VOTING WHEN THE FAIRTAX IS PASSED—A MAJOR CHANGE
When most people are elected to Congress, they undergo a transformation. Before they arrived in D.C., they were people more like us and most:- Didn’t believe that they know everything and are smarter than their neighbors.
- Knew that you can’t spend more than you take in. You have to live on a balanced budget.
- Understood that small business owners have to make a profit to stay in business.
- Understood that income/payroll taxes reduce people’s ability to consume.
- Understood that they should take every opportunity to reduce the amount of federal taxes people pay.
- Understood that inflation is especially painful for people living paycheck to paycheck.
- Believe that their IQ has dramatically increased and they are now smarter than the people who elected them.
- Believe that the need for a balanced budget doesn’t apply at the federal level.
- Believe that deficits are ok as long as the money is being spent in ways that those with higher IQ’s believe is for the best.
- Believe that any attempt by anyone to lower taxes is unpatriotic.
- Believe that inflation is caused by greedy corporations raising their prices and greedy employees demanding and receiving higher wages--not by excessive federal spending.
- Believe that the way to reduce inflation is not to reduce deficit spending but to increase unemployment rates, increase interest rates and reduce pay increases—in other words put all of the blame and the pain on their neighbors.
- Believe that their judgment is above being questioned, and that anyone who dares to question them is either stupid or dangerous.
John Lewis was a leader of the civil rights movement in the 1960’s and then a Congressman from Georgia. He said, “The vote is precious. It is the most powerful non-violent tool we have in a democratic society, and we must use it.”
Yes, the vote is indeed a powerful tool, but it must be used wisely. Sure, citizens should vote for candidates who share their beliefs and visions. But wise voters should also hold their representatives accountable for the job they do. If an office holder doesn’t deliver programs and policies that make our lives better, he or she should be voted out of office.
Regardless of political party affiliation, we should apply the same standard to hiring politicians as we do to hiring a mechanic to work on our car. We want the person we hire to do a good job and provide us with the service we paid for.
With the mechanic, that’s easy. If the problem is fixed, stays fixed and the car drives well, the mechanic did a good job. If the problem persists, or returns shortly after you get the car back, you’ll probably be looking for another mechanic.
It is not so easy with the politician who is seeking to be hired or retained as a member of Congress. They like it that they can’t be judged as easily as the mechanic.
All too often, a politician’s pitch to be hired or rehired isn’t about the good things they’ve done or promise to do. It’s about how bad their opponent is. Every election cycle, candidates and other political action groups flood the airwaves with negative ads portraying the disastrous gloom and doom that’s sure to follow if their opponent is elected.
Imagine a mechanic advertising “bring your car to me because the guy down the street at the XYZ Garage will destroy it”. That doesn’t exactly inspire confidence in the mechanic’s ability to fix your car, does it?
The voters should have some objective standards by which to judge a politician wanting to be hired for another term.
When the FAIRtax is passed, the politician seeking to be rehired can be asked some simple questions:
- Did you work to balance the federal budget?
- Is the FAIRtax rate still 23%? If so, did you try to lower it because more money was flowing into the U.S. Treasury? Were you for or against efforts to raise it?
- What did you want to do with the extra money? Did you want to lower the U.S. debt, or spend it on things that benefit one group of Americans over another?
- Has the US economy grown, stagnated or shrunk?
- Has the unemployment rate increased or decreased?
- Has inflation increased or decreased?
- Have real wages increased after taking inflation into account? What did you do to contribute to this?
The costs of the income/payroll tax system are passed on to us in the form of higher prices for EVERY product and service we purchase, but no one can tell us how much.
Politicians continue to make the bogus claim that raising taxes on corporations results in lower taxes for individuals. Higher corporate tax rates may allow individual rates to come down, but a lower tax rate obtained in that manner doesn’t necessarily mean a lower tax burden.
When taxes go up on a business of any size, that increased cost of doing business is passed on to individuals. Customers pay higher prices. Employees see less generous wages and benefits. Stockholders and private owners see lower dividends. The taxes you see on your 1040 may go down, but the taxes you don’t see often more than offset the reduction resulting in a higher overall tax burden.
With the FAIRtax, there is only one rate—23%.
The Members of Congress are doing a good job when:
- The budget is balanced and the surplus is used to pay off the U.S. debt.
- The U.S. economy grows in size and strength.
- More people are working and wages are increasing.
- Inflation is down.
- Businesses are profitable.
- Stock prices rise. Investments, including the values of retirement accounts, are worth more.
- There is serious attention paid to how to lower the FAIRtax rate as the economy grows.
CONCLUSION
Edward Everett Hale was a Unitarian minister who wrote Man Without a Country. He was the grandnephew of Nathan Hale, the American Revolutionary War spy.
He also became Chaplain of the U.S. Senate in 1903. He was asked, Do you pray for the Senators, Dr. Hale? He replied, No, I look at the Senators and pray for the country.
Unfortunately, if Dr. Hale was a Chaplain for Congress today, he would most certainly look at Congress and spend all of his time praying for the country.
We need to elect Members of Congress who are dedicated to improving the lives of all citizens and not so focused on maintaining a position of power for themselves.
The FAIRtax makes the decision of hiring or firing Members of Congress much simpler. Being able to see how the Member is doing before casting our vote will allow us to TAKE BACK CONTROL.
The income/payroll tax system is broken and no longer working—we can’t repair it but we can replace it with the FAIRTAX!
Join us and TAKE BACK CONTROL OF OUR COUNTRY AND OUR LIVES—NOT WITH BULLETS BUT WITH THE ELIMINATION OF ONE OF THE BIGGEST THREATS TO OUR LIBERTY AND ECONOMIC PROSPERITY—THE INCOME/PAYROLL TAX.
We all should remember Edmund Burke’s warning that applies to our efforts to TAKE BACK CONTROL,
“Nobody made a greater mistake than he who did nothing because he could do only a little.”
We should also remember this quote from George Orwell's 1984, which, if we do nothing, may foretell your and your children's future:
“If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face—forever.”
WHAT CAN EACH OF US DO?
We can write letters and make calls to our elected representatives and attend Zoom town hall meetings demanding that if they really want to allow Americans to “TAKE BACK CONTROL”, the first step is to eliminate the income/payroll tax system and enact the FAIRTAX!
TAKE BACK CONTROL! Help us PASS THE FAIRTAX!
The IRS will be gone and we will pay our taxes when we make purchases.
WE and not the Ruling Class and their minions in D.C. will decide how much federal tax we pay!
WE will know how much tax we and everyone else are really paying because taxes will no longer be hidden from us. It will be clearly shown on every retail receipt.
If you have friends who don’t know about the FAIRtax, send them to FAIRtax.org. Have them watch the white boards under “How It Works” and, if they agree, ask them to please join us.
Then contact your Members of Congress and the President and demand that Congress pass -the FAIRtax—the only fair tax.
Is it hopeless? When confronted with a seemingly impossible problem, remember the statement attributed to the author George Bernard Shaw who wrote, You see things; and you say “Why?” But I dream things that never were; and I say “Why not?”
Isn’t it time for us to ask, “Why not?”
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