When They Say "Reform" They Really Mean "Cuts"

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In one of my early postings from last year about education, I wrote that the quality of a public school and it’s teachers in Madison, Wisconsin should be no different than the schools and teachers in Biloxi, Mississippi. For this, only the Federal government, acting as a great equalizer can make up for the differences and shortcomings in local wealth and taxes collected. The goal of course is that every child no matter what race or economic class, would have access to a good education. The GOP followed by the club for growthers, various so-called citizen taxpayer watch-dogs and school choice advocates would like nothing better than to cut off this federal funding – under the guise of “reform.”

On the other hand and particularly here in Wisconsin, I feel the local property taxpayers could use a solid 50% reduction in the school district portion of their property tax bills – not resulting from cuts in spending – but a reduction replaced by a durable corporate tax. I feel that corporations should be at least half responsible for the education of their future employees. Again, a school tax reduction in property taxes is often promised by GOPers as property tax “reform” only to really mean “cuts” in school spending. Poor schools + poor teachers + lousy curriculum = dumb kids.

I believe Federal dollars are being systematically cut off in all categories of discretionary spending, with schools, the environment and security getting shortchanged the most. The tax cut mantra during the presidential national campaign has snowballed to the point where some people are seriously looking at a sales tax or flat tax system over the current sliding scale income tax system we now have. This is dead wrong. The Fair Tax promoted by some GOP presidential candidates including Mike Huckabee not only would force huge cuts in discretionary spending, thus endangering the country, it’s an income-blind tax that would raise the cost of living tremendously to anyone earning less than $200,000. More accurately this idea should be called “Fat Tax” and it shouldn’t be given more than a fat chance to survive. It’s a dream killer.

I bring this all up because as I was watching the CNN/GOP Presidential debates, one of the questioners asked the candidates, “What are the top three Federal programs they would CUT?” to reduce discretionary spending. Only three Republicans were brave enough to entertain the question.

CNN Debate Transcript:
“But my point is that we're going to have to reform Social Security, we're going to have to reform Medicare…..” -- Fred Thompson

“I would like to change Washington, and we could by cutting three programs, such as the Department of Education -- Ronald Reagan used to talk about that -- Department of Energy, Department of Homeland Security….” -- Ron Paul

“… the first thing that I would get rid of would be the Internal Revenue Service…. “ -- Mike Huckabee

Two things here, presidential candidates talking like this a few years ago would be laughed off the stage and called anti-American. Secondly, people are so desperate for something different, they seem willing to accept any kind of talk of change, radical or not so long as it's different. However, the reforms and cuts these three spoke of actually illustrates the philosophy of the same direction our country has been heading in over the past fifteen years. They explained little will change if you elect them.

The FDA: Just another safeguard duty of the government in a long list of federal programs underfunded well before Thompson, Huckabee or Romney and company commit to doing the same thing.