Bill Roper's Journal

Right and wrong are concepts not often brought into the political arena. People say they bring them in all the time, but they have their own version of what "right" and "wrong" are. And, underlying their stated philosophy is sometimes a radically different worldview that they'd rather people didn't know about.

Say, for example, tax cuts vs. tax increases. Lots of people consider tax cuts to be A Good Thing, but they've got several different reasons -- they don't believe the government should have their money, they believe in the private sector, they're in the private sector and want money that's currently going to government programs to come to them instead, etc. On the other hand, taxes pay for many services which a lot of people need, many of which are simply not done as well if the profit motive is involved. And that's not even getting into income vs. business taxes, the estate ("death") tax, progressive vs. regressive, sales/gas/other consumption-based taxes, etc.

I didn't learn anything in my useless Civics courses in school. Pretty much anything and everything I know about politics and political philosophy came from getting myself hip-deep in it. Unfortunately, that's not something a lot of people are going to do. Even more unfortunately, a lot of 'em will dip in a toe, and then believe they've gone in hip-deep.