When the state is so big and intrusive that people need its permission to do everything from building a house to merging businesses, it's easy for the lines to blur between conversations in which government officials merely voice preferences and those in which they twist arms to get their way. That creates room for partisans to defend "jawboning"—government bullying of private parties to do what officials won't or can't do themselves—as nothing more than casual chats.
The best way to handle jawboning is to strip government of power so it has little coercive leverage, and we should always work to do just that. Another good approach, embodied in legislation cosponsored by Sens. Ted Cruz (R–Texas) and Ron Wyden (D–Ore.), is to make it easier to monitor government communications with private parties and to punish officials who cross the line.
