KEN: So we’ve been looking at what Biden has been doing — I’m sorry, Joe Biden, what Joe Biden has been doing — since he took office. Now, a lot of people don’t even think he’s doing it. Again, that’s the kind of creepy thing that people are pretty much coming out and saying, “This is not right what’s happening. He’s not right. Who’s running the show?”

Now, if you missed it at the beginning of the week, he’s about to increase taxes the most since 1993. Now, do you remember…? I’m sure you do. In this audience, you do. Your neighbor might not. If they still have a “I’m With Her” bumper sticker on their car, they probably don’t remember anything.

Let’s go back to 1993, to the last time taxes were raised this much. Now, you may remember Rush said, “Anybody who has the power to tax has the power to destroy,” and he was crystal clear: They’re destroying the American dream. Here’s Rush.

RUSH: I don’t know how many of you saw the president last night in the Rose Garden after this thing was passed. You had to be watching CNN to see it. I’m literally… I’d think I would be used to it by now, but the gonads of it all just continue to overwhelm me. To come out of the Rose Garden and to talk about how gridlock is over, and the slow growth of the eighties has now been rectified, the low investment of the eighties has now been rectified?

Uh, it’s 1993! It’s over halfway through 1993. If any of you doubt that all that was going on last night was getting the rich — if you think this was about economic growth, if you think this was about expanded job opportunities for the middle class, if you think this was about deficit reduction — you’ve missed the point. You’re wrong. It’s not about anything other than restructuring the American way of life.

And with tax retroactivity — and I have a little bit more to say on this a little bit later on, too. With tax retroactivity, my friends, let me tell you what’s been taxed. Your dreams. Your American dream has been taxed. Let me share with you… Let me tell you why I think this way. The real rich — the Perot types, the Henry Kravises of the world, the Michael Eisners of the world — the people with $150 million, $100 million, $50 million, this really is…

In terms of dollars, it’s chump change to ’em. It’s not chump change. They’re not going to agree with me. But if you’re gonna structure this… Now, hear me out on this: If you are a gonna structure something that’s really gonna get money from the rich, then you have a couple more brackets here, and you punish certain types of income, not just wages and salary, and you expand the rates on certain types.

Now, that’s happened, and don’t misunderstand: I’m not changing a previously stated position. But when you target people who, as families, make $180,000 and $250,000 in those brackets, those are attainable brackets. Those are brackets, those are figures that people can and do earn in salary. Those are amounts that can be earned as wages.

And in many cases, at those levels, those are wages where you have enough left over to save. And how many times do we hear that the American savings rate is too low from our very own government? What has happened… We hear it a lot. What has happened here is, with the combination of retroactivity — taxing property, in essence, is what this is.

You’re taxing property. You’re taxing savings. You’re taxing something other than income. The income has already been earned. The contract with the American people has been violated with retroactivity. When you start taxing at these brackets, you’re taxing people’s dreams. You’re taxing people’s hopes, people who want to get to that level — and this is done purposefully.

This is done with a notion to somehow redistribute wealth and purchase the goodwill of the people in the middle class who you hope recognize what you’ve done, if you’re President Clinton and Vice President Algore. The dirty little secret is that most of the people who voted for this didn’t want it. The president of the United States comes strutting out of there talking about his mandate.

I really have a theory. Who was it that ran the first mile in under four minutes? Roger Bannister, right? Guy named Roger Bannister. Whoever it was, what was ever heard from him again? Nothing. In fact, so little was heard from him that most of you don’t even know if I’m right that it was Roger Bannister. But he’s the guy who broke the record.

He put everything he had into it, and he put maybe more than he had into it — and so he had nothing left. And I have a sense that that’s what this thing’s all about. This is really… This is the most unsubstantive… You talk about dirty wins in sports? Hey, look, this is not sour grapes. A win is a win. But in calculating the effect of this win on the victorious team in the future?

This is really a victory for congressional leaders more than anything else. The traditional liberal Democrat leaders in the House of Representatives got their way again. That’s who the victors are here, folks. Clinton walks out there and has to pretend this is his bill. It’s nothing like his original bill. He lost the BTU tax and it was replaced by a gas tax. The tax increases on the rich are still his, so we can remain consistent there.

The notion that prosperity was possible, the notion that improving oneself was possible? You don’t get that from this bunch. You get from this bunch that if you’re of the right kind of person, if you are this or that, then they’ll let you do okay. You don’t hear anything about the individual. You don’t hear anything about the empowerment of people from this crowd.

All you hear about is how the tax code’s gonna be used to lift people out of poverty, or the tax code is gonna be used to get even with those who benefited unfairly. It is not the stuff that motivates people. It’s not the stuff that makes them feel inspired. It’s not the stuff that makes them feel enthused.

And the eighties did, which is why they must be destroyed in people’s minds by these new socialists who wish to control as many aspects of the human condition as they can. It’s a tax on your dreams. The power to tax is the power to destroy, and this bill could be the beginning of the destruction of the American dream.

KEN: Another lesson so many of us learn but the left just can’t seem to grasp it.