Tag Archives: austerity for tax breaks for the rich

The rules we live by are not the same rules that the Romneys (and the rest of the one percent) live by

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IF YOU’RE ANN ROMNEY, being a stay at home mother is “hard work” — or so she and the pander-pundits tell us. But if you’re not wealthy like Ann Romney, well… sorry.

From Romney’s book “No Apology: The Case for American Greatness”: “Welfare without work erodes the spirit and the sense of self-worth of the recipient. And it conditions the children of nonworking parents to an indolent and unproductive life. Hardworking parents raise hardworking kids; we should recognize that the opposite is also true. The influence of the work habits of our parents and other adults around us as we grow up has lasting impact.”

THE SAME DISSONANCE APPLIES TO OUR VOLUNTEER MILITARY: If you’re a child of low or middle income parents, you volunteer to serve your country and hope you come out of it alive and undamaged, maybe to avail yourself of GI Benefits for college. But if you’re  the privileged child of wealth and / or power, you go on about your life. There’s no need to serve anything except for yourself, with your trust fund that the Republican Party has generously fought to tax at the lowest rates possible:

(Via: Operation Yellow Elephant) – Boston Herald (2005): Mitt backs war, but his boys are safe at home 

Gov. Mitt Romney, who has comforted the grieving loved ones of soldiers killed in Iraq and promoted National Guard recruitment, yesterday said he has not urged his own sons to enlist – and isn’t sure whether they would.

The Herald posed the question as Romney – a potential 2008 White House contender and backer of President Bush’s Iraq policy – was honored by the Massachusetts National Guard after he signed a bill extending pay for state workers on active duty.

“No, I have not urged my own children to enlist. I don’t know the status of my childrens’ potentially enlisting in the Guard and Reserve,” Romney said, his voice tinged with anger.

(See also: Five Not For Fighting)

Of course even when this country had a military draft, the sons of privilege got deferments – including Mitt, so he could do missionary work for his LDS church in France.

SO YOU’D EXPECT THAT WHEN THE PLUTOCRACY plans to enrich themselves even further than they have already (with Romney, Evangelical Leaders, and the Republican Party as their personal champions), it’s going to cost the rest of us dearly. Fairness, equality, shared effort, common good, decency… those kind of ‘idealistic rules’ only apply to plebeians. You deserve to pay higher tax rates — THEY DON’T. No one gets rich paying taxes, hahah!!

BILLIONAIRES FALL IN LINE – “If there’s a President Romney, donors want to see the best case scenario of a Speaker Boehner and a Senate Majority Leader [Mitch] McConnell, and if the president is somehow reelected, the last thing the country needs is a Speaker [Nancy] Pelosi and a Senate Majority Leader [Harry] Reid.” || If you think the $53 million Obama raised last month is good, you ought to see how many millions the likes of the Koch Brothers, Sheldon Adelson, Foster Friess, Bob Perry, Harold Simmons and Harlan Crow can throw around in a day — not to mention all the mystery donors. 

And right on schedule:

  • SENATE REPUBLICANS FILIBUSTER BUFFETT RULE – The Buffett Rule, a bill backed by President Obama that would ensure millionaires pay a comparable tax rate to middle-class Americans, fell to a Republican filibuster in the Senate this evening, despite a new poll showing it to be overwhelmingly popular. While the rule, named after billionaire investor Warren Buffett, earned a majority vote of 51-45, it didn’t get the 60 votes needed to overcome a GOP filibuster… A CNN poll released today found that 72 percent of Americans — including 53 percent of Republicans and almost 70 percent of independents — support the Buffett Rule.
  • FOOD STAMPS FOR NEEDY FAMILIES? GONE. Cash subsidies for rich farmers? Protected. – The Recovery Act boost in benefits is already phasing out and will be gone entirely by November 2013. But the package now, to be taken up by the House Agriculture Committee Wednesday, would end this abruptly summer, impacting families Sept. 1, and saving about $5.9 billion in 2012 and 2013. [...] the severity of the proposed House cuts could be an over reach for two reasons. First they are all coming from the Agriculture panel in a context where rich farm subsidies continue to be protected at a time of record income for producers. Even in the commodity lobby, there is broad consensus that the current system of cash payments to growers at a time of high farm profits can no longer be politically defended.

In case you haven’t figured it out yet, cutting programs and services to the rest of us, the unwashed masses, so the wealthy can slide by with lower tax rates should be our collective privilege. Jesus would have wanted it this way.

via: dasrosmeyez