FYGM

Here in Oregon we have a special election coming up to vote on a measure that is supposed to help fund our health care system, short version is I support it even though it seems like it's gonna tax some insurance companies, who will pass that along to the rest of us to some extent I am sure.

I don't know what my taxes are gonna look like this year, my guess is even with the latest changes to the tax code I am still gonna be getting the maximum refund back but even if that isn't the case and the government actually gets to keep my money I will be fine with it.

That's what I don't get about Libertarians or any anti-tax assholes, yes we can, and should, argue about if our government is spending our money wisely, but the idea that we shouldn't let it spend money on things like making people well again because it might cost us a few bucks at the end of the year is unconscionable. If you would rather someone die than for your tax dollars to contribute to them living, then you are forfeiting any right to consider yourself a moral person, and only technically hanging on to personhood status yourself.

I take issue with people who tell us not to be concerned with money, "it's just money" they say, well yeah it is, and you need it to live and be comfortable, that is precisely why I am comfortable paying my taxes even though a lot of it gets spent on stupid shit, it is just money,  money that can save the lives of people who don't have it. See, you need it to live, but you don't die if you give it away.

There is an argument to be made that it should be an individuals choice to do so anyway, that is a stupid argument which sucks because we know, not think, we know, that the vast majority of people aren't gonna go to the hospital and find a homeless guy who needs his appendix out and say "it's on me bro" the people complaining about personal choice the loudest are those who have made their decision on who they are gonna help, and that decision is Fuck You Got Mine.

You can't have a society run on Fuck You Got Mine, but these people either don't understand that or don't want a society, they want, I dunno, a homestead I guess? They think that if they were just left alone they would be able to survive just fine without anyone else, but they are probably wrong, on a practical scale it is implausible at best, to say nothing of the skills and resources you would need to be truly independent, that is why we live in cities in the first place! You can't support a society of seven and a half billion rugged individualists without first reaching a post-scarcity level of technogy, and we aren't there yet, we may never be.

Do I wish our government spent money better? Fuck yeah I do, but that doesn't mean I wish it didn't spend money at all, perhaps we need to scrap what we have and start fresh, but whatever new system we run into in our post-apocalyptic future is still going to need people to help the less fortunate.