Dick Gephardt, You've Been Plagiarized

I've grown accustomed to The Roanoke Times' Editorial staff's glowing approval of "progressive" income tax rates. A progressive tax scheme is one in which those who pay the most taxes are taxed at a progressively higher rate, so I guess "progressive" is properly descriptive.

Today's editorial entitled Stealth tax cuts strike next year was just more of the same. Except...

The undercutting of a progressive tax structure -- one in which those who have benefited proportionately more from society assume the civic and moral responsibility to pay proportionately more to keep it running -- is rolling right along.
(emphasis added)

Whoa, whoa, whoa...

Tommy, Wendy, and crew. Do you really believe that those who have achieved some level of success have done so on the back of society? You have chosen a rather literary way of paraphrasing Dick Gephardt, who famously called those same achievers "winners in life's lottery".

Yeah, right. We all know that it's not possible in America to achieve the status of "wealthy" by hard work, innovation, and commercial risk taking. It can only be achieved by the luck of the draw or by exploiting disproportionately society at large. In the America I live in, (just an hour south and slightly west of the one you guys inhabit on Campbell Ave) the only people that fit your description are a handful of NBA and NFL stars, and some outsized egos in Hollywood. And maybe some certain highly paid newspaper personnel in Southwest Virginia with apparently guilty consciences?