By John Brummett
Republicans argue they are winning voters’ minds and hearts on the substantive merits. Democrats argue that Republicans have made a few unjust inroads because they spin their messages so much more cleverly and effectively, or, if you wish, cynically.
This is not a zero-sum argument. Few if any political debates can ever be scored that way. But there is some evidence that, substance notwithstanding, Republican rhetoric tends to be better-packaged, better-marketed and altogether more savvy.
For example: Tax rates on large estates as they get passed on to heirs have been going down and kicking in only at rising thresholds ever since Republicans began calling them “death taxes” and finding traction with the nomenclature.
What was an estate tax or an inheritance tax on the most well-to-do was one thing. But for the government to go around waiting for a dear rich old patriarch or matriarch to die so it could get its dirty hands on what ought to go to the grieving kids — why, that’s another matter entirely.
So it is now with what the Republicans call class warfare.
It once simply got called progressive taxation, back when the government’s finances weren’t in such a mess and when the gap between the few rich and the many poor wasn’t such an abyss and when America had a more vibrant economy with a more robust middle class.
That is to say that, in the 1950s and early 1960s, when Beaver was cute and Ozzie and Harriett were sweet and father knew best, and when the highest federal income taxes on the very highest portions of the highest incomes were in the 90 percent range, we weren’t crying class warfare. We were building interstate highways and aiming at the moon.
But now, when President Obama proposes to put back at 39.6 percent the highest rate on the very top margins of income exceeding a quarter-million, the very place it was in the more prosperous Clinton ‘90s, the Republicans accuse him of class warfare.
By that they mean pitting the non-rich against the rich and taking the side of the non-rich to fuel dissension and punish those who have been successful for taking fuller advantage of the American dream.
Obama, bless his heart, is not as good at this game as president as he was as a candidate. “Yes, we can” had a ring to it. “It’s not class warfare, it’s math,” which is what he said last week, does not.
That is why Democrats, desperate for clear and compelling messaging, made viral last week a video of Elizabeth Warren answering a question on this general subject.
Warren is the Harvard Law professor who championed consumer-oriented Wall Street financial reforms in the Obama White House and now has offered herself as a Democratic candidate to take back the U.S. Senate that Republican Scott Brown won last year.
Asked in this video about the notion that raising taxes on the wealthy amounts to class warfare, Warren said: “There is nobody in this country who got rich on his own. Nobody.
“You built a factory out there? Good for you. But I want to be clear: You moved your goods to market on the roads the rest of us paid for. You hired workers the rest of us paid to educate. You were safe in your factory because of police forces and fire forces that the rest of us paid for.
“Now look, you built a factory and it turned into something terrific, or a great idea? God bless. Keep a big hunk of it. But part of the underlying social contract is you take a hunk of that and pay forward for the next kid who comes along.”
Pay it forward? Social contract? Early scoring says that’s quite a bit better than “math” but harder to put in context than “class warfare.”
You get into a second and third paragraph in politics and you’re risking a loss of political currency, even if, thank you, you managed read this far.
——-
John Brummett is an award-winning columnist for the Arkansas News Bureau in Little Rock and author of “High Wire,” a book about Bill Clinton’s first year as president. His e-mail address is jbrummett@arkansasnews.com.
September 26th, 2011 at 4:26 am
“Math” has little to do with Obama’s worldview. Instead, Obama’s worldview is shaped by “fairness” – - -which of course means sending more money and power to political types like him
Please remember that Obama once said he would favor an increase in the capital gains tax EVEN if it meant a LOSS IN REVENUE, simply because it would be more “fair.” Obama’s position had little to do with “math” and was centered on misquided ideology and bad policy.
* * * * * * *
Anyone who believes that a 90% tax rate is good policy has never tried to raise capital for a start up.
* * * * * * **
This is CaptainAmerica’s law of inverse value: The more a government taxes, the greater the decline
It’s funny how the USA went from a 3rd world colonial possession to the world’s greatest economic power in the space of 100 years WITHOUT an income tax.
And it’s funny how we have gone bankrupt in the past 100 years since instituting the income tax.
* * * * * * *
Brummett’s rhetoric regarding the gap between the rich and poor – and the stagnating middle class – is so misleading that it makes me want to scream. Nowhere does he mention the most significant cause of some of these problems: The fact that China went global in 1978 with a (sort of) free market economy. As did India.
* * * * * ** *
Discussing disparity in wealth, in and of itself, can be very misleading. After all, you could argue that North Korea has less disparity in wealth than the USA. But is it really good policy when the citizenry is malnourished equally?
* * * * ** * *
I criticize Conservatives for wanting to recreate 1981 all over again. I double this criticism for anyone who wants to recreate 1955.
In 1955, The U.S. had the only intact industrial base in the world. And all of our current competitors: Germany, Japan, China, India, South Korea were flat on their back.
The world has changed . . .and believing that we can recreate that world merely by enacting a 90% tax rate is nonsense on stilts.
September 26th, 2011 at 6:58 am
good post, captain. scream away. one thing: i’m not wanting to go back to a 90 percent tax rate in 1955. reread. i’m suggesting we go back to a 39.6 percent tax rate in the clinton nineties, a more fairly comparable time. remember those glory days when we had only oral sex to worry about, and before george w. made such a mess?
September 26th, 2011 at 7:31 am
Unfortunately, logically this argument fails because although we all benefit from roads, police, fire departments and education, it is not clear that the rich benefit from all the social welfare programs that Warren wants to keep running. Also how does the rich benefit from Social Security?
I think liberals need to realize that these word games will not work. IT IS CLASS WARFARE. When the government grows as rapidly as it has the last 10 years and deficits climb to record levels there is only one solution. FIND PLACES TO CUT. WHY NOT ELIMINATE THE DEPT OF EDUCATION COMPLETELY. OUR COUNTRY RAN WELL WITHOUT IT.
September 26th, 2011 at 7:53 am
According to the Census, one in five American children is living in poverty, and the average earnings of the typical man working full time are beneath 1978 levels. Anyone worried about our social contract should care first of all about creating more economic growth, and more factory owners.
Democratic Senate hopeful Elizabeth Warren said Friday she had been paid $192,722 for serving as chairman of a congressional committee that monitored the 2008 federal bank bailout, three times as much as had originally been acknowledged.
Warren spokesman Kyle Sullivan initially said Warren, who is seeking the Democratic nomination to take on Sen. Scott Brown (R-Mass.) next year, had earned $64,289 for serving on the oversight panel, based on executive-branch financial disclosure statements she filed for 2009 and 2010.
But Sullivan told POLITICO on Friday that the campaign had overlooked $128,433 Warren earned from the panel in 2009.
It’s so easy do overlook every $129,000 I make..Haha.
Warren made $347,000 annually for her work at Harvard, plus another $53,428 in royalties, according to a disclosure report filed in May 2009. Warned earned more than $116,000 as a legal consultant, and other $25,000 doing research for the Consumers Union.
September 26th, 2011 at 8:04 am
classic ad hominem, drscherrey. you attack the person not the point. rewind and comment again.
September 26th, 2011 at 8:04 am
what does a rich person get out of social security? fellow citizens and customers who aren’t starved to death.
September 26th, 2011 at 8:20 am
Halting,
So, if a rich person doesn’t benefit from a program it should be eliminated?
Talk about illogical. I guess if a rich person decides to stay home, we shouldn’t use tax money for roads. And if he has a weapons cache, who needs police?
But after reading some of the “biblical logic” on your website, I think I know where you’re coming from.
September 26th, 2011 at 8:26 am
The problem with Warren’s logic is that she wants the rich to pay more because the government needs the money to keep social programs going but she claims they are morally bound to because of the roads the government has built that the rich use.
The budget busting items are the social programs and wars fought in far away lands. What do these have to do with roads?
As far as social security goes, Bill Shipman of the Cato Institute put it best:
“In 1950, when there were 16 workers per beneficiary, the payroll tax rate was just 3% on $3,000 of wages. Since then the tax rate increased 18 times, and the wage subject to the tax increased 43 times. After adjusting for inflation the maximum tax jumped 1,322%. Benefits rose as well, but proportionally much less. The squeeze in benefits relative to taxes has progressively made the system a worse deal.”
In other words, you know your argument has crumbled if you have to defend this Ponzi scheme and make believe that this will help keep anybody from starving when it crumbles eventually as it is destined to do unless it is fundementally changed.
September 26th, 2011 at 8:54 am
And one more thing, if I may. There seems to be a recurring assertion that liberals want to make everyone equal. Another distorted notion that gets traction when a frenzied group is ready to attack all things Dem.
I’m all for people being rich if that is what they want. But that opportunity should not be at the expense of those who just want to live a decent life above the
poverty level without the fear of being bankrupted by lack of affordable medical insurance. There is no reason we can’t have both choices in this country.
Class warfare? You ain’t seen nothin yet. Keep moving towards the haves and the have nots. It’ll give that phrase a whole new meaning.
September 26th, 2011 at 10:59 am
Pilsberry, it seems to me that you agree with me that Brummett is incorrect to deny that class warfare is happening. President Obama is just trying to fire up his base and he realizes that he has no chance of getting it passed in Congress. Furthermore, he knows the Senate is going Republican too and he will have no chance of getting it passed if he is lucky enough to get re-elected.
September 26th, 2011 at 11:51 am
@Halting,
I think I agree with Brummett’s point that the GOP is very adept at spinning an issue. But when you get right down to it, it’s really easy to do when there’s so much division. And it is an artificial division IMO. They’re able to tap into an underlying anger and justify just about anything they want. Just link it to that commie Obama and, voila, a 4 or 5% tax increase on the most blessed becomes class warfare. The angry feed off of it. They enjoy warfare.
September 26th, 2011 at 2:40 pm
@Brummett,
Oh, ok. Well, I can go along with 39.6% tax rate. I actually opposed the Bush tax cuts at the time. And still do. And believe it or not – I did not vote for W in 2000 because I didn’t think he would hold the line on spending. Call me Nostradamus on that prediction.
The GOP should use the Clinton tax rates as a bargaining chip to cut spending and reform entitlements. They won’t, because our current political class appears to hell bent on pursuing a policy of misrule.
FWIW – the top tax rate in 1955 was 92% on incomes over $300k. $300k in 2011 dollars is actually $2.5 million.
September 27th, 2011 at 4:17 pm
Warren is a silly Huey Long populist who sees ‘Marauding bands’ taking over factories.