This perfectly encapsulates the difference between the Left and the rest of us. They call themselves “progressive,” but the idea of the serfs being the property of the state is as old as the state itself. What’s new is the idea of limited government and individual rights.
[Update a few minutes later]
What was the biggest disaster for the Dems on Day 1? Probably rolling over the big sixteen tee on the debt. Debbie Liarwoman Schultz’s antics are just par for that course.
Matt Welch has thoughts on the willful blindness to fiscal reality by the Democrats:
…for me the biggest direct reveal of how current Democratic rhetoric leads to bad public policy was one of the evening’s honorary former Republicans, Cincinnati firefighter Doug Stern. “The Republican Party left people like me,” Stern complained. “Somewhere along the way, being a public employee—someone who works for my community—made me a scapegoat for the GOP. Thank goodness we have leaders like President Obama and Vice President Biden who still believe that public service is an honorable calling.”
It was classic major-party Manicheasm: Eastasians do bad things for the simple reason that their hearts are bad; Eurasians’ hearts are good, so they don’t do bad things.
In this idyllic landscape of Democratic magical thinking, there is no state and local budget crises, no unaffordable and underfunded defined-benefit public pension obligations, nothing at all standing in the way of “investing” in our public safety, except (in ex-Republican Stern’s words) “right-wing extremists.” Vallejo, California is not bankrupt because of public employee pensions, and the rest of the state is not following suit. It’s a hell of a place, this Democrat-land. Wish I could live there.
The problem is that so many vote do live there, in their minds.
Mark Steyn has an amusing update over at The Corner. I find it amusing that some people really think that if it goes forward, it will be like the Scopes trial. I guess that’s how these people really think. It’s of a piece with the nuttiness that skepticism about AGW is on a par with creationism.
Observations on last night’s abortion fest in Charlotte. This is starting to remind me of 1972, in the leftist insanity on display. You almost have a sense that they know they’re going down in November, big time, and want to do it in a blaze of collectivist glory.
While it’s a nice romantic notion, the idea that there is just one person for you always struck me as nonsense, because the chances of finding them would be infinitesimal. But the indispensable XKCD actually runs the numbers.
I have to say, I am inspired to see the back of Barack Obama. But the view is more inspiring the more distance there is. Remember that nine weeks from yesterday.