Reducing expectations

[Archaea]

Limited government is a dream, and perhaps one which will never again return. OTOH, before limited government could ever become a reality, public expectations would need to be adjusted.

So a campaign to create expectations of receiving virtually nothing from government would be the only successful route.

There are some basic government provisions which nobody but a complete anarchist support.

The common defense: military, perhaps by derivation, police, (firefighters?).

What else?

Most agree on providing a fundamental level of education.

Public welfare often refers to publicly financed inoculations and vaccinations.

Banking system stability, is usually considered essential.

Infrastructure and control of monopolies for power and utilities.

Beyond that, everything else is could be considered elective or discretionary.

And it makes some sense to take some basic care of the indigent at a basic level, or the disabled for the public health.

But encouraging more than that is to ensure a costly government we can't afford, and probably shouldn't desire.

[BarbaraGordon]

Originally Posted by Archaea

Limited government is a dream, and perhaps one which will never again return. OTOH, before limited government could ever become a reality, public expectations would need to be adjusted.

So a campaign to create expectations of receiving virtually nothing from government would be the only successful route.

There are some basic government provisions which nobody but a complete anarchist support.

The common defense: military, perhaps by derivation, police, (firefighters?).

What else?

Most agree on providing a fundamental level of education.

Public welfare often refers to publicly financed inoculations and vaccinations.

Banking system stability, is usually considered essential.

Infrastructure and control of monopolies for power and utilities.

Beyond that, everything else is could be considered elective or discretionary.

And it makes some sense to take some basic care of the indigent at a basic level, or the disabled for the public health.

But encouraging more than that is to ensure a costly government we can't afford, and probably shouldn't desire.

I'm beginning to think the notion of limited government is increasingly anachronistic and chimeric.

[Archaea]

Originally Posted by BarbaraGordon

I'm beginning to think the notion of limited government is increasingly anachronistic and chimeric.

Why?

The reason I say this, is it's about expectations, and it creates an unreasonable public, for us to have a magical land where some powerful omnipotent Wizard of Oz magically makes our problems go away.

We who expect government to do more than the most basic, are at fault for the problems government creates.

Expecting a magical fairy is what's unreasonable. Government never fixes anything but just changes the color of the problems.

[BarbaraGordon]

Originally Posted by Archaea

Why?

I don't think it's very realistic to think we'll ever see significant reductions in federal reach. That's all.