Category: Politics

Send Congressional leaders from both parties a message that you’re fed up with the paralysis in Washington, D.C by declaring your independence from politics without purpose. We will email the Declaration [above] and all signatures and comments collected to the Congressional leaders: Sen. Bill Frist (R-TN), Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV), Rep. Denny Hastert (R-IL), Rep. John Boehner (R-OH), and Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA).

Add your name to the petition.

The results of a New York Times / CBS News poll about the current White House administration were released today, and I thought I’d share.

You can read the whole report in PDF form here.

This beginning of this week was marked by a day that all Americans hate — Tax Day. Sure, we shell out a sizable amount of money from our paychecks (I know income tax is higher overseas — this is just for illustrative purposes), but we also pay Uncle Sam on a variety of other occasions.

John Stossel wrote an article with the same title as this post on RealClearPolitics.com to shed a little light on how often, and how much, Americans are taxed. Here’s an excerpt:

You probably don’t know how much you pay, because the government is sneaky about how it taxes you. Paying withholding taxes each pay period dulls the pain of the income tax — it’s money you earned, but it’s never in your hands — and a hundred other taxes are hidden. For my TV special “John Stossel Goes to Washington,” we followed St. Louis construction worker Bill Thurston and totaled the little-known taxes he paid daily. It started with the tax on the electricity that powered the alarm clock that woke him. Bill paid two taxes on his toothpaste. He paid a tax on water to get it into his home, and a sewer fee so it would go out. Daring to drive to work cost him more: He paid personal property tax on his truck; he had to pay sales tax when he bought it. And when he bought the gas, there was a county gas tax, a state gas tax and a federal gas tax.

At work, Bill gets stuck with local income tax, state income tax, federal income tax, Social Security tax and Medicare tax. Bill’s boss needs two employees just to calculate how much to withhold from paychecks, and while their salaries don’t go to the government (except for local income tax, state income tax, and so on), that’s money Bill’s employer can’t spend on developing his business or giving Bill a raise.

The article continues on to say that the average American pays about $10,000 in taxes per year – more than housing and health care combined. Why should government cost us more than shelter?

During a question-and-answer session on January 23 with students and community members at Kansas State University, sophomore Tiffany Cooper asked:

Tiffany Cooper: Hi, I just want to get your comments about education. Recently, $12.7 billion was cut from education, and I was just wondering how that’s supposed to help our futures?

President Bush: Education budget was cut — say it again. What was cut?

Tiffany Cooper: Twelve point seven billion dollars was cut from education, and I was just wondering how is that supposed to help our…

Bush: At the federal level?

Tiffany Cooper: Yes.

Bush: I don’t think that — I don’t think we’ve actually — for higher education? Student loans?

Tiffany Cooper: Yes, student loans.

(Full transcript: http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2006/01/20060123-4.html)

—

Last month, the Senate passed a budget-cutting bill that takes a net of $12.7 billion out of the federal student aid programs in order to help finance the recent round of tax cut legislation. Seventy percent of the gross savings (which total approximately $21 billion) generated in the bill are achieved by continuing the practice of tacking on excessive interest rates on student loans and by increasing college loan costs for parent borrowers.

Two-thirds of all college graduates take out loans to help pay for their college. The average debt of graduates is nearly $20,000. The student loan cuts just passed by Congress, according to experts cited by the Wall Street Journal, will raise the average cost over 10 years
by $2,000 to students and $3,000 to parents.

As my student loans won’t be paid off until what feels like 2050, I am terribly upset and frustrated by this round of legislation. Aren’t you?