I don't like to blog about nothing but political matters, and I have been making a conscious effort to write about stuff other than the current COVID-19 paranoia, but we do live in difficult times, and there are things that always need to be said lest they be forgotten.
Politicians do not care about you
Politicians want your votes to grant a veneer of legitimacy to their usurped power. Politicians want your obedience to their edicts. That is first and foremost, and anything else is secondary. You exist to pay whatever taxes they demand, and obey whatever laws they past, not to instruct them to serve your interests.
I know, we've all been through civics class. "Government of, by, and for the people." We have a representative government in a democratic republic. Government serves us so we can live freer lives. Blah, blah, blah. It's all nonsense when examined in any depth.
Let's start with representation. There is no agent/principal relationship between any politician and the electorate. There isn't even such a relationship between election winners and those who voted for them, much less those who voted gains them, did not vote, or could not vote. It is a transparent usurpation. But setting that aside, one cannot rationally delegate authority to another if one does not possess that authority themselves. Every time government does something that would be criminal if you did the same thing, recognize the usurpation.
No matter how much you think prohibition laws, zoning restrictions, licenses, taxes, schools, police, the courts, and other government actions serve you, recognize that they are done by means that would be criminal if you did them yourself.
Politicians do not care about your education
They only need you to be a productive taxpayer. The government school monopoly isn't about education or personal fulfilment for the students' well-being, though. The main purpose is propaganda and control. Certainly, many teachers mean well and care about their students, but the administration and infrastructure is there to promote the State above all else.
If politicians cared about education, they would not try to centrally plan the lives of children. They would not keep trying to put a new coat of paint on the old Prussian model, and instead encourage real innovation. But that does not fit the inherent conservatism and authoritarianism of the State.
Students are treated like prisoners for the majority of their developing years, forced to learn at a pace dictated by strangers, forced to gather into arbitrary age-segregated groups, forced into an environment rife with bullying, and we wonder why perpetual reforms never actually fix anything while kids suffer from more and more mental disorders. There is no incentive to improve education when people have to pay whatever you demand, and accept whatever you provide.
Politicians do not care about your health
Do they want us healthy? Of course. Sick people don't produce wealth that can be taxed. So they trumpet their plans for universal healthcare as if that made people healthy. It does not. It doesn't even increase the number of doctors and medical facilities. Instead, it creates a government monopoly with all the attendant waste and abuse inherent in any monopoly while giving the political class more justification to tax and regulate.
The latest COVID-19 pandemic panic demonstrates the callous disregard of the political class and their lack of solid information dictating their policies. The predicted nationwide flood of patients never happened, despite the assurances months ago that it was right around the corner even if all the quarantine and stay-at-home policies were followed perfectly.
Don't misunderstand me here. I do not have reason to deny the existence of a new coronavirus strain, or declare it's "just a case of the snuffles." I don't doubt there is a real threat to the elderly and immunocompromised, or that otherwise-healthy people can still suffer severe complications and death. But the hysteria promoted by the political class, and the economic devastation wrought by their interventions, will reverberate for months or potentially for years now.
Meanwhile, everyone has already forgotten the original pitch that all of this was to "flatten the curve," not prevent infection. The same number of cases were predicted either way, but the aim was to decrease the rate of spread so the healthcare system could cope. Job done.
None of this criticism should be taken as support for the corporate status quo, of course. The US health care system is a mess. It is not because of the free market failings bogeyman, though, but rather the stark absence of market action. We have certificate of need laws restricting expansion and competition in many states and cities. We have arbitrary licensing restrictions on who can do what. The insurance industry is a literal cartel backed by government laws. Prices are deliberately concealed from the consumer. This is anti-market collusion with active government participation.
Politicians do not care about your security
The police do not exist to serve and protect you. They exist to enforce laws and collect revenue for the layer of government that employs them. That means they enforce all the laws which politicians pass to criminalize and penalize activities that harm no one.
The courts are designed not to protect the innocent, but to ensure a steady stream of prisoners, fines, excises, and levies keep money flowing in, and more people under total control.
Again, we see the perverse incentives of monopoly power in policing and courts. The goal is obedience, first and foremost. Submit or be robbed, Surrender your property or die. Do as you are told, or we will beat you. OBEY. Meanwhile, courts have repeatedly and explicitly declared that police officers have no obligation to protect anyone, and that they are always held to a different standard than the rest of us.
As for the military, history is full of proof that war and non-declared military intervention have destroyed our wealth while destroying countless lives around the world. All based on lies, half-truths, and nationalist propaganda nonsense. Soldiers don't defend our freedom, they enact the foreign policy dictates of the political class just as the police enact the domestic dictates.
Look at how the police and military are responding to the COVID-19 protestors. The cops enforce the laws, no matter how irrational they are. The troops call the protesters who carry guns cosplaytriots instead of standing with them against governmental overreach. Despite being disposable obedient enforcers of the politicians, they see themselves as part of something ennobling. It's somewhere between sad and disgusting when it isn't an immediate existential threat.
Politicians do not care about your finances
The fallout from the COVID-19 shutdown is now being used to call for a Universal Basic Income scheme of some kind. It sounds benevolent enough. People are in need. Money can help people buy stuff. Government has money. So why not just cut everyone a check? We can sort it all out with the next tax cycle anyway.
But government does not produce wealth. Government consumes what others produce, redistributes just enough to buy loyalty, and then claims to be our savior. This scheme isn't benevolence, it is blatant propaganda literally bought at the expense of the real economy. Whether the money is created through inflating the money supply or burdening the productive economy with more direct taxes, the result is essentially the same: The people who actually create wealth get screwed.
Conclusion
Remember the theme: Politicians do not care about you. they care about power and wealth for themselves. There are no exceptions when any program is trumpeted as essential to our well-being.
Good ideas do not require coercion. Taxation is theft. Monopolies promote waste and abuse. Understand these basic concepts, and you will see through all the election cycle grandstanding and perpetual political propaganda that inundates the media and public discourse.