Why has America trended (generally) authoritarian over the last 100 years?

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We've grown so much in population that political problems such as affordable health insurance, environmental pollution, energy conservation, and retirement have come to surface. The more problems with a nation, the more political responses are provided. As for our nation amongst the world, it's important to have an educated population who can help multiple sectors of the economy while providing infrastructure in times of recession in order to prevent depression. The greater the population, the more political things get. Good old fashioned libertarian style governance while ideal, is no longer practical in today's day and age.

Politicians have better access to the public and vice-versa today than ever before. Promises are made to get elected to office. "Vote for me and I'll lower the cost of health insurance, make sure you can retire, and the weather will get better because I'll stop global warming." Today's politicians are like the kids in 6th grade who promise more days off, longer lunches, and extra field trips if they're elected class president. Unrealistic promises have resulted from the access politicians have to the public. The end result is when promises are kept, government gets bigger.

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I would guess CTRattlesnake would consider laws against child labor and slavery to be authoritarian. I also would think he would be against the civil rights act that stopped a lot of those Jim Crow laws.

Please identify at which exact point CTRattlesnake said that authoritarian was always bad in every single instance. He didn't and it's not bad in every single instance.

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The United States was a much freer place circa 1973 than it is 2013.

You really have to wonder what they are teaching in schools these days.

Health teachers are grading their students' knowledge of sexual education on how well they know their positions and nerve endings. Students are pairing up and the teacher walks around with the lights out. It's disgusting for parents to have to deal with this.