Galadriel had it Right

Freedom is an over-used word. Almost too much.

To me, freedom means to run my own life. For good or ill. Who is calling the shots in my life?

Government can be the protector of freedom, ensuring a safe environment in which to run my own life. It can also do the opposite and take away my options.

An over-sized or intrusive government, no matter how well run, still reduces the quantity of "running my own life".

If you spend half your waking life working, and the government taxes away 20% of that, it means that 10% of your life was taken. If you live to eighty, you spent eight years in a labor camp by my reckoning.

Remember, even if you got a tax refund, you were still taxed quite a bit indirectly. At this time I estimate in the 30-50% range.

I don't trust another man to run my life. And I don't trust myself to run another man's life. No one is that wise and benevolent. It's not right to use the power of government to force another person to live the way I want them to.

It's the damned Utopians. These are people who have some grand vision and decide to crack a few eggs to make it happen. There will always be men who take the reins of government and cause a few hundred (or million) murders then go home and sleep well thinking "it was for the greater good". Or scaled all the way down to the city council who plows under a trailer park to make way for a Target. Or the giant mass of 20,000 pages of Federal Law in the middle.

The critical difference is there the are voluntary Utopians (good) and involuntary Utopians (bad).

I live in a Voluntary Utopia. I know it works. As I have explained in earlier posts. People banding together in a common cause, for their own good, is a beautiful human pursuit. Just as long as they do not rope others in against their will.

But I don't care how good your plan is, keep your hands off my life! Even if that means I'm an idiot who won't save for retirement and has to eat dog food in his golden years. Then again, in the current scenario I'll spend eight years in the government labor camp, watch the Feds blow it on this and that, then still be chowing on Alpo at age sixty. Worst of both worlds.

The answer: cast the One Ring into the Fire! Like Galadriel we must turn away from thinking that we are wise or good enough to run another man's life.