Steyn on the government takeover of everything

The latest from Mark Steyn.*

Is it a Bird? Is it a Plane? No, it's Big Government
(or, at NR, The Six-Trillion-Dollar Man)

Excerpts:

If you find it hard to keep track of all these evolutions, the president in his address to Congress finally spilled the beans and unveiled our new hero in his final form: the Incredible Bulk, Statezilla, Governmentuan, a colossus bestriding the land like a, er, colossus. What superpowers does he have? All of them! He can save the economy, he can reform health care, he can prevent foreclosures, he can federalize day care, he can cap the salary of his archenemies the sinister Fat Cats who "pad their paychecks and buy fancy drapes." No longer will the citizenry cower in fear of fancy drapes: Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain! With one solar panel on the roof of his underground headquarters, Governmentuan can transform the American energy sector and power his amazing Governmentmobile, the new environmentally friendly supercar that soon we'll all be driving because we'll be given government car loans to buy the government cars! He'll have hundreds of thousands of boy sidekicks, none of whom will ever be allowed to drop out of high school because (in the words of his famous catchphrase) "that's no longer an option!" "Gee, thanks, Governmentuan!" says Diplomaboy the Boy Wonder, as he goes off to college to study Gender As A Social Construct until he's 34.

* * * * *

Noting the president's assurance that the 250-grand-and-under crowd won't pay "a single dime" more in taxes, The Wall Street Journal calculated that if you took every single dime – that's 100 percent – of the over-250K crowd, it barely begins to pay for this program, even before half of them flee the country. The $4 trillion Congress is planning on spending next year (2010) could just about be covered if you took every single dime of the taxable income of every American earning over $75,000.

I know he's not a superhero, but I'm reminded of The Amazing Colossal Man, wreaking havoc in his amazingly colossal diaper, but ultimately dropping dead of his own colossal-ness.










*Readers, please stipulate the usual: that Mark is the most brilliant (and hilarious) analyst on the planet, that this column is no exception, and that you must read all of it because it's chock-full of brilliance (and hilarity).

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