The real class warfare: responsible vs irresponsible

The U.S. Congress is about to pass new legislation, the effect of which is to punish anyone who has credit cards and uses them responsibly. If you pay your bills on time you will be hurt. If you are irresponsible, or perhaps even intentionally dishonest, you will be rewarded.

Congress, in its infinite wisdom (read loads of sarcasm into that statement) wants to limit the penalties on irresponsible credit card users. The New York Times reports that one result of the legislation will be the “reviving annual fees, curtailing cash-back and other rewards programs and charging interest immediately on a purchase instead of allowing a grace period of weeks, according to bank officials and trade groups.”

One official of the American Bankers Association said: “Those that manage their credit well will in some degree subsidize those that have credit problems.”

Lest you think the Times has sympathy for responsible people, worry not. They have not given up their political bias in favor of irresponsibility and profligacy. In the sidebar they even have a section called “Room for Debate” which invites readers to debate the issue of “Should responsible card users be penalized for paying off their monthly balance?” That the Times even thinks there is “room for debate” on that issue speaks volumes.

The paper also quotes a “consultant” who claims that responsible cardholders were “making out like a bandit” because they didn’t pay annual fees and collect points for travel and other perks.

Remember that each time you use the card with a company that company pays a percentage to the bank for the privilege of having your credit backed by the bank. Individuals who don’t pay their debts on time actually take money from card companies. So, of course, banks charge them more.

But in the world of the perverted morality of politics responsibility has to be punished and irresponsibility has to be rewarded. If you think the Obama/Democratic government is waging war on the rich think again. They don’t give a damn if you are rich or poor. They merely care if you are responsible or irresponsible.

If you are irresponsible you will be favored no matter your level of income. Obama proved that by pouring trillions of dollars into the coffers of some of the wealthiest corporations in America but only if they had proven to be irresponsible. In fact, the more irresponsible they were, the more they were rewarded. Under Obama’s bailout schemes the only people punished were the responsible corporations.

Why is this sort of perverse politics so popular with the ruling elite? I suspect there are two reasons.

First, most of these clowns have never run businesses or, if they had, they ran them badly. George Bush was a lifelong failure in business; Obama has never been in business. He never paid out a salary to another person with his own money. This is sadly true from many politicians.

Second, politicians identify with irresponsible financial management. They understand it; they practice it on a daily basis when they draw up the budget. They understand spending more than you have, wasting money in irresponsible ways, lying to creditors, and cheating people out of the money they have earned. That’s how they run the country and they simply can’t conceive of any other way of managing things.