Chairman’s Report - April 24, 2015

Why You Should Contact Your Congressional Members 

When I was growing up in Arkansas, a friend said that he listened to a politician answer a question and felt like the cowboy standing in the street with a rope. He was so confused that he didn’t know if he had found a rope or lost a horse.  

Many of us have expressed similar frustration when we speak with our Members of Congress about the FairTax.® We ask something like, “Why not replace the present income tax code with a system that eliminates the billions of dollars and wasted hours spent trying to calculate the taxes we owe, eliminates the need for the IRS, that doesn’t drive profits and jobs overseas and that rapidly grows the economy?”

The Member looks at you or writes you a response to the letter that says they favor real tax reform that helps people. They don’t answer the question. After hearing an answer that makes no sense, it is tempting to just give up on the Member or directly attack their obvious evasion.  

Giving up on a Member or attacking them is not likely to move the Member over to our side. If you just walk away,   the Member will immediately forget about the FairTax and move ahead. If you challenge the Member, particularly in a public setting, they will likely react like most of us do if embarrassed in front of others, provide a retort and stalk away. The irritated Member is unlikely to engage in any further conversation to better understand the FairTax, and they will then discount the ability of the attacker to influence many other voters.  

Members of Congress assume - like we do in our lives - that if someone is a jerk, no one is going to listen to them so who cares what they say or do?

There is another way to handle Members who don’t see the value of the FairTax and seem to evade discussing the real issues. Almost all Members of Congress have one thing in common - they want to be reelected. Almost all of them want to further an agenda. Generally this agenda involves either allowing their supporters to keep more of their earnings or receive more benefits. 

Both agendas are benefitted by the enactment of the FairTax.  

The FairTax rewards people who work hard because they are only taxed on the money they spend. For the Members who want to provide more benefits to their constituents, the FairTax grows the economy so much faster than the income tax that there will be more money to pay for the desired benefits.



All levels of income earners are worried about the stability of their jobs. The FairTax immediately increases the investment in the United States from investors all over the world. These investments will lead to more and better U.S. jobs. All the constituents of Members benefit when there are more and better jobs. These constituents will see no reason not to send their Members of Congress back to Congress.

However, it is not possible to educate the Members of Congress if you cannot have a conversation. That is why it is important that we can disagree but disagree politely so that the conversation can be continued. Yes, we have to let Members know that if someone who supports the FairTax challenges them for reelection, we will make sure that their constituents know and this could lose them an election.  We don’t say it with malice, but simply as stating a fact.

Even when I am frustrated with a politician, I try to keep in mind the advice of Will Rogers who regularly made fun of politicians but was always invited to political dinners and events by the same politicians. "I have often said in answer to inquiries as to how I got away with kidding some of our public men, that it was because I liked all of them personally, and that if there was no malice in your heart there could be none in your gags, and I have always said I never met a man I didn’t like."

The logic of the FairTax will win if we can continue to have the conversation. Yes, some conversations are shorter and easier, but continuing the conversation will ultimately lead to the Member supporting the FairTax because we have the best solution.


Our Next Washington Trip: April 28-30

As we knew, getting appointments is much easier when our FairTax supporters contact the D.C. office of their Member of Congress. It is also important that you come with us to the meetings that you help set up! If you want us to see your Members of Congress, please contact Peggy at peggy.green-ernst@fairtax.org.


Thank You For Opening The FAIRtax Chronicles, Our Sponsored Mailings 

We are sending another sponsored mailing and another fee of $3,000 will be paid to AFFT! These funds help us pass the FAIRtax.

We plan to do several of these mailings each month. If you take a minute to open the sponsored emails and click through to the website, you are making an in kind contribution to AFFT. It is not required to actually make a purchase, but your minute of time will ensure that AFFT is paid ever larger amounts from people paying for us to send their offers to our supporters.

Again, we are making every effort to ensure that we work with only reputable companies. If you feel that any FAIRtax-sponsored email is objectionable, please email us at info@fairtax.org and tell us why. You can also opt to not receive these sponsored email messages but still receive FAIRtax emails.
  
Thank you for staying FairTax strong!