"During Fiscal 1996, the Government of the United States collected more taxes from the American people than any government had ever collected before in the history of mankind. During Fiscal 1997, the Government of the United States plans to collect more taxes from the American people than any government has ever collected before in the history of mankind. And still it's not enough."
I will not coment on the correctness of the U.S government's funding allocations, however the above statement is clearly designed to be deceptive. Given the GDP of the U.S as a whole during fiscal 1996 was greater than that of any other country at any other time, including the U.S in previous years (the U.S like most other countries has postive growth), of course the absolute value of taxes collected will be larger. -- "Of all tyrannies a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies, The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience." - C.S. Lewis, _God in the Dock_ +---------------------+--------------------+----------------------------------+ |Julian Assange RSO | PO Box 2031 BARKER | Secret Analytic Guy Union | |proff@suburbia.net | VIC 3122 AUSTRALIA | finger for PGP key hash ID = | |proff@gnu.ai.mit.edu | FAX +61-3-98199066 | 0619737CCC143F6DEA73E27378933690 | +---------------------+--------------------+----------------------------------+