Stephen Frick (9/9/2013)
Steve Jones wrote that size does not matter. This misses a crucial point: government is force. Government has the exclusive privilege on legal use of force. Government is not like any "one" else.If I steal your data, you may not legally come with a weapon and force me into your basement. The government can use a weapon and a prison against me.
Government is given the authority to use force to protect citizens from bad citizens. Who protects citizens from bad government?
What happens when the enforcer is a bully and misuses force?
True, and there are problems with the size of government and sheer power they wield, or is wielded by a few people poorly.
However my comment was the fact that individuals or small groups can perform similar attacks and cause the same types of impact in a way that was previously the domain of governments or countries. Now a few people could potentially create attacks at the same scale or effectiveness of governments.