Klavan On The Culture » ObamaCare — How Nice People Crush Freedom

Hayek warning on the slippery slope of legislation that chips away at personal liberty....

Not only is liberty a system under which all government action is guided by principles, but it is an ideal that will not be preserved unless it is itself accepted as an overriding principle governing all particular acts of legislation. Where no such fundamental rule is stubbornly adhered to as an ultimate ideal about which there must be no compromise for the sake of material advantages—as an ideal which, even though it may have to be temporarily infringed during a passing emergency, must form the basis of all permanent arrangements—freedom is almost certain to be destroyed by piecemeal encroachments. For in each particular instance it will be possible to promise concrete and tangible advantages as the result of a curtailment of freedom, while the benefits sacrificed will in their nature always be unknown and uncertain.

Human innovation has created gigantic strides in technology and technologies that have allowed people to raise the standards of living around the world. Government's job is to allow for an environment where these innovations can flourish and allow for the millions of decisions made by people as to what is valuable and what is not. However, under the cover of looking out for the people, governments have effectively intervened in the normal distribution of information embedded in market transactions and are intimately involved in deciding who are the winners and losers, what we have access to and what we do not and what we need and what we do not.

As Hayek argues above, the first little necessary step that is argued for, even those that appear critical in an emergency, sets us on a path to the destruction of liberty as this becomes the basis and precedent for the next intervention into our liberty. Each little government intervention into where they should not be will allow for and unconsciously move us towards resultant tyranny.

Imagine how absolutely provocative it is that the central authoritative government THINKS that it has the power, knowledge and ability to compel every single individual to purchase healthcare whether-or-not people think that they need it or want it. Supposedly, it is so important, that government forces this kind of activity upon us. All of this comes from earlier decisions such as one that i mentioned previously detailed by Sowell that disallowed a farmer from growing wheat in his own fields. It amazes me that people allow this kind of nonsense to happen.


Klavan On The Culture » ObamaCare — How Nice People Crush Freedom