Last updated on April 11th, 2012 at 10:02 am
If you’re wondering who Mitt Romney is, good luck. If you’re wondering what he’d do as President, you need only look to George W Bush’s policies and take away the compassion.
Yes, that’s right. Bush had compassion, relatively speaking.
If you’re now wondering what on earth I could mean by that, come with me to Michigan where “Moderate” Republican Michigan Governor Rick Snyder’s tax policy cuts corporation income taxes by 83 percent, while increasing taxes by 23 percent for actual humans (now known as the peasant class).
The Oakland Press reported:
The overall change will mean that corporate income taxes will drop by 83 percent while income taxes will increase by 23 percent.
The state’s poor will pay more taxes while tax rates for corporations in the state were sharply lowered, according to a study by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a research organization in Washington, D.C.
The Earned Income Tax Credit was cut from 20 percent of the federal credit to 6 percent for the 2012 tax year.
“Unless we restore the EITC, Michigan will soon tax the working poor deeper into poverty, instead of helping families climb into the middle class,” said Karen Holcomb-Merrill, policy director of the Michigan League for Human Services. “Reducing income taxes for the working poor both encourages work and reduces poverty, while setting families — and our state economy — on the path toward a better future.”
Now, if you really want a get the whole picture, you have to realize that at the same time, Michigan’s Department of Human Services has reduced services to the poor, disabled, and other vulnerable members of society. NPR reported, “Eleven thousand Michigan families were cut from welfare cash assistance late last year. Cash assistance is the $500 a month or so that helps the poorest families pay their bills and rent. The Department of Human Services says the state can’t afford the cost.” NPR concluded with, “A circuit court judge has now ruled the agency exceeded its authority. The people who run the Department of Human Services are appealing that judge’s ruling.”
Meanwhile, other states are following suit according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities:
No new states exempted working-poor families of four from income taxes in 2011, and in almost all of the 15 states where such families still pay income taxes, they saw their income taxes increase.
Taxing the incomes of working-poor families runs counter to decades of efforts by policymakers across the political spectrum to help families work their way out of poverty.
Some states went further and levied income tax on working families in severe poverty. Five states — Alabama, Georgia, Illinois, Montana, and Ohio — taxed the income of two-parent families of four earning less than three-quarters of the poverty line, or $17,264. Four states — Alabama, Georgia, Illinois, and Montana — taxed the income of one-parent families of three earning less than three-quarters of the poverty line, or $13,442.
These policies make George W Bush look liberal and compassionate in comparison.
When Mitt Romney pivots to the center (and he is already trying to walk this line), remember Rick Snyder in Michigan, where democracy is being quite literally thwarted while the middle class and the poor are gutted by corporate vultures masquerading as elected officials. Your vote no longer counts for real in Michigan, and you are being taxed so the wealthy lords can get richer. You have no chance of getting out of poverty or working your way up the ladder, because those in power want to keep you out of power.
If it’s the budget that is the issue, why aren’t corporations sharing the burden? If corporate tax breaks really worked to fix an economy, then the Bush recession never happened.
If it’s fiscal responsibility you’re looking for, you need only look to the current fiscal conservative in office, Mr Barack Obama. The Atlantic summarized Obama’s policies, “If anything, it is remarkable that, after a recession and a private sector implosion, the public sector expanded less under this administration than it did under Bush or Reagan, especially when you consider the government cuts made at the state and local levels.”
However, if you want to double down on Bush era fiscal irresponsibility and burden the deficit with more corporate tax breaks, you know who to vote for in 2012. Just imagine, if you vote for Romney, you’ll also be shoving millions of Americans into poverty, with nowhere else to turn. Maybe they’ll starve to death and finally rid this country of the burden of civilization.
Nothing says compassionate Christian conservative like reverting back to Mediaeval times, taxing the poor serfs more in order to enrich the titled Lords. Oh, freedom. Aren’t we lucky that Romney’s “policies” look more like Snyder’s than they do Bush’s?
This is what we fought that enlightenment era revolution for, so we could give all of our money to the corporations and be represented by distant, aloof Lords who don’t really represent us at all. And just to make sure you don’t get any ideas about representation and fairness, they took the power of your vote away.
Follow Sarah Reese Jones on Twitter here.
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