Sanity from New Jersey, Thanks To Governor Chris Christie

Governor Chris Christie stated in the above Piers Morgan CNN interview on Tuesday, February 21st, 2012, that he thinks his plan to reduce every New Jersey taxpayer‘s liability by ten percent is fair to all income levels. Well, Governor Christie, I don’t live in New Jersey, so your plan won’t affect me. But I lived below the poverty line last year supporting a family of four, and I have a message for you: Thank you for not buckling to the current Orwellian definition of fairness.

While I understand the political necessity of including, in a proposal of tax cuts, larger refunds for the working poor, I applaud your insistence that a ten percent tax cut across the board is fair for everyone who pays taxes, apart from the dollar amount involved per case. Ten percent is ten percent, whether it’s a hundred thousand dollars or ten dollars.

It is true that ten dollars could mean more to an extraordinarily poor person than one hundred thousand dollars might mean to an extraordinarily rich person, but it is also true at the federal level that if one’s ten percent tax cut would amount to only ten dollars, that person wouldn’t have a tax liability anyway. He would actually have no income tax to pay at all, making any applicable tax cut meaningless. He would suffer not a dime, and indeed doesn’t. Such a “taxpayer” would be getting a “refund,” whether they had actually any withholding taxes taken out of their paycheck that year or not, because nearly half of all wage earners right now pay effectively no income tax by the time they settle with the IRS for the year. So the net effect is, they’re not losing dollars to the IRS; they’re receiving dollars from the IRS that were taken from someone else who produced those dollars in one way or another.

In fact, under your draconian plan against the poor, and by your own admission, Governor, the poor will get, at twenty percent, twice the percentage break in their earned income tax credit — which is responsible for the largest part of tax refunds for the working poor these days — than the wealthiest taxpayer in the State of New Jersey will get in a ten percent reduced tax liability, which is what is lost in income by the taxpayer to the government. So much for everyone paying their fair share, huh?

Many thanks to Mr. Steve Kelley for this sliver of brilliance - © 2008 The New Orleans Times-Picayune

I also appreciate your common sense implication, Governor Christie, that the constant cacophony about the rich paying their “fair share” in income taxes is based on class warfare, not math, and that those billionaires who disagree are perfectly welcome to put their money where their mouth is without more needless legislation, and lead the way personally and freely in exercising the responsibility of the wealthy to share their wealth with the less fortunate, such as the federal government.

This whole angle of the conversation arose, of course, from Mr. Morgan’s mention of the endless lamentations of Warren Buffett that he pays a lower tax rate than his secretary. So deafening are the echoes of this mantra in the very wide circles of socialists and their minions in this country that President Barack Obama has caught the coattails of this manufactured discontent with the Buffett Rule, legislation he introduced, he says, to ensure that “the wealthiest Americans…pay a tax rate at least as high as the middle class.” That sounds reasonable enough, apart from the fact that the only substantiation given for this legislation is a single, personal example by Warren Buffett, which, since neither he nor his secretary have released their tax records for public scrutiny, is anecdotal at best, and hearsay or propaganda at worst.

"Just like you, son, I'm all about the little people."

This point is fleshed out convincingly in Glenn Beck’s article “Eleven Ways Warren Buffett is lying about Warren Buffett.” But knowing that lovers of tolerance will seek to crucify me as a redneck, bible-thumping Faux News troll for my positive reference to this wild-eyed Mormaryan pistol-waver, note that so far, Governor Christie, I’ve also cited their beloved towers-of-the-line, which include CNN, ABC News, Newser, and the Tax Policy Center, all certified kosher by MoveOn.org.  Hey, I read their crap and drew these conclusions. The least they can do is read mine before they draw theirs.

What I find hilariously telling in all of this is that during my research, and after I wrote the line above about the fuel for the outcry surrounding the Buffett Rule being class warfare and not math, I googled “Buffett Rule,” and the first result, at the top of the page, was a link to Barack Obama’s campaign website. Under the link was the phrase “it’s not class warfare – it’s math.” Touche’. The best way to deflect a punch is to anticipate it, right?. President Obama does know how to campaign, I’ll give him that. 

And that’s fine, if one stops there, as most of Obama’s supporters are wont to do. The only problem is, when one clicks on the link, the entire page is a seventy-three word talking point, not a single character of which is any part of a statistic, a percent, or even a number — as of today, anyway. Where is this ‘math” President Obama is referencing, I wonder? 

In fact, every word of this Obama campaign page invokes class warfare, pitting “middle-class families” against “millionaires and billionaires.” Read it for yourself. That’s the difference between folks like Barack Obama, and folks like me and you, Governor Christie. We don’t bluff. Of course, that’s a luxury we have precisely because, for our position, it’s not required.

Mr. Buffett’s unwillingness to, in your words, Governor Christie, “write a check and shut up,” reveals his real agenda, which more about social engineering and centralized control than paying it forward. The truth is, if Buffett did write a check, many others in higher tax brackets would do the same, just to say they wanted, in effect, to “be like Buffett.” But of course, that would still leave control in the hands of the individual, wouldn’t it? And that’s the antithesis of what Mr. Buffett is really trying to accomplish with his media influence.

By the way, Governor Christie, just ignore all of the blowhards who blather on with insults about your weight. You probably didn’t know you have a weight problem, did you? Man, lucky for you they’re around, huh? They underscore the honesty of your point when they consistently default to personal attacks on you, showing plainly that they can’t argue with your message. You may pity them, because this is the best that ignorant, brainwashed fury can offer. Or, put another way, “it’s just another tempest in a jar.”

Rock on, Governor. Rock on.

Related articles

• Chris Christie Tells Warren Buffet to “Write A Check and Shut Up” (inquisitr.com)
• Live coverage: Gov. Chris Christie gives budget speech (nj.com)
• Moran: Income-tax cut is pure political theater and a familiar play that is likely to flop (nj.com)
• Dems: Gov. Christie’s income tax cut would do little to help middle-class families (nj.com)
• Senator Barbara Buono Statement in Response to Governor Christie’s Budget Address (gloucestercitynews.net)
• Christie: Buffett should “write a check and shut up” – CBS News (cbsnews.com)
• Chris Christie is wrong on Buffett (finance.fortune.cnn.com)
• Gov. Christie leans on hopes of revved-up economy to fuel proposed income tax cut (nj.com)
• Chris Christie tells Warren Buffett: ‘Shut up’ – Politico (politico.com)
• Sanity from New Jersey, Thanks To Governor Chris Christie (americanparser.wordpress.com)