Total Pageviews

Friday, December 30, 2011

Part Man, Part Machine, all cop out


I had a friend talk to me about his beliefs of the way our government is run. This person is not the first person to tell me that we can not run the government like a business. It is not about a profit and loss statement. In that I would agree with them, however I would say that if you spend more then you make that money has to come from somewhere. So perhaps not run a P&L profile, but maybe a fiscal responsibility that we as a people are expected to have. So we spend the money we have, and no more. To simple in my eyes, and its not about profit, its about loss.

I am not expecting our government to provide services to our nation under the guise of being profitable. I would not want to live in a country were the police had to worry about the bottom line, or fire departments judged their placement of equipment based on the cost effective ability to provide protection of assets. Brings back images of OCP, for you kids out there look up Robocop. So in that yes, civil service should not be a for profit business. It also means that we as a people need to provide for those that provide those services. So instead of debt increase we allot for a budget increase when it is needed. Borrowing money from other countries is not the solution, because we have no intent of making a profit as a nation.

So how do we pay for wars, security, education and healthcare without borrowing money from other countries? We look to our own country. We look to our out dated over worked Internal Revenue Service, and we look to our over complicated tax codes. We stop looking to other people and we look to ourselves. Taxes are never popular, so our politicians do not want to raise them. The rich pay for their campaigns, so those same politicians do not want to bite the hand that feeds them. They still need to provide those services so what do they do? Well they go to China, or other countries with money and put their hands out. So they get into the same up side down mortgages they let the housing industry put us in. Debt that could never be paid back, that is just increased until they foreclose and take away our home. You do not pay those things back by staying the course. You do not get out of debt by living beyond your means and holding to old habits.

So what do we do? The answer is not to cut programs. The answer is not to take away those creature comforts that people feel they have a right too, or have grown dependent on. While I am not a fan of social security, cutting that, or medicare would not be the answer. The answer is to stop getting money from the loan shark. The answer is to revise our tax code in a way that is clear, simple, and fair. We need to put the smart people with the PHD's in a room together and bang out a workable tax code. Our system is broken and most people do not see how broken it is because they get what they want from it.

How many of you celebrate and look forward to that tax return in April? That is all the proof you need to understand waste and the systematic establishment of a culture that is being dragged around by the carrot. Why do you get a return? Because you over paid the government the amount of taxes you owed. So now those have to be processed, and that is not done for free. So each year we feed the bureaucratic machine and other companies have sprung up to support this action. Tax specialist, that work for a portion of your return. Now if they just had the system in place right to begin with, why would we have to do an annual audit? How about a small flat rate? Not that moronic nine nine nine shit that Cain proposed, but something as simple. A simple tax on wages and capitol gains, that is a percentage established regardless of marital status or amount of revenue generated? It can be stepped or progressive, so the poor are not actually carrying the burdens of the nation. So the first 40 k you make is taxed at 5%, the next 40k is 7%, and the brackets go up and you pay more. To simple, too easy, and probably would not happen because it is fair.

Big problem though, and simple sometimes is a better way to deal with things. Our trade relations are even screwy. Look at our tariffs with countries like China, and see how lopsided they are. Chinese good get into our country nearly free, while our goods are taxed to a point they are nearly unaffordable to the peoples republic. So we work out the money. We follow the money. We fix the shit where it is actually wrong, and we stop putting up with layers and layers being added to the cake. This is not the French revolution and Ms. Antoinette is not banging Uncle Sam. So you want to know how to fix this? This is another step. This is where I keep up that war on stupid.

The essence of this whole argument is the removal of money, corporate or larger personal donations in any form out of politics. With out that the inmates will continue to run the asylum, and they would never pass, support, or even breath on laws that would limit their insanity. So what do we do? How do we take our country back? How do we stop people from enjoying the spoon fed apathy designed to keep them in line as others continue to make money on their backs? Soylent green is people!

1 comment: