“The best-laid schemes o’ mice an’ men
Gang aft agley,
An’ lea’e us nought but grief an’ pain,
For promis’d joy!”

Robert Burns – 1785

A few days ago, we read an article entitled, “Liberty’s Easy Slide into Tyranny,” written by professor John Kozy. The underlying theme is that free societies need to pay close attention to how their government is conducting business. Citizens need to be informed; they need to be involved because the destruction of freedom is caused by the small things: “accumulation of errors, failed policies, and little and big unfairnesses.”

As the scenes from around the world in places like Libya, Madison, Bahrain hit local newspapers, television news casts and Websites, we are witnessing a future that will not be like the present.

Secrecy, distancing, divisiveness and ignoring the interests of citizens is no way to run a government … locally or nationally.

[NOTE: Better make that state government, too. AP story from March 13, 2001.]

[NOTE: See, too, the March 14 editorial in the Intellingencer Journal/New Era, Lancaster, PA for another argument].

Editor