The good news is that Democrats, Republicans and independents seem to agree that the deficit and the debt have to be reduced. The process to get to that goal is where the disagreements lie.

A few points for clarity: The “deficit” is the sum of money the federal government spends during a single year that exceeds that year’s incoming revenue, our tax dollars. The “debt” is the cumulative sum spent over years; this debt does not include future obligations, like Social Security and Medicare payments that would have to be scored as “liabilities” in accounting.

As the nation focuses on reckless government spending, a key solution being heralded is for “the rich to pay more of their fair share” of taxes.

The current effort is to increase the top rate of taxes paid by those who make $250,000 or more on a yearly basis, which includes small businesses that file taxes as sole proprietorships.

Those trying to frame the debate offer some insight to our mess. There’s been success in linking the “fairness” of the tax code to the reduction of deficit spending by the left.

So, what exactly happens when the “rich” — note it’s never framed as the hard-working and successful — pay more of their earnings to the government for politicians to spend?

An article on CNBC.com notes that “raising taxes to 39.6 percent on the Obama rich (earning $250,000-plus) would yield around $40-$45 billion in added tax revenue in the first year.” Since the 2012 deficit is on track to be $1.1 trillion, perspective is helpful.

Congressman Tom Price of Georgia explained in a November interview with MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell that taxing the newly-defined “rich” earning $250,000-plus “covers the spending by this federal government for not eight years, not eight months, not for eight weeks but for eight days. Eight days only.”

Politically, it sounds great and fair to tax the rich, but let’s examine the reality. Historically, increased government spending has paralleled unemployment, as recorded by the Federal Reserve Economic Data back to 1948. This time is no different.

As President Barack Obama has spent at least $1 trillion more each year of his presidency than has been taken into the U.S. Treasury, the unemployment rates have ranged from 7.8 percent at his first inaugural to a high of 10 percent and, most recently, at 7.7 percent just weeks prior to his second inaugural.

Yet, the cries have been, “tax the rich” versus “get out of the way government and let businesses create jobs!”

Less-than-conservative columnist Joe Weisenthal of Business Insider wrote weeks ago, “When unemployment drops, deficit/GDP (ratio of deficit spending to our nation’s economy) drops. When unemployment rises, deficit/GDP rises. Growth is the only deficit reduction policy that matters.”

So, if creating jobs and employing folks who’ll spend their earnings is the solution to get America out of its economic hole, why is the main focus of these political plans to tax, or penalize, the new Obama “rich” making $250,000-plus who create jobs and hire?

Voltaire, the French philosopher and writer, seems to have provided the best summary: “Common sense is not so common” at least when it’s better to frame an issue and distort it.

Democrats’ version now reads, “We the people, require membership in unions, demand social justice, insure domestic serenity, politicize the common defense, promote welfare and all entitlements, and secure the blessings of liberty by insulting others’ prosperity and taking their property…” 

Days after President Barack Obama announced to American business owners that “you didn’t build that” in promoting his collectivist agenda to the rights of communal benefits, US House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer supported the notion that the economy will do best when the government is your sustenance.  Responding during a Congressional briefing to a question regarding the proposed tax increases at the year’s end and their dramatically negative effect onAmerica’s fragile economy, Hoyer remarked, “…there are two things that are most stimulative that you can do – one’s unemployment insurance, the other’s food stamps…”

So, according to the political party controlling the White House and the US Senate, the American Dream has two tracts.  One is to risk your own capital, create a business with your own efforts of sweat, tears, time and toil, then turn your earnings over to a government that legally plunders in the name of social fairness and egalitarianism…you know, “equality.”

The second tract is to live as a dependent upon theUSgovernment for your housing, your food, and your state-awarded rights.

Doubt thatAmerica’s being led into a death spiral of dependency by those who are rejecting individual rights and success?

Investor’s Business Daily (IBD) published an article, “Disability Ranks Outpace New Jobs in Obama Recovery” revealing that “More workers joined the federal government’s disability program in June than got new jobs, according to two new government reports.” IBD noted, “While the economy has created 2.6 million jobs since June 2009, fully 3.1 million workers signed up for disability benefits.”

Answer this:  Using the Democrats’ Preamble, who works? Who provides the tax revenue to the government that is spent for social services? Who creates the jobs when the government runs out of money? 

The novel, Atlas Shrugged, by Ayn Rand featured a character, John Galt, who stood for individual property rights and free markets and was a writing described as exploring “a dystopianUnited Stateswhere many of society’s most productive citizens refuse to be exploited by increasing taxation and government regulations… The refusal evokes the imagery of what would happen if the mythological Atlas refused to continue to hold up the world.”

Is Atlas shrugging? Will we soon see “John Galt” in our society? The answer to both is, “yes.”

To wit, the declaration by the architect of failed economic policies that has no solutions past destroying another’s success:  “If you’ve got a business — you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen.”  

Translation – if you work hard, chase America’s Dream of opportunity and success, you’re not grateful enough to the state and the entitlement class living off of your labor.

Speaking to a Roanoke,Virginia campaign crowd President Barack Obama overshadows one’s hard work in business endeavors with his summation, “We succeed because of our individual initiative, but also because we do things together” evoking the government’s research that led to the internet.

It’s time for Americans be to Americans first and reject such drivel that has been the downfall across the line of time of socialist nation after socialist nation.

November’s election, when heated in the crucible of truth to the most basic elements, will be a referendum on whether America is free, based on true individualism or a socialist, collectivist state that rules, vacant of any rule of law but aimed to standardize mediocrity.

Charles de Montesquieu writes, “…in despotic government, one alone, without law and without rule, draws everything along by his will and caprices.”

Neither space nor time permits an exhaustive accounting of this president’s long list of circumvention of Congress, the absolute disregard for the separation of powers in respect to the Constitution’s enumerated powers assigned to the executive branch, or the use of federal agencies to legislate through regulation.  However, let’s just look at two events since last week that demonstrates the authentic Barack Obama.

The directive given by President Obama to the Dept of Homeland Security that appears to allow children to remain in the country and receive work permits with no penalty due to their “parent’s actions.”  Digging into the specifics of the proposal shows a tremendous variation from the optics of protecting children, but excuses even 30-year-olds who have entered the country themselves illegally.

Forget the policy, focus on the process.  For a constitutional law professor, Barack Obama blatantly ignores the legislative process that constitutionally should and could occur that might yield this same proposal, yet was trampled under foot as if he rules in a nation on a foreign continent.

Second, the invocation of executive privilege to protect his pal Eric Holder, soon to be named the government official most likely to dodge the laws he is to enforce, again aligns a leftist agenda with Obama’s actions.  As Holder earns his slimy superlative, Barack Obama and his team offer a legitimate privilege to a government agency that is not constitutionally mandated proving either many have perjured themselves claiming no presidential involvement in Fast and Furious or that this is a purely political act in an election year where the incumbent is tired of wearing a snorkel.

British Whig politician Thomas Macaulay nailed it: “A good constitution is infinitely better than the best despot.”

Time for America to make the right choice.

In August alone, the Bipartisan Policy Center projects that the U.S. Treasury will receive approximately $172 billion into the coffers from federal revenues. However, August’s approved spending by the U.S. Congress totals $307 billion. In just one month, the U.S. government will spend $135 billion more than we are able to afford…In August alone!

Many have caved to “Party Bosses” or “experts” and dare to distance themselves from Constitutional  Conservatives, Tea Party members or whatever label helps distract from the issue at hand.  Rather than stand strong for the absolute solution, it’s easier to perpetuate the lie of a “default” to justify their lack of convictions.  It’s apparently more risky to chance the label of a conservative than it is to continue down the path of national destruction.

The solution is to cut spending now, cap spending in the future and balance the budget.  Instead, we’re getting a Congressional Super Committee to do the job that Members refuse to do.

Signed a very proud opponent of any plan that doesn’t cut spending in the FIRST year, cap spending in the future and balance our budget,

Robin Smith

The Debt Ceiling has been raised 102 times since 1917, with 10 increases since 2001. The Debt Ceiling is, sadly, pretty similar to the sub-prime lending debacle. The Treasury has to approach Congress with the request to increase the “borrowing limit”. Over the last few years, the malignant level of borrowing undertaken by Treasury Secretary Geithner, encouraged by Fed Chairman Ben Bernecke, has far exceeded our ability to repay, coupled with printing of more money, weakening our dollar and causing inflation.

The request has been issued again to Congress to increase the borrowing limit in order that the US not “default” on our repayments to borrowers. Remember, the subprime lending crisis occurred & has likely damamged the value of our homes for decades because the mandate was issued by the government to lower lending standards so that folks could borrow money, at levels they could not repay, to make home purchases. Sounds pretty familiar. Borrowing and spending above our means.

The 2010 election was not simply about “opposing Barack Obama and Democrats”, it was about saving this country.

The US Treasury will receive enough revenue in the next few weeks to pay our creditors, if there was a prioritization of debt. That happens at all of our houses. Who gets paid first with the money we take in through our paychecks. The US government refuses to prioritize those payments. To the extent that Barack Obama clearly indicated he may decide to withhold Social Security checks. There will be enough revenue to the Treasury through our payroll taxes to issue these Social Security checks. However, there is no guarantee which agencies of the government will be able to function at full capacity. In other words, it’s back to a possible government shut-down.

Understand, the Constitution and current law requires that the US Senate and the US House present budgets ANNUALLY. The US Senate has neglected its duties for over two YEARS. This has permitted a wide-open spending binge because there was no budget, no limits. Yes, it’s a mess. It’s a mess at the hands of both Democrats and Republicans for treating government as a vending machine, not a constitutionally-directed entity that answers to the people.

The debt ceiling has not, in years past, been tied to debt reduction. However, after years of promises, and especially this past year’s election of promises to “defund Obamacare”, “to defund Planned Parenthood” , etc.(all, by the way funded in Continuing Resolutions by this GOP-majority at current funding levels), this request is different. The uncertainties that have businesses bound in fear are a direct result of the lack of leadership in Washington to make tough decisions. It’s time to act with courage. It’s time to cut spending. These cuts have to be tied to the debt ceiling due to the inability of those addicted to spending and feathering their political nests to stop.

We have to close tax loopholes to raise revenue; we have to stop subsidies that should’ve been sunsetted years ago; every federal agency should cut its budget by at least 5%; we have to prioritize our spending in Washington just like we do in our homes in Tennessee.

The point of the current debt ceiling debate is now tied to debt reduction, because there is no incentive to move back into a constitutional government framework unless the carrot of elections is accompanied by the stick of accountability. Let’s make sure the obvious point doesn’t get lost in the game of blame.

Tuesday’s continuing resolution vote is a snapshot of contradiction.  Despite the fears, there’s no need for a government “shutdown”. It’s truthfully unnecessary with “essential services” continuing, nonetheless.

Here’s the problem. Five months ago, a sweeping election occurred in Tennessee and across the nation that elected folks who ran on pledges of repealing or defunding Obamacare, defunding Planned Parenthood, and overall conservative leadership.  On Tuesday, there were only 54 conservative members of the US House who voted the same way they campaigned.

The facts are that a democratically controlled US House & Senate abdicated their Constitutional duty to submit a budget for the 2011 calendar year by September 2010.  That budget would have easily passed.  Because of their failure, continuing resolutions for funding now have to originate in the current U.S. House to keep funding our federal government. 

The “conservative” majority has now had the opportunity to present proposals via the continuing resolutions that would not just “cut” spending, but do so specifically in areas, like the expansive health care law, that will add to the federal and states’ deficits.  Republicans have squandered their pledge.

Bottom line:  Wisconsin Democrats only mimicked the action seen in Washington in fleeing their duties.  Republicans hold the reins of leadership but act contrary to their campaign promises.  Public distrust of elected officials only grows when actions and words are such a bundle of contradiction.   To borrow a line from Wisconsin, “Shame, Shame, Shame!”