The There's Plenty of Money Act of 2012

[davidswanson]

112th CONGRESS
1st Session
To highly resolve that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the United States of America.

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
July 12, 2011
A BILL

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

This Act may be cited as the Start Doing Our Damn Jobs Act of 2012.

SEC. 2. STOP KILLING PEOPLE

(a) The combined appropriations of the Department of Defense, the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Veterans Affairs, and all military appropriations made through the Department of State, the Department of Energy, and all other military appropriations shall never be more than twice the funding, in absolute dollars, spent on its military in the previous year by the highest military-spending nation on earth other than the United States of America.

(b) The Department of Defense will be audited annually by the United States Congress.

(c) The Central Intelligence Agency will cease to exist. Its buildings will be sold at public auction.

(d) The National Security Agency will cease to exist. Its buildings will be sold at public auction.

(e) No dollars will be appropriated by the United States government for any secret budgets or any agencies engaged in any secret operations.

(f) No slush fund will exist which might permit a president to launch a war without Congressional declaration thereof.

(g) The U.S. military, within 90 days of passage of this bill, will cease all operations in and withdraw all personnel from Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Libya, Yemen, Somalia, and every other area of earth outside the 50 states of these United States. This covers every human being in the direct or indirect employ of the United States of America in a military capacity of any sort, and includes every nation and territory in which U.S. personnel are located.

(h) The United States will not use the services of any other nation to imprison any human being. The right to habeas corpus and the rights enshrined in the United States Constitution will apply to every person our government has any contact with.

(i) Employees of the United States military will not be employed through any private contractor, but directly by the military.

(j) Violation of this Section shall be considered an impeachable offense. The House Committee on the Judiciary shall hold public hearings on the question of whether to ask the full House of Representatives to impeach any president, vice president, or other officer of the U.S. government who appears to have engaged in such a violation.

(k) Violation of this Section shall be punishable by the forfeiture of all worldly possessions and one month in jail.

SEC. 3 WE CANNOT AFFORD BILLIONAIRES

(a) A household with annual income, including investment income but excluding inheritance, less than 2,000 times the federal minimum hourly wage will pay no income tax. A household with income above and up to twice that base amount will pay 1 percent income tax. A household with income above that level and up to three times the base amount will pay 2 percent income tax. A household with income above that level and up to four times the base amount will pay 3 percent income tax. A household with income above that level and up to five times the base amount will pay 4 percent income tax. A household with income above that level and up to six times the base amount will pay 5 percent income tax. A household with income above that level and up to seven times the base amount will pay 6 percent income tax. A household with income above that level and up to eight times the base amount will pay 7 percent income tax. A household with income above that level and up to nine times the base amount will pay 8 percent income tax. A household with income above that level and up to ten times the base amount will pay 9 percent income tax. A household with income above ten times the base amount will have all income above ten times the base amount taxed at 100 percent. There will be no exceptions, exemptions, or complications to this practice.

(b) A household receiving an inheritance worth less than 2,000 times the federal minimum hourly wage will pay no estate tax. The same tax rates will apply as for income. Estates worth above ten times the base amount will have the portion exceeding ten times the base amount taxed at 100 percent. There will be no exceptions, exemptions, or complications to this practice.

(c) Money will not be loaned at greater than 10 percent interest.

(d) Workers have the right to organize, to strike, and to strike in solidarity with others.

(e) Violation of this Section shall be punishable by the forfeiture of all worldly possessions and one month in jail.


SEC. 4 CARBON IS COSTLY

(a) Emitting carbon dioxide into the atmosphere shall be taxed at $50 per ton in 2012, a rate that shall be increased by 20 percent annually for each of the next 10 years, after adjusting for inflation.

(b) Violation of this Section shall be punishable by the forfeiture of all worldly possessions and one month in jail.


SEC. 5 LEAVE SOCIAL SECURITY ALONE

(a) Social Security funding shall not be used for anything other than Social Security and shall never be invested or otherwise placed at risk.

(b) Payroll taxes shall cease to exist, and Social Security be funded each year by income tax revenue, prior to the appropriation of funding for anything else.

(c) Violation of this Section shall be considered an impeachable offense. The House Committee on the Judiciary shall hold public hearings on the question of whether to ask the full House of Representatives to impeach any president, vice president, or other officer of the U.S. government who appears to have engaged in such a violation.

(d) Violation of this Section shall be punishable by the forfeiture of all worldly possessions and one month in jail.

SEC. 6 HEALTHCARE IS A HUMAN RIGHT

(a) This bill incorporates here the full text of H.R. 676 creating a single-payer health coverage system.

SEC. 7 SHUT UP ALREADY

(a) Any person claiming on U.S. television or radio airwaves that this wealthiest nation on earth is short on money or needs to cut back on human services in order to pay its debt shall be required to write 500 times on Glenn Beck's blackboard "There's plenty of money, but the wars and Wall Street take it all. What in the world was I thinking?"

[jmowreader]

1. C, D and E are why I unrecommended this

I NEVER unrecommend anything, but I unrecommended this. This kind of thing is exactly why the freepers and teabaggers hate us. We need an intelligence apparatus because there are people out there who wish to do us harm. E would result in the immediate defunding of the entire government because every agency does some work in secret.

BTW, do the numbers on your inheritance tax. The current minimum wage is $7.25. Two thousand times this is $14,500. Your proposal confiscates anything over $145,000. Considering that a $150,000 house isn't all that much in most of the US, this means no one could ever inherit their parents' home.

And Section 2(g)...you don't like South Korea very much, do you?

This proposal is far too extreme.

[Name removed]

2. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Azathoth]

14. +1

This reads like a Patriot Movement/Christian Reconstructionist manifesto that was reworked to be "leftist".

[davidswanson]

18. don't tell the cia but

if a maximum wage law were passed, congress would dramatically increase the minimum wage so as to increase the maximum

[SidDithers]

20. I unrecommend everything from this source...

ever since their "Osama bin Lynched" article.

Sid

[billh58]

24. +1

As do many who are familiar with the "source."

[bluestateboomer]

3. This proposal is no more extreme than

the sacred cows we live with everyday. ie. The "free market is god" ,or Anything I want to do with my billions is perfectly OK ,or Of course, corporations have the same rights as people ,or We have to have our soldiers everywhere in the world to "defend" democracy (or access to oil). So since those talking points are where the other side starts their debate, it seems perfectly fine to me to start with Mr. Swanson's talking points and maybe we'll end up with something more humane and people oriented.:fistbump:

[SDuderstadt]

5. How would you propose to...

do away with the CIA and NSA?

[joshcryer]

6. Get that bill passed?

There are more private intelligence agencies which you can subscribe to who have better intel than the CIA and NSA anyway.

[SDuderstadt]

7. Please prove that...

what a ridiculous claim.

[joshcryer]

9. Stratfor broke the Chavez story, for example.

But I admit that may have been a bit premature because the CIA probably could've known that, they just wouldn't have leaked it.

The point is that I think private companies could easily take the place of the CIA or NSA in the mind of the government.

Indeed, the Trotskyite wet dream would be to have a "private" company doing all of the intelligence gathering.

On its own citizens.

[SDuderstadt]

10. Dude...

I asked for proof, not your opinion.

[joshcryer]

11. And I admitted it may have been premature.

Do you have proof the CIA knew about the Chavez story?

Right.

Let's not get into some stupid pissing match please.

[SDuderstadt]

12. Dude...

the CIA tracked down Osama bin Laden.

[joshcryer]

13. Ha.

Fair enough. It was a stupid comment. I retract / apologize for its stupidity.

You gotta admit that private security firms are on the rise though, right, right? :P

[jmowreader]

15. And you trust them?

Let's be real: do you want a private company, accountable to no one, doing your spying for you?

I admit the CIA and NSA have quite a few loose cannons, but the private companies will by definition be worse--and, because they're run for profit, will be more expensive.

[sulphurdunn]

17. It may have been an overstatement,

but it was not ridiculous.

http://motherjones.com/politics/2005/01/spy-who-billed-me

http://www.afcea.org/signal/articles/templates/Signal_Article_Template.asp?articleid=1440&zoneid=222

http://www.voanews.com/english/news/usa/US-Spy-Operations-Become-More-Reliant-on-Contractors-87830727.html

[joshcryer]

4. You should run for President.

[robcon]

21. Too ignorant to run for president, IMO.

Knows nothing about government, finance or the real world.

[LooseWilly]

8. I'll toss a rec and a kick for the sheer stones of this proposal...

I'm intrigued. ;)

[Jim Lane]

16. Social Security

A demographic bulge like the Baby Boom creates problems for a pay-as-you-go system, which Social Security is. Therefore, beginning in 1983, the system deliberately accumulated a huge surplus, which would be available to be drawn down when the Boomers retire.

While the surplus was accumulating, and waiting to be used, it was invested in bonds issued by the U.S. Government.

Your proposal says, "Social Security funding shall not be used for anything other than Social Security and shall never be invested...." So, what would the Social Security Administration do with the trillions of dollars it's holding? Right now, the money is invested. Should the trustees convert all those government bonds to cash and buy the world's biggest mattress to stuff it under?

[rdking647]

19. and people wonder

why the far left is thought of as bat shit crazy

[Jakes Progress]

22. Good starting place.

[midnight]

23. "There's plenty of money, but the wars and Wall Street take it all."

And now it's time to stop this robbery....

[backtomn]

25. Lots of passion......but,

nearly ZERO common sense. I would like things to be fairer, but if you can't keep any of your salary over $145,000 (which includes most small business, which file taxes as individuals) there will be no incentive to earn over $145,000. That means, nearly zero economic activity, many large companies will close there doors or move out of the country.....complete U.S. collapse. The people at the "minimum" need to work somewhere.

I will be happy to read your next attempt, but it will need to improve a bit.

p.s.....not to mention eliminating our intelligence services. I would like to see it focused outside of the country, but not eliminated.

Nice tirade.....I applaud it.....but, now let's get serious.

[lumberjack_jeff]

26. Math fail.

The federal minimum wage is $7.25 or $15k annually. 2000 times that is $30 million.

And for every guy who bumps up against the $300 million hard ceiling? Let 'em take a vacation and have someone else do the job for awhile.

(setting aside for the moment whether this could collect enough revenue)

Nothing wrong with confiscatory top tax rates. It helps to spread the wealth around both directly (government gives it to someone else) and indirectly (better to hire 300, one million dollar employees)

[backtomn]

27. Math fail for you.....

He is saying 2000 x $7.25........read it again.

[lumberjack_jeff]

29. Mea culpa. More of a reading fail on my part though. n/t

[Odin2005]

28. Disbanding all out intel services? That's just stupid.