Free Republic

The current Washington shutdown standoff reveals an illuminating clash of worldviews.Risibly, the aha moment for me came Wednesday while dozing off to a Tonight Show conversation between Jay Leno and his “guest,” Newt Gingrich. Leno challenged the former Republican Speaker of the House with, “Here’s the part I don’t understand with the Affordable Care Act; Why should Obama negotiate? First it came out, it passed both houses.The Supreme Court said, ‘Yes, this is legitimate.’… It’s already a law.If you don’t like it, you wait four years, you vote the guy out.” Jay Leno’s statement exhibits the statist worldview of defending...

For much of this last week, according to the spokespeople for the National Park Service, the NPS has asserted that the White House specifically ordered that they barricade the open air memorial commemorating the sacrifice and service of the veterans of World War II. In multiple statements to the press NPS spokespeople made it clear that they were directly instructed by the White House specifically to shut the memorial that had previously never been closed. How do you close something that by design is intended to be open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year?...