E!! The True Conservative Story™

Fact:  Democrats control the Nevada State Senate, 12-9.

Fact:  Due to the 2/3 super-majority rule, Nevada Democrats cannot pass a tax increase without the votes of (at least) two Republican senators.

Fact:  No Republican senator would dare to vote for a tax hike without the blessing of Senate Minority Leader Bill Raggio (R-Reno).

Conclusion:  Whether or not Nevada’s citizens, businesses and/or tourists get socked with a huge new tax hike in 2009 pretty much depends on Sen. Bill Raggio.

Action Item:  Call, fax, or email Sen. Raggio and respectfully urge him to oppose tax increases in these, the final days of the 2009 legislative session.

Toll-free Phone: 1-800-992-0973  or  1-800-995-9080
Fax: 1-775-786-1177
Email: wraggio@sen.state.nv.us

Action Item 2:  Forward this post to your friends!

Steve Wynn on Jon Ralston’s Face to Face:  “Anybody who raises taxes now is psychotic.”

Apparently there’s a guy working at the Nevada Policy Research Institute who is smarter than the entire Nevada legislature combined.

How so?

He went through the state ledgers line by line and, applying some basic principles and setting a few reasonable priorities, came up with a proposed budget of $5.1 billion.  Which, unlike the budget proposed by the Nevada legislature, stays within our current revenue projections. 

Oh, wait, that’s right:  the state legislature still has not released their budget for public discussion.  Even though they’ve been meeting up in Carson City for months.

Said a legislator who asked not to be named, “I mean, come ON, guys.  This stuff is, like, really hard.”

Says Geoffrey Lawrence, the fiscal expert at NPRI who put the proposed budget together, ”The reason the legislature and governor haven’t been able to balance the budget is that they’ve been unable or unwilling to set priorities.”

Now we wait to hear what the Economic Forum has to say.  We expect they will project lower tax-revenue than previously anticipated.  And that lawmakers will then propose record or near-record tax increases.

If they do, remind them of the four basic principles that provided the basis for NPRI’s budget:  sensible prioritizing, consistent application of government rules and taxes, agency thrift, and “last in, first out” (the elimination of some programs created and funded by Nevada’s record 2003 tax increases – which never should have happened).

Here’s another tired story about how the most helpless people in our society – our disabled, our children, and our disabled children - will be harmed if the Nevada legislature makes any more cuts to the state budget.

(yawn)

The thing about these kinds of stories is that most people don’t dare criticize them because then you’re called a supporter of “unconscionable” acts and a heartless hating hater of autistic kids.

Unless you’re me, and then you dare.

As a general rule, large government bureaucracies run so inefficiently and are guilty of so much over-spending and waste that any run-of-the-mill efficiency auditor could find ways to shave 5 to 10% without much of an impact on anyone.

If you doubt me, check out some of the information on the new Transparent Nevada website.

Like the sum total of the astronomical above-market salaries, overtime, and benfits packages being paid to some state employees.  A few reasonable adjustments and everyone could keep their jobs while the state saves about $100 million.

Or the astoundingly large vendor contracts that exist just here in Clark County.  You cannot convince me that out of the six $100,000,000 – ONE HUNDRED MILLION DOLLAR – contracts, there are no reasonable cost reductions that could be made while still maintaining adequate service levels.

It’s all about identifying and reducing inefficiency and waste - not cheating the poor kids out of their speech therapy classes.

Patrick Gibbons, a staff researcher at the Nevada Policy Research Institute, has a good column on higher education costs in the Reno Gazette-Journal.  He cuts through the hype and runs down the realities of the present budget crunch and then offers some viable cost-saving solutions based on success stories from Virginia Tech and other universities. 

Gibbons says Nevada needs to become better educated about delivering efficient, effective higher education services so rising costs (and fees) do not exceed inflation and income growth.

Jim Rogers and others need to leave the Stone Age behind and get with a financially responsible, 21st century program. 

If you are interested in learning more or becoming involved in education reform in Nevada, consider attending this conference on Wednesday, January 14.  E!! will be there to listen and learn along with many business and community leaders.

Iain Murray recently had a good post on the general arguments for them, and for meddling or not meddling with them.

At a recent meeting of Nevada conservative and libertarian leaders it was interesting to note that although we each came from different points on the political spectrum and disagreed on some things, we found one general policy area in which we all agreed:  fiscal policy.  Namely:  free market, small (and transparent) government, low tax, balanced-budget approaches.

The LVSun reports that Assembly Speaker Barbara Buckley wants to put two cents from every dollar of state revenue into the Nevada’s rainy day fund. Says the Sun:

Buckley said Wednesday that in the upcoming legislative session, she will propose a “forced savings account” into which 2 cents of every “new dollar” of state revenue would be deposited. New dollars would be any money that comes in above existing revenue levels.

Taking the pennies from new dollars would prevent this system from siphoning funding from existing programs, she said.

Having talked with state Sen. Bill Raggio, R-Reno, and Democrat Steve Horsford, the state Senate’s new majority leader, among others, Buckley said she has not “found one person who does not think it’s a good idea.”

It’s also been reported that (1) Democratic Sen. Bob Coffin has suggested a “temporary” tax that would cease when certain savings goals are met, and (2) our “no new taxes” governor Jim Gibbons has said he might agree to approve a temporary new or increased tax if it has an expiration date.

If Coffin’s plan flies and Gibbons signs off, I guess we’ll have to call him the ”no new taxes unless you pinky swear they won’t last forever” governor.

A reader emails:

Is it possible that by “freeing” the poor from paying any tax at all, they are, in essence, being completely disenfranchised?  That they do not care where the tax money goes because it doesn’t come out of their pockets?  That not being required to pay taxes sends the subtle message that they are inferior?  Thus perpetuating the victim and “gimme gimme” mentality?

I’ve often wondered whether even the poorest among us should pay some taxes in order to keep them in the game, so to speak.

Keep in mind that the poorest citizens not only pay no taxes but receive income “credits” from the government (i.e. our taxpayer dollars).  A mother earning minimum wage ($13,624 annually) with one dependent child taking the standard deduction not only owes “0″ tax, she also gets a check for $3,850 through the Earned Income Credit and Child Tax Credit.  And with two children that number jumps to $6,710, so at year end she has “earned” $20,334 in combined income and credits while having contributed nothing to the tax base (though her employer has paid some payroll tax).

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Wednesday morning during our KNPR panel discussion, LV City Life editor Steve Sebelius ridiculed the anti-socialist sentiments of Joe the Plumber and reminded listeners that America already “spreads the wealth around” via our existing social democracy and graduated tax system.  Steve also commented on the strange (to him) fact that Heartland voters like Joe will often self-defeatingly vote “against their own self interest” by opposing tax increases on hgher income famlies that would enable tax cuts for themselves and/or the funding of entitlement programs that would benefit them.

It seems that Steve and others of like mind have trouble understanding a man who votes based on principle – even if that principle might not benefit him immediately and/or directly.

So:  is Joe the Plumber, who one day hopes to own his own business and does not want to be taxed to death when he does, a big dummy for voting against the candidate who promised him a tax cut based on his present income?  He’s recently answered questions about this, as well as his general opposition to wealth redistribution, and here is the gist of what he said:

He understands that he’s earning less than $100K right now and that Obama’s tax plan would therefore benefit him in the short term.  But he also believes Obama’s tax plan and health care mandate will make it more difficult for him to succeed in the future (i.e. to start and then profit from a small business).  Joe says he is content to pay his taxes, if they are fair and reasonable.  He is willing to work hard and wants to earn his future wealth.  He does not want special breaks or handouts that he knows come out of another man’s pocket.  He does not want to pay less in taxes so another man has to pay more, and he does not want to be the man who someday pays more while others pay far less.  He believes that lower taxes on businesses create jobs, which benefits everyone (because companies that make money will generally invest profits and expand).

But yesterday Jonah Goldberg echoed Sebelius in reminding us that whatever our principles and ideals, the U.S. is a social democracy with a progressive, redistributionist tax system.  Our poorest citizens pay somewhere between 0 and 10 percent in federal income tax; the middle class pays 15 to 28 percent; and the highest earners pay 33 or 35 percent.  He writes:

A new study by the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development reveals that the United States “has the most progressive tax system and collects the largest share of taxes from the richest 10 percent of the population.” Our tax system is, in fact, the most “pro-poor,” according to a Tax Foundation analysis of that study, of any developed country’s save Ireland. That’s right, we’re more progressive than France and Sweden.

The bottom 40 percent of income earners receive more from the federal income tax system than they pay into it. Meanwhile, the top 10 percent pay 71 percent of all income tax, despite only earning 39 percent of our pretax income. Taxes on the top 1 percent constitute 40 percent of tax dollars.

So here’s my question:  Is sweeping tax reform a necessary part of a truly conservative agenda and should we therefore be pushing for a flat (or flatter) tax system?  Or are we resigned to things as they are and content to squabble over the difference between 35 and 39%? 

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Update:  Steve Sebelius emails with the following:

Actually, if you listen to the [KNKPR] tape again, you’ll see I went out of my way to make it clear that IF a voter considers his own economic self-interest a factor, then a voter of Joe the Plumber’s situation would have voted for Obama. I did not necessarily endorse using one’s own economic situation as a guide to voting; surely, plenty of very wealthy people who would be taxed more heavily voted for Obama, and plenty of less well-off people voted for McCain. I don’t condemn them for voting on principle, and made that clear on the show.  

Me:  I guess I’ll have to listen to the tape.  My impression in the moment was that Steve said guys like Joe are foolish and/or unintelligent and/or wrong for not voting in their own immediate economic self interest. 

Update 2:  Steve’s exact words were:  “There are people voting the wrong way by not voting their economic interests.” 

At least in that sentence, Steve was priveleging present economic interests over other factors, and indicating that voters (who don’t see it that way) are making a mistake.

However, Steve also says that the rich people who voted for Obama were voting against their own economic interest, and it was “the right thing to do.”

So, if someone like Joe votes against his own economic interest with a conservative/Republican vote, he’s voting wrong; but if a rich person votes against his own economic interest with a liberal/Democrat vote, he’s voting right…?

???

This post from John Hood is a winner:

A Joke And What It Reveals   [John Hood]

Speaking in front of a huge audience at downtown Raleigh rally yesterday, Barack Obama threw off a humorous line about John McCain’s accusation that the Obama tax plan is redistributionist:

McCain has “called me a socialist for wanting to roll back the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans so we can finally give tax relief to the middle class,” Obama said. “I don’t know what’s next. By the end of the week he’ll be accusing me of being a secret communist because I shared my toys in kindergarten.”

Ha ha.

Only, in this passage Obama revealed precisely why he is vulnerable to such charges: he can’t seem to tell the difference between a gift and a theft. There is nothing remotely socialistic or communistic about sharing. If you have a toy that someone else wants, you have three choices in a free society. You can offer to trade it for something you value that is owned by the other. You can give the toy freely, as a sign of friendship or compassion. Or you can choose to do neither.

Collectivism in all its forms is about taking away your choice. Whether you wish to or not, the government compels you to surrender the toy, which it then redistributes to someone that government officials deem to be a more worthy owner. It won’t even be someone you could ever know, in most cases. That’s what makes the political philosophy unjust (by stripping you of control over yourself and the fruits of your labor) as well as counterproductive (by failing to give the recipient sufficient incentive to learn and work hard so he can earn his own toys in the future).

Government is not charity. It is not persuasion, or cooperation, or sharing. Government is a fist, a shove, a gun. Obama either doesn’t understand this, or doesn’t want voters to understand it.

Nevada state senator Bob Beer’s campaign office has been located at 6822 W. Cheyenne Ave., Las Vegas, NV for the last six months or so.  He says that a couple of weeks ago, two doors down, an Obama campaign office opened.  Beers’ staffers thought maybe Obama had adopted a new slogan, but it turns out the previous tenant prepared tax returns and the Obama people neglected to take down the old sign:

Cliff May had a goodie the other day.  And it’s been nagging at me ever since.  The gist is this:

We all know that taxation without representation is a form of tyranny. But as so many have been saying lately, roughly 40% of Americans today don’t pay income taxes.

So, what if in the next administration that number rises to 51% or more?

At that point, the majority of Americans - who would not be paying any taxes – could and would elect leaders who could and would decide how much the tax paying minority would have to remit to the government.

That money could and would then be redistributed to the non-taxpaying majority through government programs and services.

A majority of Americans would then enjoy representation without taxation, and Voila, we have The Tyranny of the Non Taxayers.

A government which robs Peter to pay Paul, can always count on the support of Paul. – George Bernard Shaw

I am really busy with a few projects – researching voter registration fraud here in Nevada, researching a corruption story, writing a business plan - so I’m lifting good blogostuff for your enjoyment:

I Thought That Made Him Rich?    Jonah Goldberg [The Corner]

Ryan Lizza has a profile of Joe Biden in the New Yorker. Frankly, I barely  finished it. Normally, I think Lizza’s worth reading, but everything Biden tells Lizza in the one-on-one interview seemed like things I’d heard him say on C-Span a million times. I did, however find this bit amusing:

Biden happens to be one of the least wealthy members of the Senate, although his family’s joint income was more than three hundred thousand dollars last year. (His wife, Jill, has a Ph.D. in education and teaches at Delaware Technical & Community College.) His relatively straightforward tax returns and uncomplicated financial situation made the process easier. “All these years and you still have no money,” Obama said to Biden, teasingly.

I thought Barack Obama considers people who make more than $250,000 to be rich? I guess that only applies to normal people like plumbers and the like. Senators who only make a third of a million a year have “no money.”

posted on the Corner:  10/20 08:32 AM

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From Americans for Tax Reform

Five Things You Might Not Know About Obama’s Small Business Tax Hikes

WASHINGTON, DC— Americans for Tax Reform today released the following “top five” facts related to the Obama tax hike on small businesses:

1.        Two-thirds of small business profits are earned in households making more than $250,000 per year—the very households Obama is shouting from the rooftops that he will raise taxes on (Source: IRS Statistics of Income Bulletin*).  Small business profits are used to create jobs and invest in America .  This is the answer to the Obama campaign’s irrelevant claim that the number of small businesses affected will be small—the fact is that the bulk of profits will face a tax hike. 

2.      Small businesses pay income taxes at the household level.  This means that the Obama plan to raise tax rates is a direct tax hike on small businesses—sole proprietorships, partnerships, S-corporations, and family farms.

3.       The tax rate on the lion’s share of small business income could reach 54.9 percent under a President Obama (the individual top rate will climb from 35 percent to 39.6 percent and the Social Security/Medicare tax rate could climb from 2.9 percent to 15.3 percent.  Put those together, and you get 54.9 percent) (Source: www.barackobama.com)

4.      This 54.9 percent tax rate would be the highest since the Carter Administration, when America suffered through double-digit inflation and unemployment (Source: Congressional Budget Office)

5.       America’s 26 million small businesses employers give a paycheck to 116 million employees (Source: Census Bureau).  When small business taxes go up, millions of these employees will be at risk of being laid off.

“Obama’s tax increases will only affect you if you have a 401(k), have any savings, buy things from small businesses or are looking for a job,” said Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform.  “If you fall into one of these categories, his policies will screw you.  Otherwise, you’re fine.”

* “Small business profits” is equal to the net profits less net losses of sole proprietors, S-corporation shareholders, and partners.  According to the IRS, two-thirds of these small business profits are earned in households with adjusted gross income (AGI) equal to or greater than $200,000.  In 2006, $473 billion of the $706 billion (two-thirds) of small business profits was earned in households Obama has said he would raise tax rates on.

This post on the values of capitalism over on Overcoming Bias is just excellent.

It starts with this quote:

“The financial crisis is not the crisis of capitalism.  It is the crisis of a system that has distanced itself from the most fundamental values of capitalism, which betrayed the spirit of capitalism.”
        — Nicolas Sarkozy

and includes gems like:

The fundamental morality of capitalism lies in the voluntary nature of its trades, consented to by all parties, and therefore providing a gain to all.

and

Vigorous work is praiseworthy but should be accompanied by equally vigorous results.

and

No one has a right to their job.  Not the janitor, not the CEO, no one.  It would be like a rationalist having a right to their own opinion.  At some point you’ve got to fire the saddle-makers and close down the industry. 

and

No company has a right to its continued existence.  Change happens.

and

A high standard of living is the just reward of hard work and intelligence.  If other people or other places have lower standards of living, then the problem is the lower standard, not the higher one.  Raise others up, don’t lower yourself.  A high standard of living is a good thing, not a bad one – a universal moral generalization that includes you in particular.  If you’ve earned your wealth honestly, enjoy it without regrets.

and

People safeguard, nourish, and improve that which they know will not be taken away from them.  Tax a little if you must, but at some point you must let people own what they buy.

and

In countries that are lawful and just, the government is the referee, not a player.  If the referee runs onto the field and kicks the football, things are starting to get scary.

and

Making money is a virtuous endeavor, despite all the lies that have been told about it, and should properly be found in the company of other virtues.  Those who set out to make money should not think of themselves as fallen, but should rather conduct themselves with honor, pride, and self-respect, as part of the grand pageantry of human civilization rising up from the dirt, and continuing forward into the future.

Amen!

The sky’s been falling on Wall Street, and now hell is officially freezing over: Harry Reid is defending the same tax cuts that he once opposed and blasted as being “for the rich.”

So says Susan Jones of CNS News, who is reporting on the Senate debates of the “rescue bill” (still an Obama-ism, still smacks of false victimology, still hate it).

In an attempt to grease the Senate wheels on this bill, Reid now says he supports an Alternative Minimum Tax relief: $8 billion for natural disaster victims, and $78 billion in renewable energy incentives and extended tax breaks.

Reid’s commentary included statements like “we’ve got to get this done” and “it would be a blight on this Congress not to pass these tax extenders” and “tens of thousands of jobs will be created.”

How wonderful that liberal Democrat Harry Reid has finally admitted that tax cuts help businesses and create middle class jobs.

Pigs, commence flight.

Update:  George reminds us that Obama had a revelation on taxation also:  when he said that as president he would delay rolling back the Bush tax cuts if the economy was weak…essentially acknowledging that tax hikes hurt the economy.

Had a good conversation with a conservative friend this weekend re: government spending and Republican Rep. Jon Porter’s apparent affinity for it (despite his claims to the contrary – especially, my friend noted, when he is looking for campaign contributions).

This convo occured before I read John Ralston’s column in the Las Vegas Sun yesterday, in which he noted that although Porter has a new ad slamming Democrat challenger and former state senator Dina Titus for voting for the largest tax hike in Nevada’s history back in 2003 - which she did – Porter likely would have voted for it, too.  

In light of Jon Porter’s record of voting for pork bills in Congress, including this year’s scandalous Farm Bill, Ralston’s assumption is fair.

Does Jon Porter really think he can sell himself as a fiscal conservative at this point?  And even if he tries, why on earth would we believe him? 

I am pleased to point my readers to a new website by the Nevada Policy Research Institute.  The site – www.TransparentNevada.com – will bring much needed oversight and transparency to our state and local governments.

If you want to see how your tax dollars are being spent, just go browse the site.  It’s easy to use and allows visitors to view and search public employee salaries and overtime (there are some real Doozies!) as well as state and county contracts and purchase orders, lobbying expenditures, budgets, and financial reports.

Since your blood will no doubt be boiling after a few minutes on the site – just the first page of government Salaries/Compensation in Clark County was enoughto raise my BP ten points - you’ll be glad to know the site also features a blog for citizen comments & reporting and links to government transparency resources around Nevada.

In the website’s press release, NPRI president Sharon Rossie said, “There is simply no subsitute for independent, non-governmental oversight of public financing.  NPRI is proud to provide this valuable service to Nevada citizens.”

Last night in his interview with Bill O’Reilly, Obama said:

“If I am sitting pretty, and you’ve got a waitress who is making minimum wage plus tips, and I can afford it and she can’t — what’s the big deal for me to say, ‘I’m going to pay a little bit more.’ That is neighborliness.”

Well, Senator Obama, it WOULD BE neighborliness if you were doing it VOLUNTARILY, i.e. if free will were involved.

However, if the amount you pay is decided by the federal government, collected by the federal government, and distributed where and whence the federal government sees fit, and if you resent the hell out of it (as I do), then the act is NOT neighborliness but state-mandated SOCIALISM, otherwise known as the forcible redistribution of wealth, otherwise known as highway robbery by the Nanny State bandits of the world.

(I was pleased when O’Reilly called him “Robin Hood Obama.”)

“(Sarah Palin) brought down Alaska’s governor, attorney general, and state Republican chairman. She killed the ‘bridge to nowhere.’ She used increased tax revenues from high oil prices to give Alaskans a rebate. She slashed government spending. She took on the biggest industry in Alaska, the oil companies, to work out an equitable deal on building a new gas pipeline. Obama can’t match even one of these accomplishments.”

- Fred Barnes, The Weekly Standard, 8/30/08

This Eric O’Keefe blog/op-ed is for my Michigan readers (of whom there are a few).  It’s also worthy of note for anyone concerned with combatting massive tax hikes, the freedom of citizens in recall processes/petitions, and blatant media bias. 

The Free Press’s position is passing strange considering it’s been 25 years since the last legislative recall in Michigan.  And I agree with O’Keefe’s closing:

The Free Press is good at covering the Tigers and Red Wings. It should stick to covering sports, the weather, and the continuing decline of Michigan’s over-taxed economy.

“Our schools deserve parents’ support” was the scintillating headline of Nevada System of Higher Education chancellor Jim Rogers’ op-ed in the Las Vegas Sun on Tuesday.  Rogers kicks his column off by equating Nevada’s per-pupil funding levels to child abuse and neglect.  (Read it to believe it!)

Rogers then goes on to criticize Nevadans for not paying enough taxes to adequately fund education in Nevada. 

FACT ONE:  Based on U.S. Census data on K-12 spending and doing a little quick math, Nevada spent $8,926 per student in 2006 which, at an average classroom size of, say, 30, works out to $267,780 per classroom year.

FACT TWO:  43% of Nevada’s fourth graders are functionally illiterate, according to the National Assessment in Education Progress reading test.

Even allowing for the 3 to 18% of Nevada’s students who are ELLs (English Language Learners, meaning those who speak only or primarily Spanish) and who naturally cannot be expected to test as fully literate in English, that 43% is a pretty dismal number.

How is it that over a quarter of a million dollars of spending PER CLASSROOM is not enough money to ensure that by fourth grade our students have learned to read with basic competency?

And Rogers wants to lecture the taxpayers about ABUSE and NEGLECT…?

You can reach Rogers by email at chancellor@unlv.edu or call his office at (702) 889-8426.

Well, I don’t relish raining on conservatives’ celebratory parade after Tuesday’s primary victories here in Nevada, but a commitment to fair analysis requires that I do just that.

From the website Americans for Tax Reform: 

Cost of Government Day (COGD) is the date of the calendar year on which the average American worker has earned enough gross income to pay off his or her share of spending and regulatory burdens imposed by government on the federal, state and local levels.

Cost of Government Day for 2008 is July 16.  Working people must toil on average 197 days out of the year just to meet all costs imposed by government.  In other words, the cost of government consumes 53.9 percent of national income.

How about some suggestions for how we can all celebrate the Day we stop feeding our income to the Insatiable Monster that is Government?  Talk sarcastically amongst yourselves and report back.