Tax "Fraud"
When tax expert Michael Indenbaum argues that lack of “criminal enforcement undermines the entire tax system” (“Michigan Falls off in Pursuit of Tax Cheats,” July 10, 2006), he means that government agents, entrusted with collecting "contributions" at the point of a gun, have failed to wield that gun in a sufficiently menacing manner. Predictably, this limp-wristed approach to revenue enhancements has failed to meet with the full cooperation of taxpayers reluctant to part with their hard-earned income. How will society build the jails required to house pot smokers, prostitutes and 19 year-old beer drinkers? Who will finance baseball stadiums for billionaire welfare queens? Civilization itself hangs in the balance.
Freedom, of course, isn’t free. No doubt Mr. Indenbaum would hasten to remind me of that fact. And he’d be quite right. Freedom, in fact, is the opposite of freedom. Freedom is theft, fraud, extortion, violence, threats of violence, conscription, surveillance, kidnapping, extraordinary rendition, torture and incarceration—so long as those otherwise reprobate actions are carried out by the proper democratically elected officials to advance the public good, as defined by those same democratically elected officials.
The Free Press notes that our state-sanctioned protection racket is a system "based on voluntary compliance" and "the hammer of criminal prosecution." You might say it's "free and compulsory." You might instead say George Orwell's immortal words never rang so true: "To see what is in front of one's nose requires a constant struggle."
When tax expert Michael Indenbaum argues that lack of “criminal enforcement undermines the entire tax system” (“Michigan Falls off in Pursuit of Tax Cheats,” July 10, 2006), he means that government agents, entrusted with collecting "contributions" at the point of a gun, have failed to wield that gun in a sufficiently menacing manner. Predictably, this limp-wristed approach to revenue enhancements has failed to meet with the full cooperation of taxpayers reluctant to part with their hard-earned income. How will society build the jails required to house pot smokers, prostitutes and 19 year-old beer drinkers? Who will finance baseball stadiums for billionaire welfare queens? Civilization itself hangs in the balance.
Freedom, of course, isn’t free. No doubt Mr. Indenbaum would hasten to remind me of that fact. And he’d be quite right. Freedom, in fact, is the opposite of freedom. Freedom is theft, fraud, extortion, violence, threats of violence, conscription, surveillance, kidnapping, extraordinary rendition, torture and incarceration—so long as those otherwise reprobate actions are carried out by the proper democratically elected officials to advance the public good, as defined by those same democratically elected officials.
The Free Press notes that our state-sanctioned protection racket is a system "based on voluntary compliance" and "the hammer of criminal prosecution." You might say it's "free and compulsory." You might instead say George Orwell's immortal words never rang so true: "To see what is in front of one's nose requires a constant struggle."
posted by Tony at 5:32 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home