This is me on my soapbox. I’m not trying to be impartial.
In Ohio, Obama was approached by a man who said, “Your new tax plan’s going to tax me more.”
Obama replies, “It’s not that I want to punish your success. I just want to make sure that everybody who is behind you, that they’ve got a chance at success, too. And I think that when we spread the wealth around, it’s good for everybody.”
To any American who hasn’t been living under a rock for the past month, this encounter between Obama and an average working American is no news flash. But it defines such a fundamental difference between the Democratic and Republican point of view that I just can’t get it out of my head. The simplicity of it is genius actually. Joe Wurzelbacher, the aforementioned man from Ohio, unintentionally and honestly summarized my overall believe in Capitalism and small government. It’s not right for someone to decide you made too much—that you’ve done too good and now we’re going to take some of it back.
Capitalism, in its true form, works. Money is naturally distributed when people work for it and then spend their earned money the way they see fit. One person spending money results in another person making money. Competition between companies occurs; the companies differentiate themselves, and market their unique qualities to the public in order to grab a piece of American’s expendable income. There is an incentive to do well. The smarter the strategy, the bigger the risks, the higher the potential return. Those willing to work and take risks will profit.
Profit is not a bad word. People who earn money are not evil. Rich people are not evil. Corporations (the entity) are not evil. It is sad that the Democratic Party tries to vilify those who are able to achieve success. The “rich”, unless they were bank robbers, worked for their money, and may even have been fortunate enough to pass some on to their children. That’s the American Dream.
I am not rich. I am a well educated business professional, of sound mind, and I want what is best for this country. To me, incentive is essential. Ideally, all Americans would have the desire to work, meet their potential, and be rewarded for their actions. In reality, not all people have the same levels of motivation, and that’s fine. But those who do want to achieve success should not be punished. Ok, “punished” might have too much of a negative connotation, but essentially that is what happens when the government starts making judgment calls on how much success is too much. It takes away a persons incentive to do well, knowing that if they reach too far above the status quo, what they earn will just be taken away.
And what about the person receiving the wealth that someone else has earned? What incentive do they have to do better than they are already in their current situation? The government would be giving them fish instead of teaching them to fish, in a sense. Maybe Obama is trying to convince Americans that we’d just be giving them fish until they learn to fish on their own. But again, where is the incentive? I do not want Americans to become so completely dependent on government that they cease to be able to think on their own. Redistributing wealth is not the solution. It brings us a step away from Capitalism and towards Socialism/Collectivism.
If you believe in America, and love this country, you have to believe in the people in it. The larger government becomes the less faith it has in the American people. To me, Obama’s plan is saying “You don’t know how to spend your money correctly, so I’ll spend it for you. Keep on earning money, though, just not too much.” I know how to spend/invest my money and live within my means. If the majority of Americans do not, then that is a sign of a much greater problem that higher taxes will not fix.
The problem is, we don’t practice a “true form” of capitalism here in the United States. If we did, then the US Government, at the behest of the Bush Administration, would not have bailed out Wall Street. Instead, the companies would have paid the price for their poor decisions, and failed (and some certainly did). The GOP, over the past eight years, has presided over the largest and most costly expansion of the Federal Government since FDR’s New Deal. So much for the GOP being the party of “small government.” Currently, there is no party for fiscal conservatives (well, the Libertarians perhaps, but they are too small to compete on the national stage). Both the Democrats and GOP are guilty of spending our tax dollars like drunken sailors. They just disagree on what they should be spent on (guns, or butter?).
What sucks is, our generation, no matter what our income levels are, will be paying higher taxes thanks to this ridiculous spending orgy. Our deficit is $10 trillion and growing. We spend $10 billion in Iraq EACH MONTH. Someone has to pay for this, and it’s going to be us. Thanks, Baby Boomers.
As for Obama’s statement, it was certainly a poor choice of words, but, contrary to the claims of Joe the Plumber and McCain/Palin, none of his policies can be defined as socialism (I sincerely doubt Warren Buffet would endorse a “socialist”). Socialism is just the GOP buzzword of the day, employed to scare Americans into thinking that Obama will turn the US into the USSR and we’ll all be living in communal apartments and standing in line for sausage. Joe and Palin wouldn’t know what a socialist was if Marx dug himself out of his grave and hit them over the head with a copy of the Communist Manifesto.
BTW, have you seen McCain’s mortgage plan? He wants the federal government to buy up all the mortgages that people are having trouble paying, REWRITE THEM FOR THE HOME’S PRESENT VALUE, and give them a low rate, fixed 30 year mortgage, backed by Uncle Sam. So you know all those idiots that paid $800k for a house in Irvine during the housing bubble, HELOC’ed themselves on top of that, and now their house is worth $400K? Well, he wants the Feds to purchase that $800k mortgage, give the “homeowners” a new mortgage for $400k and us taxpayers will get to eat the cost of that other $400k write down. Why should we have to pay for the stupidity of these idiots who purchased at the height of the bubble? And meanwhile, the housing values are still artificially high because McCain wants to “stabilize” them and not allow them to fall further. So, we get double screwed as well when it comes time for us to purchase a house and we still can’t afford these inflated housing prices. Oh, and Palin? Yeah, she instituted a windfall profits tax (What the hell is a windfall profit?!?!) on oil companies in Alaska so she could give away $1200 checks to her citizens. The companies took a big hit on that and canceled a few projects. So the Republicans aren’t “spreading the wealth” when they take my tax dollars to pay someone’s mortgage, and punish the companies that I work for because their profit is “too large”?
So yeah, my point is, after all this rambling, neither candidate presents a great economic plan. When forced to choose between the two, however, I’ll go with the ticket that isn’t allied with the religious right. I can deal with a slight increase in my taxes (uh, whenever I actually make $250k), but I can’t deal with someone who wants to overturn Roe v Wade, opposes stem cell research, thinks the Iraq War is a “task from God”, and does not consider where I live (neither CA or Northern Virginia) to be “pro-America” enough.
Cindy,
Since you are in a political mood, what are your feelings on Palin?
Lindsay, I agree, to a point i think this election is choosing between the lesser of two evils… for me, being forced to choose between the two, I can at least say I’ve been able to follow McCain for better or worse over the past 8 years at least… and where did Obama come from? The more that gets researched into his past, the more corruption and shady associations are uncovered… and with each new discovery he just tries to distance himself from the truth and point figers as if its the oppositions fault for looking into his past. I honestly do not feel comfortable giving that man control over our country.
And Tracy… I think I might be Palin for Halloweek :oP ha I think she is a refreshing and intelligent choice for the ticket
Yeah, at least with Palin on the ticket we have some funny SNL skits now.
But just wondering, what “shady associations” and corruption are you referring to?
I’m late on this and the ‘people’ have since spoken…but anyway…
Well said Cindy.
(Lindsay): You’re correct; we do not have a “true form” of capitalism.
The question in my mind is, which direction do we want to lean?