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Jewish World Review Feb. 16, 2001 / 23 Shevat, 5761
James Lileks
It's the politics of personal reduction.
Which brings us to the fight over Bush's tax cut. There is no fight,
really. There'll be broad, basic rate reductions for all. No strings
attached - except, of course, you must actually pay taxes to qualify. That's
what infuriates the hard left: tax relief should be for people who don't pay
taxes. People who do pay taxes, by definition, HAVE money; it's obscene to
let these rich swine gobble extra truffles.
Who are the rich, exactly? They're those folk who, by some odd and
arbitrary set of events, managed to stay in school, chose a field that paid
a living wage, started a career, got married, stayed married, and invested
their money instead of sitting in front of a Video Poker machine for hours
on end. How did they do it? No one knows! But since they won't share their
secret chants or handshakes, we must trust our elected representatives to
wrest their booty from their miserable hands, and give it to the people who
truly deserve it - i.e., us. Gimme!
Senator Paul Wellstone (D-Leningrad) has denounced Bush's proposal as
"Robin Hood in reverse." Interesting theory, this taking-from-the-poor; he
seems to think that poor people excrete gold coins in their sleep, which the
rich take while the poor slumber, exhausted from their daily toil. In truth,
the average "rich" family in America is a professional couple making their
money from intellectual, legal, or managerial endeavors. They're too busy to
steal from the poor. They leave that job to the state, which imposes hefty
cigarette and liquor taxes on the very poor it so noisily proclaims it
protects.
In Wellstone's world, however, inequality of any sort can be redressed
by feeding more money into the system's Best Intention Machine. (The dials
go up to eleven!) This world intersects nicely with Tom Daschle's Land of
Envy, where "fair" tax cuts are "fair" only if those who've paid the most
taxes don't get more than the Democrat's warmest personal regards. Why give
them their money back, anyway? According to Daschle, they'll just spend it
on a Lexus. He even had his minions drive one up to the Capitol so he could
stand by the evil machine and make his point. Well, Let's look at this Lexus
argument, then.
1. Democrats want their constituents to believe that the rich will take
the tax cut, have the butler gild the check, and use it to feed caviar to
the poodle. Sorry. The "rich" will probably invest the money, so they can
be even richer later. They don't dare say that, of course. Nowadays if you
announce at a dinner party you want to be richer tomorrow and richer next
year, people will look at you as though you supported slavery, or worse,
ordered veal.
2. So what if the "rich" do buy a Lexus? It would be refreshing to see a
group of well-heeled taxpayers come out and say "yes, dagnabit, I have every
intention of buying a Lexus. The silver one with the vibrating seat and the
airbag filled with pure, filtered Alpine air, and a horn that plays Herb
Alpert tunes. I'm old and I've worked hard and I want one. I might even get
two. If one gets a ding in the door, I'll pay someone to drive it into the
bay, and drive the other."
This needs to be said: it is not the job of the government to take money
from someone so they cannot buy a Lexus. If you're bothered than someone can
buy a Lexus, then that's your problem. Do not confuse your teeth-grinding
resentment of your miserly father with national economic policy. If you
want to keep people from having nice cars, then at least be honest. Forget
about your accomplices in Congress. Get a mask, set the alarm for three AM,
and go steal one
02/09/01: In search of the the first ashtray thrown by a member of the First Family
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