When Bush became President in 2000, the spirits of
conservative America understandably rose to heights we hadn’t seen in eight
years. Clinton was no longer
president and his echo, Al Gore would not be.
Expectations were high for real change.
When the previous 8 year assault on the Second Amendment stopped under
President Bush, many knew that real conservatism was just over the horizon and
on its way to the rescue. The GOP
then burst that conservative bubble disillusioning many staunch traditionalists
with their record setting domestic spending agenda.
Then when the First Amendment was flagrantly violated by the Campaign
Finance Reform bill and our borders remained wide open to daily invasion by
illegals, even in a post 9/11 world, voices of protest and disappointment were
unmistakably loud and extremely clear.
Why is it that any new administration oft times brings
unbridled enthusiasm and high hopes for change only to disappoint when the
realization sets in that the size and power of government will continue to
grow—and at the expense of liberty?
The Contract with America that promised
real
change was good sound bite material but the government actually grew
tremendously in size since all those good intentions were drafted in 1994/95.
Then during the 1996 campaign, the GOP said they wanted to do away with
the Department of Education and scrap the income tax in favor of a flat tax or a
national sales tax. What do we have
today? The largest budget increase
of any department in the first Bush administration went to the Department of
Education, a function that isn’t authorized anywhere in the Constitution by
the way, and we still have that absurd income tax.
Why can’t or won’t politicians who promise to reduce government just
return America to the valued concept of constitutional traditionalism?
Why can’t they just do it?
I’ve boiled this down to three major reasons why I think
politicians lack the ability or commitment to trim government and return us to
the original concept of a small governing body that serves rather than rules.
Note: I know I’ll be accused of being too simplistic but that isn’t
new so here is the simple view from my simple saddle.
1. We’ve
become dependent slaves of our own creation and can’t escape even when we say
we want to. We’ve built a
huge complex monster that now demands we serve it rather than asking how best it
can serve us. Remember the movie
where a super computer was built to run every mundane task in society freeing
man to pursue other, more lofty activities?
This computer contained all the knowledge man had ever accumulated, was
smarter than anyone and ended up dominating mankind and demanding to be served
as man’s master. Science fiction
has become reality in Washington D.C. The
only difference between that movie and us is our master is big government
not a computer and sadly, many Americans actually want it that way.
We’ve created a monster, ascribed an ever-expanding
amount of authority to it to handle those mundane tasks we don’t want to
bother with and it now demands to be served and obeyed by a society of people
that increasingly rely on a government centric life. We’ve traded our independence and freedom for the promise
of security and paternal care given by a Washington monstrosity.
Most of modern man would now find it virtually impossible to live without
government guiding their existence. Don’t
believe it? Then ask yourself what the first reaction is to most problems
or events in today’s mainstream America—Does “What’s the government
going to do about it?” sound familiar?
Just keep in mind that we built it, gave it a powerful life of its own
and we are now here to dutifully serve it.
2. Americans are
relatively comfortable in their lethargy and don’t want their recliners
disturbed. Since we are now so
dependent on and accustom to government intrusion in our lives, if politicians
were to actually gut government in a big way, it would cause severe short-term
distress in our familiar and comfortable life style and they would be blamed.
True freedom isn’t free nor is it easy and people’s comfort level
would be significantly disrupted generating heated anger targeted at politicians
everywhere—politicos are real cowards in that regard and can’t stand such
negative attention—or the resulting low poll numbers!
3. Lastly, the
indisputable fact is that politicians in general, enjoy the real power and perks
of being in Washington and controlling millions of lives across America.
They’ve become inebriated on power and can’t get their fill.
Like an alcoholic, they can’t limit themselves to just one drink (one
term). They drink more and more and begin to see themselves as the
center of the universe. What this
translates into is the truthful crux of the whole question—politicians
really don’t want to change our system no matter what they say on the evening
news around election time. The
vast majority enjoy the power and will never willingly or freely give it up.
I’m sure at least some go to Washington for the first
time with idealistic dreams of actually changing things and have all the best
intentions of living up to their campaign promises. But how many times have you seen these idealists turned to
the dark side after only one or two terms?
A simple example are those freshman congressmen who promise to leave
office after two terms and end up making a life of it.
They get drunk on power and can’t put the bottle down.
I think we traditionalists are victims of those three
factors of modern day America and thus will never live to see the peaceful
return of that small, unobtrusive servant our founders conceived.
The embryo has evolved into a monster that now demands to be served and
obeyed while filling us with the illusion that it is really the
omnipotent guardian of our freedom—how ironic!
Let’s just be blunt.
Any government created by man that really wanted to change its governing
structure could do so. It might be
painful over the short term because of factors 1 & 2, but any system man can
create man can modify—government is no exception. The real reason they just don’t do it is factor 3.
History confirms that any change involving factor 3 has had to be forced
upon the governing by the governed. It
happened that way in America some 230 years ago and it may very well happen that
way again someday.
Just the view from my saddle…
Contact
Colonel Dan: coloneldan@bellsouth.net