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So call me off base if I point out when a Catholic Priest sodomizes a choir boy the media and press go wild but when an ex president and alleged rapist and a man who sodomized a White House Intern (but who did not have sex with that woman) is chosen by a president with two young daughters to explain why he should be re-elected and why Democrats are the friend of women the press and media go ga ga!
Maybe, I am old. Maybe, I am old fashioned. Maybe, I did watch TV with Rabbit Ears. Maybe, I grew up when one's personal conduct stood for something. Maybe, I no longer count because I am not PC enough for the new generation of unemployed Americans who are willing to put their faith in a president whose policies brought them their misery.
Maybe, because I never bought into Hope and Change, I am a certified racist. Maybe, because I believe this president is a proven liar I am biased. Maybe, maybe,maybe til the cows come home and Chick filet is banned from America. Maybe, I am just un-American because I remember a woman once telling me she was never proud of her country I am just a re-tread from the 50's generation.
Maybe, I do not believe in God because I never attended a house of worship where the Minister damned my nation.
Maybe, on the other hand, I see through the fog of campaign rhetoric and propaganda. Maybe, I am right in more ways than one!
Maybe Clinton will sodomize Obama in his address this evening?
You decide! (See 2, 2a and 2b below.)
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This is a sampling of what the witless thought of our First Lady's speech! (See 3 below.)
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Then there is the rising tension between Obama and Netanyahu because Netanyahu keeps raining on Obama's parade by making him appear empty! (See 4 below.)
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Sowell suggests figures do not lie but politicians do. (See 5 below.)
And then when facts get close to home and begin to burn and impact your message of lies call on your dolts in the press and media to be factcheckers. Distorting the truth is fair game in politics and most politicians are content, even encouraged, when those who vote for them succumb to their lies. (See 5a below.)
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Dick
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1)Chuck Norris Fact: America Is in Danger
By BRIAN M. CARNEY
First it was Dirty Harry. Now Walker, Texas Ranger has weighed in on the choice America faces in November.
In a video released over the weekend, martial-arts icon Chuck Norris and his wife, Gena, quote both Edmund Burke and Ronald Reagan in urging American evangelicals to go to the polls in November.
"It is estimated that in the 2008 election," Gena says to the camera, "thirty million evangelical Christians stayed home on voting day—and Obama won the election by 10 million votes."
The spot, filmed in what looks like a home gym, is two minutes long and never mentions Mitt Romney but warns that "our great country as we know it may be lost forever." The couple urges "like-minded brothers and sisters" to vote on Election Day and quotes Reagan's warning that if we don't preserve "the last best hope of man on earth . . . we'll sentence them to take the first step into a thousand years of darkness"—but with a difference.
Reagan delivered his iconic speech, "A Time for Choosing," in October 1964. In it he endorsed Barry Goldwater for president and defended the Republican candidate against critics before closing with the famous line: "You and I have a rendezvous with destiny" But back in 1964, Reagan warned that we were about to take "the last step" into a thousand years of darkness, not the first. Of course, Reagan didn't win the election for Goldwater, either. We'll have to wait until November to see whether Bruce Lee's greatest rival can do better.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------2)Of Bill and Barack
Clinton learned from his mistakes and changed policies. Obama hasn't.
Bill Clinton takes to the Charlotte stage Wednesday night to do what he does best—talk . . . about the virtues of Democratic economics. He'll certainly make a better witness than President Obama, and his goal will be to burnish the last four dreary years with fonder memories of the 1990s. Which means it's a good moment to remind everyone about the real economic history of the Clinton years, and why the results differ so much from those of Obamanomics.
In the nostalgic Democratic telling, Mr. Clinton got elected, raised taxes on the rich in 1993 to close the budget deficit and reduce interest rates, and thus kicked off one of the great booms in history. The truth is very different, starting with the fact that there really were two Clinton economic Presidencies.
Much like Mr. Obama, in his first two years the Arkansan bowed to the priorities of House Democrats and tried to govern from the left. He raised income and gas taxes while trying to impose a BTU energy tax, a government takeover of health care (HillaryCare) and a $31 billion stimulus, but putting off welfare reform.
Unlike Mr. Obama, Mr. Clinton failed to get his main agenda other than a tax hike through a Democratic Congress. This turned out to be an economic blessing for the country because it didn't weigh on growth, and a political benefit for Mr. Clinton, who didn't have to defend an unpopular agenda in 1996. Republicans rode opposition to the early Clinton agenda to take Congress in 1994, and that's when the second Clinton Presidency began.
Mr. Clinton moved sharply to the political middle. Remember "triangulation"? He embraced the goal of a balanced budget, using it to outmaneuver Newt Gingrich and Republicans over a government shutdown. After two vetoes and shortly before the 1996 election, he signed a GOP welfare reform.
As for economic growth, Mr. Clinton inherited an economy that grew 3.4% in 1992, including 4.3% in the fourth quarter. The expansion stumbled in the first nine months of 1993, no doubt in part due to the uncertainty of the Clinton tax hike. In 1994 stocks were flat and interest rates actually rose throughout the year, peaking on the very day in 1994 that Republicans took Congress. As the nearby chart shows, that's when the real 1990s boom began.
On policy, the rest of the decade was defined by a virtuous Beltway gridlock. Washington did little to interfere with private investment, and Congress even helped by restraining spending growth. Only toward the end of the decade did both parties began to spend like politicians again as surpluses rolled in.
Consider the policy contrasts between Messrs. Clinton and Obama. Under Mr. Clinton, federal outlays as a share of the economy fell to 18.2% of GDP in 2000 from 21.9% in 1992. Nearly two percentage points of that was from the post-Cold War cut in defense spending, but domestic spending also fell as a share of the economy.
For his part, Mr. Obama has presided over the largest spending binge since World War II, increasing outlays to 25.2% of GDP in 2009 and close to 24% of GDP for the next three years despite an economic recovery. Deficits have been above $1 trillion for four years.
Mr. Clinton did raise the top income-tax rate to 39.6% from 31% in 1993, and Democrats credit that with shrinking the deficit. But even two years after that tax hike, the Congressional Budget Office was estimating annual deficits of $200 billion a year. Only as rapid growth continued in the later part of the decade did the deficits vanish.
Meanwhile, Mr. Clinton agreed to cut the capital-gains tax rate to 20% from 28% in 1997. Revenue rushed into the Treasury as investors cashed in their pent-up gains.
Mr. Obama says he only wants to return to the Clinton-era tax rates, but he's already raised investment tax rates by 3.8 percentage points as part of Obamacare. Combined with the expiration of the Bush rates, that would leave some tax rates higher than in the 1990s.
Arguably the most memorable phrase (not related to a scandal) that Bill Clinton uttered during his Presidency came in his 1996 State of the Union address: "The era of big government is over." And for a few years, it was over. By contrast, Mr. Obama's four years have been spent expanding the government willy-nilly—with more spending, the promise of higher taxes, and intervention across the economy. His only economic plan now is still-more spending.
So as Mr. Clinton tries to lay hands on Mr. Obama and rewrite the history of the 1990s, the real story isn't how much policy the two Democrats have in common. What matters is what they did differently. Bill Clinton learned from the mistakes of his first two years. Mr. Obama has doubled down on his—and, on all available evidence, he will double down again if he's re-elected.
2a)Narcissist in Chief Selfishly Shortens Soldiers' Holiday
By
The Commander in Chief got a decidedly cool reception from the troops on a whistle stop at Fort Bliss in El Paso Friday. While this president already is not widely popular with our military, the attitude demonstrated by the shanghaied soldiers in that cavernous hangar was demonstrably cooler than at such past events. The conservative media interpreted that indifferent reception to dissatisfaction with Obama's politics and his repeated failures as CinC, but the event is far more consequential as yet another example of how little the Obama Administration understands the military it commands.
I'm an old non-com who, as a bachelor lived in the barracks, and as such I'm well aware of the excitement that permeates any military barracks in the days leading up to a four-day, holiday weekend like Labor Day. Virtually every soldier has made big plans to escape his military existence for four precious days and spend that time with family or friends. Many will have to use the first and fourth days for travel to and from distant destinations, which means only two, crucial days of holiday pleasure for them, sandwiched between two less pleasant days of travel, especially if they must fly commercially. Take away just one of those days and many of those soldiers' plans will either have to be scrapped entirely or the time at home or whatever destination, be reduced to a single day. Plans made long in advance have to be rescheduled, a sometimes quite difficult task when it regards holiday weekend travel: flight changes may be impossible and hotels are booked solid; neither may allow changes in reservations without severe financial penalties.
So, some hotshot in the Obama campaign, feeling badly stung by the sparse turnouts for the president's visits to other locales, gets a bright idea of how to produce a really big crowd for a photo op: "Hey, let's schedule one for some military facility where the commander can be ordered to produce a big audience in a sufficiently impressive backdrop." It was probably some over-eager, politically correct flack in the Pentagon who suggested the massive hangar at the Fort Bliss airfield, but you can bet it was some clueless member of the campaign with no military experience who picked the incredibly dumb date.
And as with so many other aspects of the disastrous Obama campaign, their scheme to produce a huge crowd ended up giving them another embarrassing black eye. They got their huge crowd all right but it was a silent, sullen crowd that was oozing hostility to the oblivious politician who had ruined their holiday weekend at worst and, at the least, had taken away one-fourth of their free time for his own selfish political gain. That from Democrats, who, knowing that the military is primarily politically conservative, are the first to demand political neutrality from those in uniform.
The resentment created by this incident isn't limited to just those troops ordered to be in that hangar; it is shared by their far-flung friends and family members who won't forget such a narcissistic, selfish, political imposition on their own holiday plans. Nor will it go unnoticed by other members of the military, their families, and the millions of veterans in this country who realize what an arrogant, selfish insult this was. Whoever it was on the campaign staff who scheduled that particular date for a military campaign stop might as well have said, "Here, Mr. President, take this pistol and aim carefully for your middle toe...."
2b)Bill Clinton Has Obama Right Where He Wants Him
By Jason Kissner
There are good reasons to believe that the 42nd president thinks that the chair in the Oval Office is either empty or might as well be until Mitt Romney is elected.
Can you believe that the fellow -- Mr. Clinton -- who is widely reported to have called the Empty Chair an "amateur" -- is the same fellow who is going to formally nominate Empty to a second term, without having had his speech seriously vetted (and perhaps not at all -- that is the best bet) beforehand?
What better, richer, and more conclusive demonstration of Mr. Clinton's point could there possibly be?
Of course, as Edward Klein suggested on September 3, the economy is very, very rotten, and the current occasional occupier of the White House was faced with a choice of Mr. Clinton on Mr. Clinton's terms or no Mr. Clinton at all. What kind of message would the latter option have sent?
Thus, the political stars of the man known as Barack Hussein Obama II are as crossed today as they were aligned in 2008.
In a June 8, 2012 contribution to American Thinker entitled "Did Bill Clinton Deliver a Coded Warning About Obama," this writer showed that there are very good reasons for believing that none other than Mr. Clinton (aka "Big Dog") slyly fingered Obama as both a Communist and a grave threat to what remains of capitalism.
The article also said that powerful Clintonian forces were crystallizing, and that Mr. Obama was going to pay the price for displaying the pomposity, unbridled narcissism, and grandiosity of a political tyro who has had enormous power hand-delivered to his lap.
Obviously, many things have transpired since June. Mr. Clinton himself largely turned invisible, went under, and remained submerged until August, when a much-ballyhooed (by the MSM) ad popped up (discussed momentarily) ostensibly supporting the man known as Obama and featuring a refreshed-looking 42nd president.
Can you believe that on September 3, two days before Mr. Clinton's signature DNC speech, news emerged that Douglas Band, a young (39) and top aide to Mr. Clinton, will be voting for Mr. Romney?
I mean, how uproariously funny is all of this? What a bracing insult to the Empty Chair!
Put that together with the fact, mentioned above, that Mr. Clinton has refused to render unto Caesar the contents of his (Mr. Clinton's) DNC speech, and what we have in the Obama camp is buckets of cold sweat and a sense that it's too late to avoid the trapdoor.
Then there's the Clinton quote, just now making the rounds and broken by the New Yorker's Ryan Lizza, where Clinton says that "a few years ago this [Empty Chair] guy would have been carrying our bags."
Sounds an awful lot like the Clinton quote from a while back about Obama and coffee, doesn't it?
Do you think Mr. Clinton has any friends at Newsweek? What a cover from "out of nowhere" that was!
And, what the devil's going on over at CNN?
September 3 brought a John King article talking about Democratic decline.
How about the shredding of the highly photogenic Debbie Wasserman Schultz by, on separate occasions, no less, Messrs. Cooper and Blitzer?
Now let's take a look at the August 23, 2012 ad featuring Mr. Clinton entitled "Clear Choice."
To dummies like Chrissy Matthews who see only what they want to see (which is why they see "racism" everywhere), the ad seems perfectly sunny and supportive of Empty.
However, here is the Clinton text from the ad:
This election to me is about which candidate is more likely to return us to full employment.This is a clear choice. The Republican plan is to cut more taxes on upper income people and go back to deregulation. That's what got us in trouble in the first place."President Obama has a plan to rebuild America from the ground up, investing in innovation, education, and job training. It only works if there is a strong middle class.That's what happened when I was President. We need to keep going with his plan.
Clearly Mr. Clinton has to make a pitch that is sufficiently pro-Empty on the surface to maintain credibility in Democratic circles; he's not going to shriek, with bullhorn in hand, "Vote Romney!"
When you look carefully at the language, you see that Mr. Clinton says that President Obama has a plan, but then says that "it" works only if there is a strong middle class.
Is the middle class strong now? No. Who hasn't heard, for example, that median incomes are down $4,000?
So Mr. Clinton says that Empty's plan works only if the middle class is strong, but everyone (surely including Mr. Clinton) knows that it isn't. Therefore, Mr. Clinton is really saying that Mr. Obama's plan will not work.
Then, Mr. Clinton reminds us that there was (according to him, anyway) a strong middle class when he was president ("That's what happened when I was president"), after which he says that "we need to keep going with his plan."
On the surface, "his plan" clearly refers to Obama's plan. However, we have just shown that Mr. Clinton has in fact said that Obama's plan will not work. Therefore, the plan that Mr. Clinton is saying we need to go with when he says "his plan" is his own, not Obama's -- which also explains why Mr. Clinton says "we need to keep going with his plan" right after referring to his own presidency.
After all, Mr. Clinton could very easily have said instead that "we need to keep going with President Obama's plan," where the latter is what a genuine, unequivocal endorsement of Obama would seem to require.
Mr. Clinton's plan surely has something to do with 2016.
What will he say at the 2012 DNC convention to help sink the fraud known as Obama?
Of course, nobody can be sure, but perhaps we can trace the lineaments.
Above all, Mr. Clinton is a transnational progressive who goes lighter on the fascism than Obama. He is therefore sure to send signals on an economic front that he knows more -- much more -- about the global economy than Obama does.
His speech will be a little "green," but older (including more traditional) and wiser than Obama.
He's using all kinds of inside information, of course, so he might drop a technical detail or two about Obama/Davis' national security shortcomings.
Mr. Clinton is notoriously sore about his not having gotten bin Laden. He therefore might try to abet the current trend by finding a way to detract from the undeserved credit Obama lavishes upon himself in regard to bin Laden's killing.
In fact, there is some reason to think that Clintonian forces (this time, in the person of Dianne Feinstein) warned Obama about taking too much credit for bin Laden's death even before Obama announced the killing, since Feinstein announced it first.
Here is something else that in all likelihood hurt Old Dog's bum ticker badly: the Obama-sponsored "racism" smears from 2008.
Those must have seared. Whatever else he is, there is no reason to believe Mr. Clinton is any more racist than the next Democrat.
Wouldn't it be terrific if the man increasingly known to be Empty -- whose entire career has been built for him by other race-milkers as well as seedy and in most cases very shadowy Communists -- were compelled to confront his racism when it's least in his interest to do so?
This is not to say that ole Trayvon will be resurrected (all by way of "supporting" Obama/Davis, of course), but who knows?
There is one thing, though, that we can be sure of: that Mr. Clinton is speaking when he is, where he is, and under conditions that he has completely controlled in spite of his having already humiliated Obama shows that he, not the Empty Chair, is in the driver's seat from here on out.
Dr. Jason Kissner is associate professor of criminology at California University, Fresno.
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3)Yahoo! News asked voters to share their reactions to Michelle Obama's address at the Democratic National Convention on Tuesday. In their own words, here are perspectives from voters across the nation.
***
Michelle Obama addressed a crowd that looked like the America I remember and the United States I want to live in, and she reminded us that she and her husband are real people, real people who had real dreams and real debt, real love and real obstacles. Yet there she stood, a role model, a mother, a wife, and our First Lady.
Though we've been told incessantly that the message of "Change" is tattered, worn, that it's something we should discard as idealistic and naive, Obama reminded us that change does not come easily. It does not come without sacrifice.
It does not come without challenge.
"So today," she said, "when the challenges we face start to seem overwhelming -- or even impossible -- let us never forget that doing the impossible is the history of this nation."
And once again, I felt a seedling take hold.
-- Isa-Lee Wolf
***
Resplendent in rose-petal pink, Michelle Obama fired up the crowd with an impassioned, powerful speech at the Democratic National Party Convention's opening night. Her non-partisan tone both expressed her family's foundational principles, as well as her belief in Barack Obama's vision of hard work, unconditional love and belief in the American Dream.
As a teacher and mother, I found her remarks deeply resonated with me. I also believe that how hard you work means much more than how much you make, and that living with unconditional love for your children, honesty, integrity, decency, humility and living by valuing everyone's contribution and treating everyone with respect will make our country an even better place for our children and grandchildren.
As a teacher and mother, I found her remarks deeply resonated with me. I also believe that how hard you work means much more than how much you make, and that living with unconditional love for your children, honesty, integrity, decency, humility and living by valuing everyone's contribution and treating everyone with respect will make our country an even better place for our children and grandchildren.
***
Michelle Obama effectively delivered a speech that was not only formulaic, but also attempted to advance a philosophy that many Americans outside the convention hall find pernicious.
She praised ordinary Americans she has met in her career as a political wife -- but all of them, from teachers to first responders to even people in the military, were employees of the government. Not one from the private sector.
When she delved into the political, defending her husband the president as well as her husband the man, she fell just a little flat. In Michelle Obama's world view, all good things flow from government and all good things in government flow from President Obama. The crowd in the hall ate it up; it was served up with passion and finesse. But one suspects that the TV audience may have been a little skeptical.
***
Michelle Obama's message was personal: Her experience and Barack Obama's experience is that of the American dream. We lived it, we understand it, and we are it. Her message was a mix of personal and policy -- how America should treat everyone, no matter your color, your finances, your sex, or who you love.
And she was passionate. Michelle Obama said, "I have seen firsthand that being president doesn't change who you are. No, it reveals who you are."
***
Evidently, I am supposed to be impressed by Barack Obama's rusty car and poverty. It would seem I ought to feel some sort of kinship toward Mrs. Obama because her family had to take out loans to pay for her college tuition. It would seem that she is endeavoring to identify with me, specifically, as a middle-class woman, in her DNC speech.
Well, call me crazy, but I don't. I don't identify with Michelle Obama because I don't want to be picked up in a rusty car. I want to drive my own car, and I would prefer it be a nice one. I also don't think we ought to be encouraging all young people to take out student loans that will hang over their heads for a good portion of their adult life. Not all children want to go to college.
-- Kathleen Ann
***
The genius of her speech was that it was not overly partisan, and it truly came from the heart. She also did something incredibly important: She humanized Barack Obama and brought him down to earth for everyone for and against him to see. The way Michelle sees it, being president hasn't changed who Barack is but has instead revealed who he is, a man who is out to unite and not divide like many have accused him of doing.
Michelle's speech was also a stirring reminder of how change is never easy and is accomplished over a long period of time. Many felt there was a lack of enthusiasm coming into the Democratic National Convention this evening, but the First Lady among other speakers gave rousing speeches that reminded voters that what they fought for in 2008 is still worth fighting for this November.
Michelle's speech was also a stirring reminder of how change is never easy and is accomplished over a long period of time. Many felt there was a lack of enthusiasm coming into the Democratic National Convention this evening, but the First Lady among other speakers gave rousing speeches that reminded voters that what they fought for in 2008 is still worth fighting for this November.
-- Ben Kenber
***
As a first-generation college graduate struggling to make payments on my student loans, I felt Michelle Obama's speech was extremely inspiring.
She mentioned in her presentation that the presidency does not change people; instead it reveals who they are. I completely agree because President Obama has not forgotten his lower-income background -- because he lowered the percentage rate on student loans. I was already leaning toward voting for the Obama-Biden ticket, but Michelle's speech clenched that decision for me, reminding me that Obama continues to help the middle class and that someone like me, who comes from a lower-income background, can still be very successful.
***
Even the president would have found it difficult to follow Julián Castro's speech, but First Lady Michelle Obama seemed to have pulled it off. She spoke about her travels across the country during the first few years in office. She mentioned the soldiers, business owners and regular people she met along the way.
She touched on many points to portray herself as an ordinary citizen, including her family's struggles to overcome poverty. She said she still has concerns about how another four years would affect her daughters. She succeeded in representing herself as a regular person.
If I had any doubts about Obama's sincerity, her speech would take them away.
***
Michelle Obama told anecdotes showing President Obama's personal side. "His prized possession was a coffee table he found in a dumpster." She spoke specifically about President Obama when he was still a senator. She told of the values instilled in her as a child -- working hard to earn what you want out of life.
Ultimately, I must say, I was just as bored sitting through this speech as it seemed the convention-goers were. Even though there probably is not a better advocate for Barack Obama than Michelle Obama, I must admit I was not too moved by her personal accounts and insight in the Obama campaign. I was not inspired, after hearing this speech, to give President Obama my vote this November.
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4)
Bibi, Obama have lost it
By Eytan Gilboa
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Anyone who is following the public exchanges between the US andIsrael gets the impression that Obama and Netanyahu have lost it. Obama has contracted Bibi's well-known hysteria and feels the need to respond to every statement made by the Israeli premier, regardless of whether it is wise or shallow.
He is acting as though the most important war is the one he is waging against Netanyahu, not the war he should be waging against Iran. And the Iranians? They are sitting in the stands, cracking sunflower seeds and mocking the boys who are playing before them.
Obama's rage over what he sees as Netanyahu's support for Romney is driving him up the wall, but this is not how you stop Iran's nuclear program.
Secret negotiations and creative solutions would end to this foolish dispute and increase the level of uncertainty in Iran, as well as the pressure on its leaders.
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5)'Bait and Switch' Taxes
We have heard many times from President Barack Obama how he plans to raise taxes on "millionaires and billionaires," but not on the middle class. Apparently, if you don't happen to be a millionaire or billionaire, you don't have to worry.
But the numbers say otherwise -- and say so big time.
The actual tax increase plans being proposed by Obama do not start with people who have an income of a million dollars a year. They start with people with incomes of $250,000 and up.
That is more than most people make, but it is far short of a million dollars, and miles away from a billion dollars. How many of the people who stand to get hit with Obama's higher tax rate plan are in fact either millionaires or billionaires?
According to the Internal Revenue Service, there are more than 2,700,000 people who earn $250,000 a year or more -- and fewer than one-tenth of them earn a million dollars or more. So more than nine-tenths of the people who would be hit with the higher taxes supposedly aimed at "millionaires and billionaires" are neither.
When businesses advertise one thing and then actually sell something else, that is called "bait and switch" advertising. That is exactly what President Obama is doing with his proposed tax increases on "millionaires and billionaires."
It gets worse when you look at the potential economic consequences of the tax rate increases being proposed. The small proportion of the people targeted for Obama's higher tax rates who are in fact millionaires and billionaires have the least likelihood of actually paying the higher tax rates.
People with annual incomes in the millions or billions of dollars can live pretty high on the hog on a fraction of their income, leaving them with plenty of money to invest. And they can invest it in ways that keep it away from the tax collectors. In addition to tax-exempt bonds, they can invest in other countries that have lower tax rates.
Hard facts show this happening as far back as we have had a federal income tax.
The Constitution of the United States had to be amended in 1913 to permit the federal government to collect income taxes. Almost immediately, very high tax rates on people with very high incomes led to their taking steps to avoid paying those taxes.
In 1920, Secretary of the Treasury David Franklin Houston in the Democratic administration of Woodrow Wilson pointed out that the taxable income of people with incomes of $300,000 and up had been more than cut in half, just from 1916 to 1918. He did not believe that this was because the rich were becoming poorer but "almost certainly through investment by the richer taxpayers in tax-exempt properties."
President Woodrow Wilson himself urged Congress to reconsider whether very high tax rates are in fact "productive of revenue" to the government. He said that, beyond some point, "high rates of income and profits taxes discourage energy, remove the incentive to new enterprise, encourage extravagant expenditures, and produce industrial stagnation with consequent unemployment and other attendant evils." That sounds a lot like where we are today.
Both Democratic and Republican presidents once warned that high tax rates can reduce economic growth. And Secretaries of the Treasury under both Democratic and Republican administrations once pointed out that higher tax rates do not necessarily bring in more tax revenues than lower tax rates. Yet this lesson from more than 90 years ago has still not been learned by those who advocate higher taxes on "the rich" as the answer to our fiscal problems.
In today's global economy, it is even easier for genuine millionaires and billionaires to escape high tax rates by investing in other countries. Not so for the other nine-tenths of the people hit with higher tax rates, such as small business owners or independent professionals such as dentists or realtors, whose sources of income are necessarily local.
Those hardest hit by high tax rates that drive jobs overseas are likely to be those who are unemployed and need jobs here. Ironically, millionaires and billionaires may have the least to lose from higher tax rates on "the rich." But Barack Obama has the most to gain from class warfare rhetoric that wins votes from gullible people.
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