I'm trying to figure out who is more revolting in their disdain for America's success stories - the president of the United States or the president of the Nevada teachers union.
Barack Obama spent the first four years of his presidency hunting down, Ahab-like, "the wealthiest among us" and finally got his pound of flesh at the conclusion of the fiscal cliff-hanger last month. He's now back in his boat, harpoon at the ready, looking for a sequel.
For her part, Lynn Warne and her unionized public school teachers are attacking Nevada's largest employers and targeting them with a new business tax, not only claiming "the rich" aren't paying their "fair share," but are screwing our kids in the process.
Obama and Warne should both be ashamed of themselves. But they're not.
To hear these green-eyed liberal class warfare warriors tell it, "the rich" have somehow unfairly benefited from the opportunities this country makes available to ALL Americans, including those who don't have, like Obama, an Ivy League education.
It's pure, unadulterated horse manure.
So let's disabuse this absurd notion that "the rich" and their companies aren't paying their "fair share," which in the Left's mind would apparently be an effective rate of approximately 110 percent.
To determine how much Wal-Mart, for example, is paying in Nevada, you have to look not just at what taxes the company pays directly, such as property taxes, but how much tax revenue it generates from all the sales of products in their stores.
Without the Wal-Marts of this world, who would sell all of those products that rake in all that tax money for the state and pays the salaries of our public school teachers? Lynn Warne? Puh-lease.
In addition to all the sales tax revenue that Wal-Mart pays through its operations, you also have to take into consideration all the taxes paid by all the people Wal-Mart employs. If not for Wal-Mart, all of those greeters, cashiers and clerks wouldn't have jobs to pay for their homes, cars, vacations, etc. And instead of contributing to the tax base, those unemployed folks would be draining from it.
And what about all the stockholders who profit from corporations like Wal-Mart and then use those profits to buy more "stuff" that is taxed and sent to the government?
This insulting notion that large companies aren't paying their fair share in society is, to borrow a phrase from Jim Carrey, "a worthless steaming pile of cow dung."
And instead of demonizing and denigrating those individuals who have successfully achieved the American dream - to steal a line from Jack Nicholson - "I would rather you just said 'Thank you,' and went on your way."
Or to put it a bit more bluntly: Get off their backs!
• Chuck Muth is president of CitizenOutreach.com and blogs at MuthsTruths.com.
