THE RHODE ISLAND SHELL GAME 4/6/2006
by Harold A. Meyer
III
On Wednesday April 5th I attended
the Senate hearing for the Voter Initiative (VI) amendment at the Rhode
Island State House. It was an opportunity for citizen proponents to
give testimony about why VI is so important for reforming our state. It
was also an opportunity for special interest opponents to snipe at the
bill with their usual rhetoric. Some of the questions and positions
that our elected officials were tossing out at the hearing were simply
amazing.
I was shocked to hear Senator M.
Teresa Paiva-Weed talk openly about her priority for RIte Care benefits
for the children of "undocumented" people. What a great euphemism it
was for her to say "undocumented!" It almost made it sound like it was
the fault of our country for forgetting or losing their papers. Almost.
What she really meant was ILLEGAL
immigrants, you know the people who break the rules and whose
subscriptions to welfare programs pick our collective pockets and make
us do without. It's alot more awkward for a lawyer like Esquire
Paiva-Weed to advocate for "illegal aliens" or "illegal immigrants"
than it is if she first softens their image. But, I don't expect plain
talk from Senator Paiva-Weed.
So, Paiva-Weed's heart bleeds for
the illegal aliens. Why doesn't she care with the same intensity about
the average person who plays by the rules and supports the people who
do not? Such a blind eye for these rule breakers encourages more of the
same negative behavior, which inflates the subsidy program, which turns
into high taxes, which often severely drain and impact the ability of
working people to provide for their own families.
One of the big problems with our
state is the Paiva-Weed mentality, that we have to coddle people who
are essentially criminals --whether or not they meet the strict
definition or can be prosecuted or deported. Obviously Paiva-Weed is
more concerned about pandering for votes to a huge block of people
--than doing justice for all Rhode Island citizens. Her upstanding
constituents and the taxpayers-at-large be damned!
Our state's charity has been turned
against us and turned us into a state of saps. One anecdote: illegal
immigrants in Southern California were supposedly discussing welfare
and one said "Go to Rhode Island, they have the best benefits." Our lax
security and blind eye to this abuse has turned us into victims, broke
victims.
It is no surprise that the piper
needs to be paid for this dangerous dance, and that Rhode Island
consequently lags the nation in just about every measure of our
economy, giving us a very high overall tax burden, high personal taxes
as well as high commercial taxes, sluggish growth, and poor performance.
Families that play by the rules get
penalized. The working people of our state are supporting the people
who do not work. Something like 20% of our state is on welfare, and
much of that welfare is fraudulent. Senator Paiva-Weed's professed love
for the illegal immigrant is really a hatred for the people who pay the
bills.
Regular families cannot afford the
benefits that are freely given to illegal aliens. Not only do regular
working families end up paying for benefits for these illegal
immigrants, but in many cases these working families end up doing
without those benefits themselves. That is simply not right. That is
not fair. People are getting fed up about this issue!
I predict in the near future that
the systematic welfare fraud and abuse in this state will surface. It
has to. It is one of the biggest items in the state budget. The welfare
budget is in the billions of dollars, and even a very conservative
estimate of a 20% fraud rate translates into hundreds of millions of
dollars. Backward attitudes from people in power like Teresa Paiva-Weed
only make things worse.
Senator Paiva-Weed's comments were
not the only outrage of the session, however. Senator Alves grilled
citizen Bruce Lang of Newport, a long time good government advocate.
Alves made a big deal about how income taxes were allegedly lowered.
Senator Alves talked about soaking
the upper tax bracket, the rich, with such carelessness and disregard
that he almost seemed to be saying that these policy actions are
totally without consequence.
What a joke! OK, so taxes in a few
brackets were lowered. Big deal. The rich were still penalized. So, why
do I have sympathy for the rich?! Guess which groups pays a
disproportionately high income tax? The rich! Guess which group can
help to keep our state a float? The rich. Guess which group could blunt
the shift of budget shortfalls from income tax to the property tax? The
rich!
And how do we treat these rich
people? We punish them with high taxes, essentially telling them to GET
LOST! Guess how they respond? They vote with their feet. They don't
come to Rhode Island, or, they move out. They move to Florida. They
moved to the Carolinas.
These senators failed one of the
most basic lessons of economics: that which you subsidize (welfare),
you get more of (fraud); that which you penalize (taxing the rich), you
diminish (they move out). The failure of this lesson means that the tax
burden gets shifted to the middle class, and guess what? Your property
taxes go through the roof! Do you know that feeling?
The proof? Look at the proportion
of rich people in neighboring Massachusetts and Connecticut. There are
proportionately alot more rich folk in those states than in Rhode
Island. Of course! Rhode Island policy heaps the most punishment on the
very people who provide the most financial benefit to our state. That's
screwed up! Rich people also start and own high tech companies which
are very desireable from an economic development perspective. Guess why
Rhode Island lacks these vital new businesses? It's pretty simple to
figure.
Income tax is not the sole issue.
The real issue is the overall tax burden. So what if some brackets of
income taxes were lowered --if those taxes are shifted to the municipal
level or to the gasoline tax, etc..?! Rhode has one of the highest
overall tax burdens in the nation. Period. That is the important fact,
not Alves' red herrings. It's like a shell game. Who cares if the
peanut is moved from Shell A to Shell C? It hasn't dissapeared, it's
just been moved.
State education dollars dry up, and
those shortfalls get passed on to the local communities. "But your
taxes have been 'lowered!'" Hahaha, do not buy it for one second.
Senators Paiva-Weed and Alves are
clearly two backward and negative forces at work in our government, in
my opinion. Let's vote them out of office in the next election.
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Hal Meyer, 42 is the Citizen
Critic. His primary political interest is in good government issues.
==========
CONTACT:
CITIZEN CRITIC
PO Box 5757
Wakefield, RI 02880
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