Big government isn’t just about raw expenditures - though that is important - it is also about interference in the lives of citizens from unaccountable federal bureaucrats.

Except that those raw expenditures are always interference in the lives of citizens. It’s money taken from our pockets.

Except that those raw expenditures are always interference in the lives of citizens. It’s money taken from our pockets.

To the point of expenditures by the Gov’t, Why in gods name does a member of the Royal family of Lichtenstein get farm payment benefits from the U.S. Gov’t???? and for NOT growing crops! What idiots came up with this idea????

Big government isn’t just about raw expenditures - though that is important - it is also about interference in the lives of citizens from unaccountable federal bureaucrats.

Exactly and Reagan did a great job in that regard.

Would it betray the liberal legacy to be intolerant of the idea that women should be denied the right to vote?

I wish liberals would show a little less tolerance of groups like the Islamists in the Muslim Students Association but their intolerance seems to extend only to mainstream conservatives and Christians.

Chris,

That’s why Reagan was for big government, he just wanted his big government to spend more (relatively speaking) on the military.

Big government isn’t just about raw expenditures - though that is important - it is also about interference in the lives of citizens from unaccountable federal bureaucrats. Having more military personnel available doesn’t tend to affect the lives of individual citizens the way that, say, expanding the Department of Education’s role does.

That’s why Reagan was for big government, he just wanted his big government to spend more (relatively speaking) on the military.

Whether or not you agree with that is a different story, and even conservatives take that view to varying degrees. But it’s still important to know that people who talk about small government are using that as shorthand (usually) for lower domestic spending and less federal bureaucracy- so it’s not necessarily shorthand for lower spending overall.

Big spending isn’t necessarily the same as big govt when you take into account that much of it was on the military

C Stanley,
I’m gonna have to call you on this. You’re pretending that the military is not part of the government. That’s true, wartime or not.

Besides, conservatives that are worried about government interference in their lives should also fear a large and powerful military that answers to that government.