Whose Money Is It Anyway?

Every election season is filled with a whole host of promises from the candidates. Each speech is a constant stream of promises to spend more money on the special interests of the particular group before which the candidate is pontificating. This election cycle is no different than the previous ones. Some candidates promise more than their fair share, while others still promise to reduce spending and keep the government’s greasy little fingers off of all of our wallets. On the Democratic side of the aisle, it appears to be a race to see who can promise the most spending and who can raise the tax burden the highest. They all claim that they will not raise the taxes of the middle class, but when they promise to let the Bush tax cuts expire, that is a tax increase.

Senator Hillary Clinton, the media ordained nominee, has promised billions of dollars to a veritable smorgasbord of spending increases. Her promises add up to a staggering $724,000,000,000.00 over a single term of her predicted presidency. That is a 25% increase of the current $3 trillion budget. Does anyone actually believe that a liberal Democrat will be able to fulfill these promises without opening up tax increases to the middle class? Most Democrats believe that the only way to increase tax revenues is to raise the tax burden. Most Republicans believe that the best way to increase tax revenue is to cut taxes and let the economy grow to increase tax revenues.

These are just a few of Senator Clinton’s proposals. She has proposed that each baby born in the United States will be given a $5000 bond. For those interested, according to the latest census there are roughly 4 million babies born in the United States every year. Just a quick side note, this idea was originally posited by former Senator Bill Bradley in his recent book, The New American Story. Clinton has also laid out her latest Universal Health Care proposal, which her campaign suggests will cost $110 billion per year. The former first lady has pledged $50 billion for a strategic energy fund to find ways to increase energy efficiency. Another proposal is to create universal 401(k) program for all Americans at a cost of $25 billion per year. These proposals alone amount to $620 billion over the 4 years of her first presidential term. Let us not forget that no government program ever comes in at less than the forecasted cost. The programs are always exponentially more than forecasted.

Hillary has admitted that she has “a million ideas”, but she realizes that she cannot implement them all. In her words, “the country can’t afford them all”. It makes me wonder, which of the groups that she has promised her spending will be left standing at the altar. I once heard a former politician say that if a politician ever promises to give you something, you must ask yourself, from whom are they taking it from? I feel the need to remind those who are salivating at the prospect of these proposals. The government does not produce a single service or product that produces income. The only possible way for the government to get money for their proposals is to take the money from the American people. Undoubtedly, the supporters of Clinton are jumping up and down cheering when she announces her plans. I will admit that on the surface her proposals make for great political theater, but a closer review shows government expansion at the cost of much higher taxes for all of us. The scariest part of these proposals is that we still have over a year left before the presidential election. How many more proposals can she come up with? How much more of our hard earned money does she want to steal?