I don't want to abolish government. I simply want to reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub. - Grover Norquist, NPR interview, May 2001 Republicans want smaller government the way burglars want smaller police forces - it makes it easier to steal stuff. Libertarians forget: an effective government keeps others from ruling you. You end up with warlords. This is why Germany was the last state to develop in modern Europe - the Hapsburgs were a loose confederacy of self-interested duchies and fiefdoms that sparred constantly and kept their dominion poor, uneducated and superstitious. Great for the Hapsburgs. Shitty for everyone else. The modern Republican Party, everybody. What if every deposed despot were to systematically reduce the powers of the office they were leaving?
