Radley Balko wrote about the travails of Steven Hatfill at The Agitator, using it as a window into how libertarianism happens.

Steven Hatfill, the government scientist whose life was turned upside down when he became a suspect in the 2001 anthrax attacks, is now talking about what happened to him. Hatfill was eventually cleared of any wrongdoing and given a settlement, but only after years of harassment and abuse at the hands of the federal government.

Hatfill was interviewed on the Today Show and in the Atlantic, and Radley includes quotes of Hatfill’s interviews via Firedoglake.

“I love my country,” Hatfill, 56, told Lauer. But, he added, “I learned a couple things. The government can do to you whatever they want. They can break the laws, federal laws, as they see fit … You can’t turn laws on and off as you deem fit. And the Privacy Act laws were put in place specifically to stop what happened to me. Whether we’re at war or have been attacked, the foundation of society is that you hold to the laws in place. I used to be somebody that trusted the government. Now I really don’t trust anything.”

This isn’t an epiphany, being thrust into the midst of libertarianism (or any other “ism” against one’s will.  In fact, Hatfill’s reaction largely misses the problem, and Radley’s vision of the birth of a libertarian may be premature.  Hatfill has suffered for sure, but not because he learned that the government is an omnipotent presence, one that can “turn laws on and off” at will.  Everyone who wants to know that knows that. 

We’re team players.  We pick a team and expect our team members to back us up.  Hatfill picked the government team, and had every reasonable expectation that they would be as loyal to him as he was to them, right or wrong.

“I used to be somebody that trusted the government. Now I really don’t trust anything.”

His team screwed him.  The team was disloyal. He got burned.  When you’re on the government team, you rationalize its conduct for the sake of others, while knowing (as does every cop) that it’s not a matter of believing that your team is more honest, more upstanding, more righteous than the other team.  You know that your team does things it shouldn’t from time to time, but you can turn a blind eye to it knowing that it’s your team.  Some people know that their team can be really, really bad, and still they remain in the batting order.  After all, it’s their team.

Sometimes you believe that your team is more right than wrong.  Sometimes you believe that your team has to beak a few rules or laws to accomplish the greater good.  Other times, you just slough it off when people on your team do wrong because, well, they’re your teammates and it’s your team.  Loyalty to the team is paramount, as you expect that loyalty in return.

Hatfill’s complaint is that his team was disloyal to him.  It turned on him and put him through the ringer that was only meant for the other team.  Would he have had the same epiphany had he been reading about the story happening to some other guy named Hatfill?  Has Hatfill’s travails caused a mass surge of libertarianism throughout the nation?  Of course not, because it didn’t happen to them. 

No matter what we know about the reality on the streets, the world we live in and the government that cares for us, we stick with our team.  Cops protect their own.  Criminal defense lawyers decry abuse.  Judges justify the imprisonment of the innocent based on precedent.  If we learned, or cared, we would all be of one mind.  We aren’t, and we refuse to understand why others see the world through different eyes.  These are the eyes of the team.

As long as the team continues to embrace us, we cheer for it.  We cheer for our schools, even though the other guy’s school is no better or worse.  It’s just not ours. We do the same for our country, our religion, our race.  No one has a monopoly on right and wrong, yet we stick together and back each other up.

The government team may be the best one going, since it allows you to be on the side of the powerful.  We all want to feel powerful, and by adopting the loves and hates of the government, our team wins almost every battle. Who doesn’t want to be on the winning team?  But when you’re not allowed on the winning team, or worse still, when the winning team throw you off, where do you go?

Some of us choose to be on another team.  We think we’re better than others for doing so, that we’ve chosen right over might.  We may just be naive, or perhaps a bit masochistic in picking struggle over ease.  There’s a certain smugness in being the underdog, but there’s also plenty of smugness to be on the winning team too.  No matter what team we’re on, we believe it’s the best team, not because it necessarily is but because we must believe it is. 

It’s hard to say what team Hatfill will join next, or what team will have him.  At this point, my guess is that Hatfill will be happy to be a part of any team that will protect him, but it will be hard for him to embrace any team after the members of his last team were disloyal.  The most important thing is that he’s accepted as part of the team.