OH, IT'S TAX DAY – AT 9:16 A.M. ET:  Taxes are due today.  Taxes will also be a major issue in this year's midterm elections.

No one likes taxes, but people are willing to pay them, within reason, if they feel they're getting value.  One reason for the tea party movement's success is the feeling that 1) governments, especially in Washington, abuse us by spending too much generally and 2) we don't get the result that's promised.

Our side has to be careful.  Taxes are necessary to provide the services we demand.  We can't just blindly be "anti-tax." But when you see the waste, the obscene pensions paid to public employees at the state level, the fact that the average public employee today earns more than his or her counterpart in the private sector, the enormity of the fat in education and social-service budgets that produce marginal results, you can understand the anger.

A rational, mature tax revolt begins with an assessment of what we want from government, and how it can be delivered at the lowest possible cost.  You can't scream "law and order" and then say you don't want to pay for the police.  At the same time, you can demand efficiency and sane staffing levels. 

We have a right to know where every tax dollar goes.  That means taking on the sacred cows, like universities, which demand the money, then get very haughty if the public wants to know what it's being used for.   And yes, it includes the Pentagon, where procurement practices can border on the bizarre. 

One of the things that outrages taxpayers the most is when their taxes go to establish and preserve a class dependent on the government – a built-in voting bloc for one of our parties.   And they're outraged when they find out that 47% of Americans pay no taxes at all.  That is a dependent class.  It's been pointed out that when you rob Peter to pay Paul, Paul will vote for you.

There is now serious talk of vastly increased taxes to pay for the profligacy of our federal government, and the fact that the ruling party is made up of constituencies, who, like organized-crime mobs, demand their cut of the action and piece of the turf.  The most serious talk revolves around VAT, the so-called value added tax, favored by wealthy social schemers like Nancy Pelosi, who won't even feel it.  Reject the VAT.  It will take trillions out of the private sector and will never be used to reduce the national debt.  It will be used for new social programs ordered up by the Democrats.  See the Wall Street Journal's piece on the impact of VAT in Europe. 

So let us demand lower taxes and greater efficiency.  Let us demand that any new tax be used exclusively to pay down the national debt and remove the yearly deficit.  Let us demand an across-the-board cut in government spending.  Let us bring public pensions in line with sanity.  But let us do these things carefully, presenting to the American people a rational, convincing plan, not just a placard waved in the wind.

April 15, 2010