Sunday, September 26, 2010

Left2Right: Anderson on Political Economy

Tea Baggers like to argue, vociferously, that government taxation is somehow an unjust and immoral taking of their private property.

To them, their private incomes & property are theirs (and theirs alone!).  In their eyes, liberals must believe that the government must own all the property to begin with, and could by rights confiscate it from its [apparently temporary] possessors. (Gasp! The dreaded spectre of socialism or communism - i.e., the state owning all the means of production -is raising it's ugly head again! Quick... where's Joe McCarthy when you need him?)

No wonder they hate us so much?

What a bunch of hogwash.  Turd-polishing at it's finest!

In the linked article below, Elizabeth Anderson, Arthur F. Thurnau Professor and John Rawls Collegiate Professor of Philosophy and Women's Studies at the University of Michigan, demolishes the espoused underpinnings of Tea Baggers' logical & philosophical objections to taxation.  Anderson treats us to a detailed examination, among other things, of John Locke's Second Treatise of Goverment,  which the far right is wont to recite when it suits their purpose. 

No wonder Tea Baggers hate intellectuals so much?

Left2Right: Anderson on Political Economy: "- Sent using Google Toolbar"

1 comment:

  1. Bottom line:

    We are either all in this together, or we are all on our own.

    No man's right to private property or to accumulate wealth is just cause for beggaring another. Indeed, the wealthy, by virtue of their citizenship & membership in society, are morally obligated to help provide for the support of the poor, lest we degenerate as a country into feudalism.

    Moreover, it is in their self-interest to do so: the wealthy have the most to lose if we allow ourselves to regress to that point.

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