http://action.afa.net/Blogs/BlogPost.aspx?id=2147492659The left is becoming increasingly unhinged over Rep. Paul Ryan's "Roadmap for America's Future," which is the first plan I have seen which would reverse the nation's headlong plunge into socialism and fascism, promote individual responsibility, and result in time in a balanced budget and the elimination of our national debt.
The Roadmap, about which you can read here, uses tax cuts to allow Americans to keep and invest more of their own income, uses personalized accounts to replace Social Security, and uses vouchers to replace Medicare. It's not a perfect plan, but it is the difference between light and darkness when stacked up against the Democrats' and their benighted plans for our future.
By cutting the top tax rate to 25%, Ryan's plan will allow the most productive members of America's economy to control more of the money they earn. Everything they do with the money they get to keep is good for ordinary Americans, and everything the government would do with that money is bad for them.
If America's most productive citizens are able to keep more of their own money, they will use it to buy bigger homes or remodel the ones they live in or buy vacation properties. That's good for the ordinary Americans who work in construction and good for the ordinary Americans who sell real estate for a living.
Or they will buy newer cars, which is good for the ordinary Americans who work on what's left of Detroit's assembly lines or make a living working automobile showrooms or doing tuneups and oil changes. Or they will take longer and more exotic vacations, which is good for the ordinary folks who work in hotels and restaurants and on cruise ships.
Or they will invest the money somewhere, which makes borrowed money cheaper and more available, and is good for ordinary Americans with an entrepreneurial spirit who would like to launch a venture of their own.
Or they will donate more to charity and to their own churches, which contributes to the spiritual health of ordinary Americans and directs voluntary resources to the neediest of our fellow-citizens.
If those same dollars are yanked out of the wallets of successful Americans, as is currently the case, those dollars are taken completely out of productive circulation and poured down the sewer of government waste.
Ryan would also reform Social Security by allowing workers under the age of 55 to direct a portion of their payroll taxes into personalized accounts they would control and which would have their name on them rather than the name of Uncle Sam. It would be their money, which they could invest as they choose and leave for the next generation when they die. The truth is that payroll taxes come right out of the wallets of ordinary Americans, it's their money, and they ought to be able to invest it and benefit from it. Ryan's plan will allow them to do just that.
And Ryan's plan would virtually eliminate Medicare by giving seniors vouchers rather than dumping all of them into a poorly run single-payer plan which denies claims at twice the rate of private insurance companies, is vulnerable to ripoff artists, and is rapidly going broke. If seniors were sent vouchers, money they could control for health care purposes, an entire new industry would be created overnight as health insurance companies began to compete for the health care dollars of seniors.
The cost of health insurance coverage would magically begin to drop and would soon match the amount of seniors' vouchers, making health care insurance affordable and putting seniors back in charge of their own health care decisions. They could begin purchasing low-premium, high-deductible catastrophic plans and investing the difference in health savings accounts, socking money away for future health care needs.
And best of all, Ryan's plan would result eventually in a balanced budget and an elimination of the nation's crushing debt, which right now has the Demcorats cramming another trillion-plus dollars a year into the backpacks of our children and grandchildren.
Jonathan Chait of the New Republic is naturally incensed at Ryan's plan, as he is with any plan that promotes self-reliance and smaller government.
Here is the key tell in Chait's piece (emphasis added):
"The basic thrust of liberal public policy over the last century is to keep in places (sic) the market system but use government to slightly mitigate against risk--the risk of getting sick, the risk of outliving your savings, the risk that you just won't make much money in the first place. The downside of these policies is that, in order to mitigate the downside risk, you also have to mitigate the upside benefit. If you're unusually rich, you have to pay a somewhat higher tax rate than most people. If you're unusually healthy, you have to subsidize medical care for people who aren't. If you were able to invest well enough to cover your entire retirement, some of your good fortune will be siphoned off to those who weren't."
This distills in one paragraph everything that is wrong with the liberal philosophy of governance.
It is coercive. You will notice phrases such as "have to pay," "have to subsidize," and "will be siphoned off." In a liberal worldview, this money must be confiscated from the producers against their will. This is a violation of the eighth commandment - "Thou shalt not steal" - and is nothing more than legalized plunder.
It uses the force of government to involuntarily redistribute wealth, and yet the involuntary redistribution of wealth is fundamentally immoral. Other common terms for the involuntary redistribution of wealth are "theft," "burglary" and "armed robbery." Just because the government does it doesn't make it right.
The Bible is big on the distribution of wealth - the voluntary redistribution of wealth, that is, which involves individuals motivated by compassion giving generously and willingly from their own resources to come to the aid of others. You will find many commands in the New Testament to care for the poor, but not a single one of those commands is directed to government.
The involuntary redistribution of wealth also violates the tenth commandment since it is predicated on a covetous greed for the possessions of others. This kind of naked lust for the money of the most productive Americans is beneath the character of a Christian nation.
It is also punitive. Producers must be penalized for their success by being forced to pay taxes at a higher rate than others. Those that have made healthy lifestyle choices must be penalized by subsidizing health care for those who haven't. Those that have had the foresight and wisdom to plan for their own futures must be penalized by being forced to pay for the retirement of everybody who didn't plan ahead.
I hope that Democrats will become increasingly agitated with Rep. Ryan's plan, because that will mean they know his plan represents the truest current threat to their statist agenda.
For myself, I'm ready to hop aboard "Ryan's Express" and follow his roadmap into a more prosperous and stable future for America. Anybody want to come along?
Topic: Ryan's Roadmap: a terrifying nightmare for liberals (Read 1110 times)