TAXATION IS THEFT

So the very existence of taxation – any taxation – opens the door wider to those who wish to use the state to butt further into other people’s business. It’s true that we can marshal theories and arguments about the analytical primacy of the private; the analytical (and in some cases also temporal) primacy of private property; and the analytical (and also sometimes temporal) primacy of social order.

But the fact remains that there is no method of taxation that avoids significant arbitrariness in its application and consequences. (“If X is taxed, why not tax Y, too?!”) It’s this arbitrariness – which is practically inseparable from the fiat that is legislation – that opens the door wider to those who claim, in one breath, not to wish to mind other people’s private business but, in a second breath, insist that much of what looks to non-”Progressives” as private is, alas, really public and, therefore, the business of us all.

The second reaction is one that I heard on the radio yesterday. It’s a reaction by U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) to the brouhaha over Obamacare’s confrontation with the Catholic church over health-insurance to cover contraception.

Here’s what Ms. Gillibrand said (in a tone of extraordinary self-righteousness): “The power to decide whether or not to use contraception lies with a woman – not her boss. What is more intrusive than trying to allow an employer to make medical decisions for someone who works for them?”

The twisted logic underlying Ms. Gillibrand’s worldview is stunning. First she wants to collectivize health-care funding. Second, she then expresses indignance that express orders by the state on how private parties spend their funds are resisted by those private parties. And third, she parades her indignance as being a defense of private spheres of actions that ought not be intruded into by outsiders!

As Reuvain Borchardt (quoted here with his permission and original emphases) wrote to me by e-mail in response to Ms. Gillibrand furtherance of twistocracy: “Am I missing something, or is this woman an idiot? First the gov’t forces employers to provide insurance; then, when employers don’t wanna provide a service they morally oppose, the gov’t says HOW DARE YOU INTERFERE WITH PRIVATE DECISIONS! I never thought I’d be shocked by something a politician said, but frankly, Gillibrand deserves to be impeached immediately, for failing CIRCULAR LOGIC 101