"Good intentions will always be pleaded for every assumption of authority ... the Constitution was made to guard against the dangers of good intentions. There are men in all ages who mean to govern well, but they mean to govern. They promise to be good masters, but they mean to be masters." - Noah Webster


"There is no worse tyranny than forcing a man to pay for what he does not want just because you think it would be good for him."
-- Robert A. Heinlein

Friday, April 22, 2011

Exponentially Wrong

The piece I'm about to fisk can be found here.  I'm only going to deal with the first two paragraphs, because that's all I need.  When you start with an incredibly flawed premise, your conclusions can only be madness.

Read the piece below and see if you recognize the error before I deal with it.

When we practice the privileges granted to us by our governing documents, in this case, the Bill of Rights and bearing arms, we enter into an implicit agreement with the Union to recognize and act according to the State's rules and regulations for the use and ownership of arms. And as we agree to those rules, so does the government agree to act responsibly on behalf of our collective well-being.
In this manner, our relationship with our nation mirrors our relationship with our parents; both our parents and our nation raise us; both provide for our welfare; both teach us values and ethics; both act on our behalf for our well-being. And thus should we regard our nation; as a parental figure to be a moral example, an ideal to respect and to obey. For, if the dynamics of our relationship with our parents are mirrored functionally by the dynamics of our relationship with our country, so too should the convictions and loyalties that characterize the former persist in the latter.

Let me just start with the words before the first comma.  Privileges?   Where did you get such an idea Mr. Lelonek?  Our founding documents don't even mention privileges.  It speaks of inalienable rights that come from God.  It speaks of the purpose of a righteous government being to secure and protect those rights and never abrogate them.  Therefore, we don't enter into any agreement whatsoever to agree to any rules the State might make in direct violation of our God-given rights.

Has the government violated the Constitution by passing laws that infringe on our rights?  Oh yes.  We have an outlaw government.  This is pretty much beyond any question for those of us who have read history and understand it.

It is bad enough that this condition exists today, but for someone to come along and try to interpret it 180 degrees out of phase is infuriating.

To read the records of the founding fathers as they argued and hammered out the Constitution, as well as from reading both the Federalist Papers and the Anti-Federalist Papers, an intelligent human being understands that the founders understood government in all forms to be a necessary evil that must be chained down and guarded to keep it from doing the very things that you advocate in that tripe you call an opinion.  The Constitution was written to be the very set of chains that restrained government from being anything other than a servant to the people as sovereign individuals and the sovereign States who agreed to create the Federal government.

It was never intended for the government to see to any collective well being.  Any idea of a collective was diametrically opposite the goals of the founders.  Government was meant to stay the hell out of the way of individuals pursuing their own well being and happiness so long as they respected everyone else's rights to do the same.

To  draw an analogy to parenting in regard to government is outrageous.  I don't have enough words of contempt for such an idea.  Such is the language of totalitarian communist states such as North Korea, or Cuba.  Free people understand that human beings are flawed.  We understand that getting elected to office or being appointed to positions or getting hired as a bureaucrat does not bestow some super human understanding or intelligence for making better decisions in directing other people's lives.

In a more sensible time, it was understood that when a person reached the age to vote and be a responsible citizen, they would be capable of being a parent, not needing one.  It is not the job of government to provide me with welfare or anything else.  Even more important, it is not the job of government to take part of my life and liberty in the form of the fruit of my labor and my time in order to provide things for other people.

If you are genuinely ignorant of the true meaning of the founding documents, Mr. Lelonek, I suggest you get schooled on the matter.  If you can't comprehend the writings of the men who composed those documents over 200 years ago, then I suggest some courses at Hillsdale College in Michigan.  They specialize in teaching exactly what the founders were trying to and did accomplish and exactly why.

If you really do know the history and the meaning of the founding documents, then you are a most egregious liar and you would make the most perfect example of someone who deserves to be stripped naked, slathered with tar and dusted with feathers.  Then you need to be dropped off in one of the countries that attempts to govern according to the concepts that you espouse.
There are plenty of such places.  Please take as many other child-like folks with you who don't have the grown-up thinking and maturity to handle freedom and live in any of the countries with nanny-state government.

Let them tell you what is safe to drive, eat, and talk about.  Let them dictate to you what lightbulbs to use, whether or not you can pack your child's lunch for school, who you can associate with, how much money you should be allowed to make.  Go ahead, there's nothing stopping you.

We grown-ups who have worked hard and made good choices would like to be left alone.  We know how to handle sharp objects and things that go bang.  We've even been known to create fire on a regular basis and cook our own food.  Lot's of us actually can do math at levels high enough to balance multiple checking accounts.

Take you and your immature friends and find yourself a parent style government someplace else.  Leave us alone.

Hat tip to Joe Huffman.

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