I’ve criticized centralization of power in Washington, and I’ve condemned efforts for global “economic governance.”
The simple message is that bureaucrats shouldn’t try to control our lives, regardless of whether those pencil-pushers reside in Washington or the United Nations.
These are points I made in this interview for Fox Business News.
The specific topic is a boondoggle project know as the White House Rural Council, but we also discuss a troubling U.N. scheme called Agenda 21.
Both are similar in that they are based on the idea that far-away bureaucracies (like this one) should have power over local communities.
Such bureaucrats all totally ignore the obvious truth that when they mandate something, then we’re not free to do it differently.
But when they stop trying to decide for us, then competition will show up the best way between our different ideas of how to do it.
This suggests that competition always works better…
As Le Gendre (?) said centuries ago – laissez nous faire! Loosely translated as: let us just get on with it!
Politicians always try to justify their existance by “helping” which allows them to continue then being paid without the exigencies of holding a regular job. Hardly ever run across a politician that is willing to help by divesting the government of power or control.
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Asking politicians to not “try to control our lives”…. Is unrealistic.
It is akin to companies creating advertisements saying “you don’t need out products”.
Ninety nine percent of the very product offered by politicians are simply forms of (mandatory) collectivism — almost by definition. Without mandatory collectivism, demand for politicians drops precipitously.
But, politicians can not only offer their product, but, are also in the unique position to establish themselves as monopoly suppliers of their product: mandatory collectivism. The only check against this monopoly is international competition. Competition in doing the very thing that politicians despise: refraining from offering the very product of politics, i.e. again various forms of (mandatory) collectivism. It is exactly because international competition is the only backstop to the politician’s monopoly that the “international” component of Mr. Mitchell’s cause is so vital to future human prosperity. This is the uniqueness of Mr. Mitchell’s blog and work.
Proponents of liberty and American cultural assets can preach to politicians and voters the morality and longer–term utilitarianism of individual freedom until the cows come home, but…. The voter and the politician who sells him the snake skin oil finds it irresistible to refrain from grabbing the majoritarian short term benefits of redistribution — and be captivated by the “five loaves and two fish of motivation turned into 6x average worldwide prosperity by the frivolous deception promises of interventionist economists — like Paul Krugman and the like.
The only aberrant voters that had more or less abstained from such normal behavior in recent history were Americans and this is why America became the most prosperous country in the world. But this aberrant American behavior was the result of the serendipitous fashion by which this country was created, in short, a minority of freedom loving English tradition individuals discovering a whole brand new continent. Alas, this serendipity will not be repeated, and entropy is finally taking over, reeling in the American voter into the worldwide norm mentality. His prosperity will thus soon follow into worldwide averagedom. With the lower growth trendline hidden under
the short term chaotic and fractal behavior modulating economic activity, the happy voters will check the “join the rest of the world in redistribution and central planning mentality but maintain 6x average worldwide prosperity” checkbox in November.
With America finally entering the vicious cycle of decline, humanity must now wait for a new paradigm of individual freedom and prosperity. To borrow from a religious phrase: “Praise the Lord and keep your gunpowder dry” or as I would interpret it: “Vote for freedom and keep your bags packed”…. and teach your children the flexibility of migration. That will become the ultimate backstop. All other efforts to defend liberty are commendable, but wishful thinking. And to neutralize my previous allusion to religion, I say, Darwinism will win again, for the betterment not only of species but also human freedom.
So, to return to politicians and citizens… it is the citizens who must defend their freedom. Assigning that task to politicians is like hiring the wolf to guard the chicken coop — like trying to bring around a tiger to becoming a vegetarian. Occasionally, a suicidal politician, or one who can lodge himself in the narrow niche of defending individual freedom against a juggernaut of political interest, actually does defend individual freedom… sometimes — but very-very rarely.
“Vote for freedom and keep your bags packed”
Too many Americans are opting for the so-called guilded cage of socialism never realizing why their lives are getting ever more miserable. It’s sad, and I’ve just about come to the conclusion that only the inevitable collapse of the world-wide supersystem they’re lining up will bring anyone to their senses. I’m thinking that maybe my Bible isn’t so far wrong and seven years of misery is on our doorsteps while we watch it all burn.
[...] Posted: February 20th, 2012 by Militant Libertarian by Dan Mitchell [...]