Wealth distribution on a global scale.

Barack Obama proposed legislation titled Global Poverty Act (S. 2433) and was approved by the Committee, on which Joe Biden was on.

The bill suggests we spend .7% of our GDP – .7% of 13.8 Trillion is just under $100 billion EACH YEAR! – on helping people around the world that live on less than 1 dollar a day. Coincidentally that does not include impoverished people living in the United States.

If this does not rub you the wrong way, then nothing will. The bill has 30 co-sponsors, 5 of whom are Republicans (mostly moderate) and this somehow lends the bill to the auspices of bi-partisanship.

Spending 100 billion dollars a year (assuming our income remains constant – and it won’t) on battling poverty through the administration of the United Nations, an outfit which has repeatedly demonstrated it’s anger with the United States. What should strike you is that every single taxpayer in the United States will be forced to spend thousands of dollar a year on random strangers in the world and to countries that probably hate us. The idea that this will somehow curb terrorism is a Utopian dream and nothing more.

So, not only has our president-elect expressed a strong compunction to spread the wealth across the country, but now he has taken it worldwide. Even in the best economic time, I find this somewhat offensive when we have so many people in America currently at poverty levels. Our nation is already borrowing and printing money at astronomical rates, this just really bakes the cake.

What can we do?

First, click that link and educate yourself about the act. Then tell others about this bill.
Lastly, send email to at least the Republicans cosponsoring the bill.

This is the letter I sent to Mr. Hagel – the least moderate of these “Republicans”.

“Mr. Hagel,

I am quite disappointed to have learned that you are a cosponsor for the Global Poverty Act bill. Americans are being asked to pony up 100 billion a year (assuming ~14 trillion GDP). For what? Under some notion that terrorism will be thwarted?

America cannot afford to be spending money in the form of wealth distribution, let alone on causes that do not benefit us in the slightest. I can appreciate the benevolent nature of the bill, but with the recent economic downturns and the non-stop mounting debt, how can anyone think that this bill is a good idea?

This is profoundly disappointing and shows to me why Republicans have lost ground in the Congress and is exactly the reason I now vote 3rd party. There is virtually no distinction between the two parties anymore!

Where are the spending cuts? Where is fiscal responsibility? This is very disheartening.”

Sen. Susan Collins [R-ME]
Sen. Richard Lugar [R-IN]
Sen. Olympia Snowe [R-ME]
Sen. Charles Hagel [R-NE]
Sen. Gordon Smith [R-OR]