Got into a political discussion with a Libertarian friend of mine about the size of the Federal Govt. and I told him it had actually shrunk !! He was astounded and thought I had lost it ... because it doesn't fit the GOP / Fox dogma !! Now we did disagree on how to measure the size of Govt- he does it by cost but I argue # of employees. WHY? because while $ is needed, people do the work- not $ itself. In addition, the Federal Govt is a service organization- they provide services... the more service you provide, the more people you need. Sure it costs $, but the $ doesn't provide the service (work) . . only the means to do so.

I can't post the chart he used, but it proves my point... Federal Govt. FTEs have been almost flat for >40 years.. in 1960 there were 2.7 million Govt. workers and the population was 180.67 million. That is 1494.4 FTEs per 100,000 population. In 2006 (last year of the chart) there were 2.98 million Govt. workers but the population was 298.38 million or 998.7 FTEs per 100,000 population. A Decrease of c. 500 FTE per 100K people. (surprisingly the Local Govts. grew the fastest, as a sector).

NOW you might not think FTEs / capita is logical to measure size of Govt., but think about this with respect to now vs. the 1960s... millions of more tax filings to process; million of more pieces of mail; millions of more applications - Passports, permits, VISAs, etc; more businesses to inspect by agencies like FDA and USDA; millions more of patient filings, ... the volume of work has gone UP tremendously while the # of FTEs doing it per capita, has shrunk !!! That's the fallacy of the GOPs "big Govt." reference!!

Some might argue that automation and computers have increased productivity and that'd be correct, but the fact still remains we do more (work-service) with fewer people today, than ever before. The size has NOT grown as Fox -GOP claim. Cost has, but see below.

Thought some of you might like this talking point.

Now if there are some that want to use expenditures (cost), then IF you want to cut expenditures- quit fighting so many frivolous wars and sticking our nose in every crap hole around the globe !!! WTF are we still in Japan, Korea and Europe ? Quit giving away tax cuts so your deficits rise . . Cut that BS out and THAT'll save bundles of $$$$ !

Today's Ron/Rand Paul Libertarian's ideal government means the complete elimination of the Fed and return to the Gold Standard. the elimination of Dept of Education, Interior, Justice, EPA, NSA, HUD, Homeland Security and most of the military, Social Security, Veteran Benefits, Medicare/Medicaid/Obamacare, Student loans, Welfare, Unemployment benefits, Headstart, NASA ...

The problem with bringing the soldiers back from Europe and Asia is . . . they'll be unemployed.

Yeah Libertarians don't want anything from the Feds!!

So who'll inspect their food supply to be sure it's safe?
So who'll inspect their water supply to be sure it's safe?
So who'll inspect their Rx supply to be sure they're safe?
Forget worker safety (OSHA) - they're only raw meat anyway !!
So who'll deliver the mail ?
Who'll monitor their airplane flights ? . . and inspect the planes?
So who'll try the federal criminals and make rulings on law?
And God forbid they ever need a life saving drug - Go do the decades of research yourself, you dumb SOBs !!
Lastly lets ship their azzes off to fight the wars ! (granted we have a poor record there)

Libertarians are the 20th century Neanderthals in their thought processes about how to run a country. We need "Apple" wherewithal to address MODERN problems, and they want to go back to sticks and rocks !! Booga- Booga !!!

I forgot to list the most hated of all, the IRS. Then there's also the elimination of Dept of Transportation, FDA, TSA, Alcohol & Tobacco, Agriculture, Interior, Labor, the Congressional Budget Office, Census Bureau …


Government can get pretty small to Libertarian's wishes with this partial list of cuts. So what exactly makes this different than Anarchists?

It wouldn't be anarchy--no more so than in countries where people have private armies. Think about the wonderful mobile armed force that the Koch brothers could field. And then there are the corporations (they're people too), which already have "security" services and could expand them exponentially. Oh yeah. Sing me right up.

OK. I sung you up...

Thanks!

Obama promised jobs for all the servicemen coming back to the states.Let us see if he keeps his word.

But the fallacy of your argument is that the government is outsourcing services. There are services that the government used to provide that are now outsourced to private organisations (Blackwater springs readily to mind). The "free" stuff like healthcare, internet, cell phones, are paid for by the government yet there are no government workers providing these services.

I'd say your friend and you are both right - but you need to look at the whole equation, not just your popular side of it.