(Original Post)
Woody Klein
Published 05:30 a.m., Tuesday, November 8, 2011
If you happen to be among the 345,000 taxpayers in America who will earn $1 million or more this year, you have a golden opportunity to step up and do something patriotic to save our country from falling into the worst financial hole in our history.
Last week, not a single Republican in the Senate supported President Barack Obama's plan to spend $60 billion on infrastructure repairs -- one part of his jobs bill that would create thousands of badly needed jobs across the country. Obama's bill would pay for itself with a 0.7 percent surtax on people making more than $ 1 million a year.
That's less than 1 percent!
The 345,000 figure, the Times reported, was based on an analysis by the independent Citizens for Tax Justice. Founded in 1979, CTJ is a non-profit, non-partisan research and advocacy think tank based in Washington, D.C. It focuses primarily on federal tax policy. Itsstated mission, it says, is to "give ordinary people a greater voice in the development of tax laws."
It was the third time in a month that the Senate voted down a version of Obama's jobs bill that would be financed totally with a tax on income exceeding $1 million a year. The Senate voted 51 to 49 to take up the bill, but 60 votes were needed.
The New York Times lead editorial page headline summed it up this way last Friday: "Putting millionaires before jobs, Republicans reject vital infrastructure and jobs bill rather than raise taxes on a `small elite.' "
One could argue that paying less than a 1 percent increase in taxes is easy for me to say. I do not fall into that category; neither do thousands of others in my field of journalism who comment on the big issues. We are called "political pundits" and we are not held in particularly high esteem by politicians or the financial titans of our country.
There is no question that the Republicans in Washington are out to bring down President Obama -- even if means bringing down America with him. Strong words. They have clearly articulated this goal. This is a strong -- and a decidedly wrong -- motive on the part of the Republicans in Congress.
Ironically, there are some leading Republicans in the Senate and the House who have, in the past, supported President Obama's initiative to create jobs by investing in infrastructure. The problem, at present, is that the president attached the proviso that it would be funded by the very rich among us.
Obama's $60 billion bill would directly spend $50 billion on roads, bridges, airports and mass transit systems, and would add another $10 billion to an "infrastructure bank" to stimulate investment from the private sector in a public works project--not unlike the Works Project of America (WPA) that Franklin Delano Roosevelt passed in the depths of the Great Depression.
What the Democrats have not stressed enough, I believe, is that Obama is not increasing taxes to pay for these projects. He is simply rolling back the tax cuts for the rich that George W. Bush put in place after the highly successful economy of Bill Clinton's eight-year stint in the Oval Office, when he created some 20 million jobs.
Let's be honest with ourselves. None of us like to pay more taxes than we have to. But it does not seem fair, does it, that the wealthy are not paying their fair share of the revenue that America needs to function every day and to reduce its deficit.
That's why I choose to call those who are among the top 1 percent of income earners of America and support the Obama jobs bill, true "patriots." They should let their members of and their Senators know how they feel.
If you recall, when the nation came under its worst attack in history on September 11, 2001, George Bush recommended that we all go out and shop. Keep the economy flowing, I think, was his intention. Act normally. Do not be intimidated. All well and good. But as far as I can recall, the Bush administration, did not ask us as Americans to make any sacrifices during the years when he was doing his best to restore a nation in shock to its former standing as a proud country.
President Obama has been trying -- unsuccessfully -- for three years to get our political leaders to work together across the aisle in the nation's best interests. Having failed to do that because of stubborn, partisan Republican intransigence, he is now campaigning for much-needed legislation to save the country. I, for one, am glad to see him out of the White House on the road taking his case -- our case -- to the voters of America. I sincerely hope he prevails.
Finally, we have a president who has been asking, since he took office, for the wealthiest among us to sacrifice just a little. Is that too much to ask? I think not.
Incidentally, there's no mystery as to who I am talking about in our town of Westport.
If you are a member of the country's "small elite," you know who you are.