1399 Faith in Leadership

Faith in leadership is at an all-time historical low, primarily because most people are more comfortable with decisions they make for themselves over others that want to make decisions for them. This is especially true in a Liberty society but even in totalitarian nations, the general populace is at least sophisticated enough to know there’s no elite class that has their best interests at heart and are intelligent & prescient enough to do what’s best for everybody, whatever the propaganda says. In the past, and even now, many people have faith there is a supernatural source so that their leadership will perform admirably most of the time. Their confidence is misguided and often dangerous; oversight, accountability, and “trust but verify” attitudes are mandatory. There’s even the question of whether leadership is required at all. A bureaucratic state, with thousands of individual decision-makers, can function without a leader if the goals are clearly stipulated. To a Libertarian, this even seems like the ideal form of government, but that’s also its weakness: it’s an ideal, not reality. In the real world, people contrive, manipulate & exploit for their own best interests and the power of their group. Their goal is control of everyone, and they’ll use the bureaucratic mechanism to do that. At least with a leader, elected or not, there’s a chance that they are wise & altruistic enough to punish such overreach. Unfortunately, we haven’t had any leaders like that for a long time.