On the eve of the 250th birthday of the Declaration of Independence, we give thanks for the freedoms we have. That said, let’s talk about the freedoms that these three dollar bills enjoy.
Dollar #1
The first one was dollar $34,974 earned by a teacher in one state or another. Some of it got carved out to pay into Social Security. That’s 6.2% to be precise, which ain’t nothing right off the top.
Maybe some of the rest of it went to support a political candidate, but the individual limit for political contributions to a candidate is $3,500 per year. And we’re talking about a teacher, so there’s, you know, actual living expenses and stuff.
Dollar #2
The second dollar bill is dollar $2,623,022 earned by a finance industry executive. It’s already better off, because as mentioned last week, it escapes Social Security tax requirements entirely, thanks to rules made (and protected) by people who overwhelmingly stood to benefit from said rules. More of it goes to federal income tax than Dollar #1 because that’s the only decent approach to tax policy.
What about the rest of Dollar #2? Chances are, it is not needed for any particular living expense or obligation. It might get invested, it might get spent on a personal item of some indulgence. Sure, it might get donated.
Or it might get donated to a political party. Thanks to the Roberts court, there is now no limit on how many completely discretionary dollars like this a party can spend in direct coordination with a candidate.
There’s a lot wrong with the campaign finance system and its various sham restrictions and commonplace workarounds. This is but one of those things, made worse by the Roberts Supreme Court.
If an individual or company thinks it’s smart to spend millions of dollars to save other millions of dollars in taxes, it’s pretty clear our campaign finance and taxation situations are mutually intertwined and fucked.
Side note: A long-term billionaire should be a moral embarrassment to any nation with ongoing social suffering.
Dollar #3
Or maybe the billionaire got caught doing something wrong and suffered the indignation of becoming a convicted criminal. Dollar #3 is one of a mountain of cash in their various accounts, and it has perhaps the most freedom of all.
Why? Because it might be able to release its owner from the insult of accountability under the justice system. This article outlines the frenzy that has followed President Trump’s idea to (get this) float 250 potential pardons in conjunction with America’s 250th. WHO THINKS THAT WAY?
A one-dimensional, unscrupulous S.O.B. with no respect for anyone or anything but money, that’s who. Before your right-wing friends get all “both parties!” about this, let’s go to The Atlantic‘s Sarah Fitzpatrick:
“In the Biden administration, we did see efforts to say, like, knock it off, everything goes through DOJ – we are going to keep this very close and very tight. That’s not the message here. The message here is when you come to the White House, hey, if you’ve got a client that might be interested, let us know.”
Needless to say, losing any heft to Social Security tax was never a risk for this dollar, and it enjoys clout that none of the teacher’s dollars has — although the teacher was also less likely to land in jail in the first place.
This dollar is the dollar that rises above a tax to help senior citizens stay out of squalor, and this dollar will rise above justice itself. It’s the king dollar in a country that was built to avoid kings.
The United States is still a pretty good and sometimes great country. But phrasing the task ahead as forming “a more perfect union” was putting a bit of a Glamour Shots lens on things, wasn’t it? Happy birthday, U.S.A.. Keep working toward that worthy goal, no matter the obstacles you manage to place in your own way.