08/01/2024
Taxation.
It gets a bad rep, and I can understand why. When kings imposed taxes, the took the loot and did with as they pleased. It got some of them beheaded.
We must remember though that the Revolutionaries were not against taxation in and of itself, they opposed taxation without representation.
The very first block in building this country was the idea that everyone must be involved in deciding what tax dollars are used for. Reasoning that with the power to vote on people to represent their interest, their tax dollars would be used to make their communities livable and the nation as a whole able to coordinate the larger projects of connecting the communities and protecting the whole.
Those who want to live without tax desire a world without well maintained roads, without public schools or libraries, without a free firefighting service,... the list goes on and on, but some they don't seem to want to cut the police force. Hm. 🤔
Though sans taxes to fund the police, wealthy individuals would just own them outright. Fun, fun, fun. That sounds like freedom. Not.
When we do it right, it can really work. But it means everyone has to be involved in something they have been told is distasteful and to be avoided. They have to be political. It is a political view to desire safe roads, schools, hospitals, businesses, and yes, even places of worship.
When you gripe about a pothole that never gets fixed, that's politics. Because it's the business of our government to fix the potholes in our roads and our lives. What would the point even be otherwise. Why do some people prefer a world where a few have everything and the rest have the scraps? Why does that sound like a civilization to them? It sounds like barbarism to me.
Lets get to work and make this county live up to it's promise: E pluribus unum, with liberty and justice for all. And equity. :D Well, I think inequity is an injustice, but some need it spelled out, and that's ok.
✌️
