Originally Posted by Johnny Kramer

# Americans spend more money per year on taxes than they do on food, clothing and shelter combined – and receive virtually nothing of value in return. Even worse, governments use citizens' own money against them to further erode their standard of living and persecute them for peaceful, voluntary behavior.

As Lysander Spooner wrote in No Treason: The Constitution of No Authority, ". . . whoever desires liberty, should understand these vital facts, viz.: 1. That every man who puts money into the hands of a 'government' (so called), puts into its hands a sword which will be used against him, to extort more money from him, and also to keep him in subjection to its arbitrary will. 2. That those who will take his money, without his consent, in the first place, will use it for his further robbery and enslavement, if he presumes to resist their demands in the future."