I want to mention just a couple of thoughts, about how things are in America, that people no doubt think about, from time to time.
One of the big things, apparently, is how big and bad the federal government is.
People often believe that we would really be better off without a larger political entity, say, go back to individual states, and call it a day.
I want to connect this idea, which Many people seem to share, regardless of which state they come from.
They don't like big government. They usually mean the federal one.
They sometimes claim they are closer to their state government, whichever that one happens to be.
They also, often, don't like so many darn lawyers. They wonder why there are so many, and lobbies of adverse medical and insurance professions, themselves other so called parasites, have trained them to hate these parasites (until you happen to need one yourself).
So, I am going to point out just a few basic things, about these different notions. These are really structural things, just doing a little basic math really. I don't have any political axe to grind, but rather just pointing out some basic facts.
One thing, which you might not have stopped to consider, is why there are so many lawyers, or, for that matter, financial advisers, or insurance agents, or chiropractors, contractors, electricians, plumbers, accountants, and a hundred other specialities, each 'very loosely' (to say the least) 'regulated' by your state, individually?
Not that we really need 'monopolies' of professionals dictating prices; but somehow we got oligolopolies/monopolies on the one hand in many areas (weak state and/or federal antitrust laws: we have both kinds); and fragmentary state by state regulation of all small practitioners in many fields, and piecemeal state by state plus federal regulation of oligopolies/monopolists, too.
One of the 'special problems' for Americans, especially patriotic state's rights ones, regarding the number of lawyers, or the number of any other specialists the state has deigned to regulate, has to do with the strange fact that we have 50, count them, 50, separate states in the Union.
Each of these states has its own professional bar association or whatever, and each state has its own very complex and detailed statute and case law and administrative laws, both civil and criminal law, (Louisiana even has the so-called 'civil law', from the French republic, differing substantially from all others of the 50), requiring special skills to master, special nuances to practice, each having its long and venerable history separate from each of the other 49 states' group of lawyers. Evey other profession or calling regulated by each of the several states has its own history, nuances, tradition, and rules. It is a phantasmagoria of different social and economic and legal arrangements.
So, if one wants to embark on just your state, as a political nation state, plan on having much the same cadre of lawyers, admitted only to your state, or perhaps admitted in one or two others at most, because eliminating just the federal government more or less leaves each state with its unique specialist bar, and all other specialities regulated by each several state, individually.
Another thing which you would still have, were you to recommend something drastic like this, say after eliminating the federal government, would be each of your states' legislatures.
Remember, there are still 50, count them, 50, of them. Each is different. Most of them are peopled nowadays by non lawyers. Americans have come to believe that in this simple world they don't need lawyers gumming up the state legislative works with technical legal jargon, and nonlawyers do just as well.
These are just a couple of thots, for so called political reforms that seem to be percolating out there.
I will save comments, on the duplicative additional layers of government, thousands of them, at the local levels, within each single state, which would not be eliminated merely by eliminating the federal government, for another post.
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