It's Not the Government's Money: Why how much money a person has DOES NOT MATTER (Originally Published 1/5/11)

Just raise taxes on the rich...they can afford it! That way government can continue to spend and spend, those of us who aren't rich can have more services, it's a win-win right? Liberals have been using this Robin Hood's actions with Prince John's tactics style economic policy since the Sixteenth Amendment made a federal tax on income legal.

The thing that saddens me is that far, far too many Americans have decided that these policies are acceptable, even moral. .. Herein lays a fundamental issue which must be addressed in America. Such polices serve to convince Americans that the government is entitled to whatever percentage of a citizens money...of their property, really...they "need" in order to provide whatever programs they deem necessary.

Conservatives have generally argued against this idea from the point of sound economic principle. It is absolutely true that high, confiscatory tax rates do in fact provide a disincentive for people to open businesses, create jobs, and contribute to the economy. They do punish hard work, and, in many cases, reward laziness. But there is a much more important, much more basic principle that these "soak the rich" policies breaks. Are you ready? We're going back to kindergarten here:

IT'S NOT THE GOVERNMENT'S MONEY.

It does not belong to the government. Nor does it belong to the general population of the United States. It's not yours. It's not the Government's. However much a person has, that money is his personal property. It does not matter if that person has $300 in the bank or if they have $30,000 in the bank or they have $30 billion in the bank. Whatever they own, they own it. The Government doesn't have the right to take it just because they want to provide someone else with something!

Let me give another example. If I as a single adult, choose to purchase two cars, and can only drive one at a time, does this mean that another person who has no car can simply take my second car away from me? I don't NEED two cars...I really only NEED one. So therefore, according to Liberal logic, a person can simply take it from me right? WRONG! Both of those cars belong to me. They are my property. No one has the right to take it away from me.

The same principle applies to taxation. No matter how much a person has, the money they OWN (yes, money is property), they have a right to do with it what they want to do with it, within the boundaries of the law. Period. It doesn't belong to the Government! But this logic has been used to pay for such government programs as the Endowment for the Arts and to give billions in grants every year for people to write a novel (just ask that idiot wearing the multi-colored Riddler outfit whose commercials run during the Price is Right).

Does this mean I am rejecting the morality of paying taxes? No. There are certain services that are most efficiently and equitably handled by government. For example, provision of a common defense. This includes not only the military to protect our nation, but also police departments. Government is also the most logical entity to provide for such things as fire departments (albeit in the majority of places in America, a volunteer fire department is plenty sufficient) as well as ambulances, etc. What I am objecting to is the idea that a person who receives these services in equal amounts to any other person should be charged MORE for them because they can afford it!

Does it make sense to charge someone $5 for a $1.49 loaf of basic, store brand white bread because they can afford it? Of course not! A product or a service in the private sector costs what it costs, no matter how much the consumer has in the bank. Yet the Government doesn't see things that way. Government decides what they want to provide, regardless of necessity (see the Endowment for the Arts) and then decide to tax people based upon their ability to pay. They take money "from each according to their abilities" and spend it on other people "according to their needs. (For those of you from Palm Beach County, FL that last bit in quotes were directly taken from the Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx.) And because it's for the common good, and because it's not OUR money being confiscated, we in the middle class, working class, and poor class decide that this practice is just dandy. In fact, some of us (albeit probably not the majority of my readers) love the idea that we can simply cast votes for candidates who will spend other citizens money on us!

The fact that you may be receiving something you like due to this theft from another person in the form of taxes is immaterial! The fact that these rich people may or may not be able to afford it is immaterial! Not one bit of this matters. It is about the personal property of the individual. Our second President John Adams put it this way:

"The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred as the laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence. If `Thou shalt not covet' and `Thou shalt not steal' were not commandments of Heaven, they must be made inviolable precepts in every society before it can be civilized or made free."(1)

Now I personally believe that "Thou shalt not covet" and "Thou shalt not steal" were both indeed commandments from God, recorded in His infallible Word, the Bible. (So did Adams, for the record.) Compounding this fact is the knowledge that as free people, we do wish our own property rights protected; we must extend that same protection to others. The fact of the matter is the moment we allow other individual’s property rights to be abridged; it will only be a matter of time until our own property rights will be challenged in the name of the greater good.

I am calling for all patriotic Americans to change the conversation. It's not about "they can afford it." It's not even about whether or not confiscatory taxes do in fact harm the economy (which history proves it does). It is about the rights of a free people to their property. Please join me in this cry: President Obama, IT'S NOT YOUR MONEY! United States House of Representatives, IT'S NOT YOUR MONEY! United States Senate, IT’SNOT YOUR MONEY! State governments of the United States, IT’SNOT YOUR MONEY! Liberals aplenty, IT’SNOT YOUR MONEY! Taxes are a necessary evil, but by God IT’SNOT YOUR MONEY! Period.

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1 - John Adams (A Defense of the American Constitutions, 1787)