As usual, my main point drifts off into the ether while my sentences get parsed to death.

I believe we need to drastically rethink the role of central government in our lives. If I could get any liberal to agree that our current government is probably about five times larger than it needs to be, I'd be happy.

...I said we need laws - you said we need laws. To imply I said we need 74,000 pages of them is as irrational as it would be had I implied you said it.

Good. Then we both agree that those 74,000 pages need to be drastically reduced. I think we're getting somewhere.

If someone needs something badly enough, they should have a right to take it by force from someone who has it.



Your statement, presumably about taxes. You piously point out the Constitution. I don't think you mean that people should purchase those Rights. Those Rights belong to citizens because they exist, right? What the religious would call "grace". Or would you sell them? I would gather from your statement that you begrudge those because taxes pay for their defense. That may be wrong, but I couldn't tell it from your statements.



Sorry. I'm not following this paragraph at all. Maybe the late hour. For the record, my bit on the Robin Hood Principle was directed primarily at the government function of redistributing wealth. It could be argued--though not perhaps by the true hard-core libertarian/anarchist--that other taxes, such as those for defense or police functions, would not fall under that category.

Now, how about the large corporations who pay no taxes? (There are a load of them.) They still get the benefits of the laws, and in many cases subsidies. Is it like robbing a guy at the ATM to take 15% federal income tax from some poor SOB to pay those subsidies?

It would be naive to say that the redistribution of wealth in this country never flows to the wealthy. I do not approve of government subsidies to corporations any more than to anyone else. One advantage to a flat tax or a national sales tax would be the destruction of our byzantine tax code which has the primary purpose not of collecting revenue, but of distributing political favors and social engineering. If large corporations are not paying taxes--and I'm not sure they should be if all the people in the corporation have already been taxed on their income anyway--it's due to the fix being in in the tax code.

Get rid of the IRS and put in a flat tax or a national sales tax.

Is it a George Bush tax increase on the guy who will buy a car made with American steel when there is a tariff on foreign steel? The government collects the tariff, and the car buyer pays more. Is that robbing the rich at their ATMs? Or the less well off?

Right on target with this one. Any tariff is a tax on the consumer to redistribute wealth to a targeted special interest. It is also a tax which often falls hardest on those with the least money to spend. If one were being precise, this would indeed be considered a tax increase, which theoretically should not have happened except over Bush's room temperature body.

It's hard to maintain any enthusiasm when it's impossible to find a constructive dialogue. There has to be some measure of intellectual honesty for that to take place.

I thought I was being clear enough. Sorry. Try this tack:

The government is too big.

Its function has extended far beyond any original intentions of the founders and the Constitution.

It is over twice the size it was in 1974, adjusting for inflation.

It taxes too much and spends far too much.

Both taxes and spending can and should be drastically cut.

Democrats insist that any reduction at all in spending will utterly destroy our nation and instantly fill the streets with starving corpses, therefore taxes and spending should constantly increase.

Impasse. One more reason to vote Republican. Any questions?