DASHLE PLAYS SCROOGE … KILLS ECONOMIC STIMULUS BILL
OK … the economic stimulus bill is dead. Toast. Food for worms. There may be arguments about the bill, arguments about what was needed and what wasn’t needed, but there can be absolutely no argument at all over who killed it.
The stimulus bill was passed by the House. President Bush was ready to sign it. A majority of Senators were sitting ready to vote “yes” when it came to the Senate floor. That brings one man – just one man – to center stage. That man is Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle – a leftist Democrat.
Are you getting the big picture here? The House passed it. The Senate wanted to pass it. The President wanted to sign it. One man – Tom Daschle – killed it.
There were several things that Daschle didn’t like. One was the fact that the bill contained provisions that would have allowed private employers to retain some of their earnings to be used in building and expanding their businesses and paying present and new employees. Daschle would rather see those funds in government hands than in the hands of the private businesses and corporations that earned them. When the choice is between whether the free market or the government should stimulate the economy through spending … leftists like Daschle will always go with government.
Another sticking point was the issue of health insurance. There are many people who have lost jobs who will soon lose health insurance coverage. The stimulus bill allowed refundable* tax credits to these individuals to provide them with the money they would need to purchase health insurance policies for themselves and their families. Daschle didn’t like this one bit. He wanted that money to be paid to employers so that the employers could extend the health insurance coverage for laid-off employees.
So --- what’s the big difference here? It’s simple. Under the Republican plan individuals would have the money in their private pockets that they need to go into the private marketplace and purchase health insurance policies. This is poison to Democrats. Democrats have been working for years to bring socialized medicine to the United States. To do this they must create and maintain a mindset in the population that no individual should be responsible for their own health care --- that this should always be the responsibility of someone else. Right now, the employer. Later, the government. So – anything that enables and, in fact, encourages individuals to purchase their own health insurance policies would constitute a major setback to the Democrat socialized medicine (remember Hillarycare?) juggernaut.
This is a great illustration of a basic difference between the parties. Republicans (to a much lesser extent than Libertarians) want to allow individuals to take responsibility for themselves. Democrats want to free the individual of the responsibility of taking care of their own needs.
Democrats – the individual is owned and cared for by the government
Republicans – the individual owns himself and is responsibility for his own care.
*A “refundable tax credit” is really yet another income redistribution scheme. Let’s say the amount of the tax credit is $1000. If you owe $1,200 in federal income taxes you would only have to pay $200 after applying the credit. But what if you only owed $500 in federal income taxes? You would only be able to use one-half of the credit, right? Nope. Wrong. The other $500 would be “refunded” to you in the form of a government check. Since that is $500 you didn’t pay in income taxes the payment constitutes income redistribution. It came from some other taxpayer.
OK … the economic stimulus bill is dead. Toast. Food for worms. There may be arguments about the bill, arguments about what was needed and what wasn’t needed, but there can be absolutely no argument at all over who killed it.
The stimulus bill was passed by the House. President Bush was ready to sign it. A majority of Senators were sitting ready to vote “yes” when it came to the Senate floor. That brings one man – just one man – to center stage. That man is Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle – a leftist Democrat.
Are you getting the big picture here? The House passed it. The Senate wanted to pass it. The President wanted to sign it. One man – Tom Daschle – killed it.
There were several things that Daschle didn’t like. One was the fact that the bill contained provisions that would have allowed private employers to retain some of their earnings to be used in building and expanding their businesses and paying present and new employees. Daschle would rather see those funds in government hands than in the hands of the private businesses and corporations that earned them. When the choice is between whether the free market or the government should stimulate the economy through spending … leftists like Daschle will always go with government.
Another sticking point was the issue of health insurance. There are many people who have lost jobs who will soon lose health insurance coverage. The stimulus bill allowed refundable* tax credits to these individuals to provide them with the money they would need to purchase health insurance policies for themselves and their families. Daschle didn’t like this one bit. He wanted that money to be paid to employers so that the employers could extend the health insurance coverage for laid-off employees.
So --- what’s the big difference here? It’s simple. Under the Republican plan individuals would have the money in their private pockets that they need to go into the private marketplace and purchase health insurance policies. This is poison to Democrats. Democrats have been working for years to bring socialized medicine to the United States. To do this they must create and maintain a mindset in the population that no individual should be responsible for their own health care --- that this should always be the responsibility of someone else. Right now, the employer. Later, the government. So – anything that enables and, in fact, encourages individuals to purchase their own health insurance policies would constitute a major setback to the Democrat socialized medicine (remember Hillarycare?) juggernaut.
This is a great illustration of a basic difference between the parties. Republicans (to a much lesser extent than Libertarians) want to allow individuals to take responsibility for themselves. Democrats want to free the individual of the responsibility of taking care of their own needs.
Democrats – the individual is owned and cared for by the government
Republicans – the individual owns himself and is responsibility for his own care.
*A “refundable tax credit” is really yet another income redistribution scheme. Let’s say the amount of the tax credit is $1000. If you owe $1,200 in federal income taxes you would only have to pay $200 after applying the credit. But what if you only owed $500 in federal income taxes? You would only be able to use one-half of the credit, right? Nope. Wrong. The other $500 would be “refunded” to you in the form of a government check. Since that is $500 you didn’t pay in income taxes the payment constitutes income redistribution. It came from some other taxpayer.
