The road to serfdom is paved with good elections

"The long march towards democracy has been to free men from the abuses of the sovereign’s whim. Alas ... democracy contains within it two toxic seeds. ...

"The second is what French economist Frédéric Bastiat observed in 1848: 'the State is the great fiction through which everyone endeavours to live at the expense of everyone else.'

"The longer we have had democracy, the greater demands electors have made on those elected. ...

"We are now several generations into an experiment on dependency so profound that this election we look for politicians who can fulfil central government’s promise to educate our children, pay for our entertainment, supply the news, cover our medical bills and even address our mental health issues.

"These are not the demands of a free people.

"These are the expectations of serfs."

~ Damien Grant from his column 'We escaped the whims of kings. Did we just create a new kind of dependence?'

"Freedom is not empowerment. ... Anybody can grab a gun and be empowered. [Freedom i]s not entitlement. An entitlement is what people on welfare get, and how free are they? It’s not an endlessly expanding list of rights — the 'right' to education, the 'right' to health care, the 'right' to food and housing. That’s not freedom, that’s dependency. Those aren’t rights, those are the rations of slavery — hay and a barn for human cattle."

~ PJ O'Rourke from his 1993 'Liberty Manifesto'