Michelle: ObamaCare is the tipping point in the Dems’ culture of corruption

From Walter Russell Mead:

Jacksonians are instinctively democratic and populist. Hamiltonians mistrust democracy; Wilsonians don’t approve of the political rough and tumble. And while Jeffersonians support democracy in principle, they remain concerned that tyrannical majorities can overrule minority rights. Jacksonians believe that the political and moral instincts of the American people are sound and can be trusted, and that the simpler and more direct the process of government is, the better will be the results. In general, while the other schools welcome the representative character of our democracy, Jacksonians tend to see representative rather than direct institutions as necessary evils, and to believe that governments breed corruption and inefficiency the way picnics breed ants. Every administration will be corrupt; every Congress and legislature will be, to some extent, the plaything of lobbyists. Career politicians are inherently untrustworthy; if it spends its life buzzing around the outhouse, it’s probably a fly. Jacksonians see corruption as human nature and, within certain ill-defined boundaries of reason and moderation, an inevitable by-product of government.

The reason you want small government is to keep the number of flies down, a small picnic garners fewer ants and by restricting the power of the attraction and keeping it at arms length, you do not get ants and flies following you around. Obamacare is taking a dip in the outhouse and wondering why the flies now follow you… pouring honey on yourself and laying down on the blanket and being overwhelmed with ants.

Jackson did play the patronage game, make no mistake about it, but that government was tiny and he removed one of the greatest corruption machines in the federal government: the National Bank. That latter was re-born as the Federal Reserve under Wilson and then added on to with FHA, Freddie, Fannie and Ginnie, all of which have gotten support from the Federal Reserve. Strange to think that for 70 years, through the entire Civil War, that the US government did not have an organ that was so popular with politicians and so lethal to the expansion of corruption. Yet Lincoln was able to run and pay for a Civil War with only half a Nation and no centralized banking system in government hands.

Small government, thrifty government and lean government kept on a tight leash creates a government that is not a threat to our common liberty both as a society and individuals. There is no ‘good’ that government does that is not better done by the people, and only the necessary National powers to secure our liberty from abuses at home and abroad are granted to such government under our understanding of the Law of Nations. For a time the common man will take political payoffs: home mortgages, banking, and student loans were all seen as ‘helping’ and few spoke up about them. The jump into Medicare was not unopposed and today it would have trouble passing… that with all the bribes to seniors to spend their remaining wealth on a government supported system that no longer yields thrifty care.

These are principles shared with ‘conservatives’ but Jacksonians want government out of our damned lives and telling the people what to think, eat, breathe and keep. That goes for liberals and conservatives, both. When the outhouse gets full it is time to cover it over and start a new, smaller one and remove the flies. Every picnic gets packed up and the next one may be held on a rock surface to remove some of the enticement to ants. You do not ‘manage’ big government, but take a chainsaw to its limbs… and when you keep on extending the outhouse towards the house to make it convenient, then don’t be complaining about the flies until you are ready to cover the damned thing over and start with a smaller one.

There is one and only one word I want to hear from those running for office: rollback.

NOT ‘reform’ as the beast is ugly enough without a new form to it.

Rollback, cut off the limbs and get this damned beast on a lean diet and a tight leash. That means cutting government ‘services’, laws and regulations. Obamacare isn’t an end point for rollback given SSN and Medicare, but the beginning. Its time to move the picnic to a better spot and cover the old pit over and start a new one.

ajacksonian on December 25, 2009 at 7:33 AM