Edgar Allen Beem attributes our “economic hole” to Republican “deficit spending, needless wars” and corporate tax breaks.

But since January 2009, the national debt and unemployment rate tripled, and the budget deficit quadrupled, via various bailouts, an unwanted health care act, another needless war, and other stunningly inept fiscal policies, all overlooked by Beem.

This is an interesting example of Apologetics, the practice of selecting only the data that justify your preconceived ideas, and ignoring the rest.

Beem accuses those who point out that half the population doesn’t pay income tax, of blaming the poor for their own plight. In effect, he shoots the messenger without addressing the problem.

To be fair, though, he does redeem himself in the penultimate sentence of his article: “Raise taxes on everyone.”

I agree. Everyone should pay at least some income tax, which would both raise revenue and create a shared incentive to limit big government.

But on the way to that lofty goal, Beem criticizes the “weak-minded lower-middle-class” for being “brainwashed” by Republicans, just because they are wary of higher taxes and other “government action to promote the common welfare … .”

He described one such “jerkie” who disagreed with the Administration’s welfare agenda, while picking up a prescription, “100 percent paid for by Medicare”; the “jerkie” was obviously “brainwashed” and incapable of independent thought.

Of course, the “jerkie”‘ was undoubtedly paying for Medicare coverage from his Social Security check, which, in turn he would have already paid for.

More Apologetics?

Paul S. Bachorik
Falmouth

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