If citizens actually had free choice in which government programs to fund as well as how much to contribute, the size of the US government (measured both in revenue and power over the people) would be 1/10 the size of today's utter monstrosity.
And if citizens literally had to cut a check at the beginning of every year, rather than pay through deliberately-obfuscated systems designed to hide the true cost of government, the size of government would be cut again by 90%.
by Anonymous Coward writes:
on Thursday July 28, 2011 @02:13PM (#36911254)
If the federal government restricted its activities to those areas where the Constitution explicitly grants it authority, rather than the current "If the Constitution doesn't say we can't, then we can, and if we can build a chain of reasoning, however tortured, to either weasel something into an enumerated authority or weasel around a specific prohibition, we can anyway" that resulted in things like Wickard v. Filburn and being required by law to obtain health insurance, the federal goverment would be significantly smaller, considerably less intrusive, and require enormously fewer tax revenues.
If the Congress restricted itself to what the Constitution explicitly grants it, there would be no debt ceiling to raise. Congress has the authority to appropriate money, not to refuse to pay the bills for the things they already spent it on. In fact the 14th amendment specifically says that U.S. debt should never be called into question, which is why dubya should have been censured for his Social Security "IOU" stunt.
But then, when the Constitution doesn't agree with the Teabagger line it can be convenie
Well ... (Score:5, Funny)
Easy enough (Score:0, Insightful)
If citizens actually had free choice in which government programs to fund as well as how much to contribute, the size of the US government (measured both in revenue and power over the people) would be 1/10 the size of today's utter monstrosity.
And if citizens literally had to cut a check at the beginning of every year, rather than pay through deliberately-obfuscated systems designed to hide the true cost of government, the size of government would be cut again by 90%.
Too bad government isn't voluntary, or t
Re:Easy enough (Score:0)
If the federal government restricted its activities to those areas where the Constitution explicitly grants it authority, rather than the current "If the Constitution doesn't say we can't, then we can, and if we can build a chain of reasoning, however tortured, to either weasel something into an enumerated authority or weasel around a specific prohibition, we can anyway" that resulted in things like Wickard v. Filburn and being required by law to obtain health insurance, the federal goverment would be significantly smaller, considerably less intrusive, and require enormously fewer tax revenues.
Re: (Score:2)
If the Congress restricted itself to what the Constitution explicitly grants it, there would be no debt ceiling to raise. Congress has the authority to appropriate money, not to refuse to pay the bills for the things they already spent it on. In fact the 14th amendment specifically says that U.S. debt should never be called into question, which is why dubya should have been censured for his Social Security "IOU" stunt.
But then, when the Constitution doesn't agree with the Teabagger line it can be convenie