A Nice Day on the Death Star

I drove down to D.C. yesterday, on my spring jaunt and grand tour of old haunts and old friends. Driving through "flyover country" between Pittsburgh and Washington was like skimming the borders of a Grant Wood painting -- I was not in it, but I was close enough to observe it. Of course, not all is quite as idyllic as the world of Wood -- there are plenty of trailer parks, junkyards, derelict buildings, abandoned farms, and just plain trash along the way. But still, it has a certain air of stability and authenticity. Then, as one draws nearer to the capital -- say, anywhere east of Frederick, Maryland -- the feeling of helplessness before a nameless enormity grows. By the time one approaches the D.C. Beltway, one is driving on a 7-lane highway (that is 7 lanes in either direction), bumper to bumper, at 70 mph. And this is on a _Saturday_ -- not even a workday for most of the wage slaves in the vast hive that is Washington. The thought that occurred to me at that point -- other than, how to get out alive -- was that none of this would be here -- no, not one jot or tittle -- if it were not for the gigantic, oppressive, overbearing central government we have managed to develop, mostly through benign neglect, over the past 200-odd years. The area that is now Washington would certainly include a small urban settlement, namely "Georgetown, Maryland" -- a kind of charming backwater at the head of the navigable portion of the Potomac River and at the end of a long-defunct canal system. There might be a few sprawling bucolic estates in the area now known as Arlington, as there were then. And another small town, a few miles down river, namely Alexandria, would sit in a dream-like state upon the tidewater, with the occasional river boat plying its shores. But none of the rest of it would exist -- and who can claim that the vast majority of Americans would not be better off, more conversant with their natural rights, more zealous in their application of liberty? They would reap what they had sown, and store it up against the bleak and cold winter. They would bear children and raise them up, and train them in the way they should go, without interference or harassment. They would invent, and create, and buy and sell, in a free market with an absolute minimum of regulation -- just enough to insure that those who contributed to prosperity and progress retained the rights to the fruits of their labor. Education would be need-based, and its form and duration totally optional, depending on the needs of the individual, the family, and the local community. Technology would be subject to the laws of supply and demand and the natural mechanisms of commerce, unfettered and with minimum regulation. Money -- the medium of exchange -- would be based on something tangible and of universally-recognized value (i.e., not only paper). Business and agriculture would be matters of individual initiative and individual risk, and larger enterprises would be characterized by unconstrained bargaining between owners/employers and workers. Local customs, mores, ideas of proper conduct and etiquette would not be crushed under the collectivist wheel but recognized and respected by neighbor and stranger alike. In short, it would be the America of the post-Revolutionary period without the cancer of slavery ready to bring it to its knees.

And yet, Washington D.C. is green. It is clean, scrubbed, ready for visitors, tourists, conferences, marches, demonstrations, all forms of commerce and social interaction. On the surface, it is not the least forbidding (provided, as I said, one can survive the traffic). But at the same time it is a whited sepulchre. Behind every limestone and marble facade there is a hive of parasites whose only interest is to stifle and squelch the freedom of others. Around every verdant park stand the edifices of those whose only desire is to exert power over others, in any form they can, unto the institutionalization of tyranny, one law, rule, regulation, or "guideline" at a time. And of course, the rulers -- the regime -- are always exempt from their own rules. The human race must, according to their view of things, be divided between the ruled -- i.e. the many -- and the rulers -- i.e. the few. There is no other possibility. Leaving people alone to -- for better or worse -- pilot their own destinies and decide their own fate is heresy... blasphemy... simply not done. Power has its own "technological imperative" -- what can be done will be done. By whom, to whom -- these are secondary considerations. If one is an accepted member of the power elite, one acquires staggering power over others... but one also acquires a price on one's head. If a bigger, or more vicious, person comes along who wants what you have, there is nothing whatsoever, in principle, keeping them from reaching out and taking it. And this is the down side of the system, or -- as some might say -- the saving grace. How often do we say, or think: "Lo, how the mighty have fallen." The person who today can walk through any door in Washington and bend those within to his will, and every whim, can be made a pariah and laughingstock tomorrow. It has happened, and it will happen. But apparently they consider it worth the risk; the rest of us just stay below radar and try to stay out of the way. Is this the "reductio ad absurdum" of democracy? Does this reveal the fatal flaws in the original American experiment devised by the Founding Fathers? Or is it a mutation of some sort -- a "road less taken" that, once it is taken, leads to moral chaos and social/economic totalitarianism? I'm sure I don't know. This is an "experiment" that cannot be rewound and repeated in a slightly different way. Does the failure of an application lead inevitably to an indictment of the ideas behind it? We like to make this claim vis-a-vis communism and fascism. How would we respond if someone made this claim vis-a-vis democracy? With indignation, or resignation?