We're Winning...

...and I'm not sure I'm really very happy about it.

Oh, I'm ecstatic that statism is getting thrashed, dying a thousand deaths to a thousand barbs from a thousand commentators on the internet, even - perhaps especially - those who aren't libertarian at all.  Their petty bickering and arguments and mudslinging would seem to prove government cannot ever achieve anything of value, for these are the people who would run it; evil, small-minded fools.

But libertarianism is more than a belief that government is incompetent, or evil, or any of those things.

Government is necessary.  It's not a necessary evil, it has no moral value, any more than any other tool.

If we didn't believe in its necessity, we would be anarchists, not libertarians.  To believe government is evil then is to believe -humanity- is evil; that which is good or even morally neutral does not -need- an evil thing.

Government is the potential for, the use of, the threat of, overwhelming force; in short, it's a gun.  Never let your muzzle cover anything you are not willing to destroy, and government is all muzzles and triggers.

Any liberals reading this may be horrified by this statement, but understand: I own guns.  (Actually, just one.  A 357 six-shot revolver, kept loaded by my bed or computer at all times.)  I don't want to get rid of guns, even if I could get rid of all guns in the world.

And I wouldn't get rid of government, either, even if it -is- one hell of a motherfucking big and dangerous gun.  It should simply be treated cautiously, with grave respect.  And it should never be held too close to, or directed at those things we treasure most.

The way we're winning, we may just be building a new breed of gun control advocate; one who thinks humanity too incompetent to run things.  This might seem to achieve our ends; they will call for government to be dismantled with the rest of us, people taken from positions of power.

But they aren't libertarians; they resent all positions of power, they resent the very structures.  Business will be as much their target as government.  Far from building an edifice of freedom, their goal will be the destruction of it, for freedom is power.

And they will soon enough be looking for a new master, for they resent not the chains but those who hold them, and technology may well provide them one.

We are winning.  We pick up a few more disillusioned libertarians-in-name with every swing.  But I don't know that our victory will be the one we are hoping for.