Tom,

I've worked in government for nearly 30 years and I've found that while people like to talk about "smaller government," they rarely mean it.

This is true even among conservatives whose idea of "leaner and meaner government" is to have it intrude into our bedrooms and personal choices in life. The Schiavo case is a perfect example...here we have the federal government chosing to spend millions of dollars to pass and implement legislation to intrude upon a single family's private and personal dispute that had already been adjudicated in both federal and state supreme courts.

Of course, the liberals are no better. They have their pet ideas about how to spend taxpayer dollars.

The point is that it has never truly been about fiscal restraint from either camp. Its about funding what each side believes government should do. Either scenario leads to some form of "big" government.

And the public really doesn't help. We as individuals can support cutting somebody else's pet program, just don't cut the ones we want. So a liberal's solution to crime is to cut law enforcement and the spend the money to end poverty. Meanwhile, the conservative's solution to crime is to cut social program "handouts" and increase the number of police officers patroling the streets. Its not really about the money, but more about what solution people think works best.

Where I work, we had to cut $3.6 million a year because the public voted for tax limit initiatives. When it came time to talk about what to cut, not a soul showed up for the public hearings. So now after the decisions have been made and services cut, there very same folks complain about what we can no longer afford to do. Democracy at its finest.

So you'll excuse me for expressing some measure of cynicism when I hear pundits talk about the value of "smaller government." All they are doing is speaking in tongues.