We have a situation where this country has been driven by the Tea Party for the last number of years. When I was in school, I studied government and I learned about the anarchists. Now, they were different than the Tea Party because they were violent. But they were anarchists because they did not believe in government in any level and they acknowledged it. The Tea Party kind of hides that.
They don't say they're against government, but that is what it all amounts to. They're not doing physically destructive things to buildings and people, directly, but they are doing everything they can to throw a monkey-wrench into every form of government, whether it's local, state or federal. That's what it's all about. And so, anything they can do to through a monkey-wrench in the wheels of government, they're happy doing that. And I'm sorry to say that my friend from Oklahoma is helping them. Maybe not directly, but indirectly, and that's wrong. Government is not inherently bad; government is inherently good. That's why we have a Constitution and that's what we direct the activities of this government based upon. (Senate Floor, April 23, 2013)
Harry, Harry, Harry, where to begin to discuss this insanity of yours? Tea Party people and organizations never said they were against government, they are just against bad government, oppressive government, wasteful government, the type of government and government policies that you and others have been operating for a long time.
You mistakenly interpret our disgust and frustration with the American political class as disgust and frustration with the American form of government as laid out in the Constitution. Our disgust and frustration is not with our government structure but with the way you and others operate within and outside of that structure.
Here is how the Tea Party supporters and probably most of America view our form of government (double click on the picture for a larger view):
The Constitution and Bill of Rights are the foundation of our form of government, with the tenets of liberty laid out in these documents executed by a minimalist Federal government which puts individual American freedom at the pinnacle of this Freedom pyramid.
Unfortunately, people like yourself have perverted this concept of freedom in the following manner:
In your perverted view of government, the political class is at the pinnacle, not individuals and individual freedoms. That is what many object to, this perverted pyramid of freedom, not the desired, original, Constitutional pyramid of freedom.
Note: a more detailed discussion of these pyramids can be accessed at:
http://loathemygovernment.blogspot.com/2012/11/the-freedom-pyramid-where-it-is-and.html
Government is not inherently good as you contend, government is inherently necessary. The original intent of government was to have a limited, centralized entity to do a limited number of functions for citizens that could be done more efficiently, inexpensively, and effectively from a central process. Build and maintain roads and other infrastructure, provide protection of citizens with an unbiased police force and judicial system, provide for a common national defense, and a few other, limited functions.
Our government today in Washington is not inherently good, it is a bloated, expensive, ineffective, and dangerous bureaucracy:
- The Federal government and the political class that operate it are neither inexpensive, effective, or efficient.
- They have run up a national debt of almost $17 TRILLION, an individual debt of over $50,000 for every man, woman, and child in America.
- And as a U.S. Senator once said, Colorado Senator Michael Bennet, in the Washington Post on September 3, 2010: "We have managed to acquire $13 TRILLION of debt on our balance sheet. In my view, we have nothing to show for it." No modern infrastructure, no first class education system, no national energy strategy, nothing to show for a debt that has grown from $13 trillion to almost $17 trillion in less than three years.
- Decades after the problems of illegal drugs, failing public education, skyrocketing health care costs, crumbling infrastructure, leaky borders, and overpowering military/industrial complex, etc. were identified as national problems affecting almost every American, the Federal government has managed to resolve none of them while spending and wasting TRILLIONS of the dollars in the process.
- To fund this bloated bureaucracy with no societal benefit in return, our tax freedom day, the day when we stop working for government and politicians and begin working for our families and ourselves is now been pushed out to the latter part of April, raising the question: when does the cost of government and the associated tax burden switch from taxation to oppression?
- Now that this administration, with the implicit approval of Congress, has made it clear that it can, it will, and already has assassinated American citizens without due process of law, how can you still say that government is inherently good and that our government operates under the principles of the Constitution?
- Given that the Washington political class and its passage of the Patriot Act, NDAA, and other freedom suppressing measures can bug, track, and maintain records of all forms of our communications without due process or warrants and can hold us in prison indefinitely on the whim of a politician, we have certainly mutated away from an semblance of a good government.
- Good government does not waste billions and billions of taxpayer dollars and wealth on crony-based and failed alternative energy companies, large banks, and other industries.
- Good government does not waste billions of taxpayer dollars and wealth on absolutely stupid programs such as investigating how shrimp behave on an underwater treadmill, funding the construction of robotic squirrels to see how they interact with snakes, researching the sex lives of New Zealand snails, measuring duck genitalia lengths, developing a half million computer program to simulate prom week, and tens of thousands of other idiotic wastes of money.
- Good government does not lose over two hundred billion dollars a year to waste and outright criminal fraud in its Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, food stamp, and unemployment benefit programs.
- Good government does not fail to collect over $380 billion a year from tax evaders.
The best that can be said about government is that it is necessary and needs to be kept under control. Remember that Hitler, Stalin, and the nut jobs in North Korea all operated or currently operate governments. None of them could be characterized as good, they are oppressive, brutal, and an insult to humanity, freedom and liberty.
So Harry, rather than criticize those you disagree with, unfairly and scandalously lumping them with anarchists, how about we tone down the hateful rhetoric and try to meet on some common ground? Those of us that love and respect liberty and freedom do not want to abolish government, we are not violent anarchists. We may want to minimize government, we may want to make it efficient, we may want to make it smaller so that it focuses on a smaller set of problems which hopefully gives it a better chance of resolving a major problem or two but we are not anarchists.
And by the way, we are not going away. So calling us names and insulting us when the evidence laid out above completely undermines your points, that government is inherently good, both here and around the world, does no one or the country any good.
I will say it again, minimal government is necessary. However, what is practiced today in Washington by yourself and others is neither good, effective, minimal, or worthwhile pursuing. Just because you do not always get your way does not mean that Tea Party people are wrong, they just have a different opinion, an opinion that you disrespect and create even deeper divisions within this country with your insults and slanderous rhetoric.
Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:
www.loathemygovernment.com
It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.
Please visit the following sites for freedom:
http://www.reason.com/
http://www.cato.org/
http://www.robertringer.com/
http://realpolichick.blogspot.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w
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