Two posts from Laurence Vance on Lew Rockwell’s blog today stuck out in my mind. Both were about the police-state, both were the result of Republicans (the party of so-called “limited government”).
The first post described how the Heritage Foundation has decided that despite all the evil perpetrated by the TSA (a product of the GOP), it should nevertheless remain intact, albeit with a slightly different role. Instead of providing the security directly, the TSA ought to be limited to providing “‘aviation security policy and regulations.’” The logic of this argument is destroyed by Vance, who writes:
Convenience store robberies are a much bigger problem than terrorists bringing bombs on airplanes. How about the federal government providing security at convenience stores or supervising security at convenience stores by a federal convenience store security director? Sounds ludicrous I know, but it ought to sound just as ludicrous for the federal government to handle security at airports. Why doesn’t it?
The second post concerns a case recently decided by The Supremes. From the story: “In a 5-4 decision, the court ruled against a New Jersey man who was strip searched in two county jails following his arrest on a warrant for an unpaid fine that he had, in reality, paid.” So the High Court ruled that police did not violate the rights of this man, because clearly, no one has the right not to be stripped naked and caged for eight days for no crime.
Vance notes that it was the “conservative” wing of the court that ruled against the man, and by extension, every other man, woman and child in the United States. Justices Kennedy, Roberts, Scalia, Alito, and Thomas all saw nothing wrong with this. Again, the actions of conservatives belie their limited-government rhetoric. Vance then goes on to mention that we always seem to hear that we just need more Republican presidents to nominate more conservative judges and all would be fine.
The problem of course in this case is that many law-and-order types in the GOP (so, basically the GOP) would likely approve of such draconian measures. After all, it was an argument for security that led the majority to side against personal freedom.
There are of course many more examples of the dissonance between the mantra of a “limited government” and the actions taken by “conservative” politicians. Among these are the war on Property & Liberty (drugs), the issue of who should be allowed to marry, how the issue of abortion is handled, etc. Of course a truly limited government would mean people owned their bodies; they could voluntarily associate with anyone under any terms and, just as murder is an issue for the states, so it would be with abortion.
