The Libertarian option | Eastern North Carolina Now

    Publisher's Note: This article originally appeared in the Beaufort Observer.

    "Every decent man is ashamed of the government he lives under." H. L. Mencken

    On November 6, 2012, I voted for the Libertarian candidate for president, Gov. Gary Johnson. I was simply tired of voting for the people and policies which I disliked the least. I chose to vote for a candidate whose principles echoed my own. Over a million other voters did the same. I doubt that a single one of us has any regrets.

    As a libertarian, I believe in private property and personal responsibility, division of labor, free trade and the rule of law. Gov. Johnson spoke to these values. Unfortunately, neither the Republican nor the Democratic parties shares anything like this view.

    Throughout the post World War I period Americans have been subjected to a creeping socialism that has been the result of the bi-partisan growth in the federal and local government's intrusion into our personal lives and into our pockets. Government is more and more the manager, banker and now owner of American businesses. It taxes incomes, licenses occupations, oversees employment contracts and exercises authority over domestic and foreign trade. The landscape is littered with housing collapses, union favoritism, bank rescues, regulatory malfeasance, crony capitalism, healthcare schemes and deficits. Worse than the insipid bureaucratic bungling is the fact that citizens actually have grown to expect and even demand more regulation as the response to the already awful regulation that exists. What we need is less regulation, less interference, less government.

    When the boat is sinking the crew should bail water out not let more water in. However, in response to rising unemployment both Bush and Obama raised the minimum wage, creating an added cost to hiring; while Obama instituted an unfunded healthcare benefit, guaranteeing that small businesses would be reluctant to hire, and then extended unemployment benefits to insure a disincentive to find work. Unemployment rocketed higher and stayed there until the extended benefits began to run out. As the Bush banking crises worsened the Obama administration created the Dodd-Frank Bill, which worked to enshrine "Too Big to Fail" and basically assured more concentration in the banking industry. A gift to the princes of greed who spent twenty years engineering the federally funded derivative and regulatory nightmare which led to the disembowelment of millions of homeowners.

    The Republican Party cannot seem to cease prying into people's bedrooms, while the Democrats insist on making others pay for their reproductive choices. Both parties are committed to enforcing drug laws that after 40 years have managed to criminalize much of our population and have made many young people unemployable due to their criminal history. In addition, the drug laws have spawned an expensive and well-armed sub culture of ATF, DEA, SWAT, etc., within law enforcement. The result has been a new breed of forfeiture laws that are devastating to people and property.

    After generations of nurturing by Republicans and Democrats we have become a people vying to beggar our neighbors. The old insist that their children support unfunded Medicare benefits which will not be there for the young, the poor ask the rich to work longer for less, the rich require guaranteed profits and protected markets. No matter how much good Hispanics do for this nation we refuse to welcome them, as our immigrant parents were welcomed. It is a disgrace.

    Mr. Romney and Mr. Obama are well educated, extremely intelligent and capable. Yet neither of them could produce an easily understandable proposal for change. Both spoke in trite generalities about "hope for tomorrow" by basically tinkering with the Rube Goldberg Machine by which America is governed and its citizens are taxed. Romney had a "bucket of qualified deductions" and Obama had the "rich paying their fair share." Both plans saved the imaginary trillions that such plans always boast about, but they saved them 10 years in the future, while ignoring the fiscal cliff looming in just a few weeks. Obama and Romney competed with each other to harangue China and subsidize alternative energy. Warmed over Keynesian mercantilism. This is the same directed economy that left us with $200 trillion in unfunded liabilities and a $16 trillion bonded debt. Meanwhile, the Federal Reserve has left us with investors who will not borrow and savers who earn no returns.

    The only reason that men this experienced and intelligent could not produce detailed and visible programs for substantive change is that change was not what their campaigns were about. It is not where their respective parties want to go. These campaigns were about continuing the government creep of the last 100 years. They were about maintaining control of the power to tax and spend by the small group of men and women, politicians and bureaucrats, who have deigned to appoint themselves as our masters. They take from some; give to others while empowering and enriching themselves in the process. Republicans increase spending, and in their turn the Democrats increase taxes. No crisis is wasted and after each cycle the government has more power while the people have less. The viciousness of the fight indicated the size of the fortunes at stake.

    "Government is a broker in pillage and every election is a sort of auction in stolen goods." H.L. Mencken

    Mr. Romney and Mr. Obama offered little to choose between. So I chose differently. Give me another choice between poor alternatives and I will choose differently again.