An Immodest Proposal

AN IMMODEST PROPOSAL: GOVERNMENT SHOULD BE RESPONSIBLE FOR US ALL

By Domenick J. Maglio PhD. Traditional Realist

Jonathan Swift, in 1729 was too limited in his “Modest Proposal.” He wrote his satirical essay to increase the public’s awareness of the plight of poor Irish children to promote the need for government intervention.  His shocking method was to facetiously recommend that these burdensome children could be eaten, which would end the issue and provide an additional food source for the country.

Our government should have a grander goal of not only providing for children but for all citizens and non citizens. The Obama healthcare program is the perfect vehicle to open one’s eyes to the importance of government in protecting all of us. We have learned that most of us need direction to make good choices for the common good. One person living a self-destructive lifestyle is a burden to all. By government benevolently micromanaging our lives, we can all prosper.

Mayor Bloomberg has become the modern “Gunsmoke” sheriff bringing health and stability to 8 million people through the force of his bureaucratic pen. He is so concerned about the health of his citizens in New York City, he is mandating regulations that will end obesity and lung cancer. He has single handedly restricted the use of salt, popcorn, the size of fountain drinks, forced restaurants to list calories of the dishes on the menu, eliminated saturated fats and outlawed smoking while legalizing marijuana usage in public. The bureaucratic controlling of individual’s harmful choices will promote a healthier existence for each person and the entire society.

Individual freedom has been a curse to man’s march to perfection. The freedom of the individual that allows stupid people to live stupid lives can no longer be tolerated. We have access to cutting edge scientific knowledge that intellectual elites such as President Obama and Mayor Bloomberg can analyze to make decrees for the uninformed public. They should be applauded, not condemned for usurping liberties to micromanage our lives.

Our government has the ability to insure a successful future for each and every person. The collective good overrides the concept of individual rights. Protecting us from ourselves is the only way government can obtain a better new world.

Government mandates relieve people of annoying, everyday decisions. Bureaucrats will determine scientifically the proper foods to eat, the safest and least expensive cars to drive, the amount of exercise, electricity used, type of houses to occupy, programs to watch, books to read, healthy liquor to drink, tension free vacations, best recreational drugs and type of healthcare and best death protocol for each category in which a person falls.

Every want and need will be provided by government programs. They will be managed by bureaucrats who will nudge and direct us to a hassle-free existence that will maximize the benefit to others. This daily directed life style will relieve us of the personal responsibility of making choices. This eliminates any anxiety or ambition to better oneself, for striving, thinking and judging would be unnecessary and punished in a bureaucratically controlled society.

The more freedom and independent thought citizens possess, the more difficulty government has in controlling outcomes. Citizens running amuck doing their own thing makes it virtually impossible for central planners to govern.  Citizens, like children, have to be told what and how to do things for there to be manageable and equitable progress.

Citizens will no longer have to agonize over what is the best product to buy. A government controlled economy will stop producing gadgets of convenience for more essential items. There will be one or a few of the same types of products offered in the marketplace. There will be no motivation for the entrepreneurial spirit to exist. Decisions will not be made by catching the imagination of the masses but by political bureaucrat committees who will be guided by impressing their superiors and political considerations.

America can no longer leave its future to selfish, greedy businessmen who are motivated by profit. In a free market society millionaires and billionaires may strike it rich. These “gifted” people may be more talented and able than others but they do not deserve to be given a greater reward than the least able or motivated worker.

Instead society needs to celebrate these bureaucratic experts who are driven by the social welfare of others. These public servants need to respond to the dictates of the man in charge, the president. Only with his steady hand on all the levers of power and restricting individual freedom can our nation fulfill the promise of being responsible for the personal lives of all citizens.  The sacrificing of certain types of individual habits and even human lives for the sake of the majority will allow our government to make a seamless transition into a better future while using our resources to the fullest extent. The president’s personal involvement in the transformation of our concept of freedom should make all Americans sleep well.

People who do not comply with regulations or politically correct behavior and thinking are reconditioned in reeducation centers. There will be no justice but only mercy for those who yield to the power of the government. Those who refuse to conform have to be isolated. Only belligerent and political activists have to be exterminated. Everyone, even the most able, will be expected to subordinate his will to the dictates of the government. Everyone and everything belongs to the state. Any group that threatens the nation will be repressed by military might.

This is an immodest proposal for overwhelming government intrusion into the lives of the citizens in order to benefit a more powerful government ruling class.

“Democracy extends the sphere of individual freedom, socialism restricts it. Democracy attaches all possible value to each man; socialism makes each man a mere agent, a mere number. Democracy and socialism have nothing in common but one word: equality. But notice the difference: while democracy seeks equality in liberty, socialism seeks equality in restraint and servitude.”
― Alexis de Tocqueville