Posted on 04/14/2011 10:52:21 AM PDT by rob88888
President Obama gave an important speech yesterday outlining his deficit-reduction plan. I won't comment here on the specifics of his proposals, partly because there weren't any specifics, but also because I want to focus on a single line in his speech. The president said: "My plan will require us to come together and make up the additional savings with more spending cuts and more spending reductions in the tax code."
"Spending reductions in the tax code." It has sort of a nice ring to it, until you realize that what he really means is "higher taxes."
So, the president wants to raise some taxes. This isn't at all surprising, it's perfectly defensible, and absolutely no one was fooled by his doublespeak. So why didn't he just say it in plain English? Unfortunately I cannot answer that question; I'm not a credentialed psychologist. But it's certainly not the first time this administration has purposefully used opaque words and phrases in explaining its policies. A few examples:
(Excerpt) Read more at blogcritics.org ...
Public schools are doing their work.
I am so sick of these liberals reaching into MY wallet and taking MY money to spend on things to assuage THEIR liberal guilt! Which word in the sentence “NO!” don’t they understand??
Deeply Stupid!
There is a simple choice:
Is the national mantra to be, "Proclaim Liberty throughout the land"? -
Or, "Become a nation of slaves to elected and/or unelected rulers"?
The choice is the same as that made in 1776 and 1787 by America's Founders.
The first choice resulted in the greatest explosion of liberty, opportunity, inventiveness, productivity and plenty benefiting the pursuit of happiness for more people than ever had existed in the history of civilization.
The second has led to tyranny and oppression, want, confusion, lack of opportunity, and common misery in every country in which it has been tried.
Where to, America?
Perhaps a look at two significant quotations from the past might shed light on our decision about 2012:
Sir Winston Churchill, upon leaving office as Prime Minister in 1945, described what he believed to be the state of his own country at that time:
"I do not believe in the power of the State to plan and enforce. No matter how numerous are the committees they set up or the ever-growing hordes of officials they employ or the severity of the punishments they inflict or threaten, they can't approach the high level of internal economic production achieved under free enterprise. Personal initiative, competitive selection, and profit motive corrected by failure and the infinite processes of good housekeeping and personal ingenuity, these constitute the life of a free society. It is this vital creative impulse that I deeply fear the doctrines and policies of the socialist government has destroyed. Nothing that they can plan and order and rush around enforcing will take its place. They have broken the main spring and until we get a new one, the watch will not go. Set the people free. Get out of the way and let them make the best of themselves. I am sure that this policy of equalizing misery and organizing society--instead of allowing diligence, self-interest and ingenuity to produce abundance--has only to be prolonged to kill this British Island stone dead."
Do Americans need to rediscover the formula for a "benign" (as described by James Madison) government in order to recover its greatness among the nations? Whet might happen if today's so-called conservative members of the "tea party movement" framed an argument for liberty and against a malignant government power which eats up "the People's" labor and liberty in the name of "taking care" of them?
Nobody describes our current predicament better than Thomas Jefferson, who warned Americans:
"To preserve [the] independence [of the people,] we must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt. We must make our election between economy and liberty, or profusion and servitude. If we run into such debts as that we must be taxed in our meat and in our drink, in our necessaries and our comforts, in our labors and our amusements, for our callings and our creeds, as the people of England are, our people, like them, must come to labor sixteen hours in the twenty-four, give the earnings of fifteen of these to the government for their debts and daily expenses, and the sixteenth being insufficient to afford us bread, we must live, as they now do, on oatmeal and potatoes, have no time to think, no means of calling the mismanagers to account, but be glad to obtain subsistence by hiring ourselves to rivet their chains on the necks of our fellow-sufferers." --Thomas Jefferson to Samuel Kercheval, 1816. ME 15:39
B I N G O !!!!!
I am a credentialed psychologist. The reason Obozo didn't state his position plainly is because he believes the average American is a fool, and that his vision should be our vision for the U.S.
She won't watch television, at all.
She won’t listen to me either though, so that say’s even more for her judgment.
He who controls the language frames the debate...our electorate still falls for ‘investments’, an old Democrat favorite...sounds so much nobler than ‘spending’. Seems we have no Conservatives capable of rediculing the Left each time they use this code word. Would be so simple...the government is to investing what Bernie Madoff was to personal finance. Ours guys go on camera and basically say they just want to invest less. Jerks, all of them.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.