[Superman]

Okay, I finished reading. More votes for term limits. Hmmm.... I wonder what we'd do if we found a real leader. Boot him out after two terms?

Yes dd, I think you fairly stated the two opposing camps.

There is no question that our government is misbehaving. Massively misbehaving. Tragically, unconscionably misbehaving. Bagdad does not have the market cornered on Evil. We have that right here. But to suggest that government is unnecessary is not even sensible enough to be "laughable."

Imagine a country with no government. Can't, can you? That's because "government" is what defines a country. Without it, it's just an area of land ripe for formation into a country or countries.

Now let's imagine a country with almost no government, but with "national" defense. What "national" values and principles would that "nation" defend, other than the desire to be left alone? It would be a nation formed under the principle of non-integration. And would that be a powerful force when it comes time to defend? I mean, again, the military would not be part of a government, it would be the whole thing. And it would have the job of protecting "citizen's" (if you can call them that) rights to have no other government. I'm not sure that military would be terribly motivated to be effective. If the rest of the world thought a nation such as this would survive and be stable, it might immigrate by the millions. Maybe. And there would be no immigration policy or enforcement.

In fact, there would be no enforcement of land rights. Citizens protected under this military would have to be heavily armed to further protect themselves from fellow citizens.

Let's go at this another way: If a community were cut loose.......if a community were disowned by federal, state and local government, what would happen? Easy. The people in that community with leadership tendencies would get together and talk. "What do we do now?" they would say. They would agree that a sewer system is favorable, and that roads would benefit everyone also. And schools. And they would throw some money together because these things are 1) in everybody's interest and 2) worth more than their costs in terms of health and economic prosperity.

Government is simply our way of getting ***** done. Investing in ourselves. Pooling our resources to build the infrastructure we need. We can work in competition or in cooperation. I prefer the latter. Pat imagines the former. I may get my wish. Pat will never get his wish.