A joke I’ve heard and repeated is that government incompetence is the only thing that has saved us from totalitarianism. There’s a ring of truth to the gag, which makes it more than just a throwaway dig at big government. But it seems especially apt as we watch the debacle that is the ObamaCare rollout.
Rights and liberties aren’t forcibly taken away from a nation of people – they are willingly surrendered when a majority of the people get convinced to give them up in exchange for some (usually ephemeral or soon-to-be-broken) promises of security, largesse or ease. Many voters actively support politicians who say “give me more power over your life, accept these reasonable restrictions, and I will make things better for you.” When the “make things better” promise proves to be hollow, people have forgotten, or moved on, or have grown accustomed to the new intrusions. And, rather than be exposed as gullible, foolish or wrong, they defend their past support of those who failed them, lied to them or manipulated them.
But, as in the story about the frog in the pot, who will slowly cook if the heat is turned up gradually but will leap out if dropped into already boiling water, voters can be shocked into outrage and push-back. This is why politicians nibble instead of biting, this is why restrictions on speech are specific and focused on the outrageous or extreme, this is why new gun restrictions are always incremental, this is why government uses technology to track our movements in passive and unnoticed ways, and this is why we are taxed piecemeal and in innumerable small ways (many of them hidden) rather than having half our annual incomes taken on April 15th. Statists know that they can make a thousand cuts, and explain away each as “just a little pinprick, for worthy reasons and for a good cause.”
Someone who shoplifts once will likely be very cautious and as unobtrusive as possible, picking a small and easily hidden item. But, success breeds boldness, and chronic shoplifters will become more daring and brazen. The same is true for embezzlers and other chronic thieves. The same is true for politicians. If they find they are repeatedly getting away with something, they’ll feel safe taking bigger bites, bigger steps. They’ll be less cautious and less measured in their intrusions. Because they’ve inured the voters with a long string of past intrusions, they’ll usually get away with being bolder. Such is the march towards unfettered statism, the loss of liberties and the rise of totalitarianism. And, yes, it can certainly happen here.
What happens, though, when the carrot offered in exchange for liberties forgone turns out to be horribly rotten? What happens when the first bite taken by the voter is fetid and putrid and maggot-infested? A smack to the face can sometimes wake one up from reverie. The disastrous few weeks ObamaCare has had may very well be that smack to the face.
The establishment hand-wringers on the Right were aghast at the quixotic antics of the liberty movement, Ted Cruz in particular, during the most recent government funding fight. They were certain that the efforts to delay and derail ObamaCare would come back to bite the party in the mid-term elections, where the Left and their media lapdogs would portray the Republicans as unhinged, hateful and racist obstructionists. Oh, what a difference a few weeks make. Whatever power and high ground the Left had comes apart with three simple words: “We were right.” Even if the government gets ObamaCare squared away and functioning well in the next few months (the website will likely be working by then, but there’s more than one maggot in that carrot) the Left dares to try leveraging Cruz’s pseudo-filibuster, they invite revisiting this mess and an endless loop of Kathleen Sebelius saying “whatever” to Congress.
The Left still holds both the reins of power and still has the mainstream press defending and excusing this president and this administration at almost every turn, so it’s still probable in my opinion that in a year’s time much of this will have been buried and ignored in favor of other Dem-Repub fights. But, just as it’s human nature to cling to and defend past decisions and past loyalties, when people break from those and embrace the antithetical, they dig in hard. Converts tend to be more fanatical than those who’ve embraced a philosophy all their lives, and the mess that is ObamaCare may bring quite a few people into the small government fold.
Breaking the nation from its march towards statism is a long and tough slog, filled with traps and detours, and given the history of the world, one unlikely to be successful. But, if in a few years we look at the nation and say “phew! We managed to avoid going off the cliff, we’ve saved the Republic,” we may be able to look back at the epic demonstration of government incompetence that is the launch of ObamaCare as the moment when it truly began.
Loading ...
Active Comment Threads
Most Commented Posts
Universal Background Checks – A Back Door to Universal Registration
COVID Mask Follies
When Everything Is Illegal…
An Anti-Vax Inflection Point?
“Not In My Name”
The Great Social Media Crackup
War Comes Through The Overton Window
The First Rule of Italian Driving
Most Active Commenters