I'm not anti-rich, I'm pro-fairness

The people who are in the top one percent of income saw their incomes grow by 275 percent between the years of 1979 and 2007.  The middle class saw their incomes go up as well, a whopping 40 percent.

That means that middle class America averaged an annual 1.4 percent raise during that time period.  The top one percent?  An annual raise of just under ten percent.

And what have the top one percent done to repay America for providing them with the right, the freedom and the infrastructure needed to reap such wealth?  They have lobbied for - and gotten - more tax breaks, more loopholes, more opportunities not to reinvest in America, the country that has done so much to make their wealth possible.

"The rules have been changed by the unfair tax policies of the last decade and our tax code is doing less to level the playing field than it was in the past." [said Representative Sander Levin.]

Levin is the top Democrat on the U.S. House of Representatives' tax-writing Ways and Means Committee.

As a result of this uneven shift, income was substantially more skewed toward the very top of the income scale in 2007 than it was in 1979, CBO said.

So much so, it said, that in 2005-2007, just before the financial crisis, the top 20 percent of the population received more after-tax income than the entire bottom 80 percent.

MSNBC.com: Income of top 1 percent far outgrew others: report

If this tells us anything, it tells us that that the Reagan "revolution" was an economic failure.  It tells us that the rising tide doesn't raise all boats, it just lifts the yachts and puts the average Joe's mortgage underwater. 

And what does the Republican field of Presidential candidates want to do about it?  Well, Herman Cain and Rick Perry want an even more regressive flat tax.  They want to put even more burden on the poor and middle class.  Isn't that just the opposite of what America needs right now?

Instead, it is time for America to deliver a bill to the wealthiest among us for services rendered.  Republicans are all about accountability, or so they say, so isn't it time for the uber-rich to be held financially accountable. This country helped make them wealthy so it is time for them to do the right thing, the patriotic thing, and start paying their fair share.