In 1945, “as World War II approached a successful end,” the New Hampshire Legislature adopted “Live Free or Die” as the state’s “official motto and emblem.”
Fittingly, as Nazism (national socialism) was being extinguished in Europe, New Hampshire lawmakers decided it is better to “live free or die” because “Death Is Not the Worst of Evils.”
The worst of evils, one can argue, is tyranny.
According to the Cambridge Dictionary, tyranny is defined as “a situation in which someone or something controls how you are able to live, in an unfair way.”
Democratic socialism should certainly be categorized as tyrannical because it absolutely seeks to control individuals in a very unfair way.
New Hampshire Senate candidate Karishma Manzur, who is running in the Democratic Party’s primary, is a control freak of the highest order.
Like most of her democratic socialist colleagues, she believes people are too dumb to live free, make their own choices, and be left to their own devices.
Instead, Manzur believes that experts like her should make crucial societal decisions with a bent toward one-size-fits-all, centralized planning because that model has such a stellar record of success.
Specifically, Manzur advocates big government as the solution to all that ails America.
To “fix the housing crisis,” she supports the federal government “rapidly build sustainable, affordable housing, including workforce and social housing permanently off the private market.”
She makes it sound so simple. Just have the government “expand the construction industry to deliver large numbers of social housing units efficiently and through unionized, prevailing-wage jobs.”
To “lower the cost of living,” Manzur’s tyrannical tendencies are also on full display: “Universal childcare,” “Stop utility price gouging,” “Crack down on corporate price gouging by big food companies.” These socialist slogans will do nothing to lower the cost of living but will surely increase the degree of control coming from Washington, DC.
Unsurprisingly, Manzur fully endorses “a single national healthcare plan” in which the federal government “guarantees healthcare” “with no premiums, no deductibles, and no surprise bills.”
What she leaves out is that granting the federal government control over the massive health care sector means individuals are no longer in charge of their health care decisions. If the government is paying for all health care, the government decides who gets access to treatments, services, medications, and when or if they do.
In terms of education, which has historically been a state and local issue, Manzur naturally “supports equitable funding of public schools” along with “free” college. On the other hand, she “will work to oppose federal school voucher bills” because parents should have little to no say over the education their children receive.
Manzur also thinks people should not be allowed to purchase what type of appliances or vehicle best fit their needs because we should all drive electric vehicles and “invest in a clean and renewable energy transition that protects our climate and supports jobs and economic growth.”
The bottom line is that Manzur “believes in a government that is strong” and “centered” on what she believes is the “common good.”
But that is not the government instituted by our Founding Fathers. And I believe that is not the type of government that most Americans, especially those who are familiar with the utter failure of socialism in every place it has been implemented, want for the future.
By and large, Americans long to live free because they know that death is not the worst of evils. When it comes to the worst of evils, tyranny deserves the top spot.
Chris Talgo is the Editorial Director for The Heartland Institute and a fellow for Heartland’s Glenn C. Haskins Emerging Issues Center.
