An anonymous quote, "Now, let me get this straight...We are going to pass a health care plan written by a committee whose chairman says he doesn't understand it, passed by a Congress that hasn't read it but exempts itself from it, to be signed by a president who smokes, with funding administrated by a treasury chief who didn't pay his taxes.....overseen by an obese surgeon general and financed by a country that's broke. What could possibly go wrong?"

But that's OK, we'll make the evil rich pay for it. After all, they are the lucky ones who won life's lottery.

Sock it to the rich is a popular idea in America today. One fueled by a political ideology content to divide Americans to gain power for the elite within itself. If they get their way most of the lemmings in that movement are gonna be surprised to see where they stand! When they look around the world for places they believe America should emulate, Europe leads the way. Well, if the object is to rob the rich the old continent has found a new way.

First, let's go to East Tennessee for comparative purposes. A young man I know was called by his mother because her car had quit and she was standing by the roadway shivering in the cold. The good son was soon on his way to her aid. Driving through a nearby county in the open countryside, no houses and no businesses around, and obeying the speed limit of 45 miles per hour he did not see until it was too late, a sign marking the unreasonably over-expanded, (got to raise that tax base), city limits of a town. And a lower limit of 30 mph.

Now the driver immediately hit his brakes - but he was too late. For hiding, yes hiding, nearby was local gendarme with a radar gun. Gotta catch those evil speeders. And he got one! And made $110 for his town.

Don't misunderstand, speeding is a crime and all should obey the limits. They exist for the safety of all. But speed traps like an abrupt without-notice lowering of the limit? Like many things, legal, but not moral.

Now $110 is a lot of money for not getting your foot on the brake soon enough, but it could be worse. The driver could have been a wealthy man in Europe.
Now as a rule Europe has higher taxes than America and a lower standard of living. A high percentage of Europeans would fall below the poverty line as set by our government. But they have found some novel ways to soak the rich. One is with traffic tickets.

How can traffic tickets soak the rich? Easy, just graduate the fine and court costs according to the wealth of the driver! That produces things like an incident in Sweden where a driver was charged with speeding.

Now speeding is a violation of the law and should be punished. And believe me, that man was punished. How so, to the tune of a fine of $190,000. You read it right, one-hundred ninety thousand dollars for a speeding ticket. Why so much? Because before assessing his fine the law checked his income and net worth. He was rich, so they soaked him. Just like some in America want to do.

And I thought a sin was a sin. Guess it's worse if you work hard and make more money.
But it would be a way to help pay for "free" health care.

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