From:
david.j.worrell@gmail.com
http://tinyurl.com/ycbsxo3p
Billionaires Desperately Need Our Help!
Nicholas Kristof
NOV. 15, 2017
It is so hard to be a billionaire these days!
A new yacht can cost $300 million. And you wouldn’t believe what a pastry chef earns — and if you hire just one, to work weekdays, how can you possibly
survive on weekends?
The investment income on, say, a $4 billion fortune is a mere $1 million a day,
which makes it tough to scrounge by with today’s rising prices. Why, some wealthy folks don’t even have a home in the Caribbean and on vacation are stuck brooding in
hotel suites: They’re practically homeless!
Fortunately, President Trump and the Republicans are coming along with some desperately needed tax relief for billionaires.
Thank God for this lifeline to struggling tycoons. And it’s carefully crafted
to focus the benefits on the truly deserving — the affluent who earn their tax breaks with savvy investments in politicians.
For example, eliminating the estate tax would help the roughly 5,500 Americans who now owe this tax each year, one-fifth of 1 percent of all Americans who die
annually. Ending the tax would help upstanding people like the Trumps who owe their financial
success to brilliant life choices, such as picking the uterus in which they were conceived.
Now it’s fair to complain that the tax plan over all doesn’t give needy billionaires quite as much as they deserve. For example, the top 1 percent receive only a bit more than 25 percent of the total tax cuts in the Senate bill, according to the
Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy.
Really? Only 25 times their share of the population? After all those dreary $5,000-a-plate dinners supporting politicians? If politicians had any guts, they’d just slash services for low-income families so as to finance tax breaks for billionaires.
Oh, wait, that’s exactly what’s happening!
Trump understands, for example, that health insurance isn’t all that important for the riffraff. So he and the Senate G.O.P. have again targeted Obamacare, this time by trying to repeal the insurance mandate. The Congressional Budget Office says this
will result in 13 million fewer people having health insurance.
But what’s the big deal? The United States already has an infant mortality rate twice that of Austria and South Korea. American women are already five times as likely to die in pregnancy or childbirth as women in Britain. So who’ll notice if things
get a bit worse?
Perhaps that sounds harsh. But the blunt reality is that we risk soul-sucking dependency if we’re always setting kids’ broken arms. Maybe that’s why congressional Republicans haven’t bothered to renew funding for CHIP, the child health insurance
program serving almost nine million American kids. Ditto for the maternal and home visiting programs that are the gold standard for breaking cycles of poverty and that also haven’t been renewed. We mustn’t coddle American toddlers.
Hey, if American infants really want health care, they’ll pick themselves up by their bootee straps and Uber over to an emergency room.
Congressional Republicans understand that we can’t do everything for everybody. We have to make hard choices. Congress understands that kids are resilient and can look after themselves, so we must focus on the most urgent needs, such as those of hand-
to-mouth billionaires.
In fairness, Congress has historically understood this mission. The tax code subsidizes moguls with private jets while the carried interest tax break gives a huge tax discount to striving private equity zillionaires. Meanwhile, a $13 billion annual
subsidy for corporate meals and entertainment gives ditch diggers the satisfaction of buying Champagne for financiers.
Our political leaders are so understanding because we appear to have the wealthiest Congress we’ve ever had, with a majority of members now millionaires, so they understand the importance of cutting health insurance for
the poor to show support for the
crème de la crème.
Granted, the G.O.P. tax plan will add to the deficit, forcing additional borrowing. But if the tax cut passes, automatic “pay as you go” rules may helpfully cut $25 billion from Medicare spending next year, thus saving money on elderly people who are
practically dead anyway. If poor kids have to suffer, we may as well make poor seniors suffer as well. That’s called a balanced policy.
More broadly, you have to look at the reason for deficits. Yes, it’s problematic to borrow to pay for, say, higher education or cancer screenings. But what’s the problem with borrowing $1.5 trillion to invest in urgent tax relief for billionaires?
***
So these goons are actually adding to the deficit (Republicans
doing that?), cutting Medicare and Medicaid (Trump swore he
wouldn't), and sabotaging the current Health Care system in
yet another big way, all so they can give big corporations
a huge permanent tax cut (the personal income tax cuts that
benefit much of the middle class will expire, but the huge
corporate tax cuts will be *permanent*). They're also waging
a direct war on liberal states at the same time (those with
higher state taxes and the accompanying deductions.) Surprise!
Nothing could possibly be more partisan than these people.
It all goes way beyond "conservatism". Practically everything
Trump and Republicans are doing is like a vicious attack on
the common people of this country.
And who gets the lowest tax cuts? The poor, of course.
The same people who will lose their health insurance
to pay for higher corporate profits.
That's not even the most offensive thing they've done either.
Kristof:
"...congressional Republicans haven’t bothered to renew funding for CHIP, the
child health insurance program serving almost nine million American kids. Ditto
for the maternal and home visiting programs that are the gold standard for breaking cycles of
poverty and that also haven’t been renewed."
More on that one...
Congress Just Let a Critical Home Visiting Program
for Vulnerable Children and Families Expire:
http://tinyurl.com/yck4b6pp
Once upon a time, I designed and managed database software for
State Government Maternal Child Health departments who were
being funded by this program (it's still in use today).
They used MIECHV funding to pay for the software I created.
Just one more way these incredibly selfish short-sighted
cynical assholes have made it personal with me. 😡
--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: www.darkrealms.ca (1:229/2)