[Arlo] Let's address simple "tax" first. [Platt] You do not see that the power to tax is the power to destroy. ... You don't seem to understand the list in the Declaration of grievances the revolutionaries had against the government of England which emanates from the same power as the power to tax.
[Arlo] So you are proposing we abolish taxation outright? How do we fund the military? Is the government taking my money to fund the military destructive to my "liberty"? Is my liberty oppressed because the state funds public lands? Public libraries? [Platt] What's sick is your notion that someone's life, rich or poor, grants you the power to steal from me. [Arlo] So its "sick" that you take money from me to fund the military? Parks? Roads? Libraries? [Platt] That you seem blind to the connection is really surprising to me. For you the government can do no wrong. [Arlo] That's just empty rhetoric. The government can (and does) many things "wrong". But collecting taxes to fund social infrastructure such as parks, libraries and roads, as well as ensuring our protection from violence, providing medicine and food to the poor, is not among them. Does it do it as efficiently as it could? Probably not. Are there holes that need to be filled? Probably so. But the underlying premise, taxation to fund social infrastructure, is moral. [Platt] Why "must" I and my neighbors feed a criminal who refuses to work for his food? [Arlo] "Whenever you kill a human being you are killing a source of thought too. A human being is a collection of ideas, and these ideas take moral precedence over a society." (LILA) [Platt] Do you think for a moment the gunman would not shoot the guy and also take my wallet? Where do you dream up these ridiculous hypotheticals. [Arlo] Nice evasion. Given the choice, which is "moral"? Giving away your wallet, or having the guy next to you shot? [Platt] To sum up your postion, producers can be forced at the point of gun to provide for the "needs" of takers. Now that's sick. [Arlo] Not at all. What's sick is deciding who lives and dies by how much money they have. "But here in New York it seemed as if when you're poor you're just poor. And that means you're nobody. Really nobody. And if you're rich you're really somebody" (LILA) Human value by virtue of wealth. Sad. But we're just repeating ourselves here, Platt. Let's ring the 10th round bell on this one. moq_discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
