Taxes & Regulation: The Black Hole of Government Waste and Corruption

"Washington will spend $2.6 million training Chinese prostitutes to drink more responsibly on the job." So stated an October 2009 report written by Brian M. Riedl, a Grover M. Hermann Fellow in Federal Budgetary Affairs in the Thomas A. Roe Institute for Economic Policy Studies at The Heritage Foundation---http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2009/10/50-examples-of-government-waste

Businesses are forced to provide that money. But Obama refuses to cut such spending. He demands more revenue.

Tea Party Republicans argue against raising taxes and for spending cuts. But Warren Buffett wrote that the very rich should be taxed more.

John C. Goodman, president and founder of the National Center for Policy Analysis---a free-market think tank---stated, "Consider that when Warren Buffett is consuming, he's benefiting himself. When he's saving and investing, he's benefiting you and me. Every time Buffett . . . puts his money in the capital market, he's doing an enormous favor for everyone else. A larger capital stock means higher productivity and that means everyone can have more income for the same amount of work."

The following day Jeff Carter, an independent speculator, published "The Buffett Deception." Mr. Carter wrote, "Mr. Buffett has had a great career buying companies and integrating them into his empire. He ought to stick to that. His recent editorial in the New York Times shows the flaws in many arguments that come from the left. . . . Buffett's logic also discounts how many Mom and Pop small businesses pay at the highest marginal rate."

Mr. Goodman and Mr. Carter's articles are premised on free markets economics. Obama and Mr. Buffett's views are premised on the political philosophy of Marx and Engels.

Free market economics is concerned with the production of values. It recognizes that individuals must be free to think in order to build businesses and create values. Businesspeople---employer and employee alike---must be efficient, organized and resourceful. Their efforts swiftly raise the standard of living for everyone when government does not interfere. When government does interfere, businesspeople's efforts are stifled and the standard of living is slowed,then curtailed, and finally reversed.

Leftist's political philosophy is focused on distributing the property of those that have created and/or earned it to those who have not. Such a focus relies on government-enforced distribution, which means government interference in the economy primarily through taxes and regulations.

Taxes and regulations do not increase business. They do not create more enterprises. They do not create values or jobs. They do not raise the standard of living.

But Obama refuses to cut spending. He demands more revenue.

Taxes are spent to finance government officials and their programs. They are spent to pay government salaries, which on average exceed that of most businesspeople. They are spent to maintain the offices of almost a thousand government agencies, each with large staffs. Taxes are spent on duplicate programs, inefficient work and mismanagement. For instance, "Washington spends $25 billion annually maintaining unused or vacant federal properties." Taxes are wasted through fraud: "The federal government made at least $72 billion in improper payments in 2008."

But Obama refuses to cut spending and instead demands more revenue. When he does talk about cuts in spending he names Social Security, which owes those who were forced to pay into it out of earnings. He does not mention the 70+ programs that could be cut to save over $4.2 trillion without touching Social Security.

Taxes should be spent to pay for the three proper functions of government:
the police, the military and the courts. When tax money does not go to the proper functions of government it goes to improper functions.

Mr. Riedl writes, "A GAO audit classified nearly half of all purchases ongovernment credit cards as improper, fraudulent, or embezzled.
Examples of taxpayer-funded purchases include gambling, mortgage payments, liquor, lingerie, iPods, Xboxes, jewelry, Internet dating services, and Hawaiian vacations. In one extraordinary example, the Postal Service spent $13,500 on one dinner at a Ruth's Chris Steakhouse, including "over 200 appetizers and over $3,000 of alcohol, including more than 40 bottles of wine costing more than $50 each and brand-name liquor such as Courvoisier, Belvedere and Johnny Walker Gold." The 81 guests consumed an average of $167 worth of food and drink apiece."

In addition, recall the millions of taxpayer money that Obama spent on a 500-man entourage to visit Great Britain.

But Obama refuses to cut spending. He demands more revenue.

Andrew K. Dart writing "The Pork Page," http://www.akdart.com/pork.html, lists a hundred misuses of taxpayer funds. Here are two examples:

"Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas) while claiming to be a fiscal conservative, requested 149 projects worth $1.6 billion for authorization and appropriations bills for fiscal year 2010."

In December 2010, a bill "written by . . . members of the Appropriations Committee proposed spending nearly $8.3 billion." The earmarks included $349,000 for swine waste management in North Carolina; $413,000 for peanut research in Alabama; $235,000 for noxious weed management inNevada; and $300,000 for the Polynesian Voyaging Society in Hawaii.

Onerous taxes and strangling regulations do not create prosperity. They obliterate it. Taxes drain business resources into a black hole of government avarice, corruption and waste. Regulations do not protect the consumer. They strangle the producer.

Taxes and regulations ravage the nation's savings, suffocate ambition, undermine business operations, erase certainty and penalize the successful while rewarding the indigent.

Tea Party Republicans are attacked almost every day on various interview shows and in the news. They are attacked because they refuse to give in to the Left's political philosophy of tax, spend, borrow,tax. Let us make certain to increase the number of Tea Party Republicans come 2012.

Whose American Dream?

Maybe some of you have read an August 19, 2011 e-mail from Levana Layendecker, Communications Director of Democracy for America, with the subject "Join the movement."

The opening sentence reads: "Democracy for America relies on you and the people-power of more than one million members to fund the grassroots organizing and training that delivers progressive change on the issues that matter."

Five parts of that sentence are immediately curious. You have to wonder what's going on.

For instance, democracy" means mob rule. Is the writer of the e-mail advocating anarchy in America? In a democracy the individual is a cog of no importance residing in a form of government that almost immediately fizzles into oligarchy or dictatorship. There can never be a "democracy" for any appreciable length of time for the simple reason that a mob cannot figure out what to do or come to agreement on anything without one or two individuals moderating and organizing the numerous conflicting ideas and wishes that characterize a mob.

If the DFA really does have one million members and if those one million members really are "grassroots," you might feel some dismay that they achieved such a giant slate without being called "astro turf." However, dismay quickly dissolves when you read the phrase "progressive change." You know much of MSM is peculiarly sweet on Progressive ideas, so they are surely not going to tag Progressive "grassroots" as false and synthetic.

But then you read "issues that matter." You pause. What issues matter to the DFA? They are listed in the ten goals of the "Contract for the American Dream." And here is where we get down to the nitty-gritty of what the "American Dream" means to the progressives.

For most of us, the American Dream is being free to earn your own way, unoppressed by government. That's what most people seek in immigrating to America: freedom of conscience and freedom of action. That's what our Constitutional freedoms are all about. That's what individual rights are all about.

That is not the Progressives' Dream.

For the Progressive, "the American Dream" is getting rid of the principles of American government. What else can it mean when one advocates universal health care? Universal health care has to disregard the moral principle of individual right to life and property. As such it reveals the DFA's desire to force the entire medical profession into virtual slavery under government control.

The same disregard of moral principles is seen in the rest of the DFA's goals. "Invest in America's Infrastructure," "Create 21st Century Energy Jobs", "Invest in Public Education," "Make Work Pay." Does this mean that one million Progressives are going to dig into their own pockets to put up the money to fix bridges and tunnels, create energy jobs, straighten out the horrendous problems of public education?

Don't bet on it. It means passing laws that force taxpayers to pay more into government projects---to the tune of more waste, more corruption and more mismanagement. So the inclusion of "Make Work Pay," "Secure Social Security," "Return to Fairer Taxes" and "Tax Wall Street Speculators" reduces the entire list to one thing: higher taxes and less liquidity in the securities markets---which endangers the portfolios of almost every investor, including retirees, those about to retire and those saving for retirement, the group that consists of those who earn their own way.

Ms. Layendecker asserts that in attaining these goals, "we can stop Republicans from killing the American Dream and build a future based on liberty and justice for all."

They might succeed in killing our American Dream---the actual American Dream---if we do not remain vigilant and ready to assert and defend American ideals and principles, in particular the most basic principle of our Republic government, individual rights. We should recognize that the Progressives' "American Dream" deserves to be killed---and drawn and quartered---without reservation.

There can be no liberty---which is the right to move about freely without coercion---and no justice---which is the virtue of treating men as they deserve---should Progressives attain their fetid collection of goals, which seeks to hog-tie and drain those who earn their own way.

For a lot of information about DFA's specific goals and training programs to gain seats for Progressive Democrats on all levels of government, access http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy_for_America

The Achievement of the Tea Party Movement

It was the first two years of protest. Others had taken the initiative to start a Tea Party. We joined them and supported their efforts with our time, our work, our ideas and dollars. We helped to organize events and rallies, make signs, distribute thousands of flyers, print hundreds of petitions and wove our way through rally crowds to gather signatures.

We visited our Congressmen's offices, wrote our Senators, phoned Legislators, attended City Council meetings and commissioner and district meetings. We joined parades and yelled ourselves hoarse for our chosen candidates. We sweated bullets during summer events and froze our fingers and toes during winter's. We registered voters and became poll challengers and poll workers. Sometimes we worked through the night answering queries and often rose in the morning to start work without taking time to change out of our pajamas. We cheered when others honked in support of our efforts and laughed at our own exhaustion.

Today, seasoned and still dedicated to our principles, we are, each and everyone one of us, the Tea Party Movement.

The Tea Party is a movement of many different kinds of people coming together spontaneously and voluntarily: Capitalists, Objectivists, Conservatives, Republicans, Democrats and Independents. We hold similar ideas and share a common goal of seeking to restore individual rights, Constitutional freedoms, limited government, and to establish free-markets and fiscal responsibility. For these reasons we are united against big government, against the intrusive, regulatory government of the welfare state. We hold a basic point of view: in order to realize the American Dream, each individual must work to earn it, and not look to government to hand them what others have earned.

During the Tea Party's infancy our concerns regarding big government were too obvious to ignore; so, the Leftist media and Leftist politicians tried to ridicule the grassroots by calling the Tea Party Movement "astro-turf."

Since the 2010 elections, the Left no longer uses that slur against us. They got the picture. During the "debt talks" Sour Harry had to scramble about for another slur. He thought he found one.

He bemoaned "Tea Party Republicans" and their refusal to compromise. He flatly stated that Mr. Boehner's proposal was "the worse piece of legislation ever written." How could one know he was speaking the truth? He did not allow the Senate to read it. He instructed them to vote no without seeing it. Like sheep they followed their B.O.-Peep without a baaa. As Reid's statements became shriller against "Tea Party Republicans," so did those of his fellow Leftists.

One Leftist spat out something about a proposal that would have gone through except for "a few right-wing nuts." The New York Leftist Charles Schumer complained that the Tea Party Republicans' refusal to compromise amounted to "It has to be their way or the highway . . . or no way." (He got a little confused in the heat of his moment.)

Tea Party Republicans. It is a tag to be embraced. It is a clear distinction that separates us from politics-as-usual-Republicans and Democrats.

Tea Party Republicans stick to principles. We do not compromise them. We can be accommodating when non-essentials are involved. But principles are basic. They are derived from ethics. We do not give in on them. Because of that, the Tea Party Movement attained something far more important in the long run than an insufficient budget agreement.

Tea Party Republicans understood this. A few others did, too. Last night, August 10, George Wills stated in an hour-long interview, "The Tea Party brought the issue of limited government and free-markets into the arena of public discussion."

A formidable achievement, in view of the welfare state talk that has dominated public policy since 1933.

Confirming Mr. Wills observation, this morning, August 11, GOPUSAMedia sent an e-mail advertisement paid for by Steve King, Iowa Member of Congress, which included the statement, "To preserve America as we know it, we have only one option: to return to the principles of limited government and free market capitalism this nation was founded upon."

Following the conclusion of the debt talks, many Leftist commentators attacked the Tea Party for a variety of things. A number of commentators came to the Tea Party's defense. For instance, Brent Bozell---Founder and President of the Media Research Center, the largest media watchdog organization in America---reported that John Kerry "shamelessly labeled [the S&P's action] a "Tea Party downgrade" . . .although it is known that "while Obama was tripling the deficit with trillions in new spending, Kerry happily endorsed" the spending spree. http://townhall.com/columnists/brentbozell/2011/08/10/tea_party_blame_and_fairy_tales

As someone remarked recently, "The Tea Party Movement succeeded because we avoided the danger of becoming centralized, which would have been an invitation to politicians to take us over." We avoided "the divisiveness inevitable from focusing on narrow social values," which would have diluted our dedication, energy and focus.

If we hold firm to our principles Tea Party Republicans will take the White House and the Senate in 2012. We can start to cut spending, downsize government by closing regulatory agencies and terminating at least a third of federal government employees. We have achieved a great deal. We can achieve more.

Cut, Cap & Balance the Budget

In his July 17 newsletter Steve Pearce, a New Mexico Congressman, mentioned his participation in the Congressional Baseball Game for Charity. He wrote:

"On Thursday, I played in the Congressional Baseball Game for Charity, an annual tradition reaching back to 1909. We raised over $150,000 for local charities. During this difficult economic time, I am happy to spend my time helping charities who are struggling with limited resources. My hit in the 6th inning ended the Democrat teams' no-hitter, and I was named the team's MVP."

That's not the extent of Steve's MVP status. Monty Newman, Chairman of the Republican Party of New Mexico, expressed his gratitude to Steve for "supporting the Cut, Cap and Balance legislation that passed the US House this week."

In the House, Pearce voted for Cut, Cap & Balance Act; other New Mexican Congressmen, Ben Ray Lujan and Martin Heinrich, voted against it. In the Senate 46 Republican Senators voted for the Cut, Cap & Balance Act. Fifty-one Democrat Senators voted against it---including Jeff Bingaman and Tom Udall, both New Mexico Senators.

Bingaman asserted the bill "did not achieve shared sacrifice." Lujan declared that the act "would cut the deficit on the backs of New Mexico's seniors and working families." Heinrich stated something about "breaks for the ultrarich, while making dangerous cuts to Social Security and Medicare."

To be blunt, such remarks are dishonest. The bill, HR 2560, states: Exempt From Direct Spending Limits - Direct spending for the following functions is exempt from the limits specified in subsection (c):`(1) Social Security, function 650.`(2) Medicare, function 570.`(3) Veterans Benefits and Services, function 700.`(4) Net Interest, function 900.`(c) Limits on Other Direct Spending

The entire bill can be read at Politisite.com.

Evidently, Democrats did not read the bill. Harry Reid deemed it "the single worst piece of legislation to hit the Senate floor." http://www.thenewsstar.com/article/20110724/OPINION02/107240315 That was good enough for Democrat Senators.

Politisite writes: "They actually didn't even get a chance to vote on the actual bill. Reid used a parliamentary maneuver to force a vote on whether to allow the bill to come to the Senate floor to be debated. That motion to "table" a "motion to proceed" is what passed 51-46. Once again, rather than debate the actual bill, so everyday Americans could "see what's in it," to borrow Nancy Pelosi's famous words, Democrats didn't even want to talk about it." [ibid]

It has been made clear---particularly during last week---that Democrats are not trying to solve the debt problem. Yet they characterize Republican proposals as either (a) ridiculous, á la Obama, or (b) disastrous, á la Harry Reid, or (c) does not achieve "shared sacrifice" á la Bingaman.

An Op-Ed in the July 23 Albuquerque Journal offered an explanation for this curious behavior, although that was not the author's actual theme.
Carl P. Leubsdorf, former Washington Bureau Chief of The Dallas Morning News compared the difference in attitude toward problem solving among politicians of the past and present day.

He wrote that problem-solving on a large, national scale is not the motive of most politicians these days. Instead, their approach to politics is partisan. Today, politicians are wedded to their political party. They seek to maintain party unity rather than solve a given problem besetting the nation.

But partisan politics is neither productive or predictable. Mr. Leubsdorf pointed out that "Barack Obama's disdain for Republicans in 2009, when he told them pointedly he could call the shots because he "won" in 2008, backfired when the GOP won House control in 2010."

Partisan politics boils down to "my gang is bigger than your gang; so, you have to do what I say." This is the hallmark of the gangster, the dictator, the totalitarian---call it what you will. It is an attitude that does not approach problems with a solution but with an edict.

This has been the attitude of Obama and his supporters during the debt talks. They have refused to cut the 70+ programs the Republicans proposed, which would save $2.4 trillion. They chorus one melody: "Tax the rich. Raise the debt ceiling." That's not a solution. It's an extension of the same problem of reckless, wanton spending, without thought, without plan, without concern for tomorrow.

Obama and his supporters continue to claim they need money for "seniors and the poor and the unemployed and the sick and the disabled and the maimed and the blind, for oppressed Haitians and Samolian's, for Afghan and Iraq politicians, for Libyan and Syrian and Egyptian rebels, and for anyone else they can dream up.

But not for the American earners who produce the values that pay for it all. If you're tired of politicians stampeding into your pocketbook with their pretended concern for everyone except the American producer, we need not wait for 2012. We need to start calling and writing the Democrats now and simply say, "No more money. Pass Cut, Cap and Balance the Budget."

And if they should say, as some do, "Leave me alone! You're not my constituent." Simply respond, "Thank goodness for that. I plan to convince those who are, not to return you to office."

Freedom, Profit and Prosperity

A reader sent me 5 photographs of people in Arizona in front of the capitol building. Many American flags had been placed on the ground. Graffiti of some sort was scribbled on some of the flags. Men, women and children were shown striding across the flags, stomping on them, spitting at on them and burning them.

There are many things one could say about the mind-set of those who desecrate a nation's flag. Intelligence is not one of them.

Desecrating a nation's flag is not argument to persuade others to your point of view. It is not a demonstration to show that your actions have merit. It is not even a show of loyalty to an opposing principle, such as those who might rip apart a Nazi flag to show loathing of fascism.

To try to debase the flag of the United States by throwing it whole upon the ground and stomping on it, is the attempt of the mindless, savages who stick pins in dolls or drink his enemy's blood---as if such actions were power-enabling.

The flag of the United States is unique among nations. And most people know it. It symbolizes freedom. No other flag, save perhaps that of Great Britain, carries so powerful a message. To desecrate the flag of the United States of America means one has no regard for freedom, and more: no regard for the human life freedom protects and advances.

What does freedom mean in action? Freedom is the absence of cocerion; therefore, in action it is the opportunity to live one's life, to achieve happiness. What provides us with material happiness? Prosperity. How is prosperity achieved? Through profit.

When I was a free-lance artist working in Manhattan, in order to live, profit was essential. I had to have money to buy oils, canvas and stretchers, illustration board, brushes, and all the other materials and equipment necessary to running an artist studio. There were also models' fees to pay and my own rent and groceries.

When I was paid for my illustrations and/or paintings, the price I received had to be at least a bit more than my combined expenses. To be paid less than my expenses, or to break even meant I could continue to produce paintings only by going into debt. If such a situation continues for any length of time, the business goes into bankruptcy.

Profit, even a little profit margin, kept me afloat. The same is true of any business whether you are a free-lance businessperson, or own a small company or a middle-size or large one. Profit is not "surplus income." It is not "gravy." It is the muscle and bone, the essential means of doing business. It is the means to keep on going. Without profit, business is impossible. If one takes in a bit more than the cost of one's own expenses, it means the business can stay afloat without undue strain. If it earns a lot more than its expenses, it can expand, offering more values to a larger clientele, creating more jobs improving services and so forth.

Many people, including businesspeople, do not understand the virtue, purpose and need of profit. We have been led to believe profit is somehow "dirty" or "usurious" as if making more than one's expenses was somehow "dishonest."

The truth is, profit is essential to doing business. Profit, since it supports a businessperson's life and that of his employees, is a virtue. By means of efficiently producing values and keeping a business' product desirable, profit says: "You're doing good. You're benefiting life."

The attack on profit is ancient. Today, Leftist habitually attack profit as a sure-fire way to create conflict between those who earn their own way and those who do not. Mr. Obama does the same, feverishly trying to make Americans hate "the rich." Such individuals try to convince us profit is some kind of evil that destroys society. The opposite is true.

Profit is what makes prosperity, improving and increasing the number of values that businesses offer---whether in manufacturing or in service industries. It is profit that raises the standard of living for everyone.

It is the lack of profit that is destructive. A lack of profit destroys a business, a neighborhood and a society. But profit requires individual freedom. One look at the difference between North and South Korea, or again, during the Berlin Wall the difference between East and West Berlin, attests to that. Those cities demonstrate the individual's need of freedom and the prosperity possible when he has it. Profit generates prosperity.

Our flag symbolizes freedom. It is the portable display of what our Statue of Liberty represents. When one sees the stars and stripes, one immediately thinks of freedom, of opportunity, of happiness. People the world over know that. Those who desecrate the flag of the United States of America are making an explicit statement. They are not stomping upon a mere piece of fabric. They are stomping on a symbol of man's need for freedom and the best that he can achieve. What do you call a creature who seeks to destroy the best in man? A criminal? A heinous monster? That which feeds and breeds upon a corpse? Whatever description you choose, he is a killer.

Not even anger is any longer possible toward such creatures. What remains is only a cold contempt re-enforcing a determined resolve to never give in to those who would kill freedom, the profit it can generate and the prosperity that follows.

Politicians Call for Sacrifice to Solve the Mess They Created

Jeff Bingaman is one of New Mexico's Senators. On July 07, 2011 he sent a newsletter to his constituents. It is a very long newsletter, filled with many questionable statements, premised on the usual Leftists' view of man as a sacrificial goat.

I'm posting here only some of Senator Bingaman's paragraphs and my comments. The Senator's paragraphs I've chosen to post here do not necessarily reflect the Senator's worse demands. They do, however, reveal his worse premises.

Senator Bingaman writes: 1. There has been a lot of discussion in Washington and around the country about how we can sustain and strengthen our country's two federally-funded health insurance programs - Medicaid and Medicare - even while we rein in our budget deficit.

Note Senator Bingaman's characterization of who pays for government health programs. "Federally funded?" Surely, the Senator knows the source of "federal funds." Is it possible he's trying a bit of sleight of hand?

2. Medicare and Medicaid are extremely important to New Mexico. Medicare pays for the bulk of health care provided for Americans age 65 and older as well as people with disabilities; about 300,000 New Mexicans are enrolled in Medicare.

"Medicare pays?" No. Earners pay. Through their taxes. Why does Senator Bingaman ignore the fact that taxpayers pay those costs?

Out of New Mexico's population of 2.1 million, with only about 1/3 the population being producers/earners and about 9% of these out of work, 300,000 enrollees are a mammoth number. The cost to earners who are expected to foot that bill will be onerous.

Senator Bingaman and his colleagues are adroit at making citizens pay for politician-created problems. Notice how they pretend Medicare is absolutely imperative, the totally essential life and death remedy to care for "the children," "the elderly" and "the disabled." Without Medicare, Senator Bingaman seeks to convince us, these helpless and dependent souls would horribly suffer for eons and/or die in a New York minute.

3. As we take the necessary steps to address our budget deficit . . .

The budget deficit is not ours. It is Senator Bingaman's and his colleagues'. They are the ones who voted for the reckless spending, the stimulus packages, the bailouts and buy-outs and forced lending and approval of risky loans and "affordable housing" and implemented Fannie Mae and Freddie Max corruption. They created it. Let them dig into their own pockets and pay for it.

But, of course, for Senator Bingaman and all such politicians, such an idea is not de rigueur.

4. Medicaid primarily provides health care coverage to Americans with low incomes, for example children and the elderly. It will come as a surprise that two-thirds of Medicaid funds go toward care for low-income seniors and the disabled.

Why on earth would anyone be surprised? The entire "affordable" health care law is undisguised robbery of those who earn in order to support those who do not. It's not about the children and seniors and the disabled. It's about politicians' lust to control the entire medical industry, including pharmaceuticals and insurance. It's a wholesale attack on the medical profession and the innumerable charitable foundations and organizations---to which Americans generously give---in order to place those skills and those funds under government control.

5. I believe we must ensure that the burden of sacrifice is shared broadly and not placed largely on the backs of our most vulnerable populations, such as seniors and children.

Seniors and children are our most vulnerable? Not true. With the numerous taxes, regulations, restrictions, guidelines, ruled by thousands of agencies and thousands of bureaucrats, our most vulnerable population is producers/earners. They are the ones who work to create values that we all need and buy. They are the most burdened with government's intrusive laws, which make them virtually helpless, vulnerable to any government official's whim demanding bribes, "kickbacks" and the like. Our businesspeople are the ones who take the risks and sink or swim on their own judgement. Who is it that goes down the drain if they are not protected? The entire nation, including the children and the elderly.

You can bet that politicians who are paid salaries 3 to 4 times more than the average earner most assuredly will not carry on their backs "the children" and "the elderly." Instead, as the Senator amply makes clear, it is earners that must bear the "burden of sacrifice." Why?

The call for producers/earners to "sacrifice" has worn thin. Senator Bingaman and his colleagues, snug in their taxpayer financed retirements, taxpayer financed pensions and self-exempt status, continue to demand that producers/earners "sacrifice"---counting on that word like some holy moral principle that will work its magic by making producers and earners feel guilty if they protest. Politicians such as Senator Bingaman seek to flood taxpayers with guilt should anyone dare say they have not the slightest interest in using their hard-earned money to help strangers when they want instead to help their own higher values, their loved ones.

The demand for sacrifice is long past needing to be expunged as a solution to politically generated problems. In the name of common sense and the well being of those who work and work and work and pay and pay and pay, the demand for sacrifice must be ended. Senator Bingaman and his colleagues created the problems. They should solve them without demanding that taxpayers' "sacrfice."

Congress voted for and created terrible problems as a result of their own negligence and excesses and lack of aforethought. They should cease demanding that earners/producers "sacrifice" to save politician's rear ends.

Determined to make producers/earners pay for politician's errors of judgement, Senator Bingaman of course is not at all in favor of Paul Ryan's proposed budget. He claims Paul Ryan's proposal does "not require a shared burden"---by which he means: not enough sacrifice.

There is more to object to and reject in Senator Bingaman's Newsletter. However, nothing Mr. Bingaman says is new or news or even a letter. It is a prolonged complaint that earners pay for Congress' devastating mistakes and dreadfully bad judgement.

I hope producers/earners say, "No way."

Barbara Walters & Jane Fonda

In connection with an honorarium paid to Jane Fonda as one of ABC's "100 Women of the Century," on or around September 14, 2,009, Barbara Walters stated on The View, "I hope that we have all forgiven Jane Fonda for what she did during the Vietnam War and specifically when she visited the Hanoi Hilton."

Regarding this, many readers left comments. I downloaded eleven. Of the eleven, one defended Ms. Fonda because "she was a kid" at the time. Another asked, why was the issue being talked about again now? Nine wrote in the vein that Ms. Fonda committed treason and cannot be forgiven, despite her apology many years after the Vietnam War ended.

I am in agreement in principle with those nine.

We all know what Ms. Fonda did: Her disgraceful words to our soldiers, her shameful conduct toward their captors, her servile allegiance to values and ideals that our Founding Fathers rejected when they wrote the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States.

Is there any excuse we might consider in Ms. Fonda defense? Can those who take the side of the enemy in time of war be defended or excused?

Given the Leftist influence on our government-run education system, given the Leftist influence in the media, it's certain that Ms. Fonda was as much a victim of collectivism as she was a perpetuator of it. Yet I and countless other Americans, were subjected to the same Leftist influences in government-run public education, and Left-leaning media. We did not accept the view that Communism was superior to individualism. We did not like the idea of our men fighting a war that was not in our interests. We did not like them dying so that politicians could pose as "against communism."

Some point out that Ms. Fonda was "only 18" at the time, too young to know differently. Too young, or too thoughtless? If too young, the fact is that many of us were as young as Ms. Fonda was at that time. But they did not take the side of the enemy. Neither did we burn our flag, although we were opposed to the draft. Nor did we spit at our policeman and call them "pigs." We did not interrupt speakers or yell indecent epithets at them, or refuse to allow them to speak at all. We, too, were not happy that our men were sent to foreign lands to die and/or linger in heinous conditions. But we did not turn on our soldiers, chastising them for fighting a disagreeable war.

Neither education nor age is the deciding factor here. What, then, was the difference between Ms. Fonda and us?

Ideas. The ideas Ms. Fonda acted upon. The ideals, principles and values that Ms. Fonda accepted and which guided her actions.

The consequences of Ms. Fonda's ideas was to denounce American soldiers and POWs, to call them liars because they reported being tortured and beaten, to spitefully chide suffering American POWs with questions such as "are you proud to have killed babies?"

Consider what this nation's ideals are: No man is above the law. Freedom and justice for all under the law. Habeas corpus. Innocent until proven guilty. A jury of one's peers. The sentence of guilt to fit the crime. Debtor's prison outlawed. A division of powers. A limit on presidential terms. The Constitutional freedom of speech, assembly, worship and press.

Consider this nation's basic principles: individual rights, limited government and free markets. Consider this nation's fundamental ruling values: Reason. Purpose. Self-reliance. Self-confidence. Individualism. Lifting oneself up by the bootstraps. The work ethic of "a better mouse trap"---i.e. think of a better way to do something and work like the dickens to achieve it---and putting your "nose to the grindstone."

What are the Communists ideas Ms. Fonda extolled? Man must live for the state. The state knows best. No one may descent from government decree. All rulers are above the law, exempt from the laws all citizens must follow. All citizens are without rights. The government has total control over everyone and everything: how many babies one may have, where one may work, what one may study, where one may live, what meetings one must attend, the able must support the indigent, how many acres of land may be farmed, how many cars may be produced, and so forth. All this Ms. Fonda accepted and fought for against a government that stood for the opposite.

Ms. Fonda acted in exact accordance with the ideas she accepted. She damned those who fought against totalitarianism. She condemned those who did not accept the rule of brute force. She insulted the loyalty and bravery of free men who chose to protect the innocent against the savagery of dictatorship.

We are asked to forgive Jane Fonda. I do not. Moreover, I consider Barbara Walters' "hope" as abysmally lacking in thought as Ms. Fonda's actions during the Vietnam War.

Another joins these two: the individual who left the comment: "Why the heck was this year old post bumped?" This is the same sort of question savages ask about the Holocaust: "Why bring up that old stuff?"

One reason alone: Lest we forget and forgive those who err beyond reason.

Yes, Ms. Walters comment took place about 2 years ago. Yes, Ms. Fonda's actions took place almost 50 years ago. But like the Holocaust, one does not forgive those who acted upon the ideas that made possible such grievous evils.

There is a postscript to this exposition: Why was this two-year old Barbara Walters statement revived? My opinion is that the boiling anger many of us feel against Mr. Obama's actions to change this nation into a collectivist welfare state reminded someone of what such a state means in practice. It means the ideas of Hanoi Jane in charge of us while our best and bravest and most productive are imprisoned, regulated, controlled and ultimately destroyed. We must not allow this to happen.