There are really only two types of government. There is central planning, which is logically equivalent to, if not synonymous with, dictatorship; and there is freedom, which is logically equivalent to, if not synonymous with, capitalism.
All central planning requires a person, or group of people, sometimes called “the party” that does the planning. Inevitably, such people shore up their control until it is impossible for anyone else to interfere. This leads to dictatorship, which, historically, has been the most common form of government. Dictators come in the form of Kings, Emperors, Absolute Monarchs, Presidents for life, “Dear Leaders”, etc.
Dictatorships are not always disasters. In France, citizens were very impressed, if not happy with, their Absolute Monarch Louis XIV.
However, as Wikipedia explains, “Warfare defined the foreign policy of Louis XIV, and his personality shaped his approach. Impelled ‘by a mix of commerce, revenge, and pique’, Louis sensed that warfare was the ideal way to enhance his glory. In peacetime he concentrated on preparing for the next war. He taught his diplomats that their job was to create tactical and strategic advantages for the French military.” I would not have wanted to live in a country like that.
Freedom is logically equivalent to capitalism because capitalism is the only form of commerce that can take place in a free society. If people are “free”, they own their own stuff. If they own their own stuff, they trade their own stuff. This is called capitalism.
Free people would be vulnerable if they did not have a “representative” government to enforce honest interactions and guard their borders.
The only way anyone has ever discovered for free people to have a representative government is for them to vote. When people vote for those who represent them in such affairs, this is called Democracy.
Unfortunately, Democracy has a weakness. If a country is prosperous and maintains peace for a substantial amount of time, the populace inevitably becomes soft and loses perspective. As the maxim incorrectly attributed to Alexander Tytler explains, “A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship.”
So, perhaps there is actually only one form of government: dictatorship.
Still, freedom is nice, and the United States has a good measure of it at present. We should guard that freedom for as long as is humanly possible. For that reason, we should fear politicians like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez who want to hurry us into central planning. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and her ilk are the enemies of freedom.
spikosauropod 