Government and Generations
Ilya Shambat
carry the day until met with reality. In the baby boom generation this
sentiment was anti-business, and it continued until it was met with
reality of international economic competition. What was seen for these
people as "growing up" was to accept these capitalist realities.
In my generation, the youth sentiment was not anti-business but anti-
government. This went on until the need for government was made
inescapably apparent as a result of terrorist attacks, financial
system corruption and global warming. So for people of my generation,
"growing up" is not about accepting the need for capitalism but about
accepting the need for government. The boomers had to accept that
business was necessary; my generation, that the government is.
There have been oodles of people claiming such things as that American
government is "socialist" or "totalitarian." Having lived under actual
totalitarianism, I always laughed at such claims. American government
is one of the mildest and most benign governments anywhere, and to
accuse it of such things as socialism or totalitarianism is
ridiculous. These people have no idea what totalitarianism is.
It is amusing to see all these anti-government people using government-
built Internet to disseminate their rubbish. Just as it is amusing to
see anti-government truckers use government-built, government-
maintained Interstate to deliver the products made by government-
subsidized anti-government beef farmers to "big liberal" cities that
are their markets. It is amusing to see students in publically funded
universities rail against "statism" or claim AmeriCorps program tobe
"servitude," or to see youth educated in public schools and publically
funded universities wanting government "off their backs."
It is amusing to see people whose lifestyle depends on cars,
computers, air conditioning and similar products - all of them based
on government-funded science - claim scientists to be fools and
sinners, or portray government as parasitical off their toil. It is
amusing to see the oil industry workers who have only been able to
keep their jobs because their bosses have lobbied the government to
silence the truth about global warming shout about "socialism" or "New
World Order." And it is also amusing to see the people who depend as
much as they do on government police and government military not want
to pay taxes and to continue to claim American government to be the
Great Satan when without American government they would all be dead.
The anti-government fantasy is an indulgence, and one that is just as
irresponsible as was the anti-business fantasy of the baby boomers.
Government provides military, police, roads, schools, science,
Internet - all things that are necessary, not only for people's
protection but also for the economy, and without which what is known
as today's way of life would not have existed at all. A country
without a government does not lead to freedom; it leads to Somalia.
And it is irresponsible and destructive to want a powerful country and
its citizens to follow such a path.
It is time to put away childish things, which, for my generation,
means anti-government ideology. The government is necessary, and
American people owe to it far more than many think. Anyone who does
not think so is free to confront the Taliban personally. That might
put things for them in perspective, in case that global terrorism and
global warming have not.