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Real Tax Reform - Big Picture with Jack Atherton · Brian Thomas

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: 706 here at 55KRCD Talk Station. Ryan Thomas wishing everyone
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: a very happy, happy Wednesday. And to remind you, coming
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: up in an hour, we're going to be drinking wine
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  Speaker 1: here in studio, theoretically. Keegan Corcoran, our sommelier friend, I
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  Speaker 1: guess going to give us some Labor Day wine suggestions.
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: Judge Apolitano at 830. Donovan O'Neill coming up at the
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  Speaker 1: bottom of this hour about Concerned Veterans for America endorsements.
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  Speaker 1: And without further ado, there he is. It's time for
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  Speaker 1: The Big Picture with Jack Atherton. My friend Jack, I
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  Speaker 1: truly appreciate you coming on the show.
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  Speaker 2: And I'm glad I got you sober. All right, thanks
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  Speaker 2: so much, brother.
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  Speaker 1: I don't drink in the studios. You know, Jack, I
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  Speaker 1: can't do that. It's against the rules. And you know me,
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  Speaker 1: I'd never break a stupid arbitrary rule, Jack.
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  Speaker 2: I know you don't drink much anyway.
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  Speaker 1: No.
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  Speaker 2: But now that the primaries are behind us, one of
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  Speaker 2: the biggest issues in November is going to be taxes.
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  Speaker 2: Let me say at the outset, Ainsley and I are
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  Speaker 2: not rich. Yet I'm going to defend the riches at
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  Speaker 2: least the ones who earn their money honestly. Because Democrats
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  Speaker 2: are now threatening to, quote, tax the hell out of
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  Speaker 2: the rich, or to, quote, tax billionaires out of existence.
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  Speaker 2: Those rabble-rousing threats remind me of why I love Marxists.
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  Speaker 2: Not Karl Marx. My beloved Marx Brothers. Yes, in A
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  Speaker 2: Night at the Opera, Groucho loves and, of course, insults
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  Speaker 2: the opera's biggest donor, Margaret Dumont. She was great. His brother, Chico,
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  Speaker 2: somehow represents a singer who should be making a lot
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  Speaker 2: of money. But Groucho offers to pay him peanuts and
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  Speaker 2: then adds insult to injury by noting that the singer
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  Speaker 2: will also have to pay taxes. Federal tax, state tax,
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  Speaker 2: city tax, and don't forget the sewer tax. So, Chico asks...
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  Speaker 2: How much money can this guy actually take home? Well,
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  Speaker 2: Groucho says, I figure if he doesn't sing too often,
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  Speaker 2: he can break even. Depression audiences understandably howled with glee
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  Speaker 2: because they were suffering and they loved seeing the rich
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  Speaker 2: get soaked. But even when it was talent and discipline
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  Speaker 2: that made them rich, they still wanted to take their money,
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  Speaker 2: even if the rich were great inventors who said to
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  Speaker 2: employ thousands of out-of-work Americans by improving everyone's lives. Socialists
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  Speaker 2: then and now want to soak the rich, even if
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  Speaker 2: by seizing their assets, you still cannot provide everything politicians promise.
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  Speaker 2: Free housing, free food, free income, free medical care, free
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  Speaker 2: child care, free college, government doling out free everything. Until,
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  Speaker 2: as Margaret Thatcher warned, you run out of other people's money.
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  Speaker 2: Conservatives seemed ashamed to mention it. But 250 years ago,
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  Speaker 2: our founders included rich people like George and Martha Washington.
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  Speaker 2: She was the one with the money. Yet Martha did
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  Speaker 2: not urge George to just relax and live comfortably under
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  Speaker 2: King George. Instead, as we've discussed, at great personal peril,
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  Speaker 2: Martha Washington visited the general and his troops in their
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  Speaker 2: miserable frostbitten camps throughout the eight-year revolutionary struggle. But more
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  Speaker 2: important than rich people risking their necks, our founders also
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  Speaker 2: included people without much money, like Sam Adams, whose Boston
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  Speaker 2: beer business went bust. Sam still supported the American idea
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  Speaker 2: of God-given individual rights and responsibilities, because freedom includes the
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  Speaker 2: freedom to try and the freedom to fail. Both rich
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  Speaker 2: and poor back then never expected that Americans would live
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  Speaker 2: off their neighbors without having to work, without having to
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  Speaker 2: even look for work, or even get training for work,
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  Speaker 2: which is what Democrats now dangle before their voters, being
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  Speaker 2: able to live off other people's taxes. Because as Barack
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  Speaker 2: Obama said of entrepreneurs, you didn't build that. The America
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  Speaker 2: the Washingtons and Sam Adams founded was all about opportunity,
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  Speaker 2: not redistribution of wealth. So how did we get today's
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  Speaker 2: Democrat socialism? And what's the better way to set tax rates?
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  Speaker 2: Apart from the period around the Civil War, our federal
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  Speaker 2: government never levied income taxes at all until, after bitter debate,
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  Speaker 2: the 16th Amendment to the Constitution was ratified in 1913.
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  Speaker 2: Rates began at 1%. They rose to 7%. but only
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  Speaker 2: on income over $ 500, 000, which in today's dollars would be
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  Speaker 2: 15 million. The idea of broadly redistributing income and punishing
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  Speaker 2: high earners was never even considered until under post-crash Herbert Hoover,
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  Speaker 2: and especially Franklin Roosevelt, the income tax became confiscatory. The
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  Speaker 2: highest marginal rate raised to 79%. And then during World
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  Speaker 2: War II, 91% to fund not just a safety net,
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  Speaker 2: but an ever-mushrooming government. Still, economists seem to agree it
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  Speaker 2: was not taxation, but total mobilization for war that finally,
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  Speaker 2: after 15 years, lifted America out of the Great Depression.
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  Speaker 2: Expansion continued when peacetime America and private industry rebuilt our
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  Speaker 2: allies and ourselves. Post-war, Technology, which is becoming a dirty
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  Speaker 2: word somehow. Technology created millions of new jobs. Nevertheless, a Democrat,
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  Speaker 2: not a Democrat socialist, but a man who today would
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  Speaker 2: be considered a mega populist, John F. Kennedy, thought we
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  Speaker 2: could grow even more. As JFK put it, a rising
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  Speaker 2: tide lifts all boats. So the former PT boat commander
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  Speaker 2: slashed taxes across the board. from the top marginal rate
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  Speaker 2: of 91% down to 65%. Then, Ronald Reagan, with help
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  Speaker 2: from many pro-growth Democrats, the Gipper took top rates down
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  Speaker 2: to 28%. And that actually raised revenue. It always does,
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  Speaker 2: because tax cuts stimulate the economy. Despite ups and downs,
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  Speaker 2: we are still living off the Reagan boom. Sustained by
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  Speaker 2: further tax cuts by George W. Bush and Donald J. Trump. Friends,
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  Speaker 2: the biggest problem now is not tax rates, although they
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  Speaker 2: could always be lower. Our biggest problem is the politicizing
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  Speaker 2: of the tax code, manipulating the tax code to win
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  Speaker 2: elections and to allow outright corruption. We don't have time
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  Speaker 2: to catalog all the loopholes in our one-million-word tax code.
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  Speaker 2: But here's one example, Brian, of abuse and reform by
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  Speaker 2: a Republican, reformed by a Republican who was opposed by
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  Speaker 2: fellow Republicans. From the time he was an actor, Ronald
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  Speaker 2: Reagan resented sky-high taxes, but he hated tax cheats even more.
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  Speaker 2: So in 1986, Reagan signed a tax reform bill lowering rates,
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  Speaker 2: but also eliminating a whole slew of loopholes and phony deductions,
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  Speaker 2: including deductions for so-called white elephant real estate investments, investments
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  Speaker 2: that yielded no income, but allowed owners to take massive
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  Speaker 2: tax write-offs. Those deductions discouraged the productive use of property,
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  Speaker 2: including affordable housing. Politicized tax incentives over the last 80
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  Speaker 2: years have also sent U.S. manufacturing jobs overseas. They have
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  Speaker 2: subsidized lifestyles of the rich and famous while allowing deductions
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  Speaker 2: for everything, from meals to yachts, even used underwear. Yes,
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  Speaker 2: the Clintons wrote off $ 2 a pair. Of course they did.
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  Speaker 2: And politicizing the tax code has allowed the bloated IRS
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  Speaker 2: to target enemies. the way Democrat Lois Lerner in 2010
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  Speaker 2: targeted the tax reform Tea Party starting right here in Cincinnati.
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  Speaker 2: I think the answer is not to raise taxes on
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  Speaker 2: the rich or anyone else. Instead, as you know, Brian,
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  Speaker 2: I have always supported a flat federal income tax with
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  Speaker 2: almost no deductions or loopholes. The kind of flat tax
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  Speaker 2: as low as 10% that's boosted growth and revenue throughout
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  Speaker 2: the former communist countries of Eastern Europe. With a flat tax,
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  Speaker 2: if you earn 10 or 100 times more than I do,
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  Speaker 2: you pay 10 or 100 times more than I do.
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  Speaker 2: What's unfair about that? Now look, I don't imagine we
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  Speaker 2: can pass a flat tax or a consumption tax or
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  Speaker 2: any kind of sweeping tax reform in today's deeply polarized America.
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  Speaker 2: What I am saying, friends, don't believe corrupt politicians and
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  Speaker 2: their paymasters in both parties who demagogue this issue, promising
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  Speaker 2: that the answer to America's overspending, resulting in our now
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  Speaker 2: $ 40 trillion national debt, is to wink-wink, soak the rich,
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  Speaker 2: who will always escape soaking it anyway if they're relying
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  Speaker 2: on loopholes, which we have to get rid of. The
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  Speaker 2: answer is a simple, straightforward, and fair tax code. And
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  Speaker 2: we haven't even touched on state and local taxes, the
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  Speaker 2: reason some states, like Florida, Texas, and Tennessee, you were
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  Speaker 2: talking about that with a caller before, why those states
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  Speaker 2: are booming. while others like Ohio are just limping along.
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  Speaker 2: And imagine if we elect Democrats in November. But for now,
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  Speaker 2: is there anything you want to add or deduct, brother?
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  Speaker 1: Well, your thoughts and comments, as always, are truly insightful
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  Speaker 1: and brilliant, Jack, other than but You know, in the
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  Speaker 1: whole concept of never let a good crisis go to waste,
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  Speaker 1: the $ 40 trillion debt that Republicans and Democrats bear responsibility
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  Speaker 1: for over the years, that's a real crisis and it's
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  Speaker 1: coming to a head. People are now, you know, alarm
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  Speaker 1: bells going off for the amount of money we have
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  Speaker 1: to pay for debt service, et cetera, et cetera. I
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  Speaker 1: think that's the existential crisis that the Democrats and probably
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  Speaker 1: Republicans will use to justify a much higher income tax for, oh,
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  Speaker 1: I don't know, maybe, Jack, the literally trillions and trillions
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  Speaker 1: of dollars out there in senior 401k accounts you never
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  Speaker 1: know what the tax rate's going to be until you
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  Speaker 1: pull the money out and they could it could be
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  Speaker 1: going back to the 1970s brother 70 to 90 percent
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  Speaker 1: if they decide it that's certainly possible oh my god
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  Speaker 1: we are going we've spent ourselves into a an oblivion
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  Speaker 1: that might wipe out the fiat currency we're coming for your.
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  Speaker 2: 401ks yep 401ks social security entitlements of all kind medicare
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  Speaker 2: medicaid uh We've talked about that and we're going to
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  Speaker 2: have to again. Meantime, it's awful to be envious of
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  Speaker 2: other people, to covet your neighbor's goods and feel that
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  Speaker 2: someone else's success diminishes your own. In other countries throughout history,
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  Speaker 2: which is what we talk about every week, there have
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  Speaker 2: been classes set in stone. We've never had that in America.
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  Speaker 2: Anyone can succeed. My family, not my wife and I,
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  Speaker 2: right in this generation, but certainly my grandparents, anyone can succeed.
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  Speaker 2: They prove that. Or they can squander a fortune. We
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  Speaker 2: are not a nation of victims. Though at the core
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  Speaker 2: of the Democrat Socialist Party are not over-educated, as you
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  Speaker 2: love to point out, but over-credentialed young people who choose
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  Speaker 2: to study Marxist poison and then complain that they can't
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  Speaker 2: make a living.
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  Speaker 1: I know. Revealing their ignorance and their education choices in
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  Speaker 1: and of itself, Jack. I mean, And I got to
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  Speaker 1: comment real quickly on the tax code. I agree with
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  Speaker 1: you absolutely. Now, first off, I'm going to say I
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  Speaker 1: don't believe loopholes are loopholes. Loopholes suggest that, whoops, somebody
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  Speaker 1: screwed up creating an opportunity for someone to take advantage
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  Speaker 1: of a tax code. No, I think that's an advantage
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  Speaker 1: that they intended. They're too smart to create missed opportunities
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  Speaker 1: for people to write things off. So there's that. But
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  Speaker 1: the reason, and even if we weren't in such a
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  Speaker 1: partisan divide right now in this country, the reason we
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  Speaker 1: can't get a flak tax, which makes perfect sense, is
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  Speaker 1: because people It's the opportunity that our politicians use to
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  Speaker 1: manipulate us, both Republicans and Democrats, using the tax code
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  Speaker 1: to force us to do things we otherwise might not
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  Speaker 1: do in our prudent judgment, like invest a whole bunch
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  Speaker 1: of money in green energy projects.
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  Speaker 2: Why?
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  Speaker 1: Because the American taxpayer is going to supplement your investment
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  Speaker 1: and give you a great tax advantage. Look where we've
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  Speaker 1: gotten with that, Jack Atherton, but that's just one of
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  Speaker 1: a multitude of different things that have manipulated our behavior
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  Speaker 1: through the tax code. And if you had a flat tax, Jack,
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  Speaker 1: they would lose that power. And that's why I say
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  Speaker 1: politicians of all stripes probably would run away from that option.
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  Speaker 2: You're absolutely right. I'm not going to use the word
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  Speaker 2: loophole anymore. Instead, I'll talk about that glorious store called Washington, D.C.,
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  Speaker 2: where you can go and buy a politician and get
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  Speaker 2: a deduction or an exemption or some other way not
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  Speaker 2: to have to pay your fair share. Although, again, I'm
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  Speaker 2: not going to let the other side, including some Republicans now,
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  Speaker 2: we just heard one this past week locally, talk about
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  Speaker 2: how the rich shouldn't be allowed to become too rich.
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  Speaker 2: I just don't understand that way of thinking. Let everybody
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  Speaker 2: try to get as rich as they possibly can, and
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  Speaker 2: everybody's going to do better.
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  Speaker 1: Amen, brother. And you said the words fair share. We
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: could probably have another hour-long discussion on what the hell
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  Speaker 1: does fair share mean anyway, but if it's a flat tax. 10%.
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  Speaker 2: 10%, right.
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  Speaker 1: That's everybody's fair share. Jack Atherton, it's been a wonderful conversation.
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  Speaker 1: We call it the big picture conversation. Jack joins this
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  Speaker 1: program every Wednesday beginning at 7.05, and your brilliance is amazing, Jack,
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  Speaker 1: and I appreciate the points you make, and you are
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: always welcome here on the 55KRC Morning Show. As always,
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: best of health and love to you and your better half.
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  Speaker 1: We'll talk next Wednesday.