A VERY MISTAKEN ASSUMPTION

Something I've been pondering lately: not only the loony right but, it might be, a preponderance of most Americans, proceed and have been proceeding on the assumption that every penny of the money we earn belongs to us and ONLY to us, and, hence, that taxes are burdensome impositions if not, as the Randians at least prate (although when THEY need help it's quite a different story!), outright theft.
I challenge that assumption and throw down the gauntlet to the REALLY aspiring thieves, nearly all of whom do their dirty work under the Private Enterprise colors even while they seek to loot us every which way they can, including buying up OUR government. Not even the Founders believed that ALL anyone's property was theirs alone. In proof of which, read these two quotes from two Founders:

All Property, indeed, except the Savage's temporary Cabin, his Bow, his Matchcoat, and other little Acquisitions, absolutely necessary for his Subsistence, seems to me to be the Creature of public Convention. Hence the Public has the Right of Regulating Descents, and all other Conveyances of Property, and even of limiting the Quantity and the Uses of it. All the Property that is necessary to a [person], for the Conservation of the Individual and the Propagation of the Species, is [their] natural Right, which none can justly deprive [them] of:(Nowadays, that would be whatever's necessary for a modest but decent living and to bring up--and educate--one's children in modest comfort and security) But all Property superfluous to such purposes is the Property of the Publick, who, by their Laws, have created it, and who may therefore by other Laws dispose of it, whenever the Welfare of the Publick shall demand such Disposition. He that does not like civil Society on these Terms, let him retire and live among Savages.

The protection of a [person] is more sacred than the protection of property; and besides this, the faculty of performing any kind of work or services by which [s/he] acquires a livelihood, or maintaining [their] family, is of the nature of property. It is property to [them], [s/he] has acquired it; and it is as much the object of [their] protection as exterior property, possessed without that faculty, can be the object of protection in another person.

The first was written by Ben Franklin in a letter to Robert Morris on Dec. 25, 1783. The second is from Tom Paine's 'Dissertation on First Principles of Government'.

I don't know about you but I can already hear the whines, "Don't WE know how to spend our own money better than any government revenue hound (modern variation)?"
The answer is, not necessarily. Especially not if you ain't been paying attention, clown! If you barely know what needs doing in your own town, city or region, can we believe you if and when you say YOU know how to spend all your money? I really do wonder.
Mind you, I have my own ideas where our tax dollars should be put to work, but that's another matter. You want roads and bridges safe to drive on? Clean air to breathe and water to drink? Uncontaminated and reasonably fresh food? Not to mention police and fire who serve EVERYONE fairly? The market will do whatever it thinks it can get away with; it's long past time to discipline it and none too gently neither at that!! We can (so far) only monitor the market through the agency of OUR government. You want to know who government is? The same folks as create jobs. THAT means the person you see in the mirror in the morning as you either shave or apply war paint--and his/her neighbors as well, all acting together and deputizing people (representatives; who in turn hire and deputize 'bureaucrats', many of whom actually work not at a desk but either on the road or in physically strenuous jobs) to carry out the things we the people want done!!
Remember: WE ARE THE GOVERNMENT. WE ARE ALSO JOB-CREATORS. If anyone tells you the government is your enemy, they say that YOU are your enemy and they seek to sell you for parts!
And I can't repeat often enough that OUR desires and demands create the jobs!!
So--what we need to maintain ourselves, bring up and educate a family in modest comfort is indeed ours, but anything above and beyond that can and should be put to work in ways which benefit ALL of us, benefit the society as a whole. At least, that's what Dr. Franklin said. And he wasn't the only Founder who believed that either.