It is funny sometimes where I come across things in the mess that is the web. I guess I shouldn't be too surprised, but I am. Just that I follow a blog for recipes, and find something a bit political that I quite agree with. Of course that was mostly just a response in of itself to another thing out there.

Mostly to me it is down to this single quote:

Whenever the government does something for us, it takes away from our own ability to do that for ourselves. This diminishes us as human beings.
I really strongly agree with that statement. Granted as I understand things, both posters I linked are talking about the British government, but I think it applies equally well to the U.S. government I live under. There are too many law-ish things forming that are overly restrictive with which actions they allow.

There is an important difference that one must keep in mind however. It is one thing for the government to provide methods to assist it's people. It is entirely another when it makes complete decisions for them. For some things, the line between the two is quite clear. For others it isn't so. (But in the case of the two referenced posts, if people want to be fat, let them. If they don't, explain to them how not to be. Don't decide for them.) The government should provide, and when no other option remains enforce, rules to assist it's people. Not rules to control or limit.

Groups of people with more freedoms are a stronger people. By living together with all of their differences they generate a flexibility that enhances their strength. The more similar that a group of people becomes, the weaker the people become. The overhead of having to deal with the apparent chaos of all those differences at first seems to be a loss, but in time it actually brings a strength that isn't matched elsewhere. Dealing with those differences is not difficult either. Oddly enough, I find the best description of how to deal with differences when communicating from RFC 793, which is the Transmission Control Protocol, on which most of the Internet is built. (yeah, i'm a geek).

...be conservative in what you do, be liberal in what you accept from others.

I am going to close this post with another quote. Granted this one is from a fiction book, but I still think its words hold a string measure of value.

God save us from Earth in which all people are the same. God save us from a colony where that is the goal, or a culture which assumes that is the norm. Give me a thousand people speaking different tongues, worshiping different gods, and dreaming different dreams, and I will make of them a greater nation than you can make with ten thousand of your gengineered duplicates. For mine will have the spark of greatness in them, while yours will live forever conformity, worship mediocrity, and take their carefully modulated delight in predigested dreams.
Reigning in Chaos: the founding of Guera Colony
(Historical Archives, Hellsgate Station)
From This Alien Shore by C. S. Friedman