Posted by
The Hermit Crab on Saturday, May 03, 2008 1:29:08 PM
Since New York has yet to pass a Right to Work law, I am forced to belong to UNITE-HERE #2714. Like most unions, they have asked that we contribute our votes to the Democrats, and our dollars to the union PAC. I will do neither, of course. Before you do either, please consider the following:
President Bush and the Republicans lowered all tax brackets with his tax cuts in 2001 (or 2002, I can't recall for certain). If you're in the lowest tax bracket (and if you're represented by UNITE-HERE 2714, you probably are), your federal taxes were lowered by at least 50%. The Democrats, who hate tax cuts the way Indiana Jones hates snakes, insisted on a sunset provision which stipulates that all of the tax cuts expire in 2010. The chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, Charles Rangel (D-NY), has stated publicly that he knows of none of the Bush tax cuts that should be renewed. This means that unless future actions prevent it, the taxes of those in the lowest bracket (such as myself) will go up at least 50% (see next item).
One of the tax cuts pushed through by President Bush was the elimination of the "marriage penalty"; that absurd provision that allowed a married couple to deduct less of their income from taxation than can an unmarried couple living together. This is not only grossly unfair; it is destructive, for it discourages marriage and encourages "shacking up". If this tax reform and the tax rate cuts are not made permanent, married couples in the lowest bracket will see their taxes increase by over 50%.
Another pleasing tax reform of the Bush administration was the gradual repeal of the hated "death tax". Many people were outraged to discover that after a taxpayer had spent a lifetime earning and saving money (money already taxed once at least, please note), Uncle Sam's vultures could swoop in and take up to 55% of what they didn't get the first time. Among other lamentable results of this infernal tax, this has led to the loss of many family farms to major farming industries. The families have had to sell the family farms in order to pay the death taxes. Against this the honest soul revolts. Sadly, too few of those souls reside in the Democratic leadership. They wish to revive even this monstrous exaction.
Another tax that the Democrats want to "jack up" is the capital gains tax. Without turning this into an economics seminar, capital gains are the amount in value that your holdings attain when their value increases. To the average union member, this generally means your stocks and other investments. Do you have a 402k? Perhaps an IRA? Others assets you may sell at a profit someday? Then you're "on the target" for this Democratic tax hike, too.
To his shame, presumptive Republican nominee Sen. John McCain voted against these tax cuts when passed earlier this decade. To his credit, he now realizes that the cuts should be made permanent. Characteristically, both Sen.Obama (D-IL) and Sen. Clinton (D-NY) have responded to questions about retaining the tax cuts with stale class-warfare rhetoric and evasions. They don't dare tell you that they intend to boost your taxes, and everyone else's as well. They tell you again this year that they're only going to raise taxes on "the rich". You fell for that in 1992. Did you learn anything from that?
The union have been participating in and supporting demonstration aimed at obtaining amnesty for illegal aliens, so that they can work in the country whose laws they've already broken. If they succeed, they will increase the supply of cheap labor in the US by millions. Does anyone know what happens to the price of a commodity when the supply is rapidly increased? That's right. It goes down. My union has participated in these demonstrations, perhaps yours did as well. Why, you must be asking. Why would the union officers push for an amnesty for illegals that would exert downward pressure on wages for union workers?
This is the dirty little secret of the illegal alien issue. You see, if the amnesty goes through, your wages may go down, but the union top brass will have the chance to get millions more union members, and union members pay dues to whom? To the union officers, of course! More money for them, less money for you. Just in case you wondered whose interests they really work for...
(Annoyingly, Sen. McCain is just about as wrong as the Democrats on this issue. I give you the above so that you can find out why your union is betraying your interests on this issue. If they are. I know that UNITE-HERE is betraying their members.)
(An aside -- although this isn't strictly on point, my conscience demands I make this point: to those that say that we need the addition of illegal laborers to our work force because of a shortage of workers, I would point out that if we hadn't been massacring our own infants for the last 35 years, we would have all of the workers we could need. People are an asset, not an expense. At any rate, man ought never to attempt to play God, particularly when you consider how poorly he plays man.)
After 9/11, it belatedly became clear to most Americans that perhaps we had better pay closer attention to what terrorist murderers are telling each other before they strike. President Bush requested that the telecommunications companies co-operate in attempts to thwart the next attack(s) before we had to try to identify the victims in the smoldering ruins. Most of the companies (it may have been all) did their patriotic duty and agreed. I think that most normal Americans can agree that if someone within our borders is communicating with a known terrorist or terrorist organization outside of our borders, the safety of our citizens demands that we find out why.
However, since some of the sleazier trial lawyers and their far-out pressure-group friends want to sue the phone companies for doing their patriotic duty (and breaking no law), and since the trial lawyers and the far-outs fill the Democrats' campaign coffers every election campaign, the House Democratic leadership prevented the House from considering the renewal of the law authorizing this needed surveillance unless the trial lawyers would be allowed to sue the phone companies for the supposed violation of Americans' Constitutional rights. (They have yet to inform us which article of the Constitution protects the right communicate with terrorists outside of our borders.) This inaction has hobbled our intelligence-gathering (and thus our citizen-protecting) ever since.
I think most of us would agree that it is in our best interests to keep tax rates as low as we can keep them, that the marriage penalty and the death tax are unfair exactions that the generation of 1776 would never have born, that we should get as much compensation as we can attain for our labor, and that one of our federal governments prime obligations is to protect the safety of our citizens. One of our major parties is on the wrong side of all of your interests. Odds on, this is the party your union wants you to support with your votes and dollars. Before you do, you should insist to your union officers that they explain to you why you should betray your own well-being in order to promote theirs. Ask them if they really expect you to think that you're undertaxed, too safe, and paid too much for your work.