Preparation H On Nov 3, 10:24 am, MJ <[email protected]> wrote: > Liberty Is the Theme, AgainNovember 3, 2010 > byJeffrey Tucker > Once again, voters went to the polls to reject overweening government, > responding to waves of rhetoric that decried the government takeover of > health care, the bailouts and spending, and the arrogance of power. And > again, domestic economic issues dominated. And so the Obama regime, as the > Republicans have started calling it, got a much-deserved smack on the nose. > Strangely, it was a similar set of themes that brought Obama to power: > resentment against the outrageous power abuses and wars of the Bush regime, > and fear that the Republican Party represented more of the same. Looking back > further, it was the same theme that brought Bush to power. He ran with the > promise of a more humble foreign policy, while decrying taxes and big > government. We could keep going back and back this way, to 1994, 1992, and > throughout the eighties, and back through the seventies, and back all the way > to 1932 and even to Wilson s promise to keep us out of World War I. Voters > keep pulling the lever against the state and yet the state marches ever > onward, growing bigger and more abusive all the time. > How can we account for this? FollowingRothbard,Nock,Van Creveld,Chodorov, > andOppenheimer, what the voters are voting on is not the state but merely a > false front. > If the state is a giant building, the office holders we vote for are merely > the facade. We are given buckets of paint to paint this facade red or blue or > some combination of the two colors, but this has very little to do with what > goes on inside. Our job is to argue and vote over which color we want it to > be but never presume to have an influence over its actual affairs. > If we want to truly understand the state, and not just its appearances and > its periodic election frenzies, we need to consider that the modern state is > very different from the medieval or ancient state, which were personal > states, inseparable from the ruler. Modern states are impersonal entities > that have a life apart from their temporary office holders and spokesmen. If > the Congress, Presidency, and Supreme Court were all put on a slow boat to > China, for example, the state would endure and continue as always. Its > machinery consists almost entirely in gears and parts that are not subject to > referendums and democratic mandates. > This is why these elections never really accomplish what voters what them to > accomplish. Elections deal with superficial issues, not fundamental ones. And > isn t this obvious just from listening to the victory speeches last night? I > actually heard one Republican going on about the need for a line item veto > and a balanced budget and a strong defense in this dangerous world. It was > like 30 years ago all over again. The political class is strangely > disconnected from the actual workings of the state. > Anyway, all these thoughts come from the great works on the state linked > above. They are the books we need in order to truly understand and avoid > getting tricked by this ridiculous spectacle every two and four > years.http://blog.mises.org/14481/liberty-is-the-theme-again/
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