I agree that the CDC is a legitimate example of something that only government can afford to offer. But we can have a government without the CDC. We can have government without welfare or social security. We can take many things away from government and still call it a government. Taking this to its extreme, if we remove the social order provided by police or the sovereign protection provided by military, laws and borders become meaningless and our government becomes anarchy.
This is not to day that we should or shouldn't take these things away (or add more, for that matter), but that the core of government's purpose is social order for its citizens.
You can have minimal governments, and going in that direction often seems like the right choice. Like most people I would be happy to cut 50% of all government spending, the problem is we don't want to cut the same 50%.
Take the US government remove the Air-force and you still have a functional government. In fact, we would still have the largest and most powerful Air force due to the Navy. But, that does not mean the Air force is worthless or even that taken in it's entirety it's a waste of money. And a lot of people want the Airforce which in a democracy means a great deal.
The real question is not how you can make a smaller government, but how you can have a better society and those are not always the same thing.
Agreed. The size of military and police forces are a completely different matter. It seems that many people have strong emotional reactions to military and/or public works spending, and I want to steer clear of that here.
This is not to day that we should or shouldn't take these things away (or add more, for that matter), but that the core of government's purpose is social order for its citizens.