Postcards from the Bleeding Edge
Thursday, May 11, 2006

  The reality of a runaway government

Seen on slashdot

There are now so many laws that it is literally impossible for a citizen to be 100% law-abiding. This didn't happen by chance; it's by design. The more laws (especially laws which target peaceful, non-violent individuals), the more revenue, control, and power available to those who wield the law for their own benefit.

To paraphrase that famous excerpt from Ayn Rand's novel, "when there aren't enough laws, one makes them". Imagine a government that was strictly limited to enforcing the principle of voluntary association -- what's in that for the power elite? Not much at all -- there's nothing to exploit. Now imagine a government which is unlimited in how many laws it can make, and how often those laws can be changed around -- what's in that for the power elite? Just about everything a corrupt politician ever dreamed of.

The simple reality is that laws benefit the power elite, and that's exactly why every year there are thousands more laws on the books than the year before. Government is in the business of coercion, not liberty.
  2:47 PM
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