| Notes | Book |
How to Shrink the Government Remember the Communist Line. First there would be a dictatorship of the proletariat, then the government would wither away. I think a lot of people bought the communist program because of the promise of a withered government. So why not cut to the chase and just figure out how to make the government wither away. It is possible, and probably inevitable. So called "primitive" societies have existed for thousands of years without taxation or government terrorism. I don't think these societies managed to eliminate evil, but they did have a system that was not based on criminality, and such self canceling phrases as "free and compulsory" or "war on terrorism".
I don't think we can shrink the government by fighting it directly. If we try to defeat the criminal conspiracy which is the government, with a bigger and more virulent criminal conspiracy called the revolution, we will have made the problem worse whether we succeed or fail. Government is a monster. Bleed it, don't feed it. If more and more people just ignore the government, it will quietly disappear.
If you believe that a crime is a crime, whether it is committed by some cop dressed in a blue uniform who has a piece of paper, or by a citizen, you are in the minority. You are a part of a small island of objective, honest, and logical people in the sea of criminals that is the human race. Your are in a minority, and it its a persecuted minority. The Statist correctly fears the application of logic above all else. Most people believe it is right for the government to tax, imprison, draft, or kill. These are criminal acts, and therefore, most people are criminals. If you support terrorism, you are a terrorist. If you vote for criminal acts, you are a criminal. Most people have been so scrambled by the government controlled school system and government-sponsored propaganda, they are incapable of applying rudimentary logic, and are therefore dangerously mentally incapacitated. For them, what is good for the goose if forbidden to to the gander, and they see this as perfectly logical. Doublespeak lives.
Far from facilitating the flow in information between the generations, our so-called "educational" system cuts parents and grandparents off from their children, and stops the flow of wisdom both from parents to children and from children to parents. If we continue to store our children in rows of wooden seats until they are grown we will continue to create generations that expects to be able to sustain life by sitting in rows of wooden seats. We must free our children to learn to live a free and fruitful life.
Our child labor laws stop children from learning how to work, the laws stop them from learning to enjoy work, and stop them from being able to become valued members of their families and their communities. It's no wonder that children who are forbidden from being productive members of their families and communities grow to be adults who don't take pride in being productive members of their society.
It might be possible to shrink the government by voting, but so far voting hasn't worked. To paraphrase Joe Stalin: Those who vote control nothing. Those who count the votes control everything. Do you think minority party votes are counted honestly?
Does that mean that I think that elections in the USA are crooked? Yes it does. And if a politician is elected by promising the voters he will get the government off their backs, he is soon proved to be a liar. Just read his lips.
An open ballot might be of some help. Those who chose the open ballot would have their votes published on the internet, and they would be able to verify that their votes were counted as they intended. this could have been a big help in Florida.
We need a national referendum. I think state referendums have been a tremendous help in controlling state governments. It's now time to move this process up to a national level.
Government is the problem. Governments killed about 150,000,000 of their own people in the last century, not counting wars. If they've killed millions, how many have they made sick or miserable.
Some say that an eye for an eye is primitive and harsh, but our present criminal code is far worse. Kidnapping is the most serious crime next to murder, but the government routinely kidnaps citizens on the suspicion of lesser crimes like shoplifting, fraud, and drug possession. If crimes are routinely punished with much greater crimes, violence will continue to increase. Harsher penalties only make the problem worse. The ancient code of an eye for an eye is much less brutal than our present legal system. Just watch a cop show on TV and you'll see cops using force and deceit against citizens who haven't been convicted of a crime, and that's just what they openly admit to. It's time citizens worked together to reign in our rogue police state. We can't afford to use police state methods to do this. One reason is that police state methods don't work, and another is that they are immoral.
Don't negotiate with terrorists, they say. Don't give them what they want. If you pay ransom to kidnapers, then that makes kidnapping more profitable, and it will increase. A stark example of how true this is the hundreds of thousands of people who have been kidnapped by the US government and held for ransom, otherwise known as bail, fines, and taxes.
Now that we have discounted political action and revolution, what do we have left? Economic activity. You vote only every couple of years, but you buy and sell everyday. We can shrink the government, by becoming homesteaders.
I don't mean we all need to move to Wyoming and live in the wilderness, though it is true that the power if the government is most diluted in rural areas.
By homesteading, I mean simply spend as much time as possible in your home upgrading the systems you use to maintain your life. Do it yourself. If you need something build it rather that buy it. Grow your own food if at all possible. Every time you create something yourself rather than buy it, you circulate less money through the economic system, and the government gets less of your energy in taxes, and there is less harm to the environment. Also, you learn new skills and as time goes on, you can be more and more independent of the system.
Run your own family business out of your own house, if at all possible. Own what you use, and use what you own. It is much more difficult for the government to tax your "income" if you do not get a W2 from an employer. I'm not suggesting that you break the law here, but a small business person can take legal advantage of at least some of the tax breaks that allow the largest and richest corporations to pay no taxes at all.
Employees are sitting ducks for the tax man. That's why the politicians always talk about jobs, and never work or money. They want you under their thumb from the time you enter head start. Ask an employee what he makes and he will quote his gross salary before taxes, and without deducting the expenses he incurs in order to work. Ask a business man what he makes and he will quote a figure that has every jot and title deducted. This is especially true if the government does the asking.
What does it profit a person to own a four bedroom house and spend the majority of her life in a 6 by 8 cubicle?
Statists would like you to believe that coercive taxation is the only means of social cooperation. This flies in the face of reality. More money is raised and spent every year by corporations, small business, and charities than is raised and spent by the government, and most believe that these non-government methods do so with much greater efficiency. Communist and totalitarian governments that have sought to pull all economic activity into the government system have been dismal economic and humanitarian failures. We can educate our children, repair our streets, and maintain public order without a government. I believe that taxation and government will be eliminated in the future, just as slavery was eliminated in the past.
When you work together with other citizens, try to use the most moral form of social cooperation. Government is the least moral. It uses force to achieve its aims. Next come corporations and businesses with their rigid rules and schedules. Churches and non-profit charities are the best. They are also have the best track record for keeping the government out of the lives of their members. It's no accident that churches don't have to pay taxes. Governments would collect taxes from churches if they could, but they can't because while people are in church, they trust each other more than the government. The government likes to keep us divided and suspicious of one another so it can control us. I am an agnostic, but I can't help but admire the social technology of churches, even though I still think it could be improved.
Avoid the trap of judging the quality of your life by the income numbers you report to the government.
Home school your children and teach them how to minimize their involvement with the government.
The last century saw the government grow and the family shrink. We need to make our families stronger and the government weaker.
Shrink the government by growing yourself, your family, and your home.