All of the following articles are behind schedule. My plan was to post them by spring, 2003. These things take time to prepare and I work more than one job so time is limited. I will post them as soon as practical.
An Analysis of the Susan Hamill thesis (coming someday). Those in favor of changing the tax system in Alabama often mention this document. She raises some interesting points but her arguments are based on a faulty premise so the conclusions are suspect. Her primary analytic method is subset analysis - a select portion of something is analyzed in great detail to infer aggregate conclusions. On some issues she is correct and I point these out.
A Proposal for a Truly Fair and Rational Tax System (coming someday). This article skips populist opinion and gets right to the core. Governments need a certain amount of money but not more. The current tax system is carefully rigged to favor expansion of government with the taxpayer having little voice. The system I will propose takes that power away from government and restores it to the taxpayer. The results are stable and predictable budgets and a system that is impossible to be regressive. The downside is that both liberals and conservatives will hate it as each looses key features of the current system that are very dear to them in their power quest and in their quest to slant the tax system to enrich their wealthy constituents (and as a result, themselves too).
Return to Government OF the People (coming someday).What we have now in the United States is government TO the people. This article will discuss a proposal I had some years ago to significantly improve the way we elect representatives in what is supposed to be OUR government. Our democracy has shifted from power of the people to power of the political party. The DNC and RNC combined hold virtually all the power in our government. An individual can vote for the candidate of their choice as selected by one of these two groups .One can naively think that these two groups are in opposition to each other but the phrase, in cahoots, might be a more accurate description. An insane amount of money is spent on the election process and there are always methods around any kind of campaign finance reform. The agenda of the elected is manipulation of government to assist re-election. The system I propose involves a combination of election and random selection that takes politics out of government and renders money useless for political power. Political parties are rendered obsolete and the elected are free to work together to serve the interests of the people. Power is taken away from the parties and returned to the people. The system is remarkably easy to understand and automatically provides proportional representation of all groups of people. It should be noted that our current system provides special electoral assistance (such as gerrymandering, etc.) to favored groups while diminishing representation of un-favored groups -- this is called fair and legislatures fight hard to maintain and control this managed unfairness for the sake of democracy. Government is supposed to serve the people, not the political parties .The Constitution makes no mention of power and benefits to the political parties. Many people are horrified when I mention this new concept of selecting representatives the concern is that it is theoretically possible for a scoundrel to be elected. But that remote possibility is far better than the certainty we have now of electing a scoundrel. My system favors selecting a significant number of people who are truly qualified to work FOR the people. The political corruption of the present system makes it unlikely that qualified people will even attempt to hold office. Various special interest groups (a.k.a. groups that are in favor of democracy so long as they have absolute power) will be opposed to such a change. Individuals will have to change their thinking from The only important thing is for my party to win no matter what to What can my government do to serve me? The antiquated gladiator battle we call an election should relic of the past.