Yes this has been very interesting to me, lots of fun, and I can't enjoy the prospect of having the last word.

Please, with the tales of big-hearted conservatives tossing checks for sob stories. So what? There were some junk-bond crooks who were big on that too, especially at christmas. This would seem to appeal to the idea that liberalism is all tree-huggy, compassion, and sensitivity. I'm a liberal who mistrusts sentimentality, and find that it flatters it's possessor at a rather cheap price. If you went up to Ronald Reagan with a sad story you might have to remind him you were his son, as his son once actually did at a PR event. But I don't see how either story has any real political meaning.

   Your friend's idea confuses me, since we all look to government, courts, national flood insurance (an interesting one), police, and military to address some problems here and there. The government seems to include things that are government and things that are not, and should be limited, but only the particular branches that aren't terribly profitable. It should stay out of public businesses but go into private bedrooms. I don't claim values for liberals, I claim values are the real base of economies. I certainly don't accord principles to conservatives. And yet again, I don't presume to tell anyone what they in particular what they think if I may generalize about conservatives or liberals. I'm very interested in hearing what particular conservatives think, and seem to have to prod sometimes to find out. But it seems to me liberals tend to write better, present larger and more convincing pictures of complex situations, discover things that undermine their assumptions, reconsider their positions, whereas conservatives most often present curt decontextualised stats and incidents (or heartwarming tales) as though they were definative, all-encompassing, and settled all questions. Conservatives often seem impatient and peevish--but I'd like to know who the better minds are, because I probably just have trouble finding them. Conservatives insult my intelligence so blithely and so routinely that if I were Adam Smith I'd still call myself a liberal for spite.

As it happens, I'm a teamster, and hate the union utterly, but I also know a little of the history of why we have the nasty damned things.

I enjoyed my response to you Mr. Kaufman, because I don't think you or I believe you've presented such a thorough and clear picture of the distribution of tax burden that a reasonable person must surely come around. I didn't even read the statistics, and don't see why I should. The question remains, since the wealthy invest and create jobs and provide the things we need, why should they be taxed at all? What keeps you from arguing that? Why not simply let the system work, everyone else pay taxes TO the wealthiest, since then it comes back down to the rest, and everything is for the better all around? What is the basis for deciding what would be the right distribution? What on earth would you look at, to decide that?