Here's What We
Should Do
Gary Gerard, dumbhoosier.com
Gallup Poll question:
In general, are you satisfied or dissatisfied with the
way things are going in the United States at this
time?
Duh, right?
Eleven percent of Americans said they were satisfied.
Now, as negative a number as 11 percent is in that
poll, I gotta ask, “Who are these 11 percent of
Americans who are satisfied?”
I mean, there are 11 percent of us sitting around
saying, “Yeah, it’s good. I think things are going
pretty swimmingly right now.”
Who are these people?
Are they people who simply don’t know what’s going on
around them? People who never watch, listen to or read
the news? Are they polling town drunks? Cloistered
monks? Who?
All I can say is, if you think things are going well,
you’re either delusional or you just really have no
idea what’s going on.
And the thing that concerns me the most is that there
is little evidence that things are going to get better
any time soon. Economic indicators are feeble at best.
And financial markets around the globe are beyond
jittery. Don’t even look at your 401(k).
There is no real potential for job growth as companies
rein in hiring and capital expenditures.
And worst of all? The government doesn’t seem to have
a plan.
I know, I know, this is all George W. Bush’s fault.
But seriously, can we all at least agree that Obama’s
plan to make things better – the Keynsian economic
model of spending copious amounts of government money
– isn’t making things better?
Can we all at least agree that the government needs to
try something else?
A couple of months ago, when I still had a Facebook
account, one of my liberal friends was posting all
these rosy assessments of the economy and saying what
a wonderful job President Obama was doing. I posted a
couple links that pointed out some ominous signs in
the economy and hinted that a double-dip recession and
severe stock market gyrations were possible.
He and his liberal minions dismissed my comments out
of hand and skewered me for them. See, you say
anything but glowing happy stuff about President
Obama, those folks paint you as a far-right loon.
Of course, today pretty much exactly what I warned
them would happen, happened. Never passing up the
opportunity to be a bit of a political jerk, I fired
off an email to my liberal friend and pointed this all
out. I ended with, “What do you say now, Obama boy?”
So he says, “OK, so you’re the prez beginning
tomorrow. What do you do? What’s your plan? “
I am so glad he asked.
First, you reform/simplify the tax code. You have
three tax brackets for individuals and corporations
based on income level and then you eliminate ALL
exemptions, deductions and ridiculous corporate
loopholes.
You tax income generated by outsourcing at 70 percent.
If you did only those things, tax revenue would
increase so much I might even be on board with some of
the dopey government programs liberals hold so dear.
Next, you pass meaningful campaign finance reform so
corporate, trial lawyer and union interests stay the
hell out of Congress’ business and can’t screw things
up and put the loopholes back in.
Suddenly, the only thing a Congressman has to worry
about is his constituents and THEIR wishes – you know,
the people that elect him.
Next you severely limit the size and scope of
government in all sectors, defense included. (The U.S.
is responsible for 46 percent of the world’s defense
spending. China is second at 6 percent. That’s
insanity.)
You reign in myriad government agencies that regulate
everything from how you shut off a lawn mower to how
hot a clothes dryer can be. Basically, you follow the
10th Amendment. The powers not delegated to the feds
by the Constitution stay with states and individuals.
There’s a reason the founders put that in there.
I checked out the “A-Z Index of U.S. Government
Departments and Agencies.” It’s an alphabetical list
of all organizations in the federal executive,
legislative and judicial branches of our government.
What a hoot. Well, it would be funny if it wasn’t so
tragic. There are nearly 500 of them listed.
Yes, 500.
All those departments and agencies are staffed by
piles of bureaucrats. They drain capital from the
private sector, thereby strangling investment and
innovation. Government is totally out of control.
It’s pretty simple.
If you turn the capitalists and entrepreneurs loose,
there will be jobs and prosperity.
If you regulate the daylights out of everything and
try to run everything out of Washington, if you throw
in a few huge government programs like George
Bush’s prescription drug plan and No Child Left Behind
nonsense, if you run up a mountain of debt, if you
crash the economy and reduce tax revenue, if you pass
a monstrously expensive health care mandate and a
trillion-dollar “stimulus package” and run up a 4X
bigger mountain of debt there will be, well, pretty
much what we’ve got today.
Government just needs to get out of the way and allow
the private sector to flourish.
What’s the alternative? European-style Keynsian
silliness where the government provides more and more
services and pumps money into the economy?
European economies are falling like dominoes. They’re
more broke then we are. Too much government. Too many
agencies. Too many programs. Too many administrators.
It’s a zero sum game. There are only so many of us in
the private sector paying the bills for all that
government.
I know, I know. Corporations are all evil and greedy.
Maybe, but they’re also are only hope. Allow them to
invest, innovate and make money. Tax them fairly, sit
back and watch the prosperity.
That’s a good start anyway.
Archives
|
