{"id":760,"date":"2012-12-14T06:29:01","date_gmt":"2012-12-14T06:29:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/?p=760"},"modified":"2014-02-09T04:55:58","modified_gmt":"2014-02-09T04:55:58","slug":"headed-toward-the-11th-hour-compromise-article-by-ron-paul","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/blog\/2012\/12\/headed-toward-the-11th-hour-compromise-article-by-ron-paul\/","title":{"rendered":"Headed Toward the 11th-Hour Compromise – Article by Ron Paul"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\"The<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Ron Paul
\n<\/big><\/big><\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n
December 14, 2012<\/big><\/strong><\/span><\/div>\n
Recommend this page<\/a>.<\/strong><\/div>\n
******************************<\/div>\n
\n

As the year draws to an end, America faces yet another Congressionally manufactured crisis which will likely end in yet another 11th<\/sup> hour compromise, resulting in more federal-government growth touted as \u201csaving\u201d the economy.\u00a0 While cutting taxes is always a good idea, setting up a ticking time bomb with a sunset provision, as the Bush tax cuts did, is terrible policy.\u00a0 Congress should have just cut taxes.\u00a0 But instead, we have a crisis that is sure not to go to waste.<\/p>\n

The hysteria surrounding the January 1 deadline for the Budget Control Act\u2019s spending cuts and expiration of the Bush tax cuts seems all too familiar.\u00a0 Even the language is predictably hysterical: if the federal government reduces planned spending increases by even a tiny amount, the economy will go over a \u201cfiscal cliff.\u201d\u00a0 This is nonsense.<\/p>\n

This rhetoric is based on the belief that federal spending sustains the economy, when in fact the opposite is true.\u00a0 Every dollar the federal government spends is a dollar taken from consumers, businessmen, or investors. Reducing spending can only help the economy by putting money back in the hands of ordinary Americans.\u00a0 Politicians who claim to support the free market and the lower and middle class should take this to heart.<\/p>\n

The reality is, however, that neither Republicans nor Democrats are serious about cutting spending. Even though U.S. military spending is exponentially larger than any other country and is notorious for its inefficiency and cost overruns, Republicans cannot seem to stomach even one penny of cuts to the Pentagon\u2019s budget.\u00a0 This is unfortunate, because this is the easiest, most obvious place to start getting spending under control.\u00a0 The military-industrial complex and unconstitutional overseas military interventions should be the first place we look for budget cuts.<\/p>\n

Similarly, Democrats are digging in their heels on not cutting any welfare or entitlement spending and instead propose to fix the deficit by raising taxes on the rich, even though the U.S. Government already has a progressive tax code and the rich already pay more than their fair share. Furthermore, these higher taxes would fall on small-business owners, investors, and entrepreneurs\u2014in other words, the source of economic growth and new jobs!<\/p>\n

The truth is that there is no excuse for federal spending being as high as it is, nor for taxes being as high as they are.\u00a0 Even the God of the Old Testament only asked for 10% as a tithe and offering, and Americans revolted against the King of England for taxes that amounted to less than five percent.\u00a0 Yet so many people today complain about \u201cloopholes\u201d for the rich that lower their actual tax rate to \u201conly\u201d 13% in some instances.\u00a0 Even that is a criminal amount to pay for a wasteful, abusive, unconstitutional government.<\/p>\n

We are indeed headed to a fiscal cliff and have been long before this latest hysteria cropped up.\u00a0 But it is not cuts to spending or reduced federal-government \u201crevenue\u201d that will send us over the cliff, it is continued<\/em> federal-government spending that will.\u00a0 Until the federal government limits itself to its Constitutionally-mandated role, spending and taxation will remain out of control.<\/p>\n

Look for a \u201cbipartisan\u201d compromise in late December, with Republicans giving in to tax increases and settling for phony spending cuts that actually grow the federal government, and Democrats caving on defense cuts in exchange for tax increases.\u00a0 This is how the federal government has always grown: both sides will sacrifice their pro-liberty, small-government stances in certain areas in order to grow the federal government where they prefer.<\/p>\n

Liberty always loses in the 11th<\/sup> hour.<\/p>\n

Representative Ron Paul (R \u2013 TX), MD, was a three-time Republican candidate for U. S. President. See his Congressional webpage<\/a> and his official campaign website<\/a>.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

This article has been released by Dr. Paul into the public domain and may be republished by anyone in any manner.<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ron Paul December 14, 2012 Recommend this page. ****************************** As the year draws to an end, America faces yet another Congressionally manufactured crisis which will likely end in yet another 11th hour compromise, resulting in more federal-government growth touted as \u201csaving\u201d the economy.\u00a0 While cutting taxes is always a good idea, setting up a ticking time bomb with a sunset provision, as the Bush tax cuts did, is terrible policy.\u00a0 Congress should have just cut taxes.\u00a0 But instead, we have…<\/p>\n

Read More Read More<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[451,28,1618,1593,59,33,1619,1617,1222,29,72,65,1216,658,381,1349],"class_list":["post-760","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-budget","tag-democrat","tag-democratic-party","tag-fiscal-cliff","tag-liberty","tag-military","tag-military-spending","tag-negotiations","tag-pentagon","tag-republican","tag-republican-party","tag-ron-paul","tag-spending-cuts","tag-taxes","tag-welfare","tag-welfare-state"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/760","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=760"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/760\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2058,"href":"https:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/760\/revisions\/2058"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=760"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=760"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rationalargumentator.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=760"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}