What a great comment @stevescoins, I agree that the vast majority of people don't want actual freedom. Freedom takes responsibility like you said, and that means hard work. Better for them to just get stuff handed to them if their cage is nice enough.
As for the government and groups, well freedom is the decentralization of power - each person takes control of their own. That can't be allowed to happen if someone wants to obtain power more easily.
That is a take I will have to think about for a while...it does make sense. Compare to "Absolute power corrupts absolutely"
How would you look at that concept in relation to Hobbe's Leviathan?
Free doesn't mean one is above the law. Just laws are needed in society.
If a government has absolute power we have all seen the horrible things that happen. Imprisonment without trial. Mass murders in Communism. etc
If an individual claims absolute power over themselves, what is the worst that happens? They do criminal actions at a personal level. Stopped eventually by others with their right to self-defense.
you are absolutely right. rule of law beats the hell out of rule of man...the problem is that you have to have just men to enforce the law, and so few of us are just.
To be effective at enforcing the law, one has to be aggressive, and again so few of us are aggressive. You need that intersection of just and aggressive, and both are rare to begin with.
You need the sheepdogs to protect the flock against the wolves. Like you say, sheepdogs are the rarest of them all.