Does less government mean more freedom?

Sometimes things I read or hear at different places that have nothing really in common conspire to make me think of some weird connection. Last connection went something like this: I had recently been reading about what a mess Iraq had turned into in Time Magazine, more specifically how powerless central government there actually was. People were just going about their own business.

Parallel to this I recently watched Borat (more on that later). Because of that I looked up Borat on YouTube which, moved me to Ali G which again made me end up looking at a clip from one of Sacha Baron Cohen other alter ego's the gay austrian fashion designer Bruno.

These two things don't seem very related to each other now do they? Well in my mind it made a connection.

Bruno interviewed this sort of stereo type white american guy. The guy was going on about how he was fighting for freedom. What asked what that was about he replied something along the lines: that government should not tell him what he could and couldn't do. It was kind of ironic then how negative he got towards Bruno being gay. I mean if he was so much about everybody doing whatever they wanted, then what was the problem of Bruno being gay?

I also thought about how the Iraqi government is essentially unable to enforce their will. Neither the police nor the army has allegiance to them. Instead each member of the police or army will follow the agenda of whatever ethnic group they belong too. In a way the Iraqi government is any right wing republicans wet dream. A government with no power that can't tell anybody what to do. It is actually the same for the Afghan government. They have no power. And people are free to own as many AK-47's as they like. National Rifle association must be thrilled.

And yet anybody who claims Afghans or Iraqis have much freedom would automatically qualify for the mad house. Iraqis don't have the freedom to walk outside their house because they can get shot. They don't have the freedom to have any haircut they like because they can get attack by religious fanatics for doing so. They don't have the freedom to live were they want. They have to live where their own ethnic group lives otherwise they will be killed. Yet none of these restrictions are placed by government. Afghan women are frequently being denied education, fair trail when being raped etc. Again not because of government.

In fact people in these countries lack basic freedoms because government is too weak to give it to them. It is ironic that the brutal regime of Saddam Hussein in many ways gave more freedom to ordinary Iraqis. They could go to market to buy food without fear of being shot by insurgents. They could cut their hair in whatever way they wanted without religious lunatics threatening their lives. Of course I think Saddam was an asshole and I don't wish him back. But at least it illustrates that government is always needed to give basic freedoms to its people. Even a brutal government is probably better than no government.

Now this is not about the Iraqi war, but rather about the neocon hypocrisy about government and freedom. Reagan talked about government not being the solution but the problem. They always talk about government needs to become smaller because government is bad. Government is bad because it tells you what to do. Thus big government is bad goes the logic. It is always nice when you can define words at your own pleasure however. For neocons big government means things like the state collecting more taxes and spending more money on education, social benefits, health care etc. Somehow I fail to see how this restricts anybodies freedom. On the other hand bigger spending on military, more power to secret services like CIA and FBI and laws like the patriot act, somehow isn't big government in their eyes? Strange because I thought these were all instruments in which the state could wield more power against the people or restrict their freedoms as with the patriot act.

This is what I call the republican hypocrisy. E.g. Increasing taxes to pay for health care for poor people is taking away peoples freedom, while banning gay marriage, stem cell research and severely restricting civil liberties with the patriot act is not?

Conclusion
I don't think freedom can be explained so easily as being about more or less government. More government does not automatically give more freedom nor does less government. Government does not give people more freedom if it regulates every little part of their lives, but it doesn't give people more freedom either if it does not regulate and enforce enough laws to hinder the strong from tormenting the weak. In the end the notion of big government is stupid because it too often implies something about taxation level, which is only remotely related to individual freedoms.