The government has spent the last half century-plus – in as many ways as is bureaucratically possible – picking winners and losers of its implemented policies.
Are you a member of this or that government-preferred group? Government grants you lavish favors.
Are you a member of this or that government un-preferred group? Government dumps all over you.
I feel more and more quaint and removed from current reality every time I cite the Constitution – but here goes an excerpt from the Fourteenth Amendment:
“All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States….No State shall…deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”
Emphasis ours. Because that may be the most ignored phrase of the Constitutions oh-so-many ignored phrases.
The Leftist media’s latest Flavor of the Month – has been New York Democrat Congressman and fake Bronx-reared Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (AOC). (Though her Flavor title may now be threatened by presidential politics and the announcement crowd drawn by California Democrat Senator Kamala Harris.)
AOC has demanded – as a part of her economics-free agenda – a 70% income tax on people who have earned more money than other people have earned.
Massachusetts Democrat Senator and fake Indian Elizabeth Warren – in a shameless and very-media-jealous rash of Me-Too-ism – announced a blanket wealth tax of either two or three percent, depending upon how much you have earned and then saved.
These idiocies are proffered under the banner of the “rich” not paying their “fair share” of taxes. This is egregiously obnoxious. As the great Thomas Sowell rightly asks:
“What exactly is your ‘fair share’ of what someone else has worked for?”
Not only is this egregiously obnoxious – it’s patently untrue.
Top 1% Paid As Much in Federal Income Taxes as Bottom 95%
The top 1% pay their “fair” share” – and the shares of just about every other American. And the President Donald Trump tax cuts Leftists all loathe – actually made the the tax code even more top heavy.
“Fair?” Let us turn to our old friend Merriam Webster and his dictionary:
“Fair: In a manner that is honest or impartial.”
1% of Americans paying more taxes than 95% of Americans – is the morally absolute antithesis of fair.
Of course, the fake Bronx-reared’s and the fake Indian’s proposed progressive taxes – and the entirety of our progressive tax code – is in violation of the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of our Constitution.
Congress passed one law regarding taxes. In which different people are treated VERY differently. The American people are thus not receiving “equal protection of the laws.”
We see these sorts of oft-cronyism-powered government imbalances all over the place.
To wit: The very stupid – and very misnamed – government Internet power grab Network Neutrality.
The push for this very stupid policy has been funded and fueled for more than a decade – by massive Big Tech companies.
Like Microsoft (Market Cap: $823 billion) Amazon (Market Cap: $817 billion), Google (Market Cap: $759 billion) and Apple (Market Cap: $746 billion).
Net Neutrality imposes massive, Internet-crushing regulatory restrictions on Internet Service Providers (ISPs).
Like Verizon (Market Cap: $233 billion), AT&T (Market Cap: $223 billion), Comcast (Market Cap: $163 billion) and Charter (Market Cap: $67 billion).
Get that titanic size differential – between Net Neutrality’s proponents (massively huge) and victims (comparatively puny)?
The massive Big Tech companies used their massiveness to get the ridiculously crony Barack Obama Administration to unilaterally impose Net Neutrality – in an extraordinarily non-neutral fashion.
Net Neutrality was unilaterally imposed upon ISPs – in the name of preventing ISPs from blocking people. Except ISPs do not block people. Even the most virulent Net Neutrality proponents begrudgingly admit this.
You know who does block people – all the frigging time? The massive Big Tech companies block conservatives and Republicans – all the frigging time.
Amazon does. Google has raised it to an exquisitely fine art form. Give Apple CEO Tim Cook credit – at least he admits his company censors.
But did the Net Neutrality these massive Big Tech companies spent years and billions of dollars pushing to impose – apply to them? Heavens no.
That ain’t exactly “equal protection of the laws.”
You know what that Net Neutrality did do? It forced the comparatively puny ISPs – to give unlimited free bandwidth to these massive Big Tech companies.
That ain’t exactly a “fair share.” That’s the exact opposite – of “fair share” (and of the Trump tax cuts). That’s the Internet’s richest – getting exponentially richer. In perpetuity. Thanks to terrible government policy.
We recently discussed our online data and its legal privacy protections. And how law to delineate how different companies use it – should apply equally to everyone.
We have forever said that if you want Net Neutrality – it too should be drafted and passed by Congress, not unilaterally imposed by this administration or that.
And we have forever said such a Net Neutrality law – should apply to ISPs…AND the massive Big Tech companies. Absolutely equally.
As the Constitution quite simply and fairly requires.
This first appeared in Red State.