Starchild, what you are describing is a "poison pill", which would
cause me
to vote against the good thing to keep the bad thing from happening
(or veto
it if in an executive capacity). While a huge chunk of the gay
community
may support a same-sex marriage bill in exchange for supporting a
military
draft, I certainly would not. IMHO, gridlock is better than losing
ground.
I agree.
Unfortunately, the way Congress currently works, there's always more
bad
stuff than good stuff in any omnibus spending bill, so I'd never be
able to
vote for any budget. If a tax cut bill requires increased spending,
we all
know that it's really just a deferred tax increase.
It's pointless to spend much time arguing the potential merits or
drawbacks of theoretical omnibus spending legislation or similar mixed
proposals whether in the form of ballot measures or whatever. You never
know what mixture of good and bad things may be cobbled together, so
they must be taken on a case-by-case basis and analyzed to see whether
they would do more harm or more good.
I'm not saying real tax cuts are bad. That's an easy concept to
understand.
I'm just saying that a tax cut isn't always a tax cut anymore, since
it's
almost always tied to a spending increase (with the notable exception
of
petition-driven local anti-tax initiatives). That's the concept you
seem to
be having trouble with.
I understand that what government types pass off as "tax cuts" aren't
always tax cuts. But if they're not really tax cuts, then *we* should
not participating in the charade by calling them tax cuts. When things
are what they claim to be, tax cuts are good, period. Oh I suppose if
there were a tax cut just for white males or some other extremely
unlikely hypothetical, I would have a hard time supporting it, but I
wouldn't get out and oppose it either. If it ever passed, it would open
the door to demands for tax cuts for other ethnicities on the basis of
fairness. I think we've discussed the morality of such a case before.
We Libertarians have a reputation for not having any common sense about
politics. Everything is "all or nothing". That puts us at a strategic
disadvantage, because the opposition knows that some of our hot-button
issues are so important to us that we'll abandon our basic principles.
If I
asked you, would the Libertarian Party support a new government
program to
produce, distribute, regulate, and sell via a monopoly a certain type
of
health care to all citizens without any market controls, would you say
"No"?
Because we very nearly did just that -- Prop S last year to have San
Francisco start its own medical marijuana distribution bureaucracy.
It's no
mistake that such a proposal came from a big-spending liberal. He
couldn't
ever get the voters to support a similar government monopoly on blood
pressure meds, even though he believes in such constructs, so he picked
something we'd be less rational about. The gun control politicians
play
this trick on the NRA all the time.
That's a very strange paragraph, Rob. Applying common sense to
politics does NOT lead me to conclude that Mark Leno proposed Prop. S
because he was looking to create a new government monopoly and figured
marijuana would be the easiest one to sell. If Leno was on a quest for
government monopolies, he would be championing the Bay Guardian's
relentless crusade for "public power" in San Francisco, which has long
been on the brink of becoming a reality and still may. No, I think the
reality is that he sincerely wants to stop the feds from busting people
for medical marijuana, but being a statist, naturally came up with a
statist model for achieving that goal. It was precisely our "all or
nothing" approach, and our disregard of common sense politics, in my
opinion, that led us to wrongly reject Proposition S -- which passed by
a large margin (as I predicted it would), and was, in the bigger
picture, a nice slap in the face to the Drug Warriors. Rather than
looking at the practical reality of the situation, we got hung up on
the fact that it was giving government an opening to be involved in the
marijuana business and voted no on principle.
I'm not saying we should stop agitating for tax breaks. I'm just
saying
that we should be more critical in analyzing the true consequences of
any
proposal we consider.
It's hard for me to see how we could be much more critical than we are
now without simply saying "NO!" to everything that crosses our desk.
Yours in liberty,
<<< Starchild >>>
From: lpsf-discuss@yahoogroups.com
[mailto:lpsf-discuss@yahoogroups.com]
Sent: Tuesday, April 06, 2004 2:40 AM
To: lpsf-discuss@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: Farmers Property Tax Breaks Gone AwryMichael,
Exactly... I wouldn't think this was a difficult concept to
understand. Even when tax break are tied to increases in the marginal
rate for most taxpayers, as in Rob's illustration, the tax break part
of that package *still* isn't bad. Rob, think of it like attaching a
bill allowing more gay marriage to a tax increase. That wouldn't make
gay marriage bad, even if political "magicians" were using the issue to
distract the public so they could pass something much more anti-liberty
along with it.Yours in liberty,
<<< Starchild >>>Ron,
In the instance you cite, it's not the tax break that's the problem,
but rather it's the subsequent tax that is illegitimate.Best, Michael
www.ThreeMinuteTherapy.comFrom: "Ronald Getty" <tradergroupe@yahoo.com>
To: <lpsf-discuss@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Sunday, April 04, 2004 10:23 PM
Subject: Re: [lpsf-discuss] Farmers Property Tax Breaks Gone AwryDear Dr. Mike;
Very true. However, as the article pointed out the politicians who
created the special interest tax breaks for farmers have gone and
retroactively charged back-taxes to the developers and the
corporations who took advantage of the farmers tax breaks. So once
again the only ones coming out ahead are the moron politicians who
instead of cutting programs and spending supported by taking from the
taxpayers just went on a new taking program to continue their wasteful
ways.On a special note the Citizens Against Government Waste are issuing
their updated " PIG BOOK " covering the latest in improper or
unnecessary expenditures. Congress is spending some $23 Billion on
some 10,700 dubious projects. It's $5.00 and the order number is 1 -
800 - 232 - 6479.Ron Getty
SF Libertarian
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