For years now I have said that the wars we are now fighting are NOT personal…..only a handful of people are truly effected by these actions……I have also said that if the American people had more skin in these things then the war would have ended awhile back……but now following along those lines someone was come up with an idea……

Influential US lawmakers on Thursday called for levying a new income tax to pay for the war in Afghanistan, warning its costs pose a mortal threat to efforts like a sweeping health care overhaul.

The group included House Appropriations Committee Chairman Dave Obey; Representative John Murtha, who chair that panel’s defense subcommittee; and House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank.

The proposal, a heavily symbolic measure seen as having next to no chance of becoming law, would impose a war surtax on income beginning in 2011 — though it would allow the president to delay implementation by one year upon deciding the US economy is too weak to sustain such a tax shift.

It would also exempt members of the US military who have served in combat since the September 11, 2001 terrorist strikes, their families, and families of soldiers who died as a result of combat.

The measure would create a three-tiered change in income tax with the goal of paying for all of the war’s costs.

Couples earning up to 150,000 dollars per year would see a one-percent increase in their regular tax level, from 15 percent currently to 15.15 percent.

For those making between 150,000-250,000 dollars per year or 250,000 dollars or above, the president would have to set the rate increase high enough to pay for the remaining war costs, and in such a way that the middle-tier earners pay half what the top earners do.

Currently, the war costs roughly 68 billion dollars per year, which would mean that the middle tier would see its rate rise from 28 percent to 29.5 percent, while the top would climb from 33 percent to 36.6 percent, according to a person familiar with the plan.

As said in the article it has little to no chance of being passed…..but it is a thought……I also think that it would help make these wars more personal than they are now and in doing so would fuel a new anti-war movement…….which in turn could help end the killings on both sides…..

I need to pat myself on the back a bit (why not….it is my right) back on 27 February 2007 I called for a “Patriot Tax”….but my idea was to fund all the assistance that vets needed and were not getting at the time……this latest thing from Obey is along those same lines….