I'm STOKED about the new debt deal that President Obama signed hours before Washington's deadline to raise the debt ceiling, and I'll tell you why. The new deal raises the debt ceiling, while insuring a $2.1 trillion reduction in debt at the same time that it insures no new tax revenue from wealthy Americans and no additional stimulus for our troubled economy. Here are some of the reasons I'm very happy about it:
1) It only seems fair that the wealthy should not have their taxes raised, and the middle class should bear the brunt of our devastating deficit. For one, the middle class greatly outnumbers the wealthy. I mean, when we talk about the wealthiest Americans, we're talking about 2% of the population. Why should they have to pay taxes on all their income when they are such a tiny demographic? For years, they've been enjoying generous tax breaks and loopholes, and rightfully so. They use the roads, police and fireman services, libraries, and federal college grants so much less than the rest of us. Why should they have to pay so much for them? And further, they don't rely on a financially secure middle class at all. We aren't the ones who work for them and buy their products. We don't buy their gasoline and invest in their companies with our 401k's. They owe us nothing. They made their legacy alone. And one last thing - we don't want to tax them more, because they are the job makers (never mind the slight inconsistency between this and the last argument). By freeing up their wealth, they create jobs and jobs and jobs, and we've seen that throughout the recent recession. We don't need their money in the government's vaults - we need them to continue to raise us out of our economic misery, like they've been doing over the last twenty years: making the middle class strong, bringing up those that are impoverished, helping the United States lead the world in industry, even at their own expense. Thank you super-wealthy - you've already done enough, and you don't owe us a thing. We shall take care of this deficit, as the middle class created it. We should have been paying more all along, and now we're paying the price.
2) Also related, deficit cuts without new revenue will all but insure that programs like school nutrition and federal funding for graduate studies will be substantially cut. Well, that's okay. Rest assured, this will in no way affect President Obama's call to "win the future," as in, reestablish our place as leaders in the fields of science and technology. First of all, there is no evidence that a healthy diet provided by a school affects learning in children. And also, just because someone has to take our thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars in students loans and pay interest on them for years doesn't mean they will forgo a graduate program. Besides, they are using the school's services, why should a tax revenue based on a graduated income tax affecting the wealthy be responsible for funding that? Students are the ones who should pay it back, because, again, ONLY they benefit from it. They may, upon receiving their degree, go and work for a titan of industry, but this has no affect on that titan's revenues, or the health of the nation's economy or international standing for that matter.
3) This all but ensures that there will be no extension of unemployment benefits. Good. If workers were just taking their jobs more seriously, they wouldn't be unemployed in the first place. And by cutting off their funding, they will finally be put in a position where they have to go out and find the plethora of available jobs and start working again. Once everyone starts working again, our economy will finally be back on track, so thank goodness!
4) The most persuasive members of congress have called for a reduction in social security spending, and this is a great thing. I mean, I'm mostly coming from personal preference here, but I for one want to work until I literally can't stand. By extending out the age of those who can reap the rewards of social security, Americans will work much more in their life, which means they can produce more wealth for the nation, and pay more taxes, which will in turn help our deficit problem. And as for the wealthiest Americans and a potential tax revenue that would help retain social security benefits while reducing the national debt, they don't need social security anyways, so why would they have to pay for it again? Again, they have nothing to do with those Americans who can't fund their own retirement.
5) It's just fair: the wealthiest Americans, as exhibited in the recent banking crisis, have proven time and time again that they do not benefit from government handouts, so why should the poor? Why should the middle class? They have to earn every last penny they have, and so should everyone else. Also, by making them pay taxes on all their income, we set an unfair precedent. I for one don't pay taxes on all my income! Every year when I fill out my taxes, I check a box that says I don't have to pay taxes on a certain portion of my income. Well, it's only fair that the same should be true for them - they need their own box making it so they don't pay on a certain portion of their income. And you know what - there are really poor people that don't have to pay on any of their income, so they are really the ones who are robbing the system. And don't give me that whole, "They grew up in a sick community in which they had a sub-par education infiltrated with drugs and abuse." Whatever happened to pulling yourself up by your bootstraps?
These are my five reasons, and I hope you recognize the extreme sarcasm of the article and the subdued rage at an unyielding conservative strain of the government and a wimpy, back-bending self-titled "progressive" block that has completely sold out its constituency.
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