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With “friends” like Republicans, who needs Democrats?

Just yesterday I wrote about a new betrayal out of Washington from our spineless Republicans “representatives” who just passed a “pro-gun” bill—but not pro-gun in a Second Amendment “shall not be infringed” kind of way, rather in a showmanship and superficial pro-gun way. The LEOSA Reform Act (H.R. 2243) would establish a national constitutional carry…but only for law enforcement. (At this time, I suggest you read Monica Showalter’s blog on “cops who act like third-world cops because they are third-world cops” found here.) Can we the civilian class, or as George Mason would say, “the militia,” get the same recognition of God-given rights?

I ask, sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people except for a few public officials.

Nope! Who do we think we are?! We’re just Washington’s tax slaves.

But I digress.

The GOP’s proposed new tax bill is out, which President Trump has been describing as “big” and “beautiful.” But, business mogul Kevin O’Leary of Shark Tank fame has some other adjectives in mind when it comes to the bill: he calls it “big” and “ugly.”

According to O’Leary—who actually read the proposal—the new Republican tax bill is historically bad: in his words, “I’ve never seen anything like it.” It’s “anti-American” and adds new provisions that will penalize and harm small businesses trying to survive in a tax-heavy environment.

From Kristen Altus at Fox News, via the New York Post:

The O’Leary Ventures chairman put the onus on the end of the pandemic-era Employee Retention Credit (ERC), which gave government money to businesses that kept Americans employed throughout COVID.

‘That program’s over. They want to give new powers to the IRS to audit all those small businesses for up to nine years. That’s unprecedented. Why would we want to do that to small business?’ he posited.

‘So many of these audits would occur after the period where they don’t have their records,’ O’Leary expanded. ‘This is war on small business.’

Giving the IRS more power? An unconstitutional agency that’s exclusively in the business of theft, stealing from hardworking Americans year after year with threat of prison time or death? Let me just make a little prediction: it’ll only get worse from there.

Also, from Altus:

Notably absent from the rough draft was legislation around state and local tax (SALT) deduction caps, a new millionaires’ tax bracket, eliminating taxes on tips, overtime wages and Social Security checks for retirees.

If you recall, those were major campaign promises, none of which would be fulfilled with this new tax code. From an article at The New Republic:

During a heated exchange between Representative Tom Suozzi and Thomas Barthold, the chief of staff on the Joint Committee of Taxation, it became abundantly clear that none of those promises would be happening.

‘On tips—the president said, ‘Your tips will be a 100 percent yours.’ Does this tax bill continue the payroll tax on people’s tips?’ asked Suozzi.

‘Yes it does,’ said Barthold.

So we keep the income tax, and add tariffs. What joy.

Image: Randstad Canada, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons, unaltered.