Nanny State

The nanny state describes the tendency of liberal politicians to enact policies that make economic and health decisions for citizens. It is a Democrat method of solving society's problems by putting the government in control of the people. Essentially, the government becomes the decision maker as the person who knows what is in your best interest. It removes responsibility from individuals and parents and promotes irresponsibility and dependence.

Not every nanny state style policy seems like a bad idea, and arguments can be made for the state intervening to stop for instance the insane from taking their own lives. All but the most radical of Libertarians recognize that the state has some responsibility to prevent children for marrying too young or to prevent the use of hard drugs. The great difficulty that a conservative world view helps us to deal with it keeping the nanny state impulse from getting out of control. As more and more nanny state policies are enacted it becomes legitimately in the states best interest and part of the states purview to enact more and more legislation that infringes on our liberties. Reducing the costs of the National Health Service has lead to British interference with diets and needle exchange programs.

Examples

• Hillary Clinton once quipped, "It takes a village [aka government] to raise a kid." In a normal society, however, it takes only a mother and a father.

• Helmet laws.

• Compulsory public schooling.

• Universal healthcare for 300 million so that 45 million uninsured citizens will have medical coverage

• In the United Kingdom and European Union, the government pays for advertisements about healthy eating, including encouragements to drink more milk.

• In 2011, the Welsh government mandated fire sprinklers in all new houses, regardless of the wishes of the builders or owners .

• The USFDA drug approval process, that today wouldn't let penicillin (the biggest life saving drug ever) past but lets politically connects homeopathic "medicines" walk on by.

See Also

• Police state
• Liberal totalitarianism