Well in contrast, if the system of lowering taxes for the past 50 years has not worked, then why don’t we try another way? The graphs that are shown on .gov about the debt to income ratio clearly show that the debt to income ratio was declining until 1980 which is incidentally when the first Reagan tax cuts occurred. I have no interest in the Eat the Rich movement. It just doesn’t make sense to me why if we are in the dire situation that we wouldn’t use every tool available to us. That means cutting spending and increasing taxes.
I totally understand your sentiment about the East, Midwest, and South. I understand how they think from firsthand experience. If I didn’t have public land, or had minimal levels of public land that were overrun by people, I wouldn’t support it either.
So to be devils advocate, if these programs were to be cut, would people here support putting that money into the states to make up for what we are losing if they are to be removed? I truly believe that these types of programs have a massive impact on ungulate conservation. I think we all (on this forum) can agree that is something we want to continue funding,
Non-enumerated powers of the federal government need to be handed back to the states ASAP as the founders intended. Read the Federalist Papers from the late 1780s and you'll think Jay, Hamilton, and Madison had crystal balls.
States and counties can/should fund what their citizens deem important.
How do they deem what's important? Vote on single item levies/referendums ANNUALLY to ask if the citizens are willing to pay for them. If they aren't willing...they don't get funded.
Compare that to the legalized extortion model that's existed since 1913:
To secure funding for a local project, or shiny new alphabet agency, your rep/senator 2000 miles away in DC needs to convince other reps/senators and their lobbyist handlers on whatever committee they sit on to direct money from a general or vaguely earmarked fund that millions of taxpayers pay into under the threat of arrest (majority of which who dgaf about the project). They do this in exchange for agreeing to support other projects that their own electorate dgaf about down the road, many of which get shoved into a bill with dozens of other non related items that the same electorate WOULD NEVER support.
People call it politics, I call it extortion, robbery, etc. Folks argue against the simplified model claiming wide swaths of the nation would be left forgotten and destitute...these people need to go for a road-trip.
Libertarian rant on Rokslide wasn't on my Resurrection Day bingo card, but it's a hill worth dying on
