Joe Biden: The gift that keeps on giving

[travelinman]

Every time Joe opens his mouth he provides conservatives an opportunity to expose Obama and Biden for the closet socialists they are.

Today, Biden told ABC's Kate Snow in response to a question about whether people making more than $250,000 would have to pay more in taxes with a President Obama:

"You got it," Biden replied. "It's time to be patriotic, Kate. Time to jump in, time to be part of the deal, time to help America out of the rut, and the way to do that is they're still gonna pay less taxes than they did under Reagan."
First, paying more and more tax to the federal government is patriotic? Tell that to the founding fathers! At what point do more and more taxes cease to be patriotic and start to be cause to overthrow the tyrannical central government that imposes such an outrageous tax burden?

Second, the line about lower tax rates than we had under Reagan is a massive distortion. Biden is obviously referencing 1981, when Reagan took office after the disastrous Carter years, taxes were way higher than they are now. The top marginal rate in 1981 was 70% for all income over $108,300. In 1981, the 39% bracket kicked in at a mere $23,500. In 2008, the top marginal rate is 35% (Obama wants to raise it back to 39.6%) and doesn't kick in until you make more than $357,700. But during the 1988 tax year, Reagan's last full year in office, the top marginal rate was 33% (even lower than today!). Someone making $23,500 in 1988 was in the 15% bracket and paying considerably less tax thanks to Ronald Reagan as were all Americans.

Obama says he wants to restore taxes back to what they were during the Reagan years, but he doesn't mean 1988... he means 1981! Those weren't Reagan's tax rates, those are Jimmy Carter's! The highest marginal rate was lower when Reagan left office than at any time since 1931. Tax rates were lower in 1988 for people earning $250,000 than they are today. The only people who have a lower tax rate than they did in 1988 are people like me in the middle and lower classes! Guess who cut their taxes? George W. Bush! Clinton promised a middle class tax cut but Bush delivered.

In fact, a look back at income tax rates shows that with rare exception (1932's mammoth tax hike by Hoover), Democrats have dramatically raised taxes and Republicans have been the ones to dramatically lower them. The most dramatic tax reductions came in the 1920s and in the 1980s, both times by Republican administrations. It took Ronald Reagan to finally exorcise the demonic weight of obscenely high income tax rates imposed during the Great Depression, World War II and the Korean War. Let us never again allow our economy to be strangled again by ridiculously high tax rates.

As if Biden didn't step in it enough today, he then proceeded to pontificate on Catholic teaching.

"Catholic social doctrine as I was taught it is, you take care of people who need the help the most. Now it'd be different if you could make the case to me that by giving this tax cut to the very wealthy, everybody else was going to be better off. We saw what happened the last eight years when we gave that tax cut. Tell me how everybody is better off. And the point I want to make to you is, and I mean this sincerely - wealthy people are just as patriotic, patriotic as poor people. We just have not asked anything of them."



Joe, didn't you learn anything from Nancy Pelosi?

Yes, Catholics are taught to take care of those most in need, but that is a directive to each of us as individuals and as a church, not a call for government action! You, as an individual, (not the government) have a responsibility to care for others and those most in need of help. Catholic doctrine does not say Catholics should use the power of the government through taxes to force your neighbors to help those who need the most help. Jesus said, "Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar?s, and unto God the things that are God?s." Separation of church and state, straight from Jesus' mouth, Joe! The federal government is not a church!

God loves each of us enough to let us fail (sin) over and over again with the hope that one day each of will see the light and do our best to live up to the high standards (among them charitable acts) he has set for each of us. God wants us to act out of love and our own desire to serve and love each other and Him. No where does Jesus say it is God's will for government to forcibly confiscate the wealth of the rich and redistribute to the needy. Instead, he makes charity and our actions the responsibility of each individual, accountable only to God and each other, not the government.

But why am I so shocked that Joe would have such a poor understanding of Catholic views on charitable acts? According to his own tax returns he's given a mere pittance to charity the last 10 years. Perhaps Joe should concern himself a little more with his individual actions rather than wealth confiscation and redistribution schemes.

[Sean Pa]

Damn right