A New Year's Gift From Congress: Higher Taxes For Just About Everyone!

Happy New Year, liberty lovers!  The turning of a new year is a great time to not only reflect on the past year, but hopefully to also learn from it and make some changes for the coming year.  Many people use the New Year to declare "resolutions", the result of which are theoretically intended to create positive changes in one's life.  Even though we, as humans, will often fall back into old habits, it can certainly be a positive excercise to state some goals and attempt to achieve them.The United States Congress on the other hand, goes about things a bit differently.This year Congress let the much-ballyhoo'd December 31, 2012 "fiscal cliff" deadline pass only to negotiate a deal under the cover of New Year's Day.  Of course, most people are spending New Year's Day out celebrating and not paying attention to the news.  Also quite conveniently, most if not all Congressional offices are closed on New Year's Day and therefore unable to take any possible complaints from angry constituents. It's quite a crafty move, one employed by President Obama last year when he signed the NDAA, indefinite detention and all, into law under the cover of New Year's Eve.  Instead of learning from past mistakes, such as the massive amount of deficit spending and subsequent kick-the-can-down-the-road deals that led to the much-ballyhoo'd "fiscal   cliff" crisis, Congress continued to prove that changing the party in power never changes policy. With control over the House of  Representatives, Republicans in particular had an opportunity to make a principled stand and refuse to back any bill that raised taxes on Americans and didn't drastically reduce spending. This would not only be in line with what Republicans claim to stand for, but it's also the only legitimate way to tackle the massive deficit problem.  Sounds like a no-brainer, huh? Of course, most Republicans don't actually stand for reducing government in any way other than rhetoric.  At this point we shouldn't be surprised when great Republican "leaders" such as John Boehner and big government illusionst Paul Ryan vote for bills that both raises taxes and spending while hailing themselves as heroes for avoiding the "fiscal cliff".The very idea of the fiscal cliff was an invented crisis in the first place. The reality is that the U.S. Government has already gone over the fiscal cliff and only drastic cuts in government, such as those proposed by Ron Paul during his Presidential campaign, have any hope of cushioning the landing.  Instead government continues to grow, ensuring that the fiscal cliff dive ultimately ends in a disastrous and prolonged landing. Until then, we can all enjoy knowing that the State will get even more of our hard-earned money.Despite all the rhetoric of how Congress "prevented tax increases on everyone but the rich", the facts speak otherwise.  The fiscal cliff deal ignores the automatic payroll tax increase.  The payroll tax, which supposedly funds Social Security and Medicare (we know better), automatically rose by 2% on January 1st for nearly 80% of taxpayers as a result of the 201 debt ceiling deal expiring. Bottom line: if you get a paycheck, your taxes are going up.  According to Joe Rosenberg of the Tax Policy Center: 

A household making $50,000 to 75,000 a year will make $822 less this year than last year, according to Rosenberg’s calculations. Those making $75,000 to $100,000 will see $1,206 less in their paychecks, while those making $200,000 to $500,000 will see a drop of $2,711 in their paychecks.Workers making $500,000 to $1 million will see a drop of $14,812 in their paychecks, more than $1,000 a month.

But wait, there's more! The bill also includes $76 billion in special "tax credits" for certain connected crony corporations (tongue twister!!!!). And if that weren't enough, the bill actually increases government spending!For a full breakdown of the fiscal cliff deal, check out Ben Swann's excellent summary.FOX19.com-Cincinnati News, Weather And this is before we even talk about the various Obamacare taxes set to kick in!2013 will once again be a year of higher taxes and bigger government.  Of course, if liberty activists such as ourselves have any say in it, it will also be a year when more people than ever continue to realize the folly of the two-party system, and open themselves to the ideals of liberty.  We at least plan to have fun trying, with plenty of new ventures planned for the year ahead. We hope our readers old and new will be along for the ride!Receive access to ALL of our EXCLUSIVE bonus audio content – including “Conspiracy Corner”, “Degenerate Gamblers” and the “League of Liberty Podcast” by joining the Lions of Liberty Pride and supporting us on Patreon!