Tax Day

Today is the deadline for filing US income tax forms.

One of the most telling scenes from the Tom Clancy novel where he had Jack Ryan as the new President was where Ryan's Secretary of the Treasury had the ENTIRE FEDERAL TAX CODE brought before the Congressional committees that oversee such things. The pile of books and documents was so massive that it destroyed the table, before they even got it all on there. Given Clancy's penchant for exhaustive research, I have no doubt that this is an accurate representation of the sheer verbiage regarding taxation and revenue to be found in the Federal Register.

It is not possible for the tax code to be so vast without those corrupt politicians who are drawn to the power that legislators wield inserting laws and regulations that favor themselves and those who contribute to their coffers.

It really needs to be scrapped, and completely. I doubt very much that the people in Congress will let the power cravings which drew them into that job be thwarted in that manner. I understand more and more why Claire Wolfe believes that it is too late to save our current system, though I must agree when she says it is too early to start shooting the bastards.

I also understand why the Catholic Church has never regarded democracy as much of a friend to the people. Democracy led to anti-Catholic purges in The Vendee. Democracy isn't much of a friend to the Catholic Church now, except perhaps in Poland, Malta, and to some degree in Ireland.

There is no reliable guarantor of liberty in an amoral society.