Your Opinion: Voters applauded for rejecting tax

Dear Editor:

I was heartened and in no way surprised that my fellow voters rejected the recent attempt to intimidate the taxpayers of this state into voting higher taxes upon themselves.

Why did the measure fail? Some say because taxpayers' budgets are stretched to their limits while others say people are tired of paying more taxes and getting less. Both are accurate in my opinion. But also, we are tired of being manipulated one election after another.

Recently I have heard doomsday comments indicating how the roads will inevitably deteriorate and some bridges will even close. This is just more scare tactics being promoted by slick, double-speak politicians. However, it would not surprise me if they intend to force this to occur. But we need to stand strong against these scare tactics.

As I pointed out in an earlier letter, the MoDOT budget was cut nearly 30 percent from $2.958 million in 2011 to $2.108 million in 2014, while in the same time frame, the state revenue increased 12 percent from $7.110 billion to $8.000 billion.

Why would politicians cut such a critical budget so severely when, by their own admission, roads are the arteries to our economy. The only conclusion I can arrive at is that they wish to manipulate the taxpayer into voting more taxes upon themselves by perpetrating inconveniences and deteriorating roads purposefully.

I applaud my fellow voters for not falling for these deviant ploys by voting no on the road tax increase. I encourage all to write you congressmen and let them know how we have seen though their political gamesmanship. Furthermore, instruct our employees, the politicians, to restore the MoDOT budget to 2011 levels and correct this issue through smarter, thrifty spending. Turn off the spigot of free money to those who are capable of working.

Every legislation and regulation that our federal, state and/or local governments inflict upon us reduces someone's personal, economic and/or religious freedoms.