The rise of arrogance and the need for 'Sense'

Arrogance is running wild in Olympia. It has consumed the State Legislature and the office of governor. This article addresses only the arrogance, not the specific policies, of these institutions.

It is time for Uncommon Sense.

In 1776, Thomas Paine published a 47-page pamphlet that, as much as any other factor at work in the American colonies, emboldened the populace to rise up against the monarchy of Great Britain. The pamphlet was called Common Sense. It was a runaway bestseller in its time, ubiquitous from pulpits to barrooms; it remains among the all-time best-selling American literary works.

Its words have a resonance particularly appropriate to this day, to this place.

Here is a portion of the chapter entitled, “Of the Origin and Design of Government in General,” in which Paine differentiates between society and government:

“Some writers have so confounded society with government as to leave little or no distinction between them; whereas they are not only different, but have different origins. Society is produced by our wants, and government by our wickedness; the former promotes our happiness positively by uniting our affections, the latter negatively by restraining our vices… The first is a patron, the last a punisher.

“Society in every state is a blessing, but government even in its best state is but a necessary evil, in its worst state an intolerable one; for when we suffer, or are exposed to the same miseries by a government, which we might expect in a country without government, our calamity is heightened by reflecting that we furnish the means by which we suffer. Government… is the badge of lost innocence; the palaces of kings are built on the ruins of the bowers of paradise. For were the impulses of conscience clear, uniform, and irresistibly obeyed, man would need no other lawgiver; but that not being the case, he finds it necessary to surrender up a part of his property to furnish means for the protection of the rest; and this he is induced to do by the same prudence which in every other case advises him out of two evils to choose the least. Therefore, security being the true design and end of government, it unanswerably follows that whatever form thereof appears most likely to ensure it to us, with the least expense and greatest benefit, is preferable to all others.”

Paine saw government as a necessary evil, to be “applied” delicately and with care to prevent abuse.

He portrayed the king of England as an example of government—which in effect the king in and of himself was—gone gravely wrong.

Jay Inslee is certainly not King George III. You can tell because Inslee doesn’t have a British accent, and he doesn’t wear a powdered wig. That we know of. But in many regards Inslee is as much an exemplar of supreme arrogance as the worst of kings. This can be safely said of a man who stated that we cannot allow people to make decisions that are bad for their health and that of their students—he was speaking of teachers and education administrators who might object to his mandate for vaccination of all school employees in the state.

Understand, once again, we’re not talking here about whether or not Inslee’s perception of the value of vaccination is right or wrong. We’re addressing only the astonishing state of mind that can dictate of others what their choices can be.

The State Legislature is just as bad. The notion of a bicameral body in Olympia is sheer illusion in these days of single-party control. The party in power openly eschews its powerless counterpart, paying it paltry and duplicitous lip service while remaining wholly unconcerned with its concerns. The ruling party doesn’t care because it thinks it doesn’t have to. This is not true down to the last person within that party, of course; but it is true enough of most of them to make it effectively true for the whole. What else can you say of a party that insinuates itself into the private lives of employees in the state, forcing them to pay for something (this is obvious to anyone with common sense) to be a purely personal matter—long-term care insurance?

Who died and made these people God? God’s in His heaven, but not all is well with the world.