammoth burden of supporting all this anti-Americanism.  We are about to lose our nation, our freedom, while we are paying for anti-American propaganda and worse. Now, I do not favor not paying our troops.  I personally think it required a pretty tough crust in Democrats to blackmail Conservative Republicans with the "not paying our troops" argument in order to hang on to Planned Parenthood.  Why didn't we just say, "Is Planned Parenthood more important to you that our troops?"

Undoubtedly there are hundreds more – even tiny things like taking away Michelle’s staff.  It is difficult for many of us who ponder whether we can buy a loaf of bread in the grocery store to figure out why she needs a staff with a nearly $2 million/year budget.  We neither hired nor elected her.  She doesn’t have a job.  She is a “luxury” we can’t afford.  you know, a million here, a million there . . . pretty soon you're talking real money. And anyway, the Obamas can well afford to pay for their own help.  I think they would qualify as part of that "rich" group.

It seems that these days anyone who asks that we abide by the letter of our Constitution is labeled some kind of “nut”.  But when we take the time to read that document, we see easily why America used to work but doesn’t anymore.  The federal government is doing things and buying things it was never intended or equipped to do or buy.  Let’s try just going back to what worked.

Now, my brother - who often gets brilliant ideas - thought of an interesting game for Congress.  They could challenge this president: “You show us the birth certificate and we’ll keep the government going.”  Is that certificate worth $70 billion?  We know it’s worth a million or two so far because that's what he's paid up to this point to keep it under wraps.  Just how far will Obama go to keep it locked in the drawer?  Find out just how important women's '''health" is to him. Will he show it to us?  Is he a native-born American and thus Constitutional eligible to be our President -  or just a felon who has committed perjury?  You have to admit that it’s an intriguing idea.

Yes, Kari.  George Bush is responsible – not for not stealing from the “rich”.  After all, the "rich” - the top 1% or so - already do pay around 40% of the taxes collected.  He's guilty of spending money that was not his, to do things he was not empowered or intended to do under our Constitution.  We all need to accept this and stop defending Bush. Spending is a drug. And now  Obama is just doing more and more and more of the same.




Sally Morris is a member of Americans for Constitutional Government and the Executive Committee of the Valley Tea Party Conservative Coalition and writes for The Dakota Beacon.