Labyrinth (B.Y.O.B. part duex)

No, it’s not a crime to be a buffoon.  It’s not a crime to lack the initiative, intellect or integrity to try and create your own wealth.  None of these are crimes.  The crime our Founding Fathers abhorred the most was forcing good hard-working people to be complicit with the negligence of the foolhardy through government regulation.  It is the ultimate crime for the innocent to pay for the bad behavior of those bent on self-destruction.  So, in short, if you want to be a buffoon, do it by yourself, on your own dime, and away from us.

Given humanity’s history, its weakness for power and the poor behavior it spawns, the Founders knew that it was inevitable a buffoon would cycle through the government structure from time to time.  So checks and balances were put in place.  But, again, what if a person crazy like a fox can gather a coalition of buffoons and can control them to implement the will of the crazy fox.  What if they can form a majority?  Should the minority have to follow the dictates of the majority even if the majority are buffoons?  What if those in the minority do not wish their wealth to be spent on the edicts of tomfoolery?  Should their monies be extracted from them by force of law to fund behaviors they oppose?

The framers of our government structure decided that to prevent this, government should not be involved in the everyday lives of the citizen.  It should not control the rise and fall of a person’s wealth.  It should not dictate the choices of the people it served.  The majority should rule but the majority should never infringe upon the rights of the minority.  How could this amazing dream be realized?

They acknowledged that we were all endowed by our Creator with unalienable rights-Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.  Government could not infringe upon this.  A small Federal government that focused on national security and left the matters of the States to the States while they, in turn, left matters of local ordinance to local government would assure a limited government. This they hoped would protect the rights of all individuals to strive to achieve individual goals.

But now here we are, lost in the labyrinth of big government.  How often we’ve asked, “How did we get here?”  We have allowed ourselves to trade those unalienable rights for the handouts of big government with promises to protect the minority.  Now we have an obese government structure that is crushing the individual.  Take for instance California, where a new law will force 1 in 25 Californians to have to purchase a green energy car by the year 2025, or here in Maine where LURC forces rural Maine to abdicate landowner rights to a bureaucracy, or government agencies which unfairly target independent contractors to eliminate them from the workforce, all funded with your tax dollars whether you agree with it or not.

So a government that was created to fear the people now exacts fear from the people.  Know this, that the minority will never be protected until the self-reliance of the individual is once again held in high esteem by the majority of the people and the government that fears them.