The only things government can do are regulate and redistribute, prohibit and penalize, confiscate and command. Are these the things that liberty is made of? Somebody else's money and an endless list of Thou Shalt Nots?

If citizens wish to retain their liberty, they cannot assume that those who seek power over them are honest. Skepticism of government is one of the most important-and most forgotten-bulwarks of freedom.

Some of the folks on both sides might be sincere, but it does seem as if it is only the opposition that cares about the Bill of Rights most of the time.

We are asking the wrong question. The issue is not who should be trusted with all the power of the Presidency. Instead, we must ask how much power any candidate can be trusted with.

Part of the reason that the government's fear mongering is succeeding is because so many people are so ignorant, that it is easier for government to frighten people in submission.

If an election is simply a one-day snapshot of transient mass delusions, then this is not a very noble form of government.

To blindly trust government is to automatically vest it with excessive power. To distrust government is simply to trust humanity - to trust in the ability of average people to peacefully, productively coexist without some official policing their every move. The State is merely another human institution - less creative than Microsoft, less reliable than Federal Express, less responsible than the average farmer husbanding his land, and less prudent than the average citizen spending his own paycheck.