Wednesday, July 26, 2006

The Election

I mentioned on Monday that I had distributed some reminder cards on Saturday for a friend running for the Oklahoma House in yesterday's Democratic primary. I am happy to report that Dana won.

Interestingly, her primary opponent mailed a flier late last week which claimed that Dana supported "any tax increases at any level of government (including hidden taxes, such as non-dedicated fees and deficit spending)", citing this survey.

Note that the survey question was "Do you support any tax increases at any level of government (including hidden taxes, such as non-dedicated fees and deficit spending)?"  The gist of the question is whether the candidate supports taxes, period; seeing as Libertarians oppose taxation in any form, the answer they are looking for is a simple "no." According to the posted survey results, this is the "Pro-Liberty" response.

I suspect Dana's Republican opponent will quote the accusation that she is a "tax-and-spend" liberal. I'll note that the primary difference between Republicans and Libertarians is that Libertarians are more philosophically consistent.

Somehow, the voting public has forgotten the connection between taxes and services. The equation is strikingly simple: to maintain a balanced budget, cutting taxes requires cutting services.

We would not expect to receive a service in the private sector for free. That's how the economy operates in a capitalist system. Most people understand that, at least at a very basic level.

The question then becomes: what services the Republicans have cut, or will cut, to keep taxes low. On a national level, the Republicans have cut programs such as Head Start; programs that benefit the poorest sector of our population. Meanwhile, farm subsidies are still paid to conglomerates. This same trend is reflected, to only a slightly lesser degree, on the local level.


Ideally, a representative's job is to see that their constituents get the best bang for their buck. Is the money supporting services that benefit people in her district? Is it being used in the most efficient way possible? Are there appropriate accounting measures and checks on how it is spent?

The job of a well-informed electorate is to monitor whether their representatives are putting the pooled resources (taxes) to the best use, in the best way feasible.

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