The most dangerous idea ever: why the tea party is...

Sure, most countries have elements of the American solution. Many countries now have peaceful exchanges of power decided by voters.

But we were the ones who first put it all together. Just as Alfred Nobel figured out how to mix volatile nitroglycerine with diatomaceous earth to create the equally powerful but more stable explosive dynamite, the Founders managed to take an inherently dangerous set of ideas and make them stable. You need only look at the French Revolution to see what can happen when those same ideas are dropped on a concrete floor.

The diatomaceous earth in this case is a uniquely American hatred of government. In America, you can belong to three political camps. Those who hate big centralized government, those who hate small decentralized government, and those who hate all government, big or small, here or there, everywhere. Nobody else hates government the way we do. Those who hate small decentralized governments support a strong central government. Those who hate big central governments want the states to have more power. And those who hate both are libertarians. Throughout our history we have gone back and forth and back and forth.

In theory each of those three systems make sense. In theory, a large central government should be the most efficient solution, avoiding duplication of effort and ensuring national competitiveness. In theory, strong states should provide local responsiveness and specialization, a la Ricardo, and allow the best ideas to win. And in theory, laissez faire economics and minimalist government should allow greater personal freedom and economic growth.

We have tested the theory on the first two, but the problem is we (meaning humankind) have never tried the libertarian solution. Rand and Paul and Rand Paul may be full of sh**, but we will never really know, because what they propose has never been tried.

We know the other two solutions don’t work, at least in their pure forms. The 100 percent model of a strong centralized government, e.g. Communism , doesn’t work. Very strong central governments end up stifling innovation and producing moribund economies. We also know that smaller decentralized governments don’t work. Isolated state governments inevitably turn into nasty little Balkan oligarchies with persecution of one minority or another. But no one has tried no-government solution, at least in modern times.

Personally, I doubt most Tea Partiers really want a truly libertarian government. Go to a Tea Party, sit beside someone and say that we should downsize the government and start with ending Medicare. Or Social Security. Or national defense. Or farm supports. Or highway construction. It won’t take you long to find a government program they’re in favor of. And of course when you add them all up, you end up right where we are now, which is why the new Tea Party Republicans aren’t really going very hard after entitlements. Lots of thunder, but no lightning there.

However, to be fair, we can’t say they’re wrong because we just haven’t ever tried it.