08.09
In the current arguments pro and con, most who opine seem to look at the marriage issue from within the box where those wanting to regulate it placed it hundreds of years ago. It would be more logical to review the concept of marriage and understand that, when individuals feel obligated to remain in a union, the union is not free. When we are not free, we are unable to make the right decisions about anything in life. Freedom is essential to our human existence.
For this observer, California’s Proposition 8 and all other “defense of marriage acts” across the country are equally as intrusive as having the church and the government identifying those with the privilege to enter into indented servitude. Let’s face it: Marriage is an enslaving institution into which most people enter blindly assuming a piece of paper will ensure their eternal bliss together. Quite the contrary, it is eternally doomed to fail as soon as one of the parties realizes it forces them to remain together after the love, the lust, the attraction, the peace, and the romance vanished into thin air, which according to current statistics, takes place over 60% of the time.
There is a much better solution. If the church and the government in their collusion would think outside the box, they would instead regulate divorce with the same zeal they are using today to dictate who is able to enter into a marriage contract. The threat of not being able to divorce–or live apart after the desire to break up shows its ugly face–would be a better way to raise the level of analysis and presence of mind required by those considering the august decision of entering into an endless marriage–even if it did not make a faithful husband out of Henry VIII; but his Majesty enjoyed the right to write his own laws and form his own church, joyful actions that the rest of us do not possess.
Let’s face it. Today’s no-fault divorce makes breakup and separation a viable alternative to a concentrated effort on identifying whether a union is the right choice in the first place. It eliminates the serious analysis required of every individual before deciding to marry. This observer’s hunch is that very few, if any, would execute a contract that forces everyone to remain in the hellish existence of a bad union for the rest of their life.
If all intrusive institutions currently fighting over the regulatory turf were determined to end the desire to foolishly enter into a marriage without much thought, if they truly were concerned over the health of families and children in a divorce, if the values of the family were truly the concern here, they would instead collude to make divorce equally as difficult as they want to make marriage an impossibility for some. Any individuals willing to remain together for the rest of their life–happy or unhappy–should be able to do so; just like everyone willing to work as a slave should be able to do so uninhibited.
The pursuit of happiness was written into our Declaration of Independence. No one should be turned back from making a choice for themselves. Free people make choices that they have to live with for the rest of their life. Make marriage one of these transcendental choices.
The argument is embellished by all the talk about tax breaks and privileges, which as currently applied, tend to carve out a lower class made up of individuals who are single, with less equality before the law; but this too is easily corrected and could become empty chatter. There is an egalitarian solution at hand. Let the government’s taxing arm tax everyone equally across the country, regardless of whether they sleep with someone else with a signed piece of paper filled with empty promises or not. Under this well-thought out system, everyone would be free to marry but no one can live apart or get divorced after they enter into the holy state once the license is duly executed.
Clearly, the concept of a flat tax would do away with thousands of pages in the IRS Code and in a single swoop with all the corruption from lobbies and vested interests vying for a tax break. Unlike marriage, a gradual flat tax that provides smaller brackets for lower incomes and rises to 15% for higher incomes is good for the government and great for the individual. Eliminate all deductions and simply levy a gradually increasing tax scale that starts at 0% below the poverty line and increases slowly as incomes rise, to a maximum of 15% for the highest income earners.
Both measures are fair. They are just. They are very desirable.
They would also resolve the problem of corruption in government. The open objections would come from CPAs and tax attorneys. The underhanded opposition would come from politicians. No loopholes eliminate the need for advice. The elimination of ambiguity and tax-favored measures would eliminate political contributions from lobbyists which until today, they dole out to ensure political favors. Everyone would be equal under the tax codes and all income would be taxed according to a fixed scale.
These measures would cut everyone’s desire to join in marriage carelessly any idiot that walks their way. They would efficiently fix the world of politics and the levity in which most individuals enter married life. It would be a fix all.
Why couldn’t someone else see these fixes so clearly before?
As with all posts, comments are encouraged. Thanks for reading my blog.
As if the cost of pursuing happiness in the Magic City were not already excessively high, we now have to watch where we drive. It used to be that roads were built with taxes paid by the people. There weren’t any additional taxes levied for using them. The maintenance of the roads was also paid with tax revenues from the general treasury. A built road would ensure our ability to cross it without paying anything extra. Things have changed for the worse in Dade County.