Democrats are firm believers in the welfare state for their own constituents, whether that's a crack addict mother of five or a Wall Street banker.

When every one of your arguments is characterized an attempt to bring back slavery or resegregate lunch counters, it's a little hard to have any sort of productive debate.

When we were at peace, Democrats wanted to raise taxes. Now there's a war, so Democrats want to raise taxes. When there was a surplus, Democrats wanted to raise taxes. Now that there is a mild recession, Democrats want to raise taxes.

Ironically, since Obama was elected, for the first time in my life I'm sometimes not proud of my country.

The Afghan "negotiation phase" immediately precedes the traditional Afghan "surrender phase." This entails the following: The defeated party surrenders and then comes out shooting. This is repeated several times. Finally, the vanquished party runs out of ammunition and is forced to surrender ' but seriously this time ' at which point the victors kill the foreigners and hug their fellow Afghans like long-lost brothers.

Walking back from the convention site I chatted with a normal Bostonian for several blocks -- who must have identified me through our covert system of signals. He was mostly bemused by the Democrats' primetime speakers and told me he used to be an independent, but for the last 20 years found himself voting mostly Republican. Then he corrected himself and said he votes for the American.

Instead of seeking wisdom, liberals desire to be seen as clever by being counterintuitive, crazy, and outre.