Statism
I see America as strong – perhaps stronger than most nations. But the people seem to be changing, and not for the good. We need to entrench within ourselves and our children and associates those values that helped us become great. We’re either going uphill or going downhill – there is no resting, no plateau, no station to rest. Our government didn’t bring us where we are today, we did. Our government won’t lead us to future success, we will.
One of most pernicious ideologies that hinders a nation’s progress and development is statism. The state is not the answer. That’s why we fought a war with the British. That’s why the establishment of a government was such a contentious affair in the beginning of our history. There were plenty of models to choose from, but few which didn’t include statism as its foundation. The Founding Fathers erected a system of government that not only didn’t enshrine statism but, in fact, tried to prevent it. By going against their mechanisms, we are now turning into a statist nation.
I had lived in Pakistan and the United Arab Emirates for so long that when I returned to The United States, I was a statist. I’d wonder why the government isn’t doing this thing or that thing, why it wasn’t solving such-and-such problem or issue. Or I posited that the government is the solution to our ails and woes. After all, in Pakistan, the first question that’s asked when an issue arises is: “What’s the government doing about it?” But I realized that this statism causes more problems than it solves. Rather than relying on the industry and ingeniousness of the people, we were relying on burdensome, cumbersome, inefficient bureaucracy. Each involvement of the government, furthermore, eroded the people’s freedoms, their area of movement and activity, and, indeed, even their will to work, solve, and prevail.
Mark my words – every statist nation is full of dullards, lazy people, unrealistic ideologues, and far from industrious.
I don’t care about communism or socialism. Russia, China, or Iran won’t do us in. If things don’t change, statism will be end of America as a world power.
Muslihoon 
Goolam said,
June 24, 2010 at 8:15 am
I’m enjoying your blog because you’re weaving alot of ideas together and trying to be very … skeptical in your understanding of the world …
But its troubling here that you make these bold generalisations. Particular in your awe of the United States and the implication that the US is free from ideologies by asserting that its free from ideology. That somehow the nature of the people are defined by their system of government?!? “Statism” will be the end of the United States?
Did you government not just spend the equivalent of half the worlds GDP to bail out the banking establishment. In the mean time your unemployment figures have doubled, and wealthiest citizens are wealthier now than they were before the recession. When something goes massively wrong, Americans do ask what the government is doing about it, and presidents are elected to make sure the government does what its people want.
I hate to say it, but you’ve got the bull by the tail. There’s alot of writing on your blog, but not alot of clarity.