The Failure of Big Government

By Douglas V. Gibbs

The full control over Congress by the Democrats from 2007 until this year, and the advent of the Obama presidency, has revealed the failure of liberalism, and the Democrat's love of the platform of big government. Occasionally, something will happen where it looks like big government did something right, but more often than not it's just a clever twist of words and circumstances.

Sure, I think that every once in a while something reasonable comes out of big government. . . but even a broken clock is right twice a day.

The handling of Hurricane Irene is being hailed as an achievement of big government. In fact, Dana Milbank of the Washington Post has determined that when it came to Irene, Big Government got it right.

The problem, with these big government people, is with everything they say, the premise is wrong.

For example, in Mr. Milbank's article, he quips, "Hurricane Katrina destroyed New Orleans and obliterated the notion of a competent federal government."

As if it was the federal government's duty to jump in immediately.

As per the Constitution, and the concept of State Sovereignty, FEMA can't just jump in and take control of a situation in a State without permission from the State. Governor Blanco never gave the federal government the permission to intercede, so FEMA's hands were tied during Katrina. The federal government could not act until the state gave them permission. So the failure in Louisiana over Katrina was not due to the failure of the federal government acting, but the failure of the liberals in control of Louisiana allowing the federal government to get involved as the storm bore down on their State.

The FBI can't just walk into a county jurisdiction and start taking care of their business without first making sure it is okay with the local Sheriff. And if the Sheriff says beat it, the federal agents cannot take up position in the Sheriff's jurisdiction.

The liberal thinking is that the federal government is supreme, and therefore rules over all of the smaller governments, and ultimately, over the people. But that would create an atmosphere ripe for tyranny. The federal government does not have that kind of power, as per the founders, on purpose.

The Obama administration lucked out, the storm fizzled (though there was still significant damage and flooding - it was, after all, still a hurricane), and their incompetence was not exposed. And in response, the leftists are calling it a victory.

In fact, the establishment (that includes the party hacks of the Republican Party) are so proud of themselves, as their approval rating plummets to 12%, they gave themselves and staffers a raise! Unemployment is still out of control, the green agenda is failing badly (like Obama's solar baby filing for bankruptcy), let's the TSA feel up Americans while letting members of the Muslim jihad walk on by (and on top of that hires trans-gendered people to put their hands on our children), is granting back door amnesty by disobeying the law on the books, has refused to address the spending problem through entitlement reform, and is ensuring that Islam is promoted in the military. But don't worry, he has continued to work on making sure he still blames it on Bush (as the media works on blaming, and destroying, the Tea Party movement).

Of course if the blame does start heading towards the liberals, the media works to convince us that recessionary times is the new normal.

But the rest of us recognize the obvious. . . liberalism has failed once again.

-- Political Pistachio Conservative News and Commentary