I can’t tell you when this became a (largely) annual thing for me to post, but it was on a blog that pre-existed this one. As always, it seems like a good day to post it.
A man condemning the income tax because of the annoyance it gives him or the expense it puts him to is merely a dog baring its teeth, and he forfeits the privileges of civilized discourse. But it is permissible to criticize it on other and impersonal grounds. A government, like an individual, spends money for any or all of three reasons: because it needs to, because it wants to, or simply because it has it to spend. The last is much the shabbiest. It is arguable, if not manifest, that a substantial proportion of this great spring flood of billions pouring into the Treasury will in effect get spent for that last shabby reason.
–Nero Wolfe
from And Be a Villain
Allyson Johnson
Exactly what would one want tax money NOT to be spent on? Maintaining Interstate highways? Staffing and maintaining national parks? patrolling borders? Airport traffic control? Flood control? Health care for the elderly? for infants? For pregnant women?
“Taxes are the price we pay for civilization” as OW Holmes said. Would one prefer to have the government funded by direct patronage of Congressmen and the President by multi-billionaires?
Bookstooge
And as we’re seeing today, the shabbiest reason seems to be the main reason nowadays.
HCNewton
touché