Republicans claim to oppose high taxes, but they vote for more Big Government — and higher taxes. The latest case in point is a U.S. Senate vote to pass an Internet sales tax bill that would force online retail outlets to start collecting taxes on behalf of state governments.
A majority of Republicans in the U.S. Senate (26 yeas, 19 nays) voted for the massive tax hike, joining Democrats in making online purchases more expensive for consumers, harming small businesses, and fueling ever more wasteful government spending. This come less than three months after Republicans in Congress gave the nod to massive tax increases on New Year’s Day.
The bill will soon move on to the House.
If passed, this new tax will be one more power grab by Big Government Democrats and Republicans catering to special interests who want higher government spending, or who want to harm their competition. Many large chain retailers, rather than try to persuade lawmakers to cut all sales taxes, lobby them to jam taxes on their online competitors — their own customers be damned.
For more than 40 years, the Libertarian Party has been the only political party calling for bold reductions in taxation at every level, including repealing the income tax and abolishing the Internal Revenue Service. The LP platform specifically opposes “any legal requirements forcing employers to serve as tax collectors,” a mandate that Republicans and Democrats now hope to foist on hundreds of thousands of new online businesses.
Two-time LP presidential candidate Harry Browne pointed out that if Libertarians have a chance to slash Big Government, the massive levels of taxation we have today simply wouldn’t be needed.
“If we reduce government to its constitutional limits, there will be no need for a personal income tax, estate tax, gift tax, capital gains tax, Social Security (FICA) tax, or corporate income tax,” Browne wrote in his book The Great Libertarian Offer. “And there will be no need to replace these taxes with a flat tax or a sales tax — or to increase the other taxes the federal government collects now.”
He continued, “Your children will pay no more federal income tax, and your grandchildren will never carry the tax burden you’ve had to endure. Imagine how much better their lives will be.”
Republicans and Democrats won’t even put the brakes on runaway government growth, let alone cut Big Government to its constitutional limits. By voting Libertarian, this juggernaut of taxing, spending, and regulation can finally be stopped.
In the November 2012 election, South Carolina LP candidate Jeremy Walters won 47 percent of the vote in his race for a state House seat, running on a platform of ending the state income tax. Near-victories like this demonstrate how much difference the Libertarian Party can make if everybody who identifies with libertarian ideas actually votes Libertarian.
Join the Libertarian Party today, and find out what you can do to help cut taxes.
