Reaganism has brought ruin to America's middle class while making the richest richer than ever before. Productivity and corporate profits have soared while sacrificing the wages and happiness of average Americans on the altar to St. Ronald. One of the hallmarks of the American conservative religion is a fetish for ever-smaller government. The theory goes, despite decades of evidence to the contrary, that removing government oversight, regulation, and taxes will allow a system of perfect economic freedom where the desires of the people will be heard through their purchasing power, or lack thereof. The idea is that, if we just get government out of the picture, we can rejoice in a future of prosperity and that current tender morsel of conservative ecstasy, "liberty."
This idea is, of course, demonstrably false.
There are endless examples of money corrupting throughout all of history, from the gluttonous and unregulated days of Ancient Rome to the laissez faire collapse of the Gilded Age in 1929, but for the sake of brevity we will look at the more recent example of politics. The Citizen's United decision of the Supreme Court has opened the floodgates to unlimited campaign spending, and in only six short years we have seen our government become essentially paralyzed. The rich buy the government, and the rich like the way things are, because they are rich. If the government doesn't do anything, it can't find ways to make the system more equal. After all, the government is supposed to be of, by, and for the people. Unfortunately, when the government is of, by, and for the dollar, corruption reigns and those who cannot afford to have their interests looked after are left behind to rot.
This is the legacy of "small" government: without a watchdog to ensure a level playing field, the rich will spend fractions of their expansive wealth to expand it even more. Greed rules when government doesn't, and a government too small to keep greed in check is the government of Ronald Reagan and Calvin Coolidge, the latter of whom famously quipped "the business of America is business," only to see it all come crashing down. When the sole motivator for a society is getting more and more money, you cannot expect people to be noble.
America tried, long ago, during its difficult first few years, to live by the doctrines of small government. They had just fought a war against a tyrannical king, and to ensure they would not have a new American kingdom they established a government that was deliberately small, weak, and had a heavy reliance on States' Rights. Under what became known as the Articles of Confederation, America was a "firm league of friendship," each with their own laws, borders, and even currency. There was no President, no executive branch, and the federal government had to beg the states for funding because it could not tax.
Clearly, this matches the current conservative dream of a small government, States' Rights America. It was an unmitigated failure. It should be noted as well that the Confederate States of America followed a similar model during their insurrection.
Under the Articles, the government was unable to run the affairs of state, and the states themselves bickered amongst themselves over trade disputes that the federal government had no power to resolve. Though it tried to issue its own money, the federal government became the butt of a contemporary joke when folks would refer to something worthless as "not worth a Continental" dollar. Had Britain decided to strike back against the American rebels during this time, it could have easily drawn and quartered America in the crib because America did not have a standing army, relying mostly on state militias. The system was such a quantifiable mess that men like James Madison and Alexander Hamilton had to advocate for a stronger government in the Federalist Papers, eventually leading to the ratification of the US Constitution in 1787, a mere eleven years after the revolution began.
Men like Hamilton and Madison went on to greatness and helped establish the greatest country this world has ever seen. Anti-federal maniacs like Thomas Paine and Patrick Henry failed to read the writing on the wall, and faded into obscurity, essentially "one-hit wonders" of the American Revolution.
It's often said that America's current crop of maniacal conservatives want to take America back to the 1950s, but as the movement has become more and more poisoned by the will of moneyed interests, the case is becoming increasingly clear that the goal is to go back much, much further. The right-wing obsession is one that wants to bring us back to the days of the Articles of Confederation, when the country was weak and powerless to protect its citizens. Unfortunately, today's biggest threat is not a recolonization effort from England, but rather the corporatization of America at the hands of the richest of the rich, all for want of money.
At Your Service,
Doremus Jessup
