Jim, what got me about Douthat’s article was his sneer toward “the Norquistian position on the pressing need to drown the welfare state in a bathtub.” A fundamental hostility toward the welfare state is necessary to the limited-government position. Unless conservatives can conceive of the welfare state as evil — a menace to liberty — and try to convince others to share that view, they consign themselves to merely negotiating with liberals over the size of the next increase. Rather than standing athwart history shouting “stop,” conservatives who accept the welfare state as legitimate are doomed to chase afterwards, shouting “slow down.”
