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Politics always was a dirty game and I usually don't write about it. People in the old days didn't mind it as much since some of the gravy fell onto the plate of the little guy. There used to be a saying and that was "let me dip my beak". What this referred to was the fact that there used to be people like district leaders that would go around and make sure people that were in their district had coal to heat their fires in the winter or something to eat so they wouldn't starve. Of course this was 50 years ago or more and these type of things don't seem to happen now.

There is a new saying today and it is "screw the middle class and poor". I hope that most of you will look at this article objectively and not through those party glasses. This article was meant to show what is happening from a moral point of view not a political one.

I wonder if anyone remembers how everyone used to be able to deduct credit card and loan interest from their taxes at the end of the year? And why not, this money was not really income, since it never got into the hands of the credit card holders. The idea was that the credit card companies would have to claim it as profit and that way the taxes on it would still be paid. This is not taking into account that the big companies have many ways around paying taxes on their full profits however. But the idea was sound. Then someone in the government decided that more money could be sucked from the middle class and poor if this deduction was no longer allowed and so we lost it, and the interest on credit cards and loans was taxed twice. One onto the card holder and a second time onto the company. Those in government figured, hey why not, if no one complains we are home free.

While the middle class and poor lost this tax deduction, the rich gained more deductions. As if this wasn't enough, things kept getting better for them while things got much worse for most everyone else. Jobs that Americans held were sent to foreign countries, and many skilled and educated workers no longer could find employment in their fields. It is true that employment might have went up, but the quality of employment went down. Examples of this are everywhere. One that I will cite is the person that had a degree in computer science but after a year of job searching, after his company went out of business, he was forced to take employment in a retail store. Don't get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with working in a store, but the position paid only about 30% of what he had been making originally and his education was being wasted. There are so many of these stories.

Now a panel is proposing the changes but a panel that was hand picked. Was it supposed to come to the conclusions that it reached? I would hope things didn't go that far. What the panel is proposing is sacrilegious. It is the destruction of the middle class and some housing markets through the country. Some of it's proposals are:

Four tax brackets 15%, 25%, 30% and 33%

On the face of it, this part would mean an increase in taxes. But it is not an equitable increase across the board because certain deductions will be taken away from the middle and poor class while other deductions will be given to the upper class. Because of this, only the poor and middle classes will be paying almost the full percentages.

No tax on company dividends.

Score another one for our rich friends.

Elimination of deductions for home owners for property and school tax.

Yeah, lets take everything away from the small guy. To tell you the truth, I don't know how a politician could even propose this without choking on his words. I guess this fits nicely with trying to take away some or all of the Social Security benefits.

Elimination of the marriage benefit.

Another deal to push the little guy further down. It seems like it never stops. If the government is so desperate for money, why are we spending hundreds of billions of dollars in Iraq and Afghanistan and granting huge tax benefits to all those rich people?

Elimination of standard deduction, personal exemption, child tax credits and earned income credit.

These types of deductions are known to benefit mainly lower and middle income people.

Mortgage Interest Deduction.

This will be replaced by a credit of 15% of the interest paid. This is a political ploy to play off one part of the country against the other. A national formula will be used to determine the value of your home. This formula is weighted against the northeast where the homes are much more expensive. Guess what, that is exactly the area which didn't vote for the current President. What a coincidence, isn't it?

Deductions for state and local taxes will be eliminated.

Again, another deduction for the little guy right down the drain. Here are taxes that he is paying and he has to pay tax on that amount because the deduction for it would be disallowed. Talk about immoral, it doesn't get much worse than this.

Long term capital gains tax would be set to a maximum tax rate of only 8.25 %.

Those rich guys that derive their incomes from this type of investment would be allowed to pay much less tax, percentage wise, than the rest of us, as their ceiling is much lower. Not only that, but they have been getting some nice shiny new tax reductions right along.

Tax deferred savings such as IRAs, 401(k)s and 529 college savings plans will be gone with the wind as far as tax credits are concerned.

They don't want those middle class people getting too much of an education, apparently. So they have decided not only to keep them broke but stop their children from getting ahead. In ancient times the rich were the educated and the poor were, well, just the miserable poor who would work for low wages and get taken advantage of. Are certain of our leaders trying to set up that type of society again?

Health benefits from employers would be treated as income if above $5,000 per person or $11,500 per family.

Now they want you to pay tax on money again that never went into your pocket, same as the lost credit on your tax payments.

This proposal should be railed against by every true American. First of all, as I said, it is an immoral giveaway to the rich on the backs of all middle class and poor Americans. Our country was made great by the fact that everyone had equal rights to better education, and a decent life. These things would be sorely eroded under this proposed tax change. The ranks of the poor would once more swell again and the shrinking middle class would be forced to live a miserable existence that would make the times of today look like a paradise. Let me say that I have absolutely nothing against the rich and wish them well, but just not on the backs of the rest of us.

Every politician that agrees with this tax change or votes for it, should be voted out of office. By supporting such an offensive bill they will have clearly demonstrated that they certainly are not interested in the middle or poor class and that they view us with contempt and feel that we are only fit to fund their misdirected programs and pork barreling. The time as come, America needs a change.

By the way a second proposal was also made. While the amounts are different, most of the cuts to the middle and lower class are the same or near the same. Just a note, the heads of the panel were former U.S. Senators Connie Mack of Florida and John Breaux of Louisiana. Would sitting senators have dared to make such a suggestion?