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From: cliff@unmvax.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.politics.theory
Subject: All hail the status quo! (esp. J. Giles)
Message-ID: <647@unmvax.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 7-Feb-85 15:05:09 EST
Article-I.D.: unmvax.647
Posted: Thu Feb  7 15:05:09 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 10-Feb-85 05:30:58 EST
References: <21183@lanl.ARPA>
Distribution: net
Organization: Univ. of New Mexico, Albuquerque
Lines: 147

> > The libertarian points out that taxation is theft in order to make
> > the point that something that is wrong for one person to do,
> > is wrong for a group to do.
> 
> It's not wrong for a person to take money from himself.  Why would it be
> wrong for a group to take money from itself?  That's how taxes work out for
> a democracy anyway.

Think hard friend, if you are alone on a subway, and two people enter it, you
are now a group.  If those two vote that you should give them all your money,
then would it be wrong for a group to take money from itself?  That's how taxes
work out for a democracy anyway.

Since this is net.politics.theory, it might be useful if when people are talking
about specific systems (i.e. the United States), they refrain from parroting
the first grade lesssons of this land is a democracy.  Please step up to at
least the eigth grade (I think that is where I learned it...) realization that
the U.S. is a republic.  There are significant differences, and taxation is
certainly one.

> > [...]  Robin Hood was an outlaw, remember;
> > the duly constituted Sheriff of Nottingham and the King (John)
> > wanted to kill him in the worst way.
> 
> Not at all.  They wanted to hang him.  That's not the worst way to kill
> someone.
"to kill in the worst way" is an idiom, meaning they wanted very much to
kill him.

> > In our own society, as in mediaeval England and ancient Israel,
> > it is the government which is rich and the people who are poor.
> 
> You haven't been reading about the deficit, have you?
Read about the Federal Reserve system and you will find out that, deficit
or not, the government always has as much money as it wants.  Of course it
is necessary to maintain the deficit, because if the fed was to crank out
sufficient paper money to cover the deficit our economy would go to pieces.
In effect, the deficit makes the poor poorer and the rich poorer, but it still
doesn't change that the governent is rich and the people are poor.

> > Any land I might come to own will be paid for by the fruits of
> > my labor.  I therefore find your distinction between land and
> > other kinds of property to be nugatory.
> 
> At some point in the past someone came out to your land, pounded some
> stakes in the ground, and said 'this is my land'.  His ownership of the
> land didn't come from any 'fruits of labor', he just claimed the land.
> The reason he could get away with this behaviour (and later sell the
> land, burn it, leave it to his heirs, build on it, etc.) is that the
> legal system and the government allowed him to.

Actually, the fruits of someone's labor allowed someone to claim it.
You have to reach the land to claim it.  Reaching unclaimed land (which
is NOT what the colonists did since there was already a group of people
using the land) is very much labor.  The best source of unclaimed land
now is not on this earth, and you can bet your toenails that when someone
claims it, there will have been quite a bit of labor going into that claim.

> This is the same legal
> system that your property taxes help to support.

Not usually the case.  Property taxes are local taxes.  If you own a portion
of land and your surrounding neighbors decide to incorporate, then you can
find yourself paying taxes to a government that was formed *after* you owned
the land.

> Without it, you have
> no rights to you land at all (or, at least, no rights unless you can
> defend them with strength at arms).
> 
> > Statement of belief: Manipulation of the economy via manipulation
> > of taxation is improper.
> 
> Fine.  But in what way is legitimate tax, that helps to support your right
> to own land, to be considered 'manipulation'.

Basically you are saying that in order to own land there must be a tax.
Then you are saying that the tax is legitimate because it helpss to support
your right to own land.  You never come out and explain which tax is supporting
what.  It obviously isn't property tax or income tax (property tax is a local
tax, income tax is a fairly recent addition to the U.S.)...


> > [...] I believe that our National Parks should be in private
> > hands, but that would be hard to do if the homesteading laws allowed someone
> > to claim the grand canyon.
> 
> I disagree.  The basis of my disagreement is not human nature or mistrust,
> but direct observation:  National Parks are, in general, much more fun to
> visit than privately held land, in general.  This is assuming that the
> private land holder allows me on his property at all.  I'm willing to part
> with a few tax dollars and some mineral wealth to maintain these places.

Nice of you to part with tax dollars rather than user fees.  It is very kind
of you to take tax revenue generated in cities by people who do not have the
transportation to get out and enjoy the national parks to pay for your outing.
There are many private wildlife concerns.  Many of them are committed to having
the government own the land, so it is not surprissing that you do not see land
of theirs that is a joy to visit...they give their money to lawyers.  There is
at least one group that is opposed to the government ownership of land, I
believe they are called "The Nature Conservancy."  They buy land and resell
it with clauses that require preservation of various natural aspects of the
land.

> Fortunately, enough others in this democracy feel the same.

R-e-p-u-b-l-i-c...  When you are talking about the national government of the
U.S. you are talking about a Rebublic.  There are a few states that have
democracy at the lowest (local) level, but for the most part the U.S.
government is a republic.  Just what is the difference?  Let me answer your
next statement and it may be obvious.

> If you disagree,
> you can always vote for your view - James Watt appeared to be on your side.

Here you are absolutely 100% wrong.  There is no voting for view for any
national concern (although the petition for a constitutional convention iss
closer than the general representativeness).  You can not push a button and
vote for lower taxes, you can not cast a ballot for government control of
parks, the best you can do is cast a vote for a representative and a senator
to look out for your interests.  There is a big difference.  If you were to
assume that all issues were two-sided (rarely the case) and there were only
25 isssues of importance, it would require over 33 million candidates just
so each one could represent one combination of various views.

> J. Giles

What people who rally around the democracy in the u.s. are really saying is
that they are well off and are happy that things worked out the way they did.
It is nice to sit back in your comfy chair making the dollars a computer
professsional earns, knowing that you don't have to worry about constant
police harassment, planing your next trip to Yosemite, knowing that you will
be able to get away from it all and have the tab picked up by the taxpayers,
most of whom will never set foot in Yosemite.  Who cares if we are number
three in the world for prison population per capita?  Who cares if someone
might get a bug in their ear to round up many young Americans and ship them
over to a foreign country to drop burning chemicals on little children--
most of our boys will come back alive and fairly psychologically stable.

I have much more influence over the companies that produce my food or the
devices of my leisure activities than I do of the government though my
vote.  All this hogwash about "if you don't like it you can vote against
it because this is a democracy" is just a slightly less obvious way of saying
"HEY!  *I* am well off!  I don't give two sh*ts in h*ll for the people
 who are shafted by the government each and every day."

						--Cliff