Driving Freedom

Where will it all end? Will the frogs in the pot ever wake up to the fact that the water is getting hotter? Are we already too cooked to jump out?

It is difficult for most people to understand why a larger and larger government is a very bad thing. Most folks figure the government just wants to help. Most people think we need the government to help us in every way imaginable. Most people have no fear of government. And that is precisely the problem.

Freedom lost is ever so much more difficult to regain than it would have been to keep. As former Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev so ominously prophesied, the freedom of the West is not being taken from us by force, but by our own incremental choices. We are voting ourselves right out of freedom.

Some will argue that we are still very much a free nation. And relatively speaking, we are. The United States of America is still among the freest places on earth, but that’s like saying “gen pop” is freer than solitary confinement. We need to consider the height from which we have fallen. We need to ponder the magnitude of what has been lost and what that loss portends for our future. It’s simple: more government control equals less freedom. Over how many areas of our lives does this government currently exercise some level of control? Is freedom on the increase or the decrease? How quickly are we moving in the direction of less freedom? Where does that road end?

Let’s just think about the example of driving. Driving on the open road has always been one of the images of freedom in the U.S.A. We like our cars... and we like to drive them down the open road. Driving is a poignant symbol of American freedom.

Recently I was pulled over and given two tickets, both for non-moving violations... one for driving without a seat belt (I had just left the parking lot), and another for the fact that my license plate stickers were about 3 weeks overdue. Now, I deserved those tickets, because the law is the law, but let’s think about these laws and others like them. Actually, let’s think about what it takes these days for the government to allow us to own a car and to drive it on the government-owned roads (paid for with our money).

If I want to buy a car, first I need to earn the money to pay for it. At the time of purchase I will also pay the government a substantial amount of sales tax. If it is a new car, I’m looking at hundreds of dollars. Why? Because I had the nerve to earn enough money to buy a car. (By the way, if I have worked hard enough to buy a nicer car, I get to pay an extra “luxury” tax.) Now, having paid this sales tax, and paid for the car, one might think I would have the freedom to drive it, but nay I am just getting started. I also am going to need a driver’s license, for which I will need to stand in line and pay a fee if I haven’t already done so. In fact there is a separate fee for the written test and the driving test. There is also a fee when it is time to renew it, thankfully not very often. Next I am going to need to register the car and get license plates for it. This again is going to cost me a fee, but not until I have submitted to several other governmental controls. Before I can register the car, I am going to need to have purchased insurance for it, required, of course, by the government. Unless it is a brand new vehicle, I am also going to need to pay for two separate inspections: emissions and safety. In addition, if there happens to be anything deemed sub-par by the shop (which is now being monitored by the government), then I will need to pay to get that fixed. The government decides the standards, and they can become stricter at any time. Once I have my two approved inspections and my proof of (expensive) insurance, I need to make sure I have a paid personal property tax receipt. What’s this? I bought a car and now I have to pay the government hundreds of dollars every single year just for owning it? What if I don’t pay this tax or can’t pay it? Well, then I can’t register the car, so I can’t drive it.

So let me get this straight... to experience the freedom of owning and driving a car in this great land, I need to first pay for the car (the only part of this experience related to a free-enterprise system), pay the sales tax, pay personal property tax (this is completely separate from real estate tax), buy expensive insurance and pay for two separate inspections. If I have all of these things done, and can prove my compliance to a local government office, they will graciously allow me to then pay a registration fee and a couple of other fees, so that I can now drive my car...... for one year. Each and every year I am forced to do most of this all over again (unless I pay extra for a two-year registration).

Are these the only ways I’m jumping through hoops and paying the government to let me drive my car? Not even close. Every time I buy gas, I pay a fuel tax and sales tax on that gas. When I get an oil change or change tires, I pay extra because the shop is being forced to comply with government recycling requirements. Additionally, when I bought the car, I paid more than I would have because the government has scads of safety and environmental requirements which are foisted onto car companies, who dutifully pass these expenses on to me. Meanwhile tax dollars pay government employees and rent office space to run all of this automobile bureaucracy, and I feel sure I haven’t even thought of all the ways I pay the government, in order that I might drive my car.

I remember when I was a kid and my aunt and uncle were missionaries in Argentina. I remember my parents talking about how hard it was for them to get anything done there because of the complicated government hoops they had to jump through and all the fees they had to pay. I remember that it wasn’t like that here. Things have since changed.

Are we really free to drive, or is the ideal of freedom actually being driven from our expectations?

What about seat belts? Should I wear one? Sure, it is responsible to wear a seat belt. Should the government force me to wear it? Absolutely not. The Founding Fathers were all about limited government, and they would have absolutely revolted at the idea that government needs to protect its own citizens from themselves. (Unbelievably, if they wanted to go out and shoot a squirrel, they actually went out and shot one without the government’s permission and without an expensive and time-consuming hunter safety course run by the government. Teachers could also lead a prayer in their classroom, among other scandalous things.) When did I give the government the right to force me to wear a seatbelt? I already mentioned how much the government oppresses car companies with safety requirements until now there is practically an air bag coming out of the visor mirror in case you happen to be putting makeup on when you have a wreck. Did I mention car seats? Unheard of when I was a kid. We slept in the back window. Somehow a decent few of us survived. (Next, they’ll be requiring defibrillators in the glove box or maybe we won’t even be able to drive without a licensed and insured MD in the backseat.)

Actually, let me tell you what really may be next... helmets as a requirement for driving in cars. You think I’m joking. Wearing a helmet while you drive your car would greatly reduce your risk of serious injury or death. What if the government were paying for your healthcare? The fact is that very few people would die in car wrecks if we all wore helmets. (I may make my soon-to-be driving daughter wear one, but that is beside the point.) Surely we would all be appalled if the government forced us to start wearing helmets in our cars, right? Even though we would be much safer, we would reject such an idea. And yet, what is the philosophical difference between a helmet and a seat belt? I would argue that a helmet is actually safer. The question is: What is the role of government?

It is not a matter of whether there is a good point to whatever the next government control will be. There is almost always a good reason for the next governmental requirement. (For goodness sake, someone might wind up with a toilet that actually uses enough water to flush, if not for governmental controls, and then just think of all that "wasted" water.) The question is whether anyone still values freedom enough to stand up for it as a value worthy unto itself. The question is whether I am driving freedom or sitting around while freedom is being driven from me.

What monstrosity of a government is this that we have created? Is this the Limited Government envisioned by the Founding Fathers? Absolutely not. What have we lost? Simple. We have lost freedom... and in no small amount. We have allowed far too much blood-won freedom to be compromised. Especially in urban and suburban areas, I can barely walk down the street now without getting government permission and paying a fee.

We have not even begun to realize how much freedom has already been stripped away. Worse, many people don’t even know to care. We are frogs in the pot, and the water is nearing 212 degrees Fahrenheit. It’s time for as many as comprehend the situation to jump out and vote accordingly while we still have the opportunity. Here’s hoping there are enough of us left to make a difference.

Every government in the history of mankind has become larger and more oppressive over time. Freedom is lost by attrition. Bondage has always been the destiny of ignorant and complacent masses. Freedom must be driven by the few in order to survive for all. Calling all lovers of the open road! Come drive freedom with me!