[gjenkins]

"We also need to keep them on a tight rein--even...no, especially--the best of them."

Impossible, as evidenced by the continual unabated growth of our federal government. We can not reign it in. It grew by seizing bits of power wherever the majority allows it. The fact is that everything that it does has majority approval. To change it would require changing the minds of the majority. To keep a tight reign on it would require oversite as large and powerful as it is.

[Savage Beast]

You may be right. If so, we have already seen the beginning of the end.

[epow]

. The fact is that everything that it does has majority approval

You sir, or madam, as the case may be, have hit the proverbial nail squarely on it's head. We the people have no one to blame but ourselves. The power-hungry politicians are just doing what comes naturally to would-be tyrants. It's in their nature, they are no more to blame for the mess we're in than the rabid dog is to blame for biting you. They will go just as far as the people will allow them to go, and the people are urging them to go even farther every day. The people who want to be cared for by an omnipotent government are now in the majority and have been for the last 7 decades. It isn't going to get any better.