Tax the poor, pay the rich
Reformer.com
Wednesday, October 1
Editor of the Reformer:
G. W. Bush suddenly resurfaced to urgently address the financial crisis -- the one we've watched these 18 months. Never mind that last spring he told people losing their homes that there would be no help for them. Now he offers us the most impressive tax increase ever (home-losers included). In the 11th hour of his presidency (coincidence? I think not), Bush is taking a final swipe at the middle class by asking for, essentially, an unprecedented hike in our taxes to bail out the super rich. But wait, there's more. He is not asking the investment industry to give anything back. Rather, I suspect a good portion of this $700 billion would fill the black holes left by golden parachutes. And neither Bush nor McCain are proposing a change in the tax cuts to those super wealthy. Utter disbelief is appropriate here. This is without precedent, immoral, and as bad as it sounds. Tax the poor, pay the rich.
There is an obvious solution. Let these companies fail like we let poor people fail every day. Meanwhile, now that this crazy sum of money is on the table, let's use it to start a taxpayer's bank -- countries in Europe are doing it as we speak. Bush and Paulson claim the reason for the bailout is to maintain a flow of credit in this country. Who says it needs to be from Wall Street? Forget Wall Street. We can borrow from ourselves, and get the interest back. Maybe we can even get this country
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back to where we were 8 years ago -- in the black.
Rebecca Jones, MD,
Brattleboro, Sept. 29
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