alajac

The People's Republic of America?

If you are a fan of Tom Paine, you might be interested in the following atempt to reconcile Paine`s ``Agrarian Justice`` (in which he made the original proposal for a `social security` system) with libertarianism and suggest a way to perhaps get ``Joe 6Pack`` to get behind voluntarianism, as well as END

the Federal Reserve System,
income taxes,
poverty,
war,
and most crime within our lifetimes.

(comments and critique appreciated on the whole shebang or any part thereof. Note - certain puctuation keys on my laptop are suffering from `sodapopitis`. please excuse the workarounds.)

Two axioms

1. Everyone owns whatever property that they claim and that they are willing and able to defend.

2. Whoever claims and is willing and able to defend that property is the sole and only government of that property.

Thus, Crusoe Island belonged to Crusoe only as long as no one came along and took it from him.

Thus, North America wound up belonging to the more numerous and more lethal Europeans.

On this planet at this time, a few governments own everything within their stated boundaries and divide up the rest of the property of the world as they wish, choosing when and where they wish to defend their claims.

Humans banded together in order to be able to claim and defend larger amounts of property, giving up actual ownership of all of the property they had previously claimed (including ownership of their own labor and bodies, as well as that of their children) in exchange for the protection and OTHER BENEFITS that a larger, more lethal government afforded. Those that were slower to band together were attacked by larger, more lethal governments and were either killed or became the larger government`s property involuntarily.

Therefore, all governments are comprised of all the people (or descendants of those people) who have (willingly or unwillingly) given their lives and their property to the government, regardless of whether or not the form of government gives them any voice concerning how that government operates. If the people (or some part thereof) who comprise the current government become dissatisfied enough with how their government operates, then they will change it (and not until). In other words, you are going to have trouble getting a revolution started as long as the trash gets picked up on time.

As seen from the above, we need to (legally) realize that the U.S. federal government owns ALL of the nation`s real estate. This fact is quite obvious when you think about it - try not paying the government its `rent` - aka property taxes - for a while and see how long it stays `your` property`. Your `title` gives you only exclusive `right of use` until the government decides that it needs the property back. A `right` that must be enshrined in a constitution is a legal right, not a `natural` right. A `natural right` is one that requires no defense or revolution or constitution or law for its enforcement. For example, `gravity` is the `natural law` that gives you the `natural right` to not float off into space and thus to have a chance to live. Any right not supported by `natural law` is merely a legal right and depends for its continuance (in `Magna Carta terms`) on `keeping the government`s head on the chopping block`.

It then follows that the U.S. government has (by privatizing all the land), denied everyone free access to all of its land and all other property that it claims. and, upon further inspection, we find that the government has not compensated anyone (much less everyone) for that `taking`. The government is not naturally required to make such compensation, and I am aware of none who have paid such compensation (the equi-dollar distribution of a percentage of oil royalties in some countries can be considered as `partial compensation`), but, as `We, the People` ARE the government in these United States, we can have Congress legally pay to ourselves `Adequate and Equal Just Compensation`, compensation which can fuctionally replace ALL forms of personal and corporate welfare and subsidies and boondoggles, including Federal Minimum Wage laws and a phase-out of Social Security.

As a starting point, $1000 per month (of new, non-Federal-Reserve, non-Debt-Money, see below for description and argument concerning) could be paid to every legal adult resident (compensation of minors should, of course, be held in trust to avoid incentivizing `baby factories`).

Since everyone gets the same amount, the plan is not wealth redistributive, but will (in a ``Rawlsian Justice`` manner) give the poorest the biggest advantage (in terms of monthly increase of wealth, percentage-wise) and a better chance to `catch up` than the current totally regressive system that keeps the rich getting relatively richer, through good times and bad. Someone right out of school should not be paying a greater percentage of their wealth in taxes than, say, a `Bill Gates`, but that is exactly the case under the current tax laws.

Regarding the currency we use, Federal Reserve money is privately-owned, which is why we have to borrow to get more of it to give to the bankrupt banks (the ones that have lost all or most of the Fed-borrowed money that we had entrusted to their fine care), the same banks that own the Fed in the first place. In other words, we are creating public debt in order to give the banks a greater percentage of what they already own. We`re like ``a growing kid that has to take out a loan in order to buy more blood every time we have a little growth spurt``.

We need to get rid of the Fed`s debt-money and replace it with our own debt-free fiat currency, backed by the value of all of the real estate in the country (real estate which is, as demonstrated above, factually owned by the U.S. government).

(Note - There should be no problem with the simultaneous use of other currencies, Fed money or gold included, but the ``even distribution`` of our own, debt-free fiat currency (having the least actual value and the greatest actual utility) will probably drive out the use of any other form of money before too long. Even today, anyone can use gold for transactions if they so desire. The good thing about having our own currency is that we will always know how much of it is extant, know that there won`t ever be a `shortage` (caused by hoarding) that leads to deflation, know that banks can`t print up billions of extra dollars to give to themselves (as the Fed has recently been doing), and know that we are not creating any public or private debt as we require more currency to facilitate trade.)

We also need the government to end its legal support of the Fed`s fractional-reserve Ponzi scheme. If people want to risk their money in banks that gamble with less than 100% reserves, then they should be willing to take their losses without any hope of government bailout.

Regarding taxes, non-comsumptive taxes should be transparent and avoidable (and thus arguably voluntarily-paid). The only unavoidable tax should be the one which we can`t avoid, the natural tax of purchasing power caused by the printing of more fiat money (which taxes everyone transparently and equally according to their respective wealth, in terms of currency holdings). Since everyone is taxed by the same percentage on however much of the currency they possess, there is no wealth redistribution inherent in such a tax.

In place of ALL income taxes, we should have a small and avoidable (by the use of cash) debit tax on all electronic debit transactions (1/2 percent or less will be sufficient) in order to begin paying off the national debt and to fund government programs (programs which will be pared down substantially under any Congress that puts this plan into effect). As this debit tax is imposed on everyone equally (as all taxes and benefits and laws should be) there is no wealth redistribution inherent in such a tax. Let the market do its thing. Get rid of all income taxes. No more IRS, no more tax filing at all, no more chasing businesses offshore with tax craziness.

Regarding Healthcare, we need to get the AMA and FDA to quit restraining supply and get thousands more doctors and other healthcare professionals trained up and get access to WHATEVER drugs adults want (from whatever source those adults decide thay want to obtain them) so that the market can get the price of normal medical help and pharmacology back into an affordable range paid out-of-pocket. (Cuba has 4 times as many doctors as we do per capita and medical treatment down there is DIRT cheap.) If there is going to be any `universal` insurance it should only be for major medical after, say, $2000 has been spent out-of-pocket. (``But, what about the poor?`` Remember, every `poor` adult is getting $1000 a month and they can work as much as they want on top of that with no penalty...there will no longer be any `poor`. A heck of a lot less crime, also, and, once we take this global, by annexing foreign states as we did The Republic of Texas, no more wars, because everybody will have a vested interest in everyone else - including the US government - doing well.)

(Also, if we had 3 or 4 times as many dentists as well, dental offices could stay open around the clock and dental care would also become affordable for all, out-of-pocket.)

If we want to get the US to kick its `crude (oil) habit`, we could have Congress add on a 10% surcharge at the gas pump (bumping it up another 10% every six months) and rebate it in monthly equi-dollar amounts to every registered car OWNER, regardless of how much or little they drive. That causes the biggest oil consumers to subsidize everyone else with no BOTTOMLINE cost to taxpayers. Cheaper alternatives will become apparent and people will use them with no direction from the government needed.

A system that rewards intransigience, gambling and stupidity seems to me to be the main problem. As Emerson (not Jefferson) said,``The government is best which governs least``. How great would it be to have a government that governs hardly at all except for the parts we set up to work `autonomically`?