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Thursday, August 16, 2007
Home-grown terrorists still on the job
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Thinking Right’s Friday free-for-all. Pick a topic:
• Bingo! A headline homer, from the front page of the AJC: “Democrats’ Iraq plans slower than their slogans.”
• Democrats just can’t let revisionist history go. With the resignation of Karl Rove, they dig deep into the grievance satchel to pull out the 2002 campaign commercial that reminded Georgians that we’re in a war with bad guys while incumbent U.S. Sen. Max Cleland was worrying about whether security agents were to be unionized. The Dems blame Rove — in the same vein that they blame President Bush for fallen bridges. It was a fair commercial. Cleland had but himself to blame. He became a national Democrat — and those don’t win statewide in Georgia.
• Memo #3 to state leaders: Picture your white bread Republican selves at the Grady summit table where the “stakeholder” crowd rushes in to insist that the “community” has been ignored and decisions are being made by “people who don’t use Grady.” One of said Republicans, state Sen. David J. Shafer of Duluth, proposes a state law to direct Fulton and DeKalb to turn over Grady operations to a nonprofit hospital management corporation. Good idea, but something for the locals to do on their own. Shafer proposes oversight with some from outside the two counties being appointed, and also giving the House speaker and lieutenant governor appointees. An awful idea. Local politics. Local solution.
• Home-grown terrorists, sympathetic to al-Qaida but not actually connected, are a legitimate fear, as law-enforcement officials now warn. Jailhouse Muslims who have an ax to grind with “the system” combined with the run-of-the-mill kooks, such as the Columbine or Virginia Tech shooters, represent a pool awfully susceptible to al-Qaida jihadism. New York police identify 10 recent plots developed largely or completely by home-grown militants with little or no al-Qaida support.
• When my band of right-wingers take over and institute draconian laws requiring small children to say “Yes, ma’am” and “No, sir” to adults, we show our compassionate side by giving a break to some criminals too dense to form criminal intent. First up for a full pardon is the Rochelle woman who called police to report that the $25 crack cocaine she bought was fake. Treatment, not jail for her. Gimme a hug.
• Some blacks of prominence, such as those who rushed to defend Michael Vick, can be injudicious to the point of being simpletons when they offer affection in hopes of future cash. Latest to join the circle is Macon Mayor Jack Ellis, who sent couriers bearing praise and a declaration of “solidarity” to Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. The Macon Telegraph reports: “Ellis praised the controversial leader, who has subsidized the cost of heating fuel for some American low-income citizens, as a champion for the common man who could offer aid to Macon’s residents.” The mayor, finishing out his last term, has converted to Islam in Senegal and is changing his name to Hakim Mansour Ellis. Cities, counties and states shouldn’t have foreign policies.
• It really is scandalous that taxpayers provide two or more public pensions to many public officials, including former Fulton County Superior Court Clerk Juanita Hicks, for the same day on the job. She gets $105,588 in pension benefits at age 58 after only 18 years on the job. That’s from the county. She also gets a minimum of $1,700 per month from a second public pension system for the same day of work. It’s the Superior Court Clerk’s Retirement Fund, financed by an additional levy on court filings. It’s a loophole the Legislature should close.
• Earmarks, such as the “Bridge to Nowhere,” that individual members of Congress insert in appropriations bills, should be stopped altogether. But ample loopholes accompanying Democratic hype about doing it indicate it won’t be soon. By the way, the white elephant proposal of a rail line to Lovejoy, which won’t die started as an earmark — meaning that while Georgians sit gridlocked in traffic congestion, money that could have brought some relief was earmarked for a slow train to Lovejoy.
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FairTax, GREAT tax
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
The candidate not yet in the race, Fred Thompson, indicates he’ll support the FairTax., In a letter to the national FairTax campaign, Thompson said the next president “should enact a fundamental overhaul of the tax code that makes it fairer, simpler, and more pro-growth.”
While there are a “number of ways to do that,” Thompson said the “principles and ideas found in the Fair Tax are a good place to start.” The FairTax would replace income and payroll taxes with a national sales tax. Five of the Republican presidential candidates and Democrat Mike Gravel support FairTax, but Mitt Romney and Rudy Giuliani have not taken positions.
In Georgia, House Speaker Glenn Richardson, a Paulding County Republican, is proposing a similar concept. His is called the GREAT (Georgia’s Repeal of Every Ad-valorem Tax) Plan. Georgia is first in the nation to consider eliminating property taxes on homes, land, commercial real estate, inventory, vehicles, boats and airplanes, said Richardson. Florida took a run at it with a special session in January, but instead wound up with a proposed constitutional amendment to exempt up to 80 percent of the property taxes on homes, but raw land is excluded.
As with the FairTax, there’ll be plenty of opportunity to debate the specifics of Richardson’s plan. Essentially, he’d eliminate most all of the existing 127 sales tax exemptions, groceries included. Grocery taxes of up to $3,500, taxes on prescription drugs and some other life essentials related to medical care, would be refunded on the state income tax. Sales tax exemptions for governments, agricultural products, raw materials used in manufacturing and business-to-business transactions would be retained.
The tax on income and sales would be 4 percent. The current top rate on income taxes is 6 percent.
To make up the income from lost property tax collections, the 4 percent sales tax would be extended to services: Dry cleaners, lawn, professional fees for medical attention and legal advice, hair care, and in general the full range of services consumers purchase.
One specific question here today: Is a tax on services a good idea, even if it comes in lieu of something else, the property tax, for example? Frankly, I’d have great reservations about introducing a tax on services. And why? For the simple reason that it’s an easy tax to raise, especially if marauding liberals can use it to punish a disfavored occupation or industry, as they’ve done with tobacco. A penny here, a dollar there on “the rich” and suddenly we’re back to unchecked government.
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