Obama and Romney Agree

In the third presidential debate between challenger Willard Romney and President Barack Obama, the president said to debate moderator Bob Schieffer, “Well, my first job as commander-in-chief, Bob, is to keep the American people safe.” You can see it at the 4:40 mark in this video.

Willard “Mitt” Romney, in remarks to the American Legion said, “The first job of government is to keep the American people safe – and as President, that will be my commitment to the American people.”

Whew! I feel better now. While it doesn’t help us much when making a choice in this election, I suppose that we should all be comforted that whichever candidate is elected, we’ll be kept safe.

Is that all there is to it? Before I push my keyboard out of the way, I’d like to explore this just a little bit further. While I suppose I could rant about how safe Americans really are especially in light of the recent events in Benghazi, I would rather explore this philosophy of safety.

While both answers were in a context of foreign policy, I think it’s safe to say that neither candidate’s philosophy of safety ends with keeping Americans safe from violent attacks by evildoers, foreign or domestic.

It is very noble to want to keep people safe. Who wouldn’t like people to be safe? But, to borrow from the Bard, ‘To be safe or not to be safe, that is not really the question.’ The questions are what kind of safety? How much? At what cost? And, from whence cometh this, this… ‘safety’?

When the answer to the last question is that we as individuals provide for our own safety, we make the decisions on the other questions in our daily lives. Where will we live? Will we purchase a monitored alarm system for our home? What kind of car do we drive? How and where will we drive it? How much insurance will we purchase? Will I get a concealed carry permit? The decisions are endless. We decide for ourselves the costs and benefits of the various kinds and degrees of safety that we’ll provide ourselves and our families. But when the answer to the last question is ‘government’, the answers to the other questions become much more problematic.

If government at all levels would confine its energies to keeping us safe from foreign invasion, violent crime and such, I suppose I wouldn’t complain much. But the government hasn’t done that. It’s been on a veritable safety crusade for a century or more.

We now have government ostensibly keeping us safe from terrorists, drugs, economic downturns, illness, big banks, racism, poverty, monopolies, climate change (formerly, global warming and before that, global cooling), transfats, large soft drinks, smoke, cars that go too fast or use too much gas… the list is endless. Is it any surprise that government has grown endlessly?

It is important to remember, as George Washington reminded us that, “Government is not reason. It is not eloquence. Government is force; like fire it is a dangerous servant -- and a fearful master.” The government doesn’t persuade us to act safely. Government imposes safety through the barrel of a gun. When government imposes safety, it becomes dangerous not to comply. If you don’t believe that, just try objecting to molestation by a TSA agent.

Patrick Henry knew that when government is providing the safety, the cost is liberty. Give me safety or give me death! Wait. That just doesn’t work. Try picturing the Founders, milling around in a mob pleading and crying for someone to keep them safe. You can’t can you? Because that’s not the behavior of free men. They envisioned a president who would “...preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.” In other words, a president who would keep the Constitution safe.

I stand with Patrick Henry and Benjamin Franklin who said, “Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.”