Taxing Tax Thought

People don’t like taxes. Taxes are necessary, though. Sure, there’s a lot of stuff various people will tell you our tax dollars should not be spent on. Whatever. Locally, we need taxes to fund police, fire department, roads, schools, hospitals, libraries, and a whole myriad of other stuff we’re quite glad to have and wouldn’t want to do without.

But wait! Some people believe we should have no taxes. Taxes should be voluntary. It should be a charity. Interesting concept there. It might go on to say that big companies ought to be funding the roads and hospitals and such of their own accord.

Hmmm… well, I could see companies being more than happy to do that. After all, it would give them a very nice tax write-off… oh, no, wait. No taxes. Forgot.

But even if there would be no big write-off, since taxes do not exist, they might still do it. Advertising. Let’s have a look-see.

One day, if I have kids, I might send them off to Pepsi Elementary School. Coming home, I’d drive down Comcast Boulevard. Might even return some books to the Verizon library, which is right near McDonalds Hospital. I might pass by the FedEx Fire Department if I go that way. Might have to. Can’t take the Disney Interstate unless I’m currently a guest in one of their resorts. I’ll just drop by the Microsoft Post Office before I head home.

Hey, at least I don’t have to pay taxes to the greedy, corrupt government!

Then my child gets suspended for mentioning he prefers Coke over Pepsi. I can’t drive on Comcast Boulevard anymore because I switched to satellite. Paramedics won’t come to my house because they saw us at Burger King one day. The fire department wouldn’t put out my neighbor’s fire because they send packages via DHL. We can’t even go into the Verizon library to look at books, because we’re on a Cingular cell phone plan. Dare I mail anything again if I switch to Linux?

Wait! Aren’t there laws preventing these horrible abuses of power? This can’t be constitutional! Hmmmm. Of course, it’s not constitutional. The government is bound by many documents to not abuse their power, in which it is totally the right of the people to stop them when they do. But, then again, the government is extremely small now, not permitted to limit big corporations in any way short of directly murdering people. I guess anything these public sponsors do must certainly be just then.

But, hey, at least we’d be free from the tyranny of a government for the people, by the people.