Stop supporting the state
Inside Liberty Watch Today - April 10, 2006
The barrage of garish political signs that have popped up like weeds this spring tells us that in HL Mencken's words; "a sort of advance auction sale of stolen goods" or election is near.
There will be the usual rah-rah about getting out and voting, and that you have no right to complain if you don't vote, and other such baloney. These clichés are so nonsensical it's amazing they continue to be constantly uttered by government cheerleaders.
No doubt this column will move someone to write in something to the effect that, "to make change, a person must vote," or "This is a precious freedom people must exercise," or "It's our civic duty." Just based on historical evidence, we know all of that's ridiculous. The more people vote, the bigger government gets and the less freedom we have. People should mind their own business, stay home and do something productive on Election Day.
The world would be a better place.
Besides, statistically, there is virtually no chance that a single vote will decide an election. Sure, there have been a few elections decided by one vote, but out of the millions of elections held it's an infinitesimal percentage. As Doug Casey explains in this month's International Speculator, "Politicians like to say [your vote] counts because it is to their advantage to get everyone into busybody mode."
Even if you are an informed voter, ignorant voters drown your vote out.
"Rational voters are rationally ignorant," law and economics professor David Friedman told the crowd at APEE (The Association of Private Enterprise Education) here in Las Vegas last week.
Friedman writes in his book Hidden Order that voting is how individuals make government act in our interest. Thus, voting is the private production of a public good. However, "when you spend time and energy deciding which candidate best serves the general interest and voting accordingly," writes Friedman, "most of the benefit of your expenditure goes to other people.
You are producing a public good: a vote for a better candidate." The total benefit may be great, but the individual payoff is zero. Thus, voters do not get informed, they are rationally ignorant and the public good of good candidates is under produced, "which in turn means that democracy does not work very well," Friedman explains, "so we cannot rely on government to act in our interest."
Friedman also made the point in his APEE speech that politicians have very insecure property rights. Thus, they don't act in the long-term interest of the electorate, because they themselves will not be in office controlling political property long term. Politicians act for their own short-term political benefit, at the expense of the citizenry, and rationally so.
In addition to the fact that the odds of effecting an election are astronomical, Doug Casey lists four other reasons not to partake in voting. "Voting in a political election is unethical. Voting compromises your privacy. Voting, as well as registering, entails hanging around government offices and dealing with petty bureaucrats. Voting encourages politicians."
A few readers may think this view unpatriotic: That somehow Americans must blindly support a system that keeps knaves and tyrants in power. But, today's America isn't anything like what the founding fathers had in mind. This nation was founded on principles that today are called libertarian. And the political establishment as well as the press view libertarians as: at a minimum too radical, or in many cases, just plain nuts. Voters feel the same way, the number of libertarians ever elected to office probably matches the number of elections decided by one vote.
Those that support government by voting are the ones that have no room to complain. No matter who gets elected, the government always wins. As Doug Casey says, "Participating in politics is an act of ethical bankruptcy." Cleanse your soul this election by not participating.
Doug French, Liberty Watch Columnist
