Just the latest evidence that government-run health care is less about providing health care and more about handing over control of the people to Washington. Which means, of course, controlling how much they can earn.

Senator Max Baucus (D-MT), enter stage left:

Too often, much of late, the last couple three years the mal-distribution of income in America is gone up way too much, the wealthy are getting way, way too wealthy, and the middle income class is left behind. Wages have not kept up with increased income of the highest income in America. This legislation will have the effect of addressing that mal-distribution of income in America.

I’ve honestly never understood liberal vilification of the wealthy. Do liberals think every wealthy individual was born into a centuries-old elite Mid-Atlantic family with estates and ponies growing up? Many of America’s wealthiest individuals were not born wealthy, they worked hard and made their own way up the ladder. Why should they be punished for success?

We live a country where everyone should have equal opportunity to succeed. But no government can guarantee equal outcome without guaranteeing equal misery. Outside of lala land, not everyone can become Bill Gates. But everyone can have an opportunity to work hard and with a little luck and a lot of perseverance become successful.

Those who make it, those who have worked hard and succeeded, should not be punished for their accomplishments. They should not be vilified. What’s the incentive to succeed if doing so makes you a target of the government, which then decides to take away the fruits of your labor? What’s the incentive for that young student to work hard and get a good education?

There isn’t one, at least not in reality. Which is why Communism has never worked. Everyone having the same exact thing is nice in theory but a disaster in practice. If everyone gets the same thing at the end of the day, why work harder than your neighbor? Why work twice as hard to get no further along than the guy who sat on his ass all afternoon?

But I suppose that’s the underlying reason for continued liberal insistence to vilify success. They live in a world of nice theories absent of reality. They want insurance companies to act like charities. They want energy companies to take financial hits without laying off employees or increasing energy prices. They want to take away wealth generated by the successful without hard-working people giving up the pursuit of success because it’s a dead end road.

What would liberal politicians do for tax revenue if suddenly everyone in the country made just $50,000 per year? Most tax revenue comes from the top couple of percentage points of wage-earners. Such a scenario would eliminate much of the funding Democrats waste on pork projects and entitlement programs.

Everyone being equally successful sounds nice in theory. But it’s not realistic without making everyone equally miserable.

“The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings;
the inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of misery.”

– Prime Minister Winston Churchill