In article 78vYc.224$_g7.16@attbi_s52, "Jay Honeck"
writes:


I don't think that any of this is new. However, our parents and
grand-parents were able to keep a lid on these kinds of disagreements by
maintaining a higher level of courtesy and decorum that has been all but
lost in America. Today, no one bats an eye at calling someone else "stupid"
or "immoral" because of what they believe -- and this is a radical change
that is harming our political system.


Jay,

I have an alternate theory for the polarization in US political life, and that
is that we have created an illusion that makes our political efforts from both
sides produce counter intuitive results. That leads to frustration and anger as
people cling to that illusion and see their goals fall further away. Sort of
like pulling back on the stick makes the houses get smaller, but only to a
point after which pulling back on the stick makes the houses get bigger really
fast.

The illusion we have created is the progressive income tax. We ignore the whole
concept of imbedded taxes (payroll taxes, corporate and personal income taxes,
and others) which become invisbly imbedded in the price of goods and services,
and those imbedded taxes fall very regressively on the poor.

The result is that the more progressive we make the income tax, the more the
poor fall behind and the greater the separation becomes. It is a hard concept
to wrap your mind around, but it is provably true. We see it happening all
around us every day. The more the Democrats succeed in shifting the income tax
burden to the rich, the greater the gap between rich and poor becomes, and the
history of the last 50 years proves it. I will email a copy of an editorial I
wrote for a local liberal paper explaining the paradox. It is too long to post
here, but I will email a copy to anyone who wants it.

But you can see that when every success becomes a failure, and every defeat
makes things better, the left is going batty as their class warfare fails.

And yes, I do have a solution to the problem.

--
Wm. Donald (Don) Tabor Jr., DDS
PP-ASEL
Chesapeake, VA - CPK, PVG