Just when I thought that the two major party candidates, Bush and Kerry, are no good, along comes Ralph Nader. Our only serious third party candidate, and, supposedly, the only semi-serious alternative to Bush and Kerry, is corting my vote as a disaffected conservative. Recently, Nader gave the following interview to Pat Buchanan:

http://www.amconmag.com/2004_06_21/cover.html

(By the way, a very decent magazine)

It starts off not too badly, in the beginning I actually agreed with some of the things that he said. Until he started talking about his tax plans. For one thing, Nader wants to put a 0.25% tax on every stock market transaction. Just the thing we need when the economy and the stock market finally started to recover. Can anybody think of a better way to send the stock market spiraling down? We may as well say goodbye to our 401(k)s.

But this is just the beginning. Nader also wants to put a 1% per year tax on our assets. That's right, not interest, not capital gains, not property appreciation. ASSETS. If you have 10K in a bank account, Nader wants to take $100 per year. If you have a house that's worth 500K, Nader wants the government to confiscate from you 5K every year. If you have a car that's worth 20K, Nader wants to take another $200. I wonder what the tax forms would look under Nader. "Kindly, please list all your assets here...". I don't know how else to call it except slow-motion Bolshevism.

And one more thing, you better make sure that you smoke a lot of cigarettes and eat a lot of cheeseburgers. Because if you are healthy enough, and live to be 100, Nader will take it all away from you. But then again, he wants to raise the estate taxes as well...

He's a typical socialist playing on the "big oil", "big business" theme. Take from the producers and give to the "less fortunate". blah blah blah.....

what Nader is lacking is a logical mind. In his case we can add that he is lacking an education in economic fundamentals. For him, it is all about ferreting out bad corrupt bidnessmen or politicians, all about do goodiness...with no appreciation for how things run, keep running, or run better...He is best serving us in his current state, where he can opine from the sidelines and the rest of us can consider the practical application of his ideas...sometimes, there isn't any...