This page was last updated on May 9, 2012.
Verify your facts; Thomas Finch; Beaver County Times; May 6, 2012.
The BCT has published at least 35 letters from Mr. Finch since December 2004. At least 27 of these letters were anti-Bush and/or anti-Republican and they never disappoint. Here is one example. You can find the remaining Finch letters I critiqued in the critique archives. As usual, this letter is little more than a string of leftist talking points. I wish he could get a regular column in the BCT. I also wish he could get at least five minutes per day on a local radio and/or TV station.
Below is a detailed critique of the subject letter.
“It is ironic that Joseph Zanella’s April 26 letter was headlined ‘Myth versus reality’ because after reading the first sentence, I correctly concluded the rest of the letter was myth as well and had nothing to do with reality.
“‘The highest U.S. wage earners aren’t white, but actually the smallest U.S. minority, Asians.’ Really? If Mr. Zanella did research – instead of just regurgitating half-baked Tea Party propaganda – he’d be surprised to learn that the list of the Forbes 400 wealthiest Americans includes only eight Asians. Do the math, that equals a whole 2 percent.”
[RWC] Mr. Finch took advantage of what I think was poor wording of the first sentence of Mr. Zanella’s letter. I think Mr. Zanella was writing about “Asians” having the highest household income when compared to other groups. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, as of 2009, “Asian and Pacific Islander” households had the highest median income at $65,469. White households came in second at $51,861. Funny how that didn’t show up in Mr. Finch’s “research,” isn’t it?
“Space limitations do not permit me to address the letter’s other fallacies regarding slavery, civil rights, school vouchers, tax revenue, or how the ‘benevolent’ 1 percent should be exempt from paying more taxes, because it ‘lowers the revenue collected.’ (Huh?)”
[RWC] It’s convenient for Mr. Finch that “[s]pace limitations do not permit [him] to address the letter’s other fallacies.” It’s inconvenient for Mr. Finch “the letter’s other fallacies regarding slavery, civil rights, school vouchers, [and] tax revenue” are mostly true based on research I did for previous pieces I wrote. It looks like Mr. Finch’s vaunted “research” failed him once again.
As for school vouchers, one of Mr. Obama’s early actions – supported by Democrats - was to let the Washington, DC, voucher program expire. This happened in a spending bill, however, not via an executive order as Mr. Zanella asserted.
Despite Mr. Finch’s “fact” to the contrary, Mr. Zanella did not write “the ‘benevolent’ 1 percent should be exempt from paying more taxes” or anything similar. Mr. Zanella wrote, “The top 1 percent of U.S. wage earners already pays 33 plus percent of income tax collected while contributing a higher percentage of their incomes to charity than others. Our president wants to raise their taxes, while half of the ‘99 percent’ pay no income tax! History has proven that raising taxes on the rich actually lowers the revenue collected.”
Based on 2009 federal income tax data, the top 1% (about 1.4 million taxpayers with AGI greater than $344,000) of filers paid 37% of the total and the top 5% (about 6.9 million taxpayers with AGI greater than $155,000) paid 59%. The average tax rate for the top 1% was 24% and 20.5% for the top 5%. The bottom 50% (about 69 million taxpayers with AGI less than $33,000) paid 2.3% of the total and their average tax rate was 1.8%.
As for Mr. Finch’s “(Huh?)” in response to Mr. Zanella’s comment “History has proven that raising taxes on the rich actually lowers the revenue collected,” the comment is true though I think Mr. Zanella is again guilty of poor wording. Mr. Zanella should have written “raising tax rates” instead of “raising taxes” and it applies to everyone subject to “high” tax rates, not just “the rich.” The best way to increase tax collections is via an expanding economy, but higher tax rates – and more regulation – work against that goal. Cutting tax rates and excessive regulations increases economic activity because people get to keep more of what they earn. It’s simple human behavior; the more you get to keep, the more you will produce. As a result, lower tax rates result in greater tax revenue because the lower rate applies to a bigger pie. For example, 40% of a 10” pie is 25% more than 50% of an 8” pie.
Heck, even Mr. Finch’s fellow travelers stumble into the truth occasionally, probably by accident. One of our local lefty leaders, a self-described Marxist, wrote, “The rule-of-thumb is to tax activities you want to discourage …” Which tax-generating activities does Mr. Finch want to discourage? In “The Means to Prosperity” (1933), John Keynes (1883-1946), a British economist favored by leftists, recognized increasing tax rates can provide the double whammy of damping an economy and reducing collected taxes, leading to deficit spending and debt.
“His letter should be accepted for what it is – a smear job trashing President Obama and Democrats in general.”
[RWC] Given his letter-writing body of work, I get a kick out of Mr. Finch complaining about an alleged “smear job trashing President Obama, and Democrats in general.” Have you noticed those who routinely engage in such activities tend to complain the loudest when their ox is gored? In any case, is it a smear job when what you write is about relevant issues and is true?
“Unlike other parts of the paper, where facts are usually verified, the Op-Ed page is one place where any kind of nonsense can be paraded as fact. Get ready – as November draws nearer, we’ll see even more of it.”
[RWC] The idea “facts are usually verified” in “other [non-opinion] parts of the paper” is a quaint notion I doubt was ever true. If it were true, media bias wouldn’t exist. The op-ed section is journalism tradecraft akin to a magician’s sleight of hand. Op-ed sections are a trick to make us think opinion is limited to that section of the publication while everything else is fact-checked, straight-up objective reporting.
When Mr. Finch wrote “any kind of nonsense can be paraded as fact” in the “Op-Ed page,” he wrote with authority and experience.
© 2004-2012 Robert W. Cox, all rights reserved.