Wild West

One of the recurring talking points from the right wing, science-denying Trumpists and Republicans is that somehow, President Biden is an autocrat, or a Communist, or a dictator - depending on the day and the mood of Tucker Carlson. Much of this is rooted in the irrational resistance to mask mandates, and partial vaccine requirements. There is also a lot of overlap with the Second Amendment absolutists who equate "freedoms" with owning enough guns for a small army and believe that the purpose of the Second Amendment is to allow citizens to overthrow the government if they don't like it. It seems that an article of faith among this strain of America First philosophy is that "freedom" is the ultimate goal and that government - any government - is an illegitimate infringements of our rights. 

While  acknowledging that our government doesn't oversee a utopian society (or anywhere close to it) and that power usually does corrupt, what would our world look like without any kind of government? A familiar saying is that "nature abhors a vacuum". If the government of the United States, for whatever reason you can imagine, ceased to exist tomorrow something would take its place. Maybe not immediately, and likely after a period of chaos, but the people who had power in that post-governmental world would almost certainly exercise that power. Science fiction writer S.M. Stirling wrote a series of novels beginning with Dies the Fire, in which he envisions a catastrophe that renders nuclear and electric power unavailable and even gunpowder won't work in a firearm. (He doesn't explain how this happens...magic?). The immediate aftermath is chaos, death and destruction. As his series progresses he imagines that society is reorganized in a variety of ways. In some areas urban gangs become the new ruling elite. An army general tries to rebuild the United States from his headquarters in Idaho. A renaissance cosplayer organizes Portland on a middle ages feudal model. Iowa closes its borders and its government stays in power with large farmers as the new power base and refugees from other states as virtual serfs. He imagines a dizzying variety of mini civilizations. The areas where there is no forced organization degenerate into dead zones or cannibalism. It's fiction, but with a basis in truth. 

If there really was no government as we know it, one of the first things that you'd see is large scale infrastructure failure. With no one in charge, who is maintaining the roads, how are the electrical plants kept running, and if you think inflation is bad, how can you purchase what you don't grow yourself (assuming you can do some subsistence farming) if there is no agreed-upon currency? 

Some people might be able to live a life of "freedom" on their farm, or out in the woods, away from civilization, protecting themselves with their guns. Until they run out of ammunition of course. How long would it take for somebody with a following to decide that he's the new bigshot in town and you work for him now? Or the local preacher who spent years screaming on YouTube decides that you're the wrong type of Christian and sweeps through your area purging the heretics? Freedom might just be keeping your head down and hoping no one notices you, if you even have the skills to feed and clothe and house yourself. But make no mistake, something or someone is going to fill that void left my an absent government. And the new boss might not be the same as the old boss, it might be worse.