Alexander Tytler famously wrote, "A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until a majority of voters discover that they can vote themselves largess out of the public treasury." Among his other quotations is the so-called Tytler Cycle describing the path of man as a series of stages.
- From bondage to spiritual faith;
- From spiritual faith to great courage;
- From courage to liberty;
- From liberty to abundance;
- From abundance to complacency;
- From complacency to apathy;
- From apathy to dependence;
- From dependence back into bondage.
Let's examine Tytler's phrase about the length of time that a democracy can survive. Would you tend to agree that the Democratic Party has, as a large percentage of its participants, the desire to provide for or otherwise care for the citizenry? Would you also characterize their desire to help the relatively poor by taxing at usury levels those who are considered rich (in this case, those who are single or who make more than 250,000 per year)? Would you further consider that those who have risked their own fortunes to make a company or provide a service have somehow done so to harm those who cannot start an enterprise?
When this country entered the Great Depression, it is understandable why the Social Security system was created. At that time, this country was just getting into the swing of the industrial revolution, but many people still lived in rural communities. Charity was something one found in the home, family and religious affiliations. The enormity of the Great Depression ripped a hole through almost every support system out there and left those who could least afford to survive unable to care for themselves. Social Security was created to augment incomes, not become a complete safety blanket. The establishment of this system saw lawmakers who were unable to understand the impact of such a system on the economy and debt load of the federal government.
Augmented further under the Johnson administration, Social Security saw the expansion of a new program called medicaid and medicare. These programs, like social security before, would see that younger generations would pay into a trust fund and funds would be expended as people arrived at the age of 65 (or the age of disability in terms of a subset program call SSI or supplemental security insurance). Again, the program was well-intentioned, but did not adequately consider the impact of population growth on the funding mandates this system would have.
In each case, the government did not consider important factors in determining the long range impact of its choices. What they found was that in creating these systems and other programs like them, that they had created a new class of citizen in this country. A citizen who voted based on what they got in return for their vote. Now they could vote for candidates who would extend or preserve the entitlements they were receiving, or the could vote against candidates who voted to curtail spending growth. In short, the goverment created a dependency class and they have sought to extend that class to the widest margin of voters in this country.
In looking at the breakdown of tax payers in this country, we see that some 40% of the US population pays no income taxes at all. A significant majority of these people also receive tax credits which pay them as much as 3-5,000 per year. This money seems free to them, but really comes on the backs of the rest of the population, including the so-called middle class. This dependent class now comes to need these government programs, as does those who seek to exploit often poorly written legislation to commit fraud and other waste and abuse. Millions of Americans also have become cynical and don't believe that they have the power to rein in such spending and so they become apathetic. This apathy allows more people to feel that since they can't get ahead, they should also try to get their slice of the pie, as long as others are paying for it.
All of this fits into the Tytler Cycle described above and it is my assertion that we are now well into the dependence phase of the cycle. As we see the programs introduced by President Obama and his Democratic party henchmen, each one is introduced as a critical component to preserve the American way of life. What they do in varying ways is to literally transform America from what she was founded as, into a nation of subjects whose blood and sweat is used to fuel a government that is out of control and seeks to enslave all of us in the name of the Common Good.
The founders did not intend for the government to provide the common good, but merely to allow the free exercise of commerce so that men who chose to provide a service or good at a price people were willing to pay for, would be successful. This was the basis of opportunity they sought to provide to the citizens of the young nation.
As we sit today, our elected officials are trading votes for tax payer funds. A vote on health care gets members of Congress a few hundred million so they can go back to their district at election time and say... "look what I have done." Even at the state level, we here how Ken Schilz says that you have to be around for a while and get in good with someone who can "help" you. It is our apathy that allows such conduct and collectively, we are responsible for allowing those people into positions of power that empower them to take from all of us what we have earned, and spend it, not on what we value, but on what they can broker for themselves.
Perhaps we need a different class of person in the Congress, Senate and Whitehouse. Perhaps we should take back our country and stop suffering the whining and crying masses who take, but never contribute to the prosperity of the nation. Perhaps we should create a constitutional amendment to establish term limits for congressmen and senators and to establish 25 year terms for Supreme Court Justices. Jefferson thought there should be a periodic revolt against the government every so often. The mechanism for the revolt was given to us by the founders. When they're up, they're out.
Mike Rowland
No comments:
Post a Comment