Sunday, March 29, 2009

To Amy (and others who believe government can do good)



Let me say again, for the statists on both the left and the right:

the government has no rights. Anything the government does, it must do within the rights that we as individuals delegate to it; and in order to delegate that right to government we must first possess that right.

You as an individual do not have the right to hold a gun to my head, take my money, and give it to someone else; no matter how good the cause. Neither do you as an individual have the right to hold a gun to my head and tell me how I can or cannot behave, or what I can or cannot do; unless you are preventing me from violating your rights, or the rights of others by doing so.

So, if you don't have the right to steal from me or tell me how to live, you cannot delegate that task to the government; because the government derives it's power from the rights you delegate to it.

It's wrong for you to steal from me; and getting 52 million of your friends together to to vote on it and say it's OK, doesn't make it so.


HT: Doug Mataconis