Taxes & Regulation: The Black Hole of Government Waste and Corruption "Washington will spend $2.

6 million training Chinese prostitutes to drink more r esponsibly on the job." So stated an October 2009 report written by Brian M. Riedl, a Grover M. Hermann Fellow in Federal Budgetary Affairs in the Thomas A. Roe Institute for Economic Policy Studies at The Heritage Foundation. http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2009/10/50-examples-of-government-waste Businesses are forced to provide that money. But Obama refuses to cut such spen ding. He demands more revenue. As see the American Jobs Act , which will cost taxpayers an estimated $450 billi on. Tea Party Republicans argue against raising taxes and for spending cuts. But Wa rren Buffett wrote that the very rich should be taxed more. John C. Goodman, president and founder of the National Center for Policy Analysi s---a free-market think tank---stated, "Consider that when Warren Buffett is con suming, he's benefiting himself. When he's saving and investing, he's benefitin g you and me. Every time Buffett . . . puts his money in the capital market inst ead, he's doing an enormous favor for everyone else. A larger capital stock means higher productivity and that mea ns everyone can have more income for the same amount of work." The following day Jeff Carter, an independent speculator, published 'The Buffett Deception." Mr. Carter wrote, "Mr. Buffett has had a great career buying compa nies and integrating them into his empire. He ought to stick to that. His recen t editorial in the New York Times shows the flaws in many arguments that come fr om the left. . . . Buffett's logic also discounts how many Mom and Pop small businesses pay at the highest marginal rate." Mr. Goodman and Mr. Carter's articles are premised on free markets economics. Obama and Mr. Buffett's views are premised on the political philosophy of Marx a nd Engels. Free market economics is concerned with the production of values. It recognizes that individuals must be free to think in order to build businesses and create v alues. Businesspeople---employer and employee alike---must be efficient, organi zed and resourceful. Their efforts swiftly raise the standard of living for eve ryone when government does not interfere. When government does interfere, busin esspeople's efforts are stifled and the standard of living is slowed, then curta iled, and finally reversed. Leftist's political philosophy is focused on distributing the property of those that have created and/or earned it to those who have not. Such a focus relies o n government-enforced distribution, which means government interference in the e conomy---primarily through taxes and regulations. Taxes and regulations do not increase business. They do not create more enterpr ises. They do not create values or jobs. They do not raise the standard of liv ing. But Obama refuses to cut spending. He demands more revenue. Taxes are spent to finance government officials and their programs. They are sp ent to pay government salaries, which on average exceed that of most businesspeo ple. They are spent to maintain the offices of almost a thousand government agen cies, each with large staffs. Taxes are spent on duplicate programs, inefficien

t work and mismanagement. For instance, "Washington spends $25 billion annually maintaining unused or vaca nt federal properties." And on fraud: "The federal government made at least $72 billion in improper payments in 2008." But Obama refuses to cut spending and instead demands more revenue. Taxes should be spent to pay for the three proper functions of government: the police, the military and the courts. When tax money does not go to the proper functions of government it goes to improper functions. Mr. Riedl writes, "A GAO audit classified nearly half of all purchases on govern ment credit cards as improper, fraudulent, or embezzled. Examples of taxpayer-f unded purchases include gambling, mortgage payments, liquor, lingerie, iPods, Xb oxes, jewelry, Internet dating services, and Hawaiian vacations. In one extraor dinary example, the Postal Service spent $13,500 on one dinner at a Ruth's Chris Steakhouse, including "over 200 appetizers and over $3,000 of alcohol, includin g more than 40 bottles of wine costing more than $50 each and brand-name liquor such as Courvoisier, Belvedere and Johnny Walker Gold." The 81 guests consumed an average of $167 worth of food and drink apiece ." In addition, recall the millions of taxpayer money that Obama spent more on a 50 0-man entourage to visit Great Britain. But Obama refuses to cut spending. He demands more revenue. Andrew K. Dart writing "The Pork Page"--- http://www.akdart.com/pork.html ---lis ts a hundred misuses of taxpayer funds. Here are two examples: "Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas) while claiming to be a fiscal conservative, requested 149 projects worth $1.6 billion for authorization and appropriations bills for fiscal year 2010." In December 2010, a bill "written by . . . members of the Appropriations Committ ee proposed spending nearly $8.3 billion." The earmarks included $349,000 for s wine waste management in North Carolina; $413,000 for peanut research in Alabama ; $235,000 for noxious weed management in Nevada; and $300,000 for the Polynesian Voyaging Society in Hawaii. These are only a couple of the bribes and paybacks that taxpayer money---employe rs and employees alike---is wasted on. Onerous taxes and strangling regulations do not create prosperity. They obliter ate it. Taxes drain business resources into a black hole of government avarice, corruption and waste. Regulations do not "protect the consumer." They strangl e the producer. Taxes and regulations ravage the nation's savings, suffocate amb ition, undermine business operations, erase certainty and penalize the successfu l while rewarding the indigent. Tea Party Republicans are attacked almost every day on various interview shows a nd in the news. They are attacked because they refuse to give in to the Left's political philosophy of tax, spend, borrow, tax. Let us make certain to increas e the number of Tea Party Republicans come 2012.