Darn! The Independent’s Tim McGivern and Heath Haussamen beat me to the punch in applauding Marcia Stirman, chairwoman of the Otero County GOP women’s group, who called Barack Obama a “Muslim socialist” in a letter to the Alamogordo Daily News.

But I must express my own appreciation to the lady.

Ms. Stirman, you see, offers a great springboard for myriad explorations. I could riff on Americans’ evolving ignorance, as comedian Steve Allen did so memorably in the movie “Dumbth.” Or I could elaborate on how faith substitutes admirably for thinking. I might sermonize on how religions inspire hate. But since I have been noodling economic illiteracy, that’s where I’ll go.

Unfortunately, Ms. Stirman didn’t say where she got the idea Obama is a socialist, though her declaration that “I believe in lower taxes” may be a clue. Nevertheless, her allegation, paired with New Mexico Republican Chairman Allan Weh’s explanation to the Journal…

He’s campaigning with a tax policy that smacks of socialism.

… serves to clarify how our economic system works. Conservatives believe that the redistribution of wealth is Marxist. By that they mean the Robin Hood scenario – taking from the wealthy and giving to the lower classes.

In the last eight years, however, the Bush administration (abetted by corporate Democrats) has played Sheriff of Nottingham – it’s redistributed wealth upwards. If conservatives protested that, I missed their outcry.

Obama’s plan would raise taxes on individuals with incomes above $200,000 and families making more than $250,000, reversing some of the Bush cuts for the wealthiest. Otherwise put, the Democratic candidate would restore some progressivity to federal taxes. Ah, the heart of the matter!

The progressive income tax is a constitutional restraint (adopted as the 16th Amendment in 1913) on inequality of wealth; it provides that the tax rate should increase with the amount taxed. Rates have fluctuated widely. In 1961, the richest among us paid a 91 percent tax rate. (And the economy boomed!) It’s fallen since. Obama’s plan would restore rates on the two top brackets to where they were before W.

The upper classes have never reconciled themselves to progressivity; thus the perennial proposals for a “flat” tax. Of course, some are less generous. “Only the little people pay taxes,” said Leona Helmsley. She was indiscrete; generally, the wealthy hide behind the cover story that progressive taxation kills economic progress. For lots of reasons, it doesn’t. And by its mild buffering of disparities of wealth, the progressive income tax makes our society seem just.

Maybe that’s why – brace yourself, Libertarians – Adam Smith, the high priest of free market capitalism, favored progressivity. Yep, he did. Free market fanatics don’t know that because they read Smith’s book“The Wealth of Nations” (if they read it at all) the way religious rightists read their Bibles – selectively.

Economic illiteracy extends to socialism, elements of which permeate our system – usually as corporate welfare. Obviously, that’s true of the recent Wall Street bailouts, but consider, also, the nuclear power business – subsidized at birth (at a Los Alamos boys’ school), subsidized in youth, subsidized today. I imagine that New Mexico GOP Chairman Weh and others dedicated to socialism for the rich must chuckle as they throw the epithet at efforts to benefit the non-privileged.

I could adduce more evidence to disabuse Ms. Stirman of her undoubtedly sincere belief Obama is a socialist. His chief economic advisor, Austan Goolsbee, teaches at the University of Chicago, that hot bed of Milton Friedman’s free market foolishness. He listens to Wall Street’s Robert Rubin and Omaha billionaire Warren Buffett, too. But something tells me she doesn’t lust for information.

No, Ms.Stirman’s comments reflect the eternal, ever-passionate marriage of ignorance and certainty. Which doesn’t mean she isn’t a nice person or that we shouldn’t thank her for the news peg.