Welcome friends!
I’m finding tearing myself away from the slowly unfolding catastrophe of the conservative Trump administration is becoming more and more difficult every day. Have you found that to be the case as well? It’s hard to take one’s eyes off the papers even for a moment when one doesn’t know what manner of corruption, dishonesty, and destructiveness will manifest from one moment to the next. Mesmerizing. I’ve never seen anything like it the whole of my life. I never imagined in my wildest dreams I ever would. It’s as though the USA woke up one day and agreed to self destruct. Nevertheless I’m determined to stick with the intent of this blog and not try to respond to every day to day development or I guess in this case outrage but instead focus on issues with somewhat broader and more lasting implications. With that in mind I thought this week I’d take a quick look in my folder of issues I’ve long meant to comment upon but have never actually gotten around to and cross one off the list. This week I decided to take up the American conservative war against the US tax authority the IRS and indeed by extension on democratic government itself. Huh? Taxes are bad right? So why the dig about a war on democracy? Allow me to explain.
I think by now most people get that conservatives think government should be limited to those activities they find personally useful, basically police, prisons, and national security, and that they consider any other sort of activity socialism, which by a not very clever sort of equivocation they strive to associate with the Stalinist do it my way or I’ll hit you on the head with a lead pipe variety. They run on this platform constantly and as far as I know have done so for perhaps the last two hundred years here in the USA. Not always talking about socialism per se but certainly attacking the foundation of the socialist ethos: the idea that other people matter... Sorry but only selected archived (previous year) posts are currently available full text on this website. All posts including this one are available in my annual anthology ebook series available at the Amazon Kindle Bookstore for a nominal fee. Hey, we all need to make a buck somehow, right? If you find my timeless jewels of wisdom amusing or perhaps even amusingly irritating throw me a bone now and then. Thank you my friends!
