Makers & Payers vs. Takers & Players

Back in 2011, I wrote a piece about the battle between voters and taxpayers. I noted then that,

the real source of the crises facing the major currencies, and, in fact, our core economic well-being . . . comes down to a very simple and basic fact. The western nations have developed societies where those who pay for government services, in general, are not the ones benefitting from the services. In the United States, for example, we have the top one percent of earners paying 38-41% of all Federal income tax. We have nearly half of Americans who pay no income tax, and another large percentage 15-20% who pay minimal income tax (and lets not even get into "Earned Income Tax Credits".) We essentially have a society where some 25% of the income earners pay close to 90% of all Federal income taxes. That 25% does not consume anywhere near 90% of the services provided by the Feds.

The 2016 elections in the US showed that this battle certainly proved the case, again. Look at the electoral map, especially by counties, and you will see the country is awash in a tide of red; the Democrat strongholds of blue are little islands in a vast sea of Republican red. The Founding Fathers, in their great wisdom, designed our electoral college system to ensure that all parts of the country had a voice and that there would be limitations on the "tyranny of the majority."

According to the liberal media, of course, the majority, as represented by the popular vote, is actually Democratic, with Hillary winning the popular vote by perhaps a million votes. Irrelevant for a number of reasons. We, first of all, do not have direct election of the president, and it is unfortunate that the schools no longer teach the Constitution. There are, in addition, many electoral systems around the world where the popular vote does not directly translate into political power, including in most parliamentary systems. Even well-established and "democratic" parliamentary systems do not have direct election of the head of government, so we are not alone in that. Second, as noted, the electoral college system was meant as a brake on regional or urban majorities from being able to impose their will across our vast and very diverse country. Third, we might note, a typical Republican voter is more likely to be representing a family than many of the urban Democratic voters. Last, we might note, that there are some vigorous investigations underway, e.g. here, that are demonstrating what many of us have known all along (see here and here, for example): the Democrats launched a massive voter fraud effort for the 2016 elections, including having the President urge aliens to vote without fear of consequences. It seems that easily some three million votes were cast for Hillary by non-citizens, and nobody knows yet how many millions of dead voters weighed in for the Democratic candidate--all that, of course, in addition to the Democrats' usual drive to have multiple voting. I believe we could easily deduct some five to six million votes from Hillary's total.

All that, however, is irrelevant to the point of today's post: The red areas, overwhelmingly, are the parts of the country that actually make and grow things. These are the makers and the payers. Their energy and creativity support the blue takers and players. As we see in the anti-Trump riots now sputtering along in various parts of the country, and sure to make appearances at the inauguration ceremonies in DC next January, the people doing the rioting and breaking and playing around, obviously, have no jobs to worry about or families to support.

If President Trump keeps faith with those makers and payers, he will be a great president.