TAX THE SPACE TOURISTS.

I have released and invite you to read a free issue of Roy Edroso Breaks It Down (Subscribe! Cheap!) about Bezos and other billionaires shooting into near-space, and how strenuously conservatives are defending them from the many normal Americans who have responded to their well-publicized playdates-with-destiny with mockery, insults and (most of all) calls for the fuckers to be taxed like the rest of us if not more. 

Some leading rightwingers are therein considered (McArdle, Baseball Crank, and Podhoretz, who actually compares Bezos to Magellan) but others keep speed-crawling toward the richies’ asses. A National Review editorial claims the billionaires’ “achievements should be celebrated by all who value the ingenuity of the untrammeled human spirit,” as if anyone who wasn’t already kissing their butts for the great achievement of being rich would be convinced by the fact that they got scientists and engineers to make them their own mini-NASAs and spent a few moments replicating feats achieved over fifty years ago by the despised Big Government.

I suppose if these nobs bought weapons of war on the open market and used them to invade and conquer some tiny country, National Review would demand we applaud that, too. (Though, come to think of it, isn’t that a little too close to what Reagan did to Grenada? But then Reagan, being President, was obliged to use public resources to invade, ugh! Erik Prince, it’s your time to shine!) 

NR closes:

Americans should seek to build atop these admirable breakthroughs and to ensure that, 20, 30, 40 years hence, when the next vaultingly ambitious entrepreneurs try something astonishing of their own, they, too, find a safe and welcoming reception on American soil.

And of course they’re already doing “something astonishing”: Building remote redoubts on distant islands and in mountain hideaways for themselves where – when the breakdown in order and climate catastrophe engendered by their greed and neglect (and, in the case of press lords like Murdoch, encouraged by their actions) turns America and indeed the world into an utter hellhole – they can chillax with robot slaves and private infrastructures, and maybe plan future space jaunts to see if they can’t bequeath Mars to their offspring.

Tax their asses off, I say. Most Americans agree. And some polities like Washington, D.C. and politicians like Bernie Sanders (and not just him anymore!) are getting on board. Now that’s “something astonishing” that should “find a safe and welcoming reception on American soil,” alright!