Tax plan is shameful

I will admit that it feels a little painful to pay my taxes every quarter. But on my desk is a note card with the following quote from an 1848 committee report to the State Senate of Ohio: “Rightful taxation is the price of social order.”

It reminds me of the benefit I reap when I pay my share of taxes. Indeed, the way we collect and spend our money reflects the values our society holds.

In an article published in the Daily Local News, “Trump, GOP weigh surtax on wealthy, doubled deduction” (9/27/17), Marcy Gordon and Andrew Taylor of the Associated Press give us a snapshot of some of those values.

They write about the proposal to slash corporate tax rates, lower the rate in the top bracket, and eliminate the estate tax.

There is a token benefit to the middle class, but the bulk of the spoils go to the most wealthy among us. Working and middle class families are struggling.

The wealth gap between those at the top and those at the bottom in the United States is widening. Trickle down economics has not worked in our country in the past, no matter how many times it’s been touted.

I cannot fathom why anyone believes the President or Congressional Republicans when they try to con us with it now.

I would like to see a tax plan that emphasizes a fairer distribution of financial responsibility and supports a moral federal budget. It is clear that this tax plan will do no such thing.

Instead, it will continue to widen the gap by cutting taxes for the ultra wealthy and necessitate deep cuts to the programs that are keeping the middle and lower classes afloat, even as we see Republicans suggest astronomical increases to military spending. This plan is shameful.

Cheryle Oshman Blunt

West Chester

Demand reform

America is reeling from a man-made disaster of unspeakable violence: the Las Vegas gun massacre.

How do we come to grips with a man who stockpiles more than 40 high powered guns with the intent of killing as many people as possible with a shower of automatic gun fire? 59 dead, 527 injured in 10 minutes of terror .... how does something like this happen?

As far as we know, the shooter bought the guns legally. Some of the guns were automatic weapons, which fire like machine guns.

Some of the weapons were semi automatic rifles that were modified to shoot like a machine gun.

Although heavily regulated and not being manufactured since1989, automatic weapons are legal, as are modifiers for semi-automatics to make them shoot like automatic weapons. Why? How is it than any citizen needs to own firepower that is so dangerous in the wrong hands? This disturbed man was able to get off thousands of rounds in the space of 10 minutes. THERE IS NO JUSTIFICATION FOR MILITARY STYLE WEAPONS TO BE LEGAL!

Australia suffered its worst mass shooting with a semi automatic weapon at Port Arthur in 1997 with 37 killed.

Within 3 months, Australia banned semi automatic rifles and paid the public to give up these dangerous weapons destroying over 500,000 guns. Since then, there have been no mass shootings in Australia.

Will our country have the will needed to overcome the gun lobby to do what is necessary to do the same thing?

We can’t even pass Universal Background Checks on all gun sales, including private sales, which even 80% of gun owners agree with.

The gun lobby will say it is not the gun, it is the shooter.

I say that our country does not have a monopoly on dangerous people.

At the very least, we can ban the most dangerous of weapons, including confiscating automatics, banning semi automatic rifles like the AR-15 and AK-47, and their modifiers like bump stocks that make them fire like automatics.

Unless the vast majority of people in this country rise up and demand serious change to save lives, the next mass shooting is right around the corner.

Tom Buglio West Chester