Fairness should be your biggest concern when you are standing in front of a judge or being audited. Otherwise, unless you stand to gain by leveling the playing field, fairness is a value that should be reserved for liberals and losers. Sound harsh? Welcome to Illinois, where too many of our politicians give new meaning to the word “loser.”
Illinois politicians are not special when it comes to telling lies about fairness. The White House was excited about the Buffett Rule for a while, as if changing how much we are taxed would cure overspending. We don’t hear much talk about that one anymore, perhaps because Obama signed the death warrant for the inevitable juggernaut that would come from a rewrite of the tax code (see: Obama’s Gift to Taxpayers: the Last Big Government Juggernaut). The House has done a credible job of stamping out Democratic excess since then, but that doesn’t mean states can’t stick it to their residents in the name of fairness.
When fairness wins, businesses and taxpayers are losers.
Considering Illinois can’t pay its bills, Governor Pat Quinn devotes a lot of time to dreaming up new ways to buy more fairness. The Illinois governor’s website is a candy store for liberals. Most of it is a retooling of old party favorites, from housing assistance to transportation infrastructure to aid for education, laughable luxuries in a state where fairness means taking money from kids to pay teachers’ pensions and where public employee unions and their politicians blame conservatives for trying to stem demands for more revenue.
The trite, tired hate rhetoric against corporations already socked with a 45% tax hike in 2011 is damaging, but the big losers aren’t the ones being taxed to the hilt or being vilified by progressive activist groups like Citizen Action Illinois and A Better Illinois. The losers are the ones who need jobs and agree with the position that we must keep increasing the costs for job creators to do business here.
Political egos were bruised by remarks from Caterpillar’s CEO in 2012 confirming Illinois’ horrid business climate. The situation has continued to deteriorate. This week brought news that Walgreens’ headquarters may not only flee the state, but is considering getting out of America altogether. That’s the conundrum when Democrats both demonize big business and insist that companies generate more tax revenue to support the people. Until they can figure out a way to create jobs other than using tax dollars for government workers and public works projects, they will have to get used to the pain when businesses tell states like Illinois to take a hike.
Illinois endorses the anti-American side of fairness.
Woe be it to anyone who works hard and meets with success. Whether you call it tax fairness or economic justice, you won’t see either one in Illinois.
In happier times a million dollars seemed like a sizable sum and every American wanted to be a millionaire. We worried about achieving success, not demanding more fairness. Illinois is not the only state that has turned fairness into an anti-American value, but its spectacular failure to thrive makes the argument that penalizing higher earners and businesses and threatening yet another tax hike to clobber millionaires is not in the best interests of the middle and working classes.
Pat Quinn stressed fairness and giving children the best start possible in his 2014 State of the State, but this is what fairness really means to Illinois Democrats:
Fairness means government makes the decisions and partisanship makes those decisions inherently unfair.
Fairness means taking away from others because you have the power to do it.
Fairness means higher taxes and more regulation to support spending we can’t afford.
Fairness means taxpayers are powerless to the whims of government.
Fairness means the poor are tools for stealing from the rich.
Fairness in Illinois turns politicians into losers.
Being poor doesn’t make you a loser, but using fairness to take away other’s hard-earned money for your own benefit does. So what makes politicians losers in Illinois?
Losers can’t be trusted (that tax hike was supposed to be temporary, wasn’t it?).
Losers use the money earned by others to benefit themselves (anyone checked out Illinois lawmakers’ pensions lately?).
Losers never improve the situation they complain about (how long have some of Illinois’ elected officials been in office?).
Losers harm everyone they come in contact with (does it seem like things in our state are getting better?).
Losers lie, cheat, and steal, too. With Illinois’ admittedly bipartisan contribution to the prison population, that’s a hard one to argue with.
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