Basic Confusion?

Drunken brawl breaks out
when one woman blocks
the view of a male stripper.

There seems to be substantial confusion in our country over such basic things as common sense, morality, legality, and the ordinary functions of government. I believe this is at least partly what is responsible for our accelerating decline. Let’s take a simple example to begin with, the burning down of a house in Tennessee. You probably all know the story. A family either forgot or for some other reason failed to pay a special $75 dollar fee that would have protected them from fire. Their house caught fire, the fire department was called, but because they hadn’t paid the fee, simply stood by and watched the house burn to the ground. This has outraged some people, but has been defended by others as “what they get for not paying the special fee” (it’s their own fault). Forget for the moment that the homeowner and even his neighbor offered to pay whatever it would cost if they would spray water and keep the fire from further damage. One might think that anyone, even a stranger passing by, when seeing a house on fire would feel some moral obligation to do something to help. Certainly you would not expect a fire department to refuse to help put out a fire of any kind, whether a special fee had been paid or not. This homeowner already paid his taxes, money that is supposed to be used for government protection, so why was he expected to pay additional money? Presumably, I guess, because taxes in this community are not sufficient to cover expenses. But why are they not sufficient? Is it not the responsibility of government to impose taxes for the purpose of preventing fires, crime, and so on. This seems to be a kind of mini-privatization problem.

So what is the purpose of privatization? I guess the argument has to do with the belief that private industry can do things better and more efficiently than government. I believe this is a very questionable belief, given false credence by Ronald Reagan and other nincompoops. We have many governmental programs that function very well (or would if properly funded): the Post Office, Veterans Health, Public Education, Medicare, Medicaid, Highway construction, and so on. There is, alas, little agreement on this question. Some seem to believe government should have virtually no power over individuals, others believe in a strong central government that acts in the best interest of the citizens. After more than 300 years of our democracy there seems to be little agreement on the legitimate functions of government. Some seem to believe that taxes themselves are intrinsically wrong, that people should not have to pay them. But what, then, for things like fire departments, police, highways, schools, and etc.? Obviously in a large and complex society like ours, without some government control there would be chaos, nothing would work very well and the populace would suffer.

In our contemporary society this problem is confounded by the ridiculous idea of a “free-market economy.” That is, the market operating freely will bring about desirable results for most everything. If everything were just privatized, and business and the markets were allowed to function freely we would be living in paradise. It seems to me there is by now quite enough proof that this is completely nonsensical. There have been in recent years attempts to privatize most everything: energy, schools, fire departments, prisons, agriculture, transportation, and even in extreme cases, such basic necessities as water. And government has been denied even basic regulatory functions. You understand, I hope, where this has led us. I repeat once again, there are some things that are far too important to be privatized. All our basic necessities must be seen in this way. Private enterprise does not operate with the public good in mind, but, rather, only for profit. It is perfectly obvious that privatizing schools is going (in general) to lead to more shoddy education, private prisons are going to lead to less care, less food, and inevitably an increase in the prison population. Even our food supply has been corrupted by huge private companies operating solely for profit. We know what the privatization of energy has done in California. It should not be difficult to know what basic facts of human life should be protected.

There is another area in which I think governments have failed. I receive pleas very often to save the children, help the homeless, save the whales, save the apes, save the puffins, save the Polar Bears, and on and on. Now I am very sympathetic to all of these causes, and I sincerely believe they should all be protected, and I feel guilty if I do not contribute. But should this not be the responsibility of governments? Should not, over time, our governments, supposedly acting in our best interests, have seen to it that species did not disappear, there should be no homeless, no unemployed, nothing that is currently believed to be a serious problem. Do these problems not result from just plain neglect? These problems seem to me to be the result of our failure to agree on just what the responsibilities of government, at least our own government, should be? Doesn’t it seem reasonable that in over 300 years of our history we should have come to some agreement over just what government should and should not be expected to do. I personally believe that all governments have failed miserably when it comes to protecting their citizens, the environment, and all the wonderful creatures that exist on our little planet. At the moment I see little hope for any meaningful change. I think there is most probably a serious flaw in the human character that simply does not allow us to do the right thing, or perhaps even to know what the right thing is. We can’t even agree on whether or not human life is truly precious.

LKBIQ:
Every decent man is ashamed of the government he lives under.
H. L. Mencken

TILT:
The age of the earth has been determined to be 4.54 billion years.