{"id":13373,"date":"2010-10-24T20:31:29","date_gmt":"2010-10-25T03:31:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spiken.wpengine.com\/news\/disappointed-with-reporters-stance-on-i-1098\/"},"modified":"2016-10-22T05:35:40","modified_gmt":"2016-10-22T12:35:40","slug":"disappointed-with-reporters-stance-on-i-1098","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/letters\/disappointed-with-reporters-stance-on-i-1098\/","title":{"rendered":"Disappointed with Reporter’s stance on I-1098"},"content":{"rendered":"

Your editorial (opinion) on Initiative 1098 is disappointing \u201cOur take on the state measures\u201d Kent Reporter, Friday, Oct. 22.<\/a> You apply a fear-factor intended to influence voters to reject 1098 on an assumption of something that MIGHT happen in the future, NOT something that the voters are voting on today.<\/p>\n

Surely, legislators could try to pose an income tax on the rest of us at some future date. But, just as surely (or perhaps more so), we can rely on (the parasitic) Tim Eyman to push one of his (pocket-stuffing) initiatives should your fear-factor ever be realized; AND, at THAT time the voters could decide whether other income levels should be taxed or not. I-1098 is NOT about taxing me, or most of the people reading this. I-1098 is about taxing individuals who can easily afford to pay more. I call them \u201crich people.\u201d<\/p>\n

I find it mystifying that people don\u2019t understand the concept of what it means to be \u201crich.\u201d By definition, rich people have enough money. While our state has the highest minimum wage in the country, the poor need that here because we also have the MOST regressive tax system in the country \u2013 meaning that the less you make, the more you pay in taxes as a percentage of income. It\u2019s not a formula for future prosperity (except for the few). Your readers should read about \u201cRegressive Tax\u201d on Wikipedia, and while they\u2019re in there, they should also study the \u201cGini coefficient.\u201d We should also decide if we believe in \u201cUnited we Stand,\u201d or the dictum \u201cevery man for himself\u201d (the \u201cdivided we fall\u201d free choice within our democracy). Finally, your readers should look up \u201cProgressive tax\u201d on Wikipedia, and then make their decisions on I-1098.<\/p>\n

In January 2000, John McCain said, \u201cI don\u2019t think Bill Gates needs a tax cut. I think you and your parents do.\u201d If my memory is accurate, in 2001 Bill Gates received a $76 million dollar tax cut under George W. Bush. I don\u2019t think he needed that money, do you? Who believes that? Raise your hands. AND, here I sit nine years later and I\u2019m still waiting for the rich to come save me as prophesized in 2001. Should I also mention that the 2001 tax cuts have been the largest single contributing factor to the deficit? Remember the surplus?<\/p>\n

I am guessing that your editorial opinion on 1098 has already done its damage to an effort that would bring about a more fair taxing system. There are NO taxes that people are going to like. People do not like taxes. But only a fool would think we don\u2019t need money to operate a democracy, and the best system is the one that would be the most fair\u2026 to ALL the people. I think rich people are doing okay in our society.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Brian Edmondson<\/p>\n

Kent<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Your editorial (opinion) on Initiative 1098 is disappointing \u201cOur take on the state measures\u201d Kent Reporter, Friday, Oct. 22. You apply a fear-factor intended to influence voters to reject 1098 on an assumption of something that MIGHT happen in the future, NOT something that the voters are voting on today.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":106,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-13373","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-letters"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13373"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/106"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13373"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13373\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13373"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13373"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13373"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=13373"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}