“In other words, in our polarized times, finding the proper sense of proportion might be among your greatest patriotic duties. Save your fury for a real crisis. “
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This leads to the true motivation. This is about sexual abuse, but sex is just the instrument. The motivation is the ultimate aphrodisiac: power. These abusers on the left and the right indicate they can not be trusted with power. Their thrill is the use of power.
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Voters respond to tribal and cultural cues more than ideology. They respond to demons and saviors more than ideas. I find this unsettling, but a reality that must be accepted in the competition of ideas. Ideas must be expressed in a way that connects culturally. FDR and Reagan accomplished this but it is very uncommon.
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What you tolerate, you teach. Democrats have no moral authority to hold Moore and Trump accountable to behavior they have long tolerated, but I would much prefer that their opposition not join them in the gutter they dug.
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“The biggest threats to conservatism are psychological, not demographic, trends. As an actual philosophy of life and not just a low-resolution tribal marker, conservatism thrives when people are mentally resilient, self-reliant, and strongly invested in the interpersonal bonds that make small government viable: family, friends, and community. At the national level, all of these psychological characteristics are in decline, and with them, so is principled conservatism.” Clay Routledge
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The result of this history is that entitlements have expanded far beyond assisting the poor. Many of the benefits go to beneficiaries far above the poverty line. Congress has proven totally untrustworthy in managing surpluses or trust funds or maintaining a sound financial basis. The explosion in entitlements is the primary driver of the post-World War II debts.
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“But it is time for our bureaucrats — before they engage in partisan expression or partisan giving — to ask, “What would a reasonable partisan opponent think of my conduct?” It’s time for bureaucrats to apply a governmental version of the Golden Rule. Should I inflict on others the kinds of suspicions that I’d feel myself if the roles were reversed?”
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from The John Conyers Abdication by Ben Shapiro at National Review: Americans love to mock the British for their addiction to royalty. But the fact is that we have created our own version of royalty in our politics, right down
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from Jonah Goldberg at National Review, How to Tell When Deficits are Bad As a matter of economic policy, conservatives believe that the people themselves are better at spending their money than the government is. Cutting taxes and regulations drives economic
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Kevin Williams writes on health insurance The Private Option- Back to Square One in National Review. We have written about the problem with cross subsidization driving up costs, the perverted incentives of third party payers and the tax incentives to
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In 2010 during the health care debate Democratic Congressman Jim Marshall (GA- my district) published an article in National Review about increasing consumer pressure on health care. Read Real Health Care Reform- Why America must move away from its third-party-payer
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by Henry Oliner One of a few themes that I return to in this blog is the fascination with poor decisions from very intelligent people. It has led me from reading history to reading about the way we think and
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by Henry Oliner Did Donald Trump win the election, or did Hillary Clinton lose it? It may seem irrelevant, but it does have bearing on the midterms. Hillary’s likability is used as a cloak to obscure severe character flaws and
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by Henry Oliner I have begun reading The High Cost of Good Intentions- A History of U.S. Federal Entitlement Programs by John F. Cogan. It is an impressive look at the problem. Entitlements go back to the Revolutionary War. Limited
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