Government should follow rules too
(My Eastern New Mexico News column for July 22, 2020)
People seem confused about what role-- if any-- government plays in our lives. This misunderstanding causes problems.
Government was never intended to be the master, but the servant. Your servant doesn't tell you what you are allowed to do, nor punish you for not obeying him. The servant isn't allowed to do things in secret with the master's money, nor to keep any job-related secrets from the master. Your servant is accountable to you; never the other way around.
If someone takes a government job, they either accept their subservient position in society, or they can take a job-- without such strings attached-- in the productive sector. Forgetting their place should result in immediate unemployment with no chance of ever holding another government job.
Government wrongly claims to have the right to track everyone, spy on everything we do, collect all our information, and punish us for doing things we have the natural human right to do, but which government forbids. Nothing can trump natural human rights, not even the opinions of the vocal majority legislated and enforced by government employees.
Police across the state object to a requirement to wear body cameras so they can be held accountable to their bosses-- the people of the community. If they can't do their job under this condition, they are free to find other jobs. No one is forcing them to be police.
Locally, people are begging government for permission to re-open their restaurants, when government never had the legitimate authority to shut businesses in the first place. This illustrates the danger of allowing the servant to require business licenses. It's none of their business who opens what kind of business, and nothing can make it their business. Not even if "this is how we've always done it", which isn't true anyway.
Local government is even pretending it should have the power to dictate whether someone will be allowed to use their own property as a subdivision.
This is crazy!
If we are to continue to fund government and give it our occasional obedience there must be rules for it to follow. Since the Constitution has been ignored for the past century and a half or so, what do you suggest be tried next?
Those who want to keep political government around are the ones responsible for keeping it out of the lives of everyone else. If you won't rein in your troublesome servant, his misbehavior is on your head.
I feel like a SHTF event is imminent. Notice I don't say I think it is, rather it's just a feeling. Possibly triggered by the upcoming election.
I don't have a crystal ball. I'm almost definitely wrong.
If you can see it coming, it's not going to happen. That's almost a guarantee.
Just like the Coronapocalypse came at us out of nowhere, triggered by unexpected government overreactions to a fairly normal virus, a more serious event will also be a surprise. Consider the Coronapanic a practice run. It should have shown you the holes in your preps if you were paying attention.
I lucked out with the panicdemic because I was ready. Well, maybe it wasn't completely luck; I've prepped for years "just in case", and it finally paid off. I was pretty sure I wouldn't see it coming when it finally happened, and I didn't. But it didn't matter because I stay ready all the time-- and I have done so since well before the Y2K fizzle. I intend to be just as ready, if not more ready, the next time something ...
Sometimes it's good to just listen to people's stories without interrupting, even when you know the stories are nonsense.
My 2nd wife used to tell of a ghost that lived in her house when she was a kid. It was an interesting story even though I didn't believe it. I learned quickly that her family was very prone to believe anything as long as it fit with their magical worldview.
Other people tell me stories about beneficial things political government can do. These stories are no more true-- in the sense of being objective reality-- than ghost stories, but they can still be informative if you want to know which particular superstitions a person is living under.
Interrupt and you'll never hear the whole tale. Listen and you might be entertained by some fantastical tales of magical realms. Just don't bet your life on them being true.
My nature is such that I simply can't see government as a solution to anything. This puts me at odds with most of the rest of my species.
Yes, I think "social media" has become a horror. This doesn't mean I want government to regulate it; it means I think people who don't like it (or are too dumb to know not to take it at face value) should probably stop using it.
The same is true of so many other things I don't like.
Litter/pollution, scammers, sexual predators, abortion, animal cruelty, Hillary Clinton, poverty, drug abuse, pandemics, crime, and all manner of awful things.
I may hate them, but that doesn't mean I want government to step in. Look how often that has the opposite effect anyway; making the original problem worse-- or at least not solving it-- while also creating a host of new problems that never would have existed otherwise (anti-gun legislation being a perfect example).
And even if government intervention doesn't make this specific problem worse this particular ...
