Yesterday This Week, ABC’s Sunday news
talk show, sponsored a
debate about big government. On the pro side: Rep. Barney Frank
(D-Mass.) and former Labor Secretary Robert Reich. On the other pro
side: Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) and syndicated columnist George Will
(a regular panelist on This Week). Since this was a debate
between Democrats and Republicans, there was no anti-statist side,
although Frank did a pretty good job of chiding conservatives for
their inconsistency in that regard:

I would assume, George, you’re going to sign on with me and Ron
Paul in removing the criminal penalties on the use of marijuana and
on stopping this terrible regulation of the Internet in which we
tell adults that they can’t gamble.

And frankly, here is where the right wing is very much for big
government. They are the ones who want to regulate personal
choices. Birth control…gambling, private sexual practices. Who
can get married. I have never understood why heterosexuals who want
to get married believe that if I were to marry a man, they would
somehow lose interest in their wives….

[That’s] also the case, of course, with the military…A major
reason for the expansion in American government, taxation, et
cetera, is an overly extended American military, which is committed
all over the world to accomplish all kinds of social and economic
purposes far beyond defense.

Will, to his credit, backed the legalization of online gambling,
but he expressed reservations about marijuana decriminalization,
saying, “I need to know more about whether it’s a gateway to other
drugs. I need to know how you’re going to regulate it, whether
you’re going to advertise it.” Frank rightly deemed this response a
“cop-out,” especially because Will had just answered a question
about traffic light cameras this way:

When does X trump personal liberty? Almost never….I don’t want
to make safety parallel with, equal to, let alone trump personal
liberty. 

That was in reference to a policy ostensibly aimed at protecting
third parties. Yet Will seems ready to accept marijuana prohibition
as a way of protecting people from themselves—and not even from
harm caused by marijuana itself but from harm caused by the drugs
they might use after trying marijuana.

Ryan likewise confirmed that conservatives have a blind spot
about big government when it comes to the military:

Ryan: I noticed, Barney, you have a big
thing with the national defense, with the Defense Department.
That’s the primary function of the federal government. You may not
like what they do.

Frank: But to build bridges in
Afghanistan—where in the Constitution is that?

Ryan: This time last week, this time last
week I was in Helmand Province with our Marines in Afghanistan.
They’re out there fighting for our liberties and our security,
depriving safe havens for terrorists who can come and attack again.
You might not like that. You might have a problem with that.

Frank: They go far beyond it. 

The fact that national defense is a “primary function of the
federal government” does not mean everything done under that
heading is justified. Self-identified fiscal conservatives like
Ryan should be at least as skeptical of government programs that
deliver bombs and bridges in other countries as they are of
programs that deliver subsidies and social services here. 

[Thanks to Richard Cowan for the tip.]