John Stossel Quotes
Central authority is bad. The bias should be for freedom. And without a central authority, there are lots of little authorities, and we learn which ones to trust.
Stossel, John. No, They Can't: Why Government Fails - But Individuals Succeed. Threshold Editions, 2012.
Ironically, many Republican leaders give lip service to decentralized government but they fight hard for centralized national government making. Many want Congress to make laws governing abortion and other family planning techniques. Some want the state to decide, but almost no Republicans want to leave these personal decisions to the local government much less the family and women involved. In business regulation as well, republican fight tooth and nail to have Federal legislation prempt state and local government about tort liability for defective products, and they always prefer that the Federal SEC make all the rules and regulations about selling stocks and bonds and do not want state or local government to “interfere”. Likewise, they have emasculated the state governments when it comes to authority over the state militias where virtually all the controls and promotions are decided by Congress and the Department of Defense and not by Governors or local politicians. Ther are many other examples. In most of the solid Republican Southern States, the local school boards cannot even select the textbooks that schools will use and the Republicans centralize this with the State government and state legislatures which they control. Democrats also are generally opposed to decentralization except for large cities having control along with the Federal government but otherwise they too do not want decentralization. For national political parties, what is the point of winning national elections of the big decisions are made locally?
This quotation has frequently been used by opponents of government regulation of alcohol and other drugs.
This was one of the internment camps to which Japanese Americans were consigned in WWII
Traditional political jurisdictional boundaries were geographic, but in one of the wisest decisions of English Colonial government, it was recognized that dealing with the Indians demanded a much different approach than the classic European extension of the Crown by appointing a Governor for a territory. As Superintendent of Indian Affairs, Johnson, had authority and responsibility for the Indians and relations with the Indians in Massachusetts and the other colonies, the Colonial Governor not withstanding. Bernard and the other Governors of course did not care for Johnson’s authority within his territory.
John Frank Stossel is an American libertarian television personality, author, consumer journalist, and pundit, known for his career on both ABC News and Fox Business Channel.
