Former President and Nobel Peace Prize winner Jimmy Carter was recently asked what he believed was the most important quality of a President. His answer: “I used to think it was to tell the truth ...”
Simple, yet profoundly wise. Above all, leaders should not mislead.
Yet, time and again, First District East Tennessee citizens have been misled with half-truths from their elected Congressional representative.
A notable example: the incumbent Tennessee First District Congressman has repeatedly boasted of his vote for what he calls “tax relief.”
This is nonsense. Nobody got a real tax cut.
If someone gives you a check for $50 and then puts a $50 mortgage lien on your house, they have really given you nothing. This is true no matter what name is given to the $50 check.
Likewise, if so-called recent “tax reform” has made your paycheck is a little bigger, that money is not a real gift. It is just a deficit-financed loan that will have to be paid back.
Even worse, the proceeds of the government’s gigantic deficit loan are not distributed equally, and the obligation to repay the loan is also not distributed equally. On both measures, corporations and the wealthy come out unfairly ahead. On a percentage basis, the top 20% will receive over seven times what the bottom 20% get (reduced tax of 0.4% vs. 2.9% — see Table 1 at page 3 of the linked report). Even worse, the bottom 20% will end up paying back part of the loans given to the wealthy, both with the planned expiration of the so-called “tax relief” and with calls for cuts to essential lifeline services, such as health care and Social Security, that don’t matter as much to the wealthy anyway.
Having voted for an enormous deficit increase, our incumbent Congressman now says that he should not be held accountable. Instead, in his most recent newsletter he blames the Constitution for not including a balanced budget provision that would have forced him to vote differently.
Dear Congressman Roe: your constituents deserve the whole truth. Your vote is your responsibility. Neither the Devil nor the lack of a Constitutional amendment made you vote for a gigantic deficit increase.
Just as Prohibition didn’t end mis-use of alcohol, a Constitutional budget amendment is not an adequate answer to financial irresponsibility.
We deserve better than the services of an elected representative who believes he can’t stand up for common sense and for the real interests of his constituents unless and until he gets back-up from an unlikely Constitutional amendment.
It is time for some Responsible Change.