Power in the Wrong Hands

Many of our elected Representatives have signed a pledge to never raise taxes while in office. We, the people who elected them, did not ask them to sign this pledge. We did not vote for or against them based on the fact that they did sign this pledge. A lobbyist organization asked them to sign the pledge. We, the people being represented by this elected official, did not hire the lobbyist organization to obtain this signed pledge. This organization claims to act on behalf of the people but they are not acting with our approval or our request.

The question of whether or not raising taxes is a proper course of action can not be answered by me. I am absolutely NOT a financial wizard. But to bind the hands of our elected officials and restrict (even if voluntarily) their paths for action goes against the freedom of choice our founders aimed for.
When our representatives convene they take an oath to support and defend the Constitution of the United States. Within the text of the Constitution lies Congress’ power to lay and collect taxes.

Therefore to sign a separate pledge to never raise taxes while in office goes against the oath they then take to act on that office. In essence if our Representatives continue to uphold this tax pledge while still serving under an Oath of Office they are lying through either one oath or another. I personally find this treasonous. Is there not an attorney out there who might find better language to explain this act?

The question here is not about taxes being raised. The question is about who our representatives are representing. So here is my oath:

I will no longer vote for anyone running for office if they have signed or agreed to sign this taxation pledge.

Why should I pay for stupid??

If ever there was a time to re-invent our government it would be now. Our two parties have landed us in a deadlock of philosophy. Do we borrow more or do we spend less? Do we demand more from our citizens to pay for our lifestyle or do we cut the lifestyle down? There is absolutely no way the framers had this situation in mind when they declared our country ready to stand on its own feet.

We must be free. We must not be beholden to anyone as our rights are born with us. But this time we chose to be beholden to someone. We chose to borrow the money from other countries & institutions. We can not be free if we have to answer to our debt holders. But I digress…

What if we stood up together, all Americans, and said “I hired these people to run the country well. They are not performing their jobs and I wish to fire them. My taxes will not go toward paying their salaries until we have new elections and start fresh”. We would still file and pay our taxes but instead of paying the IRS we would hold the money in escrow until a new government is sworn in.

Of course that doesn’t help the current situation. Launching such a campaign now would surely cause our country to go into default and we would suffer both in the short term and long term. What do we do now?

We compromise!

There are two sides. Both sides are wrong. Both sides, if they have their way, will cause some sort of damage to our economy or our lifestyle. The best we can hope for is to minimize the damage. Take what hurts the least from both parties and shelve the rest. I don’t want the ceiling raised. It makes no sense to borrow more money when we can’t pay back what we owe now. But I’m not stupid enough to think we can go through life without paying for what we need. We will have to raise taxes. We will have to close loopholes. Should we hit the rich more than anyone else? No, if they’ve earned their wealth they should be able to enjoy it. If they had their wealth handed to them (like a gift or from a relative’s passing) that’s another story. You earn it, you keep it.

Companies should not pay a fortune to do business here, not if we want people to seek the American dream. We can’t dangle that carrot and then tell them to pay extra for the pleasure of eating it when they finally get it!

Worth my weight in tax breaks...

Congress enacted an interesting piece of legislation I didn’t even know about. Granted I don’t peruse political news too often. Apparently last March (2010) a bill was put into law that allowed any company to receive compensation in the form of a social security tax credit whenever they hire someone who has been out of work for  at least 60 days.

On the surface this sounds like a decent incentive package. Companies who think they can’t afford to hire someone new might re-consider. Then I thought to myself…

Well that’s a load of crap!

Real companies don’t get persuaded to hire an extra person simply because they won’t have to pay Social Security tax.  If the company needs someone and can afford it, they hire someone. Giving them a tax break for doing so only makes the government look good for offering such an incentive. It did not reduce unemployment it was too little of a drop in a very large bucket.

Let’s face it, hiring people can be costly.

Today I was asked to come in for an interview and in the paperwork they sent me was a 7 page document that I had to fill out so the company could get this tax credit for hiring me. Never mind the fact that I haven’t been hired yet. Never mind the fact that I had to be hired before January 1^st this year in order for them to get the credit (obviously waaaay too late on that one). But what about me?

Am I suddenly only a means for a tax break? Is that all I’m worth to this company? I am a valuable addition to any company. I’d rather it be my skill that makes me valuable if you don’t mind.