Posted by
lobo1776 on Saturday, April 28, 2007 7:47:41 PM
Taxation without representation is tyranny. James Otis
US politician in American Revolution (1725 - 1783)
I am livid! I'm mad as heck and I'm not gonna take it anymore! Since April 17th,(Black Tuesday) I have been a rabid wolf, foaming at the mouth!!!! It's gotten so bad the lovely Mrs. Lobo had to take me out and tie me up to a tree. I even went after cats and the mail-lady!!!! What, you may ask, has turned me into a raving lunatic? Paying taxes, especially my state taxes. I did everything right. I claimed zero deductions when there are two of us in the household in actuality claiming married but at single rate. That was good enough to get a refund from the Federal government. It wasn't, however, good enough for my homestate of Kentucky. After all that, I still owed. Why?
The answer is so simple even a moonbat from Louisville could guess it: the state of Kentucky overcharged me!! Here we have a state which has a $400+ million surplus and it's residents are still paying taxes. Here's a quick history lesson for JohnJohn: One of the reasons the Revolutionary War was fought because King George wanted to raise Colonial taxes 3% to repay the British war debt incurred when the British Army helped us beat the French and Indians in the French and Indian War. 3%!!! The average tax rates for most Americans run from 10% to 30% every year. That's three and a half to ten percent more than the British wanted. This on top of sales taxes, taxes on investments, real estate, personal estate, gasoline and the list goes on and on. And we, the people do nothing!!!!
Ok, I feel better for getting that off my chest. I can understand why the state has a large surplus. It has to do with the pesky little thing called the Alternative Minimum Tax or AMT for short. The AMT, federally, applies to both individuals and businesses. Here in Kentucky we have been lucky so far. The only real hurt that has been applied has been to businesses. Yeah, we are really lucky!!!
Kentucky's AMT became law as part of Gov. Uncle Ernie's tax reform package of 2005. The idea was out with the old and in with the screw. Here in Kentucky the AMT works like so: the tax is on a businesses gross revenue NOT the net revenue. If a companies makes $3 million gross, it is exempt. If it makes $6 million in gross the first $3 million is exempt and the second $3 million is taxed on a sliding AMT scale. If it makes over $6 million, then the entire amount falls victim to either the full AMT or the Kentucky net income tax, which ever is greater. Again this tax is on gross revenue and the tax is the same whether the company makes or losses money. Got all that. Good!!!!
Now when Gov.Uncle Ernie rammed the AMT through the state legislator in 2005 he insisted that it would only reason the state about a $100 million surplus. Our ELECTED state legislators bought his story and approved it. Let me repeat that one more time in case there were some moonbats in Louisville who were out surrendering to terrorists and missed it: our ELECTED state legislators bought his story and approved it!!!
Now AMT has come home to roost. Instead of a $100 million surplus we sit at $400+ million. Sounds good, hey let's throw a party. Not so fast, slick! Let's take a look at what else has happened. The downside of all this is that businesses, especially small businesses have suffered heavily. One of the hardest hit businesses are the car dealerships. The problem was laid out plainly by one of Kentucky's car dealership owners who said: "The problem with the tax is it's on sales, not on profits. You get a car dealership that's got millions of dollars on sales, but maybe only a few hundred dollars of profit per car. " Another downside is reflected in the current unemployment statistics. While the average for the US is at 4.4%, Kentucky's unemployment in March was at 5.8%. As more and more companies see the state of Kentucky as business unfriendly due to the AMT this statistic should go higher.
So what are are over-paid and under worked professional politicians doing about all this? Glad you asked, even if you didnt. Gov. Uncle Ernie is touting the AMT as the cornerstone of his scandal-plaqued administration. He has gone on record to say he opposes any attempt to repeal the AMT. To make matters worse he uses the surplus as incentives to Kentucky counties to vote for him. In addition to flying to campaign stops at taxpayers expense, he has, to date, given away roughly $17 million dollars of the surplus. Both RINO Annie and Billy Harper are on record opposing the AMT. Harper has even started an online petition to repeal the AMT. Even the Democratic (Socialist) Party is getting in the act with Democratic candidate Jonathan Miller going on record as saying the AMT hurts small businesses and discourages companies from coming to the state.
Ronald Reagan got it. GW got it. Even Democrat John Kennedy got it. The "it" they got was a simple economic principle: cut taxes and the economy will grow. Raise taxes and the economy will die.
The only one who doesn't get it is Gov. Uncle Ernie, our ELECTED representation....