Scott Tibbs
Well, what is YOUR plan?
By Scott Tibbs, October 14, 2022
When someone proposes a policy idea, the response to people who oppose that idea is often "Well, what would you do about it?" The premise is that unless you have a plan to solve a particular problem, you do not have standing to oppose a proposed solution to that problem. This premise is deeply flawed.
This is part of the peril of having a full time legislature with a supporting staff, full-time executive branch and a large bureaucracy tasked with implementing policy. In order to justify their political power (not to mention their salary and benefits) legislators feel the need to show the public that that they intend to "do something" about a particular problem. Because the government already is so big and has so much power, it is assumed that government can solve the problem. But government getting involved can make the problem worse, not better.
Even Republicans (who are supposed to stand for smaller government) fall into this trap, and feel the need to propose an alternative to a plan put forward by Democrats - even if the Republican plan is just a watered-down version of what the Democrats want. This is especially problematic at the national level, when both parties propose a top-down solution for a nation of 330 million people that stretches across the continent and has an enormous diversity between its various communities.
But that was never the way this nation was designed. The brilliance of the Founding Fathers was recognizing that one powerful government on the east coast cannot solve all of our nation's problems. That is why most authority was invested in the sovereign states. Different states have different demographics and different needs. What works for New York may not work in Oklahoma, and vice versa. Some problems require more localized community-by-community solutions, and may be addressed by community institutions rather than government.
We need to reject the idea that it is required to have a plan in order to oppose a bad idea. "Do something" is not an argument. Doing nothing is better than doing something that is ineffective, counterproductive or destructive.
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