It’s April, and it’s time for one of the Left’s favorite activities to resume. Is it the start of Major League Baseball? Nope. Is it the NBA playoffs? No. Is it whining and complaining about the rich not paying their “fair share” in taxes?
Bingo.
The “fair share” drumbeats started up again like a Neil Peart drum solo recently when President Joe “I Helped My Son Get a Sweet Gig in Russia and All I Got Was 10%” Biden proposed a new minimum tax for billionaires (or more precisely hundred millionaires) of at least 20% on their actual income and any assets that have gained value but haven’t been sold yet. Sorry for the long sentence, folks, but to fully express the proposal, I had to be a little long-winded. Meanwhile back in the main topic, Leftists are happy with this proposal because they say it will help with the deficit. But, as you might expect, there’s a bit more to their love of taxes.
taxation
What the Left thinks it means – a means to pay for the services the government provides
What it really means – a way to punish people more successful than Leftists will ever be
Leftists thrive on negative emotions, but the coin of their realm is jealousy. Well, that and killing babies in the womb, but it’s hard to pay for massive government spending in baby parts. Besides, Planned Parenthood needs the money to buy exotic cars!
Where jealousy comes into play in regards to taxation is two-fold. First, the Left needs us to believe people like Elon Musk are gaming the system and, thus, taking advantage of the workers of America. Second, the Left blames any lack of progress in addressing societal ills on not getting enough money from the government. And as we’ve seen in recent decades, both facets work really well to get people to support higher taxes for the evil rich.
And I don’t just mean higher tax payments, either. The Left thinks the tax brackets are too low for the wealthy, so they are always looking for ways to jack up the tax rate to stick it to The Man. If you doubt this, ask a Leftist why they don’t support a flat tax, which would mean everybody would pay the same tax rate. Their answers range from “because everybody paying the same tax rate wouldn’t be fair” to “keep licking the fascist boots of the corporate overlords, you idiot.” But, really, it boils down to this.
Leftists use taxation as a purely punitive measure.
Remember the Left’s belief in a zero-sum game as it pertains to economics? If not, it’s the notion that there is a finite amount of wealth, so any time a rich person makes money it’s at the expense of a poor person. If so, it’s the same concept, but I’m far more apologetic for repeating myself. In either case, it’s based on a faulty premise: that there’s a finite amount of money. Anyone who has followed the expansion of the national debt can see the flaws in the zero-sum game idea.
But a little thing like being divorced from reality like they were Liz Taylor or Mickey Rooney won’t stop Leftists from pushing class hatred in the name of spending other people’s money. All they have to do is make the poor and middle class hate the rich and the lack of reality won’t matter. Needless to say, but necessary to type, this has worked well and continues to work.
Beyond income taxes, the Left has ways to punish the lower and middle classes through taxation. Yes, I’m talking about gax taxes. Contrary to popular Leftist belief, oil companies aren’t gouging people at the pump by jacking up prices. Based on current calculations, those evil greedy oil companies are making…pennies on the dollar with every gallon sold. That’s not a clever turn of a phrase, mind you. I’m talking literal pennies on the dollar (and unlike the kids of today, I do mean literally in the literal sense). And when you consider the costs oil companies incur to refine oil into usable fuel, it’s a wonder they even want to keep drilling.
On the other side of the equation, there’s an entity that rakes in far more money with each gallon of gas sold and incurs none of the risks and costs to get it. If you guessed the state and federal governments, you get a gold star! And these taxes affect the working class more than the upper class. You’re more likely to see Rosie O’Donnell successfully going through Weight Watchers than to see Bill Gates topping off his tank at the local Gas and Sip.
And you’re even less likely to see Leftists support suspending gas taxes right now. After all, it’s free money, and it’s a way to punish us for continuing to use the internal combustion engine instead of being able to fork over several thousand dollars to get an electric car or a hybrid…that would also use fossil fuels like gasoline to get from point A to pointless B. There’s that word “punish” again, kids!
Now, if you’re like me and not keen on paying more taxes than owed, the Left will try to guilt you into paying more by invoking patriotism. In fact, President Pudding Cup once said paying taxes was our “patriotic duty.” Who wants to be seen as not patriotic, right? Of course, this argument might be more persuasive if a) tax dollars were being spent on the country instead of pork programs with no practical application, b) we wouldn’t get in trouble with the IRS for non-payment, c) the government typically doesn’t get rid of old taxes because free money, d) around half of the American population pay little-to-no taxes in the first place, and e) the Left didn’t hate America so much. To be fair, I’m surprised Leftists don’t scream out in pain like vampires taking a holy water shower when they wrap themselves with the American flag.
Even if I grumble at paying taxes out of fear of the IRS giving me an anal cavity search without so much as dinner and a drink, I understand the need for taxation. There are some things we need to pay for, like national defense and infrastructure, because they’re in the Constitution and make sense to spend money on. (Try beating back the Chinese Army with pool noodles, oddly enough made in China.) Having said that, we need to start drawing a few lines before we’re taxed after we die…oh, wait.
Taxes are a necessary pseudo-evil. Like with fire or Auto Tune, they are tools whose use determines whether the results are good or bad. And when they’re used for the purposes of fostering hatred and jealousy, as they are with the President’s billionaire’s tax, there can be no good outcomes.
Except, of course, if you’re sitting on a few empty Swiss bank accounts.
