Simple doesn't mean stupid. Thinking that it does, does.

The party of ideas has become the party of Beavis and Butthead.

We know that advanced economies with stable governments that borrow in their own currency are capable of running up very high levels of debt without crisis.

[I]f one asks what substantive contributions [F. A. Hayek] made to our understanding of how the world works, one is left at something of a loss. Were it not for his politics, he would be virtually forgotten.

What happened after 9/11 - and I think even people on the right know this, whether they admit it or not - was deeply shameful. The atrocity should have been a unifying event, but instead it became a wedge issue. Fake heroes like Bernie Kerik, Rudy Giuliani, and, yes, George W. Bush raced to cash in on the horror. And then the attack was used to justify an unrelated war the neocons wanted to fight, for all the wrong reasons....The memory of 9/11 has been irrevocably poisoned; it has become an occasion for shame. And in its heart, the nation knows it.

The federal government is basically an insurance company with an army.

The trouble with poverty, as an issue, is that it has basically exhausted the patience of the general public.