From Terry Hansen

Grafton

To the Editor:

Republican U.S. Rep. Tom Tiffany, a candidate for Wisconsin governor, is a strong believer in small government. The best response I’ve seen to Tiffany’s position comes from Brink Lindsey, in his 2020 essay for the Niskanen Center:

“We must reject minimal government as the organizing principle of policy reform. Making or keeping government as small as possible is an ideological fixation, not a sound principle of good governance.

Small government is a false idol, and it is time we smash it. In its place, we should erect effective government as the goal that guides the development and evaluation of public policy. For maxims, we can look to America’s greatest statesman. ‘The legitimate object of government,’ wrote Abraham Lincoln, ‘is to do for a community of people, whatever they need to have done, but can not do, at all, or can not, so well do, for themselves — in their separate, and individual capacities.’”

Tiffany’s vote for legislation cutting Medicaid makes this more than a debate over slogans. Wisconsin voters should judge his small-government philosophy by what it delivers — and what it takes away.