Tuesday, October 20, 2026

Authoritarian government weakest of all

(My Eastern New Mexico News column for September 16, 2026)




Why do so many beg for a big, authoritarian government involving itself in every facet of their lives? Even when it violently destroys their liberty and violates their rights every day? What could possibly be going on in their minds to make this seem like a good thing?

Have these people not seen the results of this over at least the past 25 years? Has a bigger, more authoritarian government made life better or worse?

It appears that many people see authoritarianism as strength. I don't. I see it as weakness, relying on bullying tactics to make itself look strong to gullible observers.

If the authoritarians were actually strong, they wouldn't need to be authoritarian. Strength isn't threatened by opposing opinions. Strength can afford to allow people to live different ways; to opt out and take a different path. Strength doesn't try to censor speech. Strength does not need to spy on everyone all the time. Those are signs of weakness, cowardice, and a lack of confidence. They are an acknowledgement of incompetence.

Authoritarianism always chooses the weakest course.

I believe people who secretly see themselves as powerless, who are therefore afraid of almost everything, want a strong bully to defend them from all their hobgoblins. They are attracted to, or they become, authoritarians. Right and wrong are thrown out the window. It becomes acceptable to commit crime to prevent crime.

If you rely on a criminal gang to hold other criminal gangs at bay, you're only making the situation worse. You're shirking your personal responsibility because you don't believe you are "enough" to deal with dangerous things. You make things more dangerous for yourself and everyone around you by empowering authoritarians, believing this fixes your problem.

Whenever there's a situation and a person's first instinct is to call someone else to come save them rather than dealing with it themselves, I lose respect for the person. It's the same whether you're talking about things and events in the neighborhood or across the globe.

Then these people wonder why things keep getting worse.

"Leave it to the professionals" is the advice of someone who wants you weak and scared. Someone who wants you dependent on them, so you'll keep handing them your liberty and your money. I say the "professionals" and their authoritarian desires for control, surveillance, and "safety" are the problem. You, living your liberty to the fullest, are enough. You've got this.

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