No one should control others' choices

(My Eastern New Mexico News column for May 1, 2019)

I'm sure there will be a final answer on the racetrack/casino any month now. Right?

Those who support a local racino must see by now how giving government the power-- permission from the people-- to approve and ration racinos is obviously a terrible idea. Tying anything to the government's wagon makes certain it won't be as good as it could be. Nor will it be timely.

Those who oppose the racino should have noticed that if you give control of such things to government it will drag its figurative feet, way beyond anything reasonable people would tolerate.

Allowing government to decide these matters is silly and destructive to society.

Let projects succeed or fail on their own merits, not on the whims of a gang of control-freaks.

If fewer people fell for the lie that it's OK to use government violence to force others to live as you would prefer, things like this wouldn't even be an issue. Those who want a racino-- or anything else-- could have it. Those who don't want it wouldn't have to support it in any way. The catch is they also wouldn't be able to stop others from peaceably doing what they want. Is that really so horrible?

I have no power to stop people from wearing orange-checkered polyester leisure suits, nor should I have it. If I believe their clothing choice is any of my concern I am lying to myself. Yes, you could make various arguments about why someone should have this power. The clothing might be a distraction and cause accidents. It might be environmentally harmful to manufacture. Some fragile people might be so offended at the sight they will have a mental breakdown. Those arguments are no better than the ones made for other things people want to control, individually or through government laws.

Such as that people might gamble too much, or that a racino might attract crime.

You have the right to not gamble and the right to defend against crime (even though government tries to ration this right). What you don't have is the right to threaten to use the violence of government to force your opinions on others. Even when politics is normalized to the point it seems this is a legitimate right, it isn't.

You have no obligation to save people from their bad choices.

You would be wise to worry about your own life and not try to force your choices on other people.

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"For medicinal purposes only"

Libertarians who support Big Government "Border Security" remind me of the Nigerian scammers who start their emails saying "Dear Beloved, May God's peace shine on you".

Maybe they are sincere, but I don't trust them. There's something "off" about them. Alarm bells go off in my head when they show up. There's always that appeal to the State's "protection"; lending an unearned air of legitimacy to the State.

They remind me of abolitionists who don't really want to get rid of all slavery, just the slavery they don't like.

Or teetotalers who drink moonshine "for medicinal purposes only".

Yet, I sympathize. It's scary to not have a dangerous Big Brother at your back when you fear you may not be enough to meet the threat. Even if the threat is mostly in your head, the fear is still real.

Borderism-- big government welfare statism by another name-- is apparently a very seductive cult, leading a lot of liberty supporters down into its depths, from which there seems to be no escape.

Statism, "for security purposes only", is still full-blown statism.

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