What's Wrong with America Part II a : Liberalism

Continuing on my liberalism theme, I'll now talk about socialism. We have in our choices for president of three levels of socialists. The most dangerous I believe is Barack Obama. Hillary Clinton would be next and then John McCain.

Why is socialism bad? I'm glad you asked. It gives little to no incentive for people to work harder. The problem with socialism isn't poor work ethic, it's the fact that profits, ownership, wealth etc. are great incentives for people to work harder. When you take these incentives away, work ethic follows. Now maybe you're thinking, those things (profits, ownership and wealth) are BAD! Taken to excess, I would agree, however there is nothing inherently wrong about striving for success. It is what has made America great for centuries. People from all over the world have flocked here; why? Because of our wonderful social security benefits? No. How about our free health care? Nope. People have come here because if you work hard enough and make the right choices, you can be successful. It doesn't matter who you are, with hard work you can succeed in America.

What does socialism carried out to a more full extent do? It says, 'you are smart enough to work these types of jobs'. It says, 'do your job and you can get a place to live just like everyone else as 'good' as you'. You get so many rations for food (regardless of whether or not that food is available) and work this job for the rest of your life. You don't really own anything. You get the same things whether you work hard or not, so why work hard? Why strive to be better? If you run a store, you will get the same things whether you sell 1 item or 100, so why strive to be successful. If you are a farmer and you give all of the food you grow to the government only for them to give you some rations back regardless of how much you grow, why would you spend time breaking your back working the government's fields? You would just grow enough to keep the government off of your back. Now you might say, 'those people just have poor work ethic', but most people in those conditions will do the same thing eventually.

Now our three candidates aren't proposing the Soviet Union for America. (at least not yet) But they are proposing things that are leading us down the road to hard core socialism. All three have either said they want to raise taxes or (in the case of McCain) have voted against tax cuts. The liberal doctrine says, 'those tax cuts are just for the rich.' Well how many poor men (or women) have you ever worked for? If the rich are taxed higher, they can't afford as many employees, meaning they will spend less money and save more which means less jobs, meaning less people paying income taxes, meaning less revenue for the US Treasury. The very wealthy won't be too affected though, because they can live off of the interest of their savings and investments. If you have $20,000,000 in the bank, the interest is pretty decent money and even though you are paying taxes, you are paying tax only on the interest. You can withdraw all of the interest every year, which is probably $1,000,000, live very nicely and you will always have $20,000,000 in the bank. But you won't invest much money in expanding your wealth because the tax penalties are too high. You sit it out, live off of interest and wait for a more favorable environment to begin growing your business again.

So who suffers? The middle class. Those who depend on their jobs. Those who depend on rich people to create new jobs. Those who don't have $20,000,000 in the bank. The people who have six months living expenses in the bank or less. Why is John McCain the least dangerous? Well his base believes that high taxes are bad. He will be forced to not go too far from the conservative camp, though he likes to do whatever he feels like doing, even if it's spitting in the face of the people who put him where he is.

Hillary Clinton. Though she is further left than she is portraying herself, I think she will be looking to correct the negative legacy of Bill Clinton, and build on what is seen as his strength. She will look to solidify that the Democrats were responsible for the successful economy of the 90's instead of the Republican Congress with their tax cuts and their curbing of spending. Since Bush 43 (and the Republican Congress he controlled) spent money like water, she can probably convince the masses that the democrats are better when it comes to fiscal responsibility if (and only if) she and a Democratic Congress can reign in spending. She will have a hard time, but I think she will give it a shot.

Barack Obama. He is the worst in this area in my opinion. Every time I hear him speak he is talking about money for this, money for that. We already have a massive deficit. We need to STOP spending. Raising taxes will not make up for what we are short, because Treasury revenues will decrease. The only way to fix what is wrong with America is to STOP SPENDING. I'll paraphrase a quote from Warren Buffett that I read once that says something like, "If you are in a financial hole the first step is to stop digging." Yet the liberal mentality is to dig some more with the belief that by digging a little more we can bring in more dirt. Now Obama in my opinion is the most likable candidate. He is certainly the best speaker and that can't hurt when you're following the president who is probably the worst speaker in modern presidential politics. Of the three, he is the only one I could see myself sitting down with and hanging out with. But, I see him following in the mold of FDR and bringing in massive expansions of government, higher taxes, and less freedom. For liberals who are all about freedom, why would you accept bigger government which only leads to less freedom?

To be continued.