PRIVATE PROPERTY - PUBLIC PLUNDER

(original post May 2011)

By James Craig Green

Today, the size and scope of American government have grown far beyond the design of the Republic’s founders. It tries to be everything to everyone - intervening in everyone’s lives for the common good or public interest. This forceful elevation of the collective over the individual has produced nothing but false hope, tyranny and unsustainable debt, undermining the markets and property rights that prevented or limited them before. In short, government, producing nothing without destroying something else, is eating America alive. The best proof for this is 16 TRILLION dollars in admitted public debt, much of it owed to foreign banks, plus another 50 trillion in unfunded liabilities for future government promises like Social Security and Medicare (See: http://www.pgpf.org/). Baby boomers are retiring, reversing their decades of positive contributions.

The American Republic began with limited size and scope to prevent it from becoming what it is today. Unlike the democratic French Revolution that produced the Reign of Terror, the guillotine and the Emperor Napoleon; the American Revolution was based on respect for the individuals and their property rights that produce the wealth all collectives need. Ignoring or minimizing property protection has been a common theme of every government, including the federal government of the U.S. It is now a bloated, destructive monster, spending almost 50% of GDP for the first time since WWII - an eightfold increase in percentage over the last century, without including the costs of its oppressive mandates. Today, it conspires against America, promoting its self-serving illusion of security over freedom while waving the flag to cheering millions addicted to its "free" lunches.

The U.S. Constitution and its Bill of Rights have been largely ignored or re-interpreted by all three branches of government, to appease every special interest that can package itself with the magic words, public interest. Presidents, congresses and courts have destroyed the Founders' dreams.

A Different Animal

Today’s American government has made important things like protection and dispute resolution trivial -- confused and diluted by an endless growth of new laws each year to appease every whim of the collective mob. The People, a phrase never or vaguely defined, encourage legislators and their friends to create huge unearned advantages (jobs, contracts, handouts, economic restrictions) for some over others, by force of law.

The law has become a hammer instead of a shield.

Some may agree with the inherent problems of today's government, but may be cautious to support fundamental changes too rapidly or too sweeping in their scope. However, today's unprecedented and unstable economic conditions beg you to consider the following:

1. Most Americans feel they are entitled to your money, and need only vote to get it - unlike the work ethic that existed before the New Deal and other government welfare programs.

2. Government should be limited to people and property protection; NOT guaranteeing jobs, insurance or success. It cannot protect your property by giving it to others.

3. The next economic crash will again be sudden and unexpected. No political action can prevent it, despite false promises from Republicans and Democrats. Words are cheap.

4. Prudence suggests a backup plan for those who still believe the economy is fixable by politics, with a soft landing. This is not your grandfather's; nor Founders' America.

5. Creating alternative networks and institutions that do not depend on government may become essential if pessimistic scenarios occur. Do you believe Obama's projections?

In 1917, the Soviet Union was created to implement the ideas of Karl Marx’s Communist Manifesto that took Europe by storm after its publication in 1848. The Soviet Union eventually failed from its forced collectivism, but not before starving and murdering tens of millions of its citizens and relegating others to lifetimes of poverty and tyranny. As a lifelong, card-carrying member of the American Communist Party once told me, Communists believe the means of production should be owned by the Public.

A Silly Little Word

There it was, stripped naked for all to see - that awful, nebulous little 6-letter word that encourages people to excuse, and celebrate, their destructive tendencies without accepting responsibility. It is that word - public - that allows the plunder of innocent people for any grand, stupid, fantastic, or destructive purpose without blaming anyone. This silly little word is why public interest is a euphemism for tyranny, public servant for parasite and public property for socialism. Almost half the land in the U.S. is owned by government, with the remainder taxed to provide a cash cow for any and all public purposes. By this measure alone, America is already HALF socialist, sacrificing essential people and property protection for too many subsidized, free-riding voters. Read the Communist Manifesto to see where progressive taxation came from.

Forceful collective action, like any lynch mob, disguises and minimizes the responsibility of each individual. This allows Democrats and Republicans to constantly grow government for the benefit of their friends, despite rhetoric to the contrary. Too many of your fellow citizens, perhaps yourself, depend on this insane collective gang bang for their livelihoods. It gets worse each year, now seeming likely that only economic collapse will stop government's cancerous growth.

Ultimately, this process will reverse itself, but not because you voted for or against someone, or promoted some public policy, or fought against a tax increase. It will happen because a sizeable minority of productive people, at great risk to themselves, with the most rare and difficult kind of courage (opposing the majority) will take back their lives and choose not to support, excuse or placate this bloated monster. At this critical time in its history, America desperately needs people like Thoreau, Gandhi and Rosa Parks more than the self-absorbed politicians who pimp for your vote so they can continue to increase government every year. Read Thoreau's Civil Disobedience.

Like so many others, American government has learned to promise endless prosperity without effort or responsibility. To break this destructive cycle, we must build new institutions that help us instead of hurt us – from the ground up, not from the top down, which has always been tried and has always failed. The U. S. Government is repeating the same mistakes of the Roman Empire and the Soviet Union, and its economy will collapse for the same reason – you can’t consume more than you produce forever. Today's unthinkable will be tomorrows necessity.

It’s long past time for Americans to take back their lives, property and dreams from a fog of collectivism and the lies that are public interest, public service and public property.

Government is the great fiction by which everybody expects to live at the expense of everybody else - Frederic Bastiat (1801-1850)