A friend takes me to task for passing along the Scrappleface parody of Senator Clinton's comments about confiscating wealth for the common good:
Well, I will try it again. In the "If Only It Were True" piece you again offer this unhelpful parallel to critique Senator Clinton's not-so-shocking notion of having the wealthy pay taxes for the common good. By passing on this not-even-all-that-funny parody (of Ms Clinton's publisher deciding not to pay her her royalties from her book but rather giving it to the "common good") you seem to be again missing the point.
Collecting and distributing taxes is part of the God-required task of the State (and as Bill pointed out in his lengthy piece, is surely, if done properly, part of the founder's vision of what our government was constituted to do.) For a publisher to renege on a contract, say, violating a private business exchange is altogether a different matter. No social institution is set up to do that kind of thing except the state, which is precisely the sort of thing governments are called upon to do. But you make is sound that since Hillary surely wouldn't want that--har, har, har--her tax policy is therefore discredited.
Worse, you make it sound like nearly any tax policy would be unfounded. (Unless, maybe you think the poor should be taxed in order to benefit something other than the common good!) This is just so odd I cannot understand your point. Surely you don't think that Hillary was suggesting, a la St Francis or Dorothy Day, that we are to be voluntarily poor? You don't think that, do you?
No her comments were not about that, although perhaps that is a discussion worth having. And surely you aren't an anarchist who opposes the right of the state to do good stuff by taxing citizens. And you surely aren't opposed to spending said taxes on the common good, are you (what's the alternative?) To wit, your complaint seems to make no sense. Where's the beef? Or is it, not unlike the liberals you so often (and often properly) skewer for allowing their ideology to lead them to meanly mock anyone and everything "on the other side of the isle", just some uncivil carping going on.
I've come to expect that from the blogs and pundits you troll each day, but I wouldn't expect that from you. It looks to me just an excuse for cheap Hillary-bashing.
