THURSDAY
5/14 – Thursday – Caldwell TEA Party – NC State Representative George Robinson will be at the Lenoir library at 7:00pm to give us an update on what is going in Raleigh with attention to the road tolls. Rep. Robert Brawley also be there to answer questions about toll roads.
TUESDAY
5/19 – Caldwell TEA Party meeting. Candidate for NCGOP State Chair AJ Daoud 6th District Chair. (Also, another candidate running for NCGOP Chairman, Hasan Harnett, will be speaking at another meeting at 6pm in Charlotte and will try to make it up to see us by 8pm.) Meeting will be at the Caldwell County Public Library, 120 Hospital Ave, Lenoir, NC 28645.
Caldwell TEA Party 
“Smaller government, lower taxes, more personal responsibility, states’ rights, free market capitalism, and less government intrusion in our lives! ”
“Smaller Government?” What, exactly, does that mean? Fewer representatives in Congress? In the State Legislature? Two County Commissioners instead of five, perhaps?
“lower taxes?” Federal Taxes? State Taxes? County Taxes? Municipal Taxes? And, if we lower any or all, how, then shall we pay for the services we have come to take for granted?
“more personal responsibility?” What does this phrase mean? Are you saying corporate officers should be personally responsible for the acts of their corporate operations perhaps?
“state’s rights?” Shall we have different laws in every state? Shall states not be required to recognize the laws of any other state or national/federal laws? For over a hundred fifty years we have been the United States of America – One nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all – what part of our republic exactly do you desire to change?
“free market capitalism?” An interesting phrase, for certain. However, we’ve not had a purely free-market system for the last century or more. The excesses of unregulated Capitalism proving so onerous time after time that we, the people, voted time and again to regulate capital and capitalists. What, exactly is it you want to change now?
“less government intrusion in our lives!” Ah, what or which ‘intrusions’ do you have reference to? The Free Market Companies you mentioned first collect more information on Americans when we bank, use credit cards, shop (esp ‘on the net’) use land line or cell phones, buy a home, buy a car, purchase an insurance policy, cast a ballot, change our mailing address, etc. than ;government’ does.
Government no longer tells us whom we can marry or have sex with – but they are ‘intruding’ into a woman’s pregnancy, even adding a religious sentiment into the pledge in 1954. ‘They’ have required us to carry car insurance – do you want them to stop that ‘intrusion?’
As with so many politicians, you have the talking points down pat but are far too spare with specifics.
If we don’t tax progressively, we can’t raise enough money to pay the nation’s expenses (Trickle Down Economics did not work) and the bridges will fail (over 40% of the bridges in Caldwell County are in need of repairs today. If we don’t regulate we’ll get lead in the kid’s toys and depressions and recessions and God only knows what in our food.
What, exactly is it you want to ‘fix’ and exactly how do you propose to do it?
Thank you for the comment. Thank you for opportunity to respond. I had no idea that these things are not universally understood. Explanations are due to promote a healthy dialog.
Yes, we believe in “Smaller government, lower taxes, more personal responsibility, states’ rights, free market capitalism, and less government intrusion in our lives! ”
“Smaller government” has nothing to with representation. Smaller government is the desire to scale down the giant size of the federal government. If I recall correctly, in one example, there are 40 redundant federal agencies dealing with private property, that we staff and fund, that we are compelled to follow their regulations, file their paperwork, and stay in compliance in an ever changing bureaucracy. This is the bloat and excess of federal the TEA Party wants to stop. Reorganize these agencies and make ONE AGENCY thusly making it accountable to taxpayers. When many bureaucracies are involved the buck is passed and progress to resolve a problem or do something new is nearly stopped. That’s the problem. Congress and a new president need to fix it and that is why our decisions in elections matter.
Yes, we do want lower taxes. Personally, I like the flat tax where all Americans pay 10% regardless of income. If you make $100 a year – send in $10. If you make $10,000 send in $1,000 (that’s only about $82 per month). If you make $100,000,000 per year – send in $10,000,000. End the loopholes and make the form the size of a post card. Done.
Going along with lower taxes, there must also be a Balanced Budget Amendment To keepnthe federal government operating within their means instead of contunuing to grow and grow and grow, consuming more of our capital. We can decide where to spend our money (i.e., charities, technology, housing, food, travel, savings, investments, education,…). If government services are cut because of lower taxes, then so be it. That is debate that needs to happen so we can decide what is important to keep and what can either go away or maybe be performed by the private sector better. If many people think an elimiated service is so necessary, then a private entity can form an organization to provide the service where people can freely donate or a service or product can be sold in order to deliver to service the government is no longer providing. We have an $18 trillion national debt, so really we can’t afford much of what the government is poorly delivering.
Yes, we mean “more personal responsibility” with a passion. For example, if you have a baby, it does not obligate me/the community/government/taxpayers to pay for everything for that child (i.e., 18 years plus maternity of medical care, Headstart, other free preschool and daycare, WIC, Foodstamps, free lunch,… to name a few). Another example of personal responsibility is people who build in a flood plane on a river or on the ocean shore and don’t have proper insurance to cover the loss and expect the government to pay for what we can all forseen was mistake in the first place. The government is us – the taxpayers. It’s fine if you want to build and live there, but when a category 5 hurricane comes and wipes out your beautiful $5m home it’s not my probelm – either buy insurance or self-insure. These two examples are the heart of personal responsibility – don’t get pregnant until your ready to care for that child. And don’t ask the government/me, the taxpayer, to give you a sweet bail out when your home destroyed by nature.
I’m puzzled by your problem with states’ rights. Look at the 10th amendments in the Bill of Rights. It was such an important issue the Founding Fathers included it in the Bill of Rights, which was the deal breaker for many states, along with free speech, freedom of religion, freedom to be secure in our person and not searched without cause, trial by jury, and the right to own guns. You should really check that 10th Amendment, because it does guarantee that staes can have different laws. You could say it’s kind of a free market experiment. Today, people are leaving high tax states (California and New York) for low tax states (Texas, Florida, North Carolina). States’ Rights rock!
Free market capitalism – I can’t even begin this because it’s such a huge issue. Google economist Loren Spivek. He explains this issue very well bu saying everythingn is subject to free market pressures: education, health care, food, technologies, shipping, work place issues, cars, as long as government is out of the picture. Before your hair catches fire, the government would look for us should monopolies arise. Right now, because the government is so heavily involed in everything we have monopolies in education and health care, to name only two. It is wrong for our government to pick winners and losers (i.e., General Motors, Solyindra, Monsanto, the coal industry, etc….) in the free market. Those decisions are ours. If we want cars that get 100 miles to the gallon and we demand it and save our purchases until we get it, but if we are happy with 30 miles to the gallon in our new cars, then so be it. Government imposed Cafe Standards are ridiculous. This issue is also a government instrusion that I do not appreciate.
All off these things I’ve mentioned are government intrusions. The crushing power of the IRS and the EPA without any due process or government accountibility go to the heart of the issue with our out of control government. You brought up gay marriage, I didn’t. My only comment here is that people who don’t want to perform ceremonies, bake, or flower arrange for gay weddings should never be forced to. There are plenty of other businesses who will happily do it. Again, it should be a free market issue. If the community is offended by the business owner’s actions, they will take their money elsewhere. If enough people take their money elsewhere said business goes out of business. In the end, there is no need for government involvement.
Please respond if this isn’t clear. And thank you again!
“Please respond if this isn’t clear.”
OK, let us look at the examples you shared in your clarification response.
“Smaller government is the desire to scale down the giant size of the federal government.”
Well, the size of any government cannot be viewed in a vacuum, right.
We, for instance, had but a postal service at the ‘Federal Level’ when we began and barely thirteen small colonies – concentrated on a rather narrow portion of our Eastern Seaboard. Indeed, we had no standing Army and our ‘Naval Force’ consisted of but a few wooden sailing ships – even after the War of Independence from Britain was won (albeit with significant help from our foreign relations.
Our present Federal establishment governs a nation of in excess of three hundred million citizens with two states and a territory or two far from our continental borders.
There are more citizens in two of New York’s boroughs than there were in all thirteen colonies at our inception. As well, there are more roadways – now traversed by gasoline fed horsepower that itself demands an infrastructure more complex than any Pilgrim might have imagined.
“there are 40 redundant federal agencies dealing with private property”
I asked for specifics and you offer generalities once again. How can anyone intelligently argue or agree with your ‘redundant’ assertion absent seeing a list of the ‘federal agencies’ you would consolidate?
Now, we all know that there are efficiencies to be had if our elected representatives were able to focus on solutions as opposed to election and re-election. As well, we have experienced what a Tea Party-infused Congress failed to accomplish so far in that regard.
As so many erstwhile reformers have found, it is one thing to excoriate the establishment, rally a constituency and gain office and quite another to actually govern effectively.
“dealing with private property”
This begs the question “Are you focusing upon private real property, private intellectual property, private personal property? On the other hand, do you fail to see or make a distinction?
Beyond that, do you have any idea of the number of state and local government institutions that are involved with one or more forms of ‘private property?’
One need be careful repeating ‘talking points.’ Were they written by the Congressman spouting them on Faux News – or written for him by someone on his staff or from ALEC (for instance)?
Surely, you recall the Congressman (himself a member of the House Science Committee) who repeated something sent to him by some ‘family’ group or another – saying most forcefully that a woman’s body prevents her getting pregnant from a rape assault.
“, that we staff and fund”
Again, absent specifics, I can only assure you that more than one ‘federal agency’ receives funding from the industry it is charged with regulating – not sure if any receives all it’s funding thus, however.
“This is the bloat and excess of federal the TEA Party wants to stop.”
Your conclusion references evidence (“this is the bloat”) you simply do not offer to support your claims of ‘redundancy’ and ‘bloat.’ You need perform more research.
“When many bureaucracies are involved the buck is passed and progress to resolve a problem or do something new is nearly stopped.”
Now, we may agree upon something. However, getting the various citizen constituencies each such ‘bureaucracy’ represents to agree to dissolve ‘their bureaucracy’ is the difficulty – is it not?
I suspect this reality influences the ability of Congress to consolidate agencies as they are, ultimately beholdin’ to many of the same citizens.
If you care to offer up specifics (Agency names and such), one might be able to identify the respective constituencies and the interests they aspire to protect.
“we do want lower taxes … like the flat tax where all Americans pay 10% regardless of income”
Let’s not waste time on a hypothetical hundred-dollar per year income, but focus upon something at the bottom based upon the current minimum remuneration for fifty-two weeks of forty-hour per week employment at the Federal Minimum Wage: $15,080. Of course, it is the most unusual individual who never misses a day of work so this figure may be unrealistically high.
This hard-working individual would be taking home less than twelve hundred dollars after your ten-percent withholding but before deducting for SSI or Medicare (or would you end these programs as well?)
If he (or she) drives but ten miles to work each day in a most fuel-efficient vehicle, he would be paying some additional taxes on gas, tires, repairs and such. At 12,000 miles per year; 18mpg; and three dollar eleven-cent gas (12K/18*3.11), he/she is paying $2073.34 or over fifteen percent of his after (flat) tax income on gas. Of course, some fifty cents of each gallon he pays for represents Federal and State Taxes (about $333.00 or another two (2.45%) percent of his after (flat) tax income. Oh, let us not forget License and Tag/Registration fees and annual inspection costs.
If he spends but thirty dollars each week on food that is taxed at even two-percent, he’s paying yet another thirty dollars plus in taxes.
If he rents a room or a mobile home, his rental includes the real estate taxes his landlord passes on as part of the rental price – say ten dollars a month?
If he has a phone, he is paying several forms of tax on that contract. If he has an Electric bill, it includes a Franchise Fee, which is effectively another tax. Since similar arrangements are incorporated in one’s Municipal water bill, he is paying taxes (beyond your Flat tax) on every drop as well.
You might suspect he cannot afford to pay taxes on a Charter Bundle – but he may squeeze it in.
My point in all this is that our Federal Tax Burden is relatively insignificant when compared to local, county and state taxes. Moreover, these tax burdens impact those at lower income levels to a far greater extent than they do those we consider ‘wealthy’ taxpayers.
While I doubt that you have read Ayn Rand, you appear to support her thesis and her ‘take’ upon the subject of individual responsibility. To argue with Ayn, I would pick Elizabeth:
“There is nobody in this country who got rich on his own. Nobody. You built a factory out there? Good for you. But I want to be clear: You moved your goods to market on roads (and railroads and canals and through airports) the rest of us paid for. You hired workers the rest of us paid to educate. You were safe in your factory because of police forces and fire forces that the rest of us paid for. You didn’t have to worry that marauding bands would come and seize everything at your factory, and hire someone to protect against this, because of the work (and the sacrifice) the rest of us did.*”
As I have said, ours is a complex society and regulating it is not going to be done out of a shoebox for a dime on a dollar.
“Balanced Budget Amendment – If government services are cut because of lower taxes, then so be it.”
Again, you beg the question “Which services will you eliminate and which shall go first?
How about looking at the greatest expense item in the ‘budget?’
Will you eliminate the Armed Forces – so be it?
Given the recent debacle on Wall Street, will you the SEC – so be it?
Given the admitted failures of bureaucratic institutions, perhaps we should eliminate the Food and Drug Administration first – after all, what is a little Salmonella among true patriots?
“debate … so we can decide what is important to keep and what can either go away or maybe be performed by the private sector better.”
If we devolve responsibility to ‘the private sector’ the Free Market Capitalist approach you supported first would require someone pay them for the service – there is no Free Lunch, right?
Who will pay for a private Food and Drug administration? Those who eat food, perhaps?
Another question one might fairly ask “Who will trust a Food and Drug Administration run by ConAgra, American Tobacco, Chemie Grünenthal** et al?”
“an $18 trillion national debt … we can’t afford … what … government is … delivering”
Folks just love Big Numbers. Moreover, they seem to love them most out of context – and context is everything.
If that fellow earning Minimum Wage had home, subject to an eighty-thousand dollar mortgage, we would expect him to lose his home in a mater of months – we would say he was in over his head even at a one-percent rate.
Were he earning $41,212 (more than that earned by sixty-six percent of Americans in 2012) we would be far less concerned about his three-hundred dollar mortgage payment and his mortgage debt.
Therefore, with our nation, one must look at our income, our gross national product, the relative amount of money/wealth/income in the hands of the majority of Americans when considering our National Debt.
It might prove worthwhile to research the history of the American National Debt, as have (for instance) the Chinese (who are heavily invested in our debt upon their presumption that it is one of the safest investments the world has to offer.
Balance the U.S. Budget, eh?
Sounds great until you think about it in some depth.
However, I am a bit tired, so let me ask, “How do you budget for 9/11 and the resulting wars those Republican friends of yours started and passed on to ‘the next administration?’
One need also budget for Katrina’s offspring, earthquakes, BP and Exxon oil spills, tornados, and any number of natural disasters – or does your plan envision leaving the response solely to The Private Sector?
“If I were a citizen, would you ‘carry’ my baby?”
“not obligate … taxpayers to pay … everything for that child”
Of course, that makes perfect sense – but you paint a picture falsely – taxpayers are not obligated by government to pay ‘cradle to eighteen’ care for any and every infant brought into this world.
Though one must point out that prohibiting abortion implies a concomitant responsibility for the resulting issue on the part of the entity (our government) insisting upon the birth as against the mother’s wishes?
You have the perspective of one who believes the benefits accrue to the adults who impregnated and conceived while most folks see the benefits you decry as benefiting the issue of those adults who prove incapable of providing the necessary nurturing and support for that infant fellow citizen.
Shall such infants suffer so you might deny taxpayer dollars to their parents for their food, clothing, shelter or education?
If no ‘Private Sector’ establishment steps up – would to leave the new infant citizen to its own devices?
“I’m puzzled by your problem with states’ rights.”
When he introduced the Tenth Amendment in Congress, James Madison explained that many states were eager to ratify this amendment, despite critics who deemed the amendment superfluous or unnecessary:
I find, from looking into the amendments proposed by the State conventions, that several are particularly anxious that it should be declared in the Constitution, that the powers not therein delegated should be reserved to the several States. Perhaps words which may define this more precisely than the whole of the instrument now does, may be considered as superfluous. I admit they may be deemed unnecessary: but there can be no harm in making such a declaration, if gentlemen will allow that the fact is as stated. I am sure I understand it so, and do therefore propose it.
An often-repeated quote, from United States v. Darby Lumber, 312 U.S. 100, 124 (1941), reads as follows:
The amendment states but a truism that all is retained which has not been surrendered. There is nothing in the history of its adoption to suggest that it was more than declaratory of the relationship between the national and state governments as it had been established by the Constitution before the amendment or that its purpose was other than to allay fears that the new national government might seek to exercise powers not granted, and that the states might not be able to exercise fully their reserved powers
I suspect I understand it as well as anyone not educated as a Constitutional attorney!
My questions on the subject simple attempted to get you to specify the ‘states rights’ issue you had reference to – and my question remains “Which is your specific issue?”
“Government imposed Cafe Standards are ridiculous”
Ah, something specific at last! Your hypothetical of 100 MPG vs. 30 MPG is dramatic. Actually, we used to get about 10 mpg in our inefficient full-size sedans with much of the energy in each gallon of gas spewed out the tail pipe and evaporated before it every reached one of the eight cylinders.
Were so dependant upon foreign oil that we had shortages, long lines and violent price fluctuations that most Americans wanted ‘fixed.’
Now, passenger/light truck fleet averages approach 27 mpg and (smog-producing) emissions have been similarly reduced as has our cost ($.033 vs. $ 0.12 per mile)
If you can understand why folks who do not smoke do not like sitting next to a chain smoker, you should be able to appreciate the reduction in Carbon Monoxide emissions CAFÉ Standards brought about.
Further, they have been in place since 1975 and Congress has yet to over turn them – the people have spoken and their legislatures have acted.
Need sleep.