Typical poorly worded poll question, I assume just to generate this news story.
Both the AS video and the Fox presenter interpreted the result as 88% of people think "govmt SHOULD BE in charge of the people" (entirely different to the actual wording).

First in my opinion, we have to separate two things.

1) How things "SHOULD" be.
2) How things "ARE."

Then discuss how to get to the way things "should be."

Regardless of your personal view, philosophy, religion, ideology, as it is now we are the servants of the Government.

How things should be is that the Government receives payments from the people just like the waiter in a restaurant. How big is the tip? Depends how how well you did your job.

Piss Poor job, NO TIP go away.

I stick with the description from Stefan Molyneoux. The government is the farmer and we are the livestock. Every single day this point gets reinforced for me. I add that government is run by a few very powerful interests: pharma, banking, perhaps oil, and developers (at the more local level). Everything has become very clear to me upon compiling this view. Mainstream news media plays a vital role in keeping this arrangement glued together, as the citizenry is duped and frightened. It's been an amazing thing to observe, exciting even.

Here is a comment I just wrote ( before I read this thread ) in response to an article written yesterday,
http://www.tpnn.com/2015/07/16/msnbc-...

"The single most damaging concept in the world is that a person does not belong to himself. It is a concept embraced by communists, fascists, socialists, and statists of all stripes. The first step in alleviating most of the problems in this world would be to renounce this illogical belief. Professor Melissa Harris-Perry is simply wrong, and should learn to think logically!"

all governments to include ours own the population! they do not care what you do so long as you do it within the confines of how they want things done "they" being the people who are paid with tax revenues collected from we the working by the government. the situation has become more and more pronounced over the years that being at least the last 120 years. unfortunately the greater majority of people who have read Ayn Rand's writings and who claim to have been influenced by what she had to say are not a part of the true objectivist movement so even these people will not stand up for their rights. the end result is that the government by default in a way owns you.

I'm not sure I get why this should be controversial in particularly Objectivist circles. What's the basis of the controversy, 'Who owns me', or is it the development of individual rights from that premise?

I wonder what the response would be 2 years down the road to now.

Increasingly sense the advent of progressiveism, being taught to learn but not how to think; taking a lesson from Stalin, slowly over time disempowering the individual with faux history, poor education and collectivism, intended to create useful idiots but carried out even further created 'Useless idiots'...perfect slaves of government. Still, there are those of us, maybe 50% of us, that were natural born 'Individuals', just starving for sovereignty and willing to be accountable for our selves and create values untold. Our forefathers had it right...only those that were Invested in the country, invested in their own responsibility should have the right to vote, have a say in local laws and culture. The fed was only meant to protect those rights. At this stage of this game; Everyone must be apprised of this truth, all the necessary tools for their ascension into responsible sovereignty are readily available. But most of all, Ethics is necessary by us and our chosen representatives. A Mayan calendar suggests, this is our time to achieve Ethics. Maybe we should all start with Aristotle.

Thoughts from a twisted liberal mind:
Look, I don't care who owns me or doesn't own me. I need a government that can provide for my needs. Something I can fall back on if I don't succeed. Someone who is looking out for me if I get into trouble. And you know, if there's no government to keep things fair, it's a dog-eat-dog world out there and the big dog always wins, unless you've got a government agency to help you. I don't care about the country as long as I'm alright. After all, I have responsibilities.

I think the whole poll is flawed, and that most Objectivist believe in self-ownership. The question was worded to ask if people felt government was controlling us, liberals gladly cheer and conservatives lament the increased shackles of control over everyday activity. I would venture that most people do NOT want more government control, and certainly do not want government ownership of their children, which many liberals call for, in the way of Mao.
The question should haves asked, do you want government ownership of you and your children, do you favor it or object to it. In any case, as long as we can think, we own ourselves, barring brainwashing.

I am on the side that the government works for the people and the people are in charge. I believe this is what the founding father's meant, and am surprised we here diverge on this concept.

The practical problem is when we have 350M people and a country as powerful as ours. This makes the leaders hear too many voices and the people feel nano-scopic control.

However, I feel there should be checks in the government such that they are constantly reminded they are required to provide a "service" for the people of greater value than their pay, and they should be deathly afraid of overstepping their bounds (e.g. the constitution). These two issues also manifest in broken companies, when the indirect (and generally unmeasured) leadership starts to feel like they can weigh down the company with some unicorn and ambrosia costs, without returning the consequent value. I see this behavior all the time, and you should sell you stock if you see it. The company WILL die if it continues. I suspect the same is true for a government.

Management or government should be thought of as a necessary parasite to be minimized.

The more I study history the more this pattern stands out. All governments throughout history have started with the mantra in many different languages, but the meaning is still the same. "We are here for the people." Some governments actually follow the spirit of that statement in the beginning. Then the people in government start making your decisions for you, after all they are the government and by that virtue the "understand" more than you what your needs are. Combine this with the fact the the majority of people that migrate into government have a bad case of low self esteem and a high level of greed and governments spiral out of control.

The people in the government are assisted in their endeavors by their subjects that are to distracted and lazy to do for themselves, so they permit and encourage the government to remove their burdens.

And history repeats this over and over.

I prefer the concept of control of one's self and one's productive output based on the absolute right of the individual to own property. Ownership, per se, has a commercial connotation applicable only to that property. Self ought not be conflated with property.

Spoiler alert!
Yesterday I Netflix rental watched Jupiter Ascending which ended with a Ukrainian immigrant spliced with the genes of a royal space alien family winding up with the full ownership of this planet as ordained by interstellar law..
Jupiter (her nickname) thus saved us from being harvested (never fully explained) by an evil space alien monarch.
Have no fear, Jupiter has decided she is content with her life (and an angelic boyfriend who just had his clipped wings returned)..
The rest of us would be more content if perhaps Jupiter would read Ayn Rand. Oh, the possibilities if we were really owned (by some space alien decree) by a nice person movie character like her.
Jupiter is played by the gorgeous Mila Kunis who actually is a Ukrainian immigrant. I'm giving this action-packed feel good by the ending "space opera" flick a full five stars.

I think a lot of the controversy over this is from the way society has been changing since the mid 60s.

People are social, and that tends to invoke a latent herd instinct. Schools have been pushing that social tendency for all they can. The more they push group, the more they can also push "group think".

If you look at the reports of how much time people spend every day on social media such as facebook, twitter, and instagram, among others. You have to wonder if people are able to function on their own anymore without constant reinforcement from their peers.

My wife and I were in a restaurant having dinner one evening. We looked at a family across the room from us while we were waiting for out food. There were four of them, 2 adults and 2 kids. All four of them were using devices, 3 on phones and 1 on a tablet. Not a one talking to their dinner companions or paying attention to anything but their electronics. Is this what family dinners out have become?

Under Objectivism, we are taught and hopefully realize and internalize, that we own ourselves. Because we own ourselves, we must make our own decisions and make them in our own self interest.

Self interest includes our families, and anyone else we choose of course. But the limits and restrictions on our self interest are decided by us as individuals. Not some nebulous peer group or society as a significant motivator.

This is the opposite of what schools and society at large push for culturally, and is the fracture that produces the controversy.

Hmmm. Uh, the gubbermeant I'm afraid. >:/

I agree with those comments that say the question wasn't clear whether it was asking the current reality or how thing ought to be.

I disagree with how the part in the middle about how Republicans want less instrusive and expensive gov't and Democrats want the opposite. If that were true, we wouldn't see gov't growing regardless of who's in power.