Wednesday is Veterans Day. Our forefathers risked their lives in order to preserve our constitutional republic as well as the freedoms contained in our American Constitution. These principles of liberty are worth defending and they are worth dying for. Remember to thank a veteran today for preserving our American way of life. Unfortunately, our great American way of life is still being threatened today.

I am a Constitutionalist. Constitutionalism is the political philosophy that government should be limited in its power and bound in its authority by a constitution. Constitutionalism is foundational to our American republic. Contrary to popular opinion, the United States of America is not a democracy; our Founding Fathers actually despised democracy as a form of mob rule. Instead, they formed our nation as a constitutional republic. This means that the supreme law of our land is the U.S. Constitution.

The United States of America is currently in the middle of one of the greatest Constitutional crises in our nation’s history. The presidential election of 2020 has presented challenges to our constitutional republic never seen before. When dead people are allowed to vote in Nevada, when votes are allowed to be counted after the deadline in Georgia, and when Republican poll watchers are forced to observe the election process through a pair of binoculars at a distance of more than 25 feet away from where the counts take place in Philadelphia, there is just cause for concern that election fraud may be taking place.

The integrity of our elections is sacred to our constitutional form of government. So, whenever we suspect that voting fraud may be taking place, our politicians have a fundamental duty to stand up against it. The American people must have confidence in the integrity of our elections. As John Locke said, “…a man can never be obliged in conscience to submit to any power, unless he can be satisfied who is the person who has the right to exercise that power over him.”

As an elected official, today I am calling upon our courts and our elected officials in Congress to bring confidence back to our elections. Unless the current situation is resolved in an amenable way, the American people will be left bewildered, disenfranchised and alienated from the electoral process

I am especially calling upon U.S. Senator Ben Sasse to uphold the integrity of our elections. Ben Sasse has prided himself on being a strict constitutionalist in his campaign ads. So, where is he now that our election hangs in the balance? Sasse’s silence has been deafening. Instead of defending the integrity of the electoral process, he chose to badmouth our president two weeks before the election. Instead of criticizing the president, he could have simply said, “I disagree with the president on certain matters, but when it comes to the election, if you believe in freedom, if you uphold the right to life, and if you believe in limited government, then there is only one correct choice.”

Personal passions and dislikes should never interfere with a patriot’s commitment to Constitutionalism. Unfortunately, it appears that Sasse is unable to divorce his strict constitutionalism from his gross dislike of Donald Trump. His passions have gotten the better of him. Perhaps, he is selfishly positioning himself to make his own run for the White House in four years. Nevertheless, our nation needs leadership at the highest level, and Sasse’s isn’t giving us any. To be sure, his re-election has already been made secure. If Sasse continues to sit comfortably on the sideline, the people of Nebraska will surely take notice of it.

Over the course of the past several weeks I have been outlining the Nebraska Taxpayer Bill of Rights which will appear in Legislation I plan to introduce in January for a consumption tax. The consumption tax will replace the State income tax, property tax, State sales tax, and inheritance tax. It is the best solution to Nebraska’s tax problems.

The right that I will talk about this week pertains to the Nebraska Department of Revenue. This right of the people states that “The Nebraska Department of Revenue shall be subject to the citizens of the State of Nebraska by readily correcting errors of taxation and granting temporary relief to registered sellers suffering hardship due to the burden of paying taxes.”

For most citizens living in Nebraska, the consumption tax will remove the Nebraska Department of Revenue from their life. Because the consumption tax is paid to retailers or registered sellers, the average citizens should never have to interact with the Nebraska Department of Revenue. You pay the tax to the store and you are done with it. No more wrangling with property assessors, no more income tax audits, and when you die your heirs will get everything you willed to them.

Those who will have to interact with the Nebraska Department of Revenue will be those selling services and new goods. For the most part this will be no different than how retailers currently interact with the Nebraska Department of Revenue in regards to the current State sales tax. The difference will be that those selling services will have to collect and remit the consumption tax as well.

Generally speaking, state agencies should be seen, but not heard. In other words, state agencies run best when those running the department view themselves as servants of the people. Unfortunately, all too often those running state agencies do not share this philosophy. Whenever those in government view themselves more as law enforcement agents than as servants of the people, the people suffer. The time has come for the suffering of the people to end. For this reason, it needs to be explicitly stated as a right of the taxpayer that the Nebraska Department of Revenue is subject to the people of the State rather than the other way around.

When it comes to attracting new businesses in Nebraska or attracting already established businesses to move to Nebraska, we have failed miserably. The old tired philosophy of incentivizing businesses to come to Nebraska has not worked. It did not keep Con Agra in our state, and there is no reason to believe that any other business would ever want to move to Nebraska so long as our current tax system punishes businesses for being successful.

I believe wholeheartedly that Nebraska needs to completely overhaul its tax code, and replacing four of our current taxes with a consumption tax along with creating a user friendly Department of Revenue will cause new businesses to flourish in our state.

As you may know, for the past several weeks I have been writing about what I am calling the Nebraska Taxpayers’ Bill of Rights, which I intend to include in legislation for the consumption tax in January. This week I will tell you about the sixth right, which is the right to privacy.

The sixth right in the Nebraska Taxpayer Bill of Rights states that “the State of Nebraska shall respect, protect, and secure the confidentiality of each person’s personal tax reports and personal tax information, unless such rights are waived in writing by the person.”

When Edward Snowden leaked classified information from the National Security Agency back in 2013, he ignited new concerns about protecting private information in the new digital age. Few knew at that time that the federal government had been keeping records of every digital move they ever made.

We live in an age when hackers would like to steal our personal information, scam us on the Internet, and even take over our identity. Some have even lost their homes to identity thieves. Consequently, the issue of protecting our personal information has never been a more relevant topic than today.

Joseph S. Fulda of the Freeman once said, “The most egregious government violation of our privacy lies with our tax system, which is frankly frightening…” Fulda could not have been more correct. When you consider the vast amounts of information that the Nebraska Department of Revenue currently holds on the personal lives of Nebraskans, it is a wonder that our personal information has been protected to the degree that it has.

The health of our tax system depends wholeheartedly upon how well we protect the privacy of our citizens. When the New York Times can obtain decades of tax records and publish private information from President Donald Trump’s own tax records, we know that we have a big problem with securing confidentiality in our tax system. If private information can be leaked from the IRS, it can surely be leaked from the Nebraska Department of Revenue.

Privacy is the guardian of liberty. Privacy tends to be one of those rights we forget about until it is lost. Once our right to privacy has been infringed upon, we feel violated and insecure. Whenever personal information about a person gets into the wrong hands, it becomes too late to conceal it. Like red wine on a white carpet, it can be seen by anyone in the room. Consequently, the time to fight for privacy is long before we ever lose it.

The consumption tax resolves the problem of privacy simply by giving far less information to the State to hold. Once the state income tax, the property tax, and the inheritance tax are all repealed, the State will no longer have a vested interest in knowing where a person works, how much money a person makes, or what kind of property that person owns. The consumption tax effectively turns the tables on the State and puts them on a court-ordered need to know basis. And I like that!

Each week I have been writing about the Nebraska Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights. The Nebraska Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights will be included in legislation I will introduce in January for the consumption tax. So far, I have discussed the failures of the income tax, the property tax, and the inheritance tax. This week I will explain why the consumption tax works better than any other form of taxation.

The fourth right delineated in the Nebraska Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights states that “Because the consumption tax manifests a security against government excess, it shall be preferred above all other tax systems in the State of Nebraska.”

The consumption tax is the only tax system which naturally regulates itself. The consumption tax has a built-in mechanism which naturally prevents the government from taxing its citizens too much. Whenever the government raises the rate of the consumption tax, the result is less money for the people to spend; hence, less revenue for the State. Consequently, the consumption tax forces the State to find that delicate balance between government spending and healthy commerce.

Alexander Hamilton was a fan of the consumption tax, who explained this very same principle in Federalist Paper #21. Hamilton said, “It is a signal advantage of taxes on articles of consumption that they contain in their own nature a security against excess. They prescribe their own limit; which cannot be exceeded without defeating the end proposed, that is, an extension of revenue.”

Whereas the financial condition of the private citizen is never the concern of the State under the other forms of taxation, it suddenly becomes the concern of the State under the consumption tax. That’s because State spending suddenly becomes tied to consumer spending. Unless people are out shopping and spending their own money, the State won’t have any money to spend.

The consumption tax is the only tax that the consumer controls. The State controls all other forms of taxation, but the consumer controls the consumption tax. The consumer avoids paying the tax simply by refusing to shop or by purchasing used goods instead of new goods.

All forms of taxation allow the government to spend other peoples’ money. So, regulating when the government gets to go shopping makes all the difference in the world. Taxation makes the most sense when the private citizen gets to go shopping first. All other forms of taxation allow the government to go shopping first, while the private citizen gets to spend whatever is left over. The consumption tax, however, turns the tables on taxation and allows the private citizen to go shopping first, while the government spends whatever is left over.

Finally, the consumption tax is the only form of taxation which taxes people within their means. Under the consumption tax a private citizen will never pay any more taxes than what he or she can afford to pay. Moreover, the monthly allowance that will come with my version of the consumption tax will ensure that those living at or below the poverty line never make a positive net contribution in taxes to the State. In fact, the State will only keep the taxes on what any person spends above the federal poverty line.

As you can see, the consumption tax is the only form of taxation which equalizes the playing field between the private citizen and the government. For this reason, it has earned the reputation of being called the Fair Tax. However, my bill will be known as the EPIC Fair Tax, where the word EPIC stands for the Elimination of Property, Income, and Corporate taxes.

As you may know, each week I have been writing about what I am calling the Nebraska Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights. The Nebraska Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights will be included in legislation I will introduce in January for the consumption tax. Last week I discussed what is wrong with property taxes. This week I will expose what is wrong with the inheritance tax.
The fourth right delineated in the Nebraska Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights states that “The State of Nebraska shall never impose or collect a tax on the inheritance of its deceased citizens.”

The inheritance tax is a form of double taxation. In Nebraska we already tax a person’s income and property, so taxing what a person passes down to his or her heirs adds another layer of taxation to what has already been taxed at least once before. How many times does the government need to tax a dollar?

There are only six states that still impose an inheritance tax on their deceased citizens and Nebraska is one of them. Among these six states, Nebraska’s inheritance tax ranks as the absolute worst in the nation! According to Kiplinger, Nebraska is the worst state in the union for retirees, and much of that ranking is due to our inheritance taxes. That is not a badge of honor we should be proud to wear.

There are some very good reasons why economists rank Nebraska’s inheritance tax as the worst in the nation. For instance, Nebraska’s inheritance tax applies to all property, including life insurance proceeds paid to the estate. Distant relatives qualify as a Class 3 beneficiaries and get taxed as a rate of 18 percent. The inheritance tax even applies to the transferring of any property to another person within three years of the death of the deceased person. How does one plan for that?

Nebraska’s inheritance tax gives wealthy people the right incentive to move. Nothing encourages people to move out of our state quite like our inheritance tax. Anyone wishing to pass down their nest egg to the next generation would do well to move to another state, such as Wyoming, which has no inheritance tax. Because the super wealthy know better than to retire in a state like Nebraska, the inheritance tax has primarily become a tax on the middle class of our state. Those who tend to get hit by the inheritance tax in Nebraska are those who cannot afford to move to another state.

Contrary to the popular opinion of those who advocate for the redistribution of wealth, the inheritance tax does not redistribute the assets of a wealthy person because that person is dead! Instead it punishes another person for acquiring that wealth. The inheritance tax does not punish a person for dying as much as it does their children for inheriting their wealth. As Milton Friedman once said about these kinds of taxes, they are “…much less taxes on being wealthy than on becoming wealthy.”

Because the inheritance tax punishes the acquiring of wealth, it is the enemy of upward mobility. The inheritance tax inhibits upward mobility for the next generation who may be struggling to pay down their mortgages, college loans, car loans or credit cards. For most heirs in Nebraska, inheritances give them the lift they need to finally pay down some of their indebtedness or finally repair the leaky roof.

The time has come for Nebraskans to reform its inheritance tax, and I say the best kind of reform we could possibly make is to abolish it altogether. Whereas, the inheritance tax is a double tax, which punishes the acquisition of wealth and inhibits upward mobility, the consumption tax is a single tax which encourages the acquisition of wealth and promotes upward mobility.

As you may know, each week I have been writing about what I am calling the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights. Last week I discussed what is wrong with taxing incomes. This week I will expose what is wrong with taxing property. Property taxes come in two forms, personal property taxes and real estate taxes. In Nebraska personal property taxes are imposed on all business equipment, whereas real estate taxes are imposed on commercial, residential, and agricultural real estate.

The third right contained in the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights states: “The State of Nebraska shall never impose or collect a tax on the property already owned by its citizens, regardless of whether such property is real or personal, tangible or intangible.”

The primary problem with property taxes is that an owner never fully owns the property once purchased. If you don’t believe me, see what happens if you stop paying your property taxes. Whereas personal property taxes may expire after a period of time, real estate taxes never expire. Consequently, a person never truly owns the home or the land he or she buys.

The property tax on real estate is the tax that never ends. As Alexander Hamilton warned, it is a tax that “continually plunders the people.” Any tax that continually plunders the people is morally wrong because it undermines a person’s basic right to fully own property. The right to fully own real estate originated in the Law of Moses.

The real estate tax means that the State is a forever part-owner of your home or property. Because the State is a part-owner of your home or property, it effectively gives the State a property right in you. In other words, you as the landowner no longer may act as the sole decision-maker regarding the use of the land. What you do with your land now concerns the State.

Because the real estate tax prevents a person from ever fully owning their own home, those who purchase real estate become eternal slaves to the State. This makes retirement especially difficult. In order to retire, a person must have enough income to continue paying their real estate taxes for the rest of their life. This implies that homeowners effectively become slaves of the State until the day they die.

When real estate taxes are imposed on commercial properties, the prospect of starting a small business becomes a much more difficult and daunting task. Many a business has failed in Nebraska because the business owner could not pay the commercial real estate tax. Because Nebraska ranks as the seventh worst state in the Union for property taxes, the best thing we could do to attract new businesses to our state is to remove the tax on commercial properties altogether.

Repealing the property tax is the best thing we could ever do for our State. As Sen. Steve Halloran of Hastings once said, if we ever repealed the property tax, “We would have to build a wall around Nebraska to keep the people out…and Colorado would pay for it.”

As you may know, I have begun outlining the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights. The Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights will appear in legislation I will introduce for the consumption tax in January next year. The first basic right that I talked about last week had to do with taxing people in a fair and equitable way. Today I will address the second right in the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights. The second right states that “the State of Nebraska shall never impose or collect a tax on the income of its citizens, whether such income tax be of a personal nature or of a corporate nature.”

The income tax violates the very nature of our own personhood. Each individual has an inherent and incumbent right to own himself or herself as well as the products of his or her own labor. The income tax violates this most basic right that we have to own ourselves as well as the fruits of our own labor.

The income tax has proven over time to be an ineffective tax system. The primary reason that the personal income tax is ineffective is that it discourages people from working or making money. Because it punishes people simply for making money, it is a system which promotes poverty over prosperity. So, the personal income tax treats making money as if work is somehow evil or a bad thing for a person to do.

The progressive or graduated nature of the personal income tax especially discourages people from making money. According to the progressive income tax, the more money a person makes, the higher percentage that individual pays in income taxes. So, the progressive income tax is effectively designed to keep people poor. This makes the personal income tax the enemy of personal upward mobility. Wouldn’t it make more sense to have a tax system that is favorable to economic advancement? I think so.

Those who advocate for the personal income tax usually do so for reasons of income redistribution. But, as we have already seen income redistribution of this kind does not work and it is a fundamental violation of our most basic personal freedom. As Milton Freedman once said, “I find it hard, as a liberal, to see any justification for graduated taxation solely to redistribute income. This seems a clear case of using coercion to take from some in order to give to others and thus conflict head-on with individual freedom.”

The same principles hold true for the corporate income tax. The corporate income tax is effectively designed to keep small businesses small. The more money that a business makes, the higher percentage that business must pay in corporate income taxes. Consequently, the corporate income tax constitutes the ultimate anti-business tax. Moreover, the corporate income tax violates the nature of a corporation in the same way that the personal income tax violates the nature of personhood.

By way of contrast, the consumption tax respects personhood and honors personal freedom. The consumption tax allows individuals to keep everything they earn. No tax is ever collected until the taxpayer is ready, willing, and able to part with a portion of his or her income. Because the consumption tax comes with a monthly pre-bate allowance, the least advantaged members of society never make a net contribution in taxes to the State. Consequently, the consumption tax promotes personal and corporate upward mobility whereas the income tax discourages it.

If the best tax system is the one which best maximizes upward mobility, then the income tax will never win that prize. The more I study the consumption tax, the more I realize that it is the tax system which benefits all income earners the most, but especially the lowest income earners of society.

In last week’s article I said I would introduce you to what I am calling the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights. The Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights that I will begin outlining today will be included in legislation I will introduce in January for the consumption tax. The Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights consists of ten rights or protections which ought to be afforded every taxpayer in the State of Nebraska.

The first right in the Taxpayer Bill of Rights states, “The citizens of Nebraska are entitled to a fair tax system, one which favors neither the poor nor the rich, neither rural dwellers nor urban dwellers, neither business owners nor laborers, and that is no respecter of race, religion, creed, or sex.”

The operative word in this first taxpayer right is the word ‘fair.’ Fairness is rightly defined as equality under the law. In other words, fairness occurs when everybody gets treated the same or equally, regardless of such things as one’s place of residence, occupation, race, religion, creed or sex. Fairness in this context stands in contrast to social justice theory, which seeks to rectify the past wrongs of society.

When fairness is applied to tax systems, the goal becomes to create the kind of tax system which affects everyone in the same way without inhibiting their upward mobility. A tax system that is fair is one that does not punish a person simply for earning a modest living. In short, Nebraskans need the kind of tax system which encourages everyone to save their money, invest for the future, and plan for retirement. The consumption tax is the only tax system known to economists which encourages savings, inspires investing, and enables retirement. In other words, everyone benefits from the consumption tax, including those who live below the federal poverty line.

The citizens of Nebraska are entitled to a tax system which promotes prosperity instead of poverty. In other words, we need the kind of tax that ends. For instance, the income tax continuously punishes people simply for making money, the property tax continuously punishes people for owning property, and even after a person dies the inheritance tax is waiting there to punish a person after death simply for handing down that property to the next generation. That’s a continuous triple tax system which never ends, even after death! What makes the consumption tax fundamentally different from these other kinds of taxes is that the consumption tax has an end to it. A person only gets taxed once, at the initial point of sale and that’s it! And that is why I can say that the consumption tax promotes prosperity instead of poverty.

In Federalist Paper #30 Alexander Hamilton warned the American people against certain evils of taxation. One such evil, he said, occurs when the people are “subjected to continual plunder.” That is precisely what our State’s current tax code does. Nebraska’s current tax code discriminates against everyone, except the super-rich. Therefore, the time has come for the people to shed this burden from our backs and replace our tax code with a system which is fair to all Nebraskans.

The Declaration of Independence asserted that all men are created equal and have the inalienable right to pursue happiness. Therefore, nothing should ever hinder a person’s right to pursue happiness, especially when such a pursuit includes upward mobility. When it comes to the pursuit of happiness, everyone should be entitled to the same kind of tax system, and that tax system should not punish people for improving their standard of living. The consumption tax is no respecter of a person’s place of residence, career choice, race, religion, creed or sex. Everyone has the same opportunity for advancement under the consumption tax, and that is why I like it so much.

Like your new property taxes this year? I didn’t think so. I have received several calls and emails about the loss of the $10,000 personal property tax exemption that was eliminated by the implementation of LB 1107, the so called property tax relief bill. The more accurate name for this bill is “the decrease in the increase” bill, because that is what it really is. This bill did absolutely nothing to actually lower your property taxes this year. Let me explain why.

Over the course of the last five years property taxes statewide increased $813 million. As you can quickly figure out, that amounts to an annual increase of $162 million. LB 1107 grants to the people of Nebraska an annual reduction of $125 million in their property taxes. Sounds great, right? When subtracted from the annual increase of $162 million, it results in a net increase statewide of $37 million per year, instead of the usual $162 million. But, it gets worse.

Getting back to the loss of the personal property tax exemption, Statewide that exemption amounted to relief of $16 million per year prior to LB 1107. The personal property tax exemption was available to all businesses, including agricultural businesses, who had personal property associated with their business.

So, the net amount of property tax relief under LB 1107 is really $109 million statewide, instead of the $125 million as advertised by the advocates for this bill. Some said this bill is historic and significant property tax relief!

In essence, what this bill did was force us all to give up a guaranteed reduction in the personal property tax exemption for what we might get back if the State happens to get enough revenue to fund it. By now most of you have received notice from your county assessor informing you about the loss of your personal property tax exemption. Surprised? Frustrated? I understand your pain. For these reasons and more, I voted against LB 1107.

Nebraskans need a real solution to their tax problem, and the first step in any recovery program is to admit that a problem exists. Nebraska’s tax system is broken. It is unworkable. It is kaput! We can no longer afford to continue to play this ridiculous game of hide and seek taxation. What we need is something brand new. We need something that works, we need a tax system that is fair, and we need the kind of tax system that politicians can never tamper with.

So, what is the solution? The solution, in my humble opinion, is the consumption tax. In the weeks ahead I am going to introduce you to what I am calling the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights. The time has come for taxpayers in Nebraska to begin asserting their rights as taxpayers. And when these rights are properly understood, the consumption tax begins to emerge as the obvious answer and self-evident solution to all of Nebraska’s tax woes.

I am very excited about the consumption tax solution to our State’s tax problem and I looking forwarding to discussing it with as many Nebraskans as possible in the days, weeks and months ahead.

Just before noon on Thursday, August 27th, a fire was observed in northern Banner
County near the Hubbard gap road. Due to extremely dry conditions, it expanded rapidly.

The fire started on the Terry Brown ranch and moved west. The fire burned a significant portion of the Brown ranch. A fence repair fund for the Brown’s has been established at Z M Lumber Company in Scottsbluff. All donations are deeply appreciated.

The Banner County Commissioners signed an emergency declaration, asking the Governor to help fight the fire. The Governor then declared an emergency and sent State resources to help battle the fire.

More than 100 firefighter units responded to the fire and some of these came from neighboring states. The Army National Guard dispatched Blackhawk helicopters equipped with 780 gallon water buckets to drop water in the canyons while the Nebraska Forest Service used aircraft to drop retardant on the fires.

The Governor came to Gering last week to thank the firemen for their heroic efforts in containing the fire and protecting life and structures. I appreciate the Governor highlighting the efforts of the many volunteers who stepped up to help as they always do.

I have seen how much time and effort volunteers put into training, getting certified, and preparing to handle these kinds of emergencies. Volunteers make rural Nebraska a much safer and secure place to live. Without these folks we could not do all that we do.

It is amazing that once a call comes in, these first responders will drop whatever they are doing and come to our rescue. So, I ask that when your fire department, EMT service, or other first responders ask for your financial help that you would thoughtfully consider making a contribution. In a way, your life may depend upon it! So please give generously to the people who volunteer to make our lives better and remember to thank them for their service.

Thank you for reading my articles in the newspaper. As always, please feel free to call my office with whatever concern you may have. My office phone number is (402) 471-2616.