by Kerry Thomas
October 26, 2007
Progressive. Democrats like to trumpet Wisconsin as a Progressive state. They’d have you believe the root of the term is progress. It isn’t.
Politically, Progressive comes from the Communist Manifesto,
the second plank of which calls for a heavy progressive income tax, whereby
those who earn more are taxed at a higher rate, such that wealth is
redistributed.
From each according to his means to each according to his
needs.
The first part of that statement is usually not met with
much protest from the masses. From each
according to his means. Those who have
less have less taken from them. Those
who have more have more taken from them.
Works out just fine, as long as you never aspire to have more.
It’s the second part of that statement that most people fail
to grasp. To each according to his needs. Under any government-run giveaway program,
such as government-run health care, you’re only “given” what you need. Not what you want; what you need.
Who determines what you need? Certainly not you. A government employee will determine what your needs are. You have no say in the matter.
The proponents of government-run health care have never
mastered the basic economic principle of supply and demand. When “the government” provides for free
health care, there is virtually unlimited demand. When you couple unlimited demand with a limited supply of
government services, the end result is rationing of services.
Proponents of Progressive government have this unnatural
need to “give” people things they couldn’t possibly provide for
themselves. Free education. Free health care. Free retirement income.
Free meals.
Somewhere along the way, we seem to have forgotten the maxim
that there is no such thing as a free lunch.
No politician can “give” you anything they haven’t first
taken from someone else, by force of law.
There is a fundamental difference between coerced taxation and
redistribution, and benevolent free will charity.
Paying higher taxes to government, so that progressive
politicians can spend your money for their favorite pet giveaway program, is
just another step down the slippery slope away from liberty, toward
bondage. If you’re doing it “for the
children,” you’re condemning future generations to lives of government
servitude, unable to pursue their own dreams.
From each according to his means to each according to his
needs doesn’t just apply to material goods.
It also applies to your Liberty.
When this political ideology is imposed upon a free people, those who
cherish freedom are the first to suffer the consequences imposed by a police
state.
None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely
believe they are free.