> Private sector seems pretty enthusiastic about the wars to me

Who? Your local baker? The mechanic around the corner? How about the printer? Or the dry cleaner? Apple?

Sure, businesses that make things for the military are going to benefit from wars. It only stands to reason that they might be more pro-war (or pro-conflict) than the local dry cleaner.

Here's the paradox. And it takes a little reasoning.

Who starts wars? Government.

Who benefits from wars. Well, nobody, but let's just say that government contractors do. They make weapons, missiles, bullets, crap. They do.

If you can make so much money making stuff for the war machinery, are you going to bother making stuff for consumer applications? Nope. If you can sell toilets for $1,000 rather than $50 you are going to make radiation hardened toilets. Let the Chinese make the "small stuff".

What happens when you have a war-driven economy then? Well, your consumer products manufacturing base goes to shit. Wages are artificially inflated by the war machine and, very soon, you have to pay a guy $50 per hour to put screws into a VCR. Therefore, the consumer business has to go to other countries where someone can make a VCR for less than we can.

And, what happens over a long period of time of doing things this way? Decades? You completely erode your manufacturing base to the point where you almost can't make anything in the country any more.

So, there you go. The whole business of government being so smart. Government providing everything we need. Government being all-knowing and providing the foundation upon which we will all build our empires. This same government is almost solely responsible for the destruction of our consumer manufacturing infrastructure by creating a falsely inflated military economy that made it impossible to get anything done in this country.

Government is an ass.

If government is responsible for all of our success. If we should thank and revere government for all we have accomplished. Then, we should also hold government responsible for all of our failures. You can't have it both ways. If they make things happen then they own the disasters too.

Mind you, I am not one for complete lack of government or complete lack of regulation. This is where I have trouble with political alignment labels. Saying that you are "libertarian" doesn't necessarily mean that you adhere to the textbook definition of what this might mean today. The same is true of other political views.

Yes, some government is necessary. They need to look after our roads, power grid, ports, etc. The government we have today is far larger than what we probably need.

I use fire in survival situations as an imperfect analogy:

When a fire is the right size it provides, warmth, comfort, security, the ability to cook food, etc. In a very real sense, it "works" with your, not against you.

If it is too small it is useless. In the wilderness you might have to fend-off predators because they will not be deterred by your tiny fire. You might not be able to cook food or sterilize water. A small fire is bad.

If a fire gets too big it is dangerous. It can get out of hand and kill you. Beyond a certain size it actually becomes another threat to your survival. If big enough --and if there's enough fuel around-- it starts to create its own wind and it grows larger and larger, until it consumes everything around it. The fire only cares about itself. Every particle serves the fire and not you. It is actually this huge mass that starts to work against you, not for you.

Our government is too large. It creates its own wind. It is growing larger and larger. We have too many government workers, their corresponding unions, their families and retirees that form a unified voting block that mindlessly supports, well, bigger government. It is quickly becoming a threat to our own survival. It is working against us, not with or for us.

Nobody is proposing that we have no government and live in total anarchy. Just like the small fire, that would be dangerous. What we do need is a government of the right size and mindset. We have not had that for decades.