I was conservative once. I was libertarian once. I don’t think I was ever on the left side of the spectrum as anyone with half a brain can see that their ideas bank on people being either meat puppets with no free will or being inherently good. Any person who has any knowledge of humanity can easily determine that neither is the case.
These days I look at myself as more of an anti-Utopian. With conservatives, I slowly realized that they are engaged in groupthink, much like the liberals they so despise. This is not to say that liberals are better, just that conservatives don’t have individual thoughts. They claim to be pro-Constitution, yet balk at people when the hypocrisy of their stances on war, police state, and religion in government are clearly not part of the Constitution. Also, they are not anti-big government, just anti-liberal big government.
For libertarians, it gets more complicated. I agree with many of their views, but unfortunately, they tend to view the world in an idealistic fashion. They believe that people are inherently rational economic actors, which is the economists way of basically reiterating what liberals say about people. While it is true that people tend to do good things more often than not (even the really bad ones), we always have a slip in our rational minds and engage in some kind of foolish behavior.
I agree with libertarians, not because I believe that without government things will be better, but because I don’t trust the people in government to live up to their stated intentions. People have an inherent evil inside of them and whenever they acquire a significant amount of wealth or power, that evil amplifies. If you win the lottery, all your character traits will be amplified and you will end up being someone you never imagined you could be.
Libertarians seem to believe that with less government or no government, people will prosper and wealth will increase. While I agree that human innovation and production is stifled largely due to government influence, I have my doubts as to how a society will collectively behave if government were suddenly gone. Another problem is that most libertarians think that their chance at running things is just around the corner. Certainly with the rise of Ron Paul, it could be argued that it is. However, most people are conditioned to believe in many of the lies of the necessity of government and cannot conceive of a society outside of it.
This kind of thing will probably never change. The fact that young people these days are taking to Ron Paul and many of his ideas is probably meaningless as the young can afford to waste their time. As you get older, you get more focused on what you need to do in your life and for your family. We don’t get more then a collection of decades in this life and then we fall asleep (or just rot away). I’ve found that I have a very small window where I will gain the most wealth in my lifetime and I will not squander these years. I have seen so many people nearing retirement with jobs that don’t pay what they should and careers fading quickly. This kind of thing is inevitable, no matter what you do in your life. Very few people can make large amounts of wealth when they are reaching their golden years.
So I have resigned to the fact that things will never change. At least not in big ways. I’m fairly certain that most laws passed by Congress are really just ways to keeps things the same while looking like they’ve made significant changes. Obamacare was certainly one of those laws.
But I no longer look for what needs to be fixed or what can we do to make all these problems disappear. Instead, I choose to ignore them and live my life according to a higher power. I will strive to love God with all my heart, soul, mind, and strength. And I will strive to love others as I love myself.
And I will eat, drink, and find enjoyment in my work. This is the gift of God to man and one that we shouldn’t dismiss so lightly.