What's It All About?

First, let me state that I am a strong believer in balanced budgets and low taxes. I believe that fiscal responsibility is essential to the health of our nation and our future.

On April 15th, there was a tax protest that I found befuddling – the “tea party” sponsored by Fox News and certain members of the political right.

The Boston Tea Party of 1773 happened, in part, because the colonists felt the taxes on tea and other goods were unfair as they had no elected representatives in Parliament. The April 15 protesters have two senators and several congress people representing them in Washington so lack of representation cannot be the problem.

Nor are high taxes the real issue. The highest federal tax bracket today is 35%. The top bracket in 1950 was 91%. Even if Congress raises the top rate by two percent, the rich are not paying higher taxes now.

Finally, the protesters cannot be angry about the large federal deficit. If the deficit is the problem, they would have held this demonstration in 1984 when the federal deficit hit an all-time high. They had another chance to protest four years later when the deficit went even higher and another in 2004 when the deficit set another record. But they were silent.

So I ask myself, what was this latest "tea party" trying to communicate? As shown, lack of representation, high taxes, and the growing deficit are not the issues.

Do you see my dilemma? What was that really all about?

Election Campaign Truth

Candidates in England get about six weeks to campaign, the election is held, and then the politicians get back to the business of running the country. I sure wish it worked that way here.

Political campaigns in the United States give me a headache. There is precious little communicating and a whole lot of pontificating in campaign ads, speeches and from talking heads pretending to be journalists. The closer we get to the election, the more ridiculous it gets. Thank goodness for www.factcheck.org and www.votesmart.org.

Our country was founded on a great ideal but it works only if the citizens who live here take an active part in governing it. Sadly, we got lazy. Now we make our decisions based on the emotion generated by 30-second TV ads.

Why do we do that? We know politicians lie to us yet we believe what they say without question – no matter how preposterous it all sounds. We put our common sense on the shelf and hope that the people who run for office, whether school board trustee or president of the United States, can be trusted. Unfortunately, recent history shows us that many people asking for our support are lying to get it.

For those who care about the choices they make, there is a Web site that sorts fact from fiction. www.factcheck.org is a non-partisan site that shows us the truth behind the claims made in speeches and ads. www.votesmart.org tells us, among other things, where the millions of dollars come from that finance a candidate’s campaign and provides a view of a candidate’s actual voting record. Both sites include races for Congress and the Senate in addition to providing information about the presidential contest.

Perhaps the reason we no longer seek the truth is that, as one famous movie character stated, “You can’t handle the truth.” I remain optimistic that we Americans will ignore the television ads and find out the whole story on the candidates. If we don’t, we have lost the one thing our founding fathers fought so hard to gain – the freedom to govern ourselves. If we blindly believe what we are told, we might as well go back to being ruled by a king.

Please. Before you trust what any politician tells you in a campaign ad, find out the facts. Visit www.factcheck.org and www.votesmart.org often.