I would like to bring some fairness and balance to my practice of pointing and shaking my head at groups of which I'm slightly ashamed to be a member. In that spirit, witness a slew of current-and-future big corporate lawyers whining and moaning about the possibility that they might have to pay an additional 4% of their income above $150,000 ($200,000 for couples filing jointly) as a surtax if a bill introduced by Charlie Rangel (my congressman!) passes. Never mind that the surtax comes in exchange for an elimination of the Alternative Minimum Tax, which means that most of these learned barristers will probably be paying less under the new scheme.
Still, any chance to explain why, as true Ayn Randian Ubermenschen and Uberfrauen, they are being held back from their true, full potential by the socialist redistributive policies of the mediocre minds in government, motivated as they are by misplaced sympathies for the weak, lazy, undeserving underclasses. Truly, if the government were to disappear tomorrow these supermen and superwomen would reach untold heights of accomplishment, no longer constrained in their ability to earn money by arguing over and enforcing . . . the laws of . . . the government that doesn't exist anymore.
