-Caveat Lector- from: http://www.zolatimes.com/V3.21/pageone.html <A HREF="http://www.zolatimes.com/V3.21/pageone.html">Laissez Faire City Times - Volume 3 Issue 21 </A> ----- Laissez Faire City Times May 24, 1999 - Volume 3, Issue 21 Editor & Chief: Emile Zola ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Tax Me to Death by Peter Topolewski Tax time in Canada and the US came and went weeks ago. Sending in the money "owed" government is a chore people perform blindly, obstinately, despairingly – like Sisyphus rolling his stone up his hill, except with a great deal more griping. As part of the entire bloody charade we put on around tax time we, or some several of our noble independent think-tanks, invented "tax freedom day", that is, the day celebrating when taxpayers have earned enough money to pay their total tax bill for the year and can begin to work for themselves. Add to the petulant mix people like me who bother to put their disdain for taxes into words by citing particular outrages citizens suffer under the taxman. I tend to highlight the most ludicrous and call them unjust. Such as, •The fact that governments in Canada have the gall and the power to include 28.9 cents in tax in the purchase price of a 57.4-cent liter of gasoline, and $16.07 in tax in a $19.50 price for a bottle of liquor. •When someone dies, the government feels it is owed a portion of the deceased’s property for no other reason than that they are dead. •Governments taxing successes like wealth creation, work, productivity, and commercial activity instead of crime, stupidity, pollution, laziness, and waste. •The total tax burden in Canada accounts for 46 percent of the average family’s income. What tends to get overlooked during the day-in and day-out complaining, and even during the compilation of my tax-whiners checklist, is the moral issue behind the figures, indeed behind the act of taxation itself. For the question behind the complaints should not be "what is a fair rate of taxation?" but "by what right does the government tax my actions and my property at all?" In other words, how is it that when I have a shot of whiskey at the bar the government demands I pay them a fee in order to complete the transaction? How is it that I owe them money for a service and a transaction in which they had no part? And on what grounds can they say that a portion of the fruits of my labor each year belongs to them? The grounds have been set long ago, and indeed they are there in my words. What we overlook in our disgust is the divide we’ve created and maintained, in our mind and in fact, between ourselves and "our" government. Somehow in western society the democratic principle of government for and by the people has been mentally and effectively destroyed, so that we not only have a government over and above us, but we also have "our money" and "government money". In Canada, for example, it is entirely common to hear people append the solutions to most social and economic problems by saying, "Ottawa will pick up the tab", as though the citizens aren’t paying for anything but are rather the idiot beneficiaries of the rulers’ noble charity. Precisely by viewing government as a separate source of remedy for "our" problems, we give them the authority to tax us, no matter how unjustly. By delegating solutions we delegate responsibility and we undermine any grounds for accusing governments of over-taxing us. And once we’ve delegated responsibility to the government no one should act surprised when that government, like any entity, fights for its survival. While some citizens hold in their hearts the painfully idealistic hope that government exists to judiciously tend to our health, welfare, education, and defense, with our benison government’s true job and source of power has become the re-distribution of wealth. It’s a clean and tidy little ecology that’s developed: the single organism of society splits itself and the people surrender, with the government’s encouragement, increasing amounts of tax dollars on the condition the government re-di stributes them, by spending, no matter how inefficiently. Hollow Bitching A recent national poll found that disgust with the level of taxation in Canada has reached what is possibly an all-time high – 85 percent indicated that they are upset with the taxes they pay. But surprise, surprise, taxes are not coming down substantially any time soon. Michael Walker, president of the Vancouver based research firm the Fraser Institute, says this is because there is no evidence "on the part of governments in Canada to further restrain their expenditures, which is what would be required." Why? In part, because governments will do anything to keep hold of their power. But more importantly because at the root of all the bitching about taxes the people have no desire to end their parasitic relationship with the government. Ralph Klein, the premier of the Canada’s most "right-wing" province, made it his mission to balance Alberta’s budget and cut taxes to the lowest levels in Canada. But as he stated at the Fraser Institute’s recent annual meeting, it is very difficult, once the fiscal crisis is over, to get people’s attention on the need for fiscal probity. The bitching about taxes rings hollow. People want governments to spend money. There is no better example than the fact that we actively encourage, nay demand, that governments spend more money than they raise in taxes. Governments borrow money to fulfill the demand for it. Simple as that. And yet all the complicity in the relationship between the government and the people does not make the relationship right. Rather it proves without doubt how wrong it is. People have wholeheartedly accepted the split between themselves and their government, and have so wholeheartedly accepted the righteousness of a runaway tax system, that the free exchange of goods between citizens is called an "underground economy" and is a punishable crime! No more evidence is required to prove that the people, in laziness and apathy, have nullified their own responsibility, imagination, and freedoms. Each and every one of us has had a heavy hand in creating societies of complacent drones without liberty, real property, or ( if the tax whining is any indication) any real happiness. -30- from The Laissez Faire City Times, Vol 3, No 21, May 24, 1999 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Published by Laissez Faire City Netcasting Group, Inc. Copyright 1998 - Trademark Registered with LFC Public Registrar All Rights Reserved ----- Aloha, He'Ping, Om, Shalom, Salaam. Em Hotep, Peace Be, Omnia Bona Bonis, All My Relations. Adieu, Adios, Aloha. Amen. Roads End Kris DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion and informational exchange list. Proselyzting propagandic screeds are not allowed. Substance—not soapboxing! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory', with its many half-truths, misdirections and outright frauds is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRL gives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credeence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply. Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector. ======================================================================== Archives Available at: http://home.ease.lsoft.com/archives/CTRL.html http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/ ======================================================================== To subscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: SUBSCRIBE CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED] To UNsubscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: SIGNOFF CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Om
