All in it together

Oh, that Romney. He’s so wrong.

It’s not 47 percent of the people who depend on government in this country.

It’s 100 percent.

That’s right – whether you realize it or not, whether you like it or not – each and every one of us depends on our government for something, every day. Think about it: Even the most wealthy people in the country, say, the ones who can afford $50,000-per-plate fundraisers to hear would-be presidents speak, rely on the government. American soldiers, sailors, airmen, Marines and Coast Guard members protect them, overseas and at home, every day. Officers of the U.S. intelligence community work day and night to foil plots that would do us harm.

Those rich folks – and the rest of us – rise and sleep under the protection of law enforcement agencies from the FBI to local police and sheriff’s departments. If members of Romney’s dinner audience were to become the victims of a crime, government detectives would investigate, government attorneys would prosecute and government courts would sentence offenders to publicly run prisons, with the aim of deterring future bad acts.

The people who attended Romney’s fundraiser drove there on taxpayer-financed roads, in cars subject to government-safety standards and dined on food subject to government inspections to prevent disease and epidemics. Yes, they enjoy telling us how they pulled themselves up by their bootstraps, but if those bootstraps were made in America, it was in a factory where workers were kept safe by regulations, paid at least a minimum wage by law and afforded the right to join a union, if they so desired, in an election overseen by the federal government.

In fact, it’s virtually impossible to go even a day in America without using – and, often, depending upon – services provided by the government and paid for by us, the taxpayers, ponying up what former U.S. Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes called “the price we pay for civilization.”

Deeper into his rant, Romney mentioned how 47 percent of the population pays no federal income tax at all. According to the Tax Policy Center, it’s actually about 46.4 percent, and people in that group still pay many other taxes, from sales and property taxes to payroll taxes and gas taxes when they fuel their cars.

According to FactCheck.org, fully half of the 46.4 percent simply didn’t earn enough – after deductions – to owe any income taxes. Another 22 percent get senior tax benefits, 15.2 percent get tax credits for children or the working poor and the rest utilized deductions, credits and lower capital gains and dividend tax rates to end up not owing anything. (According to FactCheck.org, the Tax Policy Center estimates 7,000 U.S. families pay no federal income tax despite earning more than $1 million. Somebody better tell Sen. Harry Reid!)

National Review Editor Rich Lowry, in an op-ed on Politico, took a swing at Romney for embracing what he called “right-wing Elizabeth Warrenism,” the idea that, “if you aren’t paying them [federal income taxes] – or aren’t paying enough – you are a subcitizen.” Some on the left have indeed declared that paying taxes is a patriotic obligation, something required by citizenship.

But the bottom line is, whether you’re paying the top bracket of 35 percent on wages or paying local and payroll taxes only, everybody – every single person – in America depends on the government that those taxes purchase. And a good president worries about all of those people.

Steve Sebelius is a Review-Journal political columnist and author of the blog SlashPolitics.com. Follow him on Twitter (@SteveSebelius) or reach him at (702) 387-5276 or ssebelius@reviewjournal.com.