Democrats believe, plausibly, that middle-class entitlements are instantly addictive and, because there is no known detoxification, that class, when facing future choices between trimming entitlements or increasing taxes, will choose the latter.

Few things are as stimulating as other people's calamities observed from a safe distance.

What is really shocking in America isn't what's done in and by Washington that is illegal by that what is done in and by Washington that's legal.

There is no reason to think today's levels of [drug] addiction are anywhere near the levels that would be reached under legalization.

The sequester has forced liberals to clarify their conviction that whatever the government's size is at any moment, is the bare minimum neccessary to forestall intolerable suffering.

Each achieves one or both of two objectives — making liberals feel good about themselves and being good to liberal candidates.

Look, three love affairs in history, are Abelard and Eloise, Romeo and Juliet and the American media and this President at the moment. But this doesn't matter over time. Reality will impinge. If his programs work, he's fine. If it doesn't work, all of the adulation of journalists in the world won't matter.