The Government That Cried “Wolf,” by Robert Gore | STRAIGHT LINE LOGIC
This is an excerpt. The rest of the article can be accessed by clicking the link above.
Through history, no institution has come close to government in its ability to inflict violence, terror, chaos, and death. War is almost exclusively the province of government. Every legal system rests in government the right to initiate force against its own citizens, to take money from them to fund itself, to promulgate laws, to decide what is just and what is not, and to dispense its justice and inflict punishment. Just an enumeration of those powers should leave one apprehensive; a survey of the historical record should leave one pale with fright.
Ten words transmuted a healthy American fear of government into an embrace: “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” Fear, per se, is not something to be afraid of. Conscientious parents try to inculcate all sorts of fears in their offspring: of poisonous creatures and plants, strangers offering rides, drugs and alcohol, unprotected sex, and the wrath of parents. Government is, per se, something to be afraid of, but Franklin Roosevelt’s alchemy turned the Founding Fathers’ dangerous master into the Superhero that would save the citizenry from the fearsome things it was not supposed to fear. Roosevelt’s famous admonition was a smokescreen; fear was his most powerful ally.
Through history, no institution has come close to government in its ability to inflict violence, terror, chaos, and death. War is almost exclusively the province of government. Every legal system rests in government the right to initiate force against its own citizens, to take money from them to fund itself, to promulgate laws, to decide what is just and what is not, and to dispense its justice and inflict punishment. Just an enumeration of those powers should leave one apprehensive; a survey of the historical record should leave one pale with fright.
Ten words transmuted a healthy American fear of government into an embrace: “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” Fear, per se, is not something to be afraid of. Conscientious parents try to inculcate all sorts of fears in their offspring: of poisonous creatures and plants, strangers offering rides, drugs and alcohol, unprotected sex, and the wrath of parents. Government is, per se, something to be afraid of, but Franklin Roosevelt’s alchemy turned the Founding Fathers’ dangerous master into the Superhero that would save the citizenry from the fearsome things it was not supposed to fear. Roosevelt’s famous admonition was a smokescreen; fear was his most powerful ally.
Thanks, sll.
The title makes me hopeful for a backlash against gov't-stoked fears.
It does seem that the cry of wolf is heard almost every day now, yet still no wolves at my door. Just in my pocket.