My Latest Column in the Springfield Missouri News-Leader

Anyone who attempts to stay abreast of current events can easily come to the conclusion that our elected leaders are clueless about why we are in such an economic mess, much less what might help alleviate it. If the solution does not involve printing funny money and paying off past and future supporters, they wouldn’t consider it.

I hearken back to election summer, 2008, when the financial sector freefall began. McCain and Obama suspended their campaigns and rushed to Washington to be involved in the “solution”; they emerged with the “solution” of bailing out, buying out, controlling, whatever, those entities “too big too fail” with imaginary funds.

Has there been an original thought regarding our economy in Washington in the last 50 years? One that did not involve the usual political payoffs, vote buying, and lobbyist-loving that has dominated our government my entire life?

Personal experience: That same summer of 2008, republican presidential hopeful John McCain visits Springfield. He speaks. He invites questions. I decide to ask a question. What to ask? I thought of asking him something about defense or homeland security, but decided those would result in obvious softballs. So I asked about an issue that I have long studied and believe would revolutionize the American economy. I asked if he was familiar with the Fair Tax, and what he thought about it. Wow. He began pacing around the stage while I bloviated (and indulged in a little self-promotion) about the virtues of the Fair Tax. His tepid response said much more than he verbalized, and as I watch the video today, I realize that what he really said, in a nutshell was this: “This is too complicated for you regular people to grasp” (this is what avowed liberals always say, as well). “We in Washington control the 60,000-page tax code, and we like that. We use it to punish enemies and reward our friends. Forget about it.”

You can see the video on my YouTube page, or just google “Jeff Parnell” “John McCain”.

What if, instead of destroying the free enterprise system, the middle-class, and private property rights, our leaders had come forth and stated that the time had come to put politics aside and think outside the box. What if they simply enacted HR25, putting in place the Fair Tax and abolishing the IRS? America would have become the tax haven of the world. Our economy would have received an injection of capital like the world has never seen. Social Security and Medicare would be saved.

If you are not familiar with the concept of the Fair Tax, I encourage you to look into it. There are countless websites in addition to numerous excellent books on the subject. If enacted, it represent the greatest transfer of power from government to the people since that day in 1776 when another group of leaders resolved to think outside of the box.

Perhaps it is just too complicated for regular people like us to understand.

Jeff Parnell