Saturday, October 06, 2007

From Sea to Shining Sea

Americans are provincial. Whether you live in New York or New Harmony you believe that your world revolves around the good ole US of A. You are wrong. As much as we are proud of our country and what it has given to the world, we live in a global marketplace. The unions will try to deny and fight it, the Democrats and Republicans will try to politicize it and prevent it, but at the end of the day, unless we want to turn back the clock of progress, you will realize that we are just a big part of a bigger world. Mamma's let your children grow up to be cowboys, because a cowboy might be a better profession than an autoworker, steelworker, or software engineer, perhaps even attorney and stockbroker. The times they are a changin', and the times for the us US of Aers will change the most. We have won the battle and lost the war. We have proved to the world that freedom and free markets are the instruments of progress and the touchstones of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Only a handful of countries in the world now believe that central planning can bring prosperity to its citizens. In the early 1980s Ronald Reagan said that only 2o% of the world believed and practiced freedom and free markets, and that was the reason that the world was so stuck in a rut. He railed against a taxation system that rewarded those who road on the wagon without ever taking their turn at pulling it. He condemned the politicians worldwide who were so blind to think that taxing the efforts of the few could provide life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for the many. Quite frankly, he changed the world, and caused freedom to ring around the globe. But as the scriptures say, the dog returns to its vomit, and Russia, which collapsed under the weight of its own corruption, is returning to it effluence. Europe, which always speaks the poetry of wisdom, but practices the witchcraft of feudalism is raising up the lords and ladies of royalty as bequeathed by the power elite. Even the home country of Mr. Reagan, the USA, has decided that the rich must pay more than their fair share to be citizens of this county. Democrats and Republicans in this country have completely forsaken the simple wisdom of President Reagan, and they now grovel in front of a demanding electorate that has decided that the strong will carry not only the weak, but also the able. No politician in this country has the courage to name the charade for what it is: from him who has, to him who has not; not by choice, but by law. The problem is him or her who has, knows how he or she got it and how much it cost, and he or she is not going to give it away just because the politicians say so. Money moves at the speed of light from sea to shining sea. The time is fast approaching when the flags of the pullers of the wagon may well move to a country with different stripes. Companies are moving their headquartes out of this country for lower taxes, citizens will be next. Canada has just lowered it tax rate for corporations to near 25% less than that of the US. How long do you think it will be before they get real smart and lower their individual tax rates below that of the US. They are a long way from from that today, but they can see the it is near an inevitability that taxes are going up in the US. Don't you think the same Canadian lawmakers who cut corporate tax rates are going to figure out that if they cut individual tax rates they might attract the cream of American entrepreneurs, and the jobs that will accompany them. You think I am talking nonsense? You have your head in the sand. I cannot count on two hands the number of Canadians I know who left Canada because of the taxes, and I cannot count on two hands the number of Americans who would gladly move to Canada if the price were right.