Posted by
Andrews on Tuesday, February 17, 2009 12:47:58 AM
Just think about the past year. How many times did you interact with the government? I am not just talking about parking tickets, passport offices or waiting in line at the DMV, besides those direct contacts, how often was your life touched by the state? How about every pay day when you saw SUTA, FUTA, FICA, medicare, state tax, federal tax and everything else taken from your account? How about that tank of gas you bought with a massive tax added? How about the aspirin you took that had to be approved by the FDA and carry and FDA approved warning? Or when you visited your doctor and he had to consider tort liability and order tests as "defensive medicine"*? Or when you watched television, viewing one of the channels licensed and monitored by the FCC?
My point is, every day, in many ways, both large and small, the government is involved in almost everything we do. And that is simply wrong.
As I explained before, the government
should be a stranger to most people. Other than seeing police on patrol, voting, and maybe applying for a passport, ideally I would imagine most citizens would have no contact with the state. In fact, in my ideal state, the federal government would be almost invisible, with any government contact being with state or local governments, and even that relatively infrequent.
It is hard to believe, but that was once the reality in which everyone lived. People saw the government only when paying taxes, voting, or when they had committed a crime**. Prior to the Civil War, and even for some time after, maybe even until the 20th century, there was simply much less government. The states handled local affairs, and even then they did it with much less day to day contact with the average man.
And it worked. Some of our most prosperous periods were during this time. Not in dollar terms, granted, as we lacked today's inflation to balloon up the numbers, but considering either the budget surplus (and tax refund!!!) under Andrew Jackson, or the combination of falling prices and rising production we saw in the late 19th century, the lack of an intrusive government did not do the harm moderns imagine. Though many have been raised to think the 19th century was the era of robber barons and snake oil salesmen, the fact remains that whatever abuses there were pale in comparison to the abuses we still have, and the citizens of that time did not pay a fortune in taxes and surrender much of their freedom.
Which brings me to the sad truth. The supposed abuses of the 19th century, stock swindles, lack of safety, abusive employers, and so on, not only were nowhere near as bad as the caricature we often hear, but are also problems we have today. S, while we surrendered massive wealth and many freedoms, what we got in return was... nothing. While big government promised to make us safer, more secure and happier, it did none of that. All it gave us was bigger government.
Yet whenever I suggest restoring government to its proper size, people argue that it will allow this abuse or that to return, completely ignoring that the very abuse they fear continues today. After all, did the SEC stop Enron or Madoff? Did safety laws stop the peanut scare or lead paint from China? Did allowing doctors alone to prescribe antibiotics stop the creation of resistant strains? Did giving control of the money supply to the state stop the Great Depression, Carter's stagflation, or our current mess? Did a department of energy make energy any cheaper? Did a Department of Education result in better schools? The list goes on and on.
So why do we fear eliminating costly, intrusive agencies which provide no benefit? What do we have to fear from restoring our freedom?
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* Some may blame the lawyers, but it is the courts that allowed the standard of care to got from a reasonable expectation to a requirement of near perfection. For that matter it was the courts that moved medical malpractice out of the realm of contracts into that of torts and opened up this whole can of worms in the first place.
** I ignore the military here, as it is obvious those in the military have more contact with the government. Though in the past, the military itself was generally a state, not a federal, function. Whether that is better or worse than what we have is arguable, but the fact remains, in the past the federal government was much less intrusive.
*** I know most people support prescription laws, so I won't argue that here. Those interested can read "
Medical Regulations", "
Medical Regulation II", "
For Your Own Good" and "
Manipulating the Law", or examine my other blog (a bit neglected at the moment)
Examining the War on Drugs.