Saturday, October 29, 2011

Herman Cain on Trade: Imports Are Subject To OUR Domestic Taxation

I remain puzzled by this: still as of this moment maybe only one guy has really sounded the alarms about Herman Cain on free trade to its devotees, namely Jerry Bowyer at Forbes.

Larry Kudlow talks up Herman Cain like crazy every Saturday on his radio show, and I've been listening for weeks while all the other candidates come out and talk with him about flat tax proposals of their own, and still none of Kudlow's free-trade peeps seem to have picked up on it, nor has Kudlow for that matter.

While they do not take Herman seriously enough to read even Herman's own description of his 999 Plan, however, the money has started to pour in, $5 million in October alone, most of it on-line, according to Robert Costa at National Review here.

And I don't think any of Herman's Republican challengers has brought it up either. They'll criticise one or another feature of the 999 Plan as too complicated, unrealistic, unpopular or unworkable, but I still do not hear any of them criticise Herman as a protectionist.

But Herman makes no secret of his playing-field-leveling plans.

As shown here:

Exports leave our shores without the Business Tax [9 percent] or the Sales Tax [9 percent] embedded in their cost, making them world class [!] competitive. Imports are subject to the same taxation as domestically produced goods, leveling the playing field.


In other words, imports will get slapped with a 9 percent business tax and with the 9 percent sales tax just as domestic goods are in order to protect our market from unfairly subsidized products designed to undercut our prices, capture market share and drive US competitors out of action on our own soil.

Shhhhhhh!

Herman Cain is running a stealth fair trade campaign under cover of a Fair Tax program, designed in part obviously to appeal to Democrat voters in union shops.

It tells you a lot about the guy, especially since he's the only Republican running who is serious about overturning the income tax itself. All the rest of them accept the assault on the constitution it represents.

Herman is a wily devil.













(source)