[GCFL-discuss] Welcome to the Republican Party II

[Discussion of the Good, Clean Funnies List]

John, you ran this twice. I'm taking that as license to offer a different
brand of flak:

On Tuesday morning, the second stop on my route, a man who retired from
work at an Evinrude plant brought his disabled son out to the bus. I
noticed his yard sign, and made a remark about the election. He said
"Yeah, a guy like you, driving this bus, how could you afford to be a
Republican?" I couldn't agree more.

TIME magazine recently ran a special report on "America at 300 million"
which included a page on "What We Earn." 

How much time at work does it take to make $1000?

Howard Stern                     24 seconds
Dr. Phil                                42 seconds
Wolfgang Puck                        7 minutes, 30 seconds
Police officer                        43 hours
Farmer                                57 hours
Janitor                                 103 hours

I skipped some in betweens.

50% of us have income less than $30,000, while 2.3 million make between
$200,000 and $500,000, and 9,677 tax returns show income of more than $10
million.

In no sense whatsoever are these larger amounts "earned" by "hard work."
That may be true (sometimes) of the difference between $15,000 and
$100,000, but not between $50,000 and $10 million.

Accordingly, in the spirit of my favorite Democrat, the late great
senator from Louisiana, Huey Pierce Long, I have no problem whatsoever
with putting a huge tax burden on incomes over $200,000, and taking half
of all income over $1 million, to make sure that, e.g. everyone has
affordable health insurance. (By everyone, I mean, including proprietors
of small businesses who eke out just enough to support their families,
not just wage employees). 

REAL tax reform would be to make the first $20,000 tax exempt for
individuals, $50,000 for families, and no, same-sex couples don't get to
file joint returns. Also, I've always thought janitors and garbage
collectors should be paid two or three times the legal minimum wage, and
allowed to work only 25-30 hours a week, as they do necessary but
undesirable work. People who find their work stimulating and inspiring
should be content to work for a little less.

The ideological demons who run the Republican Party have a lot of people
making $30,000 a year scared to death that half their income will be
seized to pay welfare checks, when the real sharing of wealth to those
who did not work for it is at the other end of the income scale.

I am not a member of the Democratic Party because they don't have the
spine to stand up and say this straight out. But I generally vote for
them, because at least they make a half-hearted effort to raise the legal
minimum wage to maybe 75% of what it should be.

Siarlys