Government

Maybe I’m just kidding myself, but I like to think I’m an independent – in the sense that I really don’t care what party label is attached to a candidate or an idea, all I care about are the merits of that idea.  I’m certainly not going to trust a particular idea to be good “because it was proposed by Democrats” or “because it’s sponsored by Senator X”.   Past results are no indicator of future performance.

I’ve voted for Democrats, I’ve voted for Republicans, but I  really like voting for “something different” – not either major party.  Breaking the deadlock of the two party system is something I feel would do the country a great deal of good, but more on that later…

If I had to declare an affiliation with a political party, I’d likely be a Libertarian.   When it comes to laws,I truly believe that – in everything – my right to swing my arm ends right before your nose.  No closer, no farther away.

The government’s job is to provide security from foreign invaders, not to protect us from ourselves.

In other words, suicide should be 100% legal, murder 100% illegal.

With that, I realize that the modern world requires that some things be regulated.  In an era when any reasonable person could look at merchandise in a store and have a basic understanding of it, “caveat emptor” worked.  In a world where technology has made it so it’s almost impossible for a layperson to even have a concept of how something works, much less evaluate everything that goes into a product, we need some form of agency that does that for us.

I also truly believe we – as a society – have a responsibility to provide for the unfortunate in our country.  Having a basic safety net – so people who are incapable of taking care of themselves, for whatever reason, is critical.  A basic fact of life is that there are always people who are just not functioning at as high a level as others, and a basic function of government is protecting those people from exploitation by others and making sure they have an opportunity to provide for the bare minimum needs of existence.

With that, the fundamental problem we have is that our government has most certainly NOT been working for “the people” – for decades.  Despite all the populist rhetoric it takes to gain office, once elected we know all our politicians do is pay attention to their own special interests.

Democrats and Republicans both.  Neither is any better than the other, both only take action that benefits real people if it should happen to coincide with a benefit to their interests.

Both recent Presidents – Bush II and Obama – are great examples.  Both had the opportunity to be the archetypes of their party philosophies – Bush the “get government out of our lives” guy and Obama the “hope and change” candidate.

Both have failed miserably. Not because they tried and failed, but because one in office they simply did not even try.  Neither did anything like what they promised, because once in office their highest priority became “keeping their special interests happy” rather than doing what is right for the people.