"As the State swells, it ceases to perform any of its functions even marginally well."

"The annotations are significant, but even more so is the geometry through which they're depicted: an expanding sphere of State control, first over our necessities, then over our discretionary activities, and ultimately over the whole of human existence.

At each stage, the State's coercive powers are amplified by the importance and scope of the resources it appropriated in the previous stage, such that individuals and voluntary organizations steadily lose all power to resist its further expansion. The Blob wouldn't have had a chance against the State. I can add only a single observation to this depiction: As the State swells, it ceases to perform any of its functions even marginally well. Indeed, the first functions it will slough are the ones for which we originally agreed to tolerate a pre-indemnified coercive authority: national defense, police protection, and the administration of impartial justice. In the terminal stage of its expansion, when it lays claim to all things and no one outside its corridors may do anything without first asking its permission and paying its price, the State's sole concern becomes the maintenance of its power and the perquisites of its nomenklatura." Liberty's Torch: The Metastasis

Posted by gerardvanderleun at July 22, 2013 10:47 AM