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Have You Ever Noticed How One Government Intrusion Begets Another? – or -

About Seatbelts, Golf, Sex and Twinkies

by Pat Pending

It has been interesting to read people’s views of the seatbelt laws.  Some feel that their car is their castle, not to be intruded upon by the government, and whether or not they use their seatbelts is their own business.  They say they aren’t hurting anybody else, and the government should butt out.  Others feel that, since statistics show that seatbelts make the driver and passengers safer, there should be a law requiring us to wear seatbelts.  Those who want seatbelt laws say that it is a myth to say you aren’t hurting anybody else if you don’t wear a seatbelt, because, when you are injured in a car accident, the rest of us will have to pay for your medical care.  What those arguing in favor of seatbelt laws are really saying is, “Because the government currently forces taxpayers to pay for people’s medical care, this justifies the government’s further forcing people to take better care of themselves so they will require less medical care, including forcing them to wear seatbelts.” 

Of course, this argument has no logical end.  If it is appropriate for the government to take a mother away from her children, handcuff her and haul her off to jail at gunpoint for failure to use a seatbelt, as the Supreme Court recently upheld, then will it not also be appropriate, in the future, for the government to invade our homes to check our diets, sexual habits, exercise regimens, and other personal activities that may affect our health? 

The government’s provision of medical care has already been used as the basis for a major attack on the tobacco industry, totally ignoring our freedom.  If the government provides our medical care, it creates a justification for the government to further intrude into the most personal of our activities to try to reduce its costs.

Of course, the government’s overreaching in the area of health care is not the only government intrusion that begets more intrusions.  Outlawing certain drugs then creates the justification for no-knock raids on people’s homes and confiscation of private property without due process.  The Americans With Disabilities Act now justifies the Supreme Court’s rewriting the rules of professional golf.  (We can’t wait to see how other professional sports will be modified to accommodate various disabilities in the future!)  Environmental laws provide justification for hauling farmers off to jail for accidentally plowing over rats.  Education laws provide justification for jailing mothers, and so forth. 

These justifications would be comical if they did not produce such horrendous results.  For example, if the mother who was not wearing her seatbelt had resisted, she could have been shot dead right in front of her children, on the basis of a law supposedly intended to protect her health.  Of course, this happens regularly in the drug war, in which innocent people are startled awake in the middle of the night by no-knock raids on their homes and attempt to defend themselves against unannounced intruders, only to be shot dead in their own bedrooms.  No doubt their families are thankful that they have been so “protected”. 

Instead of using one overreach of government power to justify still another, isn’t it time for us to question the first overreach itself?  Isn’t it time to question whether government should be in charge of our health care, our children’s education, our retirement income, and so forth?  Unless we get government out of these areas of our lives in which it has no business intruding, this progression toward a police state will only continue.  In addition to no-knock raids on innocent people accused of possessing drugs, and in addition to hauling a mother off to jail in handcuffs for failing to buckle up, we can, in the future, expect no-knock raids on people accused of possessing Twinkies or perhaps no-knock raids on people suspected of engaging in sexual practices that promote the spread of AIDS.  We can expect in the future to be forced to participate in monthly weigh-ins with fines for those over their recommended weight (some of us are in big trouble here, folks!)  We also can expect government lawsuits against the fast food industry for promoting obesity.  Of course, activities such as parachute diving, bungee jumping, hang gliding, or rowing solo across the ocean would also be outlawed as being too risky.  Maybe even the risky business of driving your own car will eventually be outlawed in favor of requiring the use of government transportation.  The opportunities are endless, and big brother is on the move!