How do so many bad people get in positions of high power?  As Hayek said, the worst get on top.  That is very true in the United States, and it has been this way for a long time.

It isn’t just the president.  It is Congress.  It is the head of agencies.  It is the powerful people in the FBI, the CIA, the NSA, and even the military.  It is judges and prosecutors.  It is also top people in corporations, the media, and many people with influence.

The system has almost made it impossible for good and decent people to get into positions of power.  Part of it is always the fact that good people tend to not seek out positions of power, especially political power.  And when they do, they are excluded from the game because they won’t play along.

Still, the American people vote for some of these people.  Sometimes they aren’t given much of a choice, but it is still somewhat of a reflection of their character.  There are occasionally people like Ron Paul who come along and the large majority of people won’t support him because they are told so by others.  They just believe whatever their masters tell them, thinking that they are thinking for themselves.

By the way, this isn’t just Americans.  This happens everywhere, and often it is worse in other places.

Naïve or Evil?

I look at the people who are enthusiastically supporting Kamala Harris for president and wonder how it is possible.  To be sure, different people have their different reasons.  Many of her supporters just hate Trump and will vote for the person with the best chance to beat him in the election.  It is hard to imagine that so many people just love her policies, especially when her stance on many issues seems to be fluid.

This is one of those cases where there is no black and white.  It isn’t just a question of whether someone is evil or stupid.  They might be both.  They might be a little bit evil and naïve when it comes to politics.

The problem is that we can’t say that someone is just completely naïve and that is it, unless they are so naïve that they can’t recognize at all that they are supporting immoral things.  Every single person supporting Kamala Harris is acting immorally to some degree.  They are supporting her authoritarianism.  Even if they just want free tuition for college (or whatever she is promising today), it is still immoral.

I have never heard a Harris supporter or any Democrat justify voting for a Democrat just because they already pay a lot of taxes and want to get back a portion of the money that was stolen from them.  They don’t see it in these terms.  Maybe there is some Democrat somewhere who believes this, but I haven’t heard about them.

Democrats believe in the power of the state.  They believe it is just fine and dandy for the government to take your money to use it for “public goods”.  In fact, many of them wouldn’t even refer to it as “your money”.  They think it all belongs to the government and the government allows you to keep some of it.

To be sure, the Republicans aren’t much better.  At least there are some who have some understanding of the immorality of taking from some to give to others.  They don’t always apply it consistently, but there is some realization.  There are also more legitimate excuses for supporting someone like Trump over Harris because he is the lesser of two evils.  I have heard Republicans and libertarians (large and small “L”) who think the whole system is corrupt but that they support one candidate over the other because it might at least move us in the right direction.

The Ruling Elite Rely on Propaganda

Even though there is much immorality, I still believe that the majority of Americans are generally good people.  Outside of political realms, they wouldn’t dream of hurting another person on purpose other than in self-defense.  They wouldn’t rob their neighbor either, even if it was in the name of charity for others.

In a just system, most people are good people.  The ruling elite rely on the naïveté of the people for their own power.  This is why they use propaganda.

I can’t think of a single brutal dictator or elected official who came to power by announcing that they would rule with an iron fist over his people.  They might talk about ruling over a small minority of the population, but even here it is usually wrapped in propaganda.  Hitler didn’t come to power announcing that he would slaughter the Jews.  Stalin didn’t rise to the top by telling his people that he would starve them and ship any dissenters to concentration camps.

Some people rise to power by threatening other countries outside of their domain.  This is even happening now in the U.S. presidential race.  It seems that the two major parties always have some bogeyman like Iraq, Russia, China, etc.  But these are not the people voting for them.  The one exception, although he is no longer running, is Joe Biden talking about MAGA.

The point here is that no authoritarian is going to explicitly announce that he will act as an authoritarian towards his subjects.  He will want more of your tax money to help the poor.  He will want more war to spread democracy and freedom abroad.  He will want to confiscate guns for the safety of the children.  He will want to spy on you to keep you safe from terrorists.

They play on the goodness of people.

The ruling elite rely on the people to eat up their lies and propaganda.  They have to trick you into supporting them.  If they told you the whole truth, then most people wouldn’t support them because they would see it as evil.  They would also see it as being against their own interests.

The ruling elite generally hate your guts.  At best, they don’t care one way or another about you.  They care about their own power, their own wealth, and their own safety.

If only people understood that these authoritarians are not their friends.  Unfortunately, they just eat up whatever they are told by the media and then discount anyone who is actually trying to tell them the truth.

There should be fewer naïve people (politically speaking) in the world today because of alternative media. That probably is the case, but there are still way too many people who just believe whatever their media masters tell them.

We just need for these people to be a little open-minded and listen to those who are actually trying to tell them the truth.  It wouldn’t hurt if they learned a little economics too.