During the George W. Bush years, Republicans gained total control of the federal government for the first time in half a century. While this was obviously better than the alternative, it was still fraught with peril because the temptation was to believe that “big government” becomes “compassionate conservativism” and thus becomes our friend when “our guys” are in control of it. Instead of dismantling the statist monstrosity threatening liberty, we just tried to manage it better. And now as we see what truly committed statists are capable of with a government this big – whether it’s the IRS scandal, NDAA, American citizens placed on a drone “kill list” without due process of law, or the now emerging NSA surveillance story – our partisan naiveté about the nature of big government is coming home to roost. We conservatives would’ve been wise to listen to our libertarian friends about the potential danger of setting a precedent that government can become the good guy provided the good guys are running the joint. We forgot that government is neither good nor bad, but what George Washington once famously compared to a dangerous tool like fire. Both government and fire are necessary to a point of limitation, but left on their own they can quickly rage to the point of diminishing returns. We didn’t dismantle the IRS when we had the chance, but instead let the “good guys” use it to pick winners and losers. We didn’t dismantle the surveillance state, but instead introduced it ourselves as a response to a post-9/11 world. We just trusted that we weren’t going to exchange freedom for security because the “good guys” were in charge. And I admit I fell for it hook, line, and sinker myself. This Judeo-Christian distrust of human nature even resulted in the presumption of innocence for the individual being introduced into our very rule of law from the outset, but we are currently abandoning that presumption. When confronted by the IRS the burden of proof is on the defendant not the prosecution. Mass surveillance of the American people places a presumption of guilt upon the governed, and a presumption of innocence upon a government as if it is somehow incapable of the very injustices it claims to be fighting against. Government – not the Creator – is now the ultimate barometer of truth and justice. That faulty assumption is always the premise that lies at the heart of every tyranny ever known to human history. Soon it will be 12 years since the September 11th attacks that ushered in a world where television shows like Person of Interest are no longer fiction but ripped from the headlines. In the 12 years since we have accumulated more debt and more government than we’ve ever had, with less freedom and less prosperity to boot. Sadly, it appears we have a done a better job attacking our own liberty than the Jihadists have.
Posted on: Sat, 15 Jun 2013 17:49:48 +0000
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