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Let’s see if the claims that have been made about out-of-control
taxes are justified. We’ll examine the growth of the income and expenditures
(also known as the budget) in both the Federal government and the largest
state, California (statistics were obtained from official government
documents). Maybe there is
justification for all of these nasty tax hikes many of us despise.
It is an important point to emphasize that most state
governments will use the ruse that state budget expenditures have kept pace
with the economy as measured by your personal income. In essence they are
trying to dupe you into relating the tax increases to your personal income
instead of in real dollars, which means they are telling you as you prosper and
grow, they’ll take more of your money just because you’ve worked hard. This is
deliberately misleading and masks their wholesale theft.
First, we’ll compare the population increases in the U.S.
and California with the Federal and state budget, respectively, to see if they
have kept pace with these growth patterns. The Comparison of Population
Increases chart below shows the population growth in the U.S. and California
(for the period from 1970 to 2004), as you would reasonably think that
population growth should be a direct indicator of the need for increased
Federal and state budgets.
|
Year |
California |
U.S.A. |
|
1970 |
19,953,100 |
204,034,800 |
|
1980 |
23,668,600 |
226,544,600 |
|
1990 |
29,760,000 |
248,709,900 |
|
2004 |
35,484,453 |
288,368,698 |
|
Population Increase Since 1970 |
77% |
41% |
Comparison of Population Increases 1970-2004
Now we’ll look at the change in the Federal and state
budgets. The Comparison of Budget Increases chart (next page) illustrates the
changes in the Federal and state budgets for that same period in time, after factoring
in the percentage of growth. However, we can’t forget about that nasty villain,
inflation. To be fair in our evaluation, we must factor in the increase in
inflation during this 30+-year period. As unwieldy as it seems, the inflation
rate from January 1970 to December 2003 was 472%. This means if an item were
purchased for $100.00 in 1970, that same item would cost $472.00 in 2004.
Year |
California |
U.S.A. |
|
1970 |
$4,533,600 |
$192,807,000 |
|
1980 |
$17,871,500 |
$517,112,000 |
|
1990 |
$38,749,500 |
$1,031,969,000 |
|
2004/2005 |
$105,300,000 |
$2,036,273,000 |
|
% Budget Increase Since 1970 |
2,322% |
1,056% |
|
% Budget Increase Since 1970 (Factoring in population growth) |
1,298% |
748% |
|
Budget Increase Since 1970 (Factoring in inflation) |
269% |
160% |
Comparison of Budget Increases 1970-2004 (in million of dollars)
The California budget is about 23 times larger then it was
in 1970 ($105 vs. $4 billion). As the expression goes, we need to compare apples
and apples, and not apples and oranges, so when you factor in population growth
(77%) and inflation (472%), it still means the state budget is almost 3 times
larger then it was in 1970 in the same 1970 dollars. The Federal budget
is about 10 times larger then it was in 1970.
When you factor in population growth and inflation, it still means that
the Federal budget is 160% larger then it was in 1970 in the same 1970
dollars.
These numbers mean that the average Californian paid $227 in
state taxes in 1970, and then factoring in population growth and inflation paid
$658 in 2004 (in 1970 dollars). A quick glance at these charts reveals
that the average Californian is paying three times as much in state taxes (269%
growth) as they did 30+ years ago. In addition, the average California taxpayer
paid $944 in Federal income tax in 1970 and $1,492 in 2004 (in 1970 dollars)
– somewhat more than a sixty percent increase. Therefore, if you are a resident
of California you get hit with the double whammy of paying increased state and
Federal taxes amounting to close to a five-fold increase, proving (whether we
like it or not) the old adage that “a
fool and his money are soon parted.”
My cursory examination revealed that the same outrageous increases apply
to most states, whether the number is slightly higher or lower than the
California statistics.
Now this five-fold increase does not take into account the
yearly increases in the state sales tax, gasoline taxes, all of the new taxes
(such as cell phone towers – yes, cell phone towers) and luxury items such as
alcohol and cigarettes. Now that’s a real winner. In the state of New Jersey,
only $.06 of every dollar collected in the vastly increased tobacco tax program
(over $6.00 for a pack of cigarettes) goes towards smoking cessation programs. New York imposes combined excise and sales
taxes of $33.30 on every carton of cigarettes sold by stores located in the Big
Apple. I hate to imagine how city officials waste that money. According
to the Institute for Policy Innovation, Federal income taxes represent only 42%
of the total tax burden for U.S. taxpayers, and that your total tax burden
comprises 56% of your consumer spending. Government taxes are slapped onto more
than just a few items. The items you are taxed on by both the feds and the
states (and sometimes local governments) include Federal fuel excise tax (18.4
cents per gallon) and variable state and local fuel taxes, liquor, inoculations
($.75 per shot), firearms, hotel rooms, airline tickets, airport usage, real
estate transfer fees, utility bills (gas, oil and telecommunications),
contamination, motor vehicles, truck, auto rentals, inheritance, business, gift
taxes, marriage licenses, pet licenses, severance taxes, imports, restaurant
meals, retail, wholesale, package sales, estates, dividends and trusts, fur
clothing, hazardous wastes, investments, dry cleaner solvents, controlled
substances (controlled substances?), landfill, duty and excise, cosmetic
surgery (6% in New Jersey), and above all lawful gambling taxes. I have only
mentioned a few of the more common taxes above because these are the most
obvious examples. I don’t have the patience to list the all-consuming taxes of
which most of us are not even aware.
As long as we live and breathe, taxes we are hit with are
not limited to Federal taxes, state income taxes (41 states), property taxes
(in some states a very substantial amount), state sales taxes (45 states),
excise taxes, Medicare taxes, capital gains taxes, corporate taxes, and local
taxes. Nevada is one of the few states without a state income tax due to the
revenues acquired from the gaming tables, but I’ll bet that won’t last for
long.
Governor Schwarzenegger of California recently reached
agreement with all concerned for a budget for fiscal year 2004/2005 of $105
billion, including a $14-15 billion deficit. This means the budget has
increased over $30 billion in the short span of just 3 years, an increase of
over 40%. Thankfully almost half of the fiscal year 2004-2005 budget will be
spent on education. It doesn’t require a mathematics professor to realize that
this gigantic budget increase is considerably higher than the growth caused by
the population increase and inflation – magnitudes higher. Even though the people voted for a balanced
budget amendment, the politicians once again found a way to ignore their pleas.
I woe the day when California declares bankruptcy. Then there really will be
hell to pay.
In addition to the
backbreaking Federal and state budget increases, even the cities are getting
into your wallet. New York City, with a budget of $49 billion, more than many
countries, is experiencing budget growth at four times the rate of inflation.
The budget for the last two years has increased nearly 10%, and most of that
increase is attributable to Medicaid, outlandish pensions and debt service. To
pay for these huge budget increases, a number of these larger cities
impose a city income tax that drains another 1% on up to 5% of your income. According
to the Institute for Policy Innovation, the total for hidden taxes alone
costs the consumer $657.5 billion (or more than a $˝ trillion) per year.
We’re not done yet. Let’s examine those taxes that can
literally destroy small businesses - the backbone of the nation. Large and
small businesses are forced to pay worker’s compensation taxes, unemployment
taxes, social security taxes, and insurance premium taxes. And it’s not just
the taxes. The cost of complying with government over-regulation, especially
small businesses, can often be the straw that broke the camel’s back driving a
business into bankruptcy.
A new law was passed, the Regulatory Flexibility Act, which
required Federal agencies to publish the rules where the impact on small
business may exceed $100 million. According to the Competitive Enterprise
Institute, 29 different Federal departments have created over 700 of these
rules. The Environmental Protection Agency published 163 rules, while the
Department of Health and Human Services published 100 rules, while the
Department of Labor published 39 rules. Even the national Credit Union
Administration managed to sneak in a rule.
In 1997, Federal, state and local governments collected over
$215 billion in corporate income taxes, which translates to about $806 per
taxpayer (and taxes have increased substantially since then).
Depending on where you live, property taxes may well be the
largest bite of your income you pay each month. In New Jersey, which has the
dubious distinction of having the highest property taxes in the nation, one
individual I know pays $1,550 per month to his mortgage company, with over
$1,000 per month being paid in property taxes (that’s $12,000 per year).
Remember that property taxes only go to fill the local government or state’s
coffers, depending on your state. This
government extortion is separate from Federal and state income taxes. The one
charade I love is how in some states, the politicians mask the enormity of the
property tax rip-off by offering rebates at the end of the year (just prior to
the November election), as if I’m supposed to feel warm and fuzzy all over
because you gave me back a small portion of my own money.
Let’s face it; whenever there is a budget deficit,
politicians automatically want taxes raised.
In our private lives, whenever we find ourselves running out of money,
most of us think about cutting back on our spending, but not so in government.
When you look at the big picture, I estimate that the
average American is paying 10 times more in taxes than we paid in 1970 (in
1970 dollars). So where does this great bounty of money go, you might
ask? It goes into the Black Hole of
Calcutta like all of the other tax revenues. The answer to reform all of this
bleeding of the American taxpayer is really very simple. For one, eliminate all
of the unnecessary expenditures that we don’t need – likely at least one-half
the budget items. Two, eliminate all of the blatant obscene and hidden taxes
and replace it with a national sales tax (see the chapter, “Reforming Our
Tax System”). Then and only then will we know what we really pay in taxes
every time we purchase an item in the store.
And number three, get rid of all of the politicians, but I’ll explore
that possibility later.
Now, after all of that information, here’s the real
barnburner that should raise the hairs on the back of your neck. According to
the Constitution, Congress is only permitted to levy two types of taxes:
1.
Direct taxes, which are subject to the rule of
apportionment among the states of the Union. Article 1, Section 2, Clause 3
states in part,
“Representatives
and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the states which may be included
within this according to their respective Numbers,…”
2.
Indirect Taxes, including imports, duties and excises.
Article 1, Section 10, Clause 2 states in part,
“No State shall,
without the Consent of the Congress, lay any Imposts or Duties on Imports or Exports,
except what may be absolutely necessary for executing it’s inspection Laws: and
the net Produce of all Duties and Imposts, laid by any State on Imports or
Exports, shall be for the Use of the Treasury of the United States; and all
such Laws shall be subject to the Revision and Controul of the Congress….”
For clarification the term
apportionment means, “Allotment of direct taxes on the basis of state
population.” Therefore, if Congress did
collect income taxes, they should be divided amongst the states based on
population.
However, these two clauses are very specific in that the
Constitution does not allow the deferral government to use either of these two
clauses to tax citizens or permanent resident aliens of the United States of
America directly. The express purpose of these clauses was to make sure the
Federal government was the servant of the people and not the master.
Now here’s the second barnburner. In 1894, Congress passed
an act to impose a tax on the incomes of citizens and resident aliens of the
United States. The act was challenged and in 1895, the Supreme Court ruled the
law was unconstitutional. In 1916, the XVI Amendment to the Constitution
was ratified with questionable approval by more than 2/3 of the states. In a
subsequent Supreme Court ruling, they stated that the XVI Amendment conferred no
new power of taxation. Ignoring that court ruling, the Internal Revenue
Service (IRS) ruled that this amendment means that it permits direct taxes without
apportionment to the states. In other words, Uncle Sam can keep all of the
booty he has looted from the taxpayer’s wallets. What else would you
expect? And to add insult to injury,
according to many legal experts, the IRS does not have the authority to
conclude such an important decision.
Around April 15th when you fill out your income
tax forms, according to many legal experts, you are volunteering to pay your
taxes for that year. Let me repeat that – volunteering to pay your taxes. What is very interesting about the process
is that the only way you can have taxes deducted from your paycheck is by
obtaining a Social Security Number (and card). Then when you enter that 9-digit
number on IRS Form W-4 and sign it, you are permitting the withholding of those
taxes. This is one reason why the IRS pressures parents to apply for Social
Security Numbers for their children at an early age. Ironically, there is no
mandatory provision that requires workers to have a Social Security Number or
sign a withholding form to qualify and keep a job, but we all know that all
payroll systems within most companies can’t function unless you conform to Big
Brother.
Over the years, many individuals have attempted to fight the
system by 1) having the maximum number of deductions withheld from their
paychecks and then 2) by not filing their income tax. According to the Free
Enterprise Society (www.freeenterprisesociety.ws), they claimed that they have
repeatedly beaten the IRS and other tax agencies in court for more than 15 years.
This is when the IRS Gestapo troops descend on the “criminal” using fear,
bluff, deception and outright intimidation to get their monies, even seizing
people’s assets and freezing bank accounts. It’s not a pretty picture. The
numerous bloodcurdling stories of IRS agents’ excesses have been well
documented in the news media. Apparently they stop just short of the rubber
hose.
I don’t see any change in my lifestyle or how these
backbreaking taxes have benefited myself, anyone in my family, or anyone else I
know for that matter. But I must have missed something. I’m confident the money
has been put to good use. I know – it was probably used for education – that
must be the answer. But according to the Miami Herald, an estimated one to two
million California students lack books to use in classrooms, and in poor urban
districts teachers must often buy pencils, notebooks and marking pens with
their own funds. The National Educators Association estimates that the average
teacher spends $589 per year buying these items for the classroom.
Former U.S.
Secretary of Education Roderick Paige stated that,
“After
spending $125 billion of Title I (improving the academic achievement of the
disadvantaged) money over 25 years, we have virtually nothing to show for it.”
I guess that isn’t the answer. Well, it must be the war on
poverty. With all of that money spent ($8.9 trillion and rising rapidly –
that’s trillion, not billion), at least I’m sure we have alleviated the poor
people’s plight, but according to the Associated Press, 35.8 million people
lived below the poverty line in 2003.
Oh, oh, I must be confused since that’s not the answer.
Then where is this money being used for any benefit? Who is getting this money besides the corrupt
political machines and benefactors of the Federal, state and city piggy
banks? There has been heavy press about
the government’s war on drugs with the government spending over $75 billion to
no avail. It has been well documented
what a colossal failure that effort has been. For another, I absolutely know
that the Defense Department budget has increased dramatically over the years.
Finally, our soldiers, sailors and airmen are making a decent wage. But according
to a recent Defense Department study, 40% of lower ranking personnel are
eligible for food stamps. We can concede that the majority of the money is
going to the defense contractors such as the $14 billion expended on the
Bradley Fighting Vehicle before the first prototype was ever built. See” Defense Contracting Rip-Off” for
an in-depth exposure of this national disgrace. Obviously, that’s not the answer, either.
According to the Orange County Register, when local police,
fire and other agencies complained that terrorist alerts were costing money
that was not budgeted, the Department of Homeland Security (the new Federal
agency) decided to cough up $200 million to help defray the costs. Now remember
that this money was intended to reimburse local governments for
terrorism-specific expenditures. Where did the money go? A newspaper surveyed
the allocation of $15.9 million in funds given to California, and found that
San Francisco and some universities and colleges used the money to cover the
costs of policing anti-war protests. Oakland used their allocation to cover a
high-school protest against the Iraq War, while the California National Guard,
which actually patrols some of the state’s airports and bridges during the
alerts, received 10% of the money that was requested. Unfortunately, the amount
of money that was earmarked to reimburse local government for the intended
purpose was never determined, but it’s likely it was very, very small.
Another trivial item to consider is that according to the U.
S. Treasury, the national debt as of 2004 is $7.4 trillion – yes, $7.4
trillion, and the U. S Government spends $318 billion each year just on
interest payments, almost equal to the entire Defense Department budget. The
national debt is a burden of over $24,000 for every man, woman and child in the
land. If you take into account only wage earners, each one of us owes over
$50,000 – I would hate to see that bill in my mailbox.
As another perfect example of the debacle known as the great
Democratic vs. Republican 2004 presidential election, Senator Kerry continued
to challenge President Bush on homeland security, after President Bush had
explained about his increase in the Homeland Security Department spending. Senator Kerry stated that although the
budget had been increased, the money was not being spent wisely and the United
States was not any safer. Instead of just scrutinizing the Homeland Security
Department, why didn’t he put his vast knowledge to work carefully dissecting
the monies wasted by the Defense Department, Health, Education and Welfare,
Agriculture and the Veteran’s Administration?
I’m sure he would have been able to find lots of excessive examples to
throw at President Bush.
There are many examples of the excesses of state governments
and their spending stupidities, but I guess the one example that really
infuriates me is the use of public funding to build sports arenas. I assume
this a throwback to the days of the Romans when they built elaborate complexes,
such as the Coliseum, which were funded by taxes, to distract the plebeians
from the real issues they faced in their daily lives. These arenas were the
scene of garish spectacles of pain and suffering with gladiators cutting each
other to pieces or the lions devouring Christians. Not much has changed in
2,000 years. The difference today is that we now have expensive sports like
hockey practiced in these arenas wherein the brutal exhibition of talent is
more akin to fist fighting on skates instead of in the traditional boxing ring.
Well at least we haven’t lost our passion for gore over the last 2,000 years.
And not only that, we have lost our perspective of the value of a dollar due to
the gross spending habits of the government. We pay overgrown children $15
million a year to play infantile games while the president of the United States
is paid $400,00 per year, a slightly more important job.
In the last 20 years or so, various professional sports
franchises have threatened to leave a given metropolitan area that possess a
large and often maniacal fan base, unless they were given glistening new
stadiums with lots of amenities such as luxury boxes to fatten their wallets.
I have one thing to say these sports teams – GOODBYE – I
don’t respond well to threats and bribery!
Maybe I’ll get lucky and the New York Giants football team will move to
Tuscumbia, Missouri.
Involvement in sports is a classic example of government
deviating significantly away from the business of running government, which we
witness more and more on a daily basis. Numerous stadiums have been built with
a combination of public and private funds, with the investment of public funds
justified by the jobs and taxes that supposedly will be realized from the
venture. To fund these ventures, cities and states have floated bond issues and
even raised the sales tax ˝-cent just to pay for new pagan structures. And
remember that the politicians tell the people that the ˝-cent increase will be
rescinded when the stadium is up and running, which you can be assured, will
never happen in your lifetime.
Let’s examine just one example of this trend, the proposed
Newark Arena in Newark, New Jersey, as it is the most current example in the
news as I write this book. With an estimated cost of $310 million (which
continually escalates higher each day), the costs are to be borne by the City
of Newark ($210 million) and the New Jersey Devils hockey team ($100 million).
The grand plan is for the arena to be used to host not only hockey games but
also circuses, shows and ice shows. It’s hard to expect this venture will be a
booming success since the new arena will compete with the Continental Airlines
Arena, Madison Square Gardens, Radio City Music Hall, and other new facilities
on the drawing boards.
One very important aspect of this deal that no one mentions
for fear (no doubt) of offending political correctness is that many parts of
Newark are outright slums with high crime rates. I doubt that many New
Jerseyans will consider attending night games at the arena unless heavy
security is in place.
Where will Newark get the money
to invest in this project? The City of Newark reached a lease deal with the
Port Authority of New York and New Jersey for Newark Liberty
International Airport.
Note that the airport after 9/11 was
renamed from Newark International Airport to Newark Liberty
International Airport no doubt in a patriotic fervor. Let’s be realistic. Does
that name change inspire your patriotism in any way? – Of course not! No one mentions the millions of dollars that
were spent putting up new signs, stationary, and all of the hundreds of other
tasks that are necessary when a massive undertaking of this nature is mandated
by the bureaucrats. Only government can throw taxpayer money to the wind in an
empty gesture without first considering the financial consequences.
As part of that lease deal the
city of Newark is receiving a $210 million payment. Realistically, who are the
major benefactors of this grandiose plan?
Naturally, the construction companies and labor unions, which just
happen to be major contributors to the Democratic machine run by Sharpe James,
the Mayor of Newark, are the primary beneficiaries. This of course assumes that
the final price for the arena will be $310 million. The history of sports
stadium construction suggests that an overrun of between 40-50% is par for the
course. And who will pick up those additional costs? I’ll bet it won’t be the hockey team. I can just visualize a bond
issue being floated before the people now to pick up the tab.
According to initial projections, the City of Newark is
supposed to recoup its investment from the tax base created in this deal. Developers have stated that they expect the
arena to generate $135 million in salaries for employees (Naturally, $60
million of that is in player’s salaries and the rest in low-paying part-time
concessionaire wages). There was supposed to be a 275,000 square foot office
complex but the existence of that part of the proposal seems to be somewhat
fuzzy. Since the city has a 1% payroll tax, simple math tells us that the best
the city may be able to reap will be $1.35 million per year into their coffers.
Let’s do a little math - the numbers don’t lie. $1.35 million divided into $210 million means that for the city
to recoup its investment (not counting inflation), the arena must be profitable
for 155 years and that’s hardly likely, especially considering a life of 25
years is the norm for any comparable venture. If the City of Newark is instead
trying to justify the deal on the basis of the wonderful new jobs it will
create, it’s a losing proposition from any angle you approach it.
In the fall of 2004, the owners of the National Hockey
League have locked out the players because they are demanding more revenue
sharing, displaying the routine greed of sports figures. The owners have said,
“Enough is enough!” There is a strong
possibility that either the entire league will fold or after the lockout is
resolved, many teams will go out of business leaving a minimal league to pick
up the pieces. To add to the stupidity, isn’t this the perfect time for the
government to shell out $210 million to build a new hockey stadium?
According to a book written on
the subject, “Field of Schemes: How the Great Stadium Swindle Turns Public
Money into Private Profit”:
“Field of Schemes
introduces you to some real welfare kings. A used-car salesman turned baseball owner
promises to pay for a new stadium out of his own pocket, if the state
government just agrees to move a highway to clear the land. Several backroom
deals later, the state is raising a quarter-billion dollars towards the stadium
costs - and the team owner is getting his stadium scot-free.”
In September 2004, a grand rally
promoting the Arena (supposedly a public hearing on the issue) was held in
Newark with lots of hoopla and political grandstanding. Over 500 people
attended including the owner of the Devils, civic leaders, political groupies,
real estate entrepreneurs, construction workers and homeowners, who were all
shown the Promised Land, no doubt. A majority of these people stand to make a
nice buck from the transaction. Former Councilwoman Mildred Crump was one the
few voices of reason stating that when the taxpayers were sold a bill of goods
for the Newark Bears baseball stadium, all that much ballyhooed project did was
produce a few menial jobs and a lot less income then was projected. Their income
projections were based on an average attendance of 5,000 howling baseball fans
at each game. To-date, attendance has averaged 900 people.
On top of all of this waste of money is the issue of Eminent
Domain, by which government can take private property. To permit building the
complex, 52 individuals and companies owning 102 parcels of land will be
displaced. Newark is contributing city-owned land to the project, while also
making land swaps with the larger landowners and completing buyouts of the smaller
businesses that must be relocated. Some of these businesses have been in place
since the early 1900s. No consideration is given to the hassle of relocating a
business, the lost revenue during the relocation process, or the monies lost
until they are able to rebuild their customer base, as the political gain
pushes all those considerations aside.
But we should not be focusing on the pros and cons of the
economics of these highly questionable deals. The real issue is why is the City
of Newark spending $210 million of taxpayer dollars on at best a very chancy
boondoggle when the cities’ schools are crumbling to the ground? On top of that, state taxpayers heavily
subsidize these schools, more so than any other district in the state. Stories
appear in the newspapers frequently about broken windows in these schools. The
money could be better spent for education, especially to educate the people who
would have made barely minimum wages in the concession stand booths. I find it
hard to envision that the people of Newark can be that stupid, but even after
one stadium was a total failure; here they are repeating their mistake again.
The old adage immediately comes to mind:
“You can fool me once, shame on you. Fool me a second time, shame on
me.”
A similar situation is evolving in Virginia at about the
same time for a new $360 million baseball stadium, except the creative geniuses
want to use “Moral Obligation Bonds” to finance the construction. Now this is
an interesting twist to screw the taxpayers. Moral obligation bonds essentially
guarantee that the state will make the debt service payments on the stadium in
the event of default. There actually has been some debate in the State Assembly
on whether the state should help finance a facility for a private business.
Will we never learn? As I said before,
government has no business feeding the Christians to the lions.
We can draw the following firm conclusions from this or any
tainted deal to build an arena or stadium.
1.
Government has enough trouble running government
without being involved in ventures that should be handled solely by private
capital.
2.
If the deal is so wonderful, why is it that the sports
group (the Devils or anybody else) can’t raise sufficient money through investment
capital firms to build the arena? The
answer is because investors realize that the project will not provide adequate
Return on Investment (ROI), i.e., it’s a loser without public funds!
3.
Contrary to many people’s opinions, the government is
not in the business of job creation. That is the job of the free-enterprise
market.
For the people who complain about tax cuts, I offer that
there’s plenty of room for budget reductions.
Before we examine nonsensical Federal government
expenditures, remember that in the past we have all felt comfortable when the
presidency and Congress was in the hands of the Republicans, for at least we
knew they claim to want limited government. That is, until reality set in and
now the Republicans are just as irresponsible as the Democrats. Federal spending has increased by 29% in the
last three years. No one seems to care about the $500 billion deficit in 2004, with
projections just about as high for the remainder of George Bush’s term in
office. So let’s see what “critical” items are included in this budget.
We’ll examine the Federal government’s fiscal year 2003
budget and exclude what on the surface appear to be legitimate spending
requests and instead concentrate on what has commonly been called “Pork.” Pork-barrel projects are essentially
projects congressmen add to a budget to buy support from the folks back home or
to keep a pal in business. Let us not forget when debating the relative merit
of a Democrat versus a Republican, with the close balance of seats in both the
Senate and House of Representatives, none of these bills can be passed unless
there is great collusion between the members regardless of which political
party they represent. Rep. Joe Democrat
tells Rep. Mike Republican, “If you want your defense bill passed, then you had
best vote for my education bill.”
Not only does this political maneuvering apply to basic
requests from say the Defense Department or the Department of Housing,
Education and Welfare (HEW), it also applies to the billions of dollars of
money wasted on “pork” legislature for mostly insignificant and unnecessary
projects just to buy future votes. According to the Citizens Against Government
Waste (www.cagw.com), our elected representatives, who are supposed to be
fiscally responsible, added 9,362 projects in the 13 appropriations bills of
2003 at a cost of $22.5 billion. Remember now, you diehard Democratic and Republican
rooters, none of these bills can be passed without at least tacit support of
both parties.
Out of the 9,362 projects that can hardly be classified as
“essential” to the American people, we’ll briefly review a few examples in each
category of Congress’ spending that ignores the burden of the American people.
Agriculture: $44,239,000 for projects in the state of
Iowa including:
Commerce, Justice and Judiciary:
$76,570,000 for projects in South Carolina for Senate Commerce Appropriations
Chairman Ernest Hollings, including:
Defense: In a speech before
the Senate Armed Services Committee on June 28, 2001, Defense Secretary Donald
Rumsfeld stated in part,
“…We are doing two things: First, we are not treating
the taxpayers’ dollars with respect—and by not doing so, we risk losing their
support, and …Second, we are depriving the men and women of our Armed Forces of
the training, equipment and facilities they need to accomplish their missions.
They deserve better….”
I’m sure we have all read the stories of how the GI’s in
Iraq were writing home asking their relatives to ship them wipes to use for
toilet purposes. More importantly, many soldiers complain they have no body
armor (flak jackets), secure phones to communicate or protective armor on the
Humvees and Bradley personnel carriers. Based upon Rumsfeld’s explanation of
the government’s priorities to support our soldiers, I’m hopeful that all of
the astronomical sums of money were directed just for these purposes.
Let’s examine a few of the allocations. The state of Hawaii
under Senator Daniel Inouye received $226,275,000 for dubious projects, while
$5,300,000 was allocated for the National Automotive Center in Michigan, and
$3,000,000 was added to the existing Tanker Lease Program to lease 100 – Boeing
767 fuel tankers at a total cost of between $26 and $30 billion. The General
Accounting Office (GAO) recommended as an alternative that the existing fleet
of KC-135 tanker aircraft could be upgraded, modernized and repairs
accomplished for about $3.2 billion, a savings of between $23 and $26 billion.
So why was that suggestion ignored? Because the military always wants shiny new
toys at any cost. The military uses the tried and true, “We can’t defend the
country without it” argument to get their way. Let’s put the $26 billion in perspective.
If the military followed through on the suggestion to simply modernize the
KC-135 tanker fleet, the money saved could be given as bonuses to the
approximately 2,000,000 active duty and reserve personnel who daily put their
lives on the line in Iraq and Afghanistan. As mind-boggling as it may seem,
each individual would receive a one-time bonus of about $13,000. Considering
the fact that a private with 2 years of service makes $14,000 per year and a
sergeant makes $20,000 per year, a bonus of this magnitude would be very
welcome news indeed. If we eliminate just one of these ill conceived
boondoggles each year, we could substantially increase the salaries of our
warriors. Do the defenders of the nation whom we put in harm’s way daily not
deserve the best we can provide them?
If you don’t like the bonus idea, simply eliminate the expenditure from
the budget thereby reducing the national debt by .00000001%, which will make my
heart flutter with joy.
District of Columbia: $19,000,000 for projects
including:
·
$250,000 for the Washington Opera Education and
Community Program
·
$250,000 for Values First to implement a values
infusion program
·
$100,000 for Project Reality for the Game Plan
abstinence program.
Energy and Water: $218,053,000
for projects in South Carolina for Senate Commerce Appropriations Chairman
Ernest Hollings (yes, that’s the same guy we mentioned in the Commerce
category), including:
·
$216,000,000 for cleanup of the Savannah River site
·
$396,000 for Town Creek
·
$257,000 for the Folly River (aptly named no doubt).
Foreign
Operations: $25,000,000 for the International Fund for Ireland in support
of the Anglo-Irish accord. The key verbiage within this bill states “those
projects that hold the greatest potential for job creation and equal
opportunity for the Irish people.” Do
we not have enough problems holding onto our jobs in this country with
outsourcing without spending $25 million on a foreign country to take our jobs? The other bills in this category ranged from
$500,000 to $4,000,000.
Interior:
$38,250,000 for projects in Alaska for Senator Ted Stevens including:
·
$750,000 for sea otter research
·
$350,000 for backcountry hut repairs
·
$250,000 for the Iditarod National Historic Trail
·
$150,000 for the Alaska Whaling Commission.
I attempted to
investigate the $350,000 for backcountry hut repairs. According to the
Department of the Interior, “The funds provided for construction of backcountry
huts in Alaska shall be used to contract with the Alaska Mountain and Wilderness
Huts Association at Snow River to perform the work.” Why do I strongly suspect that one of his buddies or major
contributors is somehow involved in this effort?
Labor, Health, Human Services and
Education: $83,329,000 added for 239 projects alone in the state of
Pennsylvania to satisfy the political cronies of Senator Arlen Specter and his
fellow Republican and Democratic state office holders.
$36,101,000 for projects in Iowa for
Senator Tom Harkins and House appropriator Tom Latham including:
· $2,000,000 for the Iowa Communications Network statewide fiber optics demonstration
· $250,000 for Family Communications Inc.
· $300,000 for Iowa State University for the Universal Kitchen Design Project.
Legislature
Branch: Members of Congress have taken steps to improve security after
9/11, but many of the items approved in these bills have nothing to do with
security:
· $5,065,000 for the Capital building
· $1,750,000 for Senate office buildings (nothing to do with security)
· $120,000 for the Botanic Garden (nothing to do with security).
I could go on and on, but I don’t believe you want to see
the complete list of 9,362 projects that are absolutely unnecessary for
America. I’m sure you got the message loud and clear. If each and every one of
these projects were put before a vote of the American people, I suspect that
one or maybe two projects might survive the hatchet.
For the people who complain about tax cuts, I offer that
there’s plenty of room for budget reductions.
In November 2004, the government approved a mid-year budget
increase of $388 billion covering many seemingly valid budget items, but they
also managed to include the mandatory “pork” items as well.
Out of the $388 billion, the amount of “pork” may seem to be
a trifle but it’s coming out of our pockets. We taxpayers would not spend this
money, so why should we allow our congressional representatives to ignore our
wishes and deliberately give money away to placate their congressional
districts.
Again, thanks to the Citizens Against Government Waste, the
items that stand out like a sore thumb are distributed to many states:
|
State |
Budget
Item |
|
Alabama |
$4 million for the International Fertilizer Development Center; $35,000 for the Sports Hall of Fame. |
|
Alaska |
$443,000 to develop salmon-fortified baby food; $1.5 million for the Anchorage Museum-Transit Intermodal Depot. |
|
California |
$150,000 for the Girl Scouts Golden Valley Council bridge project. |
|
Florida |
$1 million for the Palm Coast Trail System. |
|
Kansas |
$100,000 for a municipal swimming pool. |
|
Kentucky |
$2.3 million for an animal waste management research laboratory. |
|
Hawaii |
$4 million for mitigation of congestion in Kapolei City. |
|
Illinois |
$1.4 million for a sound barrier on Interstate 55. |
|
Maine |
$300,000 for the Great Falls parking garage . |
|
Massachusetts |
$1.2 million for Cape Cod bike repair. |
|
Mississippi |
$750,000 for the Mississippi Museum of Natural History. |
|
Missouri |
$1.5 million for the Rep. Richard Gephardt archive at the Missouri Historical Society. |
|
Montana |
$1.5 million for a “fuels-in-school” biomass project. |
|
North Carolina |
$1 million for the Garden Parkway. |
|
Ohio |
$750,000 for a sewer construction project; $350,000 for a music education project at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame; $200,000 for the Dennison Railroad Depot Museum. |
|
Oregon |
$6.28 million to Oregon State University for wood utilization research; $628,000 for a barley gene mapping project. |
|
Pennsylvania |
$250,000 to promote tourism in the Allegheny National Forest area. |
|
Tennessee |
$2 million for the Fiery Gizzard Trail. |
|
Vermont |
$500,000 for a woods product program. |
|
Virginia |
$500,000 for the Amherst County River Walk Trail; $200,000 for a Vermont Civil War Monument in Virginia. |
|
Washington |
$1 million for the Enumclaw Welcome Center; $1 million for the Norwegian American Foundation. |
|
Wisconsin |
$3.2 million for the Chequamego-Nicolet National Forest . |
What makes these perfect examples
of patronage somewhat different is that members of Congress actually stood up and
complained about this farce. Senator
John McCain of Arizona gave a half-hour speech on the floor of the Senate in
which he targeted specific examples of the egregious waste of money exhibited
by his fellow senators. He singled out the $1 million allocated for the Wild
American Shrimp initiative by stating, “I am hoping that the appropriators
could explain to me why we need $1 million for this. Are American shrimp that unruly and lacking initiative? Why does
the U. S. Taxpayer need to fund this “No shrimp Left Behind Act?”
It’s about time someone spoke out
about this persistent rip-off of the American taxpayer.
Representative Harold Ford (Tennessee Republican) and
Senators John Corzine (New Jersey Democrat) and Rick Santorum (Pennsylvania
Republican) are among our clueless elected officials who are pushing a new bill
in Congress in 2004 under the American Savings for Personal Investment,
Retirement and Education (ASPIRE) Act to create a $500 savings account for each
child born in the United States after December 31, 2005. In addition, the
Federal government would put an additional $500 into accounts for children born
to families with incomes below the Federal poverty line. According to Kansas
State researchers, who should know better, the idea may work.
Why do I have a problem with this plan? Here’s just another example of one of
thousands of government giveaway programs that march us onto the road to
socialism and eventual bankruptcy, for one. Let’s look a little deeper. How much will this plan cost, how will it be
administered, and will it really benefit the people? According to the
World Factbook, in 2004 there were approximately 4,200,000 babies born in the
United States. For a rough estimate, let’s assume 25% of those babies are born
to families below the poverty line. That means the direct cost to the taxpayers
is approximately $3 billion per year. But let us not forget about how many
thousands of new Federal employees will be needed to manage this effort to add
to the bloated bureaucracy? This is not
a simple and straightforward task. That’ll probably add an additional $1/2
billion per year in labor costs assuming 2,500 new employees plus new computer
systems, office space, etc., must be allocated to manage the effort.
I can just picture the problems with people trying to get
their paws on an extra $500 with phony birth certificates. How will the
bureaucrats verify that a request for the monies is valid? Can you just imagine the headaches this will
cause in paper work for the people below the poverty line who must fill out
garbled “governmentese” forms to request the extra $500? Who are these people? They are generally indigent, poorly educated
souls who often cannot read or write. According to the plan, the money can be
withdrawn once the child turns 18 and could be applied to education, home
ownership or retirement. This gem of an idea will be a nightmare for government
employees to verify how the money will be used. Can you just picture the difficulties
people will encounter with the mindless bureaucracy trying to get their money
with this complex idea? Assuming beyond
belief that all will go well, in actuality, how much will the $500 buy towards
a child’s college education? At today’s
rates, $500 saved today will yield about $1,200 in 18 years, not discounting
inflation which will cut that in half to about $600 in real dollars. According
to the U. S. Committee on Education and the Workforce, the average cost of
tuition and fees at a private college or university is over $18,000. So with
the $600, your child may expect the benefit of ten days of education. This is
another classic idea that looks good on paper, but will quickly become a
gigantic boondoggle benefiting few of the people it intends to help, and of
course waste another $3-4 billion. This “ain’t” chicken feed, folks. All of
these expenditures add up to an awful lot of money. Even if we want to spend
this additional money, which I don’t, we would be much better off reducing the
national debt by .00000001 %.
For the people who complain about tax cuts, I offer that
there’s plenty of room for budget reductions.
We have Disney World, Six Flags, Universal Studios and
Congress, where you can escape reality and dwell in Never-Never Land for a day
to forget your troubles.
Take the kids out for an enjoyable day to a New York Giants
football game and spend the equivalent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of
Romania so you can forget about your problems, your job, your annoying neighbor
and your overdue property tax bill.
Now the U. S. Army can help, too. The Army is in the throes
of building a $200 million museum on the grounds of Fort Belvoir, Virginia to
help you pass the time. It’s not as if there might be any more pressing needs
like the wars in Iraq or Afghanistan, and what about those wipes for the troops
in the field?
The pathetic excuse for this latest boondoggle is that the
museum will offer Americans an understanding of what the life of the soldier is
all about. The propaganda spews out that “everyone can identify with the trials
and tribulations of the young men and women who put themselves in harm’s way to
do a job that most of us don’t want to do ourselves.” I really hate it when the military bureaucrats flaunt patriotism
to justify the expenditure of another exorbitant amount of money.
The proposed design envisions exhibit space for 515,000 art
and historical artifacts, and all of the other accoutrements like restaurants
and gift shops. The primary objective of this state-of-the-art facility is to
show simulated battles and use 4-D (dimensional) simulators available in
advanced amusement and theme parks. Yep, you guessed it. Universal Studios is a
paid consultant. Want to bet it overruns the projected budget?
Here’s the clincher. The Army stated that the museum is NOT
designed to encourage recruitment. What?
I would have thought that would have been one of its’ primary goals
considering the problems the military has in their recruitment drives now that
we are fighting multiple wars.
I have my routine alternate suggestions on how to use that
expenditure. For one, we could give all of our active duty troops each a $100
bonus check. Better yet, to accomplish the education of the public, I’ll make a
30-minute video of the proud history of the Army and mail it to the 100 million
households in the country for about the same cost. But that’s too rational. In
my scheme, you wouldn’t get to see Mickey, Minnie, Goofy or your Congressional
representatives in-person.
For the people who complain about tax cuts, I offer that
there’s plenty of room for budget reductions.
According to the Federal government, as of January 2004,
excluding men and women in uniform, civilian employment is 2,701,015 employees.
This number doesn’t include the state, city and local government employees that
number over 16,000,000. Where do all of these Federal employees work? The biggest chunks are:
Legislative Branch (Congress
and others) = 30,377
Judicial Branch = 34,333
Executive Branch:
Department of the Treasury = 117,215
Department of Defense =
663,380
Department of Justice =
102,903
Department of Agriculture =
100,457
Department of Veteran’s Affairs = 232,172
Independent Agencies =
963,890
As one minor example of the stupidity, the 50-odd
independent agencies of nearly one million employees include critical needs
such as (number of employees in parentheses):
The number of employees in these few agencies I’ve mentioned
is only the proverbial drop in the bucket, but as an example what is the
government doing with a Christopher Columbus Fellowship Foundation or engaging
in the fine arts business? I would love
to see the justification for the two hundred twenty-eight employees of the U.
S. Holocaust Memorial Museum or the eight employees in the Japan-United States
Friendship Committee.
Let’s examine just one of these
major departments, the Department of Agriculture (USDA), with over 100,000
employees consisting of the following sub-agencies and offices:
|
Sub-Agencies |
Offices |
|
Cooperative State Research,
Education and Extension Service (CSREES) |
|
|
Grain Inspection, Packers and
Stockyards Administration (GIPSA) |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Just look at this massive
organization. Do we really need all of
these sub-agencies and offices, like the Agricultural Marketing Service and a
Risk Management Agency?
In my review of the USDA’s web site, I cannot find one
concise statement of the purpose of this organization, or as we would call it
in the business world, a “mission statement.” Instead, the web site lays a
public relations campaign on the visitor. According to the USDA, “USDA remains committed to helping America’s farmers and ranchers.”
A few
other tidbits of propaganda are as follows:
·
“USDA brings housing, modern telecommunications,
and safe drinking water to rural America.
·
USDA helps ensure open markets for U.S.
agricultural products and provides food aid to needy people overseas. “
The question needs to be asked,
“Was it the intention of the Founding Fathers to have an agriculture
organization which ”brings housing, modern telecommunications, and
safe drinking water to rural America” and ”helps ensure open markets
for U.S. agricultural products?”
Housing, telecommunications, helps ensure open markets? All three of these items are the sole
responsibility of the free enterprise market. These examples are another inkling
of just how far another government organization has deviated from the primary
role of the Federal Government as defined by our Constitution. I will venture a
guess that if we compare the responsibilities of the USDA versus the
Constitution, this organization should have no more than 5,000 employees.
The Veteran’s Administration employs 232,000 people serving
26 million veterans and their dependents.
Even with a budget of $64 billion, there are over 200,000 veterans who must
wait 6 months or more for access to VA health facilities. I assume they are waiting for a veteran to
die so he or she can be replaced in the system. On the positive side, the VA
provides education, insurance, counseling, health care and rehabilitation,
pensions, home loans, and burial benefits.
On the negative side, in the last few years, a number of my associates
and I have filed disability claims against the government for Vietnam-related
service including exposure to Agent Orange and other toxic agents. Why does it take this massive organization
12 to 18 months to process the claim?
Not only that, representatives of the Vietnam Veteran’s of America and
the Disabled American Veterans strongly advise claimants to keep copies of
every piece of paper they submit, as the VA will likely lose the paper work one
or more times during the course of the process. If the VA was a commercial enterprise, they would have citizen’s
groups and lawyers clamoring for someone’s scalp, but you can’t sue the
government.
After one of my associates waited nearly a year, he received
a letter from the VA stating that his claim had been rejected EVEN THOUGH HE
MET ALL OF THE NEUROLOGICAL ASSESSMENTS NECESSARY FOR THE CLAIM. Why did the VA reject the claim? They stated that he should have filed the
claim within one year of leaving Vietnam.
Is my associate responsible for being tardy? The side effects of Agent Orange were not recognized until 20
years after that conflict ended, so I can only guess that in order to pass VA
muster, besides being a killing machine, you needed to be a physic.
Our Congressional representatives rarely listen to the
people unless that voice is backed up by large cash contributions from
organizations in their home districts. But that isn’t the worst-case scenario.
Lobbyists represent every conceivable organization on the planet from the
National Rifle Association (NRA), AARP, pharmaceutical companies, defense
contractors, school teachers, healthcare providers, pension plans,
telecommunications firms, and anybody who has a vested interest in insisting
that particular legislation is either passed for their benefit or quietly
buried under the table for later discussion. In Washington, D.C. alone there
are over 12,000 registered lobbyists, but various estimates suggest that there
may be in excess of 50,000 lobbyists providing all sorts of gratuities for our
dedicated civil servants. These companies and organizations are not paying the
salaries and expenses of these 50,000 lobbyists if the payoff for them on the
other end isn’t enormous. Now we all know that outright gifts to our
representatives are illegal but that doesn’t stop the fleecing of the taxpayers
so our representatives can take fully paid trips to Fiji for security
conferences and golf outings and who knows what other dubious expenses. What
chance do we have of getting meaningful legislation passed when confronted by
this bottomless pit of political pandering?
Herein is just another reason why we must return the government to the
people.
I may burn in the fires of hell from the response of
politicians, government officials, and the rank and file for the following statements,
but I’m sure we have all heard the horror stories about government employees
who work an hour a day, or don’t show up for work at all and just collect a
paycheck. Better yet, what about those employees who are dismissed for
egregious job performance and then fight their dismissal and continue getting
paid for the years it takes to resolve their complaint. I apologize to the
small percentage of government employees who do put their nose to the
grindstone to earn a day’s pay. If
government control of many aspects of our lives is so beneficial, why does the
U.S. Postal Service use FedEx to ship most of their overnight mail? Why? 1) Because it’s cheaper and 2) FedEx
employees have an incentive to work hard unlike the sterile environment of
government civil service where it’s almost impossible to fire a Federal
employee because of arcane civil service regulations. The paper work
justification that a supervisor must develop over a lengthy period of time to
get an employee fired is literally insurmountable, especially if the employee
is a minority. Not only is this process demeaning and counterproductive, it
detracts from the supervisor doing his or her primary job.
From the time I was a little boy, I can recall the
conversations between various adults recommending that an individual get a job
with government. “The pay may not be great but you won’t need to work very
hard.” Even in the last few weeks, I
have been told stories about a friend who took a job with the State of New
Jersey. Over too many martinis, he admitted to his friends that he works a
maximum of one hour a day.
My own personal experiences echo these sentiments. I cannot recall how many times as a small businessman I have interacted with government employees to my dismay. In one instance, I needed to obtain a business license for the county of Middlesex in New Jersey. I entered the government office in the typically garish, intimidating, marble complex surrounded by platoons of cops where there were 10 to 12 employees “working” in the office. I strongly suspect that the cops were there not to protect the building from terrorists but more likely to protect the workers from irate citizens. The office employees seemed to show annoyance at the mere fact that I required assistance. After a few minutes, one individual (without rising from her chair), hollered over to me at the counter, “What do you need?” I explained to her that I wanted to apply for a business license. She told me to open the mammoth binders on the bookshelves to determine if the name I had selected was already in use, and if I found the name to be unique, I should fill out the application. She quickly returned to reading her book. I followed her instructions to a tee which consumed about one-half hour for the painstaking search process and completion of the application. I then needed to interrupt her semi-comatose state to complete the transaction. I exited the premises fuming about the encounter. Do you think this attitude would be permissible in a private business? This was not an isolated incidence. It seems to be business (or lack of business) as usual.
As another extremely aggravating experience that we have all dealt with over our lifetime, The Apathetic Voter had been assigned by his family to be the executor or fiduciary for my cousin’s estate. As one example of the ongoing battle between the forces of good and evil – me against the government – it was necessary that I apply for a death certificate for my cousin’s mother (my aunt) to prove that she was not an heir to the savings bonds he left to his heirs in his will. Now I was assured by friends I spoke to in the Midwest and the West all you need do is go up to the window in city hall, pay the fee and they photocopy the death certificate for you. This is business as usual generally anywhere else in the country but not with the incompetent bureaucracies that plague the east coast. The only way I could obtain a copy of the death certificate was to request the document in writing from the New York City Department of Vital Records accompanied by a $15.00 fee, a sample of my aunt’s DNA and an in-depth explanation of the mummification rites of Ancient Egypt. Not only that but I had to give the Vital Records people multiple reasons why I needed the death certificate, all under the ruse I’m sure of preventing terrorists from getting a death certificate, as if there would be any plausible reason in the world why they would want one.
So on July 22, 2005, I dutifully sent my request via the U. S. Mail carefully dotting the I’s and crossing the t’s so I could assure myself of nonbelligerent service. A funeral director forewarned me that it normally takes the drugged mutants who work in Vital Records 2 to 3 weeks to process your request, but since it was summertime it would likely take 6 weeks. I brushed off his verbal bombast of Vital Records disbelieving that even a government agency could be that inept. Finally, on September 30, 2005, I received a note from the catatonic bureaucrats stating they were unable to find the death certificate – an elapsed period of 70 days from my initial mailing. Did the bureaucrats care that in the meantime I’ve been subsisting on a diet of Alpo and Kibble n’ Bits salivating like Pavlov’s dog for my share of the inheritance?
What course of action could I follow? Would it do any good to storm into Vital Records in Manhattan (ironically located on Worth Street) and demand immediate resolution of the problem? How could it take these people 70 days to process a simple request? Let’s see, perhaps its more difficult then I thought? Let’s go through the steps: 1) open the mail; 2) remove the check and place it in today’s deposit basket; 3) read the request; 4) go to the file and pull the death certificate by name or date of death or place of death; 5) make a photocopy; and finally 6) mail the copy to the requestor in the mandatory self-addressed stamped envelope. That must be a backbreaking amount of work – I guess it does take 70 days or is it 70 seconds? I decided to not venture into Manhattan to confront the bureaucracy in the Black Hole of Calcutta, as I was afraid that after a 5-minute confrontational conversation I might turn “postal” in my unfettered rage and wind up in the slammer with Bubba for the rest of my life. What can we citizens possibly do to change the modus operandi of these civil servants? They can’t fire anyone because of the arcane and overly protective civil service regulations. I can just hear one of the bureaucrats crying about how they need more money and people to do the job correctly. By my complaints they may actually raise my taxes to pay for more people to sleep on the job. So I gave up on that idea. I am now seeking alternate methods to obtain the desired death certificate (including trying to raise my aunt from the dead) as I’ve had it up to my nostrils with government incompetence over my lifetime.
For those fools who are constantly clamoring for greater government services, beware! You may get what you wish for! I strongly suspect that if the City of New York decided to “privatize” the service, we would all be able to get a copy of a certificate as a “walk in” in 30 minutes for $5.00.
The bottom line of the private versus public job sector is
that there is no accountability in government when you are unhappy with a
government employee’s performance? It
makes little difference when you complain because they are protected by the
archaic rules of the Civil Service.
Politicians count on the fact that we are overwhelmed by the
sheer size of both the state and the Federal budget. When they infrequently
talk in terms of thousands of dollars, that’s fine with us, because it’s
something we can all relate to, as most of us buy houses and cars in that ballpark.
But a billion dollars? Or even a
trillion dollars? Few of us can visualize what one billion dollar bills stacked
end-to-end in a large vault would look like. Let us remember the famous quote
from the late Senator Everett Dirksen of Illinois, “A billion here, a billion there, pretty soon it adds up to real money.”
How can we little guys fight back? We don’t have time to analyze every bill and budget item to
determine if we agree or disagree with the expenditure. We don’t have the
knowledge to sift through hundreds of pages of budget explanations to sort out
the validity about each item, especially when the justification is most likely
written in governmentese. Besides, we all thought that’s why we elect
representatives to state legislatures and Congress. That’s what they are
supposed to do, but their failure to do so borders on a national disgrace,
because they’re too busy approving each other’s favorite pork projects to buy
votes back home in their own districts.
Who can be the watchdog we all need? Journalists, that’s
who. Over the years, I’ve rarely seen extensive articles about the budget in
the major newspapers. Why can’t journalists spend the time and dissect the
budget PRIOR to its approval and let us know where are taxes are being spent so
we can scream and kick about many unnecessary expenditures. First of all, the
newspaper kingpins have already decided it won’t sell papers. I don’t
understand that attitude – it smacks of Pulitzer Prize material in the making.
I’m sure that they believe that people would rather read about violence and
gore or maybe watch reality TV shows or even sports events. Secondly, maybe the
newspapers have a vested interest in not aggravating too many politicians.
In 2004, there was an article by a columnist for the New
Jersey Star-Ledger that touched on the fringes of this subject. It’s the first
article I can recall reading about the budget during the course of the year.
Columnist Fran Woods wrote an article, “Stay Put in the Senate and Steer Clear
of Trenton,” in which she recommended that Senator Jon Corzine not seek the
soon to be vacated seat of outgoing Governor James McGreevey. She suggested
that the Senator would only assume the blame for the budget mess in the state.
She proceeded to say that:
“Rightly or wrongly, even many New Jerseyans who love the state perceive it as rife with corruption, burdensome in its property taxes, more overcrowded every year and saddled with excessive debt.”
A few paragraphs later she
literally contradicts herself.
“The alternative is to cut costs. But for all the talk about ‘waste in government,’ that’s small change. To cut $4 billion, which the next governor might have to do without additional revenues or another huge bonding scheme, we’d have to close libraries, kill school programs, and eliminate bridge repairs and worse.”
She refers to “waste in government” as “small change.” Who bought you the crystal ball? I suspect there is much larger waste. I have
a gut suspicion that maybe the waste is $10 billion. And why does every
politician and newspaper columnist automatically invoke the dreaded “we’ll
close libraries, kill school programs….” argument every time there’s a budget
crisis? I’m sure there are plenty of
places we can take a sharp knife to the budget by tap dancing around the
letters “L” or “S.” But that’s precisely the point. Why aren’t you and your
cohorts taking a hard look at where our money goes? Analyze the budget and
track the actual expenditures in much the same way as a professional auditing
firm. Find out if people are actually on the payroll. Then let us know what
horrors you’ve discovered.
Give me that budget for 90 days and I’ll come up with a
budget with $4 billion less in expenditures, and maybe I’ll find that $10 billion
I bellowed about.
Our representatives are like a kid in a candy store, eyeing
up all of the goodies they can buy as if they had all of the money in the
world. Except instead of the kid only spending a dollar to buy his favorite
confection, our representatives want to play rich kids and buy everything, for
it’s only taxpayer money that they are throwing to the wind. When our income is
reduced as individuals, what do we do?
We don’t buy that new car or buy that new appliance in the kitchen. But
not government – we need all of it now. We must learn to prioritize and
drastically reduce our spending in government just as most of us do in our own
lives.
All hope is not lost. In the traditionally liberal state of
Massachusetts (“Taxachusetts”), according to the National Taxpayers Union, a
very small and under-funded campaign to repeal the state’s income tax almost
succeeded, with 45% of the people voting for repeal. This must have frightened
the hell out of the politicians.
If you are one of the millions of Americans who is disgusted
by the ever-increasing tax burden imposed on us by indifferent bureaucrats, you
might be interested to know that in some circles you are considered nothing
less than a criminal or white racist. According to the Law Enforcement Agency
Resource Network, an arm of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), the tax protest
movement is “an anti-government
movement that believes that income taxes are illegitimate, (with)… some white
supremacist elements.” They also state that
the “overall level of criminal activity is high, consisting mostly of attempts
at tax evasion. Some tax protesters have engaged in large-scale scams and
frauds.” Are these words written
by sane and intelligent people?
In a letter from Thomas Jefferson to James Madison in January 1787,
Jefferson stated:
“I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical. Unsuccessful rebellions, indeed, generally establish the encroachments on the rights of the people which have produced them. An observation of this truth should render honest republican governors so mild in their punishment of rebellions as not to discourage them too much. It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of good government.”
Let me repeat that
last sentence – “It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of good
government.” Left unchecked, government
will grow like a cancer until we’re all 6 feet under.
Tax protests are not new to the American spirit.
Shay’s Rebellion: One of the most publicized early
tax rebellions was called “Shay’s Rebellion,” named after Captain Daniel Shays,
a veteran of the Revolutionary War. A severe economic depression in Western
Massachusetts forced many people into court, and then into jail for non-payment
of debt. The merchants of Boston demanded hard currency (generally gold) as
they had bills to pay in foreign countries. The farmers, who were hard hit by
the economic times, circulated petitions to address their grievances. The
rebellion demanded the use of paper currency, lower taxes, and reform of the
judicial process. When the non-violent approach failed, the farmers fought back
with an armed uprising in 1786-1787, in which they initially stormed the Court
of Common Pleas throughout the state effectively shutting down this body. Their
goal was to stop the debtor’s trials and imprisonment. The Massachusetts
governor assembled 4,400 militiamen to combat the insurgents. In a series of
gun battles, Captain Shays and a number of the leaders soon surrendered. The
Supreme Judicial Court sentenced fourteen of the leaders to death for treason.
The new governor, John Hancock, later pardoned them after two of the leaders
had already been hung.
California’s Proposition 13: Perhaps the most recent
and successful tax protest in the 20th century was Proposition 13 in
California. On June 6, 1978, California voters passed a new law setting tax
limits and voting on future tax increases. Under the law, property taxes are
set at 1% of assessed valuation of the property. The law also required that a
two-thirds majority would be required to increase state taxes, and henceforth a
vote of the people was required to increase local taxes. Many opponents argued
that due to the lower tax revenues, the school system would quickly degrade to
unacceptable levels, which has not occurred. Since its inception 25 years ago,
recent polls indicate that the people would overwhelming approve the same
proposition if put to a vote today.
Let’s examine other mini-tax rebellions that are occurring
across the nation as you read this:
·
Perhaps in memory of Shay’s Rebellion, in 2001 taxpayers
took to the streets of Nashville to protest the planned state income tax in
Tennessee by storming the capital shouting “No new taxes”, causing the
legislature to abandon the plan.
·
Voters in northern Virginia defeated a proposal to add
a half-cent to the regions sales tax to resolve the area’s traffic congestion
problems.
·
After three successive years of tax increases the
citizens of Livonia, Michigan finally said enough is enough, and rejected a tax
increase to provide equipment and personnel in the Police and Fire Departments.
·
In Great
Chebeague Island in Maine, a property tax revolt brought out 140 residents to
protest town-wide revaluation, which dramatically increased assessments for
homes on the water, raising annual taxes beyond what the residents say they
could afford.
·
North Carolinians rained tea bags down on legislators
considering $440 million worth of hikes to the state income and sales taxes.
If you desire more information on the tax protest movement
in this country, consult the following informative web sites:
|
Name |
Web
Site |
|
Institute for Policy Innovation |
www.ipi.org/ |
|
Americans for Tax Reform |
www.atr.org/ |
|
Free Enterprise Society |
www.freeenterprisesociety.ws |
|
National Taxpayers Union |
www.ntu.org/main/ |
|
National Center for Policy Analysis |
www.ncpa.org/ |
|
Project Vote Smart |
www.vote-smart.org/ |
Project Vote Smart’s – Americans for
Tax Reform offers voters a self-defense manual that may be downloaded from
their web site.
In addition, this group provides ratings from 0 to 100,
where 0 is the worst possible rating, of each member of Congress on their
voting records on taxes. A random sampling of some of the
Congressmen/Congresswomen who received disastrous 0 ratings are:
|
Name |
State |
Name |
State |
|
Rep. Raul M. Grijalvaa |
Arizona |
Sen. Christopher J. Dodd |
Conn. |
|
Sen. Barbara Boxer |
California |
Rep. Robert Wexler |
Florida |
|
Rep. Lynne Woolsey |
California |
Rep. Alcee L. Hastings |
Florida |
|
Rep. George Miller |
California |
Rep. John R. Lewis |
Georgia |
|
Rep. Barbara Lee |
California |
Rep. Tom Harkin |
Iowa |
|
Rep. Pete Stark |
California |
Rep. Jesse Louis Jackson |
Illinois |
|
Rep. Mike Honda |
California |
Rep. Luis V. Gutierriz |
Illinois |
|
Rep. Brad J Herman |
California |
Rep. Jan Schakowsky |
Illinois |
|
Rep. Hilda Solis |
California |
Rep. Lane A. Evans |
Illinois |
|
Rep. Lucille Roybal-Allard |
California |
Rep. Peter Visclosky |
Indiana |
|
Rep. Maxine Waters |
California |
Rep. Julia Carson |
Indiana |
|
Rep. Grace Flores Napolitano |
California |
Sen. Ted Kennedy |
Mass. |
Congressional Representatives With 0 (“Zero”) Tax Ratings
No wonder California is in trouble with their budget year
after year. What it most revealing about the above statistics is every one of
the Senators and representatives shown in the table are Democrats, so perhaps
the “tax and spend” label is well deserved.
|
|
|