Perhaps you should look at the rest of the world before you dismiss the concept that the US system of government is not something worth paying for. It has nothing to do with largess and everything to do with what the government actually does to promote a thriving system of business. Things like the rule of law. Enforcement of contracts. Prosecution of blackmail. Securities and exchange commission to give people the confidence to invest. The US treasury which prints money to use in commerce. The interstate highway system over which much commerce travels and depends. The idea that government is nothing but a parasite on business is ridiculous.

Your comment about government largess creating wealth totally ignores everything I've been trying to point out to you. The wealthy create wealth by manipulating the system better than others. Many do it by working harder. Many do it by being more creative than others. Sometimes that creativity comes in designing new or better products and sometimes it comes from manipulatintg the system in nonproductive ways. In most cases building wealth is constructive. I've said this many times. What you ignore is all the examples of wealth abusing the system. I do not claim these represent the majority of the wealthy or that it justifies criminalizing the wealthy. I'm simply saying that wealth has a tendency to corrupt and that our system should have some checks against this corruption just as our system has checks against abuse of power in the various branches of government. The wealthy pushing tax cuts that primarily benefit them at a time when many are in dire straits is an abuse of the system especially when it mortgages the future.

Tom I seriously doubt you are anywhere close to what I consider rich so your comment about what you get in return for your taxes actually supports my point. And return for campaign contributions is precisely what I am talking about. This includes Democratic allegience to labor groups as well as Republican allegience to the wealthy.

It's kind of funny to hear you talk about how little taxes will impact Gates and Buffet while defending tax cuts for the rich.

Your economic babling has reached a ridiculous cresendo when you claim "Not one bloody cent flows from the pockets of the poor (who typically pay no income taxes) into the pockets of the rich". Poor people eat Tom. They buy cloths. They rent homes. Who do they pay? The wealthy or those trying to be. Same for the middle class. The wealthy are better at extracting money from everyone else than than the rest of us. That's fine when it is a result of hard work or creativity in product development. It's not when it is due to fraud or influence. That's the fundamental issue of fairness Tom. I don't think the goal of equality of opportunity should be to hard even for a Republican to understand.

It's about equality of opportunity not equality of economic status. Wealth is automatically going to provide an advantage that makes absolute equality of opportunity impossible. It's a price we have to pay for the incentives that drive a thriving economy. It doesn't mean we have to keep providing additional driving forces to widen the income gap. There isn't even a sound long term economic justification for it. Our system has worked well and is the worlds leading system. It's recent performance was amazing and almost too powerful without any additional long term stimulous of the type dividend tax cuts would provide. Additional driving forces like lower taxes would have had to been balanced by higher interest rates which would have likely caused a harder business downturn. Our economy's recent problems are part natural business cycle, part 911, and part abuse by SOME of the wealthy. It really makes me mad that tax cuts of little short term value have a higher priority than preventing those same abuses in the future. It also makes me mad that we are jeopardizing the key feature of the last great economic growth period - LOW interest rates & LOW inflation.

I thought you's eventually display your distaste for democracy if pinned into a corner enough. Democracy has its potential negatives just as capitalism does Tom. No system is perfect. They are all imperfect human attempts to reach a goal. It's best to keep in mind the true goals when attempting changes. Democracy's goal is fair government and thus must be on guard against the tyranny of the majority. The wealthy should not be taxed so heavily that they do not reap major rewards for real contributions to the economy. No one can claim that is the case with the huge growth in income gap over the last 2 decades. Capitalism's goal is efficient production of goods and services and our sustem must be on guard against forces which seek to protect market share and economic position without regard to real efficiency in production.

In short Tom a fair system of taxation to me is one in which all boats are lifted by the same relative amount over time while mantaining a healthy economic system, not one that concentrates wealth in the hands of a few. Government waste is an issue which we should demand be fought by our representatives. It is not one that should be fought by underfunding and gifts to wealthy constituents.

Since you think a flat tax is fair please explain why you think a growing income gap is a fair thing. Are the wealthy today more valuable as job creators than they were 20 years ago?
Do you honestly believe that an economy that was almost too powerful to restrain with rising interest rates really needs more driving power?

Regards,
Mark