The Trojan Horse
link It’s About Government, Not Health Care – Mark Steyn – National Review Online.
Steyn has always been one of my favourite writers because he is able to incisively dissect an issue favored by the left and expose the truth with a skewering wit. This is a very thoughtful piece on what the real issue is behind almost any program offered by governments. They are always launched under the disguise of the common good, but wind up being an apparatus for statists who then use the mechanisms for ratcheting up spending and taxation.
As we have seen in many of our modern institutions, dismantling them once erected becomes almost impossible as entrenched participants carve out their turf like so many fiefdoms. Think even of the institution of government itself, of the never decreasing bureacracies and regulations to navigate in order to do anything. Unlike private sector businesses which have to constantly justify and rationalize their existence, government institutions have no incentive to improve or become efficient. Their source of funds are captive and guaranteed.
The great fear in the U.S. is the very noticeable and alarming trend of the government taking over control of some of their biggest industries, from banking, to autos, to now health care and insurance. Extrapolating this trend points to an economy entirely dependant on bureaucrats making decisions that were once made by a dynamic and free industrial culture. It’s possible that the entire economy will be controlled by unelected assignees. We all know how that works. Think Post Office. As Steyn distressingly points out, the people in power make very little difference once the machinery is built. Right now, it appears the most massive machinery in history is being assembled down there. Only a few seem to get it.