Kent Pitman<p>Continuing on a parallel commentary with Booker's AMAZING ongoing speech, I just want to inject by way of solidarity...</p><p>It's not just about stopping the bleeding, and there ARE surely people who are literally bleeding (or worse), it's about insisting on a better morality.</p><p>One of the issues is this whole issue of taxation, just as a general proposition.</p><p>I do not side with those who think that everyone should be taxed. I've heard some say "everyone needs skin in the game". To that I say, being poor IS having skin in the game, it doesn't need us to add insult to injury.</p><p>I think we should tax the rich, not as a punitive thing, but because we live in a society where our morality should be that no one succeeds without bringing others along. We should tax legit surplus, in other words. And we should have a society where people ASPIRE to be wealthy enough to pay tax.</p><p>That we have created a society in which the rich can claim injury due to taxation but the poor cannot claim injury for having safety nets removed is a SERIOUS breach of morality.</p><p>You can read more detail on that in my 2009 essay Tax Policy and the Dewey Decimal System.</p><p><a href="https://netsettlement.blogspot.com/2009/02/tax-policy-and-dewey-decimal-system.html" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" translate="no" target="_blank"><span class="invisible">https://</span><span class="ellipsis">netsettlement.blogspot.com/200</span><span class="invisible">9/02/tax-policy-and-dewey-decimal-system.html</span></a></p><p><a href="https://climatejustice.social/tags/BookerSolidarity" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>BookerSolidarity</span></a> <a href="https://climatejustice.social/tags/BookerFilibuster" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>BookerFilibuster</span></a> <a href="https://climatejustice.social/tags/SenatorBooker" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>SenatorBooker</span></a> <a href="https://climatejustice.social/tags/SenatorCoryBooker" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>SenatorCoryBooker</span></a> <a href="https://climatejustice.social/tags/Booker" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Booker</span></a> <a href="https://climatejustice.social/tags/Fascism" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Fascism</span></a> <a href="https://climatejustice.social/tags/Oligarchy" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>Oligarchy</span></a> <a href="https://climatejustice.social/tags/GoodTrouble" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>GoodTrouble</span></a> <a href="https://climatejustice.social/tags/USPolitics" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>USPolitics</span></a> <a href="https://climatejustice.social/tags/politics" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>politics</span></a> <a href="https://climatejustice.social/tags/taxation" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>taxation</span></a> <a href="https://climatejustice.social/tags/inequality" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>inequality</span></a> <a href="https://climatejustice.social/tags/poverty" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>poverty</span></a></p>