Saturday, December 30, 2017

The Deserving Poor



This came up first with Chuck Grassley:

"I think not having the estate tax recognizes the people that are investing,” Grassley (R-Iowa) told the Des Moines Register, “as opposed to those that are just spending every darn penny they have, whether it’s on booze or women or movies.”

If there was ever any doubt that is a true GOP sentiment, let that doubt be removed:

Then [Rep. Robert] Pettinger [R-NC] claimed that all Americans own corporate stock.

“Are you saying that the majority of American people own stock in corporation?” [Katy] Tur asked.

“The American people are shareholders, they own stock,” Pettinger argued.

“Why not do job creation by giving the money to the middle class and to lower class so they can reinvest in themselves?” Tur asked again.

“I understand your narrative and frankly that is the concept of socialism,” Pettinger claimed.

Because only rich people deserve money, right?  Isn't that the American Way?

I'm old enough to remember when the middle class was considered the economic backbone of America.

I'm gonna go watch "It Happened on Fifth Avenue" again, followed up with "You Can't Take It With You."  One is seasonal and while not exactly a paen to the first being last and the last first, is at least so egalitarian Pettinger would consider it socialism, too.  The latter is just fun and uplifting, with a title that says it all.

4 comments:

  1. Grassley mixes the worst of self-righteous New England Yankee with the moral sense of Parson Malthus. I can't hear him without remembering how much I couldn't stand Jimmy Stewart. Though I would imagine if I heard J. S. it might remind me of how much I loathe Grassley.

    Vulgar materialism always ends up the same place that high-brown materialism ends up, in depravity. It isn't helped when you add Grassley's kind of pseudo-moralistic dumping on poor people. I don't see him resting in the bosom of Abraham any time soon.

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  2. And spending money on "booze, women or movies" isn't part of the vaunted trickle down economy?? Who else is going to pay for the people that work to make booze and movies, and buy the things that women want/offer? This is all very confusing.

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  3. Dickens had a bias, un-Christian agenda. Everybody knows that.

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  4. Biased. Whatever.

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