01-20-2018, 08:46 AM
(01-19-2018, 09:47 PM)nebraska Wrote: Liberty has never come from government. Liberty has always come from the subjects of government. The history of liberty is the history of resistance.
Wrong. It takes strong, effective government to impose liberty and the rule of law. If you want to know what life was like when government was weak, then just look to the Middle Ages, when centralized governments were rare. Oh, great, you say -- no taxes, no government spending, and thus freedom?
Wrong. Most people were serfs who lived at the discretion of the Lord of the Manor, toiling when he so commanded, eating only what he chose to give them, and perhaps even having his bride subjected to the jus primae noctis? Nothing could stop the exaction of the feudal lord. Of course one was free from the influence of any government-run school. People simply grew up scared and superstitious.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.