Ruminations On Voting: A Contrarian View

“Perhaps the fact that we have seen millions voting themselves into complete dependence on a tyrant has made our generation understand that to choose one’s government is not necessarily to secure freedom.”
–Friedrich August von Hayek

Voting is a big deal to a great many people. With the last hundred years of government plunder and pillaging, centralization and murder, theft and conscription, moral and Constitutional abuse, it is shocking to still hear the battle cry toward voting for the government on the 6th of November. But then again, maybe shocking is not the right word. Maybe “discouraging” works better. For shocking implies that I am surprised the the State has learned of a way to pretend like it cared about the people.

I have heard it said that “if voting changed anything, they’d make it illegal.” I really believe that. Why? Because since McKinley, it has been a battle ground of Republican vs. Democrat wars and not once has the size, scope, influence, or domination of the US Federal Government changed for the better. Voting is the means by which the government has both duped its people into thinking there is a choice and stolen more power than every Empire in the history of the world could have imagined. Truly, our limited government and freedom-based society has a bigger, stronger, scarier Empire than even Rome. Is this possible? Apparently so.

The colonists soon became fed up with Empire. Voting for a better king or new set of laws was not an option for them. They wanted to secede, do things on their own. Yet today, we vote. We are not revolutionaries my friends. For what is voting but a signed endorsement for the next ruler? Must we really be so shallow so as to line up at the polling booths like sheep at the slaughter?

Voting today does not matter. If red wins, the government becomes bigger. If blue wins, same outcome. In the early republic, voting also did not matter. But for different reasons. The whole idea of a Constitutional Republic was that voting would not be a huge deal because no matter who got in, there was a Constitution to limit them. There is no Constitution now. Why does voting mean so much to us? I think because of the psychological attachments to the dangerous system that people grow to love. This has been labeled Stockholm Syndrome.

The fiery voice of the Old Right, H.L. Mencken says it well:

The state, or, to make matters more concrete, the government, consists of a gang of men exactly like you and me. They have, taking one with another, no special talent for the business of government; they have only a talent for getting and holding office. Their principal device to that end is to search out groups who pant and pine for something they can’t get, and to promise to give it to them. Nine times out of ten that promise is worth nothing. The tenth time it is made good by looting “A” to satisfy “B”. In other words, government is a broker in pillage, and every election is a sort of advanced auction on stolen goods.

“Every election is a sort of advanced auction on stolen goods.” By nature of its anatomy, the State promises only to destroy.

Is voting for evil really the way to overcome evil?

Does casting our endorsement for someone who will pillage and plunder the people solve the problem of pillage and plunder?

My critic says: “But voting is a privilege.” That it is. But tell that to the world after the elections of Hugo Chavez and Adolph Hitler. Voting says nothing about the system. Only that the people are deceived.

Again he says: “But I want my voice to be heard.” It won’t be heard. The State acts in its own interest, according to what is good for its own existence. Your vote means nothing to them, unless of course it supports their agenda. But then why vote? The Constitution was written so that the elected could not make changes to society and economy because man had an absolute right to life, liberty, and property. That is, individuals in the society make the changes by voluntarily acting in the economy. A Republic is where your voice is heard through the market, not the ballot. This situation would be very anti-”democracy.”

But the critic replies to me: ”How then shall we change the system?” My answer: we cannot rid ourselves of the system by participating in the means that it has ordained to con the people. Homeschool your children. Keep your money out of the banks. Don’t go to the polls. Your fellow Americans will someday follow. Someone has to take the first step. One of the colonists had to take the first shot.

Democracy is socialism. Democracy says there is public ownership of a governing institution. Democracy is where the whole of the nation makes a decision on behalf of everyone else. Private property, self-government, and individual liberties do not exist in a democracy.

Chris Rossini says this:

Very few of us would willingly, and with good conscience, go up to our neighbor’s door and threaten them to give up their property (or else).

In the time that I’ve spent on this Earth, I’ve yet to see one person standing on his neighbor’s porch and yelling “Give me an education!…Give me healthcare!…Give me Insurance!…You must pay! It is my right!”

The reason that people don’t do this is because: (A) The neighbor might whoop them, and/or (B) the government would (ironically) throw them in jail for being a criminal.

Enter Democracy.

When you vote, the government relieves you of the messiness of going to your neighbor and robbing him. The government, with your support, will do it for you!

Voting in a collectivist system that we have can lead to terrible things. At least in a dictatorship you don’t have the humiliation of standing in line to vote for your next dictator. In our system, people actually take the time to go vote for the emperor. The founders would be embarrassed at our deception.

People tell me, if everyone went to vote, we’d be in a better place. My response? What if nobody went to vote? What if nobody consented to institutionalized crime? What if the government knew its time was up? The government relies on the people voting. If you want to see it shrink, why feed it?

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