GeorgiaDon

Is clean air/water a right, a freedom, a benefit, or a privilege? Why do manufacturing industries, the auto industry, etc consistently oppose environmental regulations? Why am I forced to breath/drink their waste even if I choose not to buy their products? Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

When a group defines "freedom" essentially as being "good for corporations" then that shouldn't come as much of a surprise. There is definitely a hefty fiscal conservative bias to the rankings, which isn't surprising considering the source. Basically there seems to be an assumption that any government spending on anything is bad. For example, almost every one of the 30 "least free" states are criticized for spending too much on education, and also for requiring curriculum review and standardized testing for home-schooling. It seems clear that according to their metrics paying taxes to support public schools is a loss of freedom, but the increase in career opportunities and earning potential that follow from access to affordable decent education, for children from lower and middle income families that can't afford private school tuition, simply doesn't count. In their world view "freedom" simply means freedom from taxes, not freedom of career opportunities or social mobility. If you aren't already rich enough to afford $50,000/yr tuition at a private university (with room and board on top of that), well I guess changing bed pans at an assisted living facility is good enough for you! One could argue (and I would) that as a society we are better off when the most talented people can end up as engineers, doctors, accountants, etc, instead of limiting the pool of potential future professionals to the offspring of wealthy families, but in the calculus of the linked study there is no value assigned to such "benefits to society". Similarly, they ding states for expenditures on public health, hospitals, and even water treatment facilities. Perhaps this isn't surprising for an organization with a history of opposing limits to arsenic in drinking water, and mandatory rest periods for long-distance truckers. Basically, any regulation that imposes a burden on industry is to be opposed, regardless of the adverse consequences to the general public. On the other hand, the standards they applied seem to be quite socially liberal, marking states down for opposing same-sex unions and for draconian marijuana and "victimless crime" laws. Also they oppose elections for judges and are proponents of revising forfeiture laws to put the burden of proof on the government. Those are all positions I can agree with. Overall I'm not sure there is a clear-cut correlation between "free" and "not free" and R and D states. Several Southern states (for example Louisiana) are ranked very poorly despite being solidly Republican, and some fairly solid Democratic states (eg Oregon) are ranked at the high end of the "free" scale. There does seem to be an inverse correlation with average income, and it seems to me there may also be a loose correlation with the degree of urbanization. Basically states with large urban populations need a system of services and regulations to manage large numbers of people living in close association (so they are less free), whereas states that have large rural populations, where there is need for regulation and services as your actions as an individual (using your back yard as a toilet for example) are less likely to affect your neighbors. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

Why did that amuse you, Ron? Something that amuses me is the fact that all the supposed"rational thinkers " are blown out of the water by quantum physics. Salvador Dali may be correct. I believe he is. All Truth is within the stomach. Peace, Jim B. You seem to get it. Many here do not. It is very difficult to overcome formidable training. Colbert agrees with you! Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

I hope you have a great afternoon. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

That, I can relate to! OK. I didn't really expect a specific answer from you (though that might have been more interesting). I've just been trying to get you to acknowledge that there are a lot of "socialist" aspects to our culture, and that is not necessarily a bad thing. I think it's a tempting trap to believe that we succeed as individuals, and that America has been spectacularly successful, as a result of every individual person standing alone against the world, succeeding or failing solely on their own merits. In reality, humans have been successful as a species because we have an incredible capacity to work together towards common goals. If it was only each individual against everyone else in some winner-take-all struggle for survival, we wouldn't need the capacity for language, for example, any more than a hawk does. A better model is a balance between individual and collaborative efforts. The individuals who do best are the ones who are able to contribute to and benefit from collaborations, yet still take the initiative or go the extra mile to benefit their own interests. Individuals who only contribute to the social collaborations will survive, but never do better than "average". Individuals who refuse to participate in necessary collaborations such as defense of the group or food gathering will be perceived as parasites, and will be cast out to sink or swim on their own; mostly they end up as lion chow. Individuals who insist on doing everything on their own will generally not be competitive against groups of people working together. Think of the military service you are justifiably proud of: on average, how would one soldier acting alone without supply lines, military intelligence, and fellow soldiers to provide cover or backup fare against a well-organized platoon? Society is like that platoon: some things we do to cover one another, to increase the chance of us all succeeding, but that doesn't mean we aren't all individuals responsible for doing what is necessary to ensure our own survival. The question it is fair to debate is where is the optimal balance between collaborative and individual effort? It's disingenuous, and unproductive, to pretend that collaborative efforts are inherently bad and individual efforts are inherently good. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

Thank you. I assume you were just not aware of his service, which is understandable as he does not flaunt it. I do understand how you discriminate between VA benefits and other things. I am still curious if you have refused to accept medicare and social security, refuse to do business with anyone educated through the public school/state university systems, refuse to buy USDA certified foods, etc? When you go on your Patriot Riders missions, do you somehow try to avoid driving on taxpayer built roads? More pertinently, do you really believe that all these things are un-American bad ideas? Do you believe that America would be better off if there was no public school system, no publicly built roads and highways, no mechanism to ensure clean safe food and drugs? If we had to just rely on the good will of manufacturers to ensure they didn't pollute our water and air? Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

In other words, "don't try to convince me with facts, my mind's made up". I think your choice of the word "convicted" was quite ironic. I see you're refusing to withdraw your disrespecting of Dan's service to his country. Perhaps you can check out this thread to get an inkling of how far out of line you are. Hint: read post 13. I asked you already (as have Dan and jclalor in as many words): "I take it you have refused to partake of medicare and social security? Refuse to drive on the interstates? Refuse to hire or do business with anyone who was educated through the public school system or state universities? Refuse to buy food that has been inspected by the USDA? Refuse any medical treatment that is connected in any way to research funded through the NIH?" So have you renounced all those things, or are you just a hypocrite who likes to complain about "government intrusion" while enjoying the benefits of those "socialist programs" for yourself? Do you really believe public education, safe food, water, and air, public roads, medical research, air traffic control, the police, etc are all un-American bad ideas concocted by some evil "socialists"? Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

Do you have any suggestions as to how to affect reduced population size? The only factors I am aware of that do this in an acceptable manner (that is, outside of some terrible pandemic, war, or mass genocide) is the demographic transition, coupled with education of women. Demographic transition is the relationship between economic development and family size within a population. As overall wealth increases, family size tends to decrease. This reflects the fact that in underdeveloped economies children are an economic asset, as they can provide cheap labor (think planting/weeding/harvesting crops) and they can take care of the parents in old age. On the other hand in developed economies children are a net expense: they are rarely useful for labor (how many of us are sustainance farmers?), they cost a lot to feed and educate, and we have pension plans for old age. This is why Europe, for example, has negative population growth while sub-Saharan Africa still has 7+ kids/family. If economic development is key to population control, doesn't it make sense to invest in technologies that reduce the adverse environmental impact of that development? Sure you may be "better off with 100 million people on the planet getting around in coal-fired locomotives", compared to "10 billion people on this planet who are all living lives devoted to avoiding Global Warming", but short of selecting 99 out of every 100 people for summary execution, on the way to reduced (or at least stabilized) population levels we need to make sure that economic development doesn't just recapitulate the environmental disasters of the past on an even larger scale. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

You're saying that to Dan??? Seriously, is there no bottom to the ignorance you are willing to express?? Very few who post here have sacrificed more than Dan in the service of this country. You owe him a big apology. I take it you have refused to partake of medicare and social security? Refuse to drive on the interstates? Refuse to hire or do business with anyone who was educated through the public school system or state universities? Refuse to buy food that has been inspected by the USDA? Refuse any medical treatment that is connected in any way to research funded through the NIH? After all, those are all "socialist" programs. In fact, your postings indicate a complete and utter absence of any knowledge of the difference between "socialism" and "communism". Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

Fair enough I guess, but the presence of the link on the USPA web site does imply their endorsement of the product. Anyway, I was responding to Popsjumper, and I was just pointing out that it would be unwise to assume that an insurance plan was appropriate for skydivers just because it is linked to the USPA site. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

Well, Krisanne, following the links you'll find.... http://uspa-benefits.org/ Hey Andy, I followed the links to the health insurance plans, entered my info to get a quote, and look what I found under "exclusions" for all the plans listed: Any Injury that is caused by flight or travel in, or upon: 1. An aircraft or other, craft designed for navigation above or beyond the earth's atmosphere except as a fare‑paying passenger; 2. An ultra light, hang-gliding, parachuting or bungi-cord jumping; 3. A snowmobile; 4. Any two or three wheeled motor vehicle; 5. Any off-road motorized vehicle not requiring licensing as a motor vehicle; 6. Any watercraft or other craft designed for water use above or beneath the water, except as a fare-paying passenger; Seems odd (and rather pointless) for the USPA to have negotiated to provide health insurance that does not cover parachuting related injuries. The caps on payouts seem kind of ridiculous too, eg $1,000/surgical procedure, and $2,500/emergency room visit for one of the middle-of-the-road cost plans. I'm fortunate to have a group policy that does not exclude skydiving. I do think that if anyone needs to purchase an individual plan that provides reasonable protection against financial devastation in the event of a serious injury, they will be paying quite a lot. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

It's pretty simple, really. You have the right to not incriminate yourself, which means the right to invoke your fifth amendment rights and then shut the fuck up. You do not have the right to lie so as to deliberately misdirect investigators. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

Hi Adam, It's almost always the case that thieves will not have the resources to pay any reasonable restitution. For example, around here we are having trouble with thieves who do an incredible amount of damage to property to steal a few dollars worth of copper, which they sell at metal recyclers. It's not unusual to have tens of thousands of dollars in damage (torn out drywall, or destroyed air conditioning units) to yield less than $100 worth of copper wire. Perhaps you could force the thief to work at a wage-paying job until his debt is paid off, but then you would yourself, or through a proxy you would have to pay, have to make sure the thief does get a job, pay back the money, etc. Perhaps you would care to spend the rest of your days policing the bastard to make sure you got reimbursed, but I only have one life and I don't care to spend it following some thief around to make sure I get paid back. Who would contribute to such a "collection"? Why should one's access to justice be contingent on having a big enough circle of friends/family to be able to raise a big reward? How could you be assured that the suspect brought in by such a process is actually the guilty party, and not just some poor hapless schmuck nabbed off the street to cash in on the reward? This is exactly what the criminal justice system does. We "buy into" the system by paying taxes. I respectfully disagree with the voluntary part of your answer, though, for the following reasons. Everyone benefits from a system where criminals are at least somewhat dissuaded by the threat of being caught and punished. It's true we do still have criminals, but I think the problem would be much worse in the absence of any meaningful deterrent. Now if "buying in" was completely voluntary, several things would happen. First, a lot of people would not buy in, figuring they could just pay up later if and when they needed to access the system. This would shift the cost of creating and maintaining the system (police, courts, prisons) onto a smaller (possibly quite small) number of people, so the cost to them would be unsustainable and the system would degrade or collapse. Then when something did happen and the "cheaters" (those people who don't pay) try to retroactively buy in, the people who have been paying for the system have two unpleasant choices. They can let the cheater buy in, which just encourages everybody else to cheat too, further decreasing the pool of people willing to pay to maintain the system. Alternatively they can refuse to let the cheater in, which will likely result in no-one investigating the crime that was committed against the cheater. This creates a pool of victims for criminals to prey on, and supports the growth of a criminal element in the population. Ultimately the protective effect of having a generalized deterrent against a criminal livelihood will be lost. How do you define/measure "consume"? You might say only those people who are victims of crime are "consumers" of the benefits of the criminal justice system. I would argue that the more you have (material goods, investment wealth, even relationships with family and friends), the more you have to lose to criminal activity, and so the more you benefit by having the justice system keeping most people honest. Just as you pay more for fire insurance if your house is worth more than the average (and so you lose more if it burns down), you should pay taxes in proportion to what you have to potentially lose. Personally, I really do think of a lot of government services as insurance. I support the CDC because of the risk of disease outbreaks. I pay for the sewer system because I am familiar with the risks associated with contaminated water, and because I am sufficiently moral that I do not want to expose people who happen to live downstream to the risk of drinking my shit just so I can save a few dollars every month. I pay for the USDA so that I don't have to pay a lot more to get my food tested for E. coli before I dare feed it to my kids, and I pay for the FDA so I can have some confidence my pharmacist isn't selling me snake oil. I'd rather have an air traffic control system in place than trust pilots to figure out for themselves how to organize takeoffs and landings from busy airports. And so on... Now I can disagree with government spending priorities as much as anybody. I think prisons are full of people whose only crime is to themselves (most drug convictions), and I think we spend too much on the military. What I don't agree with is that people should be allowed to enjoy the benefits of life in an organized society, without paying a fair share of the cost for those benefits. I asked this question in another thread, and I'll ask it of you: What system can you propose that would allow people to opt out of paying taxes, at the cost of not being able to enjoy any benefit, in any manner whatsoever, of any government provided service. So if you want to drive somewhere, you have to buy land/pave the road/build bridges yourself, or only drive on privately constructed roads. No taxpayer funded interstate highways for you. If you run a business, you can't hire any people who were educated in the public schools or state colleges. If you get sick, you can't access any treatments or drugs that were based in any way on any knowledge that was gained through NIH grants or publicly funded research. And so on... How could you do it? How can you build a wall between yourself and each and every taxpayer funded (local, state, and federal) service? If you can't do that, why should you be allowed to benefit from those services and not pay a fair share to support them? Isn't taking something (services) and not paying for it theft? Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

How would this work (for one example) in relation to the criminal justice system? Let's say your house is burgled. Doesn't "pay for it yourself" mean that you are then faced with hiring some private agency to investigate, track down the perpetrator, and try to get your stuff back? After that, if you want the perp punished, do you pay out of pocket to hire the prosecutor, judge, etc; and if the perp is convicted, do you then have to pay the cost of incarcerating them? Of course you could skip some of that by abandoning your job, devoting yourself to tracking down the burglar, and then administering whatever punishment you feel appropriate. No need to worry about "constitutional rights", just the law of the jungle. Also better hope you're a good enough detective to be sure to get the right suspect. There are many things that virtually everybody needs that can be efficiently provided by working together cooperatively, and almost all of those things would be either prohibitively expensive or outright impossible for each person to do on their own. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

I'll admit I don't know much about SOX, but I think sometimes simple straightforward regulation is passed over in favor of needlessly complex systems that just "feed the lawyers" to find ways around the rules. I believe the major reason why Canada escaped the financial meltdown is that lenders have to hold on to their mortgages for a period of time before they can sell them to another lender. If you know you have to hold a mortgage for a couple of years, you will do the due diligence to make sure the borrower can pay. If you know the mortgage will be someone else's problem before the ink is even dry, and that you will make a commission both at the closing and when you sell it off to someone else, why would you care if the borrower can make the payments? Two years before you can sell the mortgage (even one year would be sufficient!); simple and effective. Canada also has a wider range of mortgage products, including 40 and even 50 year mortgages. Lower payments, as so little principle comes off, but a great return for the lender over the lifetime of the loan. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

OK, I can see that you're answering the question from the perspective of personal experience, and perhaps it's natural to think of the question just in terms of your personal experience, slightly expanded in your case to include the experience of close relatives who happen to be engaging story tellers. In that case, though, there's no point in including anything other than the 20th/21st centuries in the poll, as none of us (I'm guessing a bit here) has personal experience of living in the pre-1900 US. I'm guessing that Wendy's post was inspired by other recent threads that seem to indicate a longing for the "old days" in some of our conservative fellow SC inmates. I still think it's interesting that, when presented with a question like this, some people seem to respond as if the question was specifically in reference to themselves, and others seem to go right to the perspective of what was "best" for the largest number of people. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

So what you're saying is that you are unable to see (or have no interest in seeing) injustices committed against those who are different from you. However, let anyone point to the 1st Amendment and question the use of taxpayer-funded resources to impose Christian beliefs/practices on the public, and then it's "Help! Help! I'm being oppressed!" Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

It probably was a pretty good time to be be a straight white male. Damn those progressivists, they sure went a screwed up a good thing (for the straight white males). Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

What "assumptions" are those? The one based on your comment "Of course I'm sure you will find a way to blame the US for starting that war too." How should I interpret that, other than by concluding that you are saying that because I think Operation Ajax was a mistake, I must be anti-US across the board? Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

I think the US had more reason to support Saddam in that war, besides just having our nose out of joint regarding the hostage situation. My understanding is that we felt it necessary to prevent the regime in Iran from spreading to Iraq, and possibly further. I know of no reason to blame the US for starting that war. It would have been preferable, in hindsight, had we followed through with support for anti-Saddam factions after the war ended and our aims in the region (containing Iran) were achieved. Of course at the time Saddam was "our guy"; he only became a "dangerous madman" later, when it was politically expedient for him to be so labeled. Your reply suggest that if someone criticizes the US for one thing, then they automatically must be anti-US in all things. That's just the sort of narrow-minded "my country right or wrong" patriotism that dissuades people from objectively analyzing outcomes, so as to avoid repeating the same mistakes over and over. If you actually cared about a person, or a country, you wouldn't want them to keep repeating the same dysfunctional behaviors, would you? Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

An entirely predictable result of the fact that the only place that was not completely infiltrated with the SAVAK (the Iranian secret police) was the mosques. This had the consequence of forcing the association of political dissent against the Shah with the religious leadership, and virtually ensured that any possible replacement for the Shah would be dominated by Islamic fundamentalists. Interestingly, SAVAK was founded by the CIA, and their tactics of torture and execution of political dissidents was initiated, and supported through the duration of the Shah's reign, by the CIA. The Iranian revolution, and the regime that resulted, is the bastard child of US foreign policy from the 1950s through the 1970s. Why did the US destroy a democracy, led by a Western educated and indeed pro-Western leader (prime minister Mosaddegh)? As a legacy of British occupation of Iran (Persia at the time), British Petroleum (now BP) was extracting large amounts of oil from Iranian territory without paying royalties to the Iranian government. Mosaddegh initially tried to negotiate royalty payments with BP, but when he was rebuffed he moved to nationalize the Iranian oil industry. Diplomats in the British embassy tried to organize a coup against him, but they were discovered and expelled. At that point the CIA took over the operation. So the primary motivation for the operation was ensuring Western access to cheap oil. Also, I am an American, not Iranian, and the US is "my people". Unlike many of the right-wing-leaning types who post here in SC, though, I believe it is worthwhile to examine the past to see what worked and what screwed up royally, so we can learn from our mistakes. Operation Ajax was a disaster that has made the Middle East a much more dangerous place, and it underlies much (though not all) of the anti-US sentiment in that part of the world. I believe that we are off, in the long run, to allow countries to control, or at least to benefit from resources within their territorial boundaries. I also think a useful lesson it that it is usually better to allow societies to develop in their own way, at their own pace; the best way to try to influence outcomes by providing an example of the benefits of our political and economic systems that they can see and emulate if they so choose. That worked well in Eastern Europe, which discarded Soviet rule through home-grown efforts inspired by knowledge of economic and political disparities with their Western European neighbors. Indeed, many of Gorbachev's ideas the led to the dismantling of the Soviet communist system came from his time spent in the West, which shows the value of allowing people from all over the world access to Western education. Sometimes being a good citizen means admitting that we screwed up, and vowing not to make the same mistake again. The notion that America never gets anything wrong is simple minded, against America's long-term interests, and so is actually unpatriotic, IMHO. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

And maybe "your people" (who are also my people) should think twice before overthrowing a democratically elected government and imposing a brutal dictator who murdered thousands of civilians during a reign of terror that lasted more than two decades, supported the whole time by US (double meaning intended). For the sake of oil, we destroyed the first democracy in that part of the world, and so much of the trouble that has followed is just reaping what we sowed in 1953. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

tr027, building a bridge to the 19th century one quote at a time! I would argue that the real thief is the one who wishes to avail themselves of the benefits of an organized society, yet shoulder none of the costs. I'll repeat to you the question I asked above: if you regard taxation as theft, then how do you propose to ensure that you, personally, do not derive any benefit whatsoever, in any way, from the services provided by the institution you so disdain? Mr. Spooner lived in a day and age when the total population of the US amounted to less than 50 million people. There were no cars, no highway system, no medical technology to speak of. Industries just dumped their waste directly into the same water people relied on for drinking. If you didn't like living in one of the polluted Eastern cities, there was plenty of land for the taking out West, as long as you didn't mind clearing off the natives. If you wanted to be an "island unto himself", that could be done. Most of the population was illiterate, but that didn't matter too much as most jobs didn't require much reading and writing anyway. How well do you think that description translates to today's world? What do you imagine the life expectancy would be today with no public health infrastructure, no restrictions on industry's ability to pollute common resources, no investment in medical research? How wealthy do you imagine America would be if 80% of our workforce had less than a 3rd grade education? Would the rest of the world really step aside and let such a country, unwilling to invest at all in the health and education of its population, be a leader in anything? The problem with all you tax abolitionists is that you were born 200 years too late. Either that, or you do expect all the benefits of living in the wealthiest society in the world to be handed to you for nothing. Who's the welfare bum here? Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

These comments are directed not specifically to Davjohns, but to all who argue that taxes are "theft". Can you suggest a mechanism by which you would be able to completely separate yourself from all the tangible and intangible benefits that you receive from government (i.e. taxpayer) funded services? On the direct side there is of course law enforcement and firefighting, but also there is access to relatively safe food, water, and air. The situation would be very different if not for enforcement of laws and standards regarding food safety and pollution of water and air, as was the case in the past before those laws were enacted. In cities, massive epidemics of water-borne diseases such as cholera, with horrendous death tolls, were commonplace before the development of taxpayer-funded sewer systems and clean water supplies. The fact that average life expectancy has more than doubled compared to 150 years ago is mostly due to these public health resources. On the less direct side, we all benefit from the wealth that is generated by private enterprise having access to an educated work force. If nothing else, this helps ensure that the "talent pool" is not limited to small segment of the population who can afford to hire private teachers to educate their children, as used to be the case before the development of public education. We all benefit from the medical advances funded by the NIH, as well as from the pool of trained scientists whose graduate training is supported by NIH, NSF, and other government agencies. We have all benefited from the taxpayer funded defense of our country. If you don't want to pay your share for any of this, why should you derive any of the benefit? It seems to me that everyone who claims that taxes are unconstitutional or "theft" should present explicit alternative mechanisms for either funding such services, or ensuring that those who can pay but refuse to do so derive no benefit, direct or indirect, from these services. Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

You're getting mixed up on the units. 11,930 uSv/hr (microsieverts/hr) is only ~12 mSv/hr (millisieverts/hr), which is actually no-where near a lethal dose. micro is 1/1,000th of milli Don _____________________________________ Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996) “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)