Now that Chief Justice John Roberts has joined with the Court’s activist wing on two landmark cases, conservatives are quite naturally wondering what has happened to him.
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Role of Government
Friday Links and Notes May 11
Happy Friday!
Here’s an interesting news item from the Washington Examiner. The Service Employees International Union, the public employees’ union that was so instrumental in getting President Obama elected in 2008, is paying four thousand dollars a month to provide Occupy DC with a suite of offices in our nation’s capital.
Given the violent tendencies of the Occupy movement, I can’t help but wonder if Attorney General Eric Holder will find some way to arm the Occupy mob with guns of every kind, as he did for Mexican drug lords under Operation Fast and Furious.
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The “Julia” Vision: A Lifetime of Dependency
A power over a man’s subsistance amounts to a power over his will. Alexander Hamilton
President Obama and his campaign team have shown us his vision for the American people with their “Life of Julia” campaign ad. It’s not a flattering vision; what the President offers voters in the ad is a lifetime of dependency. Conservatives have been pouring scorn on the “Julia” ad, while very few liberal pundits have been willing to defend it, because the ad is so obviously insulting to anyone with an ounce of self respect.
Should the Government Lead Social Movements?
For the first hundred-and-fifty-odd years of the United States’ existence, it was a land of rugged individuals. The nation was founded on the idea that “that government is best that governs least,” and self-reliance and self-respect were the defining characteristics of Americans.
But over the last eighty years or so Americans have been progressively allowing the government to play a bigger and bigger role in their lives. With the passage of Obamacare in 2010, Americans have granted to the national government the power to control their access to health care. If the Democrats’ various “Cap and Trade” proposals are ever put into effect, we will have given the government the power to control our access to the fuel that makes our modern lifestyle possible.
But even more frightening than the government’s assumption of these new legal powers is its assumption of a leading role in changing the values and beliefs of ordinary Americans.
The Gold Standard and Government Power
“The Founding Fathers knew that a government can’t control the economy without controlling people.” Ronald Reagan
The first question every liberal asks about a proposed government action is “will it make the government more powerful?.” We conservatives should learn to ask that question too, and for opposite reasons.
