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That's an et tuque argumment, on their part. I, for one, would wholeheartedly favor completely dismantling public education and government subsidies or involvement in education. But so long as the government is going to take thousands of dollars from me every year, I'll send my kids to not-quite-awful public schools in the suburbs, especially since the grotesque distortion of the markets caused by public involvement prices alternatives beyond the means of most people. I went to a Catholic school in Queens, where tuition was $24/year, with a maximum of $48/yr/family. Although we had 48 kids per classroom and few fripperies, just a once a week music teacher, our performance on standardized tests was better than public schools. The shortfall in money was made up by Parish fund raising and other forms of volunteerism. The productivity was probably at least twice (or more) of the public schools, not matter how you measure it. On top of which we were not exposed the assinine government propaganda that kids are exposed to these days in public schools, although the nuns were very patriotic, like most Americans in those days. BTW, we were a lower middle class neighborhood, with a standard of living no better most blacks enjoy today.

While my personal experience in public education convinces me superiority and practicality of private education, I think a similar case can be made for smaller police forces. If people were more self-reliant for personal defense, I believe that crime rates would plummet. When seconds count, the police will be there in minutes. The current model is for crime victims to submit to violence and wait for wheels of justice to grind slowly, if ever, to extract risibly light retribution at scandalously high cost. To the criminal justice system, criminals are their clients, their raison d'etre. Taxpayers and crime victims are just the necessary host organism for the whole colony of parasites.

What evidence is there that volunteer fire departments are less effective than profession? I could go on and on. There are certain irreducable responsiblities of government, - defend the borders, for instance - , run fair and impartial courts, as a last recourse to enforce criminal laws, to hang thieves and murders. The more government strays from these limited responsiblities into other areas of our lives, the more poorly it performs its legitmate purposes.