Quote of the Day
The price of greatness is responsibility.
Sir Winston Churchill
Police War on Lemonade Stands Continues:
Thumbs DOWN!
I cannot help but wonder what sort of competently run police department would even think of risking bad PR of arresting people for doing an innocuous lemonade protest in front of the Capitol; and under what stretch of the imagination do "professional" police think they have a right to stiff-arm cameras as they pass by, i.e., not obstructing their path? Since when are these "public servants" think it's their "right" to intimidate people monitoring their behavior, consistent with their First Amendment rights?
At one point in the first video, I thought I overhead one of the policemen say that they wouldn't have a problem with distributing lemonade so long as it was given away, But the fact the protesters were selling cups of lemonade for windfall profits at 10 cents a cup was enough to write up tickets for failing to have a vendor license, not to mention handcuffing the protesters.
Perhaps the protesters should have argued they were illegal immigrants. They would then be given amnesty for their crime of selling cheap lemonade...
Warren Buffett and Same Old Same Old Class Warfare Politics
I've never been in the upper tax brackets; no doubt Barack Obama would be scratching his head: if he's not calling for an increase in my taxes, why should I care if he's targeting the super-rich? I'm arguing against my own self-interest, of course.
Buffett stands as an unelected representative of "real" billionaires and millionaires, he can afford to pay more, so they should too. We've heard the same type garbage argument before by self-styled rich people, including Clinton and Obama. We usually don't expect the same type of argument in other contexts. Just to give a couple of simple examples: Warren Buffett is notorious for living in a decades-old simple house and driving older common model cars. Of course, as a billionaire, he could afford to buy cars costing hundreds of thousands of dollars--and pay the hefty sales tax that goes with it; or mansions with hundreds of thousands of dollars each year in property taxes. Instead, he pays (within the context of said purchases) a mere fraction of the taxes paid by less affluent sources. There is no intrinsic worthy moral authority to spend what's in another man's pocket.
The Tax Foundation points out that even if you tax away every penny of people earning over $200K a year, you would only come close to closing the deficit. This is ultimately unsustainable. Despite all the propaganda, rich people actually diminish during a recession. The way you grow your way out of a tough economic crisis is to provide incentives for people to get rich and pay taxes, not charge penalties for people to take their toys and go home.
Musical Interlude: My Favorite Groups
Bread, "If". One of the greatest love songs of all time.
