An Identity Crisis: NC House GOP & Speaker Thom
Rob “Mr. Politics” Christensen tells us that “tax reform” is dead and buried. Never mind that a proposal to abolish the corporate income tax is very much alive and well in the state Senate. Don’t be too hard on ol’ Rob. He’s not all that observant. Heck, he followed John Edwards around for months and months and months and never noticed that blonde with the video camera. (Huh? Rielle? Rielle who?)
McClatchy-Raleigh ran over to Speaker Senator Speaker (Spenator?) Thom Tillis seeking validation for their narrative that the GOP has #FAILED at tax reform. Ol’ Thom obliged them, of course:
House Speaker Thom Tillis made clear Tuesday that the divide between the House and Senate tax plans remains a wide gulf.
In an interview, Tillis said the two chambers need to breach a “philosophical” divide — one that may take days, if not longer, to reconcile. His tone seemed to differ from Senate leader Phil Berger earlier in the day. “We are trying to change the mix in a way we believe will actually stimulate economic activity,” Tillis said. “I think the Senate is trying to do the same thing, but they have also focused on spending reductions –which we all want, but we need to do it at a pace that we can actually absorb.”
Tillis said House Republicans are concerned about cutting too deep into revenue needed for state spending priorities and hurt local governments, forcing them to increase property taxes.
So, our Supreme Leader is legitimizing the Democrat / Keynesian argument that the government knows best how to spend OUR MONEY. The GOP state and national platforms say the GOP is all about the free market. That means the party allegedly believes that people — their choices and their labor — are what stimulate economic growth. NOT government. If Republicans can’t agree on THAT — what’s left?
It appears the party platform doesn’t mean much to some of those folks in the NC House. At the recent GOP state convention, a plank was inserted into the party platform opposing HOT lanes and toll roads. The very next week, the House approved a budget funding the implementation of HOT lanes and toll roads.
Senator Speaker (Senaker?) Tillis continued:
As for the criticism that the Senate plan doesn’t represent tax “reform,” but merely a tax cut, Tillis said its “a valid question.”
Whose criticism? The stuff coming from Democrats and their lapdogs at McClatchy and WRAL? Reform means change. I would say that abolishing the state’s corporate income tax is one hell of a change. Lefties in government and the media don’t like the idea of shrinking government and letting people keep more of their hard-earned money. Republicans are supposedly in favor of that.
Tillis’s dig at the Senate is clearly a slap at president pro tem Phil Berger, who is still reportedly eyeing a campaign for US Senate. Ol’ Thom has already announced for the race. Recent polling already shows him faring worse against Kay Hagan than Berger or physician Greg Brannon . But TT is working on that. He’s got trolls posting anonymous comments trashing Brannon on this site and others. His buddy Carter Wrenn — still seeking relevance after,um, departing the Helms fold in the early 90s — is taking shots at Brannon.
So, is this a sign of things to come? Is legislative business taking a back seat to scoring points against potential US Senate primary opponents?
If the game plan is for Tillis to spend the rest of this legislative term running to McClatchy to take shots at Phil Berger and the Senate, that doesn’t bode well for the people of North Carolina who put the GOP in power in Raleigh hoping for relief from oppressive taxation and burdensome government red tape.
Tillis is an establishment hack who carries water for the special interests – exactly what we do NOT need in the US Senate, and need to get rid of in the legislature. He is little different from Kay Hagan in that regard.
It is absolutely shameful the way he is carrying water for La Raza and some farming special interests to try to get driving permits for illegal aliens. It is shameful the way he carried water for the Green Energy boondogglers in halting the repeal of the Renewal Energy Mandate. Not repealing that mandate will cost consumers a bundle to prop up inefficient and politicized crony capitalism. It is shameful the way he carried water for Big Ag to goose step all over the property rights of other citizens by downgrading the ability to bring nuisance lawsuits against things like factory hog farms.
My primary interest in whom we sent to the U.S. Senate is in someone who will vote to stop the President from sending men and money abroad to fight needless wars and to stop him from maintaining the surveillance state which has grown for a hundred years. Tolls roads and corporate taxes are peripheral issues. On the other hand, Rome wasn’t built in a day and our “Rome Empire” won’t be deconstructed in a day or one Congress or one General Assembly. New legislators must be elected every two years who are dedicated to the program of retrenching the American Empire back into the Republic given us by our founders. If a deliberate “go slow” approach to tax and other governmental reform, the reduction of the welfare-warfare state as we know it is necessary to keep the public on board and our party (not the Dems or the GOP, but those dedicated to the principles of the Republic and of Liberty), then, by all means, take that deliberate approach. Seasoned politicians – those who may be viewed as part of the “establishment” know something about what it takes to get re-elected. We can’t be constantly back-biting or distrusting one another. That is how the French Revolution descended into wholesale slaughter and chaos. We assess the competence, dedication and reliability of our leaders on the front end. Then we trust in them, and, most basically, trust in God.
I have less trouble with property taxes than income taxes. Both require citizens and other persons to account to the State for their possessions and their activities – things no man can be obliged to do and still be said to live “free”. But the property tax is less intrusive, particularly when limited to real property, which by its nature is always open to public viewing, at least from without. Least of all do I have a problem with the corporate income tax. The corporation is a creature of the State and, as such, can be obliged to do whatever the State bids. No one is obliged to go to the State to do his business. He does so for the state created advantages it will bring him.
Better it would be, and more likely to win re-election, to eliminate the personal income tax, and leave corporations to pay the income tax, until that day the public can be weaned from the programs that necessitate such taxation.
When an issue on the GOP agenda has middling support, going slow may make some sense. On the other hand, getting it over with also can make some sense.
What Tillis does, however, is take a popular issue like Voter ID, which is way ahead in the polls, and insists on watering it down. That makes no sense whatsoever. Or he takes an issue that is highly unpopular, like drivers permits for illegal aliens, and tries to ram it through. That is showing that he is either dumb as a brick or playing to the special interests. May bet is on the latter, and that is one of the big reasons we do NOT need Tillis as our nominee.
Tillis ought to go back north, where he came from, if he wants to run for federal office, as his liberal / special interest lackey ideology might fit in better there.
You both make good points. But in the end. Can Thillis be trusted to do the right thing, or what he told you? No. So what difference does it make where he stands?
He is all about money and is willing to do ANYTHING to get some, not unlike most. I don’t want to see Kay get back in, but I hate to vote for somebody who flip flops or outright lies just to vote against her. It’s a sad shape we are in.
Tillis is nothing more than a Tammany Hall style pol – on the take to the highest bidder. he doesn’t even try to hide it.