But where we disagree is that I consider your fixation on changing the modality of taxation to be just such an example of complacence: you're spending energy on how the government gets its unconstitutional moneys, instead of on stopping it.
Constitution for the United States of America:
- Article I Section 8: "The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises,
to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States;
Any other mechanism for funding government other than taxation is suspect, with excises, duties impost in the nature of consumption taxes favored.
- "A nation cannot long exist without revenues. Destitute of this essential support, it must resign its independence, and sink into the degraded condition of a province. This is an extremity to which no government will of choice accede. Revenue, therefore, must be had at all events. In this country, if the principal part be not drawn from commerce, it must fall with oppressive weight upon land."
- "The ability of a country to pay taxes must always be proportioned, in a great degree, to the quantity of money in circulation, and to the celerity with which it circulates. Commerce, contributing to both these objects, must of necessity render the payment of taxes easier, and facilitate the requisite supplies to the treasury."
"A government ought to contain in itself every power requisite to the full accomplishment of the objects committed to its care, and to the complete execution of the trusts for which it is responsible, free from every other control but a regard to the public good and to the sense of the people."
"As revenue is the essential engine by which the means of answering the national exigencies must be procured, the power of procuring that article in its full extent must necessarily be comprehended in that of providing for those exigencies."
"As theory and practice conspire to prove that the power of procuring revenue is unavailing when exercised over the States in their collective capacities, the federal government must of necessity be invested with an unqualified power of taxation in the ordinary modes. "
Your mere stating something to be unconstitutional is little more than demogoguery and hyperbole, certainly not an accurate characterization of the content of the Constitution.
Your insistance on abolishing taxation in fact places you in a camp that promotes extra-constitutional means.
Why should any listen to you.
Nobody will.
You are certainly correct in that in any case. Maybe there's hope for humanity afterall.
Its a dead end going nowhere.
All my hopes are pinned on (1) evolution of humans into an intelligent species,
Obviously you being the proto for that intelligent species no doubt. </sarc>
or (2) the coming of Messiah, whichever happens first.
Which promises more government, the opposite of what you claim is the ideal, the overthrow of all government.
At least you are consistently inconsistant in your views.
Any other mechanism for funding government other than taxation is suspect...
It is impossible to fund government by anything other than taxation. Wherever government gets its money, if paying up is mandatory, that's what we call "taxation". That being the case, your statement isn't particularly meaningful. The set of "suspect" alternatives is empty. There are no alternatives.
Your mere stating something to be unconstitutional is little more than demogoguery and hyperbole...
Then point out exactly where I go wrong. AFAICT, you aren't terribly clear what I'm referring to at any given moment. Redistribution, in the form of entitlements or other direct transfers, is unconstitutional. Reposing legislative powers in an executive agency is unconstitutional. Each thing I have called unconstitutional is, in fact, unconstitutional. One thing I have not called "unconstitutional" is taxation itself, and as you might guess there's a reason I haven't done that.
Obviously you being the proto for that intelligent species no doubt. </sarc>
Jesus said of the baptist that there is none greater born of women--but the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he. If it were the case that I was the smartest man on earth, I'd still be considered a dummy by humans who have evolved intelligence. And of course I am not the smartest--far from it. It isn't that I'm smart; it's that most humans are so unbelievably stupid that they can't follow simple directions or think in a straight line. We were evolved to survive, not to think logically.
Your insistance on abolishing taxation in fact places you in a camp that promotes extra-constitutional means.
You clearly don't know what "extra-" means. What I propose is well within the limits of the Constitution: the Constitution places limits on the Federal government, but nowhere does it say that the federal government can't do less than the Constitution allows.
But, as a first step, I'd be happy to get it to stop doing more than the Constitution allows. After that's accomplished, we can talk about streamlining it even further. Until then, I'm foursquare behind any true Constitutionalist.
Which promises more government, the opposite of what you claim is the ideal, the overthrow of all government.
I believe in eliminating human government, because humans are unfit to rule each other. If God wants to take over, I'm all for it. No contradiction there.