Of the Way

There is an old and widely known anecdote that a frog, when placed in a pot of boiling water will immediately jump out, but if placed in cold water and the temperature is gradually increased it will boil alive without offering any resistance.  Although not technically true, the anecdote captures an aspect of human nature rather well.

Generally, the rise of domestic American tyranny has been via a gradualist approach, much like the philosophy of the Fabian Socialists.  Incorporate an income tax at 2%, make use of a crisis to increase the top marginal rates to 90% and then settle on a rate of 35% for the time being.  They approach hasn’t been uniformly gradual.  Often the government will increase its influence at a greater rate during crises.  As Robert Higgs illustrates in Crisis and Leviathan, the government never lets a good crisis go to waste.  The government will substantially increase its intervention in the lives of its people during times of crisis, but once the crisis is over, the government never returns back to its pre-crisis levels.

The recent TSA implementation of a choice between naked scanners or a frisk-down that goes beyond inappropriate has provoked the proverbial frog to jump out of the water.  If this was a pilot program for the American tolerance for tyranny, I am pleasantly surprised with the level of resistance.  This is far more encouraging than the results of any election.  Even people at work who are usually silent regarding political matters are up in arms about this.  Only the most ardent statists are defending the TSA, and even they are grasping at straws.

Airport security is frankly too important to be entrusted to bureaucrats.  In a truly free economy, the airlines would have a vested interest in seeing to it that passengers safely arrive at their destinations without humiliating and alienating them.  If Delta got their own naked scanners, they would not get repeat business.  This should hopefully help people to rethink their opinion of government competence and “benevolence” in endeavors outside of airport security.  Education is too important to entrust to (any level of) government.  The economy is too important to entrust to the government.  “National security” is too important to entrust to the government.  This will be a tough sell for your garden variety conservative, but we need to realize that the department of “defense” is just another government bureaucracy.  As such it has the interests of bureaucrats, lobbyists, and powerful interests well above those of doing the actual job it purports to do.  I’m not stating that every individual in the armed forces (or any other government agency) is of this mindset, but every individual in the armed forces is trained to obey orders without questioning.  What the TSA has done is essentially given us a picture of what the American forces do to the rest of the world.

This parasitic tyranny needs to be opposed at home and abroad.  God has ordained civil magistrates to be his ministers of wrath.  Those usurpers who would rule in a manner that refuses to submit to the Triune God acknowledging their role as subordinate deacons, who violate God’s higher law, who pervert justice, have a lot more to worry about than a bunch of angry subjects.

Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing?

The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the LORD, and against his anointed, saying,

Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us.

He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the LORD shall have them in derision.

Then shall he speak unto them in his wrath, and vex them in his sore displeasure.

Yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion.

I will declare the decree: the LORD hath said unto me, Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee.

Ask of me, and I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession.

Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron; thou shalt dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel.

Be wise now therefore, O ye kings: be instructed, ye judges of the earth.

Serve the LORD with fear, and rejoice with trembling.

Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and ye perish from the way, when his wrath is kindled but a little. Blessed are all they that put their trust in him.      -Psalm 2