"Taxes will save us," cries the Government.

I found it interesting that these two articles came out on the same day:

Obama Administration looking at VAT

"With budget deficits soaring and President Obama pushing a
trillion-dollar-plus expansion of health coverage, some Washington policymakers
are taking a fresh look at a money-making idea long considered politically
taboo: a national sales tax....

'There is a growing awareness of the need for fundamental tax
reform,' Sen. Kent Conrad (D-N.D.) said in an interview. 'I think
a VAT and a high-end income tax have got to be on the table.'

See what Mr. Conrad did there? Okay, replace the word 'tax' with 'healthcare'. I have long held the belief that the desire for 'comprehensive healthcare reform' is not born from a knowledge that the system is truly broken, per se. The desire for 'reform' comes from ideologues who believe that the Government should run it. Looking at it from this standpoint, you can see why they would call for reform of the current system (they don't have enough control of it). So, too, Mr. Conrad is calling for tax reform not because the tax system has stopped working (according to my weekly paystub it is working too well), it just is not bringing in enough money to do all the things the Big Government types want to do.

"A VAT is a tax on the transfer of goods and services that ultimately is borne by
the consumer. Highly visible, it would increase the cost of just about
everything, from a carton of eggs to a visit with a lawyer...'Everybody who understands our long-term budget problems understands we're going to need a new source of revenue, and a VAT is an obvious candidate,' said Leonard Burman, co-director of the Tax Policy Center, a joint project of the Urban Institute and the Brookings Institution...'It's common to the rest of the world, and we don't have it.'"

So, in a time when tax revenues are down, which is an indicator that individual earnings are down, the Left is recommending MORE taxes to heal the budget "problems." What Mr. Burman fails to even consider, learned though he may be, is that the United States does not have a budget problem, it has a spending problem. Congress needs to stop spending. Mr. Obama needs to stop making promises. The problem is that no budget would be big enough to sate the spending dreams of this president or this Congress.

"It [VAT] punishes spending rather than savings, which the administration
hopes to encourage. And the threat of a VAT could pull the country out of
recession, some economists argue, by hurrying consumers to the mall before the
tax hits."

More social engineering: crack a whip over the heads of the masses to force them to do what they do not appear to want to do on their own. As a bonus, plan to rake in a bunch of cash by hoping that consumers will make poor spending decisions out of fear. Who the hell thinks this stuff up? Is it no wonder that economics and the Federal Government result in a fiasco?

Most lawmakers are still looking for "a painless source of revenue" to overhaul
the health-care system and dig the nation out of debt, Burman said.

There it is: "overhaul the healthcare system." Bingo. Government wants to overhaul a system from what it is, to something they can completely control. It seems to me that if people have less personal income coming in, it would be a bad idea for the government to take more of it from them...

Tax Revenue down 34%

"For example, 6 million people lost jobs in the 12 months ended in April — and that means far fewer dollars from income taxes. Income tax revenue dropped 44% from a year ago."

More people out of work...dollars stretched thinner in America's homes...what should we do to raise more money for Government Programs? Hmmm...raise taxes? BRILLIANT! Not really. Taking more money from already cash-strapped Americans will only reduce the amount they can afford to spend on staples, not to mention to ocassional luxury item. Or worse, more Americans will resort to living on credit, thus increasing consumer debt levels.