Justin Bieber is a 15-year-old teen idol and singing sensation. The pop star was one of the presenters at the 2010 Grammy Awards and one of the 74 music superstars who remade the 25-year-old song "We Are the World," and he just helped kick off the weekend events for the Super Bowl. MTV calls Justin one of the two "biggest names in the pop-culture universe at the moment."
A couple of weeks ago, I received word that Bieber was posting (or tweeting) on Twitter some Chuck Norris "facts" -- those mythical superhero-type sayings about what people say or think I can do. Then I heard Justin posted a playful photo of me as my character in "Walker, Texas Ranger" with himself Photoshopped into the image, kneeling next to me. The bubble caption coming from his mouth read, "Buy 'Baby' ... Chuck Norris says you should!" (For those who don't know, "Baby" is Justin's new hit single.)
As a result, more than 50,000 blogs and news columns popped up asking tongue-in-cheek questions, such as "Justin Bieber and Chuck Norris Team Up?!" "Where Is Chuck Norris? Is Justin Bieber In Danger?!"
Is Justin Bieber in danger? Maybe, but definitely not from me. (I'm going to send Bieber a copy of my new book, "The Official Chuck Norris Fact Book," which has my 101 favorite facts and stories to go with them.)
What threatens Bieber and other youths across the country is a runaway Washington that is heaping upon their generations trillions of dollars of debt, which they will have to pay off with their taxes. Like wayward parents who leave a legacy of messes that their children have to mop up, the federal government in due time will force even young, creative and wealthy entertainers, such as Justin, to pay tomorrow for its out-of-control spending today.
Washington has added a record $1.6 trillion to the national debt since President Barack Obama entered office -- unprecedented in the first year of a presidential administration. And Congress just voted last week to borrow another $1.9 trillion!
Amazingly, after initiating all that incurred debt, our president said last week, "We simply cannot continue to spend as if deficits don't have consequences, as if waste doesn't matter, as if the hard-earned tax dollars of the American people can be treated like 'Monopoly' money." To whom is he talking? Congress? Himself?
He then informed the American public that he was proposing a record-breaking $3.8 trillion budget for 2011 (starting Oct. 1), which would equate to spending $7.3 million a minute. (The federal budget was only $1.9 trillion in 2001.) Tragically, the president expects Americans to live one financial way (fiscally prudently) and the federal government to live another (extravagantly wildly).
Obama's proposed 2011 budget would call for $2 trillion in higher taxes over 10 years; that's after accounting for its $154 billion in tax cuts. The budget would allow the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts to expire for families making more than $250,000 a year. What that would mean -- again, in due time for even young, innovative musicians, such as Justin Bieber, as well as a plethora of entertainers who actually elected Obama into office -- is that the top two marginal tax rates would rise from 33 and 35 percent to 36 and 39.6 percent.
Unfortunately, such tax hikes would not help us out of the recession. Actually, they would drive us deeper into economic despair because such increases enable Washington's reckless spending, penalize productivity and often trickle down into higher consumer prices or organizational cuts. I agree with Reps. Bobby Bright, D-Ala., and Mike McMahon, D-N.Y., who wrote in a January letter to Obama, "Allowing these tax rates to expire during this recession runs the risk of curtailing economic expansion just when it begins to pick up and could lead to a 'double dip' recession."
Washington has an addiction problem, and it's addicted to debt. But instead of charging it to its own credit, it's charging it to all hardworking American people, especially the next generations. It radically opposes the sound and prudent fiscal advice of our Founding Fathers, such as Thomas Jefferson, who counseled to "put off buying anything until we have the money to pay for it." Jefferson also admonished, "The conclusion then, is, that neither the representatives of a nation, nor the whole nation itself assembled, can validly engage debts beyond what they may pay in their own time."
The bottom line is that Washington is stealing from our posterity. The White House is robbing our children of their future. But the youth have no say in the matter beyond our ability to fight for them. That's what our Founders called "taxation without representation" -- when the government forces others to pay despite their inability to vote, voice opposition or often even prepare for the fallout from the resulting and impending economic earthquake coming upon them.
Justin Bieber won MTV's brand-new "10 For 10" poll, which seeks to discover the hottest artist for the coming year. Bieber bagged a massive 41 percent of the votes. Rasmussen Reports cites that only 26 percent of the nation's voters strongly approve of the way that Obama is performing in his role as president, so after Bieber rules the music world, maybe he should consider a run for the White House.
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