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Emergency! Emergency! Everybody To Get From Street!

One constant in the history of the expansion of the state is the reliance on “emergency conditions” to justify extraordinary usurpations of power.  Paralyzing dissent and resistance with mindless fear is a time-honored way to deprive people of their liberties and fleece them of their wealth, and we are seeing plenty of this these days.  […]

One constant in the history of the expansion of the state is the reliance on “emergency conditions” to justify extraordinary usurpations of power.  Paralyzing dissent and resistance with mindless fear is a time-honored way to deprive people of their liberties and fleece them of their wealth, and we are seeing plenty of this these days.  In recent weeks, most especially last week, we have been told that dire catatstrophe awaits us unless we cede to the government–the same government that worked to create and deepen the crisis–vast, unprecedented powers that will be used mainly to use its coercive apparatus to aid a relative few.  This is a state run by an oligarchy, and run for the benefit of the dynatoi who use their ties to government officials to arrange for assistance provided by the public.  Naturally, the pseudo-populists roaming the land and ridiculing elites have nothing to say about this most outstanding example of elite perversion of constitutional and good government, because they have no real objections to concentrated wealth and power and merely want their share of both.  Indeed, they are in agreement with the pro-oligarchy moves that the administration has been making. 

All of this takes place under the threat of impending doom, which is almost certainly exaggerated, as every threat used to expand state power has been exaggerated for at least the last century.  Others have noticed the ad hoc, hasty, abrupt and irregular nature of this power-grab, as egregious in its usurpation and recklessness as the war in Iraq, and once again we are treated to the claim that the cost of inaction is too high or the failure to embrace the administration’s solution is intolerable.  This was a lie five years ago, and I am not clear why it is any less of a lie today.  The mega-bailout is nothing less than a very expensive way of saying, “I’m here from the government, and I’m here to help you,” which should strike terror in each and every heart. 

Yes, people are justifiably anxious, and no one wants to suffer the losses that bank failures would bring, but all of this is one more effort at a grand deferral of responsibility.  The mega-bailout is another attempt to avoid taking responsibility for debts already incurred and excessive consumption already enjoyed.  No one wants to pay the tab, and so “we” all pay it with the knowledge that it will mostly be our descendants who shoulder the real burden.  There is no greater proof of the anti-conservative nature of this administration than its absolute contempt for the welfare of generations not yet born.  We have great obligations to those future generations, as we are bound by the pact among the dead, living and unborn, and this anti-conservatism can be seen in its fiscal, foreign and immigration policies, among others.  Preserving the patrimony for the future, not squandering it for present enjoyment, is the quintessential conservative duty, and yet time and time again ostensibly conservative politicians rob the future and debase the patrimony for the sake of some temporary gain.     

On the one hand, the public will take on the debts of bankers, and on the other the current generation will simply pass the bill on to their children.  Rather than bear the costs of financial irresponsibility and excess, there is a natural instinct to want to be sheltered and protected from the consequences of the unsustainable expansion, which simply burdens future generations with even more unnecessary debt that is piled on top of an unsustainable entitlement system that will either drive the nation into bankruptcy or collapse.  The refusal to confront reality and make sacrifices for the good of our inheritors is the fundamental moral failing behind the mega-bailout.

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