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Herman Cain's Commentary Archive 2009-2012

October 4, 2010

The Democrats’ class warfare crap

October 3, 2010
By Herman Cain 

 
President Obama and the Democratic leadership in Congress believe it is practically immoral to allow people who have made a lot of money to decide how they want to spend it. It is equally immoral for some people to think that they are entitled to other people’s money through the force of the government.

Class warfare has been a winning tactic for Democrats for a long time, but a lot of voters are waking up to the false promise of that old tired song. Some people are realizing that they might be “rich” one day. They are asking the question that, if they work their anchovies off to make some real money, then why should the government take it and redistribute it to those who did not want to take risks and work 24/7 for themselves and their families?

Studies have shown for decades that a majority of people who start out in the lowest economic quintile (20 percent) will advance at least two quintiles higher over time with some of them making it all the way to the top quintile. My dad was one on those achievers.

My dad walked off his father’s small dirt farm with just the clothes on his back to pursue his American dreams. His only equity was sweat equity! At one point in his life he worked three jobs to try to improve his economic situation. He was a barber, janitor and chauffeur all at the same time.

When my dad died at the age of 56 in 1982, his net worth was $982,000. He started with nothing! We used the capital gains on his estate to take care of my mom who had multiple sclerosis until she died 24 years later. After mom passed, I wrote an estate tax payment to the government for $1.3 million dollars, since we had invested wisely and Dad’s estate had grown in value.

So that’s one reason I am sick and tired of people whining about what the rich ought to pay! The Declaration of Independence says “the pursuit of happiness”. It does not say anything about a guarantee or a Department of Happy.

I am also sick of the lie press secretary Robert Gibbs and other Democrats are claiming that by not taxing those families making over $250,000 a year, we will add $700 billion to the deficit. It’s a lie because it is based on static analysis, which is the method bureaucrats use when they are trying to dupe the taxpayers into another tax increase. Show me the analysis!

And another thing! For the president to tell people at one of his staged backyard town hall meetings that he needed to raise taxes on those families to help reduce the deficit and the national debt is simply disingenuous. The American people have been screaming for over a year for the government to stop the spending! But he and his Democrats in Congress have been deaf to the public.

The president and the Democrats have no positive accomplishments to boast about leading up to the 2010 congressional elections. So they play the race card, the class warfare card and politics of personal attacks.

Most people who are able to generate a modest amount of wealth usually donate a large portion of their wealth to charitable and community-based organizations. That’s where it does the most good because it is closest to where the need is based. Going through the mechanism of government redistribution is inefficient and unfair.

Two thirds of those “evil rich” people making over $250,000 a year are small businesses that employ nearly two-thirds of the workers in America. A caller reminded me last week that if those businesses have to pay more in taxes, some of their workers might lose their jobs.

Abraham Lincoln said, “You don’t help the poor by hurting the rich.” This administration is determined to hurt the rich and make more people poor.