Releasing the Dream

As much as I would like to see gov't shrink,the sad fact is: IT AIN'T GONNA HAPPEN. Too many tentacles into all aspects of our lives,and too many "cushy jobs" that would disappear. Add to that the fact that the elite schools,IMO Ivy League for the most part,seems to be ground zero for training these people SOLELY for the purpose of gov't. The IRS is one gov't agency,while most would say it is the ONLY one that works as advertised,is the one that has survived primarily on the FEAR it has instilled in people over the years. Most of it unfounded in my personal experience with them. Great post.

Big G becomes self sustaining after awhile, b/c like you said no one is going to eliminate all those guaranteed jobs. As for the IRS, the fear isn't irrational, but in my dealings with them I have been treated fairly and respectfully..except by one person. But they are the only agency that works as advertised.

A couple of thoughts.

I don't think the IRS is unconstitutional. There is an amendment that permits income taxes, and the IRS is simply the mechanism for collection of those taxes, so I don't see a constitutional conflict.

I do believe government COULD be made smaller, but it would take a form of political will and courage that I doubt we'll see. We very well could be in the "voting to themselves the largesse of the Treasury" phase of the Tytler quote I use so often.

As to the Marriage Amendment, not only do I agree we'll never see it, I don't think we should. Marriage is a state issue rightfully. I think that when the Federal government forced Utah to outlaw polygamy in order to qualify for statehood, they crossed a line and set a precedent that should have never been allowed.

That's the whole point of Federalism, isn't it?

As F.A. Hayek warned, the failure of central planning would be perceived by the public as a need for expanding the powers of government. This extension of power would inevitably lead to the loss of economic and personal freedom and set us on his "Road to Serfdom".

I think it can be safely said that we are well on our way toward that end.

Brian, you'e right that the IRS isn't unconstutional; I was careless in my wording. What I should have said is that the entire idea of an income tax is not something the Founders ever intended to see come to pass, and that is where my problem with it comes from. As for shrinking the government, I believe that we are too far gone to shrink the G. We have generations now that only know big government and do not think we can survive w/o government intervention in nearly every aspect of our lives. As for the Utah situation, if I am not mistaken polygamy was pretty much illegal everywhere, so I don't see the requirement that the Mormons give it up to enter the Union as a big stretch for the G to have made. Besides, according to the Mormons at the time they weren't even practicing polygamy openly, so there shouldn't have been that big of a deal about it. Please don't get me started on Joseph's religion!

Sarge, we are headed that way, since we are teaching the younger generations that government exists to solve all of their problems. As soon as we start giving away the power to govern our own lives to others, we have become de facto slaves to that other person.

I agree that Big G is probably irreversible at this point; all we can hope to do is limit the growth and damage.

But as to Utah/polygamy, it's not an issue of whether or not it was practiced openly, or monogamy was the national order of the day. The issue is that the Federal government made the banning of it a requirement for statehood, and that was Federal interference in a state issue, antithesis to federalism.

If we hold to the principle of federalism, we can't do it only when it suits our own philosophy.

Your point on federalism is well made and I have no choice but to take it! You're right, and I was allowing my feelings about the church to cloud my federalist leanings. Thankls for the reality check!

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The gov't may shrink, if, (and yep a big if)in the election year of our discontent, we see new blood one more cycle from now. It cannot last this way- we all know that. I'm thinking flat tax for starters, not fair. And, just enforcement of the laws in place!!! A flat tax or fair tax would eliminate the need for many arms of the octopuss!! I am just going to continue down my "good" path. I don't have to like it, but neither do I have to be negative or nasty like the damn dems!!!

to be one of the advisors of the Crawfish Party, we're gonna have to put some of your pessimism in check. We can have victories in these areas if we make them part of a larger movement. After 4 or 8 years of the upcoming socialistic state, the people MIGHT be in the mood for some Constitutionality.

I am not pessimistic, I am realistic. And the fact is that once the horse is out of the barn on these types of issues, you are not going to get that sucker back in his stall! I am not saying not to try to move government towards smaller size, nor am I saying that we should just accept the status quo, but we have to stop trying to make things into something they maybe never were. The IRS isn't going anywhere, the G is not going to rduce itself, the Department of Ed is here to stay...whether we like it or not. We need to stop pretending that we are going to eliminate these things and try to make them as small and/or efficient as possible.

You are a wise man indeed. Sad that we have to come to this realization, but you're right on all five counts, in terms of the reality of America today.

The "toothpaste is out of the tube", so to speak...all we can do is hold back the encroachment on our freedoms and the growth of government and it's power to control every aspect of our lives.

The problem I see, to an extent, is that we conservatives keep setting our cause back by our knee jerk reaction to things. We get mad because people in congress who call themselves conservative aren't as conservative as we are on an issue or two, so we throw them out to "teach them a lesson" and then we're back at square one in the minority...

We'll never get nearer our goals doing that, IMO...:)Sorry to go on like this...but as I see it...

we just have to keep pushing back, because that's the nature of this fallen world...it ain't going to get better...at least from the stand-point of fallen man's attempts at it...

Thank you for your visit, and I hope you make the Spade a frequent destination! And you're right, we do tend to knee jerk on some things and allow single issues to dominate our thinking sometimes, but there are times when we need to divest ourselves of some Congress-critters, as another poster calls them, when they stray too far afield. And there are always people in the Party who are not conservatives on major issues, so they need to be booted out. You know them, Arlen Specter, Olympia Snowe, and the not lamented Lincoln Chafee are the types.

Doc, yeah that's like asking Eliot Spitzer to crack down on call girls, ROFLAMO!

The Not-So-Revereneds Al and Jesse in charge of ending racism, with their chief deputy Calypso Louie?

Putting Mookie Al-Sadr and Iminajihad in charge of the Bureau of Religious Tolerance?

Lindsey Lohan for California Highway Patrol?

John Edwards heading up tort reform?

Me in charge of limiting soft-core porn in America.....wait, did I go there?

Dick Nixon to lead a class on political ethics, like asking Al Gore to stop pandering, like asking Ann Coulter to tone it down, like asking Rush Limbaugh not to express his opinions, like telling the sun to rise in the west, like asking Paris Hilton to get a job...

Doc, piling up all the lawyers in a pile would solve all of our alternative fuel needs...there's enough hot air there to power America for generations!

Julia Roberts? Almost as over rated as Paris Hilton.

Like asking submariners to stop going down with other men.

Like asking the Air Force to stop operating like unionized autoworkers.

Like asking an ordnanceman to write or speak on a college level.

Like asking Hitlery!(tm) and Obama to stop making race and sex the major issues.

Like.....