Tax Policy: Principle Will Always Trump Fanciful Ideology

Can you recite the U.S. Constitution's Preamble from memory?

I have taken off my robe;
How can I put it on again?
—Song of Solomon

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Fanciful is a fitting word describing those who advocate tax reform along lines blind to our government's purpose.




Democrats who claim the fiscal position of the United States was so much better during the presidency of Bill Clinton conveniently ignore coincidence that, the latter 1990s were a period midstream in the greatest credit bubble ever in history. Their current call to reduce spending and cut the deficit struggles to find parallel with the greater bulk of policy put in place by FDR — the last U.S. President to face a crisis as grave as ours presently. Greater commonality with President Herbert Hoover exists among Democrats in leadership positions today.

As for libertarians, these might better read the simple, single-sentence preamble to the U.S. Constitution and fathom how principles stated therein simply are not compatible with a flat tax. Most elementarily, the matter of "justice" is defied by a flat tax, putting "domestic tranquility" at risk of being compromised as a result of this. Then there are our government's mandates for providing the common defense and promoting the general Welfare whose cost simply will overwhelm any flat tax's capacity to provide revenue streams that do not prove burdensome to the majority of citizens.




If there is anyone who REALLY needs to read and understand the U.S. Constitution's Preamble, it is Larry Kudlow. Yet another scoundrel with time served in government (which is the last place where the likes of Kudlow ought find worthy employment).

Erica Payne makes sane sense arguing for the progressive tax system. Namely, certain activities can be encouraged while others are discouraged. How better might our government find means to honor those principles for which its existence alone is justified?

"We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."

—Tom Chechatka