It needs first to be acknowledged that the best governance promotes the general welfare of the people, protects and defends those same people, upholds their unalienable rights, and provides a framework for people to live as free people, pursuing what gives them satisfaction and happiness. Therefore, for this to be effected, there needs to be a buy-in from the citizens that necessitates some degree of their contributing to this construct actually occurring, which can come from activities such as volunteering or even compulsory community service, responsibility, being a good neighbor, and providing money to the government through various forms of taxation, such as an income tax, sales tax, property tax, excise tax, capital gains tax, and so on.
So then, when we look at a nation as big and as accomplished as America, it must be acknowledged that for that government even to attempt to do what it is supposed to do on behalf of its people, it needs to have access to some sort of steady stream of revenue, typically done through taxation, which thereby means that the people need to be taxed. When it comes to income taxation, America has determined that a progressive tax system is fair, and that certainly makes sense: those that have assets or make the most money should contribute more to their country, as their fair obligation to that country for providing them with the format to become successful, and further to the point, the best entity to impose taxes upon are those that actually have an abundance of assets and money, because they can afford to pay it.
The question then comes as to whether or not those that are gifted through the usage of, for example, tax attorneys, or connections with influential legislators, should be seen as “smart” for reducing or even eliminating their tax liability and thereby even to take pride that they have done so, which thus makes them appear to have played the tax game and succeeded in it. This would seem to suggest that it’s okay for those who could shoulder their fair amount of tax burden to utilize their adeptness at minimizing their taxation and nothing more needs to be said.
The counter argument to that is that the more complicated and convoluted a given tax code is, the more that tax code will be exploited by the very people and entities that know how to take advantage of such which is advantageous to them, but unfair to everyone else who don’t have those advantages, signifying that those that do not pay their fair share in taxes, should never be seen as smart, but rather should be seen for who and what they really are, unpatriotic, because at the end of the day, they don’t actually care about their country, but have put themselves instead at the front of the line as privileged people, thus burdening others to have to deal with the governmental obligations of the day, which isn’t fair and isn’t right, and thereby weakens the nation for not only does it serve to divide the people between the sheep and the goats, but makes therefore a country that is less united and much weaker, which is the mark of a country in decline.