When you think of what you'll be like ten years from now, if you're like most people, you probably imagine that you'll be just like you are now. Yet when you look back ten years, aren't you different than you were then? Of course you are different today than you were ten years ago - unless you've removed yourself from any experience of living. Life is a continual anti-entropy endeavor. If we don't expend energy to create order, the natural tendency of things to move toward disorder takes over. If you don't mow the lawn, the lawn becomes a growth of weeds; if you don't use your body in some kind of physical activity, your body begins to break down; if you don't use your mind to learn and think about new things, your mind will become less active and effective. You will be different than you are now in ten years. That's a fact of life. The question is, how will you be different; and will you be different mostly as a result of events, or through conscious choice?

"Just got off the phone with my health care provider asking them to explain why my premium jumped up," Democratic political strategist Donna Brazile  tweeted.  "No good answers." The poor lady needs a clue.  "Health insurance companies are seeking and winning double digit increases in premiums for some customers, even though one of the biggest objectives of the Obama administration's health care law was to stem the rapid rise in insurance costs for customers," wrote New York Times reporter Reed Abelson Jan. 5. Mr. Abelson needs a clue, too.  Premiums aren't soaring in spite of Obamacare.  They're rising because of Obamacare. Duh.

For the last two weeks, President Barack Obama and his aides have been warning about horrible calamities that will ensue when the dreaded sequester begins tonight.  But no one can outdo Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Cal, in fearmongering. The sequester could cost "over 170 million jobs," she said.  "This is very disturbing news," said Jonah Goldberg, because according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, fewer than 113 million Americans have full time jobs.  This is the Washington Monument Gambit, on steroids. James Capretta and Tevi Troy detail the administration's scare tactics here. What Obama is saying about the sequester is so wildly at odds with the facts, he could be headed for a Mayan Calendar moment, said Investors Business Daily. "Normally, the media could be counted upon to sell Obama's version," Thomas Lifson thinks. "But even the wizards of persuasion can't overcome the reality that downsizing has been a prominent part of organizational life across America, particularly among the MSM."  So if Republicans play their cards right and don't lose their nerve, they can win the PR battle this time. The stock market agrees, says Ross Kaminski.

Can you name the worst tax? In recent weeks, there have been a slew of articles in major publications about how many multinational corporations have found legal ways to reduce their tax burdens by running some of their operations through low-tax jurisdictions. In response, those who love high taxes and big government demand that corporations pay more. Economists dislike the corporate income tax because it reduces productive labor and capital and is an additional tax on income that has already been (or will be) taxed. Politicians love the tax because it is largely invisible to most voters. Because of tax competition among countries, corporate tax rates have been dropping globally, resulting in the United States having the world's highest rate. Now the high-taxers are fighting back.  They need to be stopped.

Sequestration "will jeopardize our military readiness; it will eviscerate job-creating investments in education and energy and medical research," President Barack Hussein Obama said at a news conference last week.  "FBI agents will be furloughed. Federal prosecutors will have to close cases and let criminals go. Thousands of teachers and educators will be laid off." You wouldn't guess from his remarks that sequestration was Mr. Obama's idea.  It was a poison pill he proposed to resolve an impasse with Republicans on raising the ceiling on the national debt.  He wanted to raise taxes to reduce the deficit.  They wanted to trim spending.  Sequestration kicked the can down the road.  If no deal were made before March 1, 2013, then automatic spending "cuts" of up to $1.2 trillion would be made over 9 years.  Mr. Obama is frantically predicting the end of the world if these "cuts" kick in.  We should be glad he is.

The federal tax system should be replaced with a flat tax based on the Biblical obligation to tithe, says famed surgeon Benjamin Carson.  "You make $10 billion, you put in a billion. You make $10, you put in $1." His speech at the National Prayer Breakfast was a Youtube sensation, but even some conservatives are skeptical. Dr. Carson's argument for a flat tax is not persuasive, "given the complexities involved," said National Review Editor Rich Lowry. We can't afford so sweeping a reform as Dr. Carson proposes, because innocents would suffer if the enormous distortions the tax system makes in the economy were removed, Mr. Lowry seems to say. I hope I'm reading him wrong, because that's nuts. Politicians created complexity in the tax code to camouflage costs and evade accountability.  We shouldn't let them use the magnitude of the mess they've made as an excuse to block, delay, or water down reform.

What a hornet's nest on the TTP Forum got stirred up by that Congressista's questioning of Social Security in The Traitor in the White House.  I guess some clarification is required. He meant it as a "teachable moment," a thought experiment to demonstrate that just as his conservative audience was determined no matter what to demand their Social Security payments, so is everyone else in America who's receiving some sort of government payout.  He thus sees truly cutting government spending as a hopeless task. He was not questioning Social Security, and was quite interested - as were his two colleagues - in the concept of selling off federal lands (1/3 of the entire US) to pay owed SS benefits when I mentioned it.  But his thought experiment backfired, both in his townhall meeting and the TTP Forum because of the visceral emotions surrounding SS. Here's my perspective.  People have been conned by government scammers into thinking that SS taxes are somehow different from income or other taxes.  All the money taken by force or extortion by the federalies was earned by those from whom it was taken. Social Security is a government racket, a gigantic Ponzi Scheme.  There is no Trust Fund.  It does not exist.  Your money has been spent. Further, the purpose of Social Security is to make people dependent on government.  Even conservatives, most especially conservatives.  I personally look at SS taxes as stolen and gone just like all others. Stealing money is what governments do, and SS money is no different.