Washington Post does Fact Checking on Ron Paul's IRS Policy

One of the main reasons that people support Ron Paul is because of his promises to cut taxes. "We could completely eliminate that IRS," they promise, "We just need to go back to 2000 spending levels." A bold claim. An appealing claim. But is it true? Michael Dobbs of the Washington Post does the fact checking, and gives Four Pinocchios for Ron Paul:

This seemed too good to be true, and it was. Without the revenues from individual income tax, the federal budget would shrink to the size it was in the early 1990s, not the year 2000. The discretionary share of the federal budget--the money the government spends on defense, the federal bureaucracy, the environment, education, and health--would dwindle to zero. All remaining federal revenues would be earmarked for mandatory entitlement spending such as social security--which Paul has said he would not touch--and interest on debt.

Remember, kids, there's no such thing as a free lunch.