LETTERS: PRESIDENT PUSHES MORE GOVERNMENT

To the editor:

I watched the State of the Union Address the other night. It was tour de force performance from me (I sat through the whole thing without medical assistance) and from the president who, in more modest times, would have been too ashamed to face the nation let along do it while displaying a level of political genius rarely seen in this century. Then I watched Sen. Trent Lott's response. During the president's speech, I was moved to gag. During Lott's response, I was moved to pray for deliverance.

The president's proposals represent a remarkable effort to thread the tendrils of the state deeper and more thoroughly into the fabric of American life. The state will now take care of the children whose parents have higher priorities as well as those who cannot care for their own. We have progressively shattered the family, denigrated it and dispersed it. The remaining families who care for their children exclusively in their homes are implicitly told that their value to the state is approximately zero. There's no money for what they do, perhaps because they don't earn an extra wage that the state can tax to satisfy the needs of the whine du jour.

The state continues the effort to wrest control fo schools away from the local unwashed and thoroughly unwonked citizens who pay the bills. We'll have our buildings repaired, our class sizes determined and the labor market distorted by the pressure to hire all those teachers in a very competitive job environment (I don't have the foggiest idea of how we're going to get quality people for quality day care). As with the police initiative, we'll be left holding the bag when the money runs out, or we can comply with just a few more federal rules if we want the spigot kept open.

We will extend the generous coverage of a nearly bankrupt program to an even larger population of eligible citizens (for a modest fee that won't come close to covering the actual program cost increases) and thereby hook some more citizens up to the federal life-support system. The state will further meddle in the relationship between patient and provider, not satisfied until it controls all aspects of health care.

Social Security surpluses, once as fungible as an other money in the revenue stream, are suddenly sacrosanct while we study the issue of a looming entitlement disaster. Of course, the brilliant side effect of foreclosing significant tax cuts as an issue during a congressional election year was never the primary intent. The number are illusory, but they will serve their intended purpose.

Somebody with far better insight than I once commented on the difference in the relationship that the people in Europe have with their governments from the one Americans have with theirs. In Europe, the states were formed first and then carved out and shaped the nations. In this country, a nation of people came together and formed a state. I believe that since the Great Depression and World War II, the state in this country has slowly acquired both the power and the purpose to reshape the nation. We seem to be drifting toward the European model: comfortable wards of the state living in a playpen large enough to give us the illusion of real freedom, but with the attendants always ready to administer a rap on the knuckles should we dare try to climb out.

Much gets changed as the Congress disposes of the president's proposals. This guy, however, has pointed our elected representatives into a deep and treacherous corner. I can only hope that the winds of change blow favorably between now and the fall of 1998.

BOB RATHBURN

Piedmont