If you own a mutual fund in your IRA, check and see what companies it invest in. Chances are very good it has substantial holdings in oil and gas companies.

If you are part by an employee retirement fund, check and see where the money in that retirement fund is invested. Chances are very good it has substantial holdings in oil and gas companies.

The vast majority of profits from oil companies are returned to shareholders. That’s you and me, though our IRAs and employee retirement funds.

So this is a direct attack on you and me, lead by the Democrat Party.

So taxation is theft? I guess the Constitution is illegitimate in your eyes.

Taxes=theft
It’s not that difficult a concept, even if you chose to use the words “confiscate” or “redistribute.” Since government can enforce their laws with the barrel of a gun, they get to chose what they wish to call it.
In this instance, the constitution doesn’t give cover to the sleazoids that wish to say some are making “excessive profits.” It is theft, pure and simple, and I seriously doubt they could ever get this attempt of theft past the Supremes.

If they do, then they should add the other people Robbie mentioned to the list of those to be robbed, as well as those making excessive profits from the sale of their books, like B-HO.

The market place will always settle this, as well as stockholders. Government only screws things up which they know nothing about. Hell, Congress can’t even run their own dining hall without massive government bail-outs, or hold on to your whitey-tighties, privatization.

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What are ‘excessive profits’ anyways? Certainly not the less than 10% the Oil companies made. Obama’s profits on his book are probably at least 99%.
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absurd thought -
God of the Universe says
profit is EVIL

try to make less money
so government won’t steal it

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Philosophy of Liberty Cartoon
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Help Halt Terrorism Today!
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USpace

Taxes=theft

After all of the bluster about flag pins it’s always illuminating when ‘conservatives’ reveal their true feelings about America. If you believe that “taxes = theft” then the US government is simply a crime syndicate facilitating that theft.

But..but..but..Preston, what about the constitution?

See, liberals never put their money where their mouths are, they just want to take other people’s money and use it for their precious socialist programs. In several states, a mail in program for those who thought we should be paying more taxes were initiated, and a paltry sum was collected. That would have been a “contribution,” but instead the leftists in this country believe that those who are the most productive and profitable, should be punished with confiscation of their earnings.

In the sense that government can enforce their laws at the barrel of a gun, with the threat of imprisonment, and that if a private citizen tried the same thing, then what else would you call it, but theft?

As for much of government functions, most people, me included recognize the need for taxes, but openly calling for the confiscation of profits of corporations and individuals is criminal, especially when the criminals reveal what they wish to do with that money, and that is to redistribute it to pet projects.
Your feigned outrage is funny and unmoving, as you have demonstrated your perverse interpretations of the constitution many times, as well as your socialist leanings.

Democrats Are Lawyers Litigating Politics.

When politicians as lawyers begin to view some Americans as clients and other Americans as opposing parties, then the role of the legal system in our life becomes all-consuming.

Some Americans become “adverse parties” of our very government.

We are not all litigants in some vast social class-action suit. We are citizens of a republic that promises us a great deal of freedom from laws, from courts, and from lawyers.

Very well said, very well spoken.

In the sense that government can enforce their laws at the barrel of a gun, with the threat of imprisonment, and that if a private citizen tried the same thing, then what else would you call it, but theft?

And you consider yourself patriotic? You love this country that robbing you at the barrel of a gun? It sounds like you may simply suffer from Stockholm Syndrome.

So, no, I don’t call it theft. I consider it a right and responsibility that “We the People” accept in order to reap the benefits of that “More Perfect Union”.

I’m starting to see why there is such a strong strain for Confederate fetishization among conservatives. They too don’t want to be a part of this country.

Yes I am a patriot. I don’t give the actions of the government a pass when they pervert the constitution to confiscate the profits of a legitimate business. I’ve actually taken an oath to defend and protect the U.S. Constitution, several times. Have you ever, even once?

Paying taxes is a right? No, it’s a requirement and a responsibility. Only a total liberal ideologue would try and spin it to becoming a right…quite possibly the most absurd description of a confiscatory practice I have ever heard.

For this patriot, I believe taxes need to be raised to defend our shores, build and maintain our highways, regulate commerce, deliver the mail, and stay the fuck out of our way.

Your acceptance and approval of the confiscation of profits, that some have labeled “excessive,” gives me an insight into just how Marxist you truly are. No wonder you have a crush on B-HO, as the dream of his father was a 100% tax on the wealthiest people in Kenya. Your shared desire to punish the most productive corporations and individuals in this country, is based on envy and insecurity, not on the constitution, or the common good. For liberals like you, who believe in equality of outcomes, what you are really saying is you wish to have equality of misery, rather than allow those who are smarter, work harder, or are blessed with some good fortune, to be rewarded.

As for taxes, I believe it is MY money, not the governments, but am willing to pay the minimum amount of taxes needed to keep government functioning. I don’t believe a 3.1trillion dollar budget is the minimum, and I certainly don’t believe confiscating the targeted earnings of legitimate businesses is anything other than criminal.

Sounds to me like you suffer from Un-Americanism.

This article sums it up quite nicely.
The End Of A Free Republic.

The inherent and unalienable right of every individual to freely determine their own destiny is at the root of self-governance. Every initiative that intrudes, impedes or attempts to circumvent and alienate this fundamental set of rights is a direct affront on freedom and liberty.

Yet this is exactly what today’s Democrats have chosen. They have bought into the ideas of Marx, Lenin and Stalin, that the “greater communal good” of the working class (proletariat) trumps individual freedom and liberty. Individuals have neither the right to fail or succeed.

Well, in your attempt to defend the indefensible you’ve apparently accused me of any number of things that I haven’t said on this thread. My point is simply that you have essentially accused the founding fathers of being the original mafia in this country- a reckless and ungrateful abdication of your responsibilities as a citizen. All of your hedging about whatever you think is the proper use of tax revenue is irrelevant if at the root of it all is theft- money for national defense or 100 dollar bills used to light the cigars of the Congressmen’s call girls- it’s all the same if the money was wrongfully gained as you claim.

Henh…Preston, if you weren’t so damned weird-funny, I would put you in scroll mode.

In essence, I have done none of what you claim, and have expressed my opinion and the basis for it, quite clearly. You have done so, as well, by truly defending the indefensible of the lefts desire to create the illusion of “excessive profits” as a pretense for theft.

Yeah, I believe taxation is basically theft, with the exceptions I have mentioned, and my willingness to fund the basic functions of government, not the redistribution of wealth. I further believe the income tax is wrong, and it’s no one’s business how much money anyone makes. We should be taxed on what we consume, not on what we earn.

I’m a huge fan of the founding fathers, whose wisdom is lost on the left in this country.

Jefferson said, “I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them.”- “The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not.”

Taxes should be continued by annual or biennial reeactments, because a constant hold, by the nation, of the strings of the public purse is a salutary restraint from which an honest government ought not wish, nor a corrupt one to be permitted, to be free.
Thomas Jefferson, letter to John Wayles Eppes, June 24, 1813

To take from one, because it is thought his own industry and that of his fathers has acquired too much, in order to spare to others, who, or whose fathers, have not exercised equal industry and skill, is to violate arbitrarily the first principle of association, the guarantee to everyone the free exercise of his industry and the fruits acquired by it.
Thomas Jefferson, letter to Joseph Milligan, April 6, 1816

[A] wise and frugal government… shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government.

Thomas Jefferson, First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1801

Would it not be better to simplify the system of taxation rather than to spread it over such a variety of subjects and pass through so many new hands.
Thomas Jefferson, 1784

Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master.
George Washington

The basis of our political system is the right of the people to make and to alter their constitutions of government.
George Washington

It may be laid down as a primary position, and the basis of our system, that every Citizen who enjoys the protection of a Free Government, owes not only a proportion of his property, but even of his personal services to the defense of it.
George Washington

Tax isn’t theft IMO as long as it is universally applied (per the constitution). That was the problem with the original (oil) Windfall Profits Tax in the 80s. It was only on certain oil produced—that’s the reason it was technically an EXCISE tax, not an income tax……
Trying to implement social engineering via tax legislation is one reason I’m glad my 30 year career in taxation is over…..