by Victor Davis Hanson<\/p>\n
National Review Online<\/p>\n
Government is now so huge, powerful, and callous that citizens risk becoming virtual serfs, lacking the freedoms guaranteed by the Founders.<\/p>\n
Is that perennial fear an exaggeration? Survey the current news.<\/p>\n
We have just learned that the Internal Revenue Service before the 2012 election predicated its tax-exemption policies on politics. It inordinately denied tax exemption to groups considered conservative or otherwise antagonistic to the president\u2019s agenda.<\/p>\n
If the supposedly nonpartisan\u00a0IRS\u00a0is perceived as skewing our taxes on the basis of our politics, then the entire system of trust in self-reporting is rendered null and void. Worse still, the bureaucratic overseer at the center of the controversy, Sarah Hall Ingram, now runs the\u00a0IRS\u00a0division charged with enforcing compliance with the new Obamacare requirements.<\/p>\n
It was also before the 2012 election that some reporters at the Associated Press had their private and work phone records monitored by the government, supposedly because of fear about national-security leaks. The Justice Department gave the AP no chance, as it usually would, first to question its own journalists. The AP had run a story in May 2012 about the success of a double agent working in Yemen before the administration itself could brag about it.<\/p>\n
In fact, the Obama White House has been accused of leaking classified information favorable to the administration \u2014 top-secret details concerning the Stuxnet computer virus used against Iran, the specifics of the raid on Osama bin Laden\u2019s compound, and the decision-making behind the drone program \u2014 often to favored journalists. The message is clear: A reporter may have his most intimate work and private correspondence turned over to the government \u2014 Fox News\u2019s James Rosen had his e-mail account tapped into \u2014 on the mere allegation that he might have tried to do what his own government had in fact already done.<\/p>\n
Now the civil-rights divisions of the Department of Education and the Department of Justice have issued new speech codes for campuses, focusing on supposed gender insensitivities. The result is that federal bureaucrats can restrict the constitutionally protected rights of free speech for millions of American college students \u2014 including during routine classroom discussions.<\/p>\n
Eight months after the Benghazi mess, Americans only now are discovering that the Obama administration, for political reasons, failed to beef up security at our Libyan consulate or send it help when under attack. It also lied in blaming the violence on a spontaneous demonstration prompted by an Internet video. That pre-election narrative was known to be untrue when the president, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice, and White House Press Secretary Jay Carney all peddled it.<\/p>\n
The problem with a\u00a0powerful\u00a0rogue government is not just that it becomes quite adept at doing what it should not. Increasingly, it also cannot even do what it should.<\/p>\n
Philadelphia abortionist Dr. Kermit Gosnell may well turn out to be the most lethal serial killer in U.S. history. His recent murder conviction gave only a glimpse of his carnage at the end of a career that spanned more than three decades. Yet Gosnell operated with impunity right under the noses of Pennsylvania health and legal authorities for years, without routine government health-code and licensing oversight.<\/p>\n
In the case of Boston terrorist bomber Tamerlan Tsarnaev, his loud jihadist activity had earned him a visit from the FBI and the attention of both the\u00a0CIA\u00a0and the Department of Homeland Security. But all that government monitoring was for naught. Tsarnaev was not detained, but allowed to visit Dagestan and Chechnya \u2014 both located in the supposedly dangerous region that prompted his family\u2019s flight to the U.S. in the first place.<\/p>\n
In all of these abuses and laxities there is one common theme. Bureaucrats, political appointees, regulators, intelligence officials, and law-enforcement personnel wanted to fall in line with the perceived politically correct agenda of the day. Right now, that party line seems to include protecting the progressive interests of the Obama administration, going after its critics, turning a blind eye toward illegal abortions, ignoring warnings about radical Islam, and restricting the right to free speech in order to curtail language declared potentially hurtful.<\/p>\n
Conspiracists, left and right, are sometimes understandably derided as paranoids for alleging that Big Government steadily absorbs the private sector, violates private communications, targets tax filers it doesn\u2019t like, and lies to the people about what it is up to. The only missing theme of such classic paranoia is the perennial worry over the right to bear arms.<\/p>\n
I went to several sporting-goods stores recently to buy commonplace rifle shells. For the first time in my life, there were none to be found. Can widespread shortages of ammunition be attributed to panic buying or to production shortfalls caused by inexplicably massive purchases by the Department of Homeland Security at a time of acrimonious debate over the Second Amendment?<\/p>\n
Who knows, but yesterday\u2019s wacky conspiracist may become today\u2019s Nostradamus.<\/p>\n
Victor Davis Hanson is a classicist and historian at the Hoover Institution,<\/em>Stanford<\/em>\u00a0University<\/em>. His new book,\u00a0<\/em>The Savior Generals<\/a>,<\/em>\u00a0is just out from<\/em>Bloomsbury<\/em>\u00a0Press. You can reach him by e-mailing\u00a0<\/em>author@victorhanson.com<\/a><\/em>.<\/em>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n \u00a92013 Tribune Media Services, Inc.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Monitoring AP but not detaining Tamerlan Tsarnaev–there is a common theme. by Victor Davis Hanson National Review Online Government is now so huge, powerful, and callous that citizens risk becoming virtual serfs, lacking the freedoms guaranteed by the Founders.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[330,145,41],"tags":[12,624,492,357,1044,40,872,1020,855],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p466Sb-1yE","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":6042,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/pick-you-scandal\/","url_meta":{"origin":5992,"position":0},"title":"Pick Your Scandal","author":"victorhanson","date":"June 11, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"Violating Americans' privacy while failing to identify the terrorists among us. by Victor Davis Hanson National Review Online All can agree that the Obama administration is mired in myriads of scandals, but as yet no one can quite figure out what they all mean and where they will lead. Benghazi\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Political Culture"","block_context":{"text":"Political Culture","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/american-culture\/political-culture\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8394,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/americas-politicized-tax-enforcement-is-a-harbinger-of-decline\/","url_meta":{"origin":5992,"position":1},"title":"America\u2019s Politicized Tax Enforcement Is a Harbinger of Decline","author":"victorhanson","date":"May 7, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ National Review Online Why did Rome and Byzantium fall apart after centuries of success? What causes civilizations to collapse, from a dysfunctional fourth-century-B.C. Athens to contemporary bankrupt Greece? The answer is usually not enemies at the gates, but the pathologies inside them. What ruins societies\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "America's Future"","block_context":{"text":"America's Future","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/americas-future\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"(Everett Collection\/Dreamstime)","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/pic_related_050715_SM_Hiding-Money-DT-500x500.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":10005,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/law-takes-a-holiday\/","url_meta":{"origin":5992,"position":2},"title":"Law Takes a Holiday","author":"victorhanson","date":"March 24, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"And anarchy follows. by Victor Davis Hanson\/\/National Review In the 1934 romantic movie Death Takes a Holiday, Death assumes human form for three days, and the world turns chaotic. The same thing happens when the law goes on a vacation. Rules are unenforced or politicized. Citizens quickly lose faith in\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Trump"","block_context":{"text":"Trump","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/trump\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5942,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/there-is-no-there-there\/","url_meta":{"origin":5992,"position":3},"title":"There Is No There There?","author":"victorhanson","date":"May 14, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson NRO's\u00a0The Corner Senator Harry Reid may be right that we should wait for the full sordid details before demanding resignations from an increasingly politicized and now apparently confessional IRS (yet the proof of the pudding is that groups such as\u00a0Media Matters, Think Progress,\u00a0Moveon.org, and Organizing for\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Benghazi"","block_context":{"text":"Benghazi","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/obama-administration\/benghazi\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6071,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-new-american-enemies-list\/","url_meta":{"origin":5992,"position":4},"title":"The New American Enemies List","author":"victorhanson","date":"June 18, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson PJ Media The vast majority of the annual shooting homicides are committed by inner-city and minority youths below the age of 30. Handguns are involved in 80% of all murders. Rifles and shotguns account for less than 10% of homicides. No matter; the National Rifle Association\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Political Culture"","block_context":{"text":"Political Culture","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/american-culture\/political-culture\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3312,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/make-the-rich-pay\/","url_meta":{"origin":5992,"position":5},"title":"Make the Rich Pay!","author":"victorhanson","date":"April 26, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services Last week, President Obama reversed course once again and now wants to raise taxes on the \"rich\" making above $250,000 per year. 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