Saturday, June 11, 2005 It Just Keeps Getting Better I'd like to be the first old Free Presser to offer my congratulations on another successful year of the Dartmouth Free Press, and an especially terrific senior issue. I remember how difficult it used to be for us to publish according to any sort of regular schedule, so the fact that you folks do it biweekly is an awesome feat. I really enjoyed the intelligent, deeply personal accounts of life at and beyond Dartmouth that fill the '05s culminating issue. Also, kudos on including a great quote from Warren Beatty's commencement speech--I was there, and so were all the major California media outlets, but they were much more interested in the Schwarzenegger-related soundbites.
UPDATE: Oh yeah, and also congratulations go out to all the '05s on their commencement this weekend.
All art, political or not, must make everything more beautiful in order to fulfill its most essential function, that of seizing and holding the viewer's attention. Any political artist who aspires to be more than a cheerleader for the converted must first learn this lesson, and learn it well. A boring work of art cannot convince anyone of anything, not even that we should believe what it tells us about the world in which we live.
I agree totally with him up to this point. But then:
And nothing is more boring--or less believable--than a story with only one side.
This is simply, patently, inarguably false. One need only think of the Ancient Greek theater to come up with examples of very one-sided dramas. The plays of Aristophanes had overt political content, and though it was served next to some laughs, that does not make them any less one-sided. The plays of Sophocles likewise had an utterly one-sided vision of life as tragic, an understanding which is, in fact, political, as many critics have shown, and I’d be happy to point them out to (the apparently ignorant) Mr. Teachout.
Teachout uses Shakespeare as an example of someone who shows the humanity of his villains, but is this really an effort to create a drama that “[pays] us the compliment of letting us make up our own minds?” Does anyone truly feel like rooting for Lady Macbeth, even when she’s going into hysterics over her little “spots?” Do you think Shakespeare even meant to make that possible?
I am not arguing that the plays Teachout attacks are good or even watchable. (Well, I’ll argue for Tony Kushner’s plays, but Teachout can have the rest.) I am arguing that art that is both manifestly political in nature and one-sided in its message can be good or even great and that "neutral" art can be just as bad as anything else.
It is precisely this kind of conservatism that is most insidious--the type that argues for "fair and balanced" art or news or academic faculties when that fairness and balance is not even that beneficial and is, rather, a smokescreen for protecting the status quo. There is implicit or explicit political content in all art, all news, all teaching, all life, all the time. It would be far better to recognize it and work inside that recognition than to whine about a lack of balance.
Posted by Andrew Seal,
11:28 AM
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Sunday, June 05, 2005
The myth of the graduated income tax
I recommend taking a look at this New York Times study on the unfairness of U.S. income taxation system and the growing class divide.
Some highlights:
Under the Bush tax cuts, the 400 taxpayers with the highest incomes - a minimum of $87 million in 2000, the last year for which the government will release such data - now pay income, Medicare and Social Security taxes amounting to virtually the same percentage of their incomes as people making $50,000 to $75,000.
Those earning more than $10 million a year now pay a lesser share of their income in these taxes than those making $100,000 to $200,000.
It’s hard to understand how this could be considering that those earning 70-150k are supposed to pay 28%, while those earning 325k+ are supposed to pay 35%, but a combinations of factors including the very wealthy’s greater investment income, the cap on social security taxes at 90k, and elaborate tax shelters, coalesce to push wealth income taxes below upper middle class income taxes.
The Bush Administration claims that the Bush tax cuts have shifted payments in favor of middle and lower classes, but it’s hard to see how this could be true, considering the following (also from the NYT study):
Still, an Internal Revenue Service study found that the only taxpayers whose share of taxes declined in 2001 and 2002 were those in the top 0.1 percent.
Considering these statistics, one would think a logical way of tackling social security would be to raise the 90k cap to cover incomes up to 150k, or even to cover all incomes. This idea has been hotly debated in congress, but the SS policy of progressive price that is currently in vogue only shifts more tax burden to the upper middle class, leaving the very wealthy unaffected. The two main arguments against eliminating this cap are a) the very wealthy don’t benefit from social security b) It would amount to the largest tax hike on the extremely wealthy in history. But raising the cap on social security seems like a good way of correcting this problem where the extremely wealthy are paying a smaller percentage of their income in taxes than the somewhat wealthy.
It's disturbing how the limited debate on class issues in congress always ignores the extremely wealthy, allowing them to escape with such a light tax burden.
