So, as I’ve said before, I’m mostly agnostic on gay marriage (I believe the entire institution should be left to personal/familial/community/religious devices and the government should remove itself entirely from the argument lock-stock-and-barrel). That said, you can’t be gay—well, or even straight it seems—in the United States today, according to the media, and not be completely and obsessively consumed by the issue (and, natch, your opinion can only be “FOR!”).

And since SCOTUS is hearing it this week, I suppose I might as well poke a stick into the monkey cage:

If we’re supposed to oppose DOMA on states’ rights grounds, should we then oppose the effort to overturn Prop 8?

Discuss.

-Nick (ColoradoPatriot) from HHQ

UPDATE
Excellent point made (and I don’t just say this because I have several captions vying for his “Best of” category) by VtheK from the comments:

This country would be so much better off if people cared as much about fiscal responsibility and economic growth as they do about giving same sex couples a piece of paper signed by a bureaucrat to legitimize their coupling.

Speaking of which, I think the time has come to push for polygamy. If gender doesn’t [matter], what’s so damned magical about the number 2?

(As for the first part, I have made this exact point many times myself, and I have much more to say about Viking’s second point, which perhaps I will anon…)

Some weeks, life contains too many distractions and it’s hard to find time to blog.  At least that’s what happened to me this week.  My list of potential topics to write about keeps growing, but my time and, more importantly, my energy for writing about them has been rather limited.   In the meantime, I keep coming across links and articles of interest.  Here are a few things which caught my attention this week, that might interest our readers, as well, or at least generate further discussion.

I rarely look at the “Dear Abby” column these days, but this one caught my eye.  I wasn’t interested in the first item about the wife whose husband of 30 years was having an affair with a prostitute from a strip club.  No, the one that caught my eye was the second item, the one from the gay Democrat whose new romantic interest is a Republican, and suddenly, the Democrat finds that all his gay friends have cut him off and stopped calling him and inviting him to things.  I was intrigued to see gay leftist intolerance so openly acknowledged in a mainstream newspaper column.  Dear Abby responds:

I know several couples who have strong and happy “mixed” marriages in which the spouses do not always agree politically. It is a shame that you would be required to choose between the man you care for and your longtime friends, who want to ignore that there are also gay Republicans.

I see nothing wrong with continuing your relationship with Mark; however, I think it may be time for you to expand your circle of friends if this is how your old ones behave. You’ll all be happier if you do. Trust me on that.

On a related note, I appreciated this piece on “Coming Out as a Black Conservative” at PJMedia.  I’m sure most GayPatriot readers can relate to it.   I particularly liked its last point about the importance of independent thinking rather than group identity:

Independent thinking got you here. Independent thinking will keep you going. Group identity, or more specifically the group authority Shelby Steele writes about, degenerates into herd instinct in the unthinking. Individual rights can only be effectively defended by those who have rejected any claim upon their life. You do not belong to anyone. Your life is yours. Your mind is yours. Direct it intentionally. Choose what you believe and know why you believe it. Never let someone else, anyone else, tell you what you must think or do. By all means, consider trusted advice, but take responsibility for your decisions once made.

Also at PJMedia this week, VodkaPundit Stephen Green reflects on Rob Portman’s reversal on the issue of gay marriage and suggests that the best solution is to get government out of the marriage business in this piece.   As he explains, the left doesn’t really care about what’s best for gay people: “No, for the progressive left, gay marriage is just another club for beating America’s churches into submission to the State. First Catholic birth control, then Baptist gay marriage, and so on. Progressivism is a truly jealous god and will have no other gods before it — not even yours.”

Along similar lines, earlier this week, Rand Paul suggested that the best, most value-neutral solution, would be to get marriage out of the tax code.  Walter Hudson, author of the above-linked piece on “Coming Out as a Black Conservative,” also makes a related point in this article from January on “The Distinction Between Sin and Crime”:  “The uncomfortable truth surrounding the marriage issue is that heterosexual couples have long been subsidized by their unwed neighbors. It is that state endorsement which homosexuals covet, along with the social sanction it implies. Under government informed by objective morality, marriage contracts would be just that, conveying no special benefits beyond the terms agreed upon. As a result, religious individuals and institutions with conscientious objections to homosexuality would never be forced to violate their conscience.”

Presidents’ Day is this coming Monday, but Lincoln’s birthday was this past Tuesday, February 12th.  I was traveling that day, and had the misfortune of being subjected to hearing most of the State of the Union address as I completed the last leg of that day’s journey.

As Dan and others have pointed out many times in the past, Obama is fond of comparing himself to Republican Presidents, especially Lincoln and Reagan.  Perhaps it is because both Lincoln and Reagan were associated with the state of Illinois: Reagan was born there, grew up there, and went to college there, and although Lincoln didn’t move to Illinois until his 21st year, he is most associated with the state where he became a country lawyer, served in the state legislature, and represented a district in the House of Representatives.

Or perhaps Obama compares himself to Republicans because he doesn’t want to remind the public that his political views place him to the left of Clinton, Carter, and Johnson, or, for that matter, far, far to the left of Kennedy.  Perhaps he simply wants to preserve the narrative about his alleged “post-partisanship” and thinks that comparing himself to Republican Presidents is one way to keep pulling the wool over the public’s eyes in that regard.

Whatever the reason, hearing him speak on Lincoln’s birthday only reminded me, once again, how far Obama falls from Lincoln’s historic presidency (despite Steven Spielberg’s and Tony Kushner’s attempts to draw such a parallel through their recent film).   Not only was the speech the usual melange of the same tiresome platitudes we’ve been hearing from him over the last five years, as both Bruce and Jeff have pointed out here, it was also full of his usual partisan talking points, as he placed blame on Republicans wherever he could, and he rationalized future power-grabs by the Executive branch.

In the context of Lincoln’s birthday, though, I am less interested in the SOTU, and more interested in what Obama said on January 21st of this year.  Until Bruce posted the entirety of Washington’s second inaugural last month, the second inaugural address I was most familiar with was Lincoln’s.  I had read about FDR’s second inaugural address, but never felt moved to read it in its entirety, and have generally had just passing interest in the speeches delivered on the second inaugurals of the presidents who were re-elected in my lifetime.  But Lincoln’s second inaugural address is anthologized in textbooks alongside the Gettysburg Address, and I have read both many times.  They are both lessons in brevity, resolve and humility.

Consider, for instance, the way that Lincoln discusses the issue of slavery and the conflict between the North and the South in his second inaugural address:

Both [sides] read the same Bible and pray to the same God, and each invokes His aid against the other. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God’s assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men’s faces, but let us judge not, that we be not judged. The prayers of both could not be answered. That of neither has been answered fully. The Almighty has His own purposes. “Woe unto the world because of offenses; for it must needs be that offenses come, but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh.” If we shall suppose that American slavery is one of those offenses which, in the providence of God, must needs come, but which, having continued through His appointed time, He now wills to remove, and that He gives to both North and South this terrible war as the woe due to those by whom the offense came, shall we discern therein any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a living God always ascribe to Him? Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondsman’s two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said “the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.”

These are not the words of a proud and arrogant man.  These are the words of a man who is troubled by the horrible conflict which has engulfed his nation and who prays for its speedy resolution, even as he fears the terrible price that both sides in the conflict still have to pay.  Lincoln’s words are even more powerful in that way that they echo, perhaps unintentionally, one of Jefferson’s most striking passages from his Notes on the State of Virginia:

(more…)

So already I’ve been approached by a couple people (at work, no less) asking me for reaction to the Secretary’s announcement today that he’s extending certain benefits to same-sex partnered service members.

While to some degree I appreciate the effort the Department has put into identifying bones to toss us (so to speak) that won’t run afoul of DOMA, there already was, since the repeal of DADT a year and a half ago a nice list of Member-Designated Benefits on the books. The new list isn’t all that expansive, save for dependent IDs and access to base facilities.

Still, it’s a gesture. And a gesture more welcoming than the middle-finger one President Obama gave the military with his most recent choice for the Secretary’s replacement.

That said, however, you should read the memo announcing the new policy. Here’s a little clip:

These benefits shall be extended to the same-sex domestic partners…once the Service member and their same-sex domestic partner have signed a declaration attesting to the existence of their committed relationship.

Does that make you feel a little bit creepy? My first reaction was, ah, so I get to pronounce “the existence of [my and my partner's] committed relationship” in written form, no doubt filed with my personnelist. (To make things easier, the letter goes on to explain: “A blank copy of the proposed declaration form is in Attachment 3.”)

How romantic. All over America these days, gays and lesbians are fighting for the God-given right to “sign a declaration attesting to the existence of their committed relationship” so we can be equal. Or something.

Frankly, I much prefer the stuff that’s on the prior list. For example, I have designated my partner as the beneficiary of my Service Members Group Life Insurance policy. No need to explain why or whom he even is to me. I could just as easily have left it to the nice little old lady down the block who used to watch my dogs when I deployed. And it wasn’t the DoD’s damned business who she was or why I named her. Just seemed a little easier is all.

I’ve not much expounded on my beliefs about gay marriage here. I don’t really like to get into the debate. Now that it’s kind of being directed toward me finally, perhaps I will… Perhaps soon.

Nick (ColoradoPatriot, from HHQ)

Two events in the past few days have gotten me thinking, again, about the arguments for gay marriage.  On the one hand, there was the statement by GOProud on its support of gay marriage as an issue nationwide. And on the other, there was a recent article in The Atlantic on “The High Price of Being Single in America.”  The Atlantic article intrigues me because, in my reading of the article, it indirectly undermines some arguments for gay marriage by making the case that, for single people, at least, policy makers and other institutions haven’t necessarily been “fair” in granting special status to heterosexual marriage.  The “marriage isn’t fair to singles” argument, however, if fully unleashed, could have the potential to derail the case for gay marriage: after all, there are more singles (both straight and gay) than there are gays and lesbians in committed partnerships.

The Atlantic article is seriously flawed in both its methodology and its conclusions, but that is not why it interests me.  It interests me because, by making the “marriage isn’t fair to singles” argument, it unintentionally illustrates how far the “mainstream” case for gay marriage has deviated in recent years from the more thoughtful and high-minded case that was made for the issue at the time the first serious arguments for gay marriage began to appear widely in the popular press.  And the evolution (though perhaps devolution is the more apt term) of the argument in this way is completely apparent from the way in which those on the gay left greeted the GOProud announcement.

I believe that the push for gay marriage comes partly from two different places philosophically: one is the desire by gay couples to have the same sorts of legal and financial privileges as straight, married couples, which is a consequence of having written laws and policies designed to provide special status to married couples; but the second place it comes from is what has been called “the politics of recognition,” i.e., the desire of gay people to have their worth recognized or validated in some sense  through public policy. The second push comes more from a psychological need which might be emotionally appealing, but which doesn’t  necessarily qualify it as good policy. The first comes from a more legitimate grievance against a government with an interest in deciding which sorts of relationships are “more equal than others.” (The first motive–and kind of argument–is also, incidentally, key to winning over more  conservative and libertarian kinds of voters.)  The two different strands of the argument can exist together in a kind of symbiosis, but separated, they are potentially at odds with each other.

(more…)

In Jamelle Bouie’s WaPo piece of this past Wednesday, she acknowledges that “there’s no doubt Democrats know that — barring a hike to pre-Reagan levels — there’s not much revenue to gain from restoring upper-income taxes to Clinton-era levels. And when it comes to deficit reduction, full employment — and robust growth — is the best solution.” Rather, she seems to be arguing on behalf of these Statists, it’s an issue of fairness that we should seek to eat the rich…even if it ends up hurting our country (extrapolation mine).

If that sounds familiar, it’s because it is:

Bouie’s conclusion is worth quoting in toto, if for no other reason than to pose a question about the character of our Nation:

If upper-income tax hikes serve a purpose, it’s to slow the income gains of the wealthiest Americans, who — for the past decade — have reaped the lion’s share of gains from economic growth.

If the presidential election did anything, it put inequality on the table as a national issue, and the fiscal cliff is one battle — albeit, by proxy — in a larger fight. And, unlike most issues in politics, the lines are clear — Republican disregard for inequality is matched by Democratic attempts to, however gently, apply the breaks.

(Emphasis mine)

So the question is this: Are we, as a Nation, really as vindictive and myopically spiteful as Bouie would suggest we are? And to what degree does the re-election of a man who so cavalierly (and eloquently!) expressed a desire to enforce his version of “fairness”—even at the expense of harming the economy—prove her right in that contention?

(HT, the indefatigable Reason blog)

-Nick (ColoradoPatriot, from HHQ)

I’ll start off by saying, I’m not totally agnostic on gay marriage, but I’m pretty close. I think both sides argue the wrong points in turn, and since I’ve never really felt the need to appeal to the government for validation (let alone validation of my personal relationships), I say let the chips fall where they may.

In fact, the more libertarian I become (by the day, it seems), the less I care, frankly about gay marriage. My partner and I love each other and we don’t need a government stamp nor piece of paper to make it official. Heck, even if we didn’t have the support and acknowledgement of our family and friends (we, ftr, do), we’d be content just to “watch the world die”, so to speak, our love strong as it is.

Personal mushyness aside, however, Reason‘s Scott Shackford has me confused today. Fair enough, his post last week on the site’s Hit & Run blog (which I read habitually and I recommend to you as well) is after all entitled “The Libertarian Gay Marriage Paradox“. But it seems to me the paradox is misplaced.

He first suggests that the actual libertarian argument against gay marriage (that marriage as an institution itself isn’t any of the government’s business) “is indeed a conclusion, not an argument”, whatever the hell that’s supposed to mean. In fact, it’s the argument supporting basically all libertarian positions, isn’t it? It’s the one I use all the time on a wide range of issues.

Be that as it may, he goes on to build then knock down a strawman libertarian argument that doesn’t exist, to wit: “Opponents of gay marriage recognition are not arguing for smaller government; quite the opposite” because, he suggests opponents feel “we need government to make certain that humanity continues to procreate.” Sure, social conservatives are making that argument, but do you know of any libertarian who’s saying that? I sure wouldn’t. “Paradox”? I don’t see it.

What is paradoxical, however, is his approach to support for gay marriage:

(more…)

Sometimes things just seem weird (giving that word its original meaning).

On Tuesday, I mentioned Matt Bomer’s coming out in a blog post.  That evening, joining my friend Bridget Johnson for a drink with several other of her friends, including Greg Hernandez, I learned of that latter’s blog, Greg in Hollywood.  And on that web-site, Greg mentioned the aforementioned actor in this post:

But it is clear that Bomer, star of USA Network’s hit White Collar and a co-star in Magic Mike which opens in Friday, doesn’t want to simply be known as ‘the openly gay actor.’

‘What we really have to do is stop the adjective before the job title—whether it’s ‘black actor,’ a ‘gay actor’ or ‘anything actor,” he said. ‘Everybody thinks that equality comes from identifying people, and that’s not where equality comes from. Equality comes from treating everybody the same regardless of who they  are. I hope the media and the press catches on to that because it’s time to move out of 1992.’

If that’s what “equality” is, I’m all for it.  To achieve that goal, we don’t need to expand the scope of government, only change attitudes of individuals.  And that’s already happening — as evidenced by the reaction to Bomer’s coming out.

*as well as the quality of his work — and the nature of his accomplishments.

“How Many Laws”, I asked in October 2010, “Do We Need To Achieve ‘Full Equality’?”

That question crossed my mind again yesterday when I read Paul Bedard’s post in the Washington Examiner:

President Obama’s campaign website lists 41 achievements on behalf of gay voters–a White House record–making him the hero of the community. But for some that’s not enough as he is about to find out during a star-studded Miami fundraiser Tuesday featuring singer Marc Anthony.

As donors gather at the Jackie Gleason Theater three blocks from the oceanfront to fete the president at a Latinos for Obama event, vocal members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community plan to protest for an executive order barring workplace discrimination, the last major gay initiative awaiting action by the president.

No matter how much society changes, it will always pose certain challenges to be different, even the most tolerant environments.

Government will never be able to solve all (or even most of) our problems.  Indeed, more often than not, state solutions exacerbate problems they were designed to rectify.

Let us continue to push for federal recognition of our unions and then once we’ve secured those privileges, look out for our fellows and turn to private associations for social improvement.

As diligent readers of this blog now, I am very skeptical of the notion of “equality” as pushed by the various left-leaning gay groups. They tend to want to achieve “full equality” through greater government regulation of our economy — and our lives.

Sometimes, they become so blinded to this notion that they neglect the original goal of gay rights’ movements–to make it possible for us to live freely and openly without our sexuality preventing us from participating in society or advancing professionally. They seem to think we need government to grant us more “rights” in order to effect the needed social change.

A new study seems to show quite the opposite, confirming a point I’ve been making for as long as I’ve been talking about gay issues, that all we need is economic freedom, given that private enterprises tend to respond readily to changes in society. Even in the Bush era, I noted, an increasing number of corporations adopted non-discrimination clauses as part of their employment policies and expanded their benefits packages to include same-sex partners.

Others have also studied how economic freedom helps people like us.  Through “Regression analysis of up to 65 countries“, Niclas Berggren of The Research Institute of Industrial Economics (IFN) and Therese Nilsson of the Department of Economics, Lund University; Research Institute of Industrial Economics (IFN) find that

. . . economic freedom is positively related to tolerance towards homosexuals, especially in the longer run, while tolerance towards people of a different race and a willingness to teach kids tolerance are not strongly affected by how free markets are. (more…)

What Log Cabin Executive Director R. Clarke Cooper giveth in one release on Thursday, with his strong statement on Obama’s fundraising pitch to the gay community, he taketh (partially) away in another that very day with a threatening language  directed against his own party’s presidential nominee:

Marriage equality has captured the nation’s attention, and the response to President Obama’s announcement is evidence of the tide turning in favor of equality for all. . . .

Governor Mitt Romney’s statement in opposition to not just marriage but civil unions jeopardizes his ability to win moderates, women and younger voters, especially as a large majority of Americans favor some form of relationship recognition for their LGBT friends and neighbors.

Equality for all?  What’s that mean?  It’s certainly not a conservative slogan, but one more familiar to a Mr. W. Smith.

Clarke is right to criticize Romney for his “opposition to not just marriage but civil unions”, but his tone is counterproductive.  Moderates, women and younger voters won’t vote against him because of his stand on gay marriage.  They will, however, vote against him if he makes that stand central to his campaign.  They’re not going to decide their vote exclusively on gay marriage.  He would have served himself (and the cause of his organization) better had he merely expressed disappointment with Romney’s position.

Clarke is not the only non-left gay leader to offer intemperate remarks about Romney this week.  Our pal JimmyLaSalvia, Executive Director and Co-Founder of GOProud, “With his speech at Falwell’s Liberty University, it is clear that Governor Romney’s message to Goldwater conservatives is: drop dead.”  Earlier today, Governor Romney delivered the commencement address there.

While we would rather the Republican nominee not have to make a courtesy call at Jerry Falwell U (as have all Republican candidates “in recent years“), Romney’s speech hardly amounted to a repudiation of Goldwater’s small government ideals.  Indeed, his talk barely touched upon government’s role in society, save to remind the graduating students that “Religious liberty is the first freedom in our Constitution“. He focused instead on the importance of family and faith.

And he did say, what we already know him to believe, “Marriage is a relationship between one man and one woman.” He offered nothing new on social issues — and didn’t attack gay people or advocate policies anathema to libertarians. (more…)

Well, I’m back from my deployment and wouldn’t you know the first post I make is as earth-shattering and gob-smacking as this:

I agree with what Bill Maher and Andrew Sullivan have to say here:

“If we are to retain equal citizenship, everybody should be responsible for their actions, not their thoughts.” – Sullivan

Some other good lines:

“I think the law should send the message, ‘You know what? Even if you’re emotional, you can’t commit a crime.’” – Maher

“No one is defending hate here, okay? We’re defending liberty.” – Sullivan

“The right of a bigot to walk down the street is the same as the right of a drag queen to walk down the street.” – Sullivan

“If pranking people on the basis of what every prank is–often involved, which can often be bigotry…if that is now 10 years in prison, then half the country is going to have to be locked up” – Sullivan

“I just think this is what gives Liberals a bad name.” – Maher

(on Ravi): “He insists that he did not do this out of homophobia. Some court decided what was inside his mind–for him. And he risked a lot to insist that he wasn’t a bigot.” – Sullivan

“I believe that a free country is freedom for bigotry. I really do. I think it’s freedom that they should be able to say whatever they want. But shutting people down–Criminalizing them–is not a free country.” – Sullivan

(and please forgive me, my blogging skills–as they ever were–are rusty and so I don’t known how to imbed this video from RCP…perhaps Dan or Bruce can help me out?)

I used to read (and agree with) Andrew Sullivan a LOT. I read him back in the BoiFromTroy days that got me involved with this blog in the first place. (Those were some haydays, no?) When he abandoned much of what he had pre-FMA supported, I was pretty disappointed to say the least. Here it’s good to see he hasn’t completely lost all his bearings, and perhaps I should take a look again?

- Nick (ColoradoPatriot, from HQ)

In his thoughtful commentary on the president’s speech in Osawatomie, law professor and Theodore Roosevelt biographer Joshua D. Hawley offers this observation about the liberal notion of equality:

Following Roosevelt’s lead, liberals have advocated government as the guarantor of equality, as the principal agent of national improvement, and indeed, as the source of shared national identity.

Emphasis added.

And this is why we need be wary of those who promote “equality” through legislation.  For someone must adjudicate equality.  It seems those on the left are comfortable with having the state serve as adjudicator.  But, those of who us value our freedom should always be wary of granting more power to the state.

In a review of David Mamet’s The Secret Knowledge: On the Dismantling of American Culture, Gerard Reed reminds us of the tension that exists between the conservative/libertarian ideal of liberty and the leftish abstraction of equality:

The path the leftist boomers (such as Mamet in his youth) follow was identified by Hayek as “The Road to Serfdom. And we see it in operation here, as we are in the process of choosing, as a society, between Liberty—the freedom from the State to pursue happiness, and a supposed but impossible Equality, which, as it could only be brought about by a State capable and empowered to function in all facets of life, means totalitarianism and eventual dictatorship” (p. 61). Egalitarian Liberals constantly stress the importance of sympathy and compassion, of caring for others. Translated into political action, however, these feelings frequently prove destructive, fully evident when Big Government imposes its agenda.

Emphasis added.  (H/t Westside Republicans e-newsletter)  In the book Mamet noted how politicians (and their activist) allies tout the abstraction of “Equality” as an excuse to increase the power of the state: “the prime purpose of Government is to expand Equality, which may also be stated thus: to expand its own powers”.

While we should strive to be compassionate in our personal lives, to look out for those around us, Reed’s commentary reminds us of the dangers of state compassion.  Since governments don’t generate income, save by what it expropriates from citizens, when a state strives to be compassionate, it often sets its people on a road to serfdom.

There is much the adjective that Mamet uses to modify “Equality,” “impossible.”  The ideal of liberty is much easier to define, but equality is much more abstract notion.  How does one achieve “equality” in a nation of diverse individuals, each of whom places different values on different aspect of our lives?  Should we compensate a man more who chooses to work fewer hours so he has more time to devote to his family than we compensate a woman who chooses not to have a family and work long hours so she can be a successful (and powerful) attorney? (more…)

Welcome Instapundit Readers!!

Today, I inaugurate a new category, “Equality,” deliberately putting the word defining said category in quotation marks.  Not only do we have a gay movement focused on attaining this elusive and ambiguous abstaction, but with the rise of the #Occupy Wall Street movement, “income inequality” has also come to the fore, as Jazz Shaw reports, one “of the hot terms occupying the center ring of the political circus these days“.

It seems that in both cases, the various political movements are demanding increased government regulation of and control over private enterprise in order to achieve their desired equal result.

Recently, I listened to a representative of “Equality California” detailing all the legislation his outfit advocated, asking his interlocutor to eheck the web-site to see the full list of laws they wanted to see enacted.  Driving away, I recalled the first five words of the Bill of Rights, “Congress shall make no law . . .”  (Emphasis added.)

This important addition to our nation’s charter reinforced its initial provisions limiting the things the federal government can do.*  Later, the Fourteenth Amendment applied these limitations to the states.

The Founder and the Framers wanted to limit government’s power in order to protect individual freedom.  And now, equality activists want to expand federal — and state — power to achieve “equality.”  This should help elucidate why conservatives should not rush to embrace this ambiguous abstraction.  And should call into question the motives of those who bury their commitment to an ever larger state under a noble-sounding ideal.

RELATED:  Over at Powerline quoting Steven den Beste, Scott Johnson offers a unified theory of left-wing causes:

Isn’t it interesting that no matter what the current global crisis is, according to leftists, the solution is always the same: a benevolent world dictatorship of the enlightened elite, and mass transfer of wealth from rich nations to poor nations.

*ADDENDUM: Nine of the ten amendments which constitute the Bill of Rights use the words “no”, “nor”, and/or “not”, all preventing the government from depriving individuals of their life, liberty and property.

FROM THE COMMENTS:  Lori Heine nails it:

There is only one way that a powerful, external force can make everybody equal — and that is by making them slaves. (more…)