ResourceShelf Newsletter 303
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—–Original Message—–
From: Gary Price
Sent: Thursday, March 22, 2007 11:50 AM
Subject: ResourceShelf Newsletter 303
ResourceShelf Newsletter
Number 303 March 22, 2007
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Resource of the Week: National Library Service for the Blind and Physically
Handicapped
By Shirl Kennedy, Senior Editor
National Library Week isn’t until next month (April 15-21), but an
interesting press release from the Library of Congress (LoC) crossed our
radar screen this week describing the extensive services of LoC’s National
Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped (NLS). We felt that
this outstanding free program — now in its 75th year of operation (who
knew?) deserved some attention. In an era of large-scale government waste,
fraud and abuse, Resource of the Week: National Library Service for the
Blind and Physically Handicapped
By Shirl Kennedy, Senior Editor
National Library Week isn’t until next month (April 15-21), but an
interesting press release from the Library of Congress (LoC) crossed our
radar screen this week describing the extensive services of LoC’s National
Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped (NLS). We felt that
this outstanding free program — now in its 75th year of operation (who
knew?) deserved some attention. In an era of large-scale government waste,
fraud and abuse, this service is truly an excellent use of your tax
dollars..
{Extraneous Deleted}
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—–Original Message—–
From: r at reinke dot cc
Sent: Saturday, March 31, 2007 12:01 PM
To: Shirl Kennedy
Cc: Gary Price
Subject: RE: ResourceShelf Newsletter 303
> this service is truly an excellent use of your tax dollars.
Dear Ms. Shirl,
At risk of being considered a grinch, hateful, or a loon, permit me to object to an “excellent use”.
Taxes are theft. AND, when you have to use force to fund something, then that to me is the hallmark of a bad idea.
You have to take into account the “hidden costs” view as first expressed by Frederic Bastiat, 1850 http://bastiat.org/en/twisatwins.html and think about what is precluded by this “excellent use”.
Taxes, and their “excellent uses”, are immoral, ineffective, and inefficient.
They are immoral because you are initiating force on another human being.
You have no right, authority, or justification to do that. By benefiting from that force, one becomes complicit it the brutality of it.
They are ineffective because while this may be an “excellent use”, you can’t tell what better “excellent uses” were precluded from being created. When the government gives a “free good”, it is impossible to compete with it. If a service is provided by a marketplace, it is “molded” by competitive pressures. It has to deliver value for what it charges. It is also necessary to attract paying users or it shuts down. When do gooferment programs “close down”? Never.
They are inefficient because you are paying a tremendous overhead. The gooferment makes it impossible to measure precisely how inefficient, but in the USA the federal “handling fee” is guesstimated between 50 and 75%. So, if the Federal Government does something, anything, it is by definition more expensive than if has to be. For example, the Salvation Army has an overhead of about 15% and the 911 Fund (gooferment run) was in the 80% range.
So, let’s talk about the “excellent use” that you cited.
If there was a real need and no gooferment program occupying the “space”, then there would be a business or charity to fulfill that demand. I don’t think, even with the tax load USA-ites are under, they would have any trouble raising funds. Look at the 911 fund, the Tsunami, or Katrina.
Add in the fact, that the gooferment denies us the opportunity to be charitable, and deny us the ability to properly “choose” and supervise our donations.
So, I would urge you to reconsider your cavalier attitude to basically what is “loot”. There are NO “excellent uses” for taxes except refunds to the payers!
IMHO,
fjohn
{Note: Challenge “socialist” thinking at every opportunity. Good people are deluded by the gooferment’s propaganda into thinking that gooferment can do anything that we could not do better, cheaper, or faster if left on our own. The Intelligent Designer gave us brains. Let’s use them. From time immemorial, us weak hairless monkeys have taken over the planet by VOLUNTARY cooperation towards mutual goals. Only recently, have some of use been infected with this mental virus of “socialism”. The meme of “government” has hurt us worse than any other idea in our history. Perhaps, “religion” but that’s another topic for another day.}
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[…] unknown wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptNational Library Week isn’t until next month (April 15-21), but an interesting press release from the Library of Congress (LoC) crossed our radar screen this week describing the extensive services of LoC’s National … […]
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