It’s Tax Day – Do You Know Where Your Leaders Are?
Today is Tax Day.
Tax-compliance in the U.S. is high – inordinately high, given what most of us have been dealt over the past three decades. To put things in perspective, however, let’s look at some stats:
1. 1% of the American population controls 85% of the nation’s wealth, and 90% of its income.
2. Increase that number to 5%, and you have between 95-98% of the nation’s wealth, and over 95% of its income.
3. The rest of us fight over what’s left.
4. 45% of the nation’s households pay no tax. Several of the nation’s largest manufacturers (who exported more jobs in the past thirty years than they’ve created domestically) have been rewarded by a system which does not require them to pay any taxes at all on their earnings.
5. Most of the nation’s banks fall into this category.
6. So do most of the one-percenters and a high number of the five-percenters (their marginal tax-rate is 17% - before deductions).
I’ll posit that tax-compliance in the U.S. is high for the same reason that the majority of Americans still support tax breaks for the super-rich and large corporations in America – because the system is run like a lottery, and they believe that someday, they, too, can through pluck and application wind up in the top-rung of American society, where they can take their turn thumbing their noses at the Rest Of Us.
Incredibly, Cletus and DaisyMae believe that the rich and famous will let them into the ‘clubhouse’.
On balance, we shouldn’t be surprised. Cletus and DaisyMae believe that the entire universe was created 6,000 years ago; that dinosaurs cohabited the place with humans, that climate change isn’t happening, and that America will become great again if only we’ll ‘turn to God’.
They believe that a book written by a bunch of Bronze-Age goat-herders holds the truths about life. They know this is true, along with the other stuff above, because a guy who puts “Dr.” in front of his name (never mind that he got that ‘doctorate’ from an outfit which only teaches from that book by the Bronze-Age goat-herders) told them so in a little cinder-block church-house yesterday morning, about an hour before they got in the pickup and went home to their Hoverounds and NASCAR-on-television.
America, in case you haven’t heard me state this before, is a nation of morons. Morons who failed eighth-grade math. Morons who never studied biology. Morons who will cheerfully feed us all to the machinery of chickens-for-health-care and Glenn Becks’ chalkboard.
We’ve got to face some unpleasant facts, those of us who Stayed Awake in Class: This demographic comprises a majority of Americans, and hence a majority of its voters. This is not a demographic which has the skill-sets to solve two-part math problems, let alone advanced economic issues. These are people who are accustomed to doing what they’re told, and relying on Jesus for the rest.
Those of us who tell them that this sort of ‘hope’ isn’t a strategy are roundly shouted-down – because there’s no arguing reason and logic in the face of mythology.
The other day, I read an article by George Lakeoff, a Berkeley professor who stated that “Obama had returned to his moral vision” by way of making a speech. “It was a landmark speech,” Lakeoff said, without bothering to acknowledge that Obama has made plenty of speeches, beginning with one which got him recognized on the national political stage during the 2004 Democratic convention.
Speeches are easy to make.
I still marvel at Obama’s election – I think in retrospect more people feared a Palin-presidency-via-McCain-heart-attack than they feared anything Obama might do. Regardless, he made a lot of speeches; a lot of promises, the important ones of which have gone unfulfilled, and will likely continue to languish because he’s now pushing for the one thing which eventually seduces every first term President – the desire for a second term.
With American infrastructure crumbling and somewhere around 20% of the workforce unemployed, there is only one choice left for any American president to make – increasing taxes on those most able to pay them (this is the demographic I discussed earlier – the large corporations and banking houses, plus the five-percent of the population making all the money.)
The Republicans are dead-set against this, preferring to double-down on the Neocon economic policies which got us here in the first place – the notion that, if you keep taxes low on those with money, they’ll magically ignore millions of years of hunter-gatherer hard-wiring and old-fashioned greed, and start opening their purse-strings voluntarily, creating jobs and building roads and bridges out of their own pocketbooks.
Because, of course, they’re nice guys – just like the guy in the picture, above.
I’m asked, “What do we do?” by a lot of people who read this site. I’ll start out by saying I don’t have any answers; frankly, I don't believe we can avoid complete breakdown at this point. I’ve got some suggestions, though.
First, we need to understand that there are five engines of political change in any society – its government, its business and financial institutions, its religious and philosophical community, its military, and lastly, its general population – that last of which is the source and origin of governmental consent.
Second, we need to start by admitting that the most-obvious and legally-sanctioned form of change – our current political system - is unworkable. Congress is bought-and-paid-for; instead of national service with the idea of a start-and-end-date, people who run for Congress are looking for a career.
They have world-class health care, good salaries, perks aplenty, and if they want to get re-elected, they know that taking hundreds of thousands of dollars at a crack from a corporation, bank, or wealthy individual (they’re all the same now, thanks to the Citizens United ruling) is a hell of a lot more efficient than asking the general-populace for $10 at a time - because we no longer expect to see our representatives speaking to us in person – unless we’re the fortunate few who can afford $150-and-up for a fundraising ‘dinner’.
Asking these people to give all of that up by way of legislating a workable system is insane. It won’t happen. You don’t ask the fox to legislate his way out of the henhouse. Nope; Congress isn't part of the solution, either - it's either busy pandering to Cletus, DaisyMae and the Teabaggers - or its incapable of doing anything past caving-in to the wolverines on the far Right.
Third, we need to realize that the business and financial system is not a force for positive change – in fact, as I outlined above, it’s actually working against us. We’ve let the Djinni out of the lamp by way of deregulating much of the economic system – if you stayed awake in class long enough, you learned that unregulated capitalism is at fundamental odds with any form of representative democracy. Unregulated capitalism and fascist ideology go together like ham and eggs. The business and financial-people caused most of this to begin with; that we shouldn't look to them for a solution is beyond-obvious.
Fourth, we need to realize that there’s a reason, dating back to the Roman republic, why any representative democracy didn’t allow a nation’s military to operate within its borders for any reason save to repel an invasion – the chance of a military leader saying ‘might makes right’ and taking over the whole affair is just too great a temptation. Today, thanks to the implementation of an all-volunteer force and the gradual skewing of its members toward ultra Right ideologies (including extreme fundamentalist Christianity), the most we can expect from our military is to support the current system – if not to implement something even more extreme if given the opportunity. Don't expect the military to be any sort of solution - if we have to rely on them to set things right, we have to accept all that follows - look to places like Liberia for your archetypical end-game if you want the military to solve the problem.
Fifth, we need to realize that if genuine change is going to happen anytime soon, it’s going to be up to us – those of us who Stayed Awake in Class. Cletus and DaisyMae drank the Kool-Aid a long time ago.
Here’s the problem: We’re a serious minority.
People as diverse as Margaret Mead and Vladimir Lenin have said that a small group of people, sufficiently motivated, can effect change (Mead went on to say that this is the only thing that ever has). Let's hope they're right - even so, there's a fundamental problem, at least here in America with that - the minority which really grasp the problem is doing fuck-all about it.
I’m continually amazed at the fact that even though we're a minority, those of us who’ve connected the dots are still silent. There are no protests. Frankly, I’m equally-amazed that someone hasn’t driven a moving van full of Semex into the New York Stock Exchange; that someone hasn't parked a Suburban full of nitrate-fertilizer and diesel in the underground parking garage of the Bank of America building, and that the Hamptons and other enclaves of the Rich and Corrupt haven’t been torched to the ground by a mob of angry 99ers and homeless people.
Sooner or later, we’re going to have to realize that pitchforks and rope are likely our only remedy.
More on that later.
