I didn't agree with a lot of what Reagan did, but this is a great article on the "Great Communicator" telling the truth about the Income Tax and its impact on America:

RONALD REAGAN ON THE INCOME TAX SYSTEM

The following article appeared in the Albuquerque Journal of May 31, 1985:

"Reagan Urges 'Rebellion' On Taxes, Government

WILLIAMSBURG, VA. President Reagan, promoting his new tax plan on the 22Oth anniversary of a revolutionary speech here by Patrick Henry, urged "rebellion" against Washington Thursday and expressed sympathy for the "cult of cheating" among American taxpayers.

"It's not considered bad behavior," Reagan said of tax cheating and referring to modern American morals. "After all, goes this thinking, what's immoral about cheating a system that is itself a cheat? That isn't a sin, it's a duty.

"Our federal tax system is, in short, utterly impossible, utterly unjust and completely counterproductive. It has earned a rebellion. And it's time we rebelled."

The outdoor crowd of several thousand, assembled on a sunny, picture-postcard day, erupted into cheers and applause as the president issued his now-familiar call for "a second American revolution."

In Williamsburg, Reagan seemed to equate his own campaign for tax simplification with the revolutionary cause of Patrick Henry, who on May 30, 1765, dramatically stood in the Virginia House of Burgesses and demanded repeal of the Stamp Act that recently had been imposed on colonists by their mother country England.

Henry's call for "tax reform" prompted immediate cries of "treason," but his speech fueled a revolutionary fervor that culminated 13 months later in the Declaration of Independence.

Speaking on the steps of the colonial capitol where Henry had orated, Reagan said the federal income tax is "so rigged, so unfair, that it corrupts otherwise honest people by encouraging them to cheat.... The current system just doesn't work anymore. The underground economy and the cult of cheating prove this is so."

Reagan recalled that the Founding Fathers argued, "Why should the fruits of our labors go to the crown across the sea?" He added, "in the same sense, we ask today, why should the fruits of our labors go to the capital across the (Potomac) river?"

The president declared, "Now is the time, in short, to get the federal government off our backs and out of our way."

Attacking both Washington and the income tax as symbols of each other will be a key feature of Reagan's strategy for selling his tax plan, particularly when he travels to middle class, family-oriented communities.

Leaving the ghost of Patrick Henry, Reagan flew later to the Main Street world of Sinclair Lewis in Oshkosh, Wis..

Speaking at the Winnebago County Courthouse Reagan asked: "Do the people of Oshkosh want our tax system to be complicated and unfair?"

"No," came the shouted reply.

The president asserted: "the answers are just the same every place I know of except for one city - Washington, D.C. Sometimes folks back there are a little slow to catch on. I may need some help."

Reagan was awesome! And he is dead right to this day about our taxes.

Unfortunately his words were stronger than his actions. And his inability to work with Congress to get spending and the debt under control led to the Democrats to justify later tax increases.

The person who is right about taxes today is Ron Paul. We need to repeal the income tax and drive a wooden stake through its heart.

To spend is to tax, and Ronald Reagan, just like our current idiot president, spent like a drunken sailor.

Unfortunately that is true. As I said, his words didn't always match his actions. Granted, he never had a fully Republican Congress (the House was controlled by Democrats during both his terms), but he could have fought harder for spending cuts.

When budgets pass with over 60% approval, there is not much a president can do. He spoke out against the spending and had vilifications of him going out and stealing homeless people's cans of beans, taking them back to the White House and eating them there while laughing at the stupid homeless person.

He drastically cut taxes and increased the revenue to the fed two times over, the Dems. outspent the increases and increased the deficit, "proving" that tax cuts don't work. (When there is a congress willing to spend more than what is coming in.)

__________________
I am more concerned with the intellectual environment

'Those who hammer their guns into plows will plow for those who do not.'

~ Thomas Jefferson

64,999,987 firearms owners killed no one yesterday.

As I have said in previous posts, Reagan's budgets submitted to Congress were DOA. There were some successes.

AEI - Short Publications - President Reagan, Champion Budget-Cutter

He did manage to cut some departments over the course of his 8 years. Until we get a Congress and a president who are willing to cut spending we will never eliminate the budget deficits we continue to see.

As for real changes in the income tax code, I wish it would happen. The impetus for any change is with Congress and their desire to win votes. Look at how the tax code is used to create hostility by those in Congress or running for president.