A History Lesson Is In Order

When Barack Obama says that his tax plan doesn't raise taxes for families making $250,000 or less a year (Obama wants to repeal Bush tax cuts for families earning over $250,000 a year)...

Conservatives and libertarians need to cite history as an example to refute this erroneous claim.

As George Santayana once remarked, "Those who cannot remember the past, are condemned to repeat it."

Many taxes in the U.S. - initially started out only applying to the wealthy. This allows greedy politicians to get their grubby feet in the door.

But once inside, the unquenchable thirst that politicians have for more and more of your money - leads to a slippery slope where soon the bar gets lower and lower (and applies to more and more taxpayers).

History is repeating itself yet again:

1. Income Tax - Re-proposed in 1894, Sixteenth Amendment ratified on February 12, 1913. Initially, only one-half of 1 percent of taxpayers paid any income taxes (ironically applied only to those making about $250,000 in today's dollars). To ensure passage of the constitutional amendment, Democrats waged an extensive public relations campaign contending that it would only apply to the rich.
2. Alternative Minimum Tax - Proposed in 1969, implemented in 1970. Was intended to ensure that highest of high-income families paid taxes (and did not avoid paying taxes).
   
3. Death Tax -Implemented in 1916. Was implemented to make sure the wealthy were paying for the cost of military protection and because of concerns about "concentrations of wealth."
   

As Joe the Plumber adeptly noted, there's nothing stopping an Obama administration from deciding that $150,000 is "pretty rich too" and lowering the bar to raise the taxes on yet more hard-working Americans.

Every time Obama & Biden claim that most American families won't see their taxes raised - conservatives and libertarians need to cite the history of taxes in the U.S. - for it is only a matter of time before the tax applies to you too.

As the Pastor Martin Niemoller "First they came..." poem demonstrates (with a simple search and replace)...

First they came for (those making $250,000),
- but I was not (making $250,000) so I did not speak out.
Then they came for the (those making $200,000 & $150,000),
- but I was neither, so I did not speak out.
Then they came for (those making $100,000),
- but I was not (making $100,000) so I did not speak out.
And when they came for me, there was no one left to speak out for me.

As an immensely respected and extremely wise man once remarked, "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."