Posted on 11/22/2002 2:28:42 PM PST by rwfok
Republican economist and author Walter Williams told a group of Oklahomans on Thursday that the United States is headed toward totalitarianism. Williams, a nationally syndicated columnist and occasional substitute host for radio personality Rush Limbaugh, spoke at a noon luncheon at the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum. His presentation was sponsored by the Oklahoma Council of Public Affairs.
Williams discussed the decline of capitalism and expansion of government. He compared government taxing and spending to theft and rape.
"As time goes by, you and I own less and less of our most valuable property -- namely ourselves and the fruits of our labor," Williams said. "We do not decide how the fruits of our labor will be used. Someone else makes that decision."
Williams, an economics professor at George Mason University, acknowledged the need for government to provide national defense, police services and a few other limited roles, but said most government spending is a publicly sponsored armed robbery.
"Both acts involve taking the property of one person and giving it to another to whom it does not belong," Williams said. "The only way the American government can give a person a dollar is -- through threats, intimidation and coercion -- to take that money from somebody else. Just because you vote to take someone's property doesn't make it right."
Williams said the United States became the richest nation in the world because it was founded on the free enterprise system. That status has led many Americans to give up their freedoms to stamp out social problems, Williams said.
"Free enterprise in our country is threatened today not because of its failure but because of its success," Williams said. "In the name of other ideas ... we have abandoned many personal liberties. The ultimate end to this process is totalitarianism."
Williams said the slow growth of the federal government through increased taxation is taking away liberties bit by bit.
Williams said he would like to see government put a limit on spending.
I might disagree with you that what has and is happening is progress. That remains to be seen. But basically, I enjoyed your post. Some very good points.
There's something more than wrong with a government that usurps my choices and extends its dominion over matters that are and should be purely a matter of individual conscience. That's tyranny - no matter how one parses it. Issues such as charity, abortion, home schooling, property 'takings' - are difficult and are in some cases impossible to 'resolve'. That's why living according to the principles of liberty is such damned hard work sometimes.
Someone once said that most people don't really want to be free - they just want a tyranny to their liking. Our poster Dane is a perfect example of that mindset. Trouble is, when folks like Dane get their wish, it always leads down a very, very dark and bloody road.
I'm not wrong. I have an opinion, as you do.
You don't like my opinion, that's fine. But you're not wrong because you have a different opinion on secession.
Relax.
Someone also said that "one man's junk is another man's treasure". "Someone" is always saying something.
Please understand I am not saying that the state of affairs now is optimum or even progress in the right direction. A society structured by Williams would be a lot different than the current mess we have and the trade policies would be quite different too. We now have managed trade with winners and losers. We are not all equal under the law. Some businesses, groups or even foriegn entities leverage congress to make laws that favor them over others. And that's the tip of iceberg.
So true.
Actually tyranny is hiding in the bushes waiting to jump out and make us all slaves.
The price of freedom is eternal vigilance.
If we freedom loving people do not maintain our wariness of government power and act to check that power when it threatens to usurp the powers not granted to it, that government will eventually make us slaves.
The power to tax is the power to destroy.
What Doctor Williams is saying (I believe) is that governments power to tax is being permitted to balloon in order to finance services that are out side of our government’s constitutional purview.
The government’s taxing authority is being abused to provide goods and services for which there is no constitutional authority granted the government to provide.
Given free reign the government would tax all of us to the poor house to provide services to the masses in order to buy the votes necessary to insure reelection. The Dimocrats are much worse the Republicrats in this respect, but both sides of the isle are addicted to pork.
It may not be easy for some to see taxation as tyranny however taxes can and are frequently used to alter the behavior of people and business. This is a subtle and subversive form of tyranny. Government lays onerous taxes on a product to dissuade people from buying the product. Government provides a tax relief to induce people to build housing in poor neighbor hoods.
This is a subtle tyranny but coercion by government is tyranny. The Federal government has no constitutional mandate to use taxes in such a fashion.
I have heard Dr. Williams on Rush’s show several times and have found him to be an inspired and intelligent speaker.
Socialists must avoid certain truths to remain socialists, and they will justify and rationalize that avoidance while ignoring or maligning (the ultimate weapon, the ad hominem attack) those speaking truth.
Leave it to the smartest man in America to boil it down into one succinct sentence.
Ditto
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