Sunday, March 13, 2011

Preaching to the Choir--Class Warfare ed.

I've seen this on Facebook quite a bit over the past day or two:

You can click to embiggen should you so desire, but it's really not necessary.  The gist of it is this: billions of dollars of vital programs are on the cutting board because of tax cuts for the rich.  It's all stuff like $8.9 billon: low-income housing programs/$8.9 billion: cost of allowing mortgage interest deduction for vacation homes (est. 10-year cost).

It is class warfare.  It claims to illustrate how the rich are waging war on the poor, but of course it's the more typical version.  And it rolls in quite a bit of the "that's not your money, it's the government's!" nonsense.

Folks, it works like this:  Until it's in the bank, it's not your money.  If I were to say to my brother "Hey, Pete, give me a thousand dollars" and he agreed to, but when he was on his way to the bank his wife told him he'd sleep on the couch if he gave me the money so he changed his mind about it, would he have cost me anything?  No.  Would he owe me anything?  No.  Would I have any claim, morally or legally, on that money? No.

If I said to my brother, "Hey, Pete, give me a thousand dollars" and he agreed to and while he was on his way to the bank I went to Amazon.com and put a thousand dollars worth of stuff on my Visa and then his wife threatened him with the couch and he didn't give me the money, would it be his fault I was in debt?  No.  And why not?  Because it is fucking stupid to spend money you don't actually have.  (For the record, I don't actually have a credit card, and never have.)

It is stupid with zeroes, as Dave Ramsey would say.  And you know what?  It's just as stupid for the government to count on getting someone else's money as it would be for me to count on getting someone else's money.

It's not class warfare to not take someone's money from them and give it to someone else.  It just isn't.  And while we're discussing what is immoral to do to poor people, how about we throw in "Condition them to depend upon someone else for their well-being"?

3 comments:

TBeck said...

I find it funny that the suggestion that we rest the 2011 budget at 2008 levels is met with gasps of horror. How on EARTH is this country expected to survive on the meager pittance that was the final Dubya budget?

wv: rizin

What Obama would like to see applied to the federal budget in perpetuity.

Charlene said...

I would agree with your analysis if billions were not being given to oil companies and corporations were escaping taxes which you and I pay.

No welfare? Then quit giving it to anybody; real people bodies and corporation bodies, which according to the Supremes are the same as human bodies.

Mattexian said...

'Tis a bit like the hand-wringing over NPR getting cut from the budget altogether, over their CF of the Exec being caught on camera chatting amicably with who *he thought* were Muslim Brotherhood agents. Gee, maybe they should use their sponsors and membership better, instead of playing patty-cakes with terrorist sympathizers, and then begging from all the taxpayers (in the form of Daddy Barack Warbucks) to make up the balance. Since they just got rid of two execs, shouldn't that equal their budget shortfall, now?