Obamanomics: Part I
Barack man-of-change Obama
preaches the old time Democrat religion.
.
.Earlier this week Barack Obama gave a speech that was hyped as a “major address on economics.” It turned out to be yet another vacuous, Obama monologue, 
targeting the uninformed with a standardized formula that starves the listener’s intellect and indulges his/her emotions.
Step one: Attempt to engage the listener by reciting a list of most immediate and visible concerns and complaints of typical Americans:
- Recent up-tick in unemployment
- Foreclosures
- Cost of health care
- Cost of college tuition
- Prices of food
- Price of gasoline
Step two: Vilify the incumbent political establishment for letting the rich cause whatever economic pain or anxiety the listener may have experienced.
We did not arrive at the doorstep of our current economic crisis by some accident of history. This was not an inevitable part of the business cycle that was beyond our power to avoid. It was the logical conclusion of a tired and misguided philosophy that has dominated Washington for far too long.
George Bush called it the Ownership Society, but it’s little more than a worn dogma that says we should give more to those at the top and hope that their good fortune trickles down to the hardworking many.
So, Obama-nomics finds that foreclosures and unemployment are up and gasoline, health care and tuition are more expensive because “we,” meaning government and the Bush Administration, “give” something to “those at the top.” Obama is either unaware of the facts, or he hopes his listeners are too busy and distracted to dig out the facts for themselves.
Obama defines “Those at the top,” as households earning more than $200,000 per year. According to IRS data for 2005, the most recent report available, Obama’s “top” group, 3.4% of all tax payers, paid 49.5% of all personal income tax.
On the other hand, 65% of taxpayers with low to middle incomes paid only 3.3% of all personal income tax.
Based on these facts, Senator Obama has some questions to answer:
- How does he reach the conclusion that any government “gift” has gone to the tiny group that pays half of all the income tax instead of to the 65% who pay almost none?
- How did “those at the top” cause the costs of gasoline, college, food and health care to go up by paying less tax than Obama thinks they should have paid?
- How would taxing away more of the resources of “the top,” most of whom are the owners of and investors in successful small businesses, have prevented the recent increase in unemployment?
- In a nation founded on individual liberty, does Obama consider the portion of one’s earnings that isn’t taken by the government to be a gift from the government?
The next commentary will discuss some of the gifts government actually does hand out.
