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“Progressives” recognize that some people will be irresponsible and cause damage by using firearms. They conclude the State must therefore prohibit everyone from access to firearms.
“Conservatives” recognize that some people will be irresponsible and cause damage by using drugs. They conclude the State must therfore prohibit everyone from access to drugs.
Libertarians reccognize that some people will be irresponsible and cause damage regardless of what the State does. They conclude the State’s prohibitions cause more harm than irresponsible indviduals.
Denver Post columnist Ed Quillen defends public workers in his column today. The headline is “Who are the overpaid parasites?” Not public employees, according to Ed. In support of his proposition, he lists several wonderful anecdotes of public employees doing wonderful things.
But like the wonderful progressive he is, Ed never mentions how much his wonderful anecdotal public employees get paid. Not once. You see, cost matters not to compassionate, wonderful progressive people like Ed. Cost is irrelevant in his wonderful world of selfless wonderful public servants. They are wonderful. Worrying about such nasty capitalistic things as “cost” is so un-progressive. It is so non-compassionate. It is so un-wonderful.
And we all know, in Ed’s wonderful world, money does not make the world go ’round. Love does.
How wonderful.
A. Libertarians believe in free markets.
B. Conservatives believe in free markets.
- Except in labor. Foreigners shouldn’t be allowed to take jobs away from Americans. If an American company wants to hire a foreigner, who is willing and able to do a job just as well and for less money than an American, the government should use its force to prohibit that. It is for the greater good.
- And except for marijuana. People shouldn’t be allowed to smoke marijuana. It is bad for them. If they would rather not get drunk but would rather voluntarily chose to smoke some reefer, the government should use its force to prohibit that. It is for the greater good.
- And except for prostitution. If people want to mutually and voluntarily agree to exchange that particular service for money, the government should use its force to prohibit that. It is for the greater good.
At what point do the exceptions overwhelm the rule?
C. Progressives don’t believe in the free market. It is cold and heartless. The government should use its force to keep free markets in check. Free markets are not for the greater good.
Conclusion:
Conservatives and progressives both pretend to know what is for “the greater good.” They know, deep down in their well-meaning hearts, that the government use of force is necessary to advance “the greater good.” They both know people are too stupid to make their own decisions and need a benevolent protector to set them straight. They, of course, are willing to be that benevolent protector.
Libertarians know that all of us make bad decisions, but using government force to correct them is arrogant, immoral and unworkable. When we abdicate our personal decisions to some arbiter of the “greater good,” we are knocking on the gates of serfdom. We’ve already traveled the road.
Michael Gerson, of the Washington Post, demonstrates how “progressive” statists feel about their fellow man:
“Social Security abolition would push perhaps 13 million elderly Americans into destitution.”
(See “Why the Tea Party is toxic for the GOP.”)
Gerson, and statists like him, think so little of the American people that he believes we would let 13 million Americans starve to death in the streets if the government did not compel us to subsidize Social Security. Statists of all stripe believe that humanity is base, immoral, greedy, heartless and cold.
Statists believe that but for the enlightened ones, like them, making us all commit “good deeds” through government force, we’d callously step over dying old folks in the street on the way to our jobs on Wall Street.
I’m sure Gerson sees us all twirling our moustaches as we laughed at dying old ladies in alley ways.
Libertarians know that if we didn’t have to pay 14% of our income toward Social Security, there would be fewer destitute elderly people; there would be more private money to assist the remaining destitute; and that there is no worse tyranny than forcing someone to pay for what he does not want merely because you think it is good for him.
Denver Post columnist Susan Greene is one of my favorite progressives. Her columns are uniformly thoughtful, even when I disagree with one of her statist positions.
In her column today, “ Apathy adds insult to injury,” she calls out the Colorado Department of Regulatory Agencies (DORA) for its, well, let’s just call it ineffectiveness. (A blogger less polite than me might have used the word incompetence.) Greene describes how the state agency has “stonewalled” a legitimate complaint, “failed miserably to offer any recourse” and mocks DORA’s claim that “consumer protection is [its] mission.”
I can not see this as anything but a complete intellectual disconnect of a very smart person between (1) the recognition of the ineffectiveness of government programs and (2) the desire for more government programs.
Statists of every strip – “progressive” to “conservative” – regularly display this disconnect.
Greene demonstrates a “progressive” example. Some “conservatives,” however, regularly lambaste the government for its ineffectiveness when it comes to social programs, then jump into the government’s lap when it comes to issues like the Patriot Act, expanding police power to search citizens, warrantless wiretapping and the regulation of private consensual acts of adults.
Classical liberals (modern libertarians) understand that the state should have less power over the individual and not more – in every single solitary instance.
Classical liberals understand that individuals are imperfect – but that the state forces imperfection upon them.
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