Posted on 01/05/2006 3:31:29 AM PST by The Raven
The problem with government is that it is run by people, and people are flawed. They are not virtue machines. We are all of us, even the best of us, vulnerable to the call of the low: to greed, conceit, insensitivity, ruthlessness, the desire to show you're in control, in charge, in command.
If the problem with government is that it is run by people and not, as James Madison put it, angels, the problem with big government is that it is run by a lot of people who are not angels. They can, together and in the aggregate, do much mischief. They can and inevitably will produce a great deal of injustice, corruption and heartlessness.
People in government--people in a huge, sprawling government--often get carried away. And they don't always even mean to. But they are little tiny parts of a large and overwhelming thing. If government is a steamroller, and that is in good part how I see it, the individuals who work in it are the atoms in the steel. The force of forward motion carries them along. There is inevitably an unaccountability, and in time often an indifference about what the steamroller rolls over. All the busy little atoms are watching each other, competing with each other, winning one for their little cluster. And no one is looking out and being protective of what the steamroller is rolling over--traditions, shared beliefs, individual rights, old assumptions, whatever is being rolled over today.
(Excerpt) Read more at opinionjournal.com ...
Peggy is the 1st nominee for the 2006 Adrian Huffington Award for Rabid Media Stupidity.
Republicans can still succeed and even grow as a force in Washington. It would be nice if they would deserve to grow as a force.
There are still some Republicans in DC that understand what they need to do. I guess in November I will think we are making progress if we can add to the number and make the addition, well, conservatives, thus adding to the few.
Still, I don't think the leadership is smart enough or has enough self control to govern as conservatives. And, domestically, Bush isn't now and never has been the least bit conservative (beyond taxes and judges). It's pretty sobering for those of us that believe in federalism.
I hope if anyone is convicted of accepting Abramoff bribes that they are locked up and the key is melted into oblivion.
So you like big government? Government so big that it doesn't see what is crushed as it rolls along? Freedom, liberty, individualism merely splats on the sidewalk?
Conservatism hasn't changed. Our elected republicans sure have.
I like the imagery.
"Some neoconservatives these days argue big government is OK so long as it is conservative big government representing values in which they believe. Big government is not OK. Every inch the government grows, the same inch is taken from the liberties of the people, starting with the basic liberty of spending your own money the way you choose rather than the way the government chooses to spend it for you. Massive programs inevitably have unintended consequences; government, though necessary for many purposes, is no more a precision instrument for constructive social change than a sledgehammer is for brain surgery."
--Jay Ambrose
"Already the hour is late. Government has laid its hand on health, housing, farming, industry, commerce, education, and to an ever-increasing degree interferes with the people's right to know. ... We approach the point of no return when government becomes so huge and entrenched that we fear the consequences of upheaval and just go along with it."
-- Ronald Reagan
Peggy conveniently forgets that Ronald Reagan increased revenue many fold to the US treasury as a result of his tax cuts........but spending outpaced income and nearly tripled the deficit.
We get the government we deserve. May your chains wear lightly ;-)
It is not just the politicians that deserves the blame. Farmers want more subsidies, Drug companies, and others want their corporate welfare. Real Estate professionals want to keep the home interest deduction. The list is endless. We lost the battle when FDR and later LBJ vastly increased the spending of the Federal Government.
I want behavior modification. No smoking, speed limits, seat belts, helmets for skateboarders, etc.
And compassionate wealth redistribution too. </sarc>
At some point I think our pseudo-democracy (it shouldn't be a democracy at all, but it is acting like one) reached the point where half the voters figured out they could get cash from the other half, via the ballot box, all legal.
Stolen for my profile page. I wonder what year President Reagan made the second quote?
You are exactly right. Since half the population pays 97% of the income taxes, the other half keeps playing the victim card and we get bigger Government.
"If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place, oblige it to control itself."
Of course he does. His little cluster of steel atoms are nominally in the majority right now. Any forethought that at some point the opposing team might be in the majority is cast aside as long as "our team" can grab power now.
But conservatives are not supposed to like big government. It's not our job. We're supposed to like freedom and the rights of the individual. (Individuals aren't virtue machines either, but they're less powerful than governments and so generally less damaging.) We're supposed to be on the side of the grass the steamroller flattens.
Maybe you don't understand because Peggy is a conservative and you're a reactionary partisan, merely an anti-liberal.
So9
Huh. That what I thought. Apparently, that's not true any more.
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