Barry Goldwater’s ‘Conscience of a Conservative’ Chapter 1

So…onto chapter 2. ‘The Perils of Power’

Goldwater’s opening paragraph hits with both fists.

The New Deal, Dean Acheson wrote approvingly in a book called “A Democrat Looks at His Party’ , “conceived of the federal government as the whole people organized to do what had to be done .” A year later Mr Larson wrot A Republican Looks At His Party , and made much the same claim as in his book for Modern Republicans. The ‘underlying philosophy’ of the New Republicanism, said Mr Larson, is “that is a job has to be done to meet the needs of the people, and no one else can do it, then it is the proper function of the federal government.’

Let that sink in.

Both parties utterly and completely repudiate the founding principle of limited government. Things have not changed either. Many in the GOP and the Dems both are for larger and larger government. One is just for slower growth of government. The end result is the same, Leviathan without a defined limit, an endlessly expanding monster fed by both sides of the aisle! What of the founding principles?

He continues: ‘…and they propound the first principle of totalitarianism: that the State is competent to do all things and is limited in what it actually does only by the will of those who control the state.’  .
This view, both from the democrats and republicans is in direct conflict with and total disrespect for the Constitution that is intended to limit the functions and scope and size of government!
This same expanding government, be it run by democrats or many of the GOP, cannot outrun the historical legacy that government is the single most powerful and ‘chief instrument for thwarting man’s liberty’.

So, we are back to the Hobbes v Locke arguments again. Goldwater says that State power preforming the legitimate functions of government should not restrict freedom, but absolute power always does, this creates a sliding scale from true anarchy to police state.  A government that ‘can’ restrict freedoms ultimately will. Lets place Obamacare and the recent NSA spying in this box. Power is the drug, the sex, in DC.

The founders lived through the single authority, state as master, absolute political system. They understood that the natural tendency of government is to move toward absolutism. The founders created a system where power is separated and spread on several layers of government that should always be protective of its own power and by being that, check the other branches of government. Sadly. This has failed, especially in the relationship between the States and Fedgov.

So, how to measure Fedgov? First, size of financial operations as a percent of GDP over time. We don’t have to get into this here as it is known by all. Second, scope of activities in things like land ownership, medicine, insurer, mortgage broker, employer, debtor, taxer and spender, ponzi scheme manager in Social Security. Third, how much of the people’s earning, their blood and sweat, does Fedgov take in the form of taxes? Fourth, what is the extent of government interference in the day to day lives of the citizens? We are no longer a country of law, we are a country of regulation where each individual has to operate every day in a smaller and smaller box of compliance. Everyone on this blog has heard me rail about this.

SO how did we get here? Easy, both sides lied to us. the Dems lied to us on how far and how big government would be expanded and the GOP lied that it would cut the size of government down in real terms. We are suckers of the first order. Lets just spend a little on this, hey, you like this program…well, everyone likes their own pets. We have traded liberty for security since 9/11. We have failed Franklin’s tests. First: “A Republic, if you can keep it”, and second, ‘They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.’

How do we step back and reverse the ever larger and ever intrusive government that will in the end become the Leviathan? Goldwater offers this, “The turn will come when we entrust the conduct of or affairs to men who understand that their first duty as public officials is to divest themselves of the power that they have been given.”

Are there any out there?  Who will take this to the stump:

“I have little interest in streamlining government or in making it more efficient, for I mean to reduce its size. I do not undertake to promote welfare, for I propose to extend freedom. My aim is to not pass laws, but to repeal them. It is not to inaugurate new programs, but to cancel old ones that do violence to the constitution, or that have failed in their purpose, or that impose on the people unwarranted financial burden. I will not attempt to discover whether legislation is ‘needed’ before I first determine if it is Constitutionally permissible. And if I should ever be attacked for neglecting my constituents’ ‘interests’ I shall reply that I was informed their main interest is liberty and that in that cause I am doing the very best I can.”

Personal liberty, State’s right’s, and smaller government. Is that so much to ask?