Socialised Medicine Yaaaaaaaayyyy

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Seth
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Re: Socialised Medicine Yaaaaaaaayyyy

Post by Seth » Sat Mar 01, 2014 7:36 pm

SnowLeopard wrote:Yeah, but they're not unconstitutional though. So.... And you can't back up rationally why they are immoral or unethical. So....
It's simple: Nobody has a legitimate moral or ethical right to take what someone else has labored for without that person's permission and turn it to their own benefit. That is the very definition of theft. The right to private property is the cornerstone of any ethical, moral social system. That a "democratic majority" uses the blunt-force instrument of the government to accomplish that theft is utterly irrelevant. Just taxes pay for the necessary operations of government that provide benefits to the taxpayer, like roads and sewer systems, military and police and fire protection. Taxes imposed for the purposes of transferring wealth from one private individual (the taxpayer) to another individual (some random and unknown member of the dependent class) provide zero benefit or use to the taxpayer. In fact such programs are harmful to the taxpayer because once the dependent class learns it can steal from others to satisfy their needs, they will always seek more and more of the property of the individual who worked to earn it.

Using the power of government to force others to labor for the direct benefit of someone else against their will is the very definition of involuntary servitude, which is likewise immoral and unethical. While socialist slavery apologists will natter on about how no one is "forced to labor" to pay redistributive taxes this is nothing more than another dismissal of individual rights. It is immoral and unethical for government to impoverish or imprison someone merely for refusing to be enslaved to the financial maintenance of others.

These things are the core fault of Marxism and its socialist spawn. The fundamental disrespect for the sovereign right of the individual to labor and profit from that labor on his own behalf without being robbed of that labor by those who assume that they have a just claim on the labor and property of others is heinous and evil aspect of socialism that makes it necessary to extirpate it from the earth because it does nothing but enslave everyone.

So, you see, I can back up quite rationally, and logically, and correctly, why socialism is a blight on humanity that like a cancer, needs to be excised...with radical surgery if necessary.
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Re: Socialised Medicine Yaaaaaaaayyyy

Post by MrJonno » Sat Mar 01, 2014 8:00 pm

It's simple: Nobody has a legitimate moral or ethical right to take what someone else has labored for without that person's permission and turn it to their own benefit. That is the very definition of theft
No its not , if a court says you have stolen something its theft, if they don't its not theft. That's the definition of theft
The right to private property is the cornerstone of any ethical, moral social system
No it isnt, can be useful but not as useful as ensuring everyone has food, shelter and healthcare (whether they own anything is secondary)
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Re: Socialised Medicine Yaaaaaaaayyyy

Post by Hermit » Sat Mar 01, 2014 9:31 pm

Seth wrote:
SnowLeopard wrote:Yeah, but they're not unconstitutional though. So.... And you can't back up rationally why they are immoral or unethical. So....
It's simple: Nobody has a legitimate moral or ethical right to take what someone else has labored for without that person's permission...
Permission is given by the Sixteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution "The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration." It was ratified by 42 of the states.
I am, somehow, less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein’s brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops. - Stephen J. Gould

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Re: Socialised Medicine Yaaaaaaaayyyy

Post by SnowLeopard » Sat Mar 01, 2014 9:45 pm

Seth wrote:
SnowLeopard wrote:Yeah, but they're not unconstitutional though. So.... And you can't back up rationally why they are immoral or unethical. So....
It's simple: Nobody has a legitimate moral or ethical right to take what someone else has labored for without that person's permission and turn it to their own benefit. That is the very definition of theft. The right to private property is the cornerstone of any ethical, moral social system. That a "democratic majority" uses the blunt-force instrument of the government to accomplish that theft is utterly irrelevant. Just taxes pay for the necessary operations of government that provide benefits to the taxpayer, like roads and sewer systems, military and police and fire protection. Taxes imposed for the purposes of transferring wealth from one private individual (the taxpayer) to another individual (some random and unknown member of the dependent class) provide zero benefit or use to the taxpayer. In fact such programs are harmful to the taxpayer because once the dependent class learns it can steal from others to satisfy their needs, they will always seek more and more of the property of the individual who worked to earn it.

Using the power of government to force others to labor for the direct benefit of someone else against their will is the very definition of involuntary servitude, which is likewise immoral and unethical. While socialist slavery apologists will natter on about how no one is "forced to labor" to pay redistributive taxes this is nothing more than another dismissal of individual rights. It is immoral and unethical for government to impoverish or imprison someone merely for refusing to be enslaved to the financial maintenance of others.

These things are the core fault of Marxism and its socialist spawn. The fundamental disrespect for the sovereign right of the individual to labor and profit from that labor on his own behalf without being robbed of that labor by those who assume that they have a just claim on the labor and property of others is heinous and evil aspect of socialism that makes it necessary to extirpate it from the earth because it does nothing but enslave everyone.

So, you see, I can back up quite rationally, and logically, and correctly, why socialism is a blight on humanity that like a cancer, needs to be excised...with radical surgery if necessary.
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Re: Socialised Medicine Yaaaaaaaayyyy

Post by FBM » Sat Mar 01, 2014 11:27 pm

Hermit wrote:
Seth wrote:
SnowLeopard wrote:Yeah, but they're not unconstitutional though. So.... And you can't back up rationally why they are immoral or unethical. So....
It's simple: Nobody has a legitimate moral or ethical right to take what someone else has labored for without that person's permission...
Permission is given by the Sixteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution "The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration." It was ratified by 42 of the states.
:dis: :coffee:
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Re: Socialised Medicine Yaaaaaaaayyyy

Post by Seth » Sun Mar 02, 2014 1:13 am

Hermit wrote:
Seth wrote:
SnowLeopard wrote:Yeah, but they're not unconstitutional though. So.... And you can't back up rationally why they are immoral or unethical. So....
It's simple: Nobody has a legitimate moral or ethical right to take what someone else has labored for without that person's permission...
Permission is given by the Sixteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution "The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration." It was ratified by 42 of the states.
I was discussing the principle of private property and the morality of theft. While Congress does have the power to collect income taxes the question is whether Congress or anyone else has the moral (or legal) authority (or right) to take money from one person and give it to another person without providing some service of government to the person the money was taken from.

The 5th Amendment to the Constitution says, "nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation."

Much less can Congress take private property for private use without any compensation.

Money is property. It cannot be taken for public or private use by Congress (or anybody else) without providing just compensation. For the purposes of this discussion I'm going to define two general categories of taxes: service taxes, which are defined as those taxes levied for the purposes of providing government services, and redistribution taxes, which are defined as direct transfers of property from one private individual to another using the government as the collector and distributor of the money.

Although I'm quite sure that you completely understand my argument, I'm going to treat you like a child and explain things so even a child could understand it.

While Congress can levy taxes, including (unfortunately) income taxes (not made a permanent fixture of the law until 1913 when the Progressive era was in its infancy), Congress cannot levy taxes and use them for absolutely anything it wants, and it cannot levy taxes that are used as a tool to violate the civil rights of citizens. This is why poll taxes are unconstitutional, as are taxes on the exercise of religion or free speech. Congress cannot levy a tax on Jews in order to line the pockets of legislators. It cannot levy taxes on blacks and give them to white slave owners. There are many things Congress cannot levy taxes to do, and relatively few that it is actually authorized to levy taxes to accomplish.

The 5th Amendment says that Congress cannot take private property, which includes cash, without providing "just compensation" for that taking. When it comes to service taxes, the just compensation for the taking is the service rendered by the government for the benefit of the taxpayer. Whether this is a direct benefit like police, fire or military protection or a more ambiguous benefit like making an interstate highway system available for the taxed individual's use or using tax money to research cures for diseases, service taxes ALWAYS have some identifiable benefit to the taxpayers. That's "just compensation."

But redistribution taxes are different because they are not collected for the purpose of providing any benefit to the taxpayer paying those taxes, they are collected to benefit another individual (probably NOT a taxpayer) directly by paying for that individual's social and physical needs. The primary purpose of laboring to acquire property (money) is so that the social and physical needs of the worker may be taken care of. Redistribution taxation makes the false assumption that the government is better suited, morally, legally or physically, to decide how best to dispose of the individual's labor and property and is therefore authorized to determine what the worker "needs" by way of his own property and what some other person (probably not a worker) needs from the worker's labor-created property. This is the antithesis of private property rights.

This is amply and clearly illustrated by the Marxist maxim, "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need."

The problem with this philosophy is, of course, that it is a complete and utter repudiation of the entire concept of personal autonomy and the right to property. It is in fact based on the immoral, unethical and profoundly evil presumption that the individual does not enjoy any personal autonomy at all, much less any right to obtain or enjoy property. It presumes that every member of the society is nothing more than a slave to the collective will who must labor to the limits of his "ability" only to have what he has earned taken from him and redistributed to someone else according to the government's notion of that other person's "needs" without any consideration at all of the needs of the worker. A particularly topical example of this is Ukraine, where in 1932 - 1933, Stalin deliberately starved as many as 12 million people, many of them children, to death as punishment for resisting Communist collectivization by seizing the entire output of the "Breadbasket of Europe" and sending it to Russia.

That's exactly the sort of thing that socialism both causes and celebrates because socialism disrespects the rights of the individual.

Because I have established that the 5th Amendment prohibits Congress from taking property (money or it's creator labor) from the individual without justly compensating that individual for that taking, it is therefore rational and logical to say that redistribution taxation is both immoral and unconstitutional because it does not confer any benefit upon the individual from whom the money is taken, it is simply a taking of money from one person and giving it to another more or less directly. This is immoral, unethical, unconstitutional and illegal, not to mention reprehensible, evil and selfish.

That the government has the ability to do a thing because of its natural and inherent power does not mean that it has either the legal or moral right to do that thing, because might does not make right in civilized cultures.

Now, I ran this past an 11 year old just now and she understood perfectly what I am saying. Are you smarter than an 11 year old?
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Re: Socialised Medicine Yaaaaaaaayyyy

Post by Seth » Sun Mar 02, 2014 1:16 am

MrJonno wrote:
It's simple: Nobody has a legitimate moral or ethical right to take what someone else has labored for without that person's permission and turn it to their own benefit. That is the very definition of theft
No its not , if a court says you have stolen something its theft, if they don't its not theft. That's the definition of theft
Nonsense. Theft occurs when someone takes something that belongs to someone else without their permission. Whether the thief can be convicted of that crime is utterly irrelevant to whether or not the theft occurred.
The right to private property is the cornerstone of any ethical, moral social system
No it isnt, can be useful but not as useful as ensuring everyone has food, shelter and healthcare (whether they own anything is secondary)
...Said the Marxist Communist thief...
"Seth is Grandmaster Zen Troll who trains his victims to troll themselves every time they think of him" Robert_S

"All that is required for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." Edmund Burke

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© 2013/2014/2015/2016 Seth, all rights reserved. No reuse, republication, duplication, or derivative work is authorized.

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Re: Socialised Medicine Yaaaaaaaayyyy

Post by Hermit » Sun Mar 02, 2014 1:32 am

Seth wrote:
Hermit wrote:
Seth wrote:
SnowLeopard wrote:Yeah, but they're not unconstitutional though. So.... And you can't back up rationally why they are immoral or unethical. So....
It's simple: Nobody has a legitimate moral or ethical right to take what someone else has labored for without that person's permission...
Permission is given by the Sixteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution "The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration." It was ratified by 42 of the states.
I was discussing the principle of private property and the morality of theft. While Congress does have the power to collect income taxes the question is whether Congress or anyone else has the moral (or legal) authority (or right) to take money from one person and give it to another person without providing some service of government to the person the money was taken from.

The 5th Amendment to the Constitution says, "nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation."

Much less can Congress take private property for private use without any compensation.

Money is property. It cannot be taken for public or private use by Congress (or anybody else) without providing just compensation. For the purposes of this discussion I'm going to define two general categories of taxes: service taxes, which are defined as those taxes levied for the purposes of providing government services, and redistribution taxes, which are defined as direct transfers of property from one private individual to another using the government as the collector and distributor of the money.

Although I'm quite sure that you completely understand my argument, I'm going to treat you like a child and explain things so even a child could understand it.

While Congress can levy taxes, including (unfortunately) income taxes (not made a permanent fixture of the law until 1913 when the Progressive era was in its infancy), Congress cannot levy taxes and use them for absolutely anything it wants, and it cannot levy taxes that are used as a tool to violate the civil rights of citizens. This is why poll taxes are unconstitutional, as are taxes on the exercise of religion or free speech. Congress cannot levy a tax on Jews in order to line the pockets of legislators. It cannot levy taxes on blacks and give them to white slave owners. There are many things Congress cannot levy taxes to do, and relatively few that it is actually authorized to levy taxes to accomplish.

The 5th Amendment says that Congress cannot take private property, which includes cash, without providing "just compensation" for that taking. When it comes to service taxes, the just compensation for the taking is the service rendered by the government for the benefit of the taxpayer. Whether this is a direct benefit like police, fire or military protection or a more ambiguous benefit like making an interstate highway system available for the taxed individual's use or using tax money to research cures for diseases, service taxes ALWAYS have some identifiable benefit to the taxpayers. That's "just compensation."

But redistribution taxes are different because they are not collected for the purpose of providing any benefit to the taxpayer paying those taxes, they are collected to benefit another individual (probably NOT a taxpayer) directly by paying for that individual's social and physical needs. The primary purpose of laboring to acquire property (money) is so that the social and physical needs of the worker may be taken care of. Redistribution taxation makes the false assumption that the government is better suited, morally, legally or physically, to decide how best to dispose of the individual's labor and property and is therefore authorized to determine what the worker "needs" by way of his own property and what some other person (probably not a worker) needs from the worker's labor-created property. This is the antithesis of private property rights.

This is amply and clearly illustrated by the Marxist maxim, "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need."

The problem with this philosophy is, of course, that it is a complete and utter repudiation of the entire concept of personal autonomy and the right to property. It is in fact based on the immoral, unethical and profoundly evil presumption that the individual does not enjoy any personal autonomy at all, much less any right to obtain or enjoy property. It presumes that every member of the society is nothing more than a slave to the collective will who must labor to the limits of his "ability" only to have what he has earned taken from him and redistributed to someone else according to the government's notion of that other person's "needs" without any consideration at all of the needs of the worker. A particularly topical example of this is Ukraine, where in 1932 - 1933, Stalin deliberately starved as many as 12 million people, many of them children, to death as punishment for resisting Communist collectivization by seizing the entire output of the "Breadbasket of Europe" and sending it to Russia.

That's exactly the sort of thing that socialism both causes and celebrates because socialism disrespects the rights of the individual.

Because I have established that the 5th Amendment prohibits Congress from taking property (money or it's creator labor) from the individual without justly compensating that individual for that taking, it is therefore rational and logical to say that redistribution taxation is both immoral and unconstitutional because it does not confer any benefit upon the individual from whom the money is taken, it is simply a taking of money from one person and giving it to another more or less directly. This is immoral, unethical, unconstitutional and illegal, not to mention reprehensible, evil and selfish.

That the government has the ability to do a thing because of its natural and inherent power does not mean that it has either the legal or moral right to do that thing, because might does not make right in civilized cultures.

Now, I ran this past an 11 year old just now and she understood perfectly what I am saying. Are you smarter than an 11 year old?
The constitution begs to differ from your interpretation regarding the ethics and morality of taxation. So did over 80% of the states when the Sixteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution was ratified a hundred years ago.

I am not surprised that you got an eleven year old to agree with your stance. I would have too at that age. In fact, I was a libertarian until I was about 18 or 19, but I grew up.
I am, somehow, less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein’s brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops. - Stephen J. Gould

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Re: Socialised Medicine Yaaaaaaaayyyy

Post by FBM » Sun Mar 02, 2014 1:40 am

Seth wrote:
Hermit wrote:
Seth wrote:
SnowLeopard wrote:Yeah, but they're not unconstitutional though. So.... And you can't back up rationally why they are immoral or unethical. So....
It's simple: Nobody has a legitimate moral or ethical right to take what someone else has labored for without that person's permission...
Permission is given by the Sixteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution "The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration." It was ratified by 42 of the states.
I was discussing the principle of private property and the morality of theft. While Congress does have the power to collect income taxes the question is whether Congress or anyone else has the moral (or legal) authority (or right) to take money from one person and give it to another person without providing some service of government to the person the money was taken from.

The 5th Amendment to the Constitution says, "nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation."

Much less can Congress take private property for private use without any compensation.

Money is property. It cannot be taken for public or private use by Congress (or anybody else) without providing just compensation. For the purposes of this discussion I'm going to define two general categories of taxes: service taxes, which are defined as those taxes levied for the purposes of providing government services, and redistribution taxes, which are defined as direct transfers of property from one private individual to another using the government as the collector and distributor of the money.

Although I'm quite sure that you completely understand my argument, I'm going to treat you like a child and explain things so even a child could understand it.

While Congress can levy taxes, including (unfortunately) income taxes (not made a permanent fixture of the law until 1913 when the Progressive era was in its infancy), Congress cannot levy taxes and use them for absolutely anything it wants, and it cannot levy taxes that are used as a tool to violate the civil rights of citizens. This is why poll taxes are unconstitutional, as are taxes on the exercise of religion or free speech. Congress cannot levy a tax on Jews in order to line the pockets of legislators. It cannot levy taxes on blacks and give them to white slave owners. There are many things Congress cannot levy taxes to do, and relatively few that it is actually authorized to levy taxes to accomplish.

The 5th Amendment says that Congress cannot take private property, which includes cash, without providing "just compensation" for that taking. When it comes to service taxes, the just compensation for the taking is the service rendered by the government for the benefit of the taxpayer. Whether this is a direct benefit like police, fire or military protection or a more ambiguous benefit like making an interstate highway system available for the taxed individual's use or using tax money to research cures for diseases, service taxes ALWAYS have some identifiable benefit to the taxpayers. That's "just compensation."

But redistribution taxes are different because they are not collected for the purpose of providing any benefit to the taxpayer paying those taxes, they are collected to benefit another individual (probably NOT a taxpayer) directly by paying for that individual's social and physical needs. The primary purpose of laboring to acquire property (money) is so that the social and physical needs of the worker may be taken care of. Redistribution taxation makes the false assumption that the government is better suited, morally, legally or physically, to decide how best to dispose of the individual's labor and property and is therefore authorized to determine what the worker "needs" by way of his own property and what some other person (probably not a worker) needs from the worker's labor-created property. This is the antithesis of private property rights.

This is amply and clearly illustrated by the Marxist maxim, "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need."

The problem with this philosophy is, of course, that it is a complete and utter repudiation of the entire concept of personal autonomy and the right to property. It is in fact based on the immoral, unethical and profoundly evil presumption that the individual does not enjoy any personal autonomy at all, much less any right to obtain or enjoy property. It presumes that every member of the society is nothing more than a slave to the collective will who must labor to the limits of his "ability" only to have what he has earned taken from him and redistributed to someone else according to the government's notion of that other person's "needs" without any consideration at all of the needs of the worker. A particularly topical example of this is Ukraine, where in 1932 - 1933, Stalin deliberately starved as many as 12 million people, many of them children, to death as punishment for resisting Communist collectivization by seizing the entire output of the "Breadbasket of Europe" and sending it to Russia.

That's exactly the sort of thing that socialism both causes and celebrates because socialism disrespects the rights of the individual.

Because I have established that the 5th Amendment prohibits Congress from taking property (money or it's creator labor) from the individual without justly compensating that individual for that taking, it is therefore rational and logical to say that redistribution taxation is both immoral and unconstitutional because it does not confer any benefit upon the individual from whom the money is taken, it is simply a taking of money from one person and giving it to another more or less directly. This is immoral, unethical, unconstitutional and illegal, not to mention reprehensible, evil and selfish.

That the government has the ability to do a thing because of its natural and inherent power does not mean that it has either the legal or moral right to do that thing, because might does not make right in civilized cultures.

Now, I ran this past an 11 year old just now and she understood perfectly what I am saying. Are you smarter than an 11 year old?
Chock full of fallacious appeals to common practice. :coffee:
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Re: Socialised Medicine Yaaaaaaaayyyy

Post by Seth » Sun Mar 02, 2014 1:51 am

Hermit wrote:The constitution begs to differ from your interpretation regarding the ethics and morality of taxation. So did over 80% of the states when the Sixteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution was ratified a hundred years ago.

I am not surprised that you got an eleven year old to agree with your stance. I would have too at that age. In fact, I was a libertarian until I was about 18 or 19, but I grew up.
Evidently you aren't smarter than an 11 year old. :fp:
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"All that is required for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." Edmund Burke

"Those who support denying anyone the right to keep and bear arms for personal defense are fully complicit in every crime that might have been prevented had the victim been effectively armed." Seth

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Re: Socialised Medicine Yaaaaaaaayyyy

Post by Hermit » Sun Mar 02, 2014 2:15 am

Seth wrote:
Hermit wrote:The constitution begs to differ from your interpretation regarding the ethics and morality of taxation. So did over 80% of the states when the Sixteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution was ratified a hundred years ago.

I am not surprised that you got an eleven year old to agree with your stance. I would have too at that age. In fact, I was a libertarian until I was about 18 or 19, but I grew up.
Evidently you aren't smarter than an 11 year old. :fp:
When I was eleven years old I was as smart as an eleven year old. I am glad to report that my capacity to comprehend concepts has well and truly gone beyond the limits of what an eleven year old is typically capable of. But do continue to be proud of the fact that an eleven year old agrees with you. Such an achievement. Wow.
I am, somehow, less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein’s brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops. - Stephen J. Gould

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Re: Socialised Medicine Yaaaaaaaayyyy

Post by MrJonno » Sun Mar 02, 2014 2:07 pm

...Said the Marxist Communist thief...
That sort of relies on having a common definition of thief , not to mention marxist and communist

Taking property can either be legal or illegal depending on the courts, same as killing someone can either be legal or illegal.

Courts decide that not bibles, not Seth, not dead slave owners
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Re: Socialised Medicine Yaaaaaaaayyyy

Post by SnowLeopard » Mon Mar 03, 2014 1:41 pm

Seth wrote:
Hermit wrote:
Seth wrote:
SnowLeopard wrote:Yeah, but they're not unconstitutional though. So.... And you can't back up rationally why they are immoral or unethical. So....
It's simple: Nobody has a legitimate moral or ethical right to take what someone else has labored for without that person's permission...
Permission is given by the Sixteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution "The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration." It was ratified by 42 of the states.
I was discussing the principle of private property and the morality of theft. While Congress does have the power to collect income taxes the question is whether Congress or anyone else has the moral (or legal) authority (or right) to take money from one person and give it to another person without providing some service of government to the person the money was taken from.

The 5th Amendment to the Constitution says, "nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation."

Much less can Congress take private property for private use without any compensation.

Money is property. It cannot be taken for public or private use by Congress (or anybody else) without providing just compensation. For the purposes of this discussion I'm going to define two general categories of taxes: service taxes, which are defined as those taxes levied for the purposes of providing government services, and redistribution taxes, which are defined as direct transfers of property from one private individual to another using the government as the collector and distributor of the money.

Although I'm quite sure that you completely understand my argument, I'm going to treat you like a child and explain things so even a child could understand it.

While Congress can levy taxes, including (unfortunately) income taxes (not made a permanent fixture of the law until 1913 when the Progressive era was in its infancy), Congress cannot levy taxes and use them for absolutely anything it wants, and it cannot levy taxes that are used as a tool to violate the civil rights of citizens. This is why poll taxes are unconstitutional, as are taxes on the exercise of religion or free speech. Congress cannot levy a tax on Jews in order to line the pockets of legislators. It cannot levy taxes on blacks and give them to white slave owners. There are many things Congress cannot levy taxes to do, and relatively few that it is actually authorized to levy taxes to accomplish.

The 5th Amendment says that Congress cannot take private property, which includes cash, without providing "just compensation" for that taking. When it comes to service taxes, the just compensation for the taking is the service rendered by the government for the benefit of the taxpayer. Whether this is a direct benefit like police, fire or military protection or a more ambiguous benefit like making an interstate highway system available for the taxed individual's use or using tax money to research cures for diseases, service taxes ALWAYS have some identifiable benefit to the taxpayers. That's "just compensation."

But redistribution taxes are different because they are not collected for the purpose of providing any benefit to the taxpayer paying those taxes, they are collected to benefit another individual (probably NOT a taxpayer) directly by paying for that individual's social and physical needs. The primary purpose of laboring to acquire property (money) is so that the social and physical needs of the worker may be taken care of. Redistribution taxation makes the false assumption that the government is better suited, morally, legally or physically, to decide how best to dispose of the individual's labor and property and is therefore authorized to determine what the worker "needs" by way of his own property and what some other person (probably not a worker) needs from the worker's labor-created property. This is the antithesis of private property rights.

This is amply and clearly illustrated by the Marxist maxim, "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need."

The problem with this philosophy is, of course, that it is a complete and utter repudiation of the entire concept of personal autonomy and the right to property. It is in fact based on the immoral, unethical and profoundly evil presumption that the individual does not enjoy any personal autonomy at all, much less any right to obtain or enjoy property. It presumes that every member of the society is nothing more than a slave to the collective will who must labor to the limits of his "ability" only to have what he has earned taken from him and redistributed to someone else according to the government's notion of that other person's "needs" without any consideration at all of the needs of the worker. A particularly topical example of this is Ukraine, where in 1932 - 1933, Stalin deliberately starved as many as 12 million people, many of them children, to death as punishment for resisting Communist collectivization by seizing the entire output of the "Breadbasket of Europe" and sending it to Russia.

That's exactly the sort of thing that socialism both causes and celebrates because socialism disrespects the rights of the individual.

Because I have established that the 5th Amendment prohibits Congress from taking property (money or it's creator labor) from the individual without justly compensating that individual for that taking, it is therefore rational and logical to say that redistribution taxation is both immoral and unconstitutional because it does not confer any benefit upon the individual from whom the money is taken, it is simply a taking of money from one person and giving it to another more or less directly. This is immoral, unethical, unconstitutional and illegal, not to mention reprehensible, evil and selfish.

That the government has the ability to do a thing because of its natural and inherent power does not mean that it has either the legal or moral right to do that thing, because might does not make right in civilized cultures.

Now, I ran this past an 11 year old just now and she understood perfectly what I am saying. Are you smarter than an 11 year old?
Who on earth let you near a child?
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SnowLeopard
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Re: Socialised Medicine Yaaaaaaaayyyy

Post by SnowLeopard » Mon Mar 03, 2014 1:52 pm

Seth wrote:Theft occurs when someone takes something that belongs to someone else without their permission.
You give your permission, without being forced, threatened or cajoled, to be taxed and for that tax to be spent as the government elected by the people sees fit by living in the country of your choosing.

Therefore tax is not theft. Because you agree to it.

Sorted.

You have proven you are unable to get around that basic fact of the matter contained in that short and simple sentence. The buck stops there. It's not complicated.
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MrJonno
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Re: Socialised Medicine Yaaaaaaaayyyy

Post by MrJonno » Mon Mar 03, 2014 3:41 pm

Libertarianism relies on getting something for free like (natural) rights. Without getting those merely for existing the whole pile of shit collapses.

With those free (natural rights) you can start waffling on about property but only if you get the rights in the first place. No rights no libertarianism
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