More Q&A

Phil from Newark asks:

Q: Did Forbes ever respond to this interesting plan you've devised?

A: Not as yet, Phil, but my ‘peaceful revolution’ is a tough nut to swallow in one gulp, so I’m not dismayed—he’ll respond, if and when the spirit moves him, but it won’t hurt if you e-mail him at steveforbes@forbes.com.

Think about it—a 2-page “10% on everything/replacement of everything” tax code; T-bond funding of social security (to you and me); T-bond funding of Medicare (to our towns); relinquishment of all Federal properties (to our towns, counties, and states); divestiture of all Federal “social engineering” programs (to our states, counties, towns and neighborhoods)—just for openers!

Phil, it’s a return to our 1787 Constitution, whereby our Founding Fathers had the wisdom to exclude Federal control over our 13 states, unless specific authority was ceded (national security; interstate commerce; and supreme referee in disputes).

That’s all there is of any importance after the first 10 amendments (Bill of Rights in 1789; abolition of slavery (a century and a half ago), and women’s’ votes (a century ago). It’s a lasting document rarely amended, because two and a quarter centuries later, we Americans have much to teach, and little to learn about revolution, or anything else in the 21st century.

More Q&A

Evelyn from San Diego writes:

Q: Many people say that Palin is finished politically, but you seem to think she's not. Please tell me why you think Palin is still anyone we should give a shit about? Hasn't she already used up her 15 minutes of fame?

A: Evelyn, you fail to appreciate the guts this gal has shown in her losing V.P. quest. You should be proud that any woman could speak as effectively for all women as she does, even though she is out of the “D.C. loop.”

Following her resignation as Alaskan Governor, I judge that she will be good for 15 years, not 15 minutes, because her independent American spirit will survive all the slings and arrows of outrageous drive-by media fortune, including David Letterman’s TV smears.

In fact, I can see her picking up the conservative flag, as Newt did in 1994, and leading the Republican charge in next year's bye-elections - an absolute turning point for what I judge to be the heartbeat of America - our grandiose conservative middle-class, aka the "Silent Majority".

It wouldn't hurt if Newt were at her side for the winning "Steelers of Yore" Harris/Bradshaw one-two punch, as I have suggested to Newt and Rush.

More Q&A

Phil from NYC writes:

Q: This seems like a brilliant innovative idea. Why hasn’t at least some of this been instituted in our country?

A: Phil, “simple” does not sit well with D.C. politicians, who have more axes to grind than a dog has fleas. Complicated “social engineering” is their stock in trade for cash campaign contributions; thus we have a 70,000-page tax code instead of a 2-page code with no wiggle room!

Further, my proposed ban on cash contributions to elected officials and candidates is anathema to them, although in the same breath I also propose top free-market salaries of 300 grand (Councilperson) to $50 million (President) to fund their own campaigns; and allowable “free speech” action by party boosters except for cash contributions, which I view as tantamount to bribery.

The T-bond conversion of past contributions to Social Security would likely cost many trillions, plus many trillions for past contributions to Medicare, which goes in T-bonds to local government.

Whether the total of the two is $20 trillion or $50 trillion is an actuarial enigma, but it’s a very big number that we would owe to ourselves (not foreigners), and dwarfs current “bailouts” and “stimulus packages,”—which are chump change by comparison.

On the flip side, Local and State governments would become solvent overnight, including my own San Francisco and California, which would have on-going positive cash flows, and T-bonds greater than outstanding debt.

Apart from money questions, I denounce “Socialist Big Brother” in favor of a return to hometown rule over our daily lives after 150 years. This concept scares the hell out of entrenched special interests feeding off D.C. largesse.

My hope is that we will eventually debate these issues in public forums, and will find that if my proposals are unfair, they are equally unfair for all Americans, myself included, since tax advisors like me would eventually be out of business.

Phil, there is no problem on this planet that we Americans cannot tackle and resolve fairly well—it is our God-given destiny, and we shan’t look elsewhere because there is no elsewhere, elsewhere—just you, me, our folks, and our countrymen, and come Hell or high water, we’ve gotten the job done for two and a quarter centuries, and saved Western Civilization in the process.

More Q&A



Terry from Vermont writes:

Q: Hey there. This blog is a good read. Now, about this 10% on everything tax. Since I buy very little and live off my land here in Vermont, it would be great for me, would it not? Also, how would it affect the Social Security check I get from the government every month?

A: The 10% of everything/replacement of everything would be your cup of tea Terry—the less you buy, the lower your tax bite.

But wait! There’s more! Your healthcare doctors, including a new army of G.P.’s. cranked out by our 52 new National Universities, will have an irresistible financial incentive (200-500 grand) to start making “house calls” again, at standard 100 buck or so rates. They won’t show up in a horse and buggy, nor in a Model A Ford; but rather a fully equipped mini-van with nurse in tow.

Back to the future? Why not? It’s called “preventive medicine”—all the rage in my American 21st century designed to cut late life maintenance costs of $2 trillion, which today is a full 85% of all family medical bills, because we hate fighting HMO bureaucratic bullshit until it’s too late.

All 50 million of us want a “real” doctor to hold our hand in our waning years, and will gladly pay the 10-20 buck tax bite for “Don the Doctor”, fresh out of internship, and his doc specialist buddies.

Your monthly Social Security check will probably be a bit more than now after conversion to T-bonds (est. min. $2,000 vs. $1,800 today for retired sole proprietors like you and me), and a T-bond principal balance of half-a-mil or more (vs. zero today). But as I advised Flo in Florida, don’t go “ape.” Try to live off your monthly interest check before drawing out principal.

Terry, we’re in the same boat—you on the Atlantic and me on the Pacific, with just two financial concerns: positive daily cash flow, and to leave our grandkids with an educational shot at “The American Dream”—the self reliant confidence and the financial means to accomplish their missions in life.

A Letter to Newt

Dear Newt:

I’ve just asked Rush in an open letter exactly who, if anyone, could repeat your tour de force of 1994 in the upcoming 2010 bye-elections. Perhaps the answer is no one, but there has to be someone to at least give it their best shot. Could you be the “Comeback Kid”?

Before you say ‘no way’, keep in mind that I’m 73, so ‘too old’ doesn’t hack it, and your conservative ideas are just as valid today as they were 15 years ago when you led your troops to victory-not that I expect victory, just a notable dent in Nancy and Barack’s march into 21st century Socialism.

There are 50 million senior voting citizens out here, just salivating at the prospect of a mid-term turnaround.

Yours Very Truly,

Charles Fairfax Speer

charliespeer.com

charlesspeer@yahoo.com (email)

A Letter to Rush

Dear Rush:

Just got my first Limbaugh Letter after listening to you all these years on KSFO in “Sodom By the Bay”, aka San Francisco.

One question only—who will be the gutsy guy or gal to repeat Newt’s feat of 1994, and slow down Obama? Apart from Sarah Palin on the gal side (unfortunately out of the D.C. loop), who has the “right stuff” on the guy side?

My first novel, An American Fable and second novel, An Italian Fable are now available—it’s not Hemingway by a long shot, but it is chock full of love of family, God and country, including a blueprint for Jeffersonian revolution in matters of domestic and foreign policies—my “last hurrah,” if you’re a Spencer Tracy fan. My third novel, CIA Fables, to be published later this year, completes my Fables Trilogy.

There are 50 million voting seniors out here. No one on our planet need preach to us about revolution—we invented modern-era revolution—including the coming peaceful one.

Very truly yours,

Charles Fairfax Speer

charliespeer.com

charlesspeer@yahoo.com (email)

More Q & A

Kevin, a CPA in Little Rock, Arkansas asks:

Q: Hey, Charlie—

I’ve been reading this blog since it started and first off, I’d like to say that I am intrigued by your theories and can’t wait to read your two books. I can see why some call you a “visionary.” You’re writing what a lot of us are thinking, but are unable to synthesize into an action plan. I’ve scanned your blog entries, including your “things to come” epilogue to An American Fable, and I must admit that you’ve raised a lot of questions—to whit:

• What happens to under/unemployed tax advisors (like me)? IRS agents? franchise tax agents? property tax assessors? parking meter maids? road/bridge/tunnel toll collectors? auto liability salesmen? Social Security/Medicare administrators? healthcare insurers? liquor and tobacco “revenuers”? Washington lobbyists? ambulance-chasing personal injury litigators? and so forth? How do we put food on the table?
  
  
• How can you even think about a global Pax Americana, which would increase our military from 800,000 to 2 million volunteers; jump start the Peace Corps from almost zero to a half-million American and European volunteers to back up U.N. Secretary General Colin Powell’s mandate to save Africa from the abyss?

A: Kevin, I never said that my vision of 21st Century America would be easy—just doable; and that you, I, and our countrymen, have inherited the “True Grit” and “Right Stuff” to accomplish anything we set our minds to.

Folks like us have to reinvent our productive roles, in my case for the fourth time during my life. There’s a great big world out there just waiting for new ideas, and the guys and gals behind them.

All of the under/unemployed, as well as the homeless, will be forced to find their niche within the new city and county jobs created by local assumption of federal programs—from parks to monuments; disability to disaster; museums to mausoleums; borders to bridges; and just about everything else in between. Otherwise, Uncle Sam stays out of our daily lives, and sticks to what our Constitution hired him for.

Don’t fret about your CPA practice; both my books call for accountant certification of loan applications and stock issuances—a kind of Congressional “accountants’ full employment act” designed to deter future hanky-panky at all levels, from mom and pop to Citicorp—no certification, no money from bank loans or securities offerings.

In the meantime, our City/Town/County will provide the 12 buck/25 grand minimum wage for the infrastructure work needed—buildings; maintenance; roads; schools; bridges; or work at home on a loaner laptop to do City admin or research to back up the Councilperson charged with validating and then taking care of us, our neighbors, and our townspeople, while administering about a trillion dollars of our daily 10% tax bite.

With regard to Pax Americana, my scenario is a post-WWII update, when we reluctantly ruled the planet, at a cost of 680,000 foreign gravestones for our G.I.’s, Marines and sailors, out of 10 million sent to European and Pacific battlefields; 16 million Americans put in uniform; and 20 million “Rosie the Riveters” sent to our assembly lines—all this from our Greatest Generation population of less than 100 million men, women, and children, including my boyhood gang that scavenged every old rubber tire and bit of metal in our neighborhood.

For the second time in a quarter century we proved to the world that there is no task too difficult for Americans. We saved European civilization, and capitalists that we are, proceeded to purchase a good portion of their industrial enterprises with our “heavy” dollars after WWII, while fueling their post-war recovery with our outright charity, in the form of Harry Truman’s C.A.R.E. packages and Marshall Plan.

Today, and during the 50-year-long Cold War of yesterday (which Ronnie Reagan finally won), the planet still looks to us for guidance. This is our God-given destiny, and there’s no way around it, like it or not—and in our isolationist years of yore we didn’t like it one damn bit, until Teddy R. woke us up at the turn of the last century, with his “walk softly and carry a big stick” foreign policy.

Our “big stick” tomorrow will be our operational outer space defensive and offensive satellite umbrella, in defiance of every arms treaty we ever signed.

It’s up to you and me, Kevin—don’t look elsewhere, because to paraphrase a famous old Manhattan happy hour cocktail quip, “Buddy, there is no elsewhere, elsewhere.” (Gertrude Stein at her Algonquin Hotel evening roundtable cocktail hour, when Great American Humorist Robert Benchley queried her about her Oakland, California origins, replied dryly, "Dahling, there is no there, there."

More Q&A


Walter, a 27-year-old busboy in Richmond, Virginia asks:

Q: Mister Charlie, I just heard about your 12 buck/25 grand minimum wage for myself and my wife, who works as a cleaning lady. We are both from the small village of San Francisco (population 2,000), just outside San Salvador.

You cannot possibly imagine what a promotion to America’s middle class would mean for our young family, which includes our son Walter Jr. (4 1/2) and plans for more children down the road. With a combined income of 50 grand, we can qualify for a modest home loan, our American Dream come true. And looking forward, we can plan on a decent education for our kids; locally administered medical care for our family; and if my boss lays me off, I would be happy to do city maintenance or new construction manual labor to keep my income at base level. But how is all this possible?

A: Walter, there’s nothing magical about my proposals—the stronger our middle class, the stronger America; and I am a believer in American wealth accumulation, bit by bit, beginning with a home of our own. Then, we need to convert Social Security promises to hard cash T-bonds at age 70.

A Letter to Steve Forbes

Dear Mr. Forbes:

As a CPA tax guy, I’ve been following your “flat tax” proposals for several years, and have taken your simplification ideas a step further with my “10% on everything” idiot-proof, two-page tax code. This approach is discussed at length in fictional form in my new book An American Fable, and it is debated in Q&A format on my blog.

The advantages of a “10% on everything” tax code are:

• Yields total tax revenue of $3 trillion plus, versus about $2 trillion today from income taxes, fees, tolls, licenses, duties, bondings, payroll contributions, unemployment insurance, disability insurance, health insurance, excises, assessments, property taxes, et al, which would be eliminated (along with my modest post-retirement income from tax services to long-time clients);

• Is paid day-by-day;

• Is buried in retail prices, like the European VAT, but without VAT’s accounting complexities for small business owners like my Italian brother-in-law;

• Provides for a 60% share to cities and counties (10% to States), allowing a return to local rule over social services (healthcare, unemployment, disability) and local infrastructure (bridges, roads, buildings, tunnels, and schools);

• Gets Uncle Sam out of our daily lives. His 30% cut ($1 trillion) is to pay down our national debt; protect us against enemies, referee internal conformity, and give us a functioning bank system;
  
  
• We “local yokels” will take care of our schools, neighborhoods and townspeople—a return to Constitutional States’ rights after 150 years of Federal Caesarian command;

• Is front-end loaded, with no back-end tax on business profits, interest income, investment income, capital gains or pension T-bond withdrawals. Gets my 8 grandkids (and near-term great-grandkids) off the hook for paying off our $10 trillion national debt and $20 trillion Social Security/MediCare actuarial; shortfall.
  
  
• Promotes “low-class” Americans to “middle-class” Americans overnight, with a 25 grand minimum wage and a 10% T-bond retirement account.

Steve, I don’t care who gets credit for what; I just want to see a serious debate about simple taxation, local empowerment, and T-bond conversion of Federal pension benefits. There are 50 million senior voters out here who love our country, but hate the drift to Socialism. We need authoritative voices to speak for us; don’t let us down!

Yours very truly,

Charles Fairfax Speer

charliespeer.com

charlesspeer@yahoo.com (email)

A Letter to Governor Palin

Dear Governor Palin:

Thank you for your staff’s interest to learn more about my first book An American Fable, which contains proposals to confront and conquer some of America’s financial and social ills with a body of fresh thinking (some conservative; some liberal).

You’re still the gutsy gal I voted for last November, so don’t change a thing—Republicans need all the guts that can be mustered to overcome the slings and arrows of outrageous assaults on our American culture; which I judge to be the greatest in recorded history—better than the Persians, Greeks, Egyptians, Romans, Chinese, and Turks.

We are a great people who deserve great leaders in the mold of Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Monroe, Jackson, Lincoln, Teddy R., FDR, Harry Truman, and Ronnie Reagan (my short list of visionary Presidents).

Yours very truly,

Charles Fairfax Speer

charliespeer.com

charlesspeer@yahoo.com (email)