From: jfh@rpp386.lonestar.org (John F. Haugh II)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.clinton,tx.politics
Subject: Re: Clinton Policies
Date: 1 Oct 92 00:28:39 GMT
Reply-To: jfh@rpp386.cactus.org (John F. Haugh II)
Distribution: usa
Organization: River Parishes Programming, Austin, Republic of Texas

In article <1992Sep30.041448.21874@europa.lonestar.org> tom@europa.lonestar.org (Tom Kimball) writes:
>Short answer:
>
>Because the government has never in any past years failed to spend any money
>during that year, which is what the previous poster said would happen if
>no one payed the Poll Tax.

Short response:

But the government doesn't have to provide EVERY SINGLE SERVICE known to
mankind.  The STATES are free to provide services.  One such service MIGHT
be the assumption of debts related to all the pork a state has received.

>Long answer:
>
>The idea that the Poll Tax would raise enough revenue to pay interest on the
>national debt is laughable, and anyone with an ounce of economic sense knows
>that treasury notes, bills, and bonds become worthless if the government
>stops paying interest on the debt.

Then I suggest we repudiate the debt.  Most of the money that was handed
out was done so through fraud.  Our Congressman KNOW that they can't keep
spending at an ever increasing rate, and I'd say it is high time we undid
the damage they've done.

>The government has never gone bankrupt before and defaulted on the national 
>debt (which answers your question), at least not since the Revolutionary War. 
>Why hasn't the country defaulted on the national debt before?  (1) The Poll 
>Tax was never the sole nor the main source of revenue for the government.
>(2)  We have never had a $3.5 Trillion national debt before.

1). Of course not.
2). It's now $4T.  Are you getting interested in reform yet?

>Even if you accepted the notion that Americans would be willing to return to
>the past, and forgetting for the moment that conditions in the country are
>quite different from what they once were, the new political system you propose 
>we all adopt does not resemble anything from the past.

1). The conditions are very much the same.
2). It actually does.

Prior to the 16th Amendment, the government was kept small because it didn't
have the power to tax the shit out of us.  Various use taxes, such as canal
fees and poll taxes, paid for all of government.  WE DON'T NEED ALL THE
GOVERNMENT WE ARE PAYING FOR SO WE SHOULD STOP PAYING FOR IT.

Maybe a Poll Tax is the dumbest idea every dreamt up, and being USENET that
is probably pretty close to the truth.  But the simple reality is that the
current system is only going to keep the politicians in power in a position
where they can waste trillions of dollars and have you and I pay for it.  If
we can get back to a system of use taxes for specific services (that is, if
you want to be eligible for welfare, you pay a fee that lets you collect
welfare).  Fred will jump up and down about "externalities", but I suggest
he start finding ways to turn these "externalities" into something that can
be presented as a "use tax."
-- 
John F. Haugh II           [  TSAKC  ]       UUCP: ...!cs.utexas.edu!rpp386!jfh
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Newsgroups: alt.politics.clinton