3469 Dear Mmes Pelosi and Clinton

Please don't raise taxes on the rich. Don't punish the entire country just cause you're angry that the Bush tax cuts helped all of us and you haven't done a thing. The top 5% of Americans are paying over 57% of the tax burden now and the folks at the bottom are paying no federal taxes at all.*

I'm just a pensioner, but I've benefitted from a lot of wealth transfer over the years--like all my public education from kindergarten through master's degree, all the highways and interstates I drive, the bridges (some to nowhere), the tax incentives so Wal-Mart and Target can build near my home and employ our locals who will then pay taxes, the state and national parks I enjoy, the set asides for the railroads, the subsidies to the farmers so I can have cheap milk and staples, the public libraries, and the airline bailouts so I can enjoy my vacations, not to mention the clean up of Lake Erie where I have a second home. The rich people don't need this stuff, and the poor don't use them as much as the middle-class, so lay off the rich guys, will ya? Don't mess with your cash cow.

Our investments have done so well in the past five years, that it's like having a third person in the household who gives us his take home pay but never opens the frig or forgets to fill the gas tank or asks me to do the laundry.

I know you're mad that the Bush policies have proven wrong every bad thing you projected in the economy, and you want to hide from the fact that you too read the intelligence of the former administration about the threat of Iraq, but don't punish the rest of us who've been living a pretty nice life having the rich pay taxes and invest in America.

*Especially the Mexican nationals sending money home, making their USA dollars the second highest source of income for Mexico, with tourism third and oil first.