Have you ever wondered if your property is, well, actually your property? Silly question, right? By definition, if something belongs to you that something is your "property"; the word, "property" denotes ownership by someone somewhere. So the phrase "your property" is somewhat redundant, a bit like "wet fish."
All fish are wet so why, then, are you being asked to doubt ownership of your property?
Because pundits and politicians are talking about income and estate taxes! I've found people generally do not think of their income and their estates---the products and fruits of their labor, time, and talents---as their property. Your income is your property; it is the monetary compensation of your time and efforts.
Our vote-fishing representatives in Congress never refer to your income as property. If they were to refer to property as "property," they would have a terribly difficult time explaining why you are being permitted to keep x% of your property versus y% for blah, blah, blah reasons. Chances are their reasons would come across as thinly-veiled demagoguery.
More difficult still would be the job of justifying the noxious and logically flawed premise that underpins the income and estate tax. That premise? If government has a moral right to 1% of your property it has a moral right to 100% of our property. All the public wrangling is simply about numbers and details.
Consider all the political claptrap that orbs around the income tax debates as you view this commentary by Brit Hume. And this holiday season, please don't thank your government for the gift of your own property, whatever the tax schedule for 2011.
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