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The old "paying taxes is patriotic" leftist canard. America was founded in some part due to an anti-tax mentality.
We don't have representation now. We have fake representation where we are told we are being represented only for our taxes to go to enhancing the lifestyles of the elites.
BS, there are plenty of elected and non elected (Grover Norquist) running and serving under the low/no taxes banner. Like Shank says, you are also free to run. If you don't get elected because people people think you're a moon bat, it might be time to review your priorities.
It was about taxation without representation. The folks who think taxes are theft are merely cheap and not patriotic.
This was certainly a slogan, and a justification, but it was by no means the cause of the Revolution. If it was, why didn't it happen much earlier? Why didn't it happen elsewhere?
Furthermore, Britain wasn't exactly some ruthless empire when it came to taxation, and most of the leaders of Britain did not believe in taxation without representation either. But the situation was complicated.
The aim of British taxes was primarily about international trade. And most of the merchant traders, were actually British corporations(IE the East India trading company), not American colonists. The "tea-tax" for instance, was a tax levied on the British East India company through the customs office, not on the colonists.
It is similar in-effect to our government taxing American corporations who do their business in foreign countries. On paper, the corporation pays the tax, but in reality, it is always the consumers who pay the tax. So when Microsoft has to pay taxes on profits from China, it is the Chinese people who are actually paying the tax.
Britain believed it had the right to tax any British company, if it did business anywhere outside of England(which is what America still does today). But from the perspective of the colonists, they were the ones being taxed.
Just remember, real tyranny doesn't give you options like voting, running for office yourself or renouncing your citizenship.
I always find it silly when leftists like yourself defend the American election system. I am sure you realize that the election system is rigged in favor of "big-money"(IE the elites).
You know that the media is controlled by money, that the elections are controlled by money, and that, if you have no money, and no one with money who will back you, that you will never hold any kind of elected office.
If you don't serve the interests of the billionaires and multinational conglomerates who control almost all of the media, they will ignore you and they will attack you. They will lie and distort everything you have ever said, to paint you as some evil villain. If neither Fox News or MSNBC will support you or defend you, then you stand no chance whatsoever.
I'm not going to say that our government is "tyrannical". But the idea that we live in a free government, or a government of consent, is just plain absurd.
Quote:
"One essential of a free government is that it rest wholly on voluntary support. And one certain proof that a government is not free, is that it coerces more or less persons to support it, against their will." - Lysander Spooner
"If any man's money can be taken by a so-called government, without his own personal consent, all his other rights are taken with it; for with his money the government can, and will, hire soldiers to stand over him, compel him to submit to its arbitrary will, and kill him if he resists." - Lysander Spooner
"All governments, the worst on earth, and the most tyrannical on earth, are free governments to that portion of the people who voluntarily support them." - Lysander Spooner
Last edited by Redshadowz; 06-22-2016 at 05:47 PM..
I always find it silly when leftists like yourself defend the American election system. I am sure you realize that the election system is rigged in favor of "big-money"(IE the elites).
You know that the media is controlled by money, that the elections are controlled by money, and that, if you have no money, and no one with money who will back you, that you will never hold any kind of elected office.
If you don't serve the interests of the billionaires and multinational conglomerates who control almost all of the media, they will ignore you and they will attack you. They will lie and distort everything you have ever said, to paint you as some evil villain. If neither Fox News or MSNBC will support you or defend you, then you stand no chance whatsoever.
I'm not going to say that our government is "tyrannical". But the idea that we live in a free government, or a government of consent, is just plain absurd.
Well, whose fault is that? It's the GOP's fault. They consistently defend big money in politics.
They consistently defend money as speach.
They consistently defend corporate funding.
In Obama's first administration there was an attempt at campaign finance reform and Republican's squashed it before it could even see the light of day.
Well, whose fault is that? It's the GOP's fault. They consistently defend big money in politics.
If you think you can remove money from politics, you're a fool. And the Democrats don't want to remove money from politics either. Even when they hold a super-majority, they do nothing.
Even campaign-finance merely hands more power to the media(and its corporate backers), it doesn't hand power to the people. Furthermore, since the media is located in a handful of mega-cities, such as New York, Washington D.C., and Los Angeles. By handing the media even more power over the elections, you'll just shift the entire political system more in-favor of the economic interests represented in those cities.
I mean, money loves Hillary Clinton, the bankers love Hillary Clinton. Obama received more money than any other candidate in history. Why would they possibly care about actually changing the system?
Political parties only support policies which benefit their party, or their party's corporate backers, they don't care about you, you don't matter.
To make the kinds of changes you seem to want, would require a revolution. Yet, you do nothing but attack and undermine those who are trying to make that happen.
"The people flatter themselves that they have the sovereign power. These are, in fact, words without meaning. It is true they elected governors; but how are these elections brought about? In every instance of election by the mass of a people—through the influence of those governors themselves, and by means the most opposite to a free and disinterested choice, by the basest corruption and bribery. But those governors once selected, where is the boasted freedom of the people? They must submit to their rule and control, with the same abandonment of their natural liberty, the freedom of their will, and the command of their actions, as if they were under the rule of a monarch" - Alexander Fraser Tytler
This was certainly a slogan, and a justification, but it was by no means the cause of the Revolution. If it was, why didn't it happen much earlier? Why didn't it happen elsewhere?
Furthermore, Britain wasn't exactly some ruthless empire when it came to taxation, and most of the leaders of Britain did not believe in taxation without representation either. But the situation was complicated.
The aim of British taxes was primarily about international trade. And most of the merchant traders, were actually British corporations(IE the East India trading company), not American colonists. The "tea-tax" for instance, was a tax levied on the British East India company through the customs office, not on the colonists.
It is similar in-effect to our government taxing American corporations who do their business in foreign countries. On paper, the corporation pays the tax, but in reality, it is always the consumers who pay the tax. So when Microsoft has to pay taxes on profits from China, it is the Chinese people who are actually paying the tax.
Britain believed it had the right to tax any British company, if it did business anywhere outside of England(which is what America still does today). But from the perspective of the colonists, they were the ones being taxed.
So essentially what I said. America was a relatively educated colony (wasn't made up entirely of slaves/laborers and owners) who began to see why they didn't need the British Crown in that respective capacity and rebelled.
It wasn't some grand noble cause in colonial America where the British Crown was some huge oppressor (most certainly in other parts of the globe) but a bunch of merchants and land owners wanted to cut out of the Crown in their profits to put it simply. Some tried to get better representation in British parliament but ultimately war was the only way.
I always find it silly when leftists like yourself defend the American election system. I am sure you realize that the election system is rigged in favor of "big-money"(IE the elites).
You know that the media is controlled by money, that the elections are controlled by money, and that, if you have no money, and no one with money who will back you, that you will never hold any kind of elected office.
If you don't serve the interests of the billionaires and multinational conglomerates who control almost all of the media, they will ignore you and they will attack you. They will lie and distort everything you have ever said, to paint you as some evil villain. If neither Fox News or MSNBC will support you or defend you, then you stand no chance whatsoever.
I'm not going to say that our government is "tyrannical". But the idea that we live in a free government, or a government of consent, is just plain absurd.
So..... essentially all human-controlled governments?
If you think you can remove money from politics, you're a fool. And the Democrats don't want to remove money from politics either. Even when they hold a super-majority, they do nothing.
Even campaign-finance merely hands more power to the media(and its corporate backers), it doesn't hand power to the people. Furthermore, since the media is located in a handful of mega-cities, such as New York, Washington D.C., and Los Angeles. By handing the media even more power over the elections, you'll just shift the entire political system more in-favor of the economic interests represented in those cities.
I mean, money loves Hillary Clinton, the bankers love Hillary Clinton. Obama received more money than any other candidate in history. Why would they possibly care about actually changing the system?
Political parties only support policies which benefit their party, or their party's corporate backers, they don't care about you, you don't matter.
To make the kinds of changes you seem to want, would require a revolution. Yet, you do nothing but attack and undermine those who are trying to make that happen.
"The people flatter themselves that they have the sovereign power. These are, in fact, words without meaning. It is true they elected governors; but how are these elections brought about? In every instance of election by the mass of a people—through the influence of those governors themselves, and by means the most opposite to a free and disinterested choice, by the basest corruption and bribery. But those governors once selected, where is the boasted freedom of the people? They must submit to their rule and control, with the same abandonment of their natural liberty, the freedom of their will, and the command of their actions, as if they were under the rule of a monarch" - Alexander Fraser Tytler
Maybe the GOP doesn't want to lose its corporate backers but the democrats are trying to push gun reform as we speak regardless of what the NRA thinks.
It's not tyranny unless you're talking about the Republicans.
So essentially what I said. America was a relatively educated colony (wasn't made up entirely of slaves/laborers and owners) who began to see why they didn't need the British Crown in that respective capacity and rebelled.
My only point is, it wasn't the common people who truly and honestly rebelled. The elites were the ones who were "stirring the pot", because they saw secession as beneficial to their own interests.
Why do you think people are so terrified of Donald Trump? Not merely because of his policies, but because he is literally "radicalizing" Americans, in much the same way that an Adolf Hitler did in Germany.
Trump is saying the things that people want to hear, he is saying the things that people are already thinking, but our politicians refuse to say. He is a "populist", and in America, the word populist is a dirty word. How dare you appeal to the people! The people are idiots and can't be trusted. The elites need to run everything.
Elites could stir up a revolution/rebellion in almost any country, and they could stir up one right now, if it was in their interests to do so. I mean, if Fox News got on TV every single day and advocated rebellion, tax-evasion, or civil-disobedience, it wouldn't take long before this entire country collapsed into Civil-War.
But the elites, as a general-rule, need the government, they benefit from the status-quo. They may be interested in small tweaks to the system to benefit their bottom-lines, but by no means are they revolutionary. And the Revolutionary War really wasn't even revolutionary, nothing changed, except the elites in America didn't have to take orders from Britain anymore, and thus had full control over our government.
The common people are almost completely powerless, and always have been. They know only that which the government and their media tell them. And even the ones who aren't completely ignorant, are too busy locking themselves up in a basement somewhere with a bunch of guns. They have effectively zero impact on the government.
Maybe the GOP doesn't want to lose its corporate backers but the democrats are trying to push gun reform as we speak regardless of what the NRA thinks.
It's not tyranny unless you're talking about the Republicans.
What does gun reform have to do with the people? Gun reform merely takes power away from the people.
"To be able forcefully and threateningly to oppose this party... the workers must be armed and organized. The whole proletariat(working class) must be armed at once with muskets, rifles, cannon and ammunition... Under no pretext should arms and ammunition be surrendered; any attempt to disarm the workers must be frustrated, by force if necessary. The destruction of the bourgeois democrats’ influence over the workers, and the enforcement of conditions which will compromise the rule of bourgeois democracy." - Karl Marx
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