'Twas The Night Before Christmas...and Ten Days 'Till Iowa

I don't intend to make this blog an all-political space, much less an all-Huckabee space, recent evidence not-withstanding. But the presidential election season is upon us in earnest and I am always fascinated by it, particularly this year when both party's nominations are up for grabs. I promise there will be times when politics are far-receded from my thoughts and the very idea of it will seem tedious and pathetic. For me, this usually occurs post-election, when the executive and legislative elites come together to decide over which of our freedoms they would like to limit next. The way it normally works is that the Democrats propose severe limitations, reasoning that it's for our own good and to protect us from ourselves, or, alternatively, that some of us are evil for making too much money and that the government must use its confiscatory powers to take some of it away in order to help the poor unfortunate. The Republicans then capitulate - oops! I mean compromise - on something a bit less draconian. Each congressman then slips a little something extra into the bill for his constituents back home, ensuring his re-election next time around. The eminent statesmen then slap each other on the back for a job well done, go stand in front of the cameras congratulating themselves on their bipartisanship, and issue press releases assuring the plebeian hoards that the republic is now safe. The president gives his nod, claims some benefit for himself, and the bill becomes law. The coddled masses barely take notice. A few intransigent folks observe that another slice is gone from the salami we call freedom, but their protests are met with yawns. This is the democratic process in America as we approach 2008.

But I digress. I meant to say that I am finding the nomination process highly entertaining, in a carnival-like, Menckian sort of way, and for now it is dominant in my thoughts. So I will leave you with three gifts this Christmas Eve morning, along with wishes that your Christmas is merry and bright.

The first is Ramesh Ponnuru's column this morning at NRO, in which he questions Huckabee basing his campaign on his evangelicalism. Read the whole thing but the bottom line is in Ramesh's final two sentences:

There are enough evangelicals in the Republican party to tempt a candidate to follow an evangelicals-first strategy. But there aren’t enough for such a candidate to win.

My second gift to you is the indispensable Andrew Ferguson's column in this month's Weekly Standard regarding the ban on the traditional incandescent light bulb that Congress slipped into the energy bill at the last minute and that the president signed last week. Ferguson is always highly entertaining but his humor does not mask the fact that he views this legislation as an outrage. Read the whole thing and tell me you don't too.

Finally, I have been eagerly looking forward to Jonah Goldberg's first book, Liberal Fascism, which will be released January 8, and this review by Todd Seavey makes me all the more so. By all means read the whole thing but here's a sampling:

Hillary’s not going to put anyone in internment camps (barring some strange new wrinkle in the war on terror), but as Goldberg explains, she comes from that same religious-left progressive tradition that saw itself as doing the Lord’s work whether it was expanding and ostensibly rationalizing the government bureaucracy or banning alcohol. Hillary has a mission, and it requires that we all think of ourselves as one “village,” committed not to selfish, individual ends but to letting government tax us more, regulate us more, and run our healthcare.

And she’s not unique this regard, of course. Goldberg also condemns “compassionate conservatism” and warns that “We are all fascists now,” as the subtitle of his penultimate chapter puts it. That is, after a century of collectivist zeal across the political spectrum (except among libertarians like Ron Paul, for whom I’ll vote in the Republican primary), almost all of us expect government to address every problem, speak to every heart, unite all citizens, forge a better world. We have largely forgotten that there was ever a time when government was a little-noticed last resort with few duties and few powers. As De Tocqueville and others warned over the past two centuries, it may be that mass democracy has inevitably led to demagoguery and a mild form of totalitarianism — government in every nook and cranny, but eager to “help.”

Again, I wish you Merry Christmas, while it's still allowed.