For those of us who rather read than politic.

The busy street buzzed with activity, even at this late of an hour; not that he could hear it anyways because of the pounding noise blasting from his headphones. In a kaleidoscope of light the street lights before him fluttered from green to yellow to red. The cautionary orange hand remained solid, though it was safe to cross. He stepped from the curb onto the pavement, walking briskly across the street.

He hadn't been walking long, but his shoulders ached under the immense weight of books and his computer. His head pounded from the noise, yet he did not turn down his music, it gave him piece of mind: an attempt to overthrow the loneliness. The dull orange street lights lit his path forward; every where he was bathed in the unclean light. It loomed above, oppressing and belittling him. It startled him from time to time, the multiple shadows it threw seemed dangerous, his ashen doppelgängers waiting to overthrow and convert him to a shadow.

Further ahead he reached a small pathway running through the city. The bike path was rarely used, the exhaust of the city long ago claiming the lungs of cyclists and walkers alike. He paused for a moment at its mouth, its black emptiness spread far ahead fading into to the horizon. Shifting his gaze from the dull dashed line to just above the horizon, the ghostly orange light dissolved into the perfection of the government building. Surrounding the building were stark white spotlights, their beams stopped by the immense thunder clouds holding their fire. The spectral beams of light remained vigilant awaiting the moment the clouds would break when they could shoot their blinding light to the heavens.

Photo credit: Dori, Taken in Madison, Wisconsin

Once more he began to walk without purpose, the sight causing him to shake his head and carry on, his head down. He reached for his music device and absent-mindedly switched to a random song, luckily one of his favorites. The beat changed drastically, the slower melody gently caressed his eardrums. He entered into the cold orange light once more.

A few blocks later before he were to turn, he opened his mouth and breathed in a gulp of the chilly night air, the cold tingling down his throat. He wiped his running nose and rubbed his numb ears, hoping to kindle some sort of warmth in them. Then he rolled his neck, the weight of his pack still tugging on his shoulder and neck muscles. With his head inclined, the soothing tension momentarily released, he noticed something he had not seen in months.

In the patch of sky he saw there were no planes, no stars, and no beautiful sky from horizon to horizon. In its place stood an enormous bank of thunder clouds, the same clouds over the government house. Yet, something was different. These clouds were different. Their blackness was not pierced by the orange oppression, by the white destruction. No, they were untouched by the likes of man. They slowly rolled, one edge nearly undecipherable from the others, their blackness was so full and complete; it was pure.

A singular lance of lightning dashed across the sky horizontally. The earth shaking crack of thunder followed rapidly; the wind begin to slowly whip up and twirl loose leaves on the sidewalk. He looked down and realized he had been standing in awe for an unknown amount of time; he could not recollect how many times the light had changed at his crossroads, how many times he had disobeyed the command to walk. He lowered his gaze to his shoes as if urging them to move when he saw the struggling flap of a maple leaf, red and withered, attempting to join the fray of fluttering leaves. His shoe was resting on its stem, restricting its movements. He felt a sympathetic twinge for the leaf and lifted his foot, the leaf immediately launching into the sky with a renewed vitality he had never known.

All at once a jagged line of lightning shot across the sky, a tremendous boom rattled windows, and the welled up waters of a dry summer let loose in a torrent of rain, drenching him almost immediately. He methodically stopped his music, removed his headphones from his ears, put up his hood to cover his head and stood for a moment longer. He looked to his left, his destination merely blocks away, then he looked forward. His feet moved of their own volition. They carried out the will of the boy, whether he knew it or not. He walked towards the looming thunderhead, he walked to the chaos of pure darkness, he walked away from the oppressive orange: he walked forward.

The (un)Reality of a Perfect System;

Or, In Defense of True Extreme and Working Capitalism

I'll get this off my chest now, I know it, you know it: we're going to disagree. I'm going to ask you to make a jump incredibly difficult for most people, I'm going to ask you to momentarily suspend your disbelief and allow me to pander in theory, to claw at a substantial understanding of reality through a more in depth grasp of theoretics.

I hear you ask me, "why would you do such a thing? Why be an obtuse intellectual who doesn't recognize he lives in a real living world?" And I would answer simply, "I know you're smart and I know you pay attention, so why is it you live in the same fantasy world? Why do you let yourself be led every which way by empty words?"

I want to spend my time today on the politician's need to cater to the lowest possible intelligence of voter, in specific the rallying cry of "Tax Cuts for the Rich". I understand the need to avoid pedantic financial dribbling on national television; of course your ratings will drop and you would never get reelected. But far too often do people get so swept up in the emblematic rallying cries that they forget that they're only meant as leading off points. The moment a Democrat hears someone even hint at uttering these words, they all grab their pitch forks and torches ready to toast any union-busting Scrooge McDuck. But for a moment, suspend your disbelief with me and open your mind, check your preconceived notions at the door and think.

Taxes: How They Are Now

The Middle class, making no more than $70,700 but not less than $17,400 for a married couple are paying 10% taxes (or $1,740) on the first $17,400, while every penny over that $17,400 is taxed 15%. For instance, if you are a married couple making $65,000 a year, you would pay approximately $1,740+($47,600*.15)= $8,880 in taxes. This equates to 13% of your gross income.

The Upper class, or those making more than $388,350 are charged $105,062 in taxes no matter what then an additional 35% on every penny over $388,350.

That means that for every dollar made over $17,400 for the middle class citizen, the government receives 15 cents. Likewise, the upper class individual gives 35 cents to the government for every dollar made over $388,350, or over 1/3 of their income.

Then you hear plenty of people slinging around the idea of equality, equal this and equal that. Most importantly equal taxes for everyone. There's but one exception to this: no one knows what's equal, no one wants to be the great decider of equal taxes for everyone. Before you have the chance to double back on what you want, let's just explore what equal taxes for everyone would entail.

Scenario 1: Equalization to the Lowest

You're in the middle class, so you don't particularly like your 15 or 25% (the next bracket above 15%), but you can make it fine if those greedy rich people paid their "fair share". So Let's make them. Since it would be terrible to make those in the lowest tax bracket pay as much as you do, let's level the playing field and make it truly equal. That means that your tax rate is lowered to 10% of your gross income like all American families; equality then must mean that you would like the upper class to pay their equal share: 10% of their gross income. Let's throw some numbers up.

Let's say your rich cousin, Rick from Toledo (because why not?), makes $500,000 as a salaried CEO for a crazy explosive Facebook app. So his base tax is $105,062 in the normal 35% bracket we are in now. On top of that he would be charged an additional 35% on the excess over $388,350, or a taxable excess of $111,650. Thus, under the current tax system, your cousin would pay a total of $105,062+($111,650*.35)= or a total of $144,136.50. That means that under the current system Rick pays 28.8% of his gross income out in taxes

Under the Equality of Taxes Bill (brought up by middle class Americans, like all of us), your cousin Rick would pay a blanket 10% of his gross income, just like you do.

You, making $65,000 a year would pay $6,500 in taxes (what a deal!), and your cousin Rick would pay $50,000 in taxes. Sounds like a lot right? Well, when you're looking to reduce a national debt in the trillions tax reductions across the board is not the way to go. "but that's not what I meant!" you exclaim. Okay, well let's look at it the other way.

Scenario 2: Equalization to the Highest

You are a die-hard red, white and blue blooded American who wants nothing more than to enjoy those six packs while fireworks shoot in the sky and your pants are made in America. You're willing to do what ever would make your country great again. So, when the legislature announces their new Equalization of Taxes Law, you jump at the chance to participate as much as your rich neighbor. You and your wife make a nice amount of money to fuel your multiple vehicles and recreational vehicles, a sizable $90,000; slightly above average. Your rich cousin, Gerald Maygood, owner and CEO of Maygood Enterprises, makes $1,000,000 (yes, one million, a good paying job!). Under this new tax law equal taxes has been placed at 35%, the tax level for those who make more than $388,350 a year.

Come April, however, your initiative in this great patriotic pursuit of yours falters when you see the government take its just dues, a whopping $31,500! Under the normal system you would only pay $9,735+($19,300*.25)= $14,560. You're not as big a fan of this tax plan as you thought you were when you see more than a third of your income go out the door. Soon those recreational vehicles are on craigslist and those gas guzzling made in America SUVs are gone, replaced with Vespa scooters for the pair of you. Your cousin on the other hand is paying his 35% on his $1,000,000, or $350,000, his lifestyle doesn't change.

Now you're lying there on your cardboard box and newspapers because you couldn't afford the Equalization of Taxes Bill in the latter, or you're enjoying your enormous wealth you've gained in the former. Well, until China or whoever calls for the United State's debts (which with the lowered tax rates have rocketed) and then your country has just defaulted on the largest loan in the history of the world.

This is the part where you suspend your disbelief, this is the part where you take a moment and check your premises because I'm about to unload a massive bomb on you.

Scenario 3: True Capitalism

The impossible and far-fetched never happening idea of Capitalism. A system that attempts to maintain two different policies: capitalism for those who can afford it, socialism for those who can't, is doomed to fail at both, especially when the two systems oppose each other. Instead let's try something different for once, check your premises and move past the flawed logic. Instead of trying to restrain growth, instead of enforcing a system that causes those who can afford it to hide their money away in Swiss Bank accounts (OH NO!), give them reason to invest here.

Abolish the tax code. Instead run a country of intellectuals in a new (green) industrial revolution. You there, middle class citizen, what will you do with your money you would otherwise be spending on taxes? Will you travel on an airplane built in America and owned by an American company? Or maybe you will go buy a new car constructed in an American factory and sold by an American salesman working for an American car company.

What will the rich man do with all of his immense wealth? Well, he's going to do what he's been doing before the code was abolished, he's going to be spending his money in order to build his fortune higher. Innovation expands and explodes when the restrictions of capitalism are reduced. He's going to invest in companies and services that will ensure the largest returns. The well-oiled machine that is American industry is, as Obama says, fueled "from the middle out", but the economy is receptive and reactionary. When a ripple is sent from the middle out, the rich must make a decision: 1. follow the trend and invest, or 2. ignore it and hope for the best.

If the middle class, all of a sudden begins to go on trips, the demand for aircraft skyrockets to meet the amount of people wanting to vacation. With demand high, intense and complicated algorithms will be used to project the amount of aircraft that are to be made to meet the demand. But with those aircraft numbers rising to meet the amount of tourists, fuel costs rise as well. Any businessman worth his first million realizes that the best way to gain a profit is to remove factors that reduce that profit. What results is an increase in development of green energy, if for no other reason than to reduce fuel overheads. This technology, taken over by large corporations, "trickles down" to companies that find more interesting uses for it, whether it be putting electric cars on the roads, efficient wind and solar power for homes, or power grids that fuel millions of people with clean energy only dreamed of.

Numerous arguments against such an extreme plan exist, but if you only think of how well you work at your workplace when the foreman is buckling down and watching your every move opposed to when he leaves you alone to do your job as you please, you'll understand what it is I'm arguing. The moment the US becomes a beacon of industry across the world is the moment that our deficit slows, halts, and begins to go down. It won't happen in a day, a year, or probably in my lifetime, but sooner or later the leak of jobs, people, and ideas to foreign areas to avoid restrictions must be stopped.

As a final parting remark, I'll leave you with this video a friend showed me about motivation and drive and how economic gain is not necessarily the reason we decide to do our best. It was eye opening and entertaining, thanks Amanda.

A Fresh Start

There are very few emotions in this world that equate to the beginnings of a new project. The sense of elation when the idea sparks in your mind, that urge to continue on and press forward, and the final moment when you lean back in your chair and realize the culminations of your work, the time-old fruits of your labors moment. 

But sometimes, there are those few projects you scamper across in a flurry of emotion and sensation that drive you onward, onward to a destination you do not even realize. Those projects, those recurring ideas that can continue on for years are the ones that that draw and holdfast my attention. My gaze is not drawn to those small Pinterest projects you see everywhere (as cute/charming/simple/beautiful as they are), but my mind is drawn to the projects that spawn those Pinterest copies. My heart yearns for a following of people looking for creative projects to replicate, albeit not nearly as good as the original (the artist in me says). 

To achieve the fame of originality in this generation devoted to repurposing of old images, the slaughtering of classical quotes for our 21st Century sensibilities, and cheap thrills on youtube, to achieve the slightest fame through the originality of my mind is what I hope to accomplish. Maybe fame is too strong of a term, maybe what I seek is a moment of clarity, a moment where I realize that I did the best I could and that I can be proud of it. To be a writer as famed as J.K. Rowling and (unfortunately) Stephenie Meyer, I believe, is every fledgling author's goal, but I know that I do not have a seven book saga as detailed and fantastic as Harry Potter waiting in my mind. All I have are my own thoughts, my own musings on life mingled with my own understanding of the world around me. To me, that is enough. World-renowned? No. Self-worthy? Absolutely. 

This project is for avarice of the mind. Any blogging adventure begins with a person believing that what they have to say is worthwhile, that their project is most important. My pride drives me to write, my arrogance tells me you should read. I am proud of my words and I will stand by them, double-backs and feints are not my style. So, following that logic, I, of course, believe that you should read my postings, but to read is not enough. Read at your pleasure. Read what you will. But if you plan on only reading my postings, we are going to have a problem. I want you to look at my words, comprehend my words, taste my words, but most importantly, after all of that I want you to think on my words. Cohesively explain why I am wrong and we both become the better for it. 

On this inaugural post I will leave my extremely small reader base (me and possibly you, reader) with one last thought. A is A. Let this simple logical rule lead your life to enlightenment and illumination. There will be plenty more on that principle to come, but let it mingle and dissolve in your brain.