A Billion For Your Thoughts

Recently, billionaire Warren Buffett said he would prefer a Democrat as President (See Full Story). Of course, this is not new for Buffett, he has basically endorsed every Democrat from Bill Clinton to Al Gore to John Kerry. It is no wonder that a guy like Warren Buffet would vote for a Democrat because he is a Social Liberal. This is evidenced by his comment about our system of taxes in the United States at a fundraiser for Hillary Clinton (last year): "If you’re in the luckiest 1 per cent of humanity, you owe it to the rest of humanity to think about the other 99 per cent.” (See Full Story).

Yesterday, Carl Icahn, another billionaire, told Bloomberg News that Barack Obama would make a terrible President. He blasted Barack Obama on his campaigning to raising taxes in a weak economic environment. At the same time, he was concerned that Obama's new spending programs would further erode the confidence in the U.S. dollar and would result in higher interest rates and inflation (See Full Story).

So, which billionaire is right?

One, Warren Buffett, is speaking more from his heart than from his head. The other, Carl Icahn, is clearly thinking logically about the effect of taxes and spending on the overall health of this country.

Warren Buffet, who is worth more than 52 billion dollars, isn't speaking logically. He gained his wealth because of a system of government that affords everyone the potential of being a billionaire. Unless Mr. Buffett is keeping his "billions" under his mattress, his untaxed monies and their investment in American businesses are being used in some fashion to build other businesses and jobs in this country. Much of the taxes that he and we are paying are going towards high government waste. In most cases, 50 cents on every dollar that we send to Washington is eaten up in the expense to deliver its services. Mr. Buffett made his billions by investing in the best of American companies. If our government was a company, there is no way that Mr. Buffett would invests in such a wasteful operation. Yet, he would condone more waste through even bigger government programs by putting another "tax and spend" Democrat into the Presidency. If Mr. Buffett is concerned about his wealth and not paying enough taxes, his outlet is to give his wealth away to the poor in the form of charitable giving. He could set up endowments and tuition assistance for the less fortunate of this country. And, he could do it with substantially more efficiency than if our government tried to do the same thing. But, like the typical liberal that he is, he would prefer that our tax system, alone, take care of the less fortunate in America and in the world.

Carl Icahn is right. Taxes are killing businesses in this country. They are driving jobs off shore. The faith in the U.S. dollar is at an all time low. It is at a low because we are not the economic powerhouse that we once were. International investors are dumping U.S. dollars for other currencies because of our bloated government. A government of waste and increasing national debt. Over the last 8 year's of the Bush Administration, our situation has gotten worse because, although we reduced taxes, we "did not" reduce spending and, as a result, we allowed our Federal deficit to grow. That is why a "big government spending" candidate like Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton would be all wrong. Icahn knows that and he speaks the truth.