Can you say same old, same old? Tired tax recommendations from the dark side
Tuesday, January 13, 2009 at 16:07 Flipping my way through the ever shrinking Reno Gazette-Journal this morning ( is the RG-J on its’ way through the ‘Looking Glass’?) , I eagerly scanned the state budget article, “Differing solutions offered” for the straight scoop from the Nevada Policy Research Institute.
According to NPRI spokesman, Andy Matthews, “The problem with Nevada is not a revenue problem at all. It’s a spending problem.” Hmmm. That seems to fly straight in the face of the, uh, numbers. But I cut ‘em some slack and read on.
Among the suggestions for wringing further effeciencies out of the system, NPRI recommends privatization of unemployment insurance system, abandoning school class size reduction efforts, increasing charter schools and creating private toll roads.
This NPRI herd has left so many steaming piles of stupid here, it’s hard to know where to start shoveling.
The bottom line seems to be, however, let’s privatize everything. Oh, please - that dog never did hunt. If these people had their way, we’d take everything private, have absolutely no government, no military, no public roads, no public school system, nothing, nada that was answerable to ‘we the people’ rather than the bottom line.
From my own simple observations of how privatization has ‘worked’ in Iraq, it’s been an abysmal failure with money literally thrown everywhere with zero accountibility, independent ‘contractors’ shooting civilians and mercenaries making five figure incomes standing next to G.I Joe who’ll be lucky to get some stateside PTSD counseling or a prosthesis for risking his life. Every building project the private contractors have been involved in was over budget and not even close to completion. If that’s effeciency, we’ve really lowered the bar.
Isn’t it time for folks to grow up and realize that taxes are, in the words of Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, the price we pay for living in a civilized society.
They are a fact. And, when properly structured and wisely administered, they work fairly and promote the very social and economic progress that we all benefit from.
It seems to me that America became the greatest country in the world with a - gasp! - public education system supported by tax dollars. Our highway system is the best in the world, having been a national, tax-dollars project. Anybody can point to any number of successful endeavors that have benefited many, which were tax dollar supported.
Nevada ranks 50th in expenditures for public elementary and secondary education and ranks 47th in the percentage of students able to read above a basic 4th grade reading level - so, to fix that, NPRI would have us slash spending for education, increase class sizes and hand the school system over to ‘charter schools’ ( schools for profit). Show me anywhere that works. They can’t.
I guess there will always be those in any society that don’t feel the need to pay their fair share, using semantic smoke and mirrors to deflect unwanted attention from their real agendas - privatize it and get the contract for your crony friends. They make this look good by calling those who want a fair and democratic system “liberal”. Oooooooh, scary liberal boogey man.
Better yet, they get the media doing it for them as the Reno Gazette-Journal reporter, Anjeanette Damon did when referring to “the liberal Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada.”Apparently, Damon doesn’t understand the difference between liberal and progressive, and thinks PLAN doesn’t either. But I digress.
Look - the ‘no taxation’ crowd has been inching ever closer to this privatized la-la land for the last 30 years. This isn’t news. And if they want us to believe it’s working, then just look around at the sorry state of just about every institution we have. It’s broken. As Dr. Phil would say: “how’s that been workin’ for ya?”
It’ll just take ten minutes for people who are genuinely concerned about the future of this state, to look past the hyperbole of NPRI’s ‘no taxes’ mantra and explore what a real, mature taxation plan looks like.
Make the effort.
Please.
maven
Reader Comments (1)
Haven't read through the entire NPRI report ... but it certainly seems to completely miss the magnitude of the budget crisis we're facing.
Privatizing unemployment and creating charter schools only saves the state (taxpayers) the administrative costs ... which run, what 7%? 10%? You can't get rid of the $1 BILLION hole by cutting these tiny amounts.
At least the PLAN proposal addresses the entire problem we face.