Notes from around the Human Experience…
MORE LOW TAXES, FREE MARKETS CRAP: By any measure America is as divided as it’s ever been and one of those divisions is between the haves and have-nots. The Great Recession is as responsible for this as anything else. When the economy tanked in 2008 American business – as they’ve been doing since the Pilgrims first traded with the Indians – adapted and learn how to remain profitable. American workers, pleased to have hours no matter how few or irregular they were, took whatever employers chose to dole out – something they are still doing – and the American economy remains a difficult place for the average American to make a go of it.
Gaylon For Congress…Vote Early, Vote Often: In our last column, we said the best way to change that is to have an economy anchored in low taxes and only the regulations required to establish and maintain a free market. This is something we said every hour on the hour while campaigning for the United States Senate in 2014 and House of Representatives in 2016.
Running The Numbers: American companies paid $343.79 billion in taxes in 2015. This year they are estimated to pay $418 billion dollars in taxes. Some applaud this figure, but consider this:
This is $418 billion that is not being spent on innovation, expansion and employees. It is $418 billion dollars that are being sucked right out of the economy and given to the government so they can blow it.
USA! USA!: And because taxes are nothing more than expenses passed on to customers like you and me, another way to look at it is this is $418 billion in extra taxes that you and I are paying, $418 billion that you and I don’t have in our collective bank accounts.
Also popular to talk about is how jobs are being shipped overseas and how companies send money to offshore tax havens. Fair enough.
Dry, Technical Matter: They do this, however, because the American corporate tax rate is amongst the highest of any industrialized nation, so companies ship jobs overseas because that is where profits are higher and taxes are lower.
You can’t blame them for this; they are a commercial enterprise in business to make a profit. If their American tax burden were lessened, these jobs would remain in America and the billions of dollars sitting offshore would be returned to the American economy.
Profit Is Not A Four Letter Word: What would American businesses do with increased profits? Sure, some profits would be returned to owners and investors. It’s the way the free market is built: you take the risk, you get the reward. But to continue making a profit, businesses need to innovate and expand and increased profits would go to this, too.
Companies also need good employees to make all this work, and profitable businesses would hire more workers and – providing employees demand them – would pay better wages and salaries and provide better benefits.
The Bottom Line: Only an economy anchored in low taxes, free markets and minimal regulations will produce the flourishing economy this nation needs and deserves.
ON THIS DATE! ON THIS DATE! The Los Angeles Times building in downtown Los Angeles is bombed on this date in 1910 by John and James McNamara, brothers who were members of the Iron Workers Union. The bomb went off at 1:07 am, a busy time for a newspaper, and 21 people were killed and more than 100 were injured.
Bombing was a major form of interaction back then, as the union tried to gain a foothold in LA. The McNamara brothers were arrested the following April and, after no small amount of negotiations, pled guilty with James sentenced to life imprisonment and John sentenced to 15 years.
Great Moments In Sentencing Nazis: 19 of the 22 Nazis tried in the Nuremberg Trials are sentenced on this date in 1946. Twelve were sentenced to death and the other seven were sentenced to terms ranging from ten years to life imprisonment. The death sentences would be carried out on October 16.
Dry, Technical Matter: The other three defendants had been acquitted.
This Is More Dry, Technical Matter, Isn’t It?: Two others who had been indicted by the International Military Tribunal ended up not being tried. One had been deemed too ill to be tried, though his charges remained filed in case he recovered, while another killed himself early in the proceedings.
The Long And Winding Road: James Meredith becomes the first black to attend the University of Mississippi registering for classes, under armed escort, on this date in 1962.
That’s The Spirit!: Of course, since the South was unable to let blacks so much as use crosswalks without burning crosses, a riot was involved. Two people were killed.
“I Am Immortal…I Am A Moment In History”: Meredith knew exactly what he was doing.
I was engaged in a war. I considered myself engaged in a war from Day One. And my objective was to force the federal government—the Kennedy administration at that time—into a position where they would have to use the United States military force to enforce my rights as a citizen
It worked. Though hounded and pestered from day one, Meredith would graduate with a political science degree in 1963 and would earn a law degree from Columbia University in 1968. Now 84, Meredith lives in Jackson, Mississippi.
The End Of An Era: The USS Blueback (SS-581) is decommissioned after nearly 31 years of service on this date in 1990, the last diesel submarine combat ship in the United States Navy.
A Warm, Personal Remembrance: We served on Blueback from 1984-87 receiving, among other things, a Masters degree in Swearing, with an emphasis on the Holy Trinity. Made mostly obsolete by the emergence of nuclear submarines, the only real advantage diesel submarines had was that they were quieter than their nuclear counterparts.
Quotebook: Nothing could be more insulting to me than the concept of civil rights. It means perpetual second-class citizenship for me and my kind. – James Meredith
Answer To The Last Trivia Question: The previous trivia question is withdrawn. By coincidence, it was answered in the final On This Date item.
Today’s Stumper: Of the twelve Nazis sentenced to death by the International Military Tribunal, two were not executed on October 16. Who were they? – Answer next time!
