Overgovernment: “You Didn’t Get There On Your Own” Edition
Written by Brian Garst, Posted in Big Government, Government Meddling
Commenting on a story of a type common in my Overgovernment series, Dr. Mark Perry offered this brilliant repackaging of President Obama’s now infamous collectivist screed:
Look, if you’ve been unsuccessful, you didn’t get there on your own. If you were unsuccessful at opening or operating a small business, some government official along the line probably contributed to your failure. There was an overzealous civil servant somewhere who might have stood in your way with unreasonable regulations that are part of our American system of anti-business red tape that allowed you to not thrive. Taxpayers invested in roads and bridges, but you might have faced city council members who wouldn’t allow you to use them. If you’ve been forced to close a business – it’s often the case that you didn’t do that on your own. Somebody else made that business closing happen or prevented it from opening in the first place. You can thank the bureaucratic tyrants of the nanny state.
This is one of those times when all I can think is “wow, why didn’t I think to write that?”
I serve as Vice President of the Center for Freedom and Prosperity, a non-profit think tank dedicated to preserving tax competition and free markets. This site features my personal views, which are not reflective of CF&P.