Rob: When it comes to government, less is better

Scott: If “less is better” regarding government, then surely “no government at all” would be perfect. No national defense, no transportation, education, treaties, environmental regulations, trade policies, national currency. Nirvana!

Rob:

with all due respect, what a load of horse muffins. I didn’t say none is best nor even infer it. Government bueracracy has spiraled out of control. Polititcians looking to make a name for themselves are forced to introduce legislation where none is needed… manditory bicycle helm usage for example.
The federal gov should maintain our borders and protect us from foreign enemies (this includes the interstate highway system.) it should settle disputes between states and the other few responsibilities outlined by the constitution. It should not be involved in soscial security, medicade or any other social entitlements. Those should be the purview of the states. If they want to mandate a certain amount be saved from the wages of a worker to be used for retirement… then the oney should be set aside in indavidual accounts. I have been working for the government for over 20 years now and it seems what ever they get involved in inevitably gets screwed up. They are fiscally irresponcible, doling out earmarked pork to their buddies, and advancing their thirst for power. Yes we need less government.

There is a need for government, but to paraphrase one of my favorite people again…. anyone who desires power should not be allowed to have it. We need term limits. Not career politicians

My less is better was a short comment out of time constraint nessesity. It was not intended to be an three word solution to the worlds problems.

Scott:
The “less is better” sounds more like a sound-bite than a practical philosophy, much less a plan.

Clearly government is necessary. It may be that “less government than we have now is better”, but where do we draw the line? Where do we start cutting? What constitutes “less”?Shall we take away middle-class social-security benefits and national defense, those are by far the largest budget-sinks in the government.

I agree with the first paragraph in totality.

Old Ben was a very ambitious fellow, as were Washington, Lincoln, Jefferson, etc. etc. I suspect one must have ambition and the motivation (desire) it instills in order to seek or accept public office. I suspect that a real problem with the way ambition is treated is that it is confused with conceit and the seeking of personal power. Ben was being disingenuous with his comment. He too was ambitious and desired public power, but in an almost super-human legacy of success, his ambition was almost always to help his neighbors, his city and his country.

My reply wasn’t intended to poke (or pique) you. One of my favorite tools for thinking about a problem is to take it to extremes and see where it leads. I tend to do that most especially whenever somebody makes an (over) general statement. It actually helps me think about *why* a notion doesn’t work in extremes, which then leads to thoughts about what constitutes reasonable moderation and why. It takes just a trivial amount of effort to say, “Smaller is better within limits” than just “smaller is better.” I know of many folks much less astute than you who would say something like the latter without thinking at all about limits, practicalities etc. They would just be paying lip-service to restating words which made them feel all warm-and-fuzzy when they first heard them. I didn’t cross my mind that you believed that “none is best”; it did cross my mind that you appealed to an easy and readily available catch-phrase which conveyed little real information because of its enormous ambiguity.

Your second paragraph is indicative of our diverging philosophies.

1) What if one state offers state medical insurance and another doesn’t? Won’t all the sick people move to the insured state? No way will the members of *that* state (now mostly sick) vote to give up their insurance. No way will the non-taxed state offer health-benefits and suffer a deluge of unhealthy citizens.
2) What if prescription drug benefits are decided and regulated on a state-by-state basis? Won’t it cause pharmaceutical companies to provide more timely drugs to the states which earn them more money?
3) Something as basic and seemingly simple as tax differences between the states will lead to competition for workers. Businesses in states with higher taxes must pay their workers more to compensate in comparison to low-tax states. The implication is that inter-state commerce will see goods and services offered at markedly different prices (a DJ or pet-groomer from Indiana may be half as expensive as one from Chicago, a piece of Montana candy could be much less expensive than New York candy). It would also affect capital available for investment on a state-by-state basis. All this means that there would be fifty competing micro-economies instead of an integrated national economy, and our pre-eminence in the world market would start to be fragment.
4) For government to function well in a republic it must take in a significant fraction of the GDP. If those taxes are levied at the state level, we become more like individual nations. It also means vastly different economic opportunities and social support services from state-to-state. Again, we become more like 50 countries.
5) The Interstate system had the single largest positive impact on the national economy of any government-sponsored infrastructure project since the Trans-Continental Railroad. Eisenhower wasn’t just impressed about the Autobahn’s ability to move troops, he was deeply appreciative of the way it aided the logistics of the entire German economy.
6) Ever since the Federal Government got involved in a big way in managing and moderating the economy, and since they began offering social services, absolute poverty levels have diminished tremendously and the economy has gone about 70 years without a major economic catastrophe. There’s no way the states could collude to bring about the same result on a national level – whatever “national” would mean. The Constitution does not give the Federal government:
a. the right to establish a central bank,
b. a mandate to provide guarantees of bank investments (FDIC)
c. a responsibility to protect scarce national resources
d. a charter for space exploration
e. a social support mechanism
f. ensure food and drug safety
g. respond to local disasters
h. the obligation to determine the constitutionality of congressional laws
i. A power to restrict child-labor
j. Specify uniform patent and copyright laws
k. among many other things.

If each of these were left to the states, they’d either not get done, or when done would lead to virtually independent nations due to lack of consistency. Strict constitutionalists would create a central government lacking the glue necessary to bind us into a great society.

I’m willing to admit that the Federal government gets involved in things it shouldn’t, and that it is depressingly overburdened with partisanship, cronyism, special-interest pandering, corporate collusion, inefficiency and graft. Upon giving it thought, reason informs me that reverting to originally-specified constitutional powers would be an even worse mess. It’s not perfect, and it can certainly get better: but we are still the wealthiest, most cohesive yet diverse nation on Earth. Surgery is more appropriate than evisceration.

Thursday, August 3rd, 2006 @ 11:14 pm Towards a New Liberalism
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