Re: “There have been taxes since the beginning of civilization. Even the Old Testament tells about tax collectors. So it’s settled. We will have taxes and that does not make us barbarians.”

This is the “We-do-it-because-we’ve-always-done-it” argument that doesn’t fly in some quarters. Taxes per se are not what make us “barbarian”; they are necessary to provide services that individuals cannot provide on their own, like roads, police and fire protection, and national defense, to name a few. The concept of subsidiarity applies here:

“Just as it is gravely wrong to take from individuals what they can accomplish by their own initiative and industry and give it to the community, so also it is an injustice and at the same time, a grave evil and disturbance of right order to assign to a greater and higher association what lesser and subordinate organizations can do. For every social activity ought of its very nature to furnish help (subsidium) to the members of the body social, and never destroy and absorb them.”

This is saying that legitimate needs should be provided by the lowest possible level of society, and not elevated above that level.

What makes us uncivilized is the abuse of the taxing authority. Taxes for the sake of taxing is an abuse, as are taxing to “get even” with “the rich”, to provide subsidies for wooden arrow makers, counting dogs in Oxnard, and funding for sandals for gay ex-nuns with a foot fetish.

If I recall correctly, the Whiskey Rebels lost and taxes won, so I don’t see how your response answers my question to AMAI for an alternate system.

That was all settled in 1791 during the Whiskey Rebellion.

Re: “Any society that resorts to the system of taxation is not, properly speaking, a civilization. … It’s time to drop that barbaric practice altogether and discover the true nature and meaning of civilized living.”

And what, pray tell, is your idea for an alternate system?

Because McCain has let the charge go virtually unanswered that the Republicans, and Republicans alone, are responsible for the current financial mess, the entire party is suffering. This is the single biggest issue that will factor into a McCain defeat, though there are other issues as I noted in my article that aren’t serving him well either.

My heart tells me there is enough time for McCain to recover, but my head tells me it’s a real longshot that he’ll win now. If he does, it will be a combination of the Bradley effect plus the base supporting Palin.

Although you might be correct on tactics, it still does not explain why all the other GOP candidates are doing so poorly. If McCain was such a screwup he would be doing worse than the others and he isn’t.

And it is not just a “mad at congress” sentiment, as in the senate, no incumbent Dem is in danger. Landrieu at first seemed vulnerable and now she is up by 15%. Lautenberg, now up by 12.5% has the lowest lead of any incumbent Dem. whereas Stevens, Coleman,Sununu, Dole, and Smith are all currently losing and as I pointed out Schaeffer in Colorodo is probably one of the most conservative candidates with a 100% ACU rating and he is losing in an open but formerly GOP seat.

Yes, Thompson was not Mr. Charisma, but I did like his style, and from my centrist perspective Palin is a bit scary.

Patrick:

It is true Republicans have been running Left for the past century,probably even since Lincoln. And it is also true that Democrats have been running right, both with exceptions, because that is the nature of the system. If more than half of the country agrees with you, you are much more likely to win. Probably FDR was to the left of center and Reagan to the right but those were exceptions. Obama might be an exception, yet. Like Regan he is riding an ideological wave.

I also would not underestimate the new registrations. Check out Scott Elliot’s analysis from 10/8 about the early voting in Georgia, interesting

http://www.electionprojection.com/index.shtml

There is more than pot smoking hippies being registered. I think you have a historically low voter turnout in minority and young communities and if Obama succeeds in bringing thiese voters in, he will gain in similar ways as the GOP efforts in the 70-90s in getting the less political evangelicals and social conservative voters into the ranks of the GOP.

Goldwater, McGovern, Kerry, and Dukakis are examples of the more common fate of those that are off the center. Both Clinton and Carter within the context of their party at that time were considered more centrist.

I have heard it said or implied that Nixon was a liberal but that baffles me. Republicans might feel like disowning him as Dems might wish to forget Carter, but Nixon was straight out of the center of the party.

He supported Goldwater in 1964 as opposed to the liberal wing which was for Rockefeller and he ran to the right of Romney and Rockefeller in 1968, though to the left of Reagan.

He was perhaps the inventor of the culture wars, and benefited from the support of the silent majority and had a strong personal disdain for his opponents. In contrast to McCain, who positions himself as working across the aisle and being a maverick, Nixon had his enemie’s list and espoused no such bipartisan sentiments.

One may not like McCains bipartisan leanings, but it is a reflection of the times and what the public wants. In fact, in normal times, it might have doomed Obama to be so far left, like it did McGovern or Kerry, but he is riding a wave of anger at the Republicans and Bush in particular.

Considering presidents Nixon (Nixon was about as conservative as Hillary Clinton when he actually got into office; remember “we’re all Keynsians now”), Ford (Ford was about as conservative as Nixon), Carter, and Clinton, I’d hardly call 1968-2004 a “conservative trend”. Excepting the Reagan 80′s, Republicans have been running left to try and get elected for most of the last century. Remember, Bush I wasn’t exactly held up as a conservative high priest like his predecessor, and Bush II is the “compassionate conservative” who has expanded domestic social spending more than any president since Lyndon Johnson. Not exactly uber-free-market standouts and crazy right wing nuts, if you ask me.

Bush in both 2000 and 2004 didn’t win because he was such a charasmatic standout of the Republican party. He benefited from the same thing Obama is benefitting from today: the other party nominated a guy who’s pretty dull, pretty boring, pretty uncharismatic, and didn’t get a message out very well. Flip the situation today, and then add in the fact that Obama is sheltered from attack, both politically and personally, by political correctness, the media worship him, and he’s running against an incumbent party that’s not real popular. And even at that he’s only ahead nationally by 5-8%, depending on which polls taken at which times you follow. That’s not a radical paradigm shift in political ideology, it’s a pretty typical political cycle. It’s the same political cycle that brought Reagan to office after Carter, Clinton to office after Bush, and Republicans into congress in ’94.

Throwing out the registrations of the pot smoking college dudes who will register at their local campus rally, but won’t actually walk across the street to vote when the time comes, this election, like the last two, will probably fall along pretty typical party lines, and one or two states are going to decide it. If Obama gets elected, we’ll experience a repeat of the Carter administration, and then the cycle will probably shift back to the Republicans (saying they nominate someone even marginally more charismatic than Ben Stein).

What an oxymoron that is! The system of taxation is legalized theft, the initiation of force by government on its own citizens. Your consent is not required.

Any society that resorts to the system of taxation is not, properly speaking, a civilization.

It’s time to drop that barbaric practice altogether and discover the true nature and meaning of civilized living.