Taxes and eliminating the IRS

Let’s talk about taxes baby...

Let’s talk about what we pay...

            Okay, Salt-n-Pepa I’m not, but you try to come up with an intro for taxes.  I guess I could just write about the situation and the problems with the solution proposed by many.  The problem is obvious today; the Internal Revenue Service has grown too big and powerful for its own good.  The IRS strikes fear into Americans like no other government agency.  The Federal Bureau of Investigations could knock on your door and your pulse would go higher if it was an IRS agent.  This power is being abused by the present administration (and past administrations) as a political tool in their arsenal to attack opponents.  If you are against the party in power, you have to fear the IRS.  The IRS has become so conceited in its own power that they ask what books you read and the content of your prayers!  This is a slap in the face to the US Constitution and the Founding Fathers!  In 2014 the IRS will be in charge of making sure that the Affordable Healthcare Act (Obamacare) is being complied with by business and citizens of this country.  It is bad enough that the government is instituting regulations upon a section of the economy to such a degree of control that it makes the entire industry a part of the government by proxy.  The additional power that this gives the IRS puts them on par with the combined branches of the military, but who does the IRS protect us from?  Ask the average American and the only protection they want is from the IRS!

            Dissolve the IRS has become the battle cry!  The problem is of course that the Federal Government actually does some good and they need money to operate.  So how do we accomplish this feat?  I have heard talk about a fair tax, that a citizen would only need to fill out something the size of a postcard and send in.  This sounds a little too good to be true and I am willing to bet will become a system that is easy to abuse by those who will not pay their “fair tax” share.  I have even heard people say that all we need is tariffs to support the Federal Government.  The only problem with that is that many of those same people are the ones that jump up and down about fair trade.  Fair trade by definition is one that is free of tariffs.  This creates a conflict of ideology, you cannot have both.

            Which brings us to Herman Cain’s 999 plan; now I must admit that when I first heard it, I did not like it.  I just knew that if we had a Federal sales tax, when you combined it with state and in some cases city sales taxes, it would kill the economy.  I have thought about it for a year now and the plan has grown on me as I weighed the pros and cons.  First off, everyone would have more money in their pockets without Federal withholding.  The question becomes would the increased sales tax stop people from making purchases?  My conclusion is that it does not matter.  It does not matter because if people do not make purchases they still have to do something with the money.  If they choose to put it into savings or investment it, they will still be helping the economy.  I also believe there is a segment of the population who will always be consumers and spend all of their money, no matter what the sales tax rate is.

            There are a few things that are needed to make sure that the system is fair.  First off no cap for luxury goods, many states have limits on how much you have to pay in sales tax.  For instance, if you buy a car they will put a cap on how much you pay for a purchase (or maybe my information is just a decade old).  So if someone were to buy a $50k car, but the limit maxed out at $20k, they will pay the same taxes as someone that buys the cheaper car.  That is simple enough and I am sure few people would have a problem with it.  Now for the more controversial aspects; first there will be no tax exempt status for any organization.  Without a small army to do investigations I say just keep it simple and eliminate tax exempt status.  I do not care if you are a charity, a religion or a political organization.  If you make the purchase, you pay like everyone else.  When you start exempting different organizations it will become like a drug and every special interest group will try to gain that status for itself.  Yes it will hurt some organizations, but their donors should have more money to give.  Normal people will no longer be able to take tax breaks for donations, so why add complexity by giving such status to any organization.  Next any sale will be taxed.  This sale can be business to business or business to consumer, even business to government.  There will be no loopholes to allow businesses to get out of this.  If you buy and import goods from overseas, as soon as they cross the border the tax must be paid.  Yes that will work similar to a tariff, but if you bought the goods within the USA it would bring about the same result.  There is a way for companies to get around this.  They would have to build their products from start to finish keeping cost down, rather than spreading subcontracts around.  Companies contract over pennies per piece all the time, because not only can someone else make the product cheaper, but they can use their resources on more profitable endeavors.  This will step onto the toes of middlemen.  Some middlemen are honest businessmen, but there are others who use their power in similar ways as the IRS.  This will help to shorten the steps between manufacture and final sale, but this process is already taking place in business.  There is one more process that should be mentioned/taxed.  When money is sent outside of this country, it should be taxed.  You made it and you were not taxed (consumer or business), but before you send it overseas, we are going to tax you for sending our money elsewhere.

            Even with all of this we still cannot completely get rid of the IRS.  You have to have agents investigate these organizations to make sure that they are properly paying the taxes.  Even Texas has these agents that do such investigations.  I know this for a fact; my cousin is in Dallas, has his own business and was audited.  No exemption from taxes does mean less need for agents though, because they will be concentrating on a single specialized purpose and not spread out over many different responsibilities.  

            Still there is one tax that needs to be kept in place.  The reason for this is the problem that is created without it.  What is the purpose of the stock exchange?  Basically it is to provide capital to companies to they can expand or improve their product/service.  When you own stock, you own a part of that company.  It is in your best interest that the company has long term profitability.  The problem is that the stock market too often resembles a Las Vegas craps table.  Throw in the fact that board members and upper management will cannibalize a company (or mutual fund) for a short term gain.  This could be in the form of their bonus or stock options (which are basically the same thing).  So we keep the capital gains tax, but we have to remember that our goal is to eliminate income tax and capital gains is a form of income.  By the same token we want to encourage the stock market to fulfill its actual purpose, one of long term investment.  The solution is a dropping tax rate depending upon how long you have the stock.  For instance, if you sell it the first year you own it you pay 75% tax on your profit.  I know, that sounds insane!  Well it is and that is the point!  However each year you own the tax your liability drops 15% to 60%, then 45%, etc, until you owe no tax on your sale. For stock options the term is longer, because these people actually control the direction and future of the organization.  If you sell the stock in the first year 100% of your profit is taxed and that drops 10% per year until you owe no taxes on the sale.  Once again with no exceptions for any organization, no matter what they are.  It could be a pension, a trust fund, a charity or religious organization.  There is no need to give unfair trading advantage to any such organization, since they already control billions of dollars in the market.  This will encourage our investment markets to think years down the road, instead of worrying about the next quarter.

            From the length of this, you can tell I have been playing with the idea in my mind for a while now.  I do not claim this is the perfect solution or that my limited knowledge gives me the right to make any such claim.  All I am saying is that it is an idea which maybe someone with greater knowledge can take and run with.  Fixing my errors along the way and adapting it in a way that it can work.  That is if this seed is a good one and can grow into something beautiful.  I also realize this maybe the most controversial thing I have ever written.  If you believe I am wrong and foolish, then I ask you this.  Is your body of knowledge of the subject so great that you can come up with the start of a solution on your own?  Or are you merely accepting at face value what others promise you?  To accept something like that in such a way without questioning it or gaining greater knowledge, is that not just like drinking the kool aid we accuse liberals of doing?  We live in a marvelous society and it is even more complex.  There are many variables that must be taken into account and many problems that need to be fixed.  Play with the problems in your head, maybe you are the person that can come up with the perfect solution.  However you never waste any time or effort by exercising your mind!

Multiculturalism vs the Melting Pot

            The United States of America is a very unique country; there is none other like us in the world!  I am not referring to American Exceptionalism, though I believe in it.  That is something that liberals have arguments against.  Even though their arguments are based on their own inaccurate beliefs, I am going to talk about something more concrete that even they cannot deny about the USA.  I was going to say our country, but liberals do not see the USA as “our country”.  They tend to put their faith in the United Nations and an “our planet” mentality.  

 

            The USA is the only country on the planet that is not a race of people.  Americans as an ethnic group do not exist!  I can hear liberals crying already.  There are the Native Americans, indigenous peoples, or whatever the PC phrase of the weeks is for Indians.  The only problem is that they forget there were/are many different tribes/nations in North America.  So it has to be insulting for the Sioux to be grouped with the Apache or vice versus.  Liberals never think about how they insult people, because they are blinded by their belief in what is right.  ...but I digress.

            So how could a country that has no ethnic group of its own become the greatest power on the face of the Earth?  It is very simple, the Melting Pot philosophy.  The USA accepted immigrants from all over the world.  I have no doubt that in the USA every single ethnic group on this planet has some representation in our blood.  Yet we are not 5,000 plus different countries in one land.  We are one united people (or rather one country divided between two interests, pro-American and anti-American).  All of these immigrants assimilated to the culture that has developed and added their own mix to help create the American experience.  Within a few generations the family line no longer thought of where their ancestors came from, but considered themselves Americans first.  There is still ethnic pride, look at various communities and you will see Irish pride, Italian pride, etc... but people thought of themselves as Americans.  The USA has been influenced by all of these immigrants as well.  Just think of our love of Chinese food, it is Chinese American food really.  They do not eat food like our Chinese food in China!  Think of Tex-Mex cuisine.  We can also consider our music.  Jazz and blues were founded by African American culture in the South and that gave birth to rock and roll.  Even rap has merged with rock and roll in bands like Rage Against the Machine.  The point is that the melting pot helped to create this.  Anyone that cooks will tell you that as you add spice to the main course you change the taste, you create a new dish.  This is our USA and why we are so different, but still one people (one dish).

            Now multiculturalism creates a divide in our people (even greater than the philosophical divide of liberal vs conservative).  Multiculturalism is what happens when politically correct morons get a hold of ethnic pride and screw it up!  I am personally 13 races, half Greek plus 12 others.  I am proud of my Greek heritage, but I have no connection or loyalty to Greece.  My grandfather came over from Greece in the 1920s, my father was born here, but the only Greek I speak is a few phrases and swear words (the important stuff).  Now according to multiculturalism my loyalty should be to my Greek heritage over American citizenship.  I should be concerned how Greek immigrants have been wronged over the centuries and demand that all these dead ancestors be given justice.  I should expect to have the right to create a community here that resembles what Greece is like.  The problem with all of this is not only that it is anti-American, but that it is the direct opposite of what made the USA the greatest country in the world!  If you really did not want to become an American, then why come here in the first place?  If you hate this place and think your “homeland” is so much better, then go back!  Fight your battles to make your country a better place there and not here.

            There are other problems with multiculturalism.  Pundits believe that Muslims should be allowed to practice Islamic Sharia law in their community.  Sorry but no!  There is the US Constitution, which says that state law cannot supersede federal law.  States in turn say that local law does not supersede state law.  I am not aware of all the ins and outs of Sharia law, but I will bet that much of it comes into conflict with state and federal laws.  Even the oath of citizenship in the USA is under attacks.  Do you realize that someone who wants to become a citizen does not have to swear to take up arms against our enemies?  If someone is not willing to take up arms against our enemies, I do not want them given citizenship!  In countries where the liberal left is even more entrenched than here (like Norway) the oath of citizenship is optional.  That is correct; a citizen to be does not even have to swear an oath to their new country.  Why is this such a big deal, a terrorist (like the Boston bomber) would not care about the oath and not hesitate to swear to it.  The problem is that it does not create a solid connection of the immigrant to the new homeland.  

            Multiculturalism is an effort to create 5,000 different countries here in the USA.  It is an effort to destroy us from within.  It will lead to greater violence and not more tolerance.  In the liberal effort to create a utopia they forget human nature.  People fear the other.  That other is any immigrant that is different and holds on to their culture fanatically, shunning the norm of society.  Every successive wave of immigrants in the USA has been persecuted to various degrees.  They have been used as cheap labor; they lived the lowest standard of living.   They were subject to racist attacks and given irrational associations based on that bias.  This is not hate of the American people; this is the nature of the human race.  Sometimes people are persecuted because they will not conform to the norms or society, other times it is an effort by a group to reject them as citizens.

            The history of multiculturalism proves my fear of the goal to destroy the USA.  It started in liberal controlled universities.  Here in the USA we have a great system to help the next generation become Americans (and add to our culture), it is called public education.  When children are all thrown together in the mixing pot, they tend to adopt many of the positive aspects of their peers (sometimes the negative as well).  When these teens graduate high school they saw themselves as Americans first and foremost, no matter how many generations their family has been in this country.  Yet when those same children went to college they were reconnected to their heritage and told that they did not have to conform or become American.  That America could and should change to suit the culture their family came from.  The result is that a lower percentage of college graduates see themselves as Americans than those who graduate from high school.  Now liberals are trying to get multiculturalism put into our public education system.  It is indeed an effort to indoctrinate future generations and destroy the USA.

            I will not continue to drone on for another 1000+ words.  I will just say that we need to fight multiculturalism.  It is the complete opposite of what made the USA great and it promotes racism and hate in our country.  I do not want a country where my neighbor is the other, but one where we are all Americans!

email to my Senators

Senator blank,

As the POTUS divides our nation more and more into two polar camps, I want to remind you of our great Constitution.  It is not our founding document, but it is the one that made us great!  When the Articles of Confederation were shown not to be effective, the Founding Fathers divided into two camps.  These camps took their argument to the American people and thus we got the US Constitution.  There is a mechanism in place to change our Constitution.  This change does not involve executive orders by Obama (which I believe is impeachable!) or the Congress putting limits on the Second Amendment.  It is the duty of every American to support and defend the Constitution, from me to you!  I will not falter in this and I ask that you do the same.  Freedom is never gained with half efforts and it must be held with the same determination. 

I just want to remind you of your oath of office (with all respect), because Americans take our Constitution very seriously!

Thank You,
John Doe

The Economic Reality of the Liberal Agenda

          The Democratic/liberal economic concept is that wealth is not properly distributed.  There is too much concentration of wealth in too few hands.  If there was a more equitable distribution of wealth the world would be a much happier and safer place.  Now I will not even mention how that sounds like Communism and goes against human nature.  What I am going to do is crunch the numbers and ask if you can live on that.

          The approximate GDP of the entire planet was 70 Trillion in 2011.  Now they have ways to take in account cost of living differences and currency differences, it is called purchasing power parity.  So the adjusted GDP of the planet was 80 Trillion US Dollars in 2011.  Let’s say 85 Trillion in 2012 to help the liberal argument, even though I doubt it grew that much.  Now the population of the world is 7.05 billion, estimate 30 days old.  To help liberal argument we will say an even 7 billion.  So we just simply divide 85 trillion by 7 billion and you get, $12,142.86 per person.  That is just barely above the poverty rate for one person in the USA.  How many people can live on that much money every year?  I could and have, it is not pretty.  Many of these holier than though liberals come from families that have always had 6 figure or more incomes.  How quickly would their tune change if they suddenly had to live on 10% of what they are use to.

          I can hear liberals now... I am not taking this or that in account.  We do not have a world government, what about just the USA?  Okay, let’s see what it is in just the USA.  The USA’s GDP in 2012 will end at just under 16 Trillion (estimated), so for easy math we will call it 16 Trillion even.  There are 315 million legal American citizens and residents in the USA.  So once again let’s do the math.  Now when we crunch those numbers we get $50,793.65 per person.  It is nice to live in the land of plenty isn’t it?  Now if you like the sound of that, why do you want to open up the borders to all these illegals?  Immigration is a legal process to protect citizens from all kinds of backlash of open immigration, everything from disease, stress on infrastructure to job protection.

          Now I admit the formula is very simple and many would not say realistic.  Families will have one or two bread earners and then children.  Well you are only thinking in your liberal suburban home.  The reality is that many poor need the income from their children to help ends meet at the end of the month.  You also fail to take in account how the economy would change massively after redistribution, goods that are luxury related would dry up.  This would have a negative impact on the economy.  For the sake of argument I kept the numbers the same, giving you the benefit of the doubt that some other industry would step up to take up that slack.  However I really doubt the economy would be better in a liberal utopia.  Luxury goods are high dollar and high profit margin, which means that it provides income to a lot more people that lower profit and costing goods.

          Now when you start crunching the numbers per person and counting children it gets very difficult.  Yet according to the liberal argument children (but not unborn ones) are people to, so they are entitled to their fair share.  Yet the world is also overpopulated... so the liberal wants to provide benefits for having more children, while admitting there are too many people on the planet?  To try to crunch the numbers in a way that takes in account the cost of living for families, single people and retirees is not worth the trouble of a mere blog.  That project would be the equivalent of a PhD thesis, sorry I ain’t doing it.

          What the numbers prove is that the Democrat/liberal agenda will accomplish two things.  First it will drive down wages, pushing more people into poverty.  Second is that it will not reward innovation and motivated people.  What it will reward are those liberals in power, because do you honestly expect all of these wealthy liberals to give up their standard of living?  Think about what they are worth and how they live, will they lower themselves to join you at the bottom?

Lets go nuclear to protect 2A

          Everyone knows about what is going on as the liberals try to destroy the Second Amendment to the Constitution.  Oh they may say that they do not want to come after anyone’s guns, only assault weapons.  Yet I do not see them standing outside military bases and police stations, since only the military and law enforcement have legal access to real assault weapons.  The Democrats are ignoring Gallup polls that state Americans believe the problem is mental illness and not firearms.  Yet the media keeps claiming less guns will make us safer and the liberals continue on this path of disarming the law -biding citizen.   Well I believe I may have came up with an idea that will so threaten the power structure that not only will it force them to back off (at least when it comes to Federal laws), but it will help to avoid bloodshed (only if successful).

          Now we know that many state and local elected officials are much more friendly and concerned about the Second Amendment than nationally elected officials.  What I propose is to force a Constitutional Crisis on this administration.  We, as patriots, need to make this idea go viral.  Then as many people as possible will be pressuring their state and local elected officials to make a law.  What law will they be making?  A law that says said jurisdiction does not recognize the right of the Federal government to override the Constitution (especially pertaining to the Second Amendment).  So this local law will supersede illegal Federal regulation.  The more areas that actually do this, the greater the problem it will cause for DC.  

          I got this idea because IL and NY are rushing to increase gun laws, yet I have not heard of anyplace saying we will ignore anything that violates the Constitution, even if it comes out of the White House.   I know any first year law student will tell me that these arguments have already been solved in court.  When the parties submit to rule of law, they are satisfied.  What happens when someone say they do not care about past rule of law and the threat of future laws is illegal?  The more locations that do this, the greater the threat is to the stability and authority of the Federal Government.

          Think about it, improve upon the idea and then contact state, county and city officials.  Lets get some of these laws passed.  If this operation is successful, I see a number of potential outcomes.  A- the Fed backs down.  B- every side continues to bang heads, no one gives an inch and the Republic tears itself apart.  C- open warfare starts between the Fed and liberal contingents vs conservative and military units.  This would not be very pretty and would lead to a liberal genocide on a national scale.  Which I do not have a problem with to be honest. D- is not an option, the Fed wins and starts their process of disarming all Americans.  E- is equally unlikely, DNC and GOP reach a compromise.  Yeah right, compromise with a Lib is such an illusion,

          My reasoning for this is simple.  I am willing to protect the Constitution by any and every means necessary!  No matter how great of a tragedy Sandy Hook is, the lives of 30 children do not justify touching a document that has been around for 221 years! 

          There was more I wanted to add, but I am sorry it is past my bedtime.  If I remember this later I will edit it and add what I forgot.