How Freedom Was Lost

Today even private universities and tenured faculty have lost pieces of their independence.  There are subjects that cannot be investigated and opinions that cannot be expressed.  We can rationalize the inhibitions by saying that they are proper subjects for censorship.  However, once the process of suppressing thought and speech begins, it spreads.

The Tax Foundation has calculated that tax freedom day arrives on May 29 this year if the federal government’s budget deficit is included, as it should be, in the tax burden. That means that Americans work 42 percent of the year for the government, a higher tax rate than was endured by medieval serfs and one approaching  that of a nineteenth century slave.

In the nineteenth century, there were “underground railways” that slaves could use to escape to freedom.  In our time, “underground railways” are known as “tax havens.”  Just as slave owners sought to abolish “underground railways,” our owners today seek to outlaw “tax havens.”

Some Americans will reject these analogies.  They can test the validity of the analogies by refusing the government’s claim on their labor.  Perhaps the best evidence of American serfdom is that most Americans do not even have the ability to test the validity of the analogy, because the government takes its share in withholding tax before wages and salaries are paid to us serfs.

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