CovOps
 Location : Ether-Sphere
Job/hobbies : Irrationality Exterminator
Humor : Über Serious
 |  Subject: Via Anarcho-Capitalists' Forum: Libertarian Party targets legal pot, no state tax  Thu May 10, 2018 6:50 am | |
| Behind their campaign for marijuana legalization, direct funding for public education and abolishment of state and federal taxes, there is a philosophy that Libertarian Party members think will appeal to the disenfranchised.
According to A. Blair Dunn, Libertarian candidate for New Mexico attorney general, the Libertarian Party’s basic party line is to stay out of the daily lives of citizens.
“The core beliefs all Libertarians share is that the proper role of government is not to interfere in everybody’s daily lives,” Dunn said.
“That means lowering the financial burden that the government places on individuals and lowering the amount of personal burden that the government places on the lives of individuals.”
Legalization of marijuana, giving parents more control over funding for their children’s education, and abolishing the current federal and state and local tax systems in favor of a consumption-based tax system are the issues the New Mexico Libertarian Party will be campaigning for in this year’s election.
Though Dunn couldn’t speak for their gubernatorial candidate, Bob Walsh, he said his father, Aubrey Dunn, is in favor of legalizing marijuana. Aubrey Dunn, the current state land commissioner, is running against incumbent Sen. Martin Heinrich, a Democrat, and Republican Mick Rich, a businessman, for the U.S. Senate.
Aubrey Dunn wants to remove marijuana from the federal schedules and allow states to regulate marijuana the way they see fit, Blair Dunn said.
“Letting the states handle it is his position,” Blair Dunn said, of his father’s viewpoint.
Aubrey Dunn’s position, and all of the Libertarian candidates’ pro view on legalization fits in with the party’s national stance on government regulation.
“All of the candidates are pro-legalization. And that fits within the rubric that if a person is making an individual choice to ingest something, they’re really not having any kind of impact on any other person so therefore criminalizing that sort of activity is just wrong,” Blair Dunn said.
If Blair Dunn becomes New Mexico’s next attorney general, he said he would also seek to decriminalize marijuana use.
“I have a personal belief that we need serious criminal justice reform which includes decriminalizing a lot of what we’ve made criminal behavior when it comes to victimless crimes,” Blair Dunn said. “Marijuana use is one of those crimes that is a victimless crime. When it comes to that, reforming the criminal justice system is a big part of my platform. All the candidates are in favor of decriminalizing any of those activities that are related to marijuana.”
The Libertarian Party of New Mexico also believes that the federal and state income tax is a form of theft.
“One thing that’s consistent for Libertarians is that we don’t believe in the income tax. Taxation at that level is theft. It’s essentially taking from one person backed by the force of the government to give it to another person,” Dunn said.
“Now, that said, I’m pragmatic about my beliefs for taxation and I’m a big proponent personally on a federal level of something like the fair tax, which is a consumption tax.”
Just like energy, Libertarians feel that a tax should go with marijuana legalization.
“There is a cost to using our roads. We pay a gas tax for something like that. There is a health issue that’s created by the use of illicit substances and that’s a cost to society so the choice does have consequences for everybody else, since, as a society we’ve decided to take care of people with those issues. So I’m OK with consumption taxes on those types of things,” Blair Dunn said.
He also said his father, along with Libertarian candidate for New Mexico land commissioner Michael Lucero, are for funding early childhood education and mental health.
However, where they differ from the Democrats is that don’t want to use the state’s $22.3 billion Land Grant Permanent Fund to do it.
“Neither Mike nor Aubrey are in favor of raiding the permanent fund,” Dunn said. “In fact, they’re opposed to it. But they’re not opposed to funding early childhood education or mental health.”
Blair Dunn said if the two are elected to their respective offices, they will both work on federal and state legislation to work on leasing the state’s subsurface mineral acres owned by the federal government.
The New Mexico Land Office would pay a royalty portion that the state would receive from the leases back to the federal government, and the rest would go toward paying for early childhood education and perhaps mental health.
“So, rather than raid the permanent fund and use those funds that are never supposed to come out of there… new beneficiaries are created for early childhood without having to raid the permanent fund,” Blair Dunn said. “We grow the pie rather than taking a piece out of the pie.”
The Libertarian Party of New Mexico is also in favor of funding public education through federal block grants to the states.
“There are no strings attached to it. You give that money back to the states, you let the states decide how to use it,” Blair Dunn said.
The states would then turn around and give it to the school districts and the parents to decide how they want to spend the funding for each child.
http://www.lamonitor.com/content/libertarian-party-targets-legal-pot-no-state-tax |
|
