[Paradox]

An excellent read. He is a libertarian leftist.. I have been there, it was a stage along the way from my conversion from Liberal to conservative. Those types will disagree with you, but they'll be honest and usually can hold up their end of the argument without resorting to the stupidities that the Left usually resort to. From that stage I slowly made the rest of my conversion (let me clarify that, I am something of a libertarian/conservative, South Park Republican, neo-conish type, definately not a fire-and-brimstone conservative).

I respect this type of liberal, even when I think they are wrong. Hitchens is another one, always a good read, even when you disagree.

I dont know if I ever had a "goodbye to all that" moment, although the first gulf war might have been the start. Not the war itself, but the reaction by the leftists was so... so abjectly stupid. It was hard to believe I ever thought the way they demonstrated..

Oh, and for the record, the Pledge thing bothers me somewhat as well. For very conservative reasons.

[Sam Cree]

" He is a libertarian leftist.."

I have an artist friend who thinks the same way. It's a gross contradiction, IMO, since true leftist thinking comes close to requiring the kind of lockstep thinking that the writer deplores.

My opinion is that many who call themselves "liberals" embrace the contradiction at least in part because the word "liberal," with its allusion to liberty, seduces them.