If the average gun owner had to pay a $400 tax each year for each gun, it's likely that the gun owner would decide to dispose of some or all of his guns. With fewer guns in existence, the cost of the gun tax would increase the following year. Eventually, an equilibrium would occur where our country would have far fewer guns and far fewer deaths.Y'know, for someone who claims to be an engineer, Scott Dixon is pretty much cause-and-effect impaired beyond redemption. Engage him in comments and deconstruct his foolishness if you like--when someone proposes evil, I feel no obligation to attempt civil discourse. He presumes to teach but has proven himself incapable of learning.
So here's my only rebuttal:
How about "No"? And that's non-negotiable.
Your move, Scott.
30 comments:
"Ironically, a gun owner's family is the most likely beneficiary of a gun owner disposing of his guns"
Define benificiary for me, Scott.
I believe Scott's area of expertise is in rectal engineering.
Ashland. A.K.A., Berkley North. It would never occur to someone from Ashland that taxing a constitutional right is a bad idea.For,is not the pen mightier than the sword? The ability to inspire men to fight more dangerous than the weapon? Then a progressive tax on his printer is in order! And alas, is not the mind of man the most dangerous weapon of all? Our ability to think, the most costly? Poor Scott, a tax on intellect he will never have to fear.
One of the comments really caught my eye. "Taxing guns is not wise. We need to tax (very heavily) self-righteous, ugly, paranoid stupidity. That will not only reduce gun ownership to a responsible level, it will also get rid of all this blather.
Harold"
Thanks, Harold, for admitting that you don't like the first amendment any more than you like the second.
Since I despise the very concept of "law abiding" and embrace my outlawry, I will not pay your "gun tax".
BWAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAAA!!! This is the most funniest shit I ever read for a long time. Damn son, this beats even the most ridiculous garbage the anti-freedom extremists at Brady and elsewhere can defecate out.
Mr. Scott Dixon should visit the Great Crime-Free Utopian Paradise Great Britain while wearing an "I Love New York" T-shirt and come back in a month and tell us whats it like. LOL!
Gun tax my arse!
Taxing Your Way to Civil War
To the editor, Ashland (Oregon) Daily Tidings.
tidingsopinion@dailytidings.com
Scott Dixon wants a $400 tax each year for each firearm in America. He believes that this will lead to fewer firearm deaths. Perhaps, but only after one side or the other wins the civil war which would erupt if his proposal is adopted.
Frankly, some of us firearm owners are done being pushed back from our traditional rights to liberty and property. For 75 years we have backed up at every gun control law, and we will now back up no further. Has crime abated because there are more gun control laws that, by definition, restrain only the law-abiding? No, but Dixon isn’t really after criminals and their behavior, he’s after law-abiding citizens’ firearms – their means of defense against criminal behavior and oppressive government.
Dixon’s plan is too cute by half if he thinks that gun owners are going to buy a plan that merely taxes our property out of existence rather than seizing it outright. Does he think we’re morons? Expecting us to obey such a government order is an extrapolation from his own cowardice. Just because he would obey a tyrannical regime doesn’t mean that we will. And may I remind him that we have the means to resist?
If Mr. Dixon wants his tax, he's going to have to kill me to get it. Not surprisingly, when his raid party comes to my door, I will shoot back. Nor will be the only one. How is that going to lead to fewer firearm deaths exactly?
(249 words)
Mike Vanderboegh
I think anyone who comes up with an idea should be shot, no questions asked. Very UnAmerican & undeserving of life. And anyone who agrees with him. Just line em up - it's time. There's a whole list of idiots that need to be squashed in whatever the appropriate manner is - time to start cleaning up this country!!!
Just an F.Y.I.folks. Ashland is the university of so.Oregon, Liberal arts college. The biggest industry there is the,"Shakespear festival". You can't take your minor children downtown. Because people are allowed to walk naked there.As the police cheif said as long as theres no,"sexual intent", It's O.K.. If you ever want to watch a freak show, just set up a chair in downtown. You'll see everything from Chiquita banana boys to lesbo wickian witchs. Just don't get caught lighting up a cigarette. Or you'll find out about the "civilian security force", the hard way. To bad they don't have a web-cam downtown. If the rest of the country could see the future of America in action. It would go from 3% to 85%, in a matter of hours.
One reason that so many people are opposed to gun ownership is that guns are, by their very nature and design, very efficient at killing people. While it's possible to kill people using knives and clubs, guns are quicker, easier and more certain.
Mr. Dixon is missing the selling point! That's exactly why I carry a gun instead of a club. Well, that and because my attacker might be bigger, stronger and meaner than I am.
The act of stabbing or hitting another human being can cause the attacker to pause, curtail or lessen his actions.
Yeah, Mr. Dixon. I suppose it can do that. It can also piss him off enough to tear your head off and beat you to death with it. Tell you what; why don't you give that method a try, and report back how it went. When/if you get out of the hospital.
What a moron. This guy presumes to lecture people who actually know something about guns?
QUOTE: One reason that so many people are opposed to gun ownership is that guns are, by their very nature and design, very efficient at killing people. While it's possible to kill people using knives and clubs, guns are quicker, easier and more certain.QUOTE
Maybe because thats the same reason many people prefer to own and carry guns. Why else would a 350 pound former linebacker-turned-robber would cringe at the sight of his wheelchair-bound 80 year old victim? Probably because she's got a .357 Mag snubbie pointed right at his chest.
I am sure Comrade Stalin and Comrade Lenin would have loved to have Scott Dixon as an engineer. A social engineer, that is. LOL
Re: Vanderboegh. I think Mr. Dixon is doing what the anti-freedom extremists are always fond of doing: projecting his own cowardice upon the people he seeks to rule and terrorize.
Re Anonymous
"Shakespear Festival?" Now that is downright creepy. Damn, a freak show that occupies ALL of downtown?
This reminds me of Anthony Burgess' novel "A Wanting Seed". And it is, a novel about the largest freak show on earth.
Qi Ji;I don't know how else to describe it. There was a guy panhandling there with his,"pet", sheep at his side once. True story,dude. My friend asked him if he was,"on the lamb", the grubby pothead didn't even look offended. Welcome to Ashland,Or.
I took the trouble to register to leave the following observation:
As I recall something very similar was once proposed by a duly authorized agency of the government, a bunch of fellows wearing red coats. I believe we shot them. What makes you think it would turn out any different this time?
Well said, Uncle Lar. Wish I'd thought of it.
He got a snarky reply from a hoplophobe calling him violent.
And, exactly who is violent here? How does this hoplophobe propose to sieze these weapons?
Is he going to insist the police use strong language only?
pops1911 said...
I think anyone who comes up with an idea should be shot, no questions asked. Very UnAmerican & undeserving of life. And anyone who agrees with him. Just line em up -
After reading Dixon's drivel, my outrage and disgust made my mind race to some quite extreme ways of dealing with such pukes, actions that I wouldn't want to recount in the presence of my (very) young children...
I thank Pops1911 for blog-commenting out loud and proud, what many here must consider as the appropriate way to deal with enemies of the Constitution.
Kristopher gets the Reasoned Discourse Award. The Powers that Be thank you for your comments, and remind you that your kind has no place in the Second Republic. They're looking for brain-dead slogan-shouters; the more froth on the lips, the better. Sorry, Kristopher.
I love how the "free speech forums" require registration. I am an Authorized Commenter!
Mr. Dixon people like you propose shit like this but what I note is that you usually send some other poor SOB to implement it. Coward.
pops1911 said...
I think anyone who comes up with an idea should be shot, no questions asked. Very UnAmerican & undeserving of life. And anyone who agrees with him. Just line em up -
Not to derail the message of this thread, but isn't it hypocritical to suggest killing people for thinking violent thoughts?
Because if it isn't; you're next in line, bub.
At least he openly admits to taxation being a tool of repression and social control. Refreshing honesty, I say.
What was the rallying cry of the Patriots? Something about taxation and representation.
Speaking of which, if anything like this was seriously proposed - I wonder what economically and politically powerful companies like WalMart might say? They don't listen to us, no, but money talks.
As far as engineering a civil war goes. Its already been engineered long ago and the plans are being applied.
Would they send in the Revenuers to collect the tax? Oh yeah, right, they are called the BATFU now. And there already is a one time tax on Class III weapons.
I suggest that we start with a proposal for a tax on newspapers, TV stations, radio stations, magazines, whatever. They pollute too much. When the media objects, point out the similarities. Also tax your 4th and 5th Amendment Rights - makes as much sense.
Damn boating accidents...
Microeconomics 200
Q: When the cost of continued ownership of a gun is increased by taxation to a level much higher than the expected utility, what happens to the price of guns on the open market?
A: The price plummets as the supply soars while demand simultaneously crashes. Hundreds of millions of cheap guns flow from Elmer J. Fudd to John Q. Thugg, as the only people that will want the guns wold be those that have no intention of paying the tax -- i.e. criminals.
Brilliant move.
I suck at writing short pieces, which means that I suck at writing. I had to settle for a less than 500 character comment, and it changed my name to "Anonymous". Lesson learned: sign your name at the end.
Here is my reply. I tried so hard to get it down to 250 words. I couldn't. Too long for the Op Ed page or the comment page, but exactly 500 words:
--
Perhaps it's helpful to consider the opinion of someone with experience. I have been inundated with rules and restrictions since I became a gun owner twenty years ago. I studied disarmament laws initially to avoid prison time by accidentally violating some restriction, and have since combed through history, constitutional commentary, statutes, and crime statistics. I have been trained, tested, delayed, spot-checked, background-checked, questioned, fingerprinted, and have filled out stacks of forms. No matter how many tests of fitness I pass, some distant stranger assumes I am untrustworthy and proposes more.
I feel “reasonable” restrictions aren't. I'm restricted by “gun laws” crafted by politicians who are incapable of naming the part on a gun that makes it unsuitable for ownership. I've heard it all before. I am aware that guns are dangerous; that's what makes them effective for defense. The world is full of things that are both commonplace and dangerous. You're viewing this website through a device that contains a lethal amount of electric current and a cocktail of toxic metals. So?
Every infringement imaginable has already been tried, and none assuredly produce greater public safety, whether it suffers due to negligence or criminal enterprise. Don't believe me? Scour the FBI's Uniform Crime Report, and try to match a change in crime rates with some new restriction on firearms, or with the CDC's mortality data. We already pay taxes and regular fees for dozens of licenses and permits required by governments nationwide. This in addition to the laws punishing negligence and violent crime that preceded the licensure extravaganza.
Mr. Dixon offers nothing new, except the tactic of stating that one supports the constitutional right to keep and bear arms, immediately followed by a list of suggestions for violating the constitutional right to keep and bear arms. (Google: “third way” and “owning the Second Amendment” if you're curious.) Governments require citizens to bear the costs incurred by the few by spending taxes to keep those directly responsible for violating the property and lives of others—the negligent and the criminal—in prison. There's no justification for the continued squander of taxes on ineffective programs such as gun buy-backs, maintaining possession records, “safe storage” laws, “gun-free” zones, permits, prohibited weapons lists, and ammunition serial numbering.
Most restrictions have nothing to do with safety or crime. It's estimated that 60 million households contain firearms, yet suicide and homicide effect a fraction of a percent of the population. Suicide rates have not dived with the passage of gun safety laws. Punitive taxation and prohibition failed to engineer the flaws out of human beings, and I doubt that more will produce different results. Example: gun bans in the UK were followed by a sharp rise in the criminal use of knives. I note the irony in Mr. Dixon's example of Capone--the crime boss who profited from black markets created by another type of prohibition. Organized crime continued to flourish after Mr. Capone was jailed for tax evasion, as did drunkenness.
--
I settled for this:
"It seems that a day doesn't go by where I am not accused of being responsible for someone else's behavior, and forced to surrender my liberty not because of constitutionally guaranteed power, but because the government intimates that there will be violence in my future if I don't comply.
Mr. Dixon just plain hates people with guns. It's not the guns. It's who they are."
TJP:
Guest Editorials: Submissions are limited to 500 words
Go for it!
A fee levied for the exercise of a Constitutional right "...restrains in advance those Constitutional liberties... and inevitably leads to suppress their exercise."
U.S. Supreme Court, 319 US 105, Murdock vs. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Decided 3 May 1943
Thanks Mike, I am inspired by all your good works.
Seems one commentor took exception to my, in his view, threats so I had to post a followup quoted below:
As John Marshall said, the power to tax is the power to destroy.
Mr. Dixon would strip me and my fellows of our constitutionally protected right to armed self defense. I consider that a violent act. What you call a threat I respectfully submit was an attempt to pass on some small bit of learning from history. When we upstart colonials find our rights being violated we respond in kind, with violence. Not a threat, but a cautionary tale.
Not all engineers have lost the ability to read. Liberty simply scares a lot of people. What I don't get is why so many people want to live in a police state as slaves.
The shit is going to hit the fan, folks. I just don't know if I'll be around to see it, as I'm a geezer.
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