I keep talking to Libertarians, whose view is so obviously bankrupt that I can hardly figure out how anyone would fall for that. But at the same time, I get accused of wanting government in every nook and cranny of our lives, which is just as obviously wrong. It’s a thorny problem, and one that has been festering in America almost since its inception: where does government belong, and where should it leave well enough alone? Libertarians and Tea Party folks would limit government beyond what is even remotely reasonable. Many progressives would extend it beyond what makes any sense. As usual, the right answer is somewhere in the middle.
The flimsy underpinnings of the Libertarian/Tea Party stance are most easily demonstrated in Rand Paul’s recent comments about the Civil Rights Act. While in the end he said he’d have supported it, that came after days of waffling and (more particularly) after expressing his discomfort with the act in several venues. His argument against the Civil Rights Act is not a racist one, as I’ve pointed out before. Rather, it is a philosophical question in his mind (and in the minds of many Libertarians) about the role of government in our private lives. In a nutshell, the argument goes like this: while government very properly prohibited discrimination in the public square, it should really stay out of the private lives of citizens. They can think whatever nutcase thing they want, and they can do whatever they like. In short, many Libertarians would not have shut down the segregated lunch counters in the South, on the grounds that it’s none of anyone’s business what those folks want to think. This is not to say that they would support those people or that they’d like it, but they would like government staying in the public arena and staying out of the private. So, how would the right things happen? Well, apparently the market would fix everything: you and I (and everyone else) would never shop at places with wacko ideas about whom to serve (or not), and before long the bigot behind the lunch counter is out of a job. The free market does its thing.
Only, umm, a laissez-faire government (at least with respect to racial discrimination) was precisely what they had in the south back then, and it didn’t fix itself (and it never would have). Nor would oil companies regulate themselves in such a way as to keep from fouling our waters. And don’t even get me started on Wall Street. There are party lines spouted by Libertarians (primarily, that our economic problems were a result of government forcing folks to make worse and worse loans) that have the rather thorny problem of not squaring – at all – with facts.
It’s not elitist to suggest that it should matter, to everyone, that these movements are led by folks (the insipid Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, et. al.) who have barely one diploma to split amongst them. That’s not “I’m better than you”: it’s common sense. Perhaps, in fact, this is why they are so barren rationally, and why their illogic is so staggering.
But the other side is no better: I have argued for very limited public involvement in the markets (really, just for healthcare), but everyone should be prepared to admit that socialism is a failed experiment. While I think we did what we had to do to steady the markets (and remember: at the outset both parties supported “bailouts”), government does not belong in the auto industry in the long term. It shouldn’t own banks. It shouldn’t “seize” BP (except, maybe, by the neck).
The amount of waste in government is staggering, and neither party has shown the slightest interest in stopping it. One example will give us a good indication of how far we’ve gone wrong: we have 62 programs administered by 7 different Federal agencies dealing with the issue of child medical care and nutrition for children younger than 6 years of age. It’s past the point of “bad” on the dial and into the “truly insane” level. Hence the overreaching Tea Party, which is really just a hard counterweight against a government that has swung too hard in the opposite direction.
The question of where government belongs, and where it does not, is not solvable in a blog post — it’s the fundamental argument of the past 234 years; fifteen minutes won’t fix it. But one would normally be safe thinking it’s somewhere in the middle: yes not only to roads and armies, but also to education, healthcare and oversight of industries capable of harming unwitting citizens if mismanaged (Wall Street, food and product safety, oil exploration…). No not only to sin taxes and most subsidies, but also to mortgage interest deductions and most entitlement programs.
I like to think of it this way: If I can easily map the idea to one of our inalienable rights (life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness), then I can consider it a go. If I have to torture it to make such a mapping, then it’s a no. Army = life. Healthcare = life. Education = liberty, or the pursuit of happiness. Preventing oil companies from spoiling our beaches and wetlands = happiness. Preventing Wall Street from gambling with my money in ways that are riskier than I ever agreed to = liberty. Encouraging me to buy a home instead of renting one through subsidizing that purchase = ??? Protecting me from poor choices of my own = ???
Hard questions still arise: there is often a debate over whether Dems want a level playing field, or just level results. But give us the benefit of the doubt for a second: if I could guarantee you that a certain action to be taken by government had purely the effect of offering citizens level opportunities, and not results, is it government’s job to do that? I’d fit that easily under either “liberty” or “pursuit of happiness.” Would you?
