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I'm on the left and I would love to have "small government" the only problem is that small government requires the citizenry acting in a responsible manner. As Madison observed:
"If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.
The growth in government grows in direct relationship to men failing to act as angeles particularly when they are operating in an economic system that is absent any incentive to act as responsible citizens.
the problem in USA is that both republicans and democrats want bigger government
Correct. Republicans claim to want small government because that is what their base wants to hear, but they don't practice what they preach. It's not in the interest of a politician to shrink government since government is their livelihood. Republicans have become the party of lower taxes with little commensurate reduction in services.
For me its not so much the size of the government as the type of government. I think our Federal government stinks because the US is too big and too diverse to have an effective strong central government. Our system of government is designed so that most government activity would occur at the state and local levels. The reason there is so much discord in national politics is because it is because every 4 years the guy representing 50% of the people tries to ram through policies that the other 50% find morally repugnant. We wouldn't have this problem if most governing occurred more locally.
"What I do say is that no man is good enough to govern another man without that other's consent. I say this is the leading principle, the sheet-anchor of American republicanism. Our Declaration of Independence says: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: That all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed."
- - - Abraham Lincoln, Speech at Peoria, Illinois (1854) http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Abraham_...
As Lincoln reminds us, under the republican form, promised by the USCON, instituted by the Declaration of Independence, NO MAN (nor American government) is good enough to govern you without your consent. Without your consent, all that government is authorized to do is secure endowed (sacred) rights (prosecute trespass; adjudicate disputes; defend against enemies, foreign or domestic).
If 97% withdraw consent to be governed, then the 3% in government will have to make do with 97% less revenues and warm bodies to govern.
It's a rural/urban disagreement. I've lived in both places so have seen both sides.
I grew up rural. We hauled out trash to a communal dumpster. We had a private septic tank. We had well water. We had our own security system with guns and neighbors for protection. We lived on 80 acres with access to hundreds more owned by neighbors. We had a local volunteer fire department.
In other words, we had no need for a government to provide curbside trash pickup, sewer/waste treatment, city water, police, public parks, or a professional fire department. The only public services were basically road maintenance and public schools, and many neighbors send kids to private "Christian" academies (mostly for racist reasons... it was Mississippi). We had few neighbors, so disagreements were small. Small government all the way.
As an adult I've lived mainly in cities. Not enough room for septic or private wells. Too many people for everyone to walk around settling things with guns, so a police force is needed. Only the extremely wealthy can afford enough land for a private park. Hundreds of thousands of "neighbors", so disagreements can get out of hand very very quickly.
Also, looking back, I see the distinct need for government regulation in schools because I've seen what happens when the local school board dumps all the money into athletics while cutting academics. It isn't pretty.
As population density increases, we do need larger and larger governments. If you want small government, move to Wisconsin. But if you want to live in a modern society with the rest of us then governments have to grow to keep up.
Both parties want big government, the issue is where. The Democrats are like the Federalists during the early days of the US, they want a big central government to have even laws across the states as do some Republicans. Other Republicans don't want big federal government but rather leave it to the states who then want big government in the bedroom. Just look at the conservative side of gay marriage and abortion as well as religious right to discriminate laws.
We've had BIG government for many decades and it's here to stay.
The main difference between the major parties comes down to whom they prefer to tax and whether to spend most of that on creating bomb craters in the mideast or on improvements here in the USA.
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Big or small government?
