>>The US spends more on defense than the rest of the world, combined.

Good start. Worth noting that Trump started with a bang, vowing to reduce excessively expensive military purchases- before he got distracted by his every appointment blocked or subverted, his every comment willfully misconstrued, Russians under every bed (even beds nobody can actually see) and the insistence that signals about protestors are more important than anything else. As I keep saying, good luck rearranging those deck chairs instead of watching for the iceberg.

>>Who in the US is highly taxed?

I think you all are when you consider lack of imputation credits and federal plus state taxes, depending where you are.

>>Estate taxes (cleverly dubbed "death taxes" by the right) at the federal and state level have been slashed steadily since Reagan.

Whereas some other jurisdictions have no estate taxes. Or capital gain tax. Or gifting duties.

>>Sales taxes - the most regressive form of taxes - have risen steadily in order to fund the services that were once funded by income taxes on the wealthy.

I think most of the western world has sales tax now but the difference in the US is that the tax is not included in the sticker place as it is in many other jurisdictions. In some places it's illegal to publish prices that don't include the sales tax. So y'all are constantly reminded of the effect of the tax rather than just "the price". Certainly I agree that consumption tax favors those who enjoy surpluses while draining those who live hand to mouth but interestingly, in other jurisdictions that had imposed sales tax on virtuous goods like books or vegetables before pressure mounted to zero rate those goods: all evidence is that the tax is absorbed and the price stays the same, because prices are carefully managed these days to hit the affordability spot, no more and no less. Which explains why prolific producers like NZ manage to charge more for local produce at home than in foreign markets. Other places like the UK zero rate books and raw foodstuffs, but I'm not convinced that prices were 20% (the VAT sales tax rate) lower than elsewhere. Other interesting point is that in most jurisdictions, sales tax goes to "the state" singular rather to an individual state as in the US, so effectively it's another federal tax.