seventy or so years of regulatory accretions and liberal institutions have robbed the least fortunate of opportunity. Exhibit #1, the education establishment, run by the a wholly owned subsidiary of the Democratic party, the NEA. For the poorest and least fortunate, its schools are as bad as jail.  Romney policies, to the extent they're Reagan-like, will create economic dynamism that will help everyone, including the least skilled.

I’ve sometimes wonderred how columnists and other Learned Pundits can stick to their "signature" points of view for years and decades, seemingly oblivious to facts and evidence. It's a branding issue. A brand by definition is a package of characteristics your customers can count on staying the same. Even a minor departure would be to risk a "New Coke" fiasco and a loss of your loyal readers. Thus Paul Krugman, who wrote some books in the 90's that were quite sensible, won't risk delivering a column that departs from the brand of vituperative fulmination his readers love and expect. David Brooks's brand is that of nice conservative who liberals can even agree with, which makes them feel tolerant.  Since he has little competition in that space, it's a real sweet spot in pundit-land, making him much in demand in media-land. Is he likely to admit to error, no matter how obvious? Not likely.

Where's the podcast??

Peter,

This has nothing to do with the thread, but I'm getting cranky cause I haven't gotten this week's Ricochet podcast. What's up guys? Where else am I supposed to find a comparable mix of wit, wisdom and belly laughs? Do I have to start worrying about you guys?

Hey Jonah Goldberg--did you see the interesting side conversation about how the term "politically incorrect" has lost all meaning, in large part because the left has grabbed it and inverted its meaning? (e.g., leftist Bill Maher's TV show "Politically Incorrect.") A good column for you on the theme you brilliantly explored in your book, Liberal Fascism, i.e., how the left has twisted terms (such as Fascism) to mean their opposite. (Fascism is a form of leftism, but you'd never know it from the past 50 years of mainstream politically commentating.)

My opinion on Assange will change about 180 degrees as soon as he published the diplomatic secrets of, say, Putin's Russia, Hu's China, or Ahmadinejad's Iran.

Enjoyable and at times laugh-out-loud, as ever. Two memorable points for me: Peter's "profound truth"; and Pat's point that death panels are a necessary and inevitable aspect of socialized medicine. Outraged condemnation of death panels is the politically easy and obvious response by conservatives, but the truth is if you suppress markets, alternative forms of "allocation" must take their place.

So to follow-up on JD Fitzpatrick's point, the question becomes "How to campaign against socialized medicine (and other forms of socialized cost) while being both honest and politically effective"? Perhaps JD is right in his suggestion, but he's surely right I think that it's a challenge conservatives need to work on.

All you guys on the Ricochet podcast are smart, knowledgeable, and witty, but for me Peter articulated it perfectly once again with his "profound" truth, which he generously attributed to co-podcasters: Keeping the streets clear, clean and passable may not always be easy, but we all agree that that, at least, is a legitimate and necessary function of government, unless we go the radical libertarian route. But not only does government screw up the basic services that can't feasibly be provided by others, they want to worm their way into and take over every widening swaths of the economy and our lives. It's this willful, blind stupidity that makes us legitimately enraged at the Bloombergs, Berwicks and Obamas at all levels of government. Well put Peter!

Oh, and about the parallels to the age of exploration: the explosive economic growth that created the largest increases in living standards in history started in the late 18th/early 19th centuries. Whatever you might think of the heroism and glamor of the Magellan, Columbus, Vasco de Gama, etc., I don't think you'd find much evidence that their efforts did much for their fellow subjects. In short, the various monarchs' spending on exploration may have glorified their reigns and, if they were lucky, gratified their avaricious dreams, but did little or nothing for the general populations who were the ultimate source of the funding.

I'm puzzled by why this question should be worth discussing among conservatives. National defense is a legitimate and necessary function of government. Fulfilling that function properly means doing research so that our country can keep foiling our enemies thoroughly and effectively. Sending people to the moon is not a legitimate function of government and no conservative should support it. Is it more complicated than that?

David Strauss, don't worry, there's a limitless supply of productive scientific research that entrepreneurial dreamers can and will want to fund if they're not made to spend their days filling out environmental impact statements and the like.  

An excellent interview and Ridley is a persuasive and compelling interview subject. He's in the intellectual lineage of Julian Simon, who as we know turned out to be emphatically correct. I believe Ridley will also, but that won't stop big swaths of the intelligentsia to kick and scream at his evidence and his arguments. A separate topic may be why his evidence and arguments should be so upsetting to so many.