I’ll be damned.

There really are socialists who believe their own bullshit. It doesn’t make a lick of sense, of course.

The tax burden we face is a very small price to pay for the privilege of taking responsibility for our own freedom and our own society.

What does that even mean? Sort of a greased pig of a sentence, isn’t it? You almost think you have your brain wrapped around what he’s getting at, but then the sentence just keeps wriggling away, squealing maniacally off to the magical land of vague principles, ambiguous high-mindedness, and brainless platitudes.

I do like this line:

Personally, I find banking fees, high cable and internet charges, health care costs, and credit card hidden charges much more abrasive than taxes, because with those I’m just being ripped off to pay for someone’s summer home.

No, you naive douche. When you pay your taxes, you’re just being ripped off to pay for your congressman’s summer vacation.

At least no one’s forcing you to buy cable, and you get a little Everybody Loves Raymond for your trouble.

Which brings me to the two key differences between paying your taxes and paying the cable bill. The first is that the government doesn’t have to compete with anyone else for the crap it promises you in return. So it never needs to actually deliver on what it promises. Which means it usually doesn’t. In fact, the one thing the government seems to do quite well with your tax dollars is find new ways to take more freedom away from you.

Which makes that first sentence I quoted from MyDD all the stupider. Paying your taxes (or better yet, as Matt Stoller obviously does, paying your taxes while sporting a healthy erection!) isn’t “taking responsibility for your freedom,” any more than giving the crack addict down the street $20 is you “taking responsibility” for his drug habit. It’s giving the government money with which to take your freedom away. You’re enabling, pal. Unfortunately, because the government has a monopoly on force, you don’t really have a choice.

That brings me to the second key difference between paying your taxes and paying your cable bill: If you you don’t like the cable service you’re getting and decide to cancel and stop paying, Comcast isn’t allowed to hunt you down and kill you.

(I realize my witty metaphor is somewhat hobbled by the fact that Comcast in some markets enjoys a government-granted monopoly. Of course, that’s not exactly a ringing endorsement of government either, now is it?)

There’s a reason why they put Tax Day so far away from Election Day.

(Via Instapundit.)

This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 17th, 2007 at 9:58 pm by Radley Balko and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.