General Assembly’s plan to lower income tax is not much of one | Opinion

State budget

The annual Kentucky State Budget is around $12 billion. In fiscal year 2015, 47.6 percent of total tax revenues came from sales taxes and gross receipts. Income taxes accounted for 41.5 percent of total state tax collections. That means our state income tax provides some $5 billion in state revenues. In spite of that, the Republican-controlled state legislature is bound and determined to eliminate this source of income. They intend to do this even though they have NO PLAN to replace the lost revenue with anything other than extending the sales tax to items and services that it is currently not applied to. So when you pay 6 percent sales tax on goods or services that were previously tax exempt, thank the Republicans!

Jim Porter, Danville

Love not hate

President Abraham Lincoln said, “A house divided against itself cannot stand.” Rome ended after 500 years — internal politics and division sealed its fate. Fear and hate are stronger emotions than love. Mainstream religion promotes peace and love. The 10 commandments talk about loving our neighbors, not idolizing false Gods; not lying, stealing or cheating.

Politics and all forms of media have become a part of our being, part of our skin. It’s bad theater at best. Our government and country are failing. We need to stop blaming others and start seeing each other the same. A beautiful, kind, elderly African American lady told me her view on racism after enduring Jim Crow most of her life. She believed in God; believed God made us in his image; believed he made everything.

He made cows every color, size and shapes, yet they are all cows, she said. I believe if it worked for her, it should work for me. We must stop accepting hate and fear as a normal way to live. I am not afraid and am working on being like her.

Bill Moloney, Lexington

Democratic conspiracy

Democrat politicians told us that our democracy was on the ballot this past election. They were right. In my opinion, they are the threat. They are not democratic, nor are they liberals. They are corrupt Leftist totalitarians.

Here’s what I think. Some news sources say the FBI had Hunter Biden’s laptop starting in December 2019 and knew that the Biden family was making millions of dollars from foreign governments. Those sources say when the FBI learned that the New York Post was going to publish the laptop’s contents prior to the election, it and members of the national security community created the narrative that Russian disinformation was coming and warned Twitter and other news media not to “fall for it.” Voters were lied to, I think, and Biden won the presidency. Now, our border is open, fentanyl is killing our citizens, inflation is raging, we are in another foreign war, and we are $31 trillion in debt. Our government is being thoroughly corrupted by the Democrat party.

Ray Davis, Lexington

Insurrection similarities

I have been watching the MSNBC video of U.S. Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) and specifically the portion of the video dealing with the events of Jan. 6, 2021. They show the offices of the Congress members being invaded, looted, and all but destroyed by the insurrectionists. I thought to myself, “Have I seen this before?”

Then I remembered. The homes and offices and schools and libraries of Ukraine that were occupied by the Russians looked exactly the same. The pattern of wanton and utterly capricious destruction of everything, even when there was no reason to do so, was identical.

I have been reading the excellent New York Times coverage of the invasion and takeover of Ukrainian towns and cities by Russia. The speech patterns, the epitaphs bellowed by the invaders, the cursing and disparagement of the citizens are almost exactly the same as the vile utterances and curses the Jan. 6 insurrectionists used against the Capitol Police. I do not know what these deluded people thought they were but I’ll tell you exactly who they were - fascists guilty of seditious conspiracy.

James Porter, Danville

Misinformation maestro

U.S. Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) better watch out. It appears his reputation as the consummate Congressional tall tale teller is about to be smashed by a newly inducted U.S. Representative from New York— George Santos.

In his time, Paul has crafted and passed on so many conspiracy stories some feel they have made him the Grand Poobah of misinformation. He’s been perfecting his misinformation craft ever since his days in medical school. He’s pretty good at it.

His stature as the leader of tall tale tellers in Congress apparently is no match for Santos. Sen. Paul, you are going to have to either relinquish your tall tale teller leadership position, or you will need to really step up your misinformation game noticeably to surpass Santos. Right now he’s considerably better at misinforming American than you are. Can you share with us what you plan to do?

Gene Lockhart, Lexington

Branded politicians

In the movies and on TV, ranchers brand their cattle. I don’t know if that happens in real life or is a continued practice among mega-ranchers. My understanding is that the practice was to show ownership, to identify where the cattle belonged and to stop cattle rustlers. Suggesting that all elected officials, including school board members, be branded by their political affiliation is demeaning and treats these public servants as the property of someone or something. Let us voters do some work and learn who stands for what. Let these candidates speak for themselves, an honor that cattle do not have. Or perhaps you prefer a lot of “mooing” to free-range thoughtfulness, creative thinking and problem solving?

Janice Russell, Lexington

McCarthy struggles

It appears to me that Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy (R-Cal.) will continue to struggle with a big problem that is similar to the big problem Kentucky Democrats face in our Kentucky General Assembly. As McCarthy surrenders to the far-right members of his own party, Kentucky Democrats are suffocated by Republican opponents who tend to be more extremely right than ever before.

Here’s the problem in a nutshell. Far-right candidates for public office nowadays typically promise the voters they will not “compromise.” It appears, they are keeping that campaign promise at both the state and national levels.

How might Kentucky Democrats stop far-right candidates from defeating their candidates in the first place, we might ask? Many think the solution is to press further left. Give the voters a clear alternative, they say. So far, however, that strategy has not worked outside of our biggest cities. Now what?

Tom Louderback, Louisville

Popular vote

I’m writing today to talk about the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact.

Some historians have said the Electoral College was created to preserve the stalemate around slavery. Slave states knew they were in the minority, and if everyone had an equal vote, slavery would be abolished. They wouldn’t accept a Constitution that gave everyone an equal vote. They insisted on their votes carrying more weight, so we wouldn’t be able to elect an anti-slavery president.

The Electoral College didn’t preserve slavery forever, but it did preserve the process that consistently allows a smaller number of people to dictate what happens against the wishes of a larger number of people. It gave us President Bush and a 20+ year war, then President Trump and a wave of white supremacy and religious extremism.

At its core, the question is simple: shouldn’t we get the president the American people choose?

Cassandra Lyons, Lexington

Premature concern

Thanks to the Herald Leader for pulling us out of our rational, complacent (“corporatism and uniformity”? and or “a soulless and uniform world”?) by publishing a local reactionary: J. Larry Hood. I am reluctant to spend the huge amount of time needed to try to ferret out some logic in his rant, but I do admire the paper for having the temerity to publish it. Yes Hood’s diatribe could make the milk in your coffee curdle, but his vast generalizations and fantastic leaps of logic offer some comic relief as a counter to the otherwise bleak “news.” More importantly, it is so consoling to realize that this great country still has room for the nut cases---thus proving that Hood’s alarm about uniformity is premature.

Sally Wasielewski, Lexington

AI opinion

If scholarly articles on Marxism, ‘corporatism,’ 1950’s America, and ‘Woke/cancel culture’ were plugged into the ChatGPT chatbot, one only can wonder whether it would produce the artificial intelligence expressed in Larry Hood’s Jan. 11th Opinion piece on the “unforeseen consequences of AI.”

Charles Thomason, Prospect

UK Loses

I have watched UK basketball for the past six decades, and I have seen the good, bad, and ugly over those years. I know that UK teams have lost many games, but it’s how this year’s team loses. They lose without aggressive teamwork on offense and especially on defense. They are good at passing around the horn, but that should be a tactic used only if you have the lead. And if your only “team play” is to get the ball into the paint and allow the other team to triple-team Oscar, that is not going to work against the better teams. I know they are excellent individually on paper, but they have had a half-season to gel and come together as a team, and I haven’t seen it yet. This is most apparent when on defense or lack thereof. The way to win is to field the best team willing to scrap and fight for every point and sacrifice self for the group.

Joe Hinds, Florence

Added landscaping

How many of you, while driving near the intersection of Man ‘O war and Richmond Road have noticed the lovely landscaping and new plank fence? From what I understand, this was created by the owners of United Motorsports, current tenant in the old Walmart building. The improvement in the façade is dramatic and the owners are to be strongly commended. In this era of slimmer profit margins, this is an exceptional improvement that benefits us all. By the way, I have absolutely no financial interest in the above mentioned business.

John J. Gohmann, MD, Lexington

IRS funding

In the U.S., during most of the last 70-80 years the federal taxes collected have been insufficient to cover the cost of running government. The difference being made up by borrowing money. Today, the yearly deficit has reached $3 trillion per year and our total federal debt as a percentage of gross domestic product (GDP) is 135 percent.

Because of competing political views, the problem just keeps getting worse. It seemed an easy starting point would be to just “collect taxes that are already due.” In April 2022, former Internal Revenue (IRS) Commissioner Charles Rettig estimated $1 trillion in taxes that should be collected each year aren’t. The current response by Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives is to cut IRS funding (HR 23). Every GOP House member from Kentucky voted in favor of that bill.

The GOP House solution to the deficit has never been to collect tax revenue, but to cut services and support to those dependent on them. Current GOP legislation under consideration will cut Social Security and Medicare. Many Kentuckians who voted to support these GOP House members probably did so because they believed Democrats had abandoned them and the GOP “cared about them.” Actions speak louder than words. As Roberta Flack sang, “Where is the love?”

Peter Wedlund, Lexington