Posted by
Compassionate Conservative on Friday, October 09, 2009 11:32:26 AM
Here's a reply to another idiotic letter to the editor, one which I've
sent to the editors in rebuttal. I don't expect they'll publish it, so
here it is.
"Mark Miller contends that Paul Krugman, who is in face a Nobel-winning economist,
“knows his stuff.” No, he doesn’t. He continually makes predictions
and cites facts that are erroneous. But Krugman isn’t the only liberal
who’s continually in error. So is Mark Miller.
Probably the biggest error in Miller’s letter is to say that the Obama
plan will pay “for health care by letting Bush’s tax cuts for those
earning more than $250,000 expire.” Let’s look at the facts. The Bush
tax cut reduced the top tax rate from 39% to about 35.5% on the top end
of earnings. That means that only the top $125,000 or so of income is
actually taxed at that rate, so that the total increase in tax paid by
each individual will be about $4500 per year. Meantime, the Obama
health care plan is estimated to cost about $800 billion. That means
that we’d have to have almost 183 million taxpayers making $250,000 per
year, and since only about 1% of the 300 million Americans actually
make that much, Miller is telling a white lie."
Finally, the “ultra-wealthy” might have inherited their money, but they
still invest it and spend it, as do wealthy entrepreneurs and
athletes. If you tax them to give their money to the government, some
bureaucrat gets it to waste. In any case, people making over $250,000
per year aren’t “ultra-wealthy,” but they are doctors, lawyers,
accountants, and business executives, and they are indeed the most
productive members of society.
I would say that people like Miller need to check their facts, but I
don’t want to waste my breath. Liberals aren’t interested in facts, at
least not if they contradict their cherished beliefs. This letter is
for the reality-based community."