I agree with this as it normally applies so long as I am the one that gets to determine when spending is out of whack. But who is to say that spending is out of whack, as you put it? There is no budget possible that someone won't declare spending "out of whack." If you can reduce this "out of whack" business to objective terms than " spending out of whack" takes on a substantive meaning. Otherwise its an expression with wide appeal, but meaningless nevertheless, wouldn't you say?Taxes only become an issue when spending is out of whack.
I have claimed there is currently a breakdown in the U.S. tax system. I firmly believe this "breakdown" would exist even if we were to bring spending under much tighter control. Our broken tax system threatens our democracy, but not because we aren't taxing enough to hold down deficits, which we aren't. Too large deficits, if persistent, can be a side effect of taxes being "out of whack" with spending. And there is very likely a long term threat to the soundness of the Dollar posed by persistently too high deficits. I'm more concerned about an immediate threat of another kind however. The threat I perceive has little to do with government spending, but everything to do with bad tax policy and the threat this poses to our democracy.
I maintain that there are good reasons to tax. Thinking of taxes as raising money to spend, however, will confuse the issue, even though we do spend tax revenue. My thinking on this point is radical!, and I expect it to raise some hackles. This has taken the usual form equivalent to "you are full of shit". This full of shit thing comes always from those who believe that government raises taxes in order to get money to spend , and when government spends more then its revenue allows, it must borrow the difference. The MMT economists reject this claim as false. On this point, I am in total agreement with their radical view.