Time and time again throughout the latter part of the Cold War, liberals chose a morally perverse pose. They would seek to find any suspect motive or impure act on the part of the United States rather than confront the staggering scale of destruction and misery being wrought by our adversaries.
Mona CharenEvery liberal initiative, from welfare to antismoking measures, is justified by reference to 'the children.' Yet the clear result of liberal policies is to harm children even more than adults.
Mona CharenThe Senate wants you to know how terribly, sincerely sorry they are even though not a single member of today's Senate was even in office the last time America saw a lynching. Some were not even born. But that's the way we prefer our apologies in American politics. We don't apologize for our own sins.
Mona CharenPopular culture, in all its crudeness, is the output of liberals. It is liberalism that for decades has rejected any protest as 'censorship' or 'McCarthyism.'
Mona CharenIt's a peculiar thing about liberals. When it comes to middle-class people who are fully capable of caring for themselves, liberals seek to undermine their independence in every way possible. With seductive 'entitlements' like guaranteed retirement, health care, nutrition, education, and jobs, liberals attempt to lure the middle class into dependence on the state. But when it comes to those who are truly incompetent, those whose mental afflictions render them unable to manage their lives at all, liberals are suddenly transformed into absolutists for personal autonomy.
Mona CharenLiberals cling to the idea that critics of welfare are motivated by greed or callous disregard for the less fortunate. In fact, during the twenty-five years that followed Lyndon Johnson's declaration of war on poverty, U.S. tax payers spent $3 trillion providing every conceivable support for the poor, the elderly, and the infirm. Private foundations spent scores of billions more, and private and religious charities even more. Nevertheless, as Ronald Raegan later quipped, 'in the war on poverty, poverty won.'
Mona CharenThe notion that the UN is some sort of dispassionate body that, โdoes rightโ and just pursues everybodyโs best interests is a fantasy. Each individual nation will be pursuing their best interests. Thatโs the normal behavior of nation-states. It shouldnโt surprise us, but neither should we go to them for permission to do whatโs in our national interests.
Mona Charen