Originally Posted by Villages Kahuna

Bucco, you are sooo sensitive. If it weren't for the fact that my reference to Tom deLay came directly from a New York Times article on the growth of the influence of lobbyists, I might even take it personally.

Just to set the record straight, so no one gets confused about my politics...

• Until the 2000 Presidential Election I never voted for any candidate other than a Republican.
• Now I call myself a "center-left independent" and I will vote for whomever I believe to be the best candidate with no concern whatsoever for party affiliation.
• I voted for Barack Obama and believe that he was and is the best choice as the President to lead our country.
• I am particularly pleased with the progress the Obama administration has achieved in satisfying so many of the promises made during the campaign. That is a refreshing change from many prior years and many prior candidates who said one thing while campaigning and then did anther after being elected. Obama certainly seems to be a "what you're getting is what he promised" candidate in that he has not surprised with the legislation he has pushed thru Congress.
• I think many in the U.S. Congress are self-serving political hacks with little interest in anything other than their own re-election and the power of their political party.
• I believe that in recent years, particularly in the last decade or so, that our governance has become much more for the benefit of special interests than for the people.
• I particularly disdain Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Barney Frank, Chris Dodd and Charles Rangel. I think that other members such as Richard Shelby, Lindsey Graham, Mitch McConnell and Charles Schumer are egotistical and idealogical blowhards.
• I believe that the most wealthy Americans have benefitted greatly from the political polices of the last dozen or so years at the expense of the middle class.
• I am offended by those on either the far left or far right of the political spectrum. I am particularly offended by those with an interest only in a narrow spectrum of social or religious issues.

Now, let's get on with our discussion.

Thanks for finding the distribution of tax payments for the last three years. I found the concentration interesting. Initially, I thought that maybe the wealthy were being asked to carry too much of the burden, but when I re-considered the data, other questions crossed my mind. Why is the upper 15-16% of taxpayers bearing so much of the load, an increasing amount actually? Is it because the concentration of their income(s) has so exceeded that of the middle and lower classes that even with relatively low marginal tax rates, they still pay more taxes than the lowest 85% of taxpayers? The discussion of what is a fair distribution of the tax burden only makes sense if the distribution of income is fairly normal. If the distribution is skewed heavily towards high incomes, the resulting tax payments will naturally be as they have been for the last few years.

As far as free-market, capitalistic, "trickle down" economic theory is concerned, all I can say is that the performance of our economy for the last decade or so, capped by the current financial crisis, has proven that economic ideology to be ineffective in achieving its theoretical objectives--at least in the short term. The reason for its failure might not be all economic. Cultural, moral and political faults certainly are on the list of causal factors. But currently, the only solution appears to be massive intervention by government forces, regardless of the variance from desired economic theory. The cost of such intervention not happening is simply too great. Whether our economy and government can ever return to the pure free-market capitalism that many believe is most desirable is a question that may not be answerable for a decade or so.

P.S. That National Taxpayers Union website is a good one.