Q:”Is it moral to use the power of government to impose moral standards? At what level of government? Whose standards? If your answer is “sometimes” where do you draw the line?”

THE CORRECT ANSWER

Just as we can know negative freedoms but not positive freedoms we can know negative morality but not positive morality. Why? Because negative morality is a universal: “reciprocity over time within the limits of proportionality” or its inverse “irreciprocity” is as impossible to counter as “all choice is rational given the knowledge and incentives of the actor at a time”, and “people always pursue self rational interest within the limits of their knowledge and incentives” All of these are necessary truths and perspectives on the same scientific and logical necessity.

However, what constitutes morality (reciprocity) given any set of resources, economy, traditions, norms, at any point in time between any particular individuals or groups, may vary – although by predictable properties such as technological development, economic development and organization, the resulting social political and military organization.

So this logic is constant across all people across all time, because it is a necessity of physical, natural, and evolutionary laws:

Negative: Silver Rule: Do not unto others as they would not have done unto them

Positive: Bronze Rule: Do unto others only as they would have done unto them.

Positive: Golden Rule: Do unto others as you would have done unto you.

Negative Freedom: that which we can reciprocally not do to each other (prohibition on imposing costs upon others.)

Positive Freedom: that which we can irreciprocally do to each other (freedom to impose costs upon others).

Negative: Immorality refers to irreciprocity in display word and deed.

Positive: Morality refers to “reciprocity in display word and deed over time and within the limits of proportionality”

Negative: humans never act irrationally against their self-interests given their knowledge in time.

Positive: humans always demonstrate rational self-interest over time, given their knowledge at the time.

ERGO:

Yes, it is rational, and moral, for governments to impose ANY standard of measure that is NOT FALSE OR IRRECIPROCAL. Most moral constraints limit some form of personal consumption of the commons or require some form of personal investment in the commons, where the commons consist of physical assets, institutional processes and procedures, and traditional, normative rules of behavior that facilitate cooperation.