A boy gets to go backstage at the circus. Amidst all the wonders, it is the circus’s elephant that surprises him the most. Out there, under the big top, the elephant had appeared mighty and glorious. To see him now, tied to a weak railroad stake in the ground by nothing more than a frayed length of rope, the boy is confused.
“Why does he stay?” the boy asks the handler.
“He doesn’t know his own strength,” the handler replies. “He’s been tied to that spike since he was just a little fella. He learned a long time ago…that’s just the way it is. He don’t try to escape now.”
Our government is like that railroad spike. We’ve grown so accustomed to the great might of the federal government that we hardly question it anymore. Some of us may not even understand that we are being held captive at all.
At its outset, the role of the government was to protect its people. Protect them from foreign and domestic harm, protect their (inalienable) rights from being encroached upon, and protect their ability to pursue life, liberty, and happiness. The current federal government goes well beyond those basic tenets. The U.S. government in the 21st century is a provider. It provides welfare for those who don’t work. It provides grants for artists who can’t sell. It provides education for a nation of schoolchildren. Now it even provides healthcare.
There are people who think the problem with government is that it doesn’t provide enough. These are the now fully-grown elephants who have become complacent and accepting of their shackles. They only wish that their handlers would give them a few more peanuts in the morning. Or if not them, at least those skinny elephants across the way.
Total Conservative is geared towards those elephants who understand that they have outgrown their restraints. That the circus never had the right to put them in those restraints to begin with. It is geared towards those people who want to see the federal government protect its citizen’s rights without encroaching on them in an oppressive and systematic way. It is geared towards people who understand that the very best thing you can say about government is that it’s a necessary evil.
Today’s liberal government goes well beyond infrastructure, defense, and policing. It systematically educates our young in public institutions, ensuring that many of them will never see the government as the hostile captors that they have become. It regulates and limits the free market. It limits basic freedoms – look no further than the New York mayor’s outlandish ban on 2-liter sodas to see a government that isn’t even shy about exercising illegal authority over its citizens.
At Total Conservative, we think that it’s time to remember that the federal government was created for the people. By the people. One nation, under God. It’s time to see that tiny railroad spike for what it is. It’s time to return government to a small, limited beast, and let America’s people walk forward into the bright light of day.
It’s time for freedom.