Tag Archives: taxes

Bible, Politics

This what coveting looks like.

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The green bars below are the percent of people in various UK political parties who would increase taxes on the wealthy even if it didn’t yield extra tax money.  That’s coveting, pure and simple.  Guess which political party had 72% who admitted to coveting?  The Labour party, the UK equivalent of the U.S. Democrats.

british-punitive-taxation-support

Think about this carefully: The Left wants to take money from prosperous people even if it doesn’t help others.  That speaks volumes about their worldview and their other policies.  

Via Most British Labour Voters Would Impose Taxes Purely Out of Malice:

Here’s the legend: Con = Conservative Party (Tories); Lab = Labour (equivalent to USA’s Democrat Party); Lib Dem = Liberal Democrat (not as left-wing as Labour); UKIP = UK Independence Party.

The esteemed countermoonbat Daniel Hannan provides some analysis:

Sixty-nine per cent of Labour supporters would want a top rate tax of 50 per cent even if it brought in no money.

That is, they would impose the tax simply to punish people for having created wealth — on moral grounds.

Politicians either know or should know that increasing tax rates doesn’t always increase tax revenues.  Even JFK knew that!  But they appeal to people’s covetous nature and want to “soak the rich,” even though they are usually remarkably waterproof.

Appealing to people’s sinful desires may help people get elected, but it is still evil.

The problem is in the church as well, where Leftist false teachers encourage people to covet.

By the way, Obama is officially on the green bar, having supported the concept of ineffective tax hikes just to support the appearance of “fairness.”

More from the link:

Theft motivated purely by maliciousness is regarded as moral by these freaks.

No doubt they would wrap their malice in rhetoric about reducing income inequality…

. . .

We can encourage by far the most common forms of legal tax avoidance: shorter hours and earlier retirement. All these things will make our country more equal. All of them will make it poorer.

Lately Obama has been demagoguing the income inequality issue like a true Marxist. Appallingly but unsurprisingly, he has revealed that he believes wealth should be confiscated even if it actually reduces government revenue, “for purposes of fairness.”

Bible, Giving, Politics

King David vs. the theological Left

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If you ask the government to take from neighbor A by force to transfer to neighbor B, then that is not charity on your part, and certainly not something Jesus taught. He said to give your own money.  Yet the theological Left and its false teachers do this endlessly.

These people, who claim the name of Christ, should follow the example of King David when he was making an offering to the Lord: 1 Chronicles 21:24 But King David said to Ornan, “No, but I will buy them for the full price. I will not take for the Lord what is yours, nor offer burnt offerings that cost me nothing.”

David wouldn’t even take the offerings that were given freely.  He didn’t want to just re-gift something to God.  The theological Left does something far worse than re-gifting: They advocate taking from others by force to “give” in their name.  They are greedy (wanting to keep what they have) and covetous (jealous of what others have), not generous.  Don’t let them fool you, and don’t be a part of it.

Give generously, but give your own money.

2 Corinthians 9:6–7 The point is this: whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.

Roundup

Roundup

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Study Suggests That Wimpier Men Hold Liberal Views — Of course they do!

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Don’t Make it About Barack Obama — He isn’t running for office again and is very unlikely to be impeached.  Use his scandal-fest to attack big government and Liberalism, not Obama.  That will help in many elections.  One of their excuses (read: lies) is that government is too big for Obama to know enough about it.  So just agree with them and point out how we need to make it smaller and less intrusive in our lives.

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From the “What could possibly go wrong?” category: IRS official in charge during Tea Party targeting now runs agency’s Obamacare office

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BABY DIES AFTER MAN ALLEGEDLY TRICKS GIRLFRIEND INTO TAKING AN ABORTION PILL — Of course this is ghastly, but so are all abortions.  I wish the people quoted would have also noted whether they are anti-abortion if the mom wants to have the unwanted child killed.

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Friendly reminder: If someone uses the “tea bagger” pejorative against you, just ask them what it means. Then point out that they must be homophobic if they are using the slang for a gay sex act to demonize their ideological foes. Shouldn’t the gays be as offended as if they called you the “f” word?  Haters!!  Hate speech!!

Note that this is also an effective question to ask when someone is punished for using other slurs against homosexuals.  I’m not advocating the use of the slurs, of course, but it is worthwhile to point out their hypocrisy.  The people reflexively using “tea bagger” are the same ones who go into full pants-wetting mode if someone uses other slurs.  For some reason those are worthy of major fines and even the termination of employment, while the Liberals get a pass.  Also feel free to ask if those using the term “Santorum” in a derogatory way are “homophobes.”

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Socialism Leads to D.I.Y. Dentistry in Britain — Ouch.  The government can force you to  use their insurance plan, but they haven’t figured out how to force people to be dentists. This is the predictable and inevitable results of socialized medicine.

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Wow, Sojourners finally posted on the Gosnell case! I’m glad to see that. Until now, searching for his name returned zero hits. It is harder to imagine a case more opposed to the “common good.” Killing babies, storing their body parts in jars, unsanitary conditions, pure racism (white women got better treatment than blacks and the clinic mainly targeted blacks), government officials deliberately not enforcing laws, Planned Parenthood knowing of the conditions there yet saying nothing — and then pretending to be aghast at Gosnell, and more.

We should never stop reminding people that Gosnell’s main crimes were killing these babies 30 seconds too late. He did a bad job of killing them before they were completely delivered, so he just finished the job outside the womb. But all abortions are just as immoral.

And he isn’t the “rogue” that this article makes him out to be. People who kill unwanted human beings for a living don’t seem to mind breaking the rules regarding how to legally kill unwanted human beings for a living.

Remember that Obama and Planned Parenthood are on record opposing the obligations of abortionists to save the lives of babies who survive abortion. And Planned Parenthood has been caught countless times hiding statutory rape and sex trafficking, yet they continue to get hundreds of millions of dollars in taxpayer funding and “social justice” groups not only give them a pass but they support the Democrats’ platform of taxpayer-funded abortions. The right to life should be the foundational principle of “social justice,” not an afterthought — or worse yet, something completely ignored or even opposed.

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Deuteronomy 18 and Moses/Jesus parallels (and why they don’t apply to Mohammad)

  1. Born during the reign of an oppressive king (Moses with Pharoah in Exodus 1:8-14; Jesus with King Herod in Matthew 2:1)
  2. The evil ruler decree the killing of children that threaten the newborn’s life (Exodus 1:15-16; Matthew 2:16-18)
  3. The witnesses of the birth of the child obeyed God and therefore disobeyed the ruler (Midwives in Exodus 1:17-22; Magi in Matthew 2:12, 16)
  4. God protects the witnesses (Midwives in Exodus 1:17-22; Magi in Matthew 2:12)
  5. The newborn survived by hiding in Egypt (Exodus 2; Matthew 2:13-15)
  6. When the child grew older, God leads them to depart from Egypt (Exodus 13-14; Matthew 2:19-23)
  7. After leaving Egypt, water around them symbolizes a new era (the parting of the sea Exodus 14:13-31; Baptism, Matthew 3:13-17)
  8. Both enter the Wilderness for a considerable time of testing (Forty years, Exodus 16:35; Forty days, Matthew 4:1-11)
  9. Both expounds on God’s law to God’s people in a mountain (Mount Sinai, Exodus 19-20ff; Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 5-7)

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Links to Barack Obama’s votes on Illinois’ Born Alive Infant Protection Act — Obama, Planned Parenthood and Kermit Gosnell all agree.

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Court upholds Obama Admin denial of asylum for German homeschool family — Millions of people can cross our border illegal and get lifetime welfare, but because this family probably wouldn’t vote for Democrats we won’t help them.  If only they’d claim to be gay they’d get a free pass.

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House of Horrors 2: graphic photos show Texas abortionist killed living babies, say nurses — Kermit Gosnell was not the lone exception.  People who kill babies for a living don’t mind breaking the rules regarding how to kill babies for a living.

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Canadian Supreme Court Rules Biblical Speech Opposing Homosexual Behavior is a ‘Hate Crime’ — This is inevitable with bogus “hate speech” laws.

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Flight: The Genius of Birds – Official Trailer — great examples of Intelligently Designed beings.

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His behavior is getting borderline comical.  He dramatically releases Benghazi emails in an attempt to appear cooperative, but the earliest is dates 9/14 when the incident happened on 9/11.  Uh, so, either no one sent any emails for 3 days (unbelievable, but very bad if true) or he has good reasons to hide those emails (believable, and a tacit admission of guilt).  And then he “fires” the IRS guy who was leaving next month anyway.  Great leadership, champ.

Roundup

Roundup

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Safeguards schmafeguards: “a little wave and they were gone” – the creepy, evil and inevitable expansion of euthanasia.  It isn’t a slippery slope in the fallacious sense.  It is a “cliff” in the sense that the reasoning used to justify the original euthanasia exceptions (reducing suffering, some lives not worth living, etc.) provide the foundation for the scope creep.

[Two 45 yr. old brothers born deaf] chose to be euthanized when they learned they were going blind. Dufour gave them each a lethal injection 11 days before Christmas.

In 2000, Holland became the first country in the world to legalize euthanasia. Two years later, Belgium followed suit, legalizing euthanasia for people over 18. The law requires that the person wishing to end his or her life is able to make that wish clear, and a doctor must judge that the person is suffering “unbearable pain.”

It’s worth paying attention to how euthanasia works in countries where it’s legal. Because with the legalization of assisted suicide in Oregon, Washington and Montana, we’re on that  road as well.

And how it works is that once a law is in place, the safeguards in it are quickly swept aside–or simply ignored.

Euthanasia: an “ever-widening interpretation” of the law

Notice that the Belgian law stipulates that the person must be suffering unbearable pain. The twins were neither terminally ill, nor apparently in any physical pain. They probably were depressed–understandably–at the thought of losing their sight.

But since when is depression a capital offense?

. . .

And now the Belgian government is considering a law that would extend legal euthanasia to children–”if they are capable of discernment or affected by an incurable illness or suffering that we cannot alleviate”–and people with dementia.

An incurable illness. Like, say, blindness? Epilepsy is incurable, too, and dwarfism, and developmental disabilities, and a host of other conditions.

. . .

A civilized society offers comfort, help and care in such a situation. One descending into barbarism offers simply death instead.

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Coca-Cola has a new anti-obesity commercial.  Oddly, there are no fat people in it.  Friendly reminder: If you exert less effort than people have typically done throughout history and you consume lots of caffeinated sugar water instead of regular water, bad things might happen.  Sodas should only be used as treats, never a part of a regular diet. 

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Chicago United Methodist Bishop Misrepresents Denomination’s Position – she lobbies for “same-sex marriage” even though her denomination explicitly opposes those. 

She isn’t qualified to be a Bishop. Or a pastor. Or a lay leader. Or even a member. She is on the anti-biblical side of the most straight-forward and important issue in her denomination today (because it is splitting the church). She is shaking her fist at God 24×7 in rebellion and mocking her employer. It is as if a salesman for HP publicly said that people should buy Dell. Good for them to expose how deceptive she is being.

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NAIVE LEGISLTORS ON GUN CONTROL – Mike has a great summary of their mistaken positions.  Sample:

2) “At what point do you say, ‘No more innocent loss of life’?”

Hey, innocent people have been dying since the dawn of time; and they always will.  It’s part and parcel to the fallen nature of humanity.  I wonder if cavemen put strict stick and rock possession laws on their books when there were mass stonings and clubbings?  No, they probably served swift justice on the violators.
By the way, do legislators recall the details of the 9/11 attacks?  What brought down those twin towers in New York…airplanes.  Not guns — not clubs or rocks — but airplanes.  And what brought down those big airplanes?  Not guns.  Not potato cannons.  But box cutters.  When used skillfully, darn near anything is a viable weapon.

Also keep in mind that those shouting for no more innocent loss of life are 99% likely to be pro-abortion.

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Let Freedom Ring – Great points about how the inability of any authentic (read: Bible-believing) Christian to say the inaugural prayer is not such a bad thing.  Now people can quit kidding themselves that the opposition has any desire for compromise or rationality.  Pick a side and go with it.  Here’s part of it, go read it all.

Let us be free from the false hope that heroic deeds and quiet agreeableness can atone for the sin of orthodox conviction.

Let us be free from the wishful thinking that good works and good manners can appease the Great God Tolerance.

Let us be free from the misplaced assumption that faithfulness to God can go hand in hand with worldly congratulation.

If it is “anti-gay” to believe that the normativity of male-female sexual union is taught by nature and nature’s God then let us wear a Scarlet Letter around our necks. Christ bore much worse.

If the culture of free love is going to hate those who believe marriage was made with God-given limits then let the opprobrium fall on us. We will despise the shame.

If henceforth we shall be considered the scum of the earth for believing what the Church has taught for 2000 years then let us be the scent of death to some. We shall be the aroma of life to others.

And lest anyone think this is a call to arms or a manifesto of malediction, it is not. If we are reviled, we shall not revile in return. If we are hated we shall pray to God for more love. If we are excluded from polite society, we will still include all Christ-exalting, Bible-believing, broken hearted sinners in the fellowship of the redeemed. And if we are esteemed by some as better off dead, we will not cease to offer the words of life.

We will not stop serving where we can. We will not stop repenting when we sin. We will not stop speaking the truth about our Lord and about his law.

There are likely far bigger disappointments to come than the one that dropped last Thursday. We did not choose this culture war and it is not about to leave us alone. The media, the academy, the government, the libertine elite–they may sully our reputation and shame our convictions, but they cannot steal our joy. We can pray more, sing more, and smile more than any of the party-goers making mud pies in the slums. We do not have to fit in down here so long as we fit in up there. We do not need a president’s approval if we have the affection of our King. Our hearts and our Bibles are wide open. Our salvation is firm. Let freedom ring.

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Some excellent time management tips – I’d summarize lots of them with the O-H-I-O theme: Only Handle It Once.  Have a system to do something with whatever email or paper you come across.  I do that well sometimes.  When I don’t, I waste lots of time.

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What should Christians think about global warming?  A good list of questions to ask.

  1. Is the earth warming?
  2. If the earth is warming
    , is human activity (like carbon dioxide emissions) causing it?

  3. If the earth is warming, and we’re causing it, is that bad overall?
  4. If the earth is warming, we’re causing it, and that’s bad, would any of the proposed “solutions” (e.g., the Kyoto Protocol, legislative restrictions on carbon dioxide emissions) make any difference?

I would add one: Are the people advancing the global warming / global climate change policies profiting from them?

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A great set of graphs showing the growth of government spending and who really pays taxes — All the Numbers You Always Wanted on Government Spending (But Were Afraid to Ask).  Here’s an example.  Anyone think this is sustainable?

Government Keeps Growing

In 1902 (the first year for which data are available), government spending in America (federal, state, and local—all of it, combined) took up only 6.9% of the economy (GDP); in 2010 (the last year for which data are available), it was 41.0%.

In other words, in just a few generations, the government has gone from well under a tenth to representing more than two fifths of all economic activity in the country.

Growth of Government (Combined) over the Twentieth Century

Roundup

Roundup

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Comedian Jon Lovitz mugged by reality — twice! — First, he felt betrayed by Obama’s class warfare and lies.  Then he found out how “tolerant” his liberal fans were of opposing viewpoints.  Ouch.

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Great video on why Christianity is true and Islam is not.

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Obama’s creepy composite character, “Julia,” and her cradle-to-grave consumption of other people’s money should make even Liberals realize how ridiculous his government-will-solve-all-your-problems worldview is. But alas, discernment seems to be at an all-time low.

By her mid-twenties, Julia is a litigious member of the workforce suing for equal wages while hard working Americans subsidize her. She has her fatherless child and for twenty years drops off the map. That’s the most curious part — that and the fact that this paragon of Obama’s liberal America has no documented abortions and was not herself aborted.

James Taranto at the Wall Street Journal points out “[t]hat period includes the typical peak earning years–the time at which, assuming Julia is gainfully employed, she will be paying the biggest price for “Obama’s” generosity.” We know nothing of her time during those key years. Perhaps they were of little consequence because her whole adult working life was spent paying for the benefits of those who came after her.

That is the key. There is no mention of cost, no mention of debt, and no mention of tax burden for Julia. She receives everything and gives nothing. What is Julia’s fair share? In retirement, Barack Obama claims social security helps her live comfortably. Really? It boggles the mind.

This is Barack Obama’s vision of America — a welfare state from cradle to grave where parents and spouses are not needed because you have a federal government there for you the whole way from the delivery room to the death panel.

Here’s a good spoof (hat tip: Matthew from Facebook)

Plus this from Roxanne:

This blogger will note a few other telling problems with Julia’s life: no where does it mention where this money is coming from.  It assumes that social security will be available into the indefinite future, which is plainly erroneous. It also assumes that income-based repayment for college will exist throughout Julia’s life, which is also erroneous (explanation to follow shortly).  Julia has a sexy job as a web designer, but it never mentions that any old college major won’t qualify her for that job, nor does it say that she eschewed the liberal arts in favour of computer science.   Julia has a baby at age 31 but still needs more government help than my parents did when they were in their very early 20s. No where does Julia turn to charity, participate in charity or her community (except for a community garden, which is helpful only to those in her nice, middle-class area), go to church, or do many other things that normal Americans do.  It never said, “Julia’s Catholic Church shut itself down rather than pay for abortion drugs, so she was left to say her rosary at home.”  No mention is made of how Julia’s one child, and, by extension, everyone’s precious one baby, can pay for Social Security for their parents.

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More reality from Roxanne as she nails the upside-down nature of Obamacare:

The only way that ObamaCare can control costs (and not reduce them, see above), is to ration care.  We’ll eventually all have “free” doctor’s visits but be denied life-saving treatment, which is the exact opposite result that you want for insurance, which is supposed to cover the really expensive things you can’t pay for yourself.  It would be like homeowner’s insurance that covers a leaky faucet for free but doesn’t give you a cent if your house burns down.

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Some good pro-life news: Georgia becomes 6th state to protect pain-capable preborn children.  That’s progress, but even if someone doesn’t feel pain it is still immoral to kill her because she’s unwanted.  Pain-free killing is still killing.  If we really love our neighbors we’ll fight abortion.

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The Left Got it Right: Let’s Drop the “I-Word”

So today, let’s acknowledge that words are indeed important. Let’s follow the lead of our friends on the progressive left. Let’s agree that “illegal alien” is inaccurate, insufficient, and possibly charged with interplanetary racism.

Today, let’s begin using the far more accurate and race-neutral term of criminal entrant.

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Black Teen Run Off the Liberal Plantation — fascinating story about a teenager who dared to write about the similarities of slave-owner mentality and those who rule her schools.  Monopolists don’t like to give up their power!  Oddly, she hasn’t received a call from the President.

And see Rewriting History, where Stan exposes the many myths about which political party has really helped black people.

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California apparently solved all their financial problems, so they are branching out.  Now the anti-choice zealots want to take away the rights of people who want to leave the LGBTQX lifestyles.  Stan has a good analysis.  Apparently all the stories of change from places like this must be lies, because the State of California said they couldn’t be true.

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The non-virgin Virgin Mary of Mormonism — very thorough analysis of one of the many foundational errors of Mormonism.  Chock full of facts and quotes you won’t be hearing from the young men knocking on your door.

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California bill targets consensual therapy for unwanted same-sex attraction — Just part of the activists’ ongoing SodoMonopoly plan, where religion, education, entertainment, government, media, medicine, counseling, foreign aid, etc. must be 100.0000% pro-LGBTQX or else .

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General Electric: $14,000,000,000 in profits, 57,000 page tax return, zero taxes paid.

The sole purpose of corporate taxation is that it allows for Big Government “picking winners and losers,” as Paul Ryan puts it. Not even corporations that lack GE’s cozy relationship with the Obama Regime pay the taxes themselves; all costs are passed along to customers. In any case, the government’s main source of income is Ben Bernanke’s metaphorical printing press. The tax that actually produces the most revenue is inflation, a means of taxing every penny in your pocket.

The point of our tax code is to allow bureaucrats to “reward our friends and punish our enemies,” to use Obama’s phrase. Otherwise, corporations would devote their resources to hiring, cutting costs, and producing better products rather than to bribing the leeches in Washington.

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“Attacked by tolerance.”  Not coming soon to the mainstream media near you.  These would be front-page “hate crimes” if done in the other direction.  I expect this hypocrisy from the pro-LGBTQX groups, but not from those claiming the name of Christ who aid, abet and encourage them.  I pray that they all repent and believe.

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This is a great video by those upset that Obama is taking all the credit for killing Bin Laden.

Politics

Federal tax facts: The U.S. rich pay the most vs. other countries, and 51% of the population pays zero

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When 51% of the population realizes they can tax 49% into oblivion, bad things happen.

Via New study finds that US rich pay a larger share of taxes than in any other country « Wintery Knight.

A 2008 study by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, for example, found that the highest-earning 10% of the U.S. population paid the largest share among 24 countries examined, even after adjusting for their relatively higher incomes. “Taxation is most progressively distributed in the United States,” the OECD study concluded.

Meanwhile, the percentage of U.S. households paying no federal income tax has been climbing, and reached 51% for 2009, according to a new analysis by the Joint Committee on Taxation. That was the first time since at least 1992 that more than half of households owed no federal income tax, according to JCT estimates.; earlier data were unavailable on Monday.

Financial, Politics

Stealing from future generations

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The constant cries by the theological Left to have the government redistribute wealth are more than just annoying.  They hurt more people than they help and they mock authentic Christianity. 

It is bad enough that they would ask “Caesar” to take – by threat of force or imprisonment – from neighbor A to “give” to neighbor B and consider it charity on the part of the theological Left.  That is the opposite of common sense and what Jesus taught.  But at least then neighbor A could voice his opposition and vote against it.

To make things worse, now they are funding their “giving” solely with additional debt.  This means that the ones who will pay for this faux giving can’t vote or may not have even been born yet.  These folks have found a way to steal from people who aren’t even alive! 

They are trying to help a small amount of poor people – who by the world’s standards are actually quite blessed – even though it will continue to drive more people into poverty.  It will ultimately destroy the goose that laid the golden egg. 

Forced wealth redistribution does not alleviate poverty.  If false teachers* really wanted to help the poor they’d do things like this instead:

  1. Establish and maintain the rule of law.
  2. Focus the jurisdiction of government primarily on maintaining the rule of law, and limit its jurisdiction over the economy and the institutions of civil society.
  3. Implement a formal property system with consistent and accessible means for securing a clear title to property one owns.
  4. Encourage economic freedom.
  5. Encourage stable families and other important private institutions which mediate between the individual and the state.
  6. Encourage belief in the truth that the universe is purposeful and makes sense.
  7. Encourage the right cultural mores.
  8. Instill a proper understanding of the nature of wealth creation and poverty.
  9. Focus on cultivating your comparative advantage rather than protecting what used to be your comparative advantage.
  10. Work hard.

I would add that Junior Achievement classes are proven to help keep kids in school longer.  Also, they teach essential life skills in how to manage money. 

And if you really want to help the poor, don’t just throw money at them.  Have them do some work for it.  Give them healthy, inexpensive food like milk, oatmeal, pasta, eggs, etc. instead of food stamps that can be abused. 

Friendly reminders: 1. Conservatives give more money and even blood than Liberals.  2. Liberals fail at basic economics

* False teachers include people like Jim "the Gospel is all about wealth redistribution" Wallis and race-baiting Chuck “Jesus is not the only way” Currie

Giving

Number of things Jesus said about giving away your money: A lot.

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Number of things He said about petitioning Caesar (i.e., the government) to take from neighbor A to “give” to neighbor B and considering it charity on your part: None.

Susan Brooks Thistlethwaite is a professor and former President at Chicago Theological Seminary and she wrote the piece below.  As I think you’ll see, it is more evidence that a seminary designation means nothing until you peel back the layers to see what people believe.  She is a prime example of a false teacher.

Her premise is that in the passage in Luke 18 about the rich young ruler Jesus was telling us to redistribute wealth via the government.  Here’s the passage in question.

Luke 18:18–30 (ESV) 18 And a ruler asked him, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” 19 And Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone. 20 You know the commandments: ‘Do not commit adultery, Do not murder, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Honor your father and mother.’ ” 21 And he said, “All these I have kept from my youth.” 22 When Jesus heard this, he said to him, “One thing you still lack. Sell all that you have and distribute to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.” 23 But when he heard these things, he became very sad, for he was extremely rich. 24 Jesus, seeing that he had become sad, said, “How difficult it is for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God! 25 For it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.” 26 Those who heard it said, “Then who can be saved?” 27 But he said, “What is impossible with men is possible with God.” 28 And Peter said, “See, we have left our homes and followed you.” 29 And he said to them, “Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or wife or brothers or parents or children, for the sake of the kingdom of God, 30 who will not receive many times more in this time, and in the age to come eternal life.”

This was timely considering that at lunch today a non-believing friend asked me about the basics of giving from a Christian worldview.  Now on to her analysis, which is basically the opposite of what the Bible teaches.

Jesus to the rich young ruler: “distribute the money”

She fails from the title onward.  Jesus said for the young man to distribute his money, not someone else’s.

A deal President Obama struck with Republican leaders last week will extend tax cuts across the board including, controversially, to the richest Americans.

While it may indeed be “controversial,” is it that illogical that if tax cuts are extended then all who pay taxes would receive the same extension?

Some politicians argue that religious values should be reflected in the public square. Should this faith-based view of politics be applied to the economy? Jesus said, “Whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me.”

Right.  He said, “Whatever you did to the least of these . . .”  He didn’t say, “Whatever you asked Caesar to do by taking from others . . .”

Also, as we’ll soon see, Ms. Thistlethwaite is pro-abortion.  I wonder how she reconciles that with her “least of these” theology?

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Once a rich young ruler came to Jesus, wanting to know what it took to be “good.” ‘I’ve kept all the commandments since my youth,’ the young man said, bragging a little.

A little?! How about, “That was a spectacularly wild lie on his part.”

Well, Jesus replied, “there is still one thing lacking. Sell all that you own and distribute the money.” But the young man, “who was very rich,” turned away. Jesus’ comment? “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.” (Luke 18: 21-25)

Note how she stops at verse 25.  If she would read the rest of the passage she would get a better idea of Jesus’ point: “What is impossible with men is possible with God.”  He also answers the “Who can be saved?” question, which I assume that Thistlethwaite and similar false teachers ignore.  After all, if Jesus answered who can be saved then that means some are unsaved.

All too true. It’s also easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than it is for a bill with the rich paying their fair share of taxes to get through Congress. Not gonna happen.

Was that Jesus’ point?

But that’s the moral thing to do. Our tax policies in this country are a way to help our neighbors who are the “least of these,” as Jesus also notes.

How outrageous of her.  That isn’t what Jesus noted.  He did say one thing about taxes in a separate passage, which was basically, “Stop whining and pay them.”  Matthew 25 had nothing to do with taxes.

We “distribute the money” so that we can help those who are the most vulnerable like children, the sick, those with handicapping conditions, and the elderly. It’s a way to “distribute the money” to those of our citizens who want to work and can’t find it. We give unemployment benefits to people thrown out of work while they struggle in hard economic times to find another job. We pay taxes to educate our young, keep our bridges from falling down, and support our troops.

But that isn’t what Jesus addressed in the passage.  If it was, why didn’t He force the rich young ruler to give?  The young man walked away and Jesus let him.  And Jesus didn’t go forward with a fundraising campaign or any lobbying of Caesar to get to the young man’s money.  The passage wasn’t about taxes and “giving” the money of others.

Politicians love to pontificate on how we need to restore “Christian values” in the public square, but that’s mostly limited to denying equal civil rights for gay Americans, or controlling women’s bodies. When it comes to what the bible says about wealth and poverty, however, you’ll never hear that touted as morality in the public square. No, no. That’s “private.”

Note the multiple fallacies and her true religion: Liberalism.  No one is denying civil rights for gay Americans.  They are welcome to marry someone of the opposite sex.  Whether they want to or not is their problem.  Skin color is morally neutral; sexual behavior is not.  She mocks black Americans with her civil rights blather.

And the “controlling women’s bodies” bit makes for a good bumper sticker, I suppose, but is easily disproven.  Pro-lifers want to protect the bodies of females and males in the womb.  Thistlethwaite thinks the mother should be able to have them crushed and dismembered.  Got any Bible verses for that?  It is a scientific fact that they are human beings and a theological fact that they were created by God.   This isn’t science versus religion.  Theological liberals oppose science and religion when it comes to life.

Baloney. The bible is filled with references to the religious imperative to “remember the poor” (Galatians 2:10) and “the worker deserves his pay.” (Luke 10:7)

Yep.  What workers have not been paid?  And yes, there are imperatives for believers to remember the poor with our money. It doesn’t say, “Remember the poor with your neighbor’s money.”

When Jesus went to Jerusalem, he “sat down opposite the treasury, and watched the crowd putting money into the treasury.” (Mark 12:41) Jesus watched what people did with their money. He sees the money-changers in the temple charging pilgrims an exorbitant rate of exchange and he turns over the tables in anger, saying, “‘My house shall be called a house of prayer,’ but you have made it a den of thieves.” (Matthew 21:13)

So?  If this is going on in her church then the church should do something about it.  What a non sequitur.

For those who have eyes to see, the real moral values in scripture are about loving God with our whole heart and our neighbor as ourselves, and that includes what you do with your money.

That includes what you do with your money.  Is this so hard to understand?  Your money, not your neighbors’.

Even though it’s harder for Congress to pass through the eye of a needle than to pass legislation that will “distribute the money” in a fair way, I hope and pray they will. That’s real Christian values in the public square.

No, that’s her politics disguised as religion.

And one more thing: I don’t want my grandchildren saddled with paying off a huge deficit caused by giving more tax breaks to the very wealthy.

Boo-hoo.  I don’t want mine saddled with paying off Obama’s stimulus bill (mainly paybacks to his cronies) and his un-Constitutional health care bill, among other things.

If she wants to take the passage literally, why hasn’t she sold all her possessions and given the money to the poor?

And as Stan noted in his post, why do people like her ignore passages like this one:

I prefer to do nothing without your consent in order that your goodness might not be by compulsion but of your own accord (Philemon 14).

(Not surprisingly, I found the link to this at the site of false teacher Chuck “Jesus is not the only way” Currie.)

Financial, Politics

Another waste of taxpayer funds by people who don’t understand business

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Government employees who have little, if any, business experience are bound to come up with wasteful ideas.  Here’s another one:

Via Obama Announces $33 Billion Hiring Tax Credit for Jobs – ABC News.

Under the president’s proposed tax credit, businesses would receive a $5,000 tax credit for every net new employee that they employ in 2010. The total amount of credit will be capped at $500,000 per firm to ensure that the majority of the benefit goes to small businesses.

This is simple: While a few companies might hire employees they otherwise wouldn’t have due to these incentives, the vast majority of businesses fall into one of two categories:

  1. Business that don’t have demand for their goods and services and don’t need to hire.  Even with a $5,000 incentive, hiring new employees means they’ll be paying more for wages than necessary.   They won’t use this program.
  2. Businesses that were going to hire anyway.  They had demand for goods and services but didn’t need the additional incentives.  Sure, they’ll cash the checks, but what’s the point?

Leave the $$ with the taxpayers and let them spend it how they like.  That will stimulate demand and lead to real hiring.  Don’t give it to an inefficient government that will take its cut then waste the rest by giving it to companies that were going to hire people anyway.

Financial, Politics

A big part of the problem

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Listen to the President talk about why he would raise capital gains tax rates even though cuts by Clinton and Bush both increased revenues.

Amazingly enough, the liberal commentator Charles Gibson knows and tells the truth about what happens when the capital gains tax rate is reduced:

History shows that when you drop the capital gains tax the revenues go up.

But note how Obama ignores the facts and says he wants “fairness,” as if having a higher rate for those evil rich people will make things more “fair,” even though there will be less tax revenues to fund his liberal projects.

As I said in Jobs!!! Part one, here’s a huge part of the problem: Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader?  Self-identified liberals and Democrats do badly on questions of basic economics.  The video is just more evidence of that, not to mention the failure of putting Utopian ideals above financial facts.

And you wonder why unemployment is so high?  It is just like when ideology and feel good finger-pointing unnecessarily cost tens of thousands of jobs with the offshore drilling moratorium.

Hat tip to TNWAHM via Hillbuzz for the video