Neither are/am a journalist. Hume has FOX biases; Olbermann, MSNBC. Anthony

I am fully aware that the Internet was given birth by the government and the defense industry. So? I don't object to a Defense Department. Or NASA, and I also sort of like Tang.

And btw, it is not at all obvious that the FDA saves more lives than it takes, as has been written about extensively. (I'm too lazy to go gather links right now, but that is true.) But in any event, the state has NO BUSINESS saving me against my will. If it wants to refuse a seal of approval on a drug, fine. But my liberty to choose my own medicine and assume risks as I see fit is inherently valuable, and not purchased by a paternalistic intent to "save" me.

As for your notion that the FDA plays only a "tertiary" role in the drug war, the mind boggles. The war on drugs collapses without the prescription drug system.

I think it's important to note that there's a big difference between left and right partisans. By definition and in every realistic way, conservatives are narrow-minded. They have come to their partisan conclusions with blinders on. Literally, and figuratively. Liberals--if they are true liberals--have looked at the issues from all conceivable angles before coming to their conclusions and thensporting a particular partisan color or flag.

Paul R:

The internet, of course, was created by the government. Let me say that again: The internet, of course, was created by the government.

And not just the internet, but virtually everything that underpins it. Massive government investment is what made the computer revolution possible, every step of the way. Either through direct investment in R&D, or through creating the original market for the products developed, or through subsidies for early entrants--the list goes on and on and on.

Not only the internet and virtually everything that underpins it, but nearly every aspect of the modern economy has relied upon massive government investment in one way or another. Our transportation network, from roads to trains to planes, exists because the state, ranging from municipal governments to the federal bureaucracy, has invested what must amount to trillions of dollars in building and maintaining it. The railroad network, for example, exists because the government gave massive land-grants and subsidies to railroad magnates to build their empires. The transcontinental railroad was heavily subsidized by the federal government. The national highway system was built by the government, and so were the interstate highways.

Aviation, aerospace, communications, armaments, automobiles, transportation, construction, chemicals, energy...all of these things have benefitted massively from the mechanisms described above. And this is a small cross-section of the economy.

Could someone identify any specific views that Keith Olbermann has that demonstrates he is a "liberal" in the sense that it's meant (i.e., in the left-wing Democratic Party sense, rather than the classical 18th Century sense Paul Rosenberg described earlier)? I'm not saying he has none, but I honestly don't know of any.

A Skinner Box is a controlled environment used to study animal behavior as a function of reward and punishment. The psychological term is operant conditioning. Journalists in the MSM have responded to the beltway's "Skinner Box" by becoming docile in terms of their thinking and fully supportive of political power's machinations. They receive their cues, they punch the bar, they receive their "reward."

One thing thing to bear in mind, Glenn. It takes much longer to extinguish the behavior than it does to create it. Your work is cut out for you.

Another thing.

All this talk about Democrats being weak on security is a GREAT BIG LIE. At times of global crisis, our leaders have almost always been Democrats:

Conflict - President - Party

Revolutionary War - Washington - Federalist

War of 1812 - Madison - Democratic-Republican

Mexican War - Polk - Democrat

Civil War - Lincoln - Republican

Spanish-American War - McKinley - Republican

World War I - Wilson - Democrat

World War II - F.D. Roosevelt - Democrat

World War II - Truman - Democrat

Korean War - Truman - Democrat

Vietnam War - Kennedy - Democrat

Vietnam War - Johnson - Democrat

Vietnam War - Nixon - Republican

Gulf War - G.H.W. Bush - Republican

Iraq War - G.W. Bush - Republican

For a more detailed description of wars, dates and presidents see:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Declaration_of_war_by_the_United_States

Mona opines:

No one designs markets. They just are, if allowed to be.

This is perhaps the most uninformed statement I have heard today, though to be fair I don't listen to talk radio or watch cable news so you don't have much competition there.

Markets are an emergent and deliberate structure with extremely complex governing factors, from spending caps and rate adjustments to corporate investments and silent mergers. Your incredible belief that these are self-organizing systems is astounding. That is on par with the notion that a 5-star French kitchen is a miraculous box that turns raw materials into haute cuisine through intrinsic and ungoverned processes.

The market is a work of many hands, each of which labors to impose its own degree of design and direction. There is nothing self-regulating about it, and it is sheer simplicity to think otherwise.

I appreciate what human beings generate when they are free to do so. Like, for instance, the quality of American medicine, it totally rocks.

And the instances where it does so is because of regulation, not in spite of it. I worked for the FDA for several years and saw all manner of horrors perpetrated by your magical market Americans. One entrepeneur decided it was more cost effective to subsitute dog vitamins for malaria medication in the production of his cures. Fortunately that was one of the ones that was caught. Do you genuinely think that was an isolated case? Or that most Americans will always want to make the best product they can, damn the expense, as long as there's no oversight?

Believe me, I understand the appeal of libertarianism. If comes from a core philosophy of "leave me alone and I'll leave you alone". But the problem is there are too many people who won't leave you alone, who see you as something to exploit to make their own life better (usually via money). And an unregulated "free" market is an open invitation for these people to suck folks like you dry.