Never ask a liberal for consistency. There are always rules for them and rules for everyone else.
No one else can step into it the way a socialist can. Christine Lagarde, the head of the International Monetary Fund really proved that the other day.
From The UK Independent:
It was called her "Let them eat cake" moment. Now Greece will be saying: "Make her pay tax".
The IMF chief Christine Lagarde was accused of hypocrisy yesterday after it emerged that she pays no income tax – just days after blaming the Greeks for causing their financial peril by dodging their own bills.
The managing director of the International Monetary Fund is paid a salary of $467,940 (£298,675), automatically increased every year according to inflation. On top of that she receives an allowance of $83,760 – payable without "justification" – and additional expenses for entertainment, making her total package worth more than the amount received by US President Barack Obama according to reports last night.
Unlike Mr Obama, however, she does not have to pay any tax on this substantial income because of her diplomatic status.
The news will intensify criticism of the former French Finance Minister following her controversial remarks on the increasingly bleak prospects for the Greek economy last week. Stating that she had more sympathy for poor African children with little education than for jobless people complaining about austerity measures in Greece, she said last week: "As far as Athens is concerned, I also think about all those people who are trying to escape tax all the time. All these people in Greece who are trying to escape tax."
Speaking to The Guardian, she added that they could "help themselves collectively" by "all paying their tax," and agreed that it was "payback time" for ordinary Greeks.
Greece remains a slow motion train wreck. Its economy continues to fall apart thanks to all of the lavish spending on various constituencies promoted by politicians over the past decades. They have hit the true socialist moment as predicted by Margaret Thatcher when she said the problem with socialism is that sooner or later you run out of other people’s money. The Greeks have run out of other people’s money.
Lagarde is living proof of leftist hypocrisy. She thinks higher taxes are great for everyone else.
It is easy for her to say that as she draws a tax free salary.
The real problem is socialism. It is simply an unsustainable model. Sooner or later you run out of other people’s money. Once the socialist economy is created, the government cannot tax their way out of the hole. By the time a socialist economy is created, they have destroyed the engine of growth, the free market and small business entrepreneurship.
I hate to see Greece go the way it is going but as my family motto says, “If you can’t be a good example, at least be a horrible warning.” Greece is the horrible warning to America of what our future is if Barack Obama and the Party of Treason are allowed to continue their policies.
As for Lagarde, she is rapidly becoming an international joke. Unfortunately, we are paying the tab for her international bumbling.
Permalink Reply by Debrajoe Smith-Beatty on Thank you for the information. She and the Obama's make a good trio.
Permalink Reply by Lizzie on "We don't pay taxes. Only the little people pay taxes."
-attributed to Leona Helmsley, but espoused by...
pretty much every public figure who advocates for raising taxes.
Who still believes that a call to "raise taxes on the rich" will result in anything but higher taxes for the middle class???
Permalink Reply by Julia A. Berry on And if Margaret Thatcher were here, the revered Iron Lady could debate the socks off the former French minister with no difficulty!!
Permalink Reply by Dr. Arthur W. Carpenter on I'm not much for quoting scripture but Paul's letter to the Thessalonians (2 The) reminds them that he had not taken "any man's bread" for "nought" but earned it "with labor" "night and day"...not because they didn't have the power to do so but "to make ourselves an example unto you to follow us." My solution is Paul's: "...if any would not work, neither should he eat."
A leader must lead by example or they should be stripped of leadership. As for Lagarde and those who wish to rule the world...
Permalink Reply by Roc29 on Unlike Mr Obama, however, she does not have to pay any tax on this substantial income because of her diplomatic status.
Both Lagarde and Obama are members of the ruling elite. The ruling elite do not pay taxes. Their income is derived from taxes. Even if, like Obama, they write a tax check, they are just rebating a portion of their income paid by taxes. They then proceed to have their income raised to compensate for the rebate.
That is why our Founders put in the Constitution that all taxes should be levied equally. That's why the Supreme Court struck down the graduated income tax. That's why they had to use sophistry to pass the 16th amendment.
The truth is that for most of history societies have been governed by a ruling elite. Every past attempt at a form of government that is not set up a rulers and subjects has failed.
Our Founding Fathers found the formula. They said that if we do not teach it to every generation it too would fail. We stopped teaching it.
For an exposition on the subject, go here: Liberty or Tyranny
Permalink Reply by JC Patriot on Roc29 hit the nail on the head about the graduated income tax -- anybody that defends this moronic type of tax code should be asked to explain why any one particular person's poor financial situation (regardless of the cause) should entitle them to a lower tax rate than someone else. All men are supposedly created equal, at least until the politicians start deciding who is a little less equal than the next guy.
Permalink Reply by Tucker Gillenwater on Wonder how many diplomats on America soil pay zero tax?
Permalink Reply by Tucker Gillenwater on Can anyone name a political animal that is off-shoring income to avoid paying taxes?
Permalink Reply by Charles Wimberly on my family motto says, “If you can’t be a good example, at least be a horrible warning.”
What a wonderful motto! I may adopt it myself.
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