Some Maggie's Farm readers have the feeling that Federal government in the US has been a gigantic sponge of money and power for over 100 years, to the point that we view Washington, DC almost like an imperial city (albeit with the consent of the governed), with an arrogant subculture which is oblivious to the views of huge regions of the country.
People nowadays clearly look to the Feds to meet their wants and to supply their needs far more than to their states or localities. However, the further governance is from the people they serve, the less responsive it is to the views of states and localities. Thus, for example, people in South Carolina feel somewhat disenfranchised when the Feds attempt to interfere with their Right To Work local opinions.
In the process, the Federal government has nurtured and fertilized gigantic constituencies with financial and/or power stakes in every detail of everything it undertakes. This is quite convenient for the constituencies - one-stop shopping instead of bothering with all of those messy states with their knuckle-dragging realtor and liquor store-owner legislatures and their back-woods governors.
Power and authority, unlike money and wealth, is a zero-sum game. Any authority or power which accrues centrally is lost by the individual, the localities, and the states (see Obamacare).
So, to get to today's poll question, if you were King For A Day, which Federal departments and agencies would you abolish to return the responsibilities, powers, monies, and choices to the individual, the localities, or to the states?
I'll start it off: The US Department of Education (what the heck does the federal government have to do with education, which is/was a local matter? We remember why - Jimmy Carter promised to create it to get the support of the teachers' union. Has American education improved since then? I'd say it has gotten worse as the power has moved from the PTA and local school boards, to Washington.)
My second candidate: Fannie Mae (this quasi-governmental, highly political agency threw a giant wrench into the gears of the world economy. Many predicted what would happen, but nobody cared.)
