September 16, 2005 @ 4:23 PM
Tax Time
Two hundred billion here, two hundred billion there…but what the hell they’ll just pass the bill on to us, and the next gang to take charge inside the Beltway.
Already the Republican leadership is saying that we can re-build New Orleans and Iraq if we just cut spending on some other programs. Why, we might even be able to continue to cut taxes, too!
This is a testing time for the American people and for Congress. Most especially it is a testing time for Democrats in Congress, who are going to have to stand up and make some tough decisions.
One of those is the decision to raise taxes, either with a war-time style "recovery tax" or by re-instating taxes that have already been cut. If the President, Congress, and the rest of us really want to rebuild New Orleans we have to be willing to sacrifice to do it.
The alternative is to push the "sacrifice" ahead to some future generation, which can cope with it while seated in the rubble of a deficit-savaged economy.
Thank God It’s Just Another Day
Do you remember, however dimly, when we thanked God it was Friday? When the weekend was the time for recovery from a work-filled week? When we looked forward to the escape from quotidian anxieties?
Now Friday is just the day before the next stressful bout with our own lives.
