Tax Cut Follow-Up And Black Reparations

The vote on the supposed deal regarding an extension of the current tax rates may happen today. Given that this will directly impact your pocketbook and mine, I thought I'd go into a bit more depth with a few more thoughts.

I think it's interesting to read the various reactions to this deal. This seems to be a good short summary of what's going on:

The quick rundown is, no one’s taxes are going up (Good), unless you’re dead (Bad) and its temporary nature will make it more of a depression protection as opposed to an economic boost (Ugly).

The writer of that post rightly suggests that we should consider it a victory because we kept more dollars in our pockets rather than putting it into the hands of the government, which is always a good thing. That's a good point, though I still keep coming back to the fact that our side won. If only our elected reps had the stones to play hardball, we should be seeing a lowering of the tax rates rather than simply keeping them level.

Still, the point remains that it is the Democrats who are fighting tooth and nail to raise taxes, and the GOP that is standing firm against them. Don't believe the inevitable spin that Obama is trying to help out middle class families here; much like Clinton, he's being dragged kicking and screaming to the signature line of this bill. By way of proof, he's not even helping everyone who actually needs help - it's more like selective welfare than anything else.

Speaking of which, it hasn't been signed into law yet. It appears that a few of the more hardcore conservatives in Congress are going to stand against this vote because it only pushes forward the dependency upon government for basic necessities of millions of Americans. That's another great point. Rock star conservative Jim DeMint says this:

“[W]e don’t need a temporary economy, which means we don’t need a temporary tax rate. A permanent extension of our current tax rates would allow businesses to plan five and ten years in advance, and that’s how you build an economy.”

Of course, if the Democrats are so livid about a two year extension that they've successfully shut down the White House switchboard complaining about the lack of tax increases (really? I mean...really?!), can you imagine what they'd do if this was a permanent change? Yep, it's totally something the new GOP majority should do immediately in January.

So how is the President taking what can only be considered his first true legislative defeat? Not well. In fact, he offered a petulant and whiny statement yesterday in which he called Republicans 'hostage-takers' and 'bomb throwers'. My, what great leadership, bipartisanship, and unity building! I listened to part of that press conference, but I just couldn't make myself keep going after I heard this line: "This has nothing to do with the politics of the moment. It's a question of what can we get done right now." Mm-hmmm... Is it any wonder Obama's approval rating is now lower than that of ***GASP*** George W. Bush?

In the meantime, another mind-boggling issue has flown almost completely under the radar:

More than 92,000 “black farmers” have signed up for reparations from the Obama USDA after the Pigford case was extended this past year. That’s five times the number of blacks who were actually farming during the time period in question and would possibly qualify for the reparations.

Pigford v. Glickman was a class action lawsuit against the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), alleging racial discrimination in its allocation of farm loans and assistance between 1983 and 1997. The lawsuit ended with a settlement in which the U.S. government agreed to pay African American farmers $50,000 each if they had attempted to get USDA help but failed. To date, almost $1 billion has been paid or credited to the farmers under the settlement’s consent decree. Democrats want to add another $1.2 billion to the money pot and continue with the reparations.

I think I speak for everyone when I saw Why The Face?! (hint: watch Modern Family)

Rep. Steve King rightly called this out for what it is: guilt money being paid over slavery from decades ago. And the House just passed it. Will the Senate pass it, too? Loads more information here.

So, not only to we have the ultimate in leadership, bipartisanship, and unity building, Barack Obama also appears to be the ultimate post-racial President, too!

Welcome to Obama's America, where up is down, yes is no, and Obama is on your side.