The Monkey Cage

The Mean Green political attitude takes unlimited money as a given. This results in fiscal train wrecks, like the $1M wheelchair ramp in San Francisco. It also results in tortured doublethink like Reid's in this video.

The IRS always insists that collection is voluntary; this isn't just Reid. This page from a GWU law prof goes into the details.

I suppose taxes are voluntary in the sense that they are all tied to voluntary activities...earning income, buying/selling, owning property, etc.

Taxation is voluntary in the sense that most people accept that the cost of living in a (relatively) well-functioning society is to pay taxes. If I could get the (admittedly meager in DC) public services I get without paying taxes, then sign me up. But I would rather live under a political system with taxes and police, public transport and a public health care system, especially given that as a graduate student I pay considerably less tax as a proportion of my income than richer people (at least that is the hope).