A winning Democratic Party message? [View All]

[Atman]

After reading the article about the hyper-rich getting hyper-richer, and the FACT that 53% of Bush's tax cuts went to the top 10%, it appears that TAXES may actually be a winning issue for us IF we frame it properly: as an issue of fundamental fairness.

Now that middle-America is firmly in the grip Bush's tax policies, which have caused a tidal wave of fee increases and hidden "taxes" on them, cutting into living standards in demonstrable ways, maybe it is time we point out that it is fundamentally unfair for Joe America to work his ass off to fund the TAX CUTS OF THE HYPER-RICH LEISURE CLASS!

Why do we have to schlub to the office, the factory, the Burger King, and bust our balls, only to see our kid's lose after school programs, our parks sold off to the energy industry, our seniors lose health care, our dads and granddads losing the pensions they've worked their whole lives for...while the fat-cat leisure class who've DONE NOTHING PRODUCTIVE FOR SOCIETY WITH THE TAX CUTS THEY'VE ALREADY BEEN GIVEN, just keep compounding interest on the money WE'VE been forced to give them.

It will take rigid talking points and echo-chamber mentality, because the right will immediately start whining about "tax and spend liberals!" The usual tired meme. But it simply isn't true, and can be demonstrated untrue. So if we approach our deficit/economic problems as being directly the fault of the very, very wealthy, who do not share America's values of fairness, then it can be a winning issue. We don't want to raise taxes on anyone, especially low and middle income Americans already being beaten down by Bush's policies. We only want to return FAIRNESS to the system, so that the people who are getting the most from our society will once again shoulder their FAIR SHARE for our nation's upkeep.

Carefully, properly framed, TAX EQUITY can be a real winning issue for us, I believe. Not RAISING taxes, just returning many of Bush's cronies and golf buddies to tax rolls, just like the rest of us.