Our friends over at the National Taxpayers Union have put together a paper on the top ten tax hikes that will face Americans if liberals in Congress and president Obama get their way. Kristina Rasmussen of NTU writes,
“The arrival of a President who’s seeking more revenues and a Congress whose majority seems willing to oblige him could mean the New Year won’t be a very happy one for taxpayers. These 10 tax hikes all have a strong likelihood of being considered at some point in 2009 or 2010 — and at least one of them might be among the first bills considered in the opening weeks of the 111th Congress.”
1. Repeal/Expiration of the 2001 and 2003 Tax Cuts;
2. Payroll Tax Increases;
3. Smaller Alternative Minimum Tax Patches;
4. Imposition of “Windfall Profits” Energy Taxes;
5. Modification of Health Care Tax Treatment;
6. Increase in the Federal Excise Tax on Cigarettes;
7. Increase in the Federal Excise Tax on Gasoline;
8. Approval of the Streamlined Sales Tax Project;
9. Repeal of Tax Protections for Retirement Savings; and
10. Attack on Earnings Deferral and International Tax Competition.
Thanks to NTU for putting this list together. I’m sure that we will be facing many, if not all, of these tax fights in the next session of Congress. Keep track of NTU’s work by visiting their blog, Government Bytes.
Today President Bush announced that he would be cementing his record on fiscal irresponsibility by bailing out the Detroit 3 automakers to the tune of $17 billion. As FreedomWorks President Matt Kibbe stated,
“Too big to fail means too big to bail out. With Washington sinking in an ocean of red ink, we are leaving the next generation a staggering bill to pay for our inability to live within our means. This is definitely not fiscally conservative policy.”
Just this week President Bush’s communications shop sent out talking points making a case for Bush’s record on fiscal issues. It was a sad attempt to justify huge increases in government spending, the federal deficits under his watch and the overall public debt. Although I supported Bush’s tax relief and his bold decisions to go after al Qaeda in the Middle East, I was never impressed with his domestic policy on spending the taxpayers’ money. President Bush and the Republican-controlled Congress of the last 8 years have soiled the reputation of conservatives, which is terrible, because they did not act as conservatives. They acted as big government Republicans who cared more about power and politics than public policy.
Russia is about to pass a law that would deem any anti-government behavior as “treason.” Read this article from the Associated Press.
New legislation backed by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin would allow Russian authorities to label any government critic a traitor—a move that rights activists said Wednesday was a chilling throwback to times of Soviet dictator Josef Stalin.
The bill, which is expected to become law, would expanded the definition of treason to include damaging Russia’s constitutional order, sovereignty or territorial integrity. That, rights activists said, would essentially let authorities interpret any act against state as treason—a crime punishable by up to 20 years in prison.
The Russian bear is rearing its head again, in both foreign policy and domestic policy. I guess president Bush was a bit off when he saw Putin’s soul. All those who care about liberty should be alarmed by these developments.
Texas Railroad Commissioner Michael Williams announced his candidacy for the US Senate today. Williams is a conservative who believes in lower taxes and less government, and deserves the support of my fellow Texans. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison has decided to challenge Governor Rick Perry in 2010, which opened up this chance for Williams to run for her seat in two years.
Michael Williams, the Republican chairman of the Texas Railroad Commission, said today he’s running for the U.S. Senate seat held by Kay Bailey Hutchison, who has said she might resign by late next year to run for governor in 2010.
Williams, declaring on Facebook and via Twitter, said he’s seeking the seat because he thinks it’s a race he can win.
Who is Michael Williams? You can read his full bio on wikipedia.
Michael L. Williams (born May 31, 1953) is one of the three members of the elected Texas Railroad Commission, a regulatory body over, not railroads, but the oil and natural gas industries. Williams is currently the highest-ranking African American in statewide Texas politics. In the 2008 Election cycle, Williams won a six year term to serve until 2014. He joined the commission under appointment of Governor George W. Bush in 1998.
I am only posting this video for two reasons. One, I’ve never seen anything quite like it. Two, president Bush showed some quickness and calm that deserves a few views of this video.
FreedomWorks chairman Dick Armey sent out an email today asking FreedomWorks members to send a letter to Congress against the Detroit 3 bailout being proposed. Here is an excerpt of the letter:
The plan to bail out the Detroit 3 auto makers is moving fast. It appears that the president and Congress might have reached an agreement to give $15 billion to the Detroit 3. According to them, its to prevent them from failing as companies. But their failure is still looming, due to decades of poor business models and union shakedowns for unreasonable benefits and pay.
You can help us deliver a message to Congress. Just CLICK HERE and type in your information, and the automated letter system will deliver your message. The bailouts have to end!
Conservative columnist George Will has a great piece up today on Real Clear Politics about the so-called “fairness doctrine.” This is one of the agenda-items for the liberal Congress and president Obama in the next few years. Will takes a look at its application through history, and at the constitutionality question.
Here is an excerpt:
Because liberals have been even less successful in competing with conservatives on talk radio than Detroit has been in competing with its rivals, liberals are seeking intellectual protectionism in the form of regulations that suppress ideological rivals. If liberals advertise their illiberalism by reimposing the fairness doctrine, the Supreme Court might revisit its 1969 ruling that the fairness doctrine is constitutional. The court probably would dismay reactionary liberals by reversing that decision on the ground that the world has changed vastly, pertinently and for the better.
Texas A&M professor Patrick Slattery writes in today’s campus newspaper, The Battalion, that he supports terrorist Bill Ayers. In fact, he signed an online petition to publicly state his support of this man who bombed the Pentagon and U.S. Capitol building. Ayers, as mentioned in previous posts, was a founder of the terrorist group Weather Underground, a radical communist organization dedicated to the overthrow of the federal government.
Professor Slattery writes,
I support Bill Ayers. In fact, I proudly and enthusiastically support Bill Ayers. I wish I could do more to support my friend.
In short, Ayers is not the caricature of a “domestic terrorist” presented by politicians in the presidential campaign. I am angered by the politics of fear, innuendo, misinformation and guilt by association. I want my name to be added to the list of people who stand against this disingenuous and degrading maneuver. Our fragile democracy depends on people speaking out in rebuttal to these types of tactics.
So, professor Slattery is angered by the “politics of fear” but he is friends with a man who supported a violent overthrow of the government, and actually set off bombs that could have killed innocent people. Let professor Slattery know what you think about his relationship with an unrepentant terrorist. Email him at pslattery@tamu.edu and be sure to cc A&M’s president, Elsa Murano (president@tamu.edu).
Author Amity Shlaes has a great piece in today’s Wall Street Journal about how president-elect Obama’s FDR style plan for “economic recovery” will only make things worse. She debunks Paul Krugman’s arguments about the great depression and his ideas about what the U.S. should do in response to the current financial problems.
What kept the picture so dark so long? Deflation for one, but also the notion that government could engineer economic recovery by favoring the public sector at the expense of the private sector. New Dealers raised taxes again and again to fund spending. The New Dealers also insisted on higher wages when businesses could ill afford them. Roosevelt, for example, signed into law first his National Recovery Administration, whose codes forced businesses to pay an above-market minimum wage, and then the Wagner Act, which gave union workers more power.
Let’s hope that we don’t have to undergo the same government-created problems in the future.
