[jkmcf]

  As if the taxpayers should automatically give billions to Harvard, no matter what Harvard does. That's insanity (to me at least).

AFAIK, Harvard doesn't get money for nothing -- it's primarily for research. The demands are orthogonal to what Harvard provides: top tier talent for whatever the government sees fit to fund.

  It's amazing how communist problems always end with: "you eventually run out of other people's money"

It's always someone else's money. Roads suck? You probably have too many roads for other people's money to fix. The list goes on. Libertarian dreams of self-sufficiently die when their money has to pay for things. Unless you meant feudalism or plutocracy, where wealth primarily flows away from the working class.

Humans are creatures of community. There will always be taxes for any sufficiently developed people, the only hope is they serve the public good and aren't funneled into the oligarchs' pockets.