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Friday, January 04, 2008

Nice Guys Finish First

Hooray for the Nice Guys! Barack Obama and Mike Huckabee both won their perspective caucuses last night in Iowa. (I was going to make that a link, but really, if you found me you're capable of looking up cnn.com or Googling "wins Iowa".)

The two men who faced negative attacks and refused to sling mud in return wiped the floor with their supposedly inevitable opponents.

The two candidates who were told they'd never make it, because they didn't have the money or the right color skin, because they openly embraced their faith and/or dared to organize their communities for a better tomorrow, because conventional wisdom said the other candidates had "inevitability"-- those candidates soared ahead on the one thing greater: the belief of voters too smart for all of that.

One woman asked Mitt Romney in the hours before the caucus, will you keep running negative ads in the general election? Without hesitation, the candidate replied with a hearty "yes". That's because he believes in these "contrast ads" as being important parts of a campaign-- but the spirit in the room sagged like a poor soufflé when he said it. Because we're tired of evil. We want someone who for heaven's sake is at least NICE, and trustworthy. Last night, we got two, one for each side. Thank you, Iowa!

I am a registered Democrat, and while I hope that I am centered, balanced, fair, moderate, and willing to see the other side of a debate, it does mean I'm following the Dem side more closely. The GOP can pick whoever it wants and it's not really any of my business. I guess I feel the need to point this out because I will sometimes sound like I support Huckabee (cuz, shuckabee, he's keen) while at other times I might criticize him or his policy ideas. The thing is, he's a Republican I like while still disagree with on many issues. But as I've said before, at least I can trust that a debate with Huck would end in a prayer and a salad, not a wiretap and rendition.

And as you'll hear me say time and again, those of us who love our country and are interested in policy and governance have more in common with each other, even on different sides, than we do with our fellow citizens who don't care. So yeah, I like Mike. I'm not going to vote for him, and I'll tell you why as the election draws near, but today, I'm nothing but happy.

Two fine people showed that money and mudslinging don't win elections. And we couldn't have gotten a better gift from Iowa or a better message to start off the primary season of 2008.

Today, be happy. There is hope.

Oh, hey, I didn't even talk about the main attraction last night, but Mr. Obama not only walked away with Iowa at 38%, but gave a speech that reminded us of why we all fell in love with him back in 2004. If you've been wondering where that Obama went, he's back.

Thursday, January 03, 2008

A Message from My Roommate

[Update below]

My roommate used to work for the IRS managing databases. Perhaps this gives him a unique perspective, because recently he said this to me:

"When I hear a candidate say that their tax system idea will 'shut down the IRS', I stop listening. They don't know what they're talking about."

Why is that? Because someone is still going to have to process the forms. Let's say we have a flat tax. Great, if you're single and have one employer. What if you're self-employed? You'll have to report your income to someone, and that would be the IRS.

Let's say it's a national sales tax. It's agreed that's overly punitive for the lower income folks, because they spend their whole paycheck and therefore pay a higher percentage of their income in taxes. So national sales tax plans usually involve a break for the poor-- if you make less than x, you're exempt. OK, so who do I tell that I'm exempt? I'll have to fill out a form and someone will have to process it. That would be the IRS.

You could dismantle the IRS, get rid of its assets like facilities and computers, fire its staff, and create something else, buy all new stuff, get new buildings, and hire ex-IRS employees, but I dare you to name it something more vague than "the Internal Revenue Service". So long as revenue is generated internally in this country, someone's going to have to service it.

As if to prove my friend's point, Mike Huckabee spoke on New Year's Day and said that his Fair Tax plan would do away with the IRS. "Citing a poll conducted by FOX News, Huckabee said, 'The average American is more afraid of being audited than being mugged. This didn't make sense at first, but when you think about it, it does make sense. When you get mugged it only lasts a few seconds. When the IRS comes after you, they don't quit until they have every last dime and it could take years,' Huckabee quipped." (Iowa Independent)

Or, as my roommate put it, "every last dime you owe the government". Well, when you put it that way...

But even so, all I could think of when I heard that Huckabee quote was, the federal government is US. If we're so afraid of ourselves, maybe we should change the rules, yes? Or are those rules important to keep people from cheating, as the lawmakers clearly believe? Either way, quit telling me about how a government agency is so "bad" that we would kill it. Fix it! (Except those created in knee-jerk reactions like the Dept. of Homeland Security, of course.)

And back to my friend's point: Huck's Fair Tax plan involves a national consumption (sales) tax. And he says he'll kill the IRS. Well, who will collect the tax? And his plan involves cutting a check to every American to cover x amount of the consumption tax. (This makes it so the poor aren't paying that disproportionate amount.) Who does he think will write these checks and distribute them? And how will we know who every American is unless they fill out a form and send it to... someone? That's even assuming that the poor can get these checks-- we're talking about the homeless, the poor who rent and move a lot, students, etc. There are many problems with this plan, but not the least of the problems is how we will implement this system without an Internal Revenue Service to, hello, service the revenue generated internally.

So I have come around to my friend's opinion: if you say your tax plan will do away with the IRS, then you clearly don't know what you're talking about.

UPDATE: There's a great article on this on Salon.com (you'll have to watch a short ad before accessing their site). Listen to this:

The FairTax doesn't eliminate the IRS. It replaces the IRS with another agency -- the United States Fair Tax Federal Revenue Administration and State Tax Authority Reconciliation Service, or the USFTFRASTARS.

Hah! So, there you go. Just in acronyms alone this system makes things more confusing!