Author Stephen King has a fantastic rant in The Daily Beast. Go read it now.
If you need some incentive to go read it, here are a few choice quotes. But the whole thing is reasonably short, funny, and as good a read as any Stephen King story:
The U.S. senators and representatives who refuse even to consider raising taxes on the rich—they squall like scalded babies (usually on Fox News) every time the subject comes up—are not, by and large, superrich themselves, although many are millionaires and all have had the equivalent of Obamacare for years. They simply idolize the rich. Don’t ask me why; I don’t get it either, since most rich people are as boring as old, dead dog shit. The Mitch McConnells and John Boehners and Eric Cantors just can’t seem to help themselves. These guys and their right-wing supporters regard deep pockets like Christy Walton and Sheldon Adelson the way little girls regard Justin Bieber … which is to say, with wide eyes, slack jaws, and the drool of adoration dripping from their chins. I’ve gotten the same reaction myself, even though I’m only “baby rich” compared with some of these guys, who float serenely over the lives of the struggling middle class like blimps made of thousand-dollar bills.
What some of us want—those who aren’t blinded by a lot of bullshit persiflage thrown up to mask the idea that rich folks want to keep their damn money—is for you to acknowledge that you couldn’t have made it in America without America. That you were fortunate enough to be born in a country where upward mobility is possible (a subject upon which Barack Obama can speak with the authority of experience), but where the channels making such upward mobility possible are being increasingly clogged. That it’s not fair to ask the middle class to assume a disproportionate amount of the tax burden. Not fair? It’s un-fucking-American is what it is.
8 Comments
just to be fair and balanced, here is the flip side to the argument. Surprisingly from someone who claims to be a liberal democrat.
http://www.wnd.com/2012/04/democrat-comic-scorches-obama-again/
Lovitz’s rants are a bit weak in comparison to those of King. Just because Lovitz believes every rich person pays their taxes, or even their fair share, doesn’t make it true. I don’t think anyone is arguing that taxing the rich more will fix all of our budgetary woes, but it is a start. Combine it with cutting corporate tax loopholes, lowering healthcare costs and starting to seriously reduce defense spending, then you have the makings of a dent. Any belief that ALL we have is a spending problem (as some of the enlightened commenters on King’s rant seem to believe) is ludicrous. We need to chop at this problem from both sides.
The problem with solving the problem is that no one wants to touch the military budget, we’re conflicted as to how to cut healthcare and the GOP won’t raise taxes on anyone, even those wonderful people called corporations, as per the Norquist anti-tax pledge. As King points out, claiming charities make up for the lack of taxation is bunk too. I live in a town of low to middle income households in New Hampshire and I can all but guarantee that no one is donating to keep the plows running in winter or the road crews fixing frost heaves in summer.
Not very balanced. Lovitz makes pitiful arguments like “everybody knows” and “I pay my fair share”. Not even in the same league as King. As far as I can tell, he is just whoring for attention.
Brilliant. I love it when King cuts loose.
Bullshit persiflage? Brilliant. Stealing.
If it makes sense to pay for gov’t by letting rich people write whatever kind of checks they want, why not do that for everyone? I mean, we don’t even need to collect taxes. Once a year (or really, just whenever you feel like), write a check to the government for whatever feels right. Maybe that’s 50%. Or maybe 30%. More likely 0% but hey everyone feels differently, right?
This is my biggest problem with the ‘let them just write checks’ argument from the right. The reason we have taxes in the first place is because people will not just write checks. They will try to keep as much of their money as possible, even as the nation that built them burns around them.
If you want to argue that their taxes are just right, or that they are too high right now, fine. Make that argument. But insisting that they can just give any extra money that they want to is pure rubbish.
I was looking forward to a good flip-side article, but Lovits’s rant — as far as the linked article goes — is content free.
Also, anyone who brings out the old “write your own check, then” canard has lost the word “fair” from their vocabulary.
My neighbor has heard it is the “entitlement programs” that are wrecking our economy. He has a three year old daughter. My neighbor is somewhat allergic to work, has difficulty keeping a job while his wife works at home and sells the on-line mortgages. I have written Schumer and the White house over and over in the last ten year about the inequity of our tax system, why the working man who commutes and has the same income as I pays four times the Federal Tax I do. I’m tempted to write my neighbor and encourage him to do the same: Send his representatives e-mails: Do away with earned income credit, child tax credit on the National Level, Health insurance on the Local level=Healthy New York for the self employed and Child Health Plus for low income families with children. Anyone want to take bets that he would be thrilled to do away with these “entitlement programs”?