IBD repeated falsehood that Obama bill would levy "Global Tax" on U.S. taxpayers

A July 29 Investor's Business Daily editorial headlined "Obama's Global Tax" falsely claimed that the Global Poverty Act of 2007, sponsored by Sen. Barack Obama, "would force U.S. taxpayers to fork over 0.7% of our gross domestic product every year to fund a global war on poverty, spending well above the $16.3 billion in global poverty aid the U.S. already spends." The editorial continued:

Over a 13-year period, from 2002, when the U.N.'s Financing for Development Conference was held, to the target year of 2015, when the U.S is expected to meet its part of the U.N. Millennium goals, we would be spending an additional $65 billion annually for a total of $845 billion.

During a time of economic uncertainty, the plan would cost every American taxpayer around $2,500.

IBD's assertions echoed false claims made by Accuracy in Media's Cliff Kincaid in a February 12 column and by Rush Limbaugh on the February 14 edition of his nationally syndicated radio show. In fact, the bill does not impose a tax on the United States or allow any other body to impose a tax.

While the Global Poverty Act would proclaim that "[i]t is the policy of the United States to promote the reduction of global poverty, the elimination of extreme global poverty, and the achievement of the United Nations Development Group's Millennium Development Goal of reducing by one-half the proportion of people worldwide, between 1990 and 2015, who live on less than $1 per day," the bill would not "force U.S. taxpayers to fork over 0.7% of our gross domestic product." The bill would establish no specific funding source and would not commit the United States to any targeted level of spending, as Media Matters for America has documented.

The bill directs the president, acting through the secretary of state, to develop a strategy to meet the goal of reducing poverty. It also states that strategy "should include" among its components "[i]mproving the effectiveness of development assistance and making available additional overall United States assistance levels as appropriate," but it does not require that foreign aid be increased or mandate a funding level for foreign assistance. The Global Poverty Act is currently pending on the Senate floor after the Senate Foreign Relations Committee approved the bill with amendments on April 24. The amended bill also does not establish a specific funding source or commit the United States to any targeted level of spending. A companion version of the bill, introduced in the House of Representatives by Rep. Adam Smith (D-WA), passed the House by voice vote on September 25, 2007.

From the July 29 Investor's Business Daily editorial:

His [Obama's] legislation refers to the "millennium development goal," a phrase from a declaration adopted by the United Nations Millennium Assembly in 2000 and supported by President Clinton.

It calls for the "eradication of poverty" in part through the "redistribution (of) wealth of land" and "a fair distribution of the earth's resources." In other words: American resources.

It's a mantra of liberals that the U.S. is only a small portion of the world's population yet consumes an unseemly portion of the planet's supposedly finite resources. Never mentioned is the fact that America's population, just 5% of the world's total, also produces a stunning 27% of the world's GDP -- to the enormous benefit of other countries. Nonetheless, their solution is to siphon off the product of our free democracy and distribute it.

We already transfer too much national wealth to the United Nations and its busybody agencies. Obama's bill would force U.S. taxpayers to fork over 0.7% of our gross domestic product every year to fund a global war on poverty, spending well above the $16.3 billion in global poverty aid the U.S. already spends.

Over a 13-year period, from 2002, when the U.N.'s Financing for Development Conference was held, to the target year of 2015, when the U.S is expected to meet its part of the U.N. Millennium goals, we would be spending an additional $65 billion annually for a total of $845 billion.

During a time of economic uncertainty, the plan would cost every American taxpayer around $2,500.