From 5eb9997b4904f722b8251745933451647bb1df48 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Andrew Yu
- In any case, both democracy and liberty are important in a long-lasting prosperous system of society. Note my wording in the first paragraph, that the decisions of elected experts are for ``running thr country''—I specifically mean issues that deal with either the general public (such as public health and the environment) and things that would be otherwise hard to solve personally (such as enforcement of contracts and crimes). The `'will of the people'', represented by the government, have no business doing things like banning freedom of thought or mandating people not to smoke in their private property. Only when things affect others such as smoking in public should the government, or the will of the general public, have any say. And of course, people should take responsibility for their own private deeds. A lung cancer patient who got lung cancer by smoking excessively doesn't deserve medical insurance from taxpayers; but for cases where an illness isn't caused by a identifiable private decision factor, medical insurance and support should be given. + In any case, both democracy and liberty are important in a long-lasting prosperous system of society. Note my wording in the first paragraph, that the decisions of elected experts are for ``running thr country''—I specifically mean issues that deal with either the general public (such as public health and the environment) and things that would be otherwise hard to solve personally (such as enforcement of contracts and crimes). The ``will of the people'', represented by the government, have no business doing things like banning freedom of thought or mandating people not to smoke in their private property. Only when things affect others such as smoking in public should the government, or the will of the general public, have any say. And of course, people should take responsibility for their own private deeds. A lung cancer patient who got lung cancer by smoking excessively doesn't deserve medical insurance from taxpayers; but for cases where an illness isn't caused by a identifiable private decision factor, medical insurance and support should be given.
People overemphasize the importance of democracy. In fact, democracy is in my opinion less important than liberty—though in practice indeed liberty wouldn't survive for long without democracy. -- cgit 1.4.1-2-gfad0