Starving the Beast using the Tax Code

The Democrats, who are poised to take control of Congress in a couple of weeks, are about to face the almost insurmountable challenge of ending the war in Iraq. There is general concensus that this is the will of the electorate, but there are a broad range of ideas on how to execute that apparent mandate, from an immediate evacuation of US forces to an escalation with the intent of a swift, victorious conclusion, and just about everything in between. The Iraq Study Group report, due out on Wednesday, will likely be a mish-mash of status-quo and minor adjustments, but the basic tone is an eventual withdrawal. It get the Duh-of-the-day award for that one. Seriously though, it's unclear how the Bush administration will view the report or if they'll follow the advice of the distinguished panel. The bottom line though is that, as commander in chief, Bush calls the shots, the way he sees fit, as long as the war is funded.

Democrats could, if they wanted to, opt to stop funding the war and that would force us to pack up and leave Iraq. Of course you know what the fallout would be to that. First of all, it would never pass. Also, anyone who proposed it would be howled at for not supporting the troops.

But there is a way to do this. Imagine this:

The Democrats propose one of the biggest tax cuts in U.S. history. It's across the board and percentage based. In fact, they could even make it disproportionately slanted toward the super rich.

Here's how it works.

They come up with the amount of all income tax revenue spent on the wars, in the last fiscal year, as a percentage of all income tax revenue combined. Say that's 25%. Then, on the revised 1040 form, you're allowed to choose to fund or not fund the wars. If you choose not to, simply take that 25% percent as a deduction.

You want to see how popular the wars really are? As soon as people are faced with the choice of coughing up a few thousand extra dollars... or using that money for something more important to them, suddenly they're not so detached from the war anymore. It comes with a real price tag, and an invoice due on April 15th.

Let the American public defund the war in the same way we fund it. Use the Tax Code.