The Lone Star Strategy for National Impoverishment

Angry Bear:
http://angrybearblog.com/2013/09/the-lone-star-strategy-or-the-house-that-conservatives-built.html#more-18416

and Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont
http://www.sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/video-audio/the-lone-star-strategy

itemize some of the features of the Texas Republican Party platform 2012:
http://www.tfn.org/site/DocServer/20...pdf?docID=3201

“1. An orderly transition to individual private retirement accounts and the elimination of Social Security.

2. Privatization of Veterans health care.

3. Abolish all federal agencies who’s activities are not enumerated in the constitution including the department of education and the department of energy.

4. Oppose mandatory kindergarten

5. Abolish the EPA

6. Abolish the 16^th amendment and thus get rid of the IRS to be replaced with a national, state collected
sales tax.

7. Abolish the capital gains tax and estate tax.

8. Repeal the minimum wage.”

_______________

Each of these points will transfer wealth and income upward, even the elimination of mandatory kindergarten.  Indeed, what will remain after the implementation of these policies is a rump federal government, incapable of securing even the meanest rights for its poorer citizens. And this will be most of its citizens.  Each agency is an empowerment of the people, a securing of rights they would not otherwise have. The federal government will not be capable of securing the interests of its citizens even within the borders of the country, much less beyond them.

The EPA was established by necessity, unregulated industry having made such a mess of things that rivers burned, and people died from breathing the polluted air.

Privatizing Social Security and Veterans health care is sure to make a few rich, at the expense of many.

Item 6 is obviously regressive, since poor and middle class consume a larger portion of their income, and thus will end up paying a higher percentage of their income as tax than the wealthy.  

 Item 7 will result in the establishment of a moneyed aristocracy, something which is an anathema to a democracy. 

Repealing the minimum wage will create downward pressure on all wages, making the poor poorer, and impoverishing even those who now get by.  It shows the Texas Republicans to be parochial and shortsighted in their thinking, even with regards to their own fortunes.

They make the fallacy of composition.  They imagine that if they cut the expenses of their businesses, which, in one way or another are compensation to the people, they will make greater profit, and be richer.

But by cutting these expenses, they impoverish the people, and they destroy the market for the production of their own farms and factories, and render idle the foundation of their own fortunes. With the Texas strategy, they seek to impoverish everybody, themselves included. 

What is your citizenship worth?

What is your citizenship worth? A monetary value can be put on it. Is it still positive? Is it still worth something positive? Or has it become a burden? It is supposed to be a blessing.

Consider the negative value added to it by the national debt. At about $10Trillion or so, or about $33,000 for every man, woman and child, about $60,000 for every worker. And climbing. Taxes also take away from the value of citizenship, but with taxes, we buy things, and the value of these things adds to the value of citizenship. So add to that the benefits provided by society. Schools, highways, rule of law, etc. What should be a very significant net positive. Hard to put exact figures on them. Perhaps willingness to pay. Plus a premium. When you think about it, schools, law enforcenment, and many other public goods supported by our taxes, really are a bargain.

But in any case, citizenship is worth less than it was before, for most of us:

http://prospect.org/cs/articles?article=the_impunity_of_the_roberts_court

http://prospect.org/cs/articles?article=signing_away_our_rights

But not for some:

http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2011/04/wachovia-paid-trivial-fine-for-nearly-400-billion-of-drug-related-money-laundering.html

Not exactly the 'shining city on a hill' mentioned by Ronald Reagan. Not exactly an example for others to follow, either. With increasing debt, budget cuts to education and so forth, loss of rights in the workplace, etc, the value of citizenship seems to be decreasing. What will happen if, or when, the value turns negative, the bribes for obedience are no longer enough, and propaganda can no longer hide the fact that citizenship in the United States has, for many, becomes an increasingly onerous burden? Will they sell their citizenship to the highest bidder, by which I mean the rights citizenship confers? Piecemeal, perhaps? Or will the people organize, and reestablish a new citizenship, under new terms?