Fitzsimon’s Defense & a Mea Culpa

Chris Fitzsimon ably defends himself here against those fighting proposed devolution of new taxing authority to municipalities — specifically on local transfer tax referenda. We at Civitas were among the accusers (here) in our suggestion that he used the referendum proposal in a cynical manner. Fitzsimon more-or-less satisfactorily resolves the inconsistency. And I can see now that we were unfair.

That, however, shouldn’t distract us from the fact that Fitzsimon wants to give municipalities the power to tax us in a different – additional – way than they’re already taxing us. The new form of taxation is death by a thousand paper cuts. We can’t afford that at any level of government — even if it involves tyrannies of the majority. So instead of our trying to point out inconsistencies, or their trying to point out how much special interests are spending to protect their industry, let’s both stick to the ideas — i.e. the costs, benefits, and wisdom of the legislation. -Max Borders