Will you live better?

In September, 2002, Governor Gray Davis of CA just signed into law more restrictions on our freedoms. Effective January 1, 2003 all young people through age 17 will be harassed and taxed if they ride skateboards without a helmet. Davis has sold his signature for millions. He would gladly trade your freedom for money, and our state's Attorney General has called for an investigation of his corruption.

Will you live better when Government makes all your decisions?

Societies since the beginning of time have had individuals who through their own folly cause themselves harm. Once such example is a prominent man I know who when younger consumed lots of the 'gateway' drug called alcohol in his youth. He then moved up to at least cocaine. He then went on to become the head of a large organization which tries to force others to stop using drugs by imprisoning them (especially if they are black or brown). You can read all about this dangerous hypocrite here.

But, there are also people who excel and make wonderful decisions and move ahead benefiting all of society. One recent example comes to mind: Bill Gates.

Government has made the decision that you should never smoke marijuana. Forget the fact that 'we the people' of California are supposed to be the government. Or that government was supposed to be 'of, for, & by the people.' That was then. This is now. Forget that Californians overwhelmingly voted to give our citizens the right to smoke medical marijuana. And, forget the fact that our elected prostitutes promise to represent the electorate, or that they take an oath to 'uphold protect and defend the constitution.' They won't. Why? Because they have a better idea predicated upon the notion that you, the lowly citizen are too stupid to manage your own affairs. And, sadly, they allow themselves to sell your freedoms because they (unlike at least some drug dealers) have no moral values.

So, they continue to erase from our lives the ability to make our own decisions and direct our own affairs. Whether at the State, Local, or Federal level, there is an assault on your ability to make decisions. When my Great Uncle was a boy he decided to build his own car. Today a private citizen would be jailed if he did this. In the 1940s you could build a home without permission from anyone. Today, you will be forced to tear down a house if you try to build it without paying bribes to teams of county inspectors. You have little choice over your medical care. You must go to government licensed doctors and professionals for many critical services. If you decide to not pay for the bombings the US conducts all around the world, you will be imprisoned. We cannot use our own property and equipment unless we do so exactly as our governments want us to. And, if you are a wage-earner in California, government, NOT YOU decides where over 50% of your income will go. There is even a movement afoot in California right now to end the right of parents to teach their children at home instead of at the official government youth indoctrination centers. When a family breaks up, the government will almost always decide that the Father is an unfit parent and should financially support the Wife and her boyfriend.

Decisions and lack of decisions make us or break us. By living a normal, free, at-risk life we move ahead, or behind. We bear the inconvenience of our bad decisions or reap the rewards of our good decisions--except when government makes our decisions. Then, like good little communists we can only give credit to the omnipotent state for being our god. We become robots. We have no purpose or self-interest in life. We simply do whatever the government tells us to do. We become listless, pointless, unable to assert our own wants, needs, individuality or personality. We essentially stop living. We have no purpose in living when government makes all our decisions. Am I the only one who feels like we're getting dangerously close to that point? What is the purpose or need for us to live, if we are simply going to be government-programmed robots?

Mark Blackburn is a business analyst who provides data base consulting services under contract to various Sacramento clients including the California Department of Parks.

Mark S. Blackburn, MBA

Will you live better when Government makes all your decisions?