Coyote Blog

Those on the left and the right often try to laugh off libertarians, ascribing to "paranoia" our fear of the power of government. 

Well, I could argue that if this is paranoia, I share a similar phobia with men like Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, whose fear of government power permeate all their writings, as well as the Constitution they helped to produce.  They believed that even good men could be corrupted by the government, and they were proven correct in an incredibly short time by John Adams.  Adams is by all accounts a good man, dedicated to freedom and democracy, and one of the chief intellectual architects both of the Revolution and the Constitution.  But it was Adams that signed into law the Alien and Sedition Act, perhaps the worst piece of illiberal and unconstitutional legislation in the history of this country.

Or, if I didn't want to make the founding father's / original intent argument, I could just point to this (hat tip Marginal Revolution):

A federal judge in Texas, calling the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. a "corrupt
agency with corrupt influences on it," awarded a Houston financier $72 million
to cover his legal fees in a decade-long suit involving a failed savings and
loan and the government's efforts to take control of a stand of endangered
California redwood trees in the 1990s.

The FDIC, a regulatory agency that insures deposits at banks and
savings and loans, filed suit against Charles E. Hurwitz in 1995, seeking to
collect more than $800 million because Hurwitz indirectly controlled a Texas
S&L that failed in 1988. The FDIC, after a series of legal setbacks, dropped
its suit against Hurwitz in 2002....

On Tuesday evening, Hughes issued a scathing, 131-page ruling. In it, he cited
evidence that the FDIC brought the case largely because of pressure from
environmental groups, members of Congress and the Clinton administration. The
reason: Hurwitz's Pacific Lumber Co. owned 3,500 acres of endangered redwoods in
Northern California. Hughes found that the FDIC, in close concert with
environmental groups, sued Hurwitz to pressure him into a "debt-for-nature"
swap, in effect giving the government his trees in exchange for his supposed
liability in the failure of the United Savings Association of Texas....

Hughes said FDIC officials and lawyers, in depositions, "ranged from
manipulative evasiveness to plain perjury." He cited records of two years of
communications, including extensive discussions of legal strategy and political
matters, between the FDIC and environmentalists over the proposal to use a
banking-practices lawsuit as pressure on Hurwitz to give up the
redwoods.

Hughes said FDIC officials "discarded the mantle of the American
Republic for the cloak of a secret society of extortionists. If the vice
president called, they responded. If a congressman called, they responded. If a
lobbyist called, they responded. They heeded every call but that of duty and
honor."

Wow.  I know many people are paranoid about the lack of accountability of major corporations, and felt vindicated by the Enron case, over which the press spilled acres of ink.  However, Enron is nothing compared to this.  While fraud is bad, Enron at least was never able to use the coercive regulatory and police power that the government has to seek its ends.