I was sitting at a restaurant being a fat ass eating some $29 fish that was worth maybe half the price when I overheard a converation. A woman (a republican woman, as she later affirmed, though I could tell immediately) complained of her forty percent taxes (I was in Connecticut, obviously) and how she paid more in taxes than many people make in their lives. Her teenage children were astonished, "the government just TAKES forty percent of your hard earned paycheck?" they wonedered. Those bastards. HOW DARE THEY!!!
So I sat back and thought to myself, "are these people so simplistic as to believe that the government is stealing their money?" How lamonic is that? Do they not realize that it takes money, A LOT OF MONEY, to run a country, especially one like the United States. After thinking about it, I realized what many left-leaning political satirists had been suggesting all along: Americans hate to part with their money, especially when they don't see concrete products (cars, houses, TVs, etc.) out of it.
Is this the reason that people are voting more conservatively now than eight or ten years ago. Perhaps the bad economy and unemployment rate have made people more critical of the government's taking of their money. It's no wonder then how GW can get away with his absurd tax cuts that favor the wealthy. Even if it means keeping the status quo for taxes in the middle and working classes, people don't want some damn liberal coming in and screwing it up and taking their money. This ideology is somewhat (or rather, BLATANTLY) contradictory to America's current political mindset where we love to spend money on invading other countries and placing warrant-free wiretaps in innocent American's homes.
For a country that strongly supported sending hundreds of thousands of men into a foreign country to wage an expensiver war during a time of enormous budget deficit, you'd think people would understand the importance of taxes. But no, for some reason we like to believe that we can do whatever the hell we want without worrying about that vaccuum in our wallet. No wonder people weren't so against the Iraqi war, NO ONE UNDERSTOOD THE FINANCIAL PART OF THE EQUATION! Now, coming from someone who for over a year owed his twelve year old brother over three hundred dollars, that's something.
That's also one of the reasons people are so adverse to the left as well. They're afraid those damned liberals are trying to take their money. What the fuck? THE CORPORATE BUSINESSMEN AND THE INSIDE TRADERS ARE RIGHT WINGERS! If anyone wants to take your money, it's the right. Though they don't (notice present tense) do this through government, they do it through the stock market (where they let the middle class buy in the nineties until the elitists bail out and cause a huge drop post-2000) and in selling you those greasy hamburgers and overpriced, taiwan-manufactured clothing. If they did get your money through government, they'd have to put it into things like social services and education, and who wants that? Instead, they get you tthrough their corporations so the money goes straight to their wallets. If anyone wants your money, it's the right.
Then what the hell does the left want to do with your money, you ask? Better America, that's what! Hell, imagine if we all had government-covered health care, like EVERY OTHER WESTERN NATION DOES, or to improving education because the rest of the world considers America a country of morons, and we are by most Western standards, or towards ensuring Social Security lasts beyond the baby boomers. or how about towards something the right actually likes, LIKE THE MILLITARY (gasp)! That's right (no pun intended) kids, it takes money to keep a millitary. Sending troops around the globe to "fight terrorism" or find those gosh darned WMD (they're really good at hide and seek) isn't free. So, once again, what the fuck is this administration thinking.
Let's go into one of the areas mentioned before that us bleeding hearts would love to bring to this country: universal health coverage. Canada, Spain, France, Sweden, Germany, and Switzerland are only a few of the western countries that have this. Why would they do such a thing, this socialization, THEY MUST BE COMMIES, BLOW 'EM TO HELL!!! Or look at the situation here in America. The rich can afford the best health care, the rest cannot. With a little bit of motivation and a little more money, universal health care for all Americans could become reality, as it has in the countries mentioned above. Many people will arguy "BuT MY tAXes Will GO uP so MuCH!!11" to which I reply, "look at the numbers." In the US, we spend over $4000 per capita on health care, while countries with socialized health care spend about $2500 per capita on health care. So, in essence, it aint' that much more. Hell, our taxes may go up, but not as much as one may imagime. Also, consider how much you DON'T pay in taxes that you DO pay in health care coverage. Some argue that doctors won't go for it because of how little they'll make under universal health coverage. This is not necessarilly true. In America, malpractice insurance has become so costly that many doctors are QUITTING because it's simply not worth it. Do you see this in Canada? NO! Some also argue that it's near impossible to get surgery done in Canada. True, but most American's can't even afford expensiver surgery today, without going in debt, or spending life savings, if they can at all. Also, we do not need to replicate Canada. Hey, we're America, we pride ourselves on being revolutionary.
Now, if any of you out there are still bitching about what a burden taxes are, and how the liberals are trying to steal your money, please stick your genitals in a wood chipper, because your simple-minded genes are exactly what the Eurpeans are talking about when they call us "stupid Americans." Seriously, America needs to get over these simple minded notions and look at the bigger picture. "Ooh, I'm rich. I don't need a fraction of the money I make, but I'll bitch when the government spends it on things that improve society." Shut up. The rich like to believe they have some special privalege in America, no thanks to the Bush administration (though hopefully these prosecutions of corporate execs will get them somewhat in line), and we need not cater to their desires for more money in their pockets rather than in education, health care, or social security. We need to stop letting this administration let the corporations have their way, while the rest of America wonders where the hell their tax dollars are going. If you want a government that makes you proud (or at least justifies) for paying your taxes, then I suggest you get someone in the white house and some new guys in the capital who'll change things around this coming November.
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